Fourteen Years of Happiness
It was so comfortable.
If you could actually touch a cloud, and then lie down on top of it, it would probably feel something like this.
Body and mind were so at ease that, given the chance, she would have stayed like this forever.
Without a doubt, it was the first true peace of heart and body she had ever known in her life.
But even that lasted only a moment.
"Vita~!"
"……?"
A familiar voice at her ear snapped her fully awake.
"Aah?! J-Jesus—!"
She bolted upright, eyes wide, and the first thing that filled her vision was a face she had missed more than anything.
"Today's the big—"
"Jenice!!"
The only friend she had ever been able to trust with her back in this godforsaken place.
"Mmph— mmph!!"
"Ah— s-sorry, sorry."
Buried against her chest and unable to breathe, her old friend flailed urgently; Vita scrambled back at once.
"Pwah~!!"
The moment she gave her room, Jenice shot upright, gasping in that exaggerated way of hers.
No question. That was Jenice.
Shaaaaa—
Only then did the sound of sewer water reach her ears.
Right. This place was a sewer even the rest of the slums rarely set foot in—and it had been their sanctuary.
"What the hell happened?"
"That's what I want to ask!!"
A girl who had died of consumption more than ten years ago was yelling at her with a face full of life, and joy and confusion crashed together in her chest.
"I figured it out yesterday when I finished off a whole cask of rum. I figured it out."
"R-rum?"
"Yeah! Don't you remember? You said you were done with this miserable hole and drained a whole oak barrel?"
Following her friend's pointing finger, Vita turned her head—and there it was, an actual oak barrel rolling on the ground.
"No, no. W-wait. So…"
"So what?"
She was lost.
What was any of this?
"Oh my god, what's wrong with you? Normally the second I try to cop a feel you start throwing bread rolls at my chest."
"……."
It was warm.
The cheeks under her palms were so warm it hurt.
"…You're really okay?"
"No. I'm not okay."
The heat against her hands.
The small breath at her ear.
Those worried eyes, shifting.
"Wait— wait a second."
"Huh? Wh-whoa, wait, what—?!"
Why hadn't she done this sooner?
What was so hard about just holding someone?
"You're really all right, right?"
"…Be quiet."
"Ugh."
Thump. Thump. Thump.
She pulled Jenice's shirt aside and pressed her ear beneath her breast. Jenice's heartbeat came through clear and strong.
Proof that the friend in front of her was alive.
"……."
"Done?"
"Yeah."
When Vita sat up, Jenice's cheeks were faintly pink; she yanked her shirt back down in a hurry and straightened her clothes. Not that there was much chest to cover anyway.
"Okay. Talk."
"About what."
"You drank, passed out happy, and then woke up throwing a full-blown fit. Why?"
"…Just… I think I had a nightmare."
"A nightmare? You? You, who never even dreams?"
"I know, right."
Yes. That expression.
That cute little scrunch of the brow that said she couldn't believe what she was hearing.
"What kind of dream?"
"Don't know."
"You bitch! You get a person curious and then refuse to tell them—that's a crime!"
"No. I really don't know."
The moment she understood that Jenice was actually alive—that the death ten years ago had only been a dream—the contents of the nightmare collapsed in on themselves, and the memory wouldn't come clear.
"Ugh, fine. Fine. More importantly, if you're back in your head, let's get out of here."
"Get out?"
"This girl has genuinely lost it."
Slap! Slap!
Small hands patted her cheeks, and the sensation traveled vividly up into her skull.
"Do you seriously not remember what day it is?"
"Today……."
Her head throbbed.
Was the hangover from last night's rum only just catching up?
"Today… to-day……."
The headache sharpened for a moment—and then the memories she had forgotten began to surface, one by one.
They had found a hidden room in the Labyrinth Dungeon.
From it they had taken a golden bottle filled with wine.
Under the witness of a priest who served Bishua, the god who governed contracts, the wine had been appraised. And the result—
"Nec…tar…?"
"Yeah. Heavily diluted Nectar, but still."
Like puzzle pieces clicking into place, the memories grew sharper still.
"Fifty million Mora."
"Yes! Now you remember?"
"No— ha? Holy shit."
Fifty million Mora.
If they had put it up for auction they might have gotten more, but they hadn't had the strength to protect a prize like that, so they had taken the auction house's offer without haggling and sold it off.
"Th-the money?"
"Right here."
Jenice drew two cards from her clothes.
Cards issued by Golden Wood, the largest bank on the continent—present wherever business was done.
"Fuck."
"There she is. That's more like you."
Jenice tossed the cards; Vita reached out and caught them.
"We're almost out of time. Let's go."
"…Yeah."
There was nothing to pack.
Selling their used gear would have brought in decent money even secondhand, but she didn't want to. She couldn't even spare the time it would take to fence it.
"Vita!!"
She was sitting with her back against a tree, staring blankly up at the apples just beginning to round out on the branches, when Jenice's voice carried from far off.
"Stop spacing out and come wash up! Help get dinner ready!!"
"I'm not a kid…."
She forced the corners of her mouth back down and stood.
Behind her, a healthy tree hung thick with apples still faintly green.
So this is what living feels like.
Nearly five years had passed since they had slipped out of the labyrinth city through the maze of sewers and settled here in Benatus.
No more suffering through cold and heat.
No more half-sleeping with one eye open for the bastards who might jump them from anywhere.
No more paying shit prices for food that tasted like shit.
"What a fucking place that was."
Born in the back alleys, she had grown up seeing every kind of ugliness there was.
A place she never, ever wanted to set foot in again.
"Hurry up!"
Unlike the faceless scum she would have gladly chewed up and spat out, here waited someone who shared no blood with her and yet was truly family—a warm home.
"Yeah."
In the end her mouth curved up again, and it only came back down after she bit into a piece of green pepper that had been sneakily mixed into the evening's beef stew.
"Hup—!"
"What."
They shared a room, but there were two beds, and they always slept in their own. Yet Jenice, fresh from washing and with her hair still dripping, barreled in and burrowed straight into her arms.
"Haa~ so warm."
"Hey. Dry your hair before you get in."
"I do the laundry anyway?"
"……."
Winning with facts. Unfair.
"I'm trying to sleep. Get off."
"Tonight we sleep together."
"Why are you being so gross right now."
She tried to shove her aside, but the more she did, the harder Jenice laughed and clung, until Vita finally gave up. The body heat she hadn't felt in so long felt good, too.
"Vita."
In the hazy drift between waking and sleep, Jenice's voice brushed softly against her ear.
"What…."
"Are you happy?"
Was that even a question.
"Sleeping?"
"…Yeah."
"Hey, Vita."
Her mind was clearly fogging over, and yet for some reason Jenice's voice only grew clearer.
"I really want you to be happy."
She was already overflowing with happiness—did Jenice want her to be happier still?
"My only friend. My reliable big sister."
She wanted to ask why Jenice was doing this in the middle of the night, but she could feel her consciousness slipping farther and farther away.
"Stay strong. If it's you, Vita—you can do it."
So then……
·
·
·
Shaaaaa—
That hated sound of water dragged her awake.
Her body was heavy.
Her chest was tight; even breathing was hard.
"Jenice……."
Her throat burned so badly she called for water, for the Jenice who should have been in her arms—but no answer came.
Her back was cold.
Her hands and feet were freezing.
"……!!"
The absence of warmth anywhere at all snapped her fully conscious.
A small lantern jammed into the wall.
A pile of gear with a rag thrown over it.
A tiny glass vial holding white powder.
"Ah."
"Ah— uh, uuhk……."
"Tears this time, is it."
Exactly two weeks had passed since Vita began to dream.
But for the woman inside the dream, fourteen years would have gone by.
I had looked into her dream twice.
The first time, she had been spending happy days with a woman I didn't know. On the second visit, she had been covered in blood and laughing like a madwoman.
Truly opposite scenes.
After that, I stopped looking into her dreams.
The reason was simple.
From the third time on, I could tell there was another audience besides me.
And the only being who could freely peer into a human's dreams was one: Verdia.
My guess was that Verdia had been watching from the moment Vita first started to dream.
"Priest."
I looked up and met the eyes of Jamie, who—after my repeated suggestions—had finally taken up post right at my side as my guard.
"May I ask one question?"
"Of course."
When I gave permission, she glanced at Vita, who lay on the bed weeping and moaning.
"Can you truly cure addiction with a dream?"
"I don't know."
"…Excuse me?"
"I'm not a doctor. How would I know that."
"Ah— that… uh, yes…."
Her face said she had a great many things she wanted to say, but unlike John, who was no longer assigned to my protection, she was a professional. She composed her expression almost at once.
"You seem curious why I'm doing this."
"…Yes."
I don't dislike honest people.
"It's an experiment."
"An experiment, you say?"
"What kind of reaction a person shows upon waking after spending decades inside a dream indistinguishable from reality—and whether their memories are confused. Things of that nature."
"……."
Jamie looked at me with the usual stare reserved for strange people, and by now I was thoroughly used to it, so I put on my customer-service smile.
Of course, the things I had told her were reasons as well.
But the real core of it was something else.
"And… the treatment?"
At Jamie's question, I drew from my coat a crystal vial the size of a thumb.
Inside it was a liquid the clear, bright blue of a captured sky.
"That is?"
"The cure."
And as a bonus, an elixir that would make Vita into something far greater than she was now.
Nectar—the drink of the gods, purchased from the Benefit Shop.