Encounter (3)
Encounter (3)
I couldn't understand a single thing.
Until now, I'd hardly ever doubted my own ability.
When I was young, that is, shortly after I came to this world, I did doubt it a little. Whether this ability had a limit. Whether there was some usage cap I didn't know about, or whether I kept shaving away some part of myself every time I used it.
But over the past ten years, I'd never felt anything being worn away when I used the ability.
People get tired when they move. They get drowsy when they don't sleep, thirsty when they don't drink, hungry when they don't eat.
This ability, however, seemed to operate on a dimension entirely separate from all of that. When I rewound time, no matter how exhausted I'd been, I became perfectly rested again. The moment when I was thirsty or hungry returned intact to the moment when I wasn't. And the reverse was just as true.
Only my memories continued on......
In that case.
How, exactly, did those memories keep carrying over?
I couldn't even remember how I'd left the dungeon. Along the way, both Claire and Alice spoke to me several times. The Emperor said nothing and simply walked ahead of the group. Leo, the whole time, remained frozen.
Bella wasn't in my line of sight. She was probably walking at the very rear of our party.
Had Alice been supporting me? Or had Claire?
The only thing I remembered clearly was my own hand constantly touching my torn collar.
Right. Until now, it had never once occurred to me that I was moving through time. From the start, I couldn't even have conceived of it. Within the time I went back to, I was simply myself. Like rewinding clockwork, once I turned back time, I existed as myself inside the space that belonged to that moment.
...... Had I truly existed as myself?
My memories continued as though time had simply flowed forward for me.
Honestly, discovering such a doubt only after ten years wasn't a pleasant feeling, even as flattery. An ability I'd trusted absolutely and used without the slightest suspicion now felt profoundly suspect.
Far ahead, I saw the moonlight. Strangely, the light didn't reach inside the dungeon. Only the glow seeping from the Divine Treasure illuminated the corridor. Because of that, the moon shining at what appeared to be the dungeon's entrance, and exit, looked like a black-bordered painting that gave off its own light inside a pitch-dark room.
I stared blankly at the sight for a while,
then, again,
I turned back time.
*
It was an impulsive act.
It wouldn't be strange to call it impatience.
Given my personality, rewinding was the natural thing to do.
The Emperor had worn an expression that suggested he'd gotten a rough idea of my ability. I hadn't managed to reveal the identity of that unidentified figure. If I made the wrong move, not only the Emperor but also the people around me might discover my ability.
And so, as always, I would rewind time to before my mistake and render it undone.
I'd pull off that figure's mask, watch my tongue in front of the Emperor, and clearly shake off the hand that had seized me—
But I couldn't.
"—Sylvia!"
I gasped in a huge breath again. The sensation of falling through shattered space wasn't exactly pleasant even on a second experience. The feeling of collapsing onto the ground. The strange floating sensation. Lungs that felt hollow, as if I'd barely returned to the world after drifting in a vacuum.
No, this wasn't something I could just write off as "not exactly pleasant." It was the worst. Perhaps because I'd already experienced the sensation once before, my mind was accepting the situation with greater detachment.
That didn't make me particularly calm, though.
I couldn't go back. As if a wall stood between the present and the moment I'd faced that figure, I collided against it once again.
This time, the wall didn't break.
My body trembled from the impact. Gasping one deep breath after another to somehow force oxygen back into my hollow lungs, I checked my collar.
The torn collar was still there, completely intact.
With my lips pressed firmly shut, I barely managed to lift my head and look toward where the man had been standing. Empty.
"The person who was standing there?"
"...... He vanished without warning."
"The Divine Treasure too...... He probably took it with him."
Alice answered, and Claire added the rest.
"......."
I had nothing to say to that. A moment ago, I'd asked about the battle and ended up exposing my ability to the Emperor in the process.
"Hm."
However, the Emperor as portrayed in the game hadn't been such a lenient figure.
Of course, he wasn't the sort of person who would fail to extract information from me just because I kept my mouth shut.
He'd merely been keeping me at a cautious distance and leaving me be for the time being.
"Father!"
When the Emperor raised his sword and aimed it at my throat, Alice cried out in shock. Claire's hand flew to the hilt of her sword before she snatched it away, apparently startled by her own reflex.
But it seemed the Emperor hadn't intended to cut my throat.
Recalling the sword aura that had severed the hand aiming a gun at Alice earlier, the Emperor could just as easily have sliced through my throat without a second thought, regardless of whether I could rewind time.
Contrary to its thick appearance, the blade moved delicately, touching my collar. It traced the torn edge, where the fabric was frayed irregularly with fibers jutting out.
"A form you wouldn't get from simply collapsing. Did someone grab and tear it?"
Alice drew a sharp breath, as though she'd only just noticed. Claire did the same. Leo still wore a dazed expression, as if he hadn't yet processed the situation. Bella, wearing her mask and watching from a distance, was unreadable.
"Not just the collar. There are bruises on your body here and there. Contusions, are they?"
One corner of the Emperor's mouth curled up. It was the face of someone who'd just heard a joke—amusing, but somewhat indecent.
That was precisely why that expression terrified me.
"Contusions, you say."
The Emperor withdrew his sword from my throat as he spoke.
"The Sylvia Fangriffon?"
"......."
Slightly bending at the waist toward me, still offering no answer, the Emperor spoke in a low voice.
"Have you and I had this conversation 'before'?"
The "before" the Emperor spoke of was probably a question measured from my perspective.
I was certain of it.
There was absolutely no way for me to escape from this future.
*
After that, events proceeded much like the first time.
The Emperor seemed to have formed a rough guess about my ability. I didn't know how much of its principles he'd grasped, or whether his insight reached even deeper than my own understanding as the user, but I could feel in my bones that this wasn't a good sign.
Alice, Claire, and Leo said nothing. They simply kept glancing my way, as though trying to read my mood.
Bella......was humming. Whenever she presented herself that way, her voice took on that high pitch.
"Well then, everyone, go inside and rest."
Even though one of the Divine Treasures had been stolen, the Emperor looked utterly unconcerned. He was smiling contentedly.
"It was an enjoyable walk, but you all look quite worn out. I do hope you'll enjoy the rest of your travels."
With those words, the Emperor turned on his heel and walked away, leaving us behind. Yet his gaze, as he turned, lingered on my face to the very last moment.
I said nothing until the end.
*
"I won't ask you anything right now."
Alice spoke with a serious expression.
When I came to my senses, I was in my room. That is, the room in the Northwood estate where I was supposed to be staying. It was as large as the one Alice used, and the interior decoration was similar. But we weren't at the room's guest reception table.
I'd been seated on the bed, and Alice and Claire stood around me as though shielding me. Leo was absent. Had they barred him from entering because it was a woman's room? It wouldn't be strange if Leo had declined to come in of his own accord.
Not that it mattered right now.
"We don't know what just happened......."
Alice and Claire exchanged a brief look with each other. Then they both looked at me at once.
The first to speak was Alice.
"Right now, you seem completely exhausted. So......."
This must have been the first time they'd seen me like this.
I might have looked tired before. Walking through a dark dungeon is tiring enough, and trudging through a snow-covered forest or wandering through sewers is more than exhausting.
Neither Alice nor Claire would think my stamina was infinite.
But suddenly collapsing when nothing had happened was strange.
Especially with bruises here and there on my body.
As if I'd endured something on my own in the meantime.
"First, just rest well."
Claire picked up the words Alice had broken off and completed them.
"...... Let's continue this talk tomorrow."
"......."
Their faces were full of worry.
They didn't threaten to make me reveal what kind of ability I had, nor did they press me about what had happened.
I was grateful for that consideration.
"Understood."
For now, I decided simply to accept their kindness with thanks.