What Was Gained and What Was Lost (5)
The words had been simple enough. I feel like entering the Gladiator Fight. Nathan had said it exactly like that, in a tone so light it might as well have been an announcement that he was stepping out to use the bathroom. Benny’s face slowly curdled, yet she answered with a smile of such perfect serenity it looked completely out of place on her.
“Before I completely lose my mind, let me say one thing. Thank you for bringing Kilika back safely, Nathan. If anything had happened to her, I probably would have cried my eyes out.”
Nathan gave a heavy nod. “Thank the crow, not me. She was the one who guided us there.”
“Calling her that when she’s supposed to be a god? Never mind. Could you repeat what you said just before? My ears suddenly stopped working and I didn’t catch a thing.”
“The Gladiator Fight? I said I feel like entering. You heard me.”
“Tell me you were only trying to get under my skin. Say it right now.”
“I didn’t say I definitely would. I said I feel like it. I’m thinking it over and making a suggestion, that’s all.”
“You’re the only one thinking? I have thoughts too. What if I don’t want you to?”
“Then I’d probably insist until the end. If you’re born a creature with two feet on the ground, sometimes you reach a point where you can’t back down even though you know better. I have to fight.”
Benny blinked, then shoved all ten fingers into her lavender hair and raked them through it. “Aspen, is he serious? He’s lying, right?”
Aspen, who had now been treated like a human lie detector twice, glanced at Benny and muttered, “First of the five stages of accepting despair. Denial.”
Benny glared at Aspen as if she wanted to devour her with her eyes. Aspen subtly looked away. Nathan noticed the twitch at the corner of Aspen’s mouth and realized something. Aspen had expected him to say he would enter. Benny, on the other hand, clearly had not. Whether they had anticipated it or not, it was obvious neither of them had been emotionally prepared.
Benny screamed. “Don’t give me that crap! You think the Gladiator Fight is some playground you can just walk into whenever you feel like it? You disappear for days without sleeping, then suddenly announce you want to fight? Why! Lord Keres, what exactly did you whisper in Nathan’s ear!”
The crow that had been perched on Nathan’s shoulder until then tilted its head. Then it flapped its wings and took off. The door was closed, but the crow paid no attention to such boundaries. It simply opened a black transfer gate in the ceiling and slipped through. When asked if it had been scheming something, the bird chose to flee rather than offer a single excuse. Benny’s eyes twitched violently.
“Where do you think you’re going, you bird-brained—!”
“We have a meeting scheduled in a little while. If you have anything to say, tell me and I’ll pass it on,” Nathan said, cracking his knuckles meaningfully behind his back. One of the tail feathers Keres had left behind drifted down slowly, as if mocking them.
Aspen followed the feather with her eyes and murmured, “Second stage. Anger.”
“Nathan, just—calm down and think about this. Can’t we… can’t we just hold each other a little longer? This isn’t fair. We haven’t even had time to be good to each other. Why are you already talking about going off to fight again? At the Graveyard House, and now here. Are you addicted to fighting? Is that it?”
“I think you’re the one who needs to calm down, friend. Third stage—bargaining.”
Aspen kept needling her to the very end, holding back laughter as if she had known this would happen. Benny’s rage finally exploded.
“Hey—!”
“Strange. The fourth stage is supposed to be depression.”
Nathan was right. It would be a fight with overwhelmingly low odds of victory. But if you were born a creature with two feet on the ground, sometimes you reached a point where you could not back down even though you knew better.
In front of a horrified Nathan, Benny grabbed a fistful of Aspen’s hair and yanked.
So how did it turn out?
“It resolved nicely. Aspen apologized first after five minutes and we made up. Though if you see Benny later, don’t ask why she cut her side hair so short. And don’t ask Aspen if she really had to do that. It was an accident.”
…I meant, how did you convince Benny?
“I told her my honest feelings as sincerely as possible. She eventually accepted it.”
Will you tell me exactly what you said?
“Are you trying to waste time?”
I’m asking out of pure curiosity. Because once you start that, I probably won’t be able to hear anything for a while. At least until you regain your proper shape.
Nathan, who had been standing with his arms crossed, thought for a long time before finally opening his mouth.
“It’s a rather long story.”
I won’t run away, so take your time.
“In a region called Bisamil, there lived mages from a school that studied dimensional science. Then one day a horrific thing happened. Every member of the school vanished without a trace. The locals living near the school’s fortress disappeared along with them.”
Oh dear.
“It happened before I was born, but the incident was so famous that everyone in the Federation knows about it. The circumstances remained a mystery, which drew people’s interest. The established theory was that some terrible accident had occurred during their research, but I suddenly began to suspect there might be another story behind it.”
The reason?
“On our way back, we saw a man with leprosy. Remember? His skin was rotting so badly from the inside that he didn’t look like he’d survive the week. Even though his flesh was swollen and blistered, there were things you could still make out clearly. Scars from long-term abuse—whip marks, burn marks. And on the back of his hand, the faint shape of a white lily. He was a Bisamil mage.”
Are you certain?
“It was practically a protest, like he was begging someone to recognize him. In the end he brought both hands together like a flower bud, made a hand sign, and melted into the scenery. It didn’t look like they had come here willingly. They looked like they had suffered greatly. It hinted that something terrible had happened to their comrades. If there had been any way to return, even for a moment, they would have informed the Federation or some kingdom about the existence of the Heavens.”
The corner of Nathan’s mouth twitched.
“I wasn’t the only one. It wasn’t just me and Aspen who were dragged here by those filthy slave galleys. The Eleim have been to Bisamil. Correct?”
Slave galleys. That’s a loaded choice of words. And close to the truth. You are right.
“Yesterday that priest named Ezgel said something like that. He claimed there were far more people in the Conclave who deserved to burn before a traitor like himself. He wasn’t joking at all. Benny told me the Conclave has thousands of light mages who can be mobilized for that kind of human trafficking. Every time the Heavens move to invade somewhere, they deploy mages who create illusions that can’t be observed from the outside so the surface world won’t notice.”
Nathan ground his teeth. “All the light mages I’ve seen until now were just rats chasing after headlines. I never thought I’d end up thinking that was the better option.”
Such crimes are not new. The descendants of Hessen you saw went through the same thing.
“Descendants of Hessen?”
Don’t try to sound me out, Nathan. I can still read that much. In that village, you definitely saw a Hessen person with green hair and brown skin. They were covered in dark gray dust from working in the mines, so it was hard to tell at a glance.
Hessen. Ten years ago, without any warning, a volcanic eruption engulfed the entire kingdom in flames and sank it—a tragic island nation. The catastrophe occurred right before it was to be incorporated into the Federation. There were no survivors. From the elderly to the children, every one of them was buried beneath the waves of the southern sea. That is what you would have known until now.
“What are you trying to say?”
Exactly what you are guessing. Hessen’s fall was the work of the Heavens. If not for the mischief of mages who wield the light element, a landscape painting depicting Hessen’s tragedy would have shown a massive island floating in the sky on one side. Along with the scene of them dropping a giant mana bomb into the volcano’s crater.
“I feel like I just heard one of the most insane things I’ve heard in my entire life, but what makes me even angrier is that I don’t even feel the need to ask if it’s true. When I think about what those bastards usually do, it doesn’t seem strange at all. Assuming it’s true, why did they do it?”
You already know from experience. The moment something becomes completely someone else’s problem, how cruel a being can become toward another. The Eleim are not supposed to look down at the humans of the surface. But there are exceptions if the Conclave approves it. One Eleim who hadn’t looked down at the surface in a long time watched the grand spectacle of a volcanic eruption and the destruction of a civilization and cheered. Another obtained living ornaments—slaves with beautiful green hair. Yet another was holding a Gladiator Fight over ownership of the gold mines revealed beneath the cracked bedrock. Was any of it essential for survival? Who knows. It may have helped them avoid dying of boredom. Long lives require stimulation. At least the ones who caused the disaster thought so.
“I want to snap all their necks.”
The slums you passed through were filled with humans gathered from all over the world. If you had observed them a little longer, you could have guessed even more stories. Diseased laborers riding airships back and forth between surface mines and the Heavens. A farmer originally from Brittany. A holy slave discarded the moment she turned thirty. A former countess from Eves. There are more than a few such villages in the Heavens. They pick people up and throw them away however they please.
“There were many gladiators in the arena who had been dragged here from the surface. Those disgusting creatures are stirring up the surface world as they like, and the surface doesn’t even know it’s being violated. No one can help those lost people.”
If the surface world learned of the existence of the Heavens, could they take revenge? Could the surface kingdoms invade three kilometers above the clouds and withstand the thunderbolts of the Celestial Gods?
“Even if the entire surface joined forces, they might not be able to pull the Heavens down. But perhaps they could do something from up here. We can’t just sit on our hands.”
Did Benny accept that explanation?
“I told Benny exactly that. If risking my life for the rest of humanity is too hard to accept, then use me for your own sake, Benny. You have a good blade, and there are things you must protect with it, so what are you hesitating for? Protecting others while secretly helping the weak in the form of an underground organization is certainly noble, but it has clear limits.”
Benny has endured for more than fifty years, but enduring the next fifty would be difficult.
“That leper mage asked me to deliver a message to the ‘Saint of Petal Light.’”
If such a rumor spread just from dyeing her hair, it doesn’t seem like a very fitting nickname for Benny.
“The content is what matters. He said it would soon become impossible to endure with good intentions alone. He was right. Benny doesn’t only have to protect ownership of the Great Arena. This illegal charity cannot stay hidden forever. Eventually she will have to fight head-on to claim those rights.”
It will be a struggle with overwhelmingly low odds.
“The odds keep getting worse, yet it’s strange. My neck has never fallen. Not once in my life. I have never fought a battle that looked advantageous to others. But in the end I survived.”
Every gladiator says that before their head rolls. Those who wish for your death will one day enjoy the fruit they desired. After all, the Eleim live forever.
“On the other hand, there are also people who pray for me to win. People who desperately want to see those pointy-eared bastards who try to rape the rest of the world get a dick shoved down their throats. My situation isn’t exactly pleasant for me, but for someone else it could be the opportunity they’ve been longing for. There must be countless people who would love to stand in my place for even a moment and smash an Eleim’s head with a pommel.”
You feel a moral obligation toward the oppressed.
“It’s more than that. I fight for them. In exchange for four whole years stolen from me, I gained two things. Skill. And purpose. I gained the confidence that there is at least one field I will never lose in, and I realized exactly where I should use that confidence.”
A moving story. Benny must not have liked it, though.
“Benny wants to give me four years’ worth of rest, but I can’t rest easy. There are people out there who had everything taken from them, not just four years. Someone has to lighten that burden.”
So that is what you told Benny. Then, what is the truth?
“I told you. It’s something someone has to do. I—”
I told you as well. I can still read that much. The truth? The territory left in your heart after removing duty and sympathy. What is the emotion that fills most of that empty space saying?
There was no point in trying to hide it clumsily. Nathan brought the thing he had been suppressing to the surface.
“If you’re asking for personal reasons, it’s because I want to fight.”
Santra’s head, dried like a corpse, looked up at Nathan with eyes that seemed to belong to a malfunctioning endocrine system. Four years ago there had still been traces of a boy on that Nodin’s face. Not anymore.
“No one paid the price for my wrists.”
The anger wearing the shape of a person spoke. That was how it looked in Santra’s eyes.
“Not the kings. Not the corporations. Not the Conclave. And not even you, who are practically the biggest culprit as far as I’m concerned. None of the vermin of that disgusting world. Yet they still tried to take more. They were openly boasting that they could do so whenever they wanted. Do you know what I thought when I saw that glass bottle Sezlark had? I wanted to put every ounce of effort into waking that horrible evil spirit again so it could never be sealed away.”
“It is fortunate that became impossible. And that those eyes were fake. If, hypothetically, you had accepted his offer, you might have been able to make the entire Heavens pay the surface world’s debt.”
“If I had even a shred of reason left, I wouldn’t have done that. But revenge isn’t supposed to be done that way. My life is mine. So is my revenge. If I borrow someone else’s hand or let myself be swallowed by rage, I’ll carry a stain of regret until the day I die. With a cold head and both eyes wide open, I have to take away everything they waste without knowing its value. That is the fair settlement of karma.”
Having finished speaking, Nathan twisted his fingers deep into Santra’s hair and lifted her head. The head with no neck bone beneath it rose without resistance. Santra sighed and braced herself.
“I am going to enter the Gladiator Fight. I will hunt them down one by one. I will smash the wealth they plundered, take away the rights they think are theirs by right, and shatter their idiotic plans. I will make every single pointy-ear pay the price for these wrists. And I will make sure they can never take anything from me again. If necessary, I’ll stuff every pointy-ear except Benny into a six-foot coffin.”
“Your revenge is justified.”
“I know that perfectly well without you telling me. Right. Let’s get back to the main topic. The reason I decided I had to see your face in the first place. When you’re locked in an arena cage, nursing wounds that fester and rot, you have too much time to look back on the past. It was agonizing. I thought about it very hard, very carefully.”
Strong fingers dug into Santra’s scalp. Santra swallowed a groan.
“I still can’t understand why I let you off.”
“If you suspect some kind of brainwashing, you’re wrong. Lord Keres’s power does not work that way. Do you want to know why you did it? Shall I tell you exactly what I saw and felt?”
“Go ahead and bark.”
“The sympathy that arose from peeking into my past and the anger you felt toward me were pulling your decision with exactly equal strength. What broke the balance of the tug-of-war was a small weight. The slight reluctance that came from the fact that Santra, who is both my vessel and half of my personality… is a woman.”
“Bullshit. You think I thought that?”
“It was an unconscious aversion. I understand. Most of the women you met while roaming the chaos of the surface would have been objects to protect, unless they were fellow Lion Wing Knights. But I am not an ordinary civilian. I am an avatar.”
Santra took a deep breath. It was an odd action for someone who only had a head left.
“Even if you do… what you are thinking right now… there will be no particular problem.”
“Don’t pretend to give permission so shamelessly. If you were in a normal state, you would never have let me get close.”
“Even with only a head, I could have summoned my followers to stop you. Half of the Hedonic follow my words. But I deliberately did not. From now on, today’s events will remain a secret between the two of us.”
“I don’t believe a fucking word. Do as you like.”
“Even if you don’t believe me, I will keep my promise. And I hope we can use this as the end of all the unnecessary conflict between us. As a god who has lost her place speaking for humans who have lost their place, let us get along well from now on. How about it, Nathan Maia?”
“Fuck off.”
“I see. Rejection is also a choice. The death of possibility only occurs when someone makes the decision to carve it out. The revenge you gave up four years ago became great strength for me. The firm forgiveness you are giving up now is the same. You simply made a choice, and neither option was wrong. Your revenge is justified.”
“Fuck off. Flattery won’t do you any good.”
The buttons had already been done up wrong for any positive relationship to be possible. Ever since she had threatened Aspen’s life. No matter how much she had been aiming for the Mark of the Beast, Nathan had no intention of getting in the same boat as a god who viewed people as tools. Therefore this was not a token of reconciliation but a legitimate settlement.
Nathan dragged his nail across the stone floor and drew a circle. He wondered what the people of the Federation would think if they knew such a precious miracle was being used for something like this. He carefully placed Santra’s head inside the white circle on the floor, then slowly stepped back one pace at a time. When he had reached a suitable distance, Nathan began to loosen up his body as if preparing for a match. Perfect execution. After all, it would only take one kick to destroy it.
“One thing before I do it. If you restore Aspen’s hair color, I might not hit you with all my strength. It’s not that I dislike black hair, but she’s starting to resemble you so much that it makes me flinch sometimes. How about it?”
“You must be anxious about my influence reaching Aspen.”
“Stop nitpicking every little thing. Just let it slide.”
“Impossible. It happened during the process of saving Aspen’s life, and because of that event the power I bestowed upon her designated her as Keres’s next high priestess.”
“Goddammit.”
“Just a few days ago that child dyed her hair. She said she wanted to show you the same hair color as before. She thought you would like that side of her better. The color washed out quickly as soon as she rinsed it, though.”
“So there’s nothing I can do about it. I knew it.”
Nathan looked up at the ceiling and sighed. “You were the one who brought me here. And when I was exhausted and injured and collapsed, you kicked me. You don’t seem to understand how disgusting it feels to be the one getting kicked while standing. Do you?”
Santra let out a sigh. “I know. That feeling. If I didn’t, why would I have left you al—”
The top of a foot shot up from the ground. The nasal cartilage beyond the nasal bone turned to powder. The skull, unable to absorb the full frontal impact, burst all the way to the back of the head, spraying a dizzying trail of blood as it flew upward. A vessel shattering did not mean the avatar was destroyed, but the pain of the flesh was real. Santra screamed without sound. And soon she felt nothing at all.
Her head, split into more than two pieces, scattered and poured into a corner of the darkness. Nathan stared at the scattered remains for a long time, spat on the floor, and turned away.
He had lost things.
What?
His wrists. His freedom. His life. The normal happiness of an ordinary human. The right to choose his own battles. The last remnants of self-restraint that had been growing somewhere in his boyhood. Four years of youth that should have been spent with the people he loved—time that could never be enough. And, for a little while, Aspen.
Nor was it only the things he had never willingly given up. Even the things he had sworn he would never trade for anything, including his life, had been taken from him.
What he had gained in return was small. Absurdly worthless. Yet that small gain could do a great many things. Mostly to his enemies.
From now on he would show them. To those pathetic old creatures who only knew how to sit atop the world’s legacy and consume it. What Nathan had seen at the end of a struggle no one had ever overcome.
“So, did you have a good conversation? Nathan?”
“It was a good talk. Very informative.”
In front of the most secret room in the underground residential area owned by Somnus, Pontima Peres—Keres’s errand boy who had been waiting for Nathan—was rather surprised. Only a few minutes had passed since Nathan went inside, yet here he was again. The ordinary, everyday surprise quickly turned into shock strong enough to make him faint. Blood soaking Nathan’s pants was dripping steadily onto the floor.