1

The way ahead was barricaded with particular care. Detached segments of sketchy fences and other wooden clutter had been piled over the forest road in an impressive mound. Its apparent purpose was to seal the entrance of a rock-walled ravine up ahead, through which the road passed. The message was clear to anyone, regardless of cultural background: whatever stood beyond this point, it was better left unexplored.

Before the blockade, the steed Nobuhiro (renamed) came to a decisive halt. Whatever instructions had been magically encoded in the animal’s mind, they weren’t absolute enough to make it run into a wall. Therefore, the passengers had no choice but to get off the cart.

“My, what a hassle,” Itaka Izumi commented, looking at the chaotic assembly.

The fences were well in the process of decaying, eaten by moisture and microscopic life in the woods, and largely coated by batches of thick, green moss. The barricade had to have been raised decades ago—forty years ago, if Erekhigan’s word was to be taken for granted.

Turning back was obviously not an option and the only way to proceed with the horse was to clear the whole road of obstacles, which was bound to take quite some time. Lazy to the bone, Izumi abandoned the idea immediately.

“We’d better tie Nobu up and do some advance scouting by ourselves,” she concluded, scratching her head.

“Yes,” the young woman beside Izumi, Millanueve de Guillon, nodded. “They wouldn’t have set up such a blockade in the middle of nowhere, would they? There must be a settlement close by.”

“And who knows what else?” Izumi sighed, remembering again that she didn’t have her sword. Video games had conditioned her to expect an enemy ambush in every new area, and whether her fears were justified or not, being unarmed left her reluctant to go on.

In contrast, Millanueve appeared unusually composed.

“Come on.” the knight maiden strode to the blockade and beckoned Izumi to follow. “We should be able to get through here with a bit of effort.”

“Oi, straight through the front?” Izumi hurried after the girl. “Aren’t we eager! I took you for the less brazen type.”

“I want to go back home quickly, isn’t that a given?” Millanueve replied, and started to pull the old fences aside. “And that means taking care of this little job of yours as quickly as possible. My little brother’s out there by himself. I can’t count on Stefan alone to keep him in check!”

“Ehh...”

“Alex always pretends to be the more mature of us, like he’s the one looking after everyone else, but he’s never been able to look after himself!”

“You didn’t have to come along, you know?” Izumi reminded Millanueve, following along the narrow trail the girl cleared through the barrier, careful not to dirty her clothes. “If you were that worried. Could’ve stayed behind.”

“I did have to!” Millanueve replied. “I don’t know why yet, but I’m sure of it.”

“That’s not very scientific.”

“It’s the way I feel, I can’t help it!”

“I get it, I get it. Take it easy.”

It took a while, but the two managed to kick and wrestle a path through the rotten obstacles, eventually reaching the ravine on the other side. The air was damp, the woods slimy and easily broken apart. Millanueve ended up with her clothes wet and dirtied all over in the process, looking like she had crawled through a swamp. Yet, she displayed unexpected sportsmanship, smiling triumphantly at their progress.

"Here we are!"

The pair of travelers had been riding through the night, but by now, the coming of a new day brightened up the jungle again. Showered by the rays of the sun that shifted through the foliage above, the two carried on with cheer in their steps.

“What do you suppose we’ll find out there?” Millanueve asked Izumi, as they walked along the narrow ravine path, carved into hillside by ancient hands.

“I don’t know,” Izumi replied, lost in thought.

“Do you think the story about the plague is true? Is it really safe for us to be heading into such a place?”

“So the wizard said.”

“A disease that not even the elves could heal—if such a thing were to spread to human lands, we’d be in huge trouble. Our healers have been able to stop many major epidemics in the past, but if even the elves can’t deal with this one, how could we?”

“I don’t know.”

“What kind of a person was this ‘Sage’, anyway? Do you think it's all right to trust him?”

“I don't know.”

“Lady Carmelia and Lady Isa seem to think highly of the man, but isn’t it true that he failed to stop the plague the first time? How would he have the cure now? What if we’ll only end up making things even worse?”

“I don’t know.”

“—Don’t know, don’t know, is that all you can say!?” Millanueve lost her temper and turned angrily back to Izumi. “Our actions here could mean the start of something terrible! Can’t you take it a little more seriously?”

“I don’t know what I don’t know,” Izumi shrugged. “Whether the Sage can come up with a vaccine or not, whether everybody dies or not, I have no choice but to do this. Or I’ll die instead.”

“Eh…?”

“Come on. I thought you wanted to get home quick.”

Izumi took the lead and walked on. Exiting to the other side of the ravine, the way began a smooth descent, curving along the natural jungle terrain. The elves hadn’t cleared away thickets or cut down trees here, but put in a great deal of additional effort to blend their road into the landscape.

The sense of being out of her element returned to Izumi, as she hiked down that winding path, past odd-leaved plants and mysterious flowers, listening to the unfamiliar sounds of the birds around. After so many months in this otherworld, she had grown accustomed to her new life, to a degree. Yet every now and then, the environment betrayed her expectations in a way that left her feeling somewhat disconnected. At times like that, she had to slap or pinch herself, to remind herself that it was really happening and not only a dream.

Because if it was a dream, that would mean eventually waking up.

It was the last thing Izumi wanted.

“Oh, look!” Millanueve suddenly exclaimed, pointing past the woman. “Houses! I told you there’d be something nearby!”

Ahead, the land spread out in a wide, flat basin, presenting an ideal platform for a settlement. An opportunity not missed. The path they followed widened into a proper street, which drew a sharp loop akin to a great needle eye, some five hundred yards long, before carrying on towards east. Tidy residences lined both sides of the looping road, somewhere between sixty to eighty of them, in all. Quite a community had dwelt here once, it seemed. Though so far removed from the main city, the settlement didn’t look any less civilized than the suburbs, remaining in a rather good condition to this day. Whatever materials the elves made their houses of withstood the passage of time without showing signs of decay. Then again, it was a necessity to invest in construction, seeing as the residents could need their homes for a very, very long time.

There were no signs of life to be seen in this outpost, however. It appeared to be deserted.

Izumi paused and took out from her pocket the device Erekhigan had given her.

Inside of the compass-like medallion, upon a transparent glass lens, flickered a tiny spark. The light had been blue and faint as they had set out, but by now it had nearly doubled in size, taking on a slightly purple hue. The spark hovered above one o’clock near the edge of the glass.

“What is that?” Millanueve peered past Izumi’s shoulder and asked, frowning at the blinking dot.

“It’s the thing you see when you press the menu button,” the woman replied.

“...What?”

By the looks of it, they were getting closer but were still a distance away from the main objective. Regardless, not exploring the town on the way would have been waste. Who knew what treasures the elves had left behind. There was no sign of any enemies either. Izumi closed the lid and put the radar away.

“Let’s get to adventuring then.”

2

Not a soul strolled the solemn streets. No children played in the front yards, where the once cultivated flower beds had either withered away or else outgrown their boundaries, thriving under the law of the jungle. Facing the threat of the deadly disease, the inhabitants had been evacuated, forced to abandon their homes, for the second time in their long lives. What a tragedy indeed.

With no one there to stop them, Izumi and Millanueve went on to search through the settlement. One wished to learn about these timeless people and their culture; the other to shamelessly loot whatever valuables she could get her hands on, though neither would mention their motives to the other, only assuming they were the same in their intentions.

In the end, however, neither was able to achieve what they wanted.

The evacuation had been carried out with sufficient time and care, allowing the elves to gather their possessions, and only leave behind what was deemed unneeded. There was very little to be found in the empty rooms, in terms of either information or treasures. After searching some dozen buildings, the tourists gave up wasting their energy, and departed from the settlement empty-handed.

They had breakfast in the crossroads near the eastern exit.

Millanueve’s addition to the party necessitated a strict fifty-fifty division of the supplies, which were intended for one. But Izumi wasn’t particularly hungry. Whether it was due to her degrading condition, or the vague unease she felt over the future, she couldn’t say.

“Are you sure?” Millanueve asked her, pointing at the white, dumpling-like edible in the box. “I’m going to take it. It’ll be too late to change your mind.”

“I’m not a kid, all right. I can live with my decisions,” Izumi made her halfhearted response.

“Oh, how very mature of you,” Millanueve scowled. “So you’re saying I’m being childish?”

“I’m quite sure I said nothing of the sort. Hurry up and eat it, so we can leave.”

“Well, thank you for the treat.” Millanueve said, gladly picking up the dumpling. It had been a long time since she had last eaten anything and was famished.

“You don’t look very old to me,” the girl said, nibbling her food, while glancing at Izumi.

“Is that so?” Izumi said, leaning on her knees.

“I don’t think you’re much older than me.”

“Sure. And how old were you again?”

“Seventeen.”

“Seventeen…”

“My brother’s a year younger. Even then, people often assume he’s the older one of us. Can you believe that? It’s ridiculous! I know I look younger than my age, but I’m the more mature of us, mentally, and by far! Don’t you think so?”

“I wonder...” Izumi pondered, thinking Millanueve looked exactly her age.

“It’s true!”

Izumi looked up. Pale sunlight warmed her face. She basked in it, eyes closed, and smelled the fresh woodland air. How nice would it have been, to be seventeen again?

“Ah, that’s right...” she mumbled. “The years here are two months longer. So I’m younger here than I was back home, in numbers. Hm-hm. And if she’s twenty here, that would make her...”

Izumi kept performing simple arithmetic in her mind, while Millanueve watched her in silence.

“Was it true, what you told me before?” the girl asked her. “About being from another world?”

“So you didn’t believe me, after all?” Izumi asked, slightly offended. “Even though you said you did.”

“I do believe you!” Millanueve insisted. “Did! That’s not what I meant. Just...”

“What?”

“What kind of a world was it? Your world.”

Izumi looked away. “Terrible.”

“Even worse than where we are now?” Millanueve asked.

“A lot worse,” the woman replied. “Worse than anything you can possibly imagine.”

“How could that be?” The girl looked a little disturbed. “Because of monsters?”

“There weren’t any monsters.”

“Then wasn’t it a paradise?”

“Monsters would’ve been an improvement,” Izumi told her. “Would’ve made things simpler. No. People can be a lot worse, I think. And the best part is, they don’t even realize it.”

“I don’t understand...”

“Of course. Nobody does. We created a world so complicated nobody had any hope of understanding half of it. Those, who think they do, are only fooling themselves. Not that you could function in such a place without a good deal of self-deception. The idiots had the right idea. You could only make life work out for you by mindlessly believing it will work out, even though there was no reason, no basis at all to think that way. Even though everything around you showed otherwise, time after time again. I just lost my ability to keep up with the lie. And that’s when I lost the whole game.”

“...I can’t say I know what you’re talking about,” Millanueve slowly remarked. “But I’m sorry. It had to have been tough.”

“Well, it wasn’t all miserable,” Izumi shrugged. “There were some nice things too. TV, smartphones, video games, anime, manga, light novels, movies, the internet...Yeah. It’s uncanny how good we got at making up stuff to escape reality. But, in the end, it was all lies. Beautiful lies, but lies all the same. Over the years, even playing around started to seem real shallow and pointless to me. Was I going to have to spend my whole life in denial? I guess, what I really wanted was to find something genuine.”

“Genuine?”

“Like, a direction. A reason to wake up and start living, for real. A purpose in which to put all my strength and passion. Something actually worth a damn.”

“...What do you mean?”

“Don’t worry about it,” Izumi replied, standing up. “It doesn’t matter. I’m here now. I’m not going back to that terrible world ever again. I’ve found myself a direction. There may not be any video games here, but that’s fine, when life itself is like a video game. Yeah. This is my wish-fulfillment paradise.”

“Eh...?”

Izumi got up to her feet and stretched her arms.

“Come now, we have a quest to clear! Onwards, ho!”

3

The pair continued northeast, out of the abandoned elven settlement. They hiked through the expansive basin, following the road, admiring the flora and fauna, and talking about random things. After about two hours of walking, the path began to ascend again, and they arrived at another barricade, much alike the one before, closing an artificial gap in the steep cliff that bordered the basin.

Near the barricade, leaning on a tree, was the corpse of an elven male.

The body had decomposed to the point of being nearly impossible to identify, darkened and shriveled, but the posture remained eerily life-like. Cradling his knees, as if seeking shelter from under the tree, the deceased had succumbed to death in obvious agony.

“How terrible...” Millanueve’s appalled reaction was understandable.

“There’s more where that came from,” Izumi said, looking ahead.

Three more corpses lay amid the barricades. They had met their end trying to climb and crawl past the obstacles, with poor results. As if their strength had simply failed after barely getting started.

“Were they...infected?” Millanueve asked in a quivering voice.

Izumi took out the talisman. The indicator had turned distinctly red and brighter, but kept pointing ahead, ignoring the proximity of the corpses. Either the spell wasn’t smart enough to recognize the presence of the disease, or else the dead had passed for other reasons.

As before, the summoned champion and her companion wriggled and wrestled their way through the rotten pole fences. Made cautious by the sight of death and decay, they proceeded through the following gorge, which went on for roughly forty yards.

What awaited them next was a dead end.

A wall blocked the way. It was about nine feet tall, and looked anything but natural, with a smooth, even surface, and level top. Yet, the wall blended seamlessly with the natural rock at the sides, as if it had been there from the day the island first emerged from the sea.

“What...?” Millanueve frowned, trying the wall with her hand. “There’s no way through? But, this doesn’t make any sense.”

“Hardly the strangest thing you could see in a world of might and magic,” Izumi noted. “Looks like we’re getting close to the mark.”

“Getting close—and not much further,” the knight sighed and turned around. “How do you mean to get through this?”

The gorge walls slanted slightly inward, rendering them unfavorable to climb, and the smooth-faced barrier lacked any features to take a hold of. They could only turn back and either try to construct something of a ladder, or look for a way around.

Though Izumi had other ideas.

“What do you mean, how?” she replied, amused. “The way they do at JSDF, of course. Don’t tell me you’ve never tried this before?”

“Eh? What are you—?”

As Millanueve looked on in confusion, Izumi backed up some twenty feet, and then dashed at the wall. Only a few steps before running into it, she jumped, kicked off the surface and reached up. Her fingers caught the edge of the wall and with only that light hold, she proceeded to pull herself up.

“Haha!” The woman soon sat on top of the wall, laughing. “That’s the way! Just like in Prince of Pe****! It’s been a while since I last did pull-ups, but I can still manage this much!”

“What are you talking about?” Millanueve yelled back at her, unable to believe her eyes. “How am I going to get up there?”

“Here. I’ll help.”

Izumi laid down on the wall and held out her hand over the edge.

“You’ve got to be kidding me...” Millanueve sighed.

“Hurry, hurry. Mash that triangle.”

“Stop saying weird things!”

Mimicking what the woman had done before, Millanueve ran at the wall and jumped. Her performance was quite a bit less confident, and it took her a few tries before she was able to reach Izumi’s hand.

“Up we go!” Tightening her grip, Izumi pulled the girl up with ease, and soon they sat side-by-side on the wall, at last.

“How are you this strong?” Millanueve asked, amazed at how easily they had overcome the enormous obstacle.

“Come now, that’s nothing,” Izumi puffed. “Try pull up a guy twice your weight, that’s a real challenge. Not that I’ve actually been in JSDF, mind you. There was just a little course like that, once.”

“Again, I haven’t the faintest idea what is a J-S-D-F, or whatever you’re talking a...bout...”

The view ahead interrupted Millanueve mid-sentence, and she crawled past the woman, to the outer edge. The wall was about ten feet in length, and from the top of it spread a breathtaking view to a little vale. There, the road continued down an ungentle descent, with several buildings visible between the woods, roughly six hundred yards ahead, at the bottom of the vale.

Another elven settlement.

Then, bringing her gaze down, Millanueve saw something that made her recoil in horror.

“Lords!” she gasped, bumping into Izumi, who followed behind her.

Izumi moved past the girl and looked down along the stone wall. And what she saw made her frown.

In the cliff’s shadow laid a dark, grotesque heap of shapes. Clearly enough, that mass was not the work of nature. It was difficult to discern what it actually was, on a glance, but a closer examination soon revealed unnerving familiarity in the details of that grievous mash-up.

They were dead bodies.

Elven corpses, and a disorienting number of them.

Corpses and more corpses.

Corpses. Corpses. Corpses.

Corpses. Corpses. Corpses. Corpses. Corpses. Corpses.

Corpses. Corpses. Corpses. Corpses. Corpses. Corpses.

Corpses. Corpses. Corpses. Corpses. Corpses. Corpses.

Corpses. Corpses. Corpses. Corpses. Corpses. Corpses.

Corpses. Corpses. Corpses. Corpses. Corpses. Corpses.

Corpses. Corpses. Corpses. Corpses. Corpses. Corpses.

Stretched. Piled. Sprawled. Trapped. Locked. Mixed. Mingled.

Dozens upon dozens of those majestic beings, perished in the midst of a merciless dying struggle. Frozen at the moment life had left them, in the apparent act of fleeing an unknown threat. Crawling. Clawing. Wrenching. Pulling. Dragging. Writhing.

It was an ugly sight.

It was a hopeless sight.

The withered, blackened remains all faced the wall the women knelt on, like an abstract art work. They had climbed over each other, used one another as stepping stones, fought, and despaired, reaching in vain for the obstacle before them. In that place they had all succumbed, robbed of the strength to cross over to the other side.

“W-what on earth happened here...?” Millanueve asked in a voice barely stronger than a whisper.

Izumi didn’t reply. Without a word, she went on to climb down from the wall.

“H-hey!” Millanueve hesitated to follow after the woman, instinctively fearing they would be left trapped and die the same way as the rest.

Showing no such concern, Izumi went on to approach the pile of corpses and crouched to examine their empty eye sockets and horribly distorted faces. Then, standing up, she pushed one over with her foot, to see its bottom side.

“W-what are you doing!?” Millanueve shrieked at her, half shocked over the disrespectful treatment, and half scared that the corpse would come to life and lunge at the woman.

“No plague killed these guys, that’s for sure,” Izumi finally remarked.

“What? What do you mean?”

“All perished here, almost at the same time. In this specific spot, suitably out of sight. No disease is this convenient. Yet, they have no external wounds either. No one’s armed, not even wolves would eat them. They were only ordinary folk, trying to get out. But somebody didn’t want them to leave.”

Izumi looked back up at the wall, then the settlement below.

“So they were all murdered here. With magic. The village sealed off.”

“Murdered?” Millanueve repeated, looking abhorred. “You mean, the elves did this to their own? But why?”

“To contain the plague...Or was that it?”

Whatever she was thinking, Izumi wouldn’t elaborate on it.

“Come on down here,” she told Millanueve and went walking past the dead, down the hill, towards the buildings in the distance. “We should keep going.”

“Do we really have to…?”

4

The path went downhill, past clusters of white rocks and dense bushes full of rose-like flowers, white, lavender, red. It had to have been a beautiful, scenic route once, but the vegetation had since overgrown its formerly defined limits, turning wild and ragged, carrying a bare echo of the past splendor. Some of the plants had sharp thorns, and forcing her way past them, Millanueve got her arms full of small cuts.

“Ow…!”

Izumi kept her eyes fixed at the front.

The town ahead was not quite as orderly as the one before, but also cozier, in a sense.

Some houses had been raised high up on stilts and were connected to others with wooden stairs and arcing little bridges, allowing for more effective use of space. There were longhouses, curved like crescent moon, and houses that coiled around trees in multiple layers, or climbed over large rocks. There were round houses without walls, numerous seats inside, probably for communal gatherings and such. A little brook ran through the town lengthwise, uninterrupted and untouched, all the pathways going either around or above it.

The village was quiet.

Not a living soul was left in here either, it seemed.

Nevertheless, Izumi moved on with caution, her senses sharp. The air about the place felt ambiguously tense. There was a distinct presence of death, of madness, lingering between the houses. It took visible forms too, with more dead bodies here and there. Not as many as on the slope, but in most unexpected places. As if the inhabitants had merely stepped out of their homes for another average day, then to perish where they stood.

Izumi stopped and took out the radar.

The spark had moved closer to the center, dancing bright red and flickering.

“This is the place, then,” she noted. “My, it’s like Jonestown.”

“These people were victims of the plague?” Millanueve asked with a look of disgust. “It began here, in this place?”

“That’s what we’re to find out,” Izumi answered her, flipping the talisman close.

Look for a corpse that’s as close to its natural state as possible—had been Erekhigan’s request to Izumi. Living, infected cells were needed to create a vaccine against the plague, apparently. Such could not be obtained from the withered, weather-beaten remains outside. But the quest was not entirely hopeless either. Elven remains would not decompose as fast as those of a human, and finding biologically sound samples even after four decades was not only possible but probable. A body left indoors, safe from most microbes, insects, and carnivorous wildlife, could still carry what they were looking for. Therefore, Izumi and her assistant set out to search all the buildings, in hopes of locating a victim left in an appropriate state.

There was a lot more left to discover this time.

No attempts had been made to evacuate this settlement, and it remained practically as it had been at the time its inhabitants yet lived. The houses were fully furnished and equipped, all but ready for everyday life to resume, if given the chance.

The earthling became hopelessly sidetracked in her quest for the samples, instead browsing the elves’ personal belongings. Millanueve berated her for this, at first, but soon became absorbed in a similar activity herself.

Whether a looter or an archaeologist, the village was undeniably a treasure trove. They came across many fanciful things in the houses; jewelry, clothes, books, futuristic gadgets, toys, and miscellaneous accessories. Mementos from Amarno, the lost continent, bearing history greater than human memory, delivered overseas by the survivors. These people had eluded death in the hands of monsters, only to be claimed by the disease stirred from the accursed soil of the island. Nature certainly knew no mercy.

“All those legends, did they really happen, after all…? Hm?”

In one of the houses, Millanueve came across a red-covered tome, lying on the living room table. It looked terribly old and worn-out, distinctly different from the books of the elves, which were generally bound with thin metal frames or material resembling plastic, instead of cloth or leather. Picking up the book, Millanueve left the dark house and stepped out onto the sunlit veranda, where she wiped off the dust and carefully pried open the front cover.

A surprise exceeding its discovery followed the book’s opening.

“What in the…?”

Millanueve found that she could read it. The book wasn’t written in elvish.

The letters filling the pages were in the common tongue of men, written with pen and ink, in tidy cursive. Time had done its job, rendering the text largely illegible in places, and a lot of pages were altogether missing, removed either intentionally or by age. But wherever meaning could be discerned, a window to past life was opened. Spellbound, forgetting where she was and what she was meant to do, Millanueve started to read.

4th of Maarat, on the year 913 of the OLD GODS’ COVENANT WITH THE WORLD, Cycle 33

(...)got to work. Ere long were the foundations for the kitchen laid, the framework of our new home & together with it our dream coming to reality before our very eyes. Next to it we had intended for our own room to be raised, mine & that of my dearest, Elaine, to whom I owe a lifelong debt for accompanying me on the long & arduous paths of ancient men to the place of our future, which we agreed to name Tradden, in the fashion of our forebears. In this task aided me greatly our Lahrs, my eldest son, the brother of Madias, my pride & joy in this world, & he, who shall one day hold the keys to our complete property, to pass onto his own. (...)are only a few of us here, for the time being, but (…) assured me more would be soon forthcoming, & our town would teem with joyous life, far unlike the lands we begrudgingly left behind. The Lenthukets, the Matherses, and the Urwhollens accompanied us, as we set out of Threngen’s Hold two months back, & they equally share the honor of being the founders of Tradden, though their families were blessed with lesser prosperity than ours, & lesser were their numbers & the servants they could bring with them. Regardless, in Tradden we agreed to stand equal & this united accord keeps our bonds firm on our quest to turn this harsh land again bountiful, as I have heard it to have been in the past…

The book appeared to be a journal of sorts. According to the date, it had been started more than ninety years ago, which explained the condition. But why was such an obviously human record found in an elven house? This mystery made Millanueve keep reading with confusion and growing unease. She skipped over a number of pages, letting her eyes fly over the thin lines, in search for an answer.

30th of Decaarat, on the year 916

I am most proud to mark down how on this day, I held new life in my hands. Never may I forget this experience, made all the more meaningful by what it represents to us. Mark, the son my dear Elaine and I, was born, & though we have been blessed with children before & there may be no doubting the love I hold for them all, there was very special meaning in Mark’s timely birth. He is the first child to have born in Tradden, which has in the span of only 3 quick years gone from a furtive collexion of households into a settlement rivaling, if not well exceeding, Eslow, that Yarl Renner’s miserable tax pool, in which I was born, & which I am glad to leave in the past. It is in our children that we must place our hope, for unlike (…) brief & many are the dangers that roam (…) The increase in population is Tradden’s future & we all work tirelessly from dawn to dusk to build a stable, prosperous future for our growing families. I, as the humble servant & governor of Tradden, must take care not to repeat the mistakes of my own lords, but guide our work with the necessary wisdom, fairness, & foresight, in the virtues of which I look (…) for an ideal

Where was this town of Tradden? Millanueve couldn’t recall having ever heard the name before. Frustrated with the uneventful description of daily life, she skimmed through the entries, trying to find any clue. But soon, the journal’s tone took a change, and she paused.

4th of Fenriat, on the year 921

A misery struck us last week, when Josif, my fourth son, caught a persistent fever, which has since rendered him feeble & bed-ridden. As we feared, this makes him the eighth victim of what may now rightfully be called an epidemic, which has continued to make the rounds in our peaceful town starting from two weeks back. No medicine or treatment known to us can lift the fever & it leaves the patient greatly weakened & racked with pain, day & night. I fear, if this goes on, we shall all soon be sick & become incapable of work. In a few weeks must we begin tending to the fields & ready to plant the coming summer’s harvest, or else face a famine in the winter. Unless this vile malady will not claim us before then. I must seek (…) ask if (...) a remedy for our plight. I have not given up on hope, for surely troubles of this level (…) having conquered a great deal more. I assured Elaine of this, but to my grievance, she has begun to diverge from my unwavering faith in (…) as of late

Numerous lines were borderline unreadable, forcing Millanueve to move on with frustration. Turning the pages, squinting her eyes, she tried her hardest to make out the faint, blurred characters on the damaged paper.

Yester-day, we laid our dear Madias to rest. At only fourteen years of age, he passed away, his body & spirit drained by the long fight against the sickness. We buried him by the windmill that he loved, singing prayers to the Lord of Darkness, to receive & guide his soul. I could not touch my pen then due to the sorrow, & even now my hand begs to stop after each line. But continue I must, not for my own sake, but for the sake of our future, for the sake of our dream, which brought us to start anew in the land of our ancient forebears. & for the sake of those who may read this after I am no more, I must keep writing & convert my heart as a callous witness of time. Of Tradden’s populace was poor Madias the twelfth to pass away. The prior victims succumbed within the span of six to eight weeks each, a testament to the unrelenting cruelty of (…) a grievous blow to our small community, made all the more bitter by the (…) made no good of his promise & did not come back on the day previously announced. Yet still, though I am tested, I continue to hold faith in him & believe only a cause of pressing need could have stalled (...) I yet hope. Severe cough fits have kept Elaine up at night & I dread to think that the same ailment that has claimed three of our children will soon come to take the light of my life—

——“Find anything?”

“Hiya—!”

Izumi suddenly appeared behind Millanueve and peered over the girl’s shoulder. Absorbed in reading, Millanueve hadn’t noticed her approach and jumped in surprise. The abrupt motion of her hands was too much for the old book. With a muffled tearing sound, the spine tore from top to bottom. The entire front half slipped through the girl’s hands and fell over the balustrade, into the brook coursing under the veranda. Splash. Cradling the back half, Millanueve watched a significant portion of the heart-breaking journal be destroyed, numerous detached pages washed away.

“Don’t scare me like that!” she yelled at Izumi.

“Whoa, sorry!” Izumi backed up. “Aren’t we on the edge!”

“...This book was written by people,” Millanueve explained, calming down. “Humans, like us! It mentioned places I know in Ludgwert. Why would such a thing be here, in an elven village?”

“The elves traded with humans, didn’t they?” Izumi shrugged. “Maybe they got the book on one of their trips?”

“This isn’t something you’d give on top of a good bargain," Millanueve said, looking down at the abused record in her hands. "I have a bad feeling.”

“Reading’s a nice hobby, but save it for later. We’ve got to a job to do, remember?”

“I know. Moreover, what are you...?”

Millanueve only noticed it now, but Izumi had also found something.

In fact, she had a whole pile of metal in her arms.

There was a long, curved saber with a brass guard and a matching sheath. She also carried something that looked like a recurve bow of a similar design, and a quiver with a handful of dusty arrows. A utility belt with little pouches. Elegantly designed metal bracers. A jerkin made up of countless, tiny steel scales. Numerous necklaces and bangles, and more. In short, her hands were quite full.

“I don’t feel right if I’m not armed,” Izumi said, laying down her loot on the veranda, happily showing off the sword. “And I found a guard house with a lot of useful-looking things. Take your pick.”

“That is called...looting,” Millanueve told her. “You’re robbing the dead.”

“They don’t need this stuff anymore, do they?”

“And what do you suppose the Sage will say, when you go back after ransacking the houses of his dead kindred, you idiot!?”

“I don’t need to report everything to him, do I?”

“You don’t think he’ll find out? He’s a magician of the highest caliber!”

“I’ll worry about that when the time comes.”

“Worry about it right here and now!”

Izumi wasn’t listening. Giving up with a heavy sigh, Millanueve took the bow and the quiver, as well as a leather bag, where to store the book and other items. The circumstances were dire, after all, and she had to admit that staying unarmed in this hostile, foreign land was unwise.

Not that they met anything particularly dangerous in the village. The unsettling atmosphere aside, everyone present was quite dead. Wild animals appeared to steer clear of the buildings, as there were no traces of the corpses having been eaten. This also meant that the explorers had no need to fear scavengers that might lurk in the jungle and come after them at night.

Hours flew by as they continued to look through the remaining houses.

Izumi took samples here and there, but all the corpses were in a rather poor condition. She could only hope and pray that Erekhigan would be able to make use of what they found.

Then, as dusk already neared, Izumi made the strangest discovery so far. One house, built high up in a tree, stood apart from the rest. By the looks of it, it wasn’t an ordinary house, lacking in everyday utilities and accessories, and was rather sterile and simple in layout.

Indoors they found a lone corpse slightly different from the rest.

In the round, spacious central room, the victim of the unknown illness sat leaning on the back wall, as if merely taking a breather. She had been a woman, by the looks of her figure and attire. The body was far better preserved than any of the others they had come across, even the hair color remained distinct. Underneath the body, on the floor, was drawn a circle of arcane nature, decorated with numerous runic markings.

That was not all. There were more ancient characters drawn on the floor around the circle. One particular symbol repeated with noteworthy frequency. It had been written on the walls as well, over and over again, and after running out of ink, the victim had continued to paint the letter with what appeared to be her own blood.

Over and over.

“I...think I’m going to be sick,” Millanueve said.

“It doesn’t even smell that bad after so long,” Izumi remarked.

“Give me a break,” the girl groaned, turned, and left the house.

Regardless of how she felt about the view, Izumi couldn’t shy away from her mission. Instead of following Millanueve back out, she took out another ampule from the case the Sage had given her and approached the corpse.

“Sorry about this,” she said. “Just doing my job. And hey, thanks to you, nobody else might have to die.”

After taking the sample, Izumi stood to survey the room itself.

Sticking out from the right side wall was a long table with various parchments scattered over. Glass jars with moldy contents. Tubes in little racks, conical flasks, boiling pots, pipettes, all slightly different from their earthly counterparts by design, yet sharing their purpose.

“You were a doctor?” Izumi asked the body, examining the documents.

Naturally, all the papers were written in elvish. Izumi’s magically gifted literacy did not extend to this ancient tongue, and so she had to give up on trying interpret them. However, she did know someone at home, for whom the task was not only possible but child’s work, most likely. Therefore, out of a sudden whim, she scooped all the papers together, and stuffed them into her bag.

“If it comes down to it, I can at least make one mean bonfire.”

5

Their task completed—as well as it could be—and the village thoroughly charted, the travelers were free to return. But the ride back home was going to be no shorter or less tiresome than the other way. Considering their options, Izumi and Millanueve ultimately came to the decision to spend the coming night at the quarantined village, and only begin the trip back in the morning. They had hardly slept in the previous night, after all, and both were feeling the effects. Hoping no evil beast would eat Nobuhiro meanwhile, the women set up a base in one of the empty houses higher above the ground. They even managed to light up an automated fireplace in the living room, and had light dinner with the remaining provisions.

It could have been an enjoyable vacation, if not for the gruesome history of the place.

“If this were a game,” Izumi pondered, “all the corpses would come back to life at night and attack us.”

“Don’t say such things!” Millanueve berated the woman, not hiding her fear very well.

“You’re right, we kinda did the Resident Ev** thing before. Nobody would pull the same gimmick twice.”

“Again, I don’t know what that is!”

Determined to ignore Izumi’s nonsense, Millanueve sat on the floor close to the fireplace, and took out the journal’s remains from her bag. As tired as she was, she didn’t feel like sleeping just yet, and thought to take a moment to unravel the book’s mystery.

“Eeh...?” Izumi looked at the girl with exaggerated disappointment. “You’re going to read? It’s finally just the two of us in a romantic little cabin in the woods, and you’re going to read a dusty old book?”

“What do you want from me!?” Millanueve cried.

“Nooothing, geez,” Izumi complained and laid down, with her leather bag for a pillow. Millanueve stared at the woman for a moment, pouting, made highly self-conscious by her words.

Then, she slowly set the book aside.

“Fine,” Millanueve said and faced Izumi, sitting on her knees. “There was something you wished to do with me?”

“Eh?” Izumi quickly sat up, looking alarmed. “...W-where’s this coming now?”

“You’re the one who started it! Were you only fooling around with me then? Well, here I am. What should we do?”

“...Just so you know,” Izumi said. “I was thinking about naughty things when I said that. The kinds of things you wouldn’t normally do with another girl. No games.”

She imagined her words would be dismissed as a joke, as always, yet the earnest response betrayed her expectations.

“I-I had a feeling it was going to be something like that,” Millanueve replied, knowing her face had to have been bright red. “You’re always saying such unbecoming things, ever since we first met. Looking at me in a strange way. I—I can tell that much.”

“...And you’re fine with it?” Izumi inquired.

“I didn’t say I was!”

“Then why are we talking about this now?”

“I—I was only curious,” Millanueve said, turning her face away. “I want to know what kind of things you’re thinking about. W-what you think of me. That’s all, I didn’t imply anything more than that!”

Her act really was terrible.

“Hm,” Izumi thought. “Things like kissing, I suppose? For starters.”

“I-I see. So, you want to k-kiss me, is that it...?”

“Yeah. For starters,” Izumi stressed.

“And then? W-what comes after kissing?” Millanueve forced herself to ask. She thought she was going to die of embarrassment, but couldn’t stop.

“Well,” the older woman tilted her head. “Um, I suppose we’d have to see how things develop from there.”

“It doesn’t sound like you’ve thought it through...”

“Oh, I’ve thought about it plenty—I mean, it’s not like I put active effort into picturing it. It was just like, screensaver mode. A background process. Something unconscious and nothing too deliberate.”

“What are you talking about...?”

“I was trying to phrase it gently, so as to not look like a maniac. Anyway, like they say, you shouldn’t count your chickens before the eggs hatch, so I’d be happy if I ever even got to the kissing part.”

“That’s...unexpectedly innocent of you,” Millanueve mumbled.

“Unexpectedly?” Izumi repeated, raising her brows.

“That’s right,” the girl said. “With the way you were acting, I was expecting demands much more outrageous than a k-kiss.”

“Geez. Do I really seem like such a lecher to you?”

“W-well, not exactly, but...well...”

“Would you be okay with it then? Us kissing, I mean.”

“I didn’t say I was! Don’t get carried away!”

“Right.”

“...W-what’s so special about kissing, anyway?” Millanueve continued.

“It’s not special to you?” Izumi asked. “You’ve been kissing lots before?”

“Of course, I have,” the girl declared. “I’ve kissed my mother, and father, and other relatives sometimes. Isn’t that completely normal?”

“Eh, maybe it is, but that’s not the kind of a kiss I’m talking about...”

“Then what kind of a kiss is it? Be more precise!”

“The kind that makes your heart race when you do it?”

“M-my heart isn’t racing at all, though,” Millanueve claimed.

“That’s not how it looks to me,” Izumi pointed out.

“Don’t tease me!” the girl snapped at her.

Izumi wasn’t going to retreat so easily, now that the fire had been lit within her.

“If it’s nothing too special, then there’s no problem if...if I kiss you for real? Here and now?”

“M-mm...” Millanueve twisted her face, an unbearable, ticklish feeling tormenting her on the inside. “I...don’t see how that’s...”

“That a yes or no?”

“I...um..I really wouldn’t say...I mean, it's not about if it's strictly problematic or not...”

“Yes? Can I get an answer?”

“Aah!” Millanueve cracked under the pressure and yelled. “You should just do it, if you really want to!”

“E...”

Izumi’s jaw dropped.

The conversation sure wasn’t going the way she had pictured, at all.

That is, she had never imagined she could get as lucky.

Naturally, Izumi had fantasized about Millanueve since the day they had met. How could she not? The girl was practically the walking catalog of erotic ideals. But as a born pessimist with close to no practical experience, not even Izumi herself could believe that her far-fetched daydreams could ever come true. Which was why she was left in a state of utter disbelief, now that they stood within arm’s reach.

Normally, she would have retreated right then and there. But, perhaps something inside Izumi had began to change since her arrival in this world. Perhaps, through the many trials and harrowing experiences, she had accumulated certain confidence as a person, beside that as a warrior.

Come now. Didn’t I say I wanted to live without regrets? That I'm going to turn a new page and start over? It can’t be so much harder than the things I’ve done before.

“Okay.” Making up her mind, Izumi crawled over to Millanueve, who continued to sit stiffly on her knees. “I’m really going to kiss you then. Since I want to.”

“Wah...!” Millanueve looked like a deer caught in the headlights. Yet, her temper would not allow her to back away either. "Fine!"

“...Incidentally," Izumi asked, "have you ever kissed a guy that was not your dad before?”

“As if I would have!” Millanueve exclaimed, before looking away. “O-or, maybe I have, my brother, on the cheek, sometimes...”

“That’s not what I was after, exactly. You don’t have a...well, a fiance? A boyfriend? A girlfriend?”

“W-what are you talking about? I wouldn’t have the time for such! Don’t mess with me!”

“You don’t have a brother complex either, do you?”

“What is that, even!?”

“Well, it’s okay to have no experience. Just leave everything to big sis here.”

“What are you acting all haughty for!?” the girl retorted in embarrassment. “You don’t have any experience either, do you!?”

“No,” Izumi said, holding the girl’s shoulders. “I don’t mean to boast, but I’ve gone through a lot in my time in this world. These hands have even held Divine beauty, once or twice.”

“That’s obviously a lie…”

“Here. Look at me.”

With great exertion of will, Millanueve looked back at Izumi. She was bright red up to her ears, like a traffic light. Her sky-blue eyes were moist, nearly to the point of overflowing with tears, glittering in the light of the fireplace. Her lip trembled. She was cute. Absurdly cute. At that moment, Izumi was certain that what she held surpassed any wonders of the elven land.

“I’m going to kiss you now,” she repeated, leaning closer.

“I know...!” Millanueve replied, torn by almost violent emotion, unsure of what she was even saying.

Holding her hand on the side of the girl’s face, half to calm her down, half in an effort to keep her from escaping, Izumi leaned slowly closer, closer, letting their noses lightly touch, before meeting Millanueve's lips with her own.

“Hn!”

It wasn’t a particularly tender kiss.

Millanueve was tense and trembling, pressing her lips tightly together. Not knowing how to respond, or daring to. She had her eyes firmly shut too. Izumi didn’t care. She touched Millanueve’s lips with her own, embracing the girl, holding her close. She kissed the bottom lip and the upper lip separately, then the pointy nose, savoring the rare human contact to the fullest, feeling waves of unprecedented happiness and relief pass through her. Lifting her face, she rubbed her nose against the young knight’s pale forehead, taking in Millanuve’s scent, and brought her lips up to place a kiss on—

——And in the next moment, the girl in her arms was someone else.

A tanned vixen of dark curls, a charming, mischievous grin on her lips, a playful look in the emerald eyes, reflecting sinful, carnal lust.

“Khh….!” The warmth in Izumi’s heart was at once replaced by a chilling terror, and she pulled back, averting her face, scared, scared, scared.

“Ha…?” Millanueve opened her eyes. “W-what’s wrong?”

Izumi quickly stood, wavering, and walked over to the window across the room, hiding her face.

“No...Sorry,” she forced an answer, panting, her pulse painfully quick and heavy. “Guess I’m just exhausted...”

Gathering herself, Izumi glanced briefly back and saw only Millanueve de Guillon, an expression of deep concern and dismay on the girl’s still flushed face. A play of flames and shadows. A waking dream. Berating herself for losing her cool, yet unable to rid herself of the lingering terror either, Izumi wobbled back to her spot on the floor, and laid down, turning her back to the fire and the girl seated beside it.

“...We’ll pick up from there once you grow older,” she muttered, pulling her coat tighter on.

“W-w-w-what’s that supposed to mean!?” Millanueve yelled. “Give me a breeeak!”

Izumi didn’t speak again. In a moment, rattled and weak for the shock, tired out by the accumulated fatigue from the past weeks, she passed out into restless slumber.

Millanueve remained where she sat, listening to the woman’s breathing for a time, trying hard to understand what had just happened, every bit of sleepiness shaken from her.

“I can’t believe this!” she sighed, feeling unfathomably disappointed, though she couldn’t quite say why. “What’s wrong with her…?”

Waiting in vain for her heart to calm down, knowing she wasn’t going to sleep easily, Millanueve picked up the fragmented book she had set aside before, and started over. She had to distract herself somehow, from the storm of emotion still raging in her bosom. She impatiently turned the pages in the fireplace's glow, barely conscious of what her eyes were seeing. A great many pages had been lost towards the back end, and the part where she resumed was dated more than a year after the previously seen record.

12th of Jaanat, on the year 922 of the GODS’ COVENANT WITH THE WORLD, Cycle 33

With the coming of a new year, fortune has begun to smile upon our tested lot once more. After so many months’ of restless waiting for (…) the results went beyond our most deranged hopes. There can be no one left at Tradden who denies my faith now. Indeed, all the others now share it, & ever shall I thank the Divines for proving me right. Needless to say, I knew from the beginning that my unwavering trust was not misplaced, but grounded in reason & objective judgment. If there are any misgivings lingering, they would be over the late appearance of our valorous friends—though the reasons given were noble, mind you!—but which nevertheless came to cost us the lives of eighteen of our number, including poor Madias, Josif, and Mark. (…) far be it from me to blame our (...) for our sorrows, however, since without their timely arrival, the casualties could have been far more severe, & perhaps our endeavor as a whole could have ended miserably. With a wondrous effect (…) delivered from Death’s door, including little Edith, and even my dear Elaine! Allow me to record it here now, for all future generations to know, beyond all reasonable doubt, that Erekhigan the Wise is as kind as he is able, and a friend to all men.