The planes of snow continued to look endless. The mountain ranges looked far as ever. The clouds, still there, showing not a single spot of the blue. The slow snowfall was light, but could soon become harsh and deadly.

Time after time, Nathanael found something new, yet the scenery of the plains was always the same.

He knew of the cliffs, mountains, and forest, but has yet to go near any of them. There was no need to go to them at the time, but Nathanael would want to explore some of those areas.

Especially an area that had hot springs that Seth once mentioned;

“I need to wash, I really am starting to smell. Why are there no showers here?” Nathanael once asked.

“There is no water source nearby. And I’m not going to use planks of wood to create fire and melt the snow for that.”

“Then how do you keep yourself clean?”

“In a crystalized cave are geothermal hot springs. Just warm enough to bathe in. I go there every one or two weeks, it’s quite a track.”

“I need to check the place out myself. Of course, you would need to show me the way.”

Nathanael was ready to head off with Seth to that cavern with the hot springs, but couldn’t. Because the girl finally spoke.

“Huh?”

“…E-Etta.”

The girl grabbed his arm as he was about to leave the room and venture outside. She took all her courage, felt the cold scarcely dissipate, and said her name.

“…My name… Etta.” Though it was warm inside the house, she still shivered as she held his arm.

“Etta? That’s a nice name. Do you still feel cold?”

She nodded.

Nathanael helped her go back to bed and pulled the covers over her. He sat by the chair next to the bed. The travel to the cavern would be put on hold.

“Are you ready to talk now? I hope it’s okay to know what happened to you.”

It took a minute. But she eventually started telling him about her memories. Or what she could recollect from her dreams.

She ran with her brother through the snow, away from their house. Following the carved trees, escaping the abstracted void, finding father. Then losing sight of him as the skies fell and made the earth quiver. Brother fought the unseen, then Etta lost his hand and got separated.

A memory between was blocked within her mind.

She opened the shelter’s only hatch and closed it once entering with frozen tears in her goggles.

Then after that, nothing. Only waking up in a different bunker, waiting for a few days until Nathanael and Seth found her.

All the while she told Nathanael this, he held the drawings she created and compared them to her words.

“Why are the faces blurred?” he asked.

“…Mm,” she answered.

“You don’t remember them, do you?”

She looked down with a sad expression.

“…Mm…”

“I’m the same. I don’t remember anything from my past. Or perhaps it isn’t exactly the same, you still remember them, but not their faces.”

Maybe like my dream? The figures I see. All blurred, only their forms could be shown. But I don’t see them act in those dreams. They only stand there, facing me, doing nothing.

She ran through a snowy forest. The forest that Seth said was nearby? Is her house somewhere there? Perhaps her father or brother is still there. But is it safe? Something followed her, she didn’t know what they were, or what they looked like. Whatever that is, it’s dangerous. How dangerous though? Did they get her family?

Nathanael wanted to help her. To protect her. To find her family. He hoped they were still alive.

“You want to find them, don’t you?”

Etta nodded.

“I’ll see what I can do. I would need to speak with Seth first, though.”

“…Mm.”

She really doesn’t speak that much. But at least she said something.

Surprisingly, Seth agreed.

“Finding her home somewhere in that forest? Fine, I do need to search the forest more than I have done.”

“You agreed to this much easier than I thought…”

“I haven’t gone there many times. It’s highly dangerous after all.”

“How dangerous?”

“Well…” Seth took a second to think. “The air is toxic. And further down the center you go, it’ll become nearly impossible to survive without a mask.”

Nathanael looked down at the gas mask. He hasn’t used it once since he was given it. Seth made sure he had the mask every time they went outside the house, even just going to the workshop. Nathanael has yet to be given a better answer than, “the air is toxic”.

Why is the air toxic? What causes the air to be deadly? And why do I need it when he specifically says it’s only in the forest? What is in there?

Nathanael and Seth ventured towards that cavern of hot springs. It felt the same as trudging towards the bunkers and that village. Still the same snow.

But there was a difference. They were going straight towards the mountains. But as Nathanael walked, it still looked far away. Nothing feels to change. Until they stumbled across a hole.

It was more like a sinkhole. The range from one end to the other was close to a kilometer, and it was nearly a perfect circle. The ridges were sharp and close to impossible to climb down or up. The depth was around five hundred meters.

Seth showed him a tunnel that would bring them down. It was rather narrow and was actually more like a ravine. You could see snow on the ceiling, if not walking carefully above ground, you might just end up falling down this narrow chasm.

There were many cracks like this around the hole, and once Nathanael made it all the way down, he could see the many caves around every side.

“Careful now, the ground looks snowy, but beneath it is hard ice. You might slip, but it won’t break easily.”

Nathanael got to his knee and swiped away the snow, and then knocked twice on the ice. It was definitely hard.

“Right. Got it.”

In one of the many cavern entrances, Nathanael stared at one in awe. Crystalline structures, big and small, covered nearly every wall and the entire ceiling. They came out of the ruptured crust. Lines and lines, all connected to one prime crystal further in the cave.

They didn’t glow. They only act as mirrors. Nathanael could see his reflection everywhere he looked.

He tried remembering something about the crystals. They weren’t icicles, he was sure of that. He thought he would recognize them once seeing them with his own eyes, similar to the other objects and things he has seen. Yet nothing really came to mind.

These crystals sprouted from the ground, walls, and ceiling, pointing their sharp ends in all directions. He was certain icicles aren’t normally formed in such various ways. He could only remember them having their end facing down.

Seth and Nathanael followed the crystal veins further in the cave. The minerals were getting more abundant, and as the cavern opened more and more, the crystals looked to become bigger.

Nathanael entered the central chamber of the cavern after Seth, and there he was met with an unbelievable sight.

A giant crystal, close to the size of Seth’s house, hung over a pool of water. Hot steam hovered up to the ceiling, and the ice coating the main crystal melted slowly. The tip dripped the melted ice every so often down to the hot spring.

A calm, peaceful aura. That was the feeling he had. Close to no sound, except for that dripping. And once he got closer, he could hear bubbles coming from the other smaller pools around the cavern.

“That central hot spring is just hot enough to get in. The others around it would easily burn your skin. The volcanic lava beneath has a current flowing around the central cavern, thankfully far enough from the center.”

“Incredible.”

“Isn’t it? I’m fortunate to have found it.”

There wasn’t much light. Seth has put up torches from when he first ventured through here, now he was going around and lighting them all.

The crystals reflected the fiery glow. Red, orange, and yellow flickered on all the walls and pools. This cavern suddenly felt more alive.

“You can take your bath. I already had mine yesterday.”

“Huh?”

Seth suddenly walked off with nothing else to say. Now Nathanael was left alone and bewildered.

What? Huh? He already came here yesterday? He must have left really early then, I saw him come back to the house when half the day had already gone by.

Nathanael didn’t want to think much of it. Perhaps Seth was the type to bathe in private, without others around.

“At least he was kind enough to show me the way here. Not that I could easily track the way back through the same plains of snow,” he muttered.

Seriously, how does he do it? Does he really just use the mountains to find his way around? I can’t even see that as a possibility when everything looks the same.

Or that is just how long he has been around this area. He knows every little thing. Every secret place. Every bunker, village, and caverns. Everything around the plains of snow.

“This old man…”

I must not get separated, I would easily get lost. I would most likely die without him.

I hope he doesn’t leave me behind here, that would suck.

He took a moment to think further on that last thought.

“He wouldn’t really leave me, would he?”

He had a bad feeling. A new kind of bad feeling. Was it a feeling of betrayal? A feeling of being tricked and abandoned. Yeah, that was the feeling. A nasty feeling.

But why would he leave me? There should be a good answer for that. Has he had enough of me and my questions? Did he not want to deal with me anymore? Has he done this to someone else before? Is that why there are empty rooms?

No, he just has those rooms for people coming from the harsh snow outside. Like me. Would there be any gain to leave me here?

Yeah. He’s just waiting at the exit. He couldn’t have left. No way.

Nathanael thought. And pondered. The single drip, drip, drip could be heard much louder. The torches still had enough fuel for the entire day. He had time to ponder further.

“Seth? Hello!? I hope you are still there!” Nathanael called towards the exit tunnel. Yet he didn’t get a response.

Then my decision is made.

He dropped his backpack and dashed out after the old man. He wasn’t going to be left here. Nathanael wouldn’t allow him to leave.

There were many paths to take, it was almost like a maze. But thanks to the snow that came from the outside, traversing the wind, he could track his way back without getting lost.

The crystal reflection ran with him, he could see his own desperation. Not seeing Seth halfway out the tunnel made him want to run faster.

You wouldn’t leave, right? You wouldn’t abandon me here, right? You aren’t that cruel, right? Right? Right!?

Adrenaline rushed through his system. He couldn’t think of anything else than being stranded here. In the crystal cavern. He did have food and materials for a fire with him that could last for two days. If he rationed his resources, he could last a few more.

If Seth was nowhere to be found, he would need to quickly find his tracks. All he hoped was that it wasn’t snowing. And if the tracks are gone, only luck could save him.

Nathanael always looked around while he walked through the white desert, and kept track of the mountains. But he still believed it impossible to track his way back with only a mound of rock and stone. The vertical, sharp peaks, piercing the heavens above the clouds. A compass that could only work if there were more landmarks around.

The crystal spikes pointed their ends in all directions, they shrunk more and more as Nathanael closed in on the exit. He saw the light ahead. The sun that lit the endless clouds, lighting the endless snow.

Up until now, Seth was nowhere to be seen. He has been left alone. To die in the cavern with crystals and hot springs. Rows and rows of bad thoughts, he couldn’t think of anything else. Only thoughts on how he would die.

Starvation. Hypothermia. A slip into a crevasse. The ice breaks and into the cold waters he goes.

He didn’t think of surviving. There was close to zero of that chance happening. He would die. His lost memories, never to be returned. Never to remember his past. No answers to be given. Dying without knowing anything. Dying without finding his purpose.

He didn’t want that at all. He didn’t want to leave this world in such a miserable way.

“Seth! Where are you!?” Nathanael shouted.

Etta would be left alone with the liar. That old man who thought nothing but of himself. Nathanael couldn’t bring himself to think of what would happen to her. Would she be left alone like him? To die out here with no rescue on the horizon?

Seth was ready to leave the girl in the bunker. Nathanael wouldn’t be surprised if he threw her somewhere far away from the house.

Bad thoughts. Bad ideas. Bad future. Bad. Bad. Bad. It was all bad.

Nathanael made it out of the cave. He breathed in and out at a rapid pace. Running with heavy, warm clothing wasn’t ideal in this situation. Beads of sweat ran down his forehead. He could hear his heartbeat pulsate.

Anxiety flowed through him, and he started to hear a slight endless ringing noise within his ears. He felt he might collapse any second now.

Nathanael turned his head. And if his eyes weren’t deceiving him, he saw the old man.

He sat on a foldable chair, which was part of his backpack, and looked at him as if seeing an idiot.

“Are you done with your bath?” Seth asked.

Slight embarrassment arose. But only slight. He wasn’t far from the idea of being left abandoned. Seth left the cave after all.

“I… um… No.”

“Then go back to it. Don’t waste time gawking around. Nighttime could come when you least expect it.”

“R-right.”

He slowly took a step back into the cave. Then peaked back out to see if Seth was still there. He was. And he had his eyes closed. Was he sleeping?

And with that, all his bad thoughts dissipated. But not all of them, he was still afraid he would ditch him. Yet Seth was waiting outside, and not leaving.

I guess he isn’t as bad as I thought…

He could still leave. But he won’t. I guess I was wrong. This feeling of distress. And a high amount of it. He won’t leave. Yeah. I was wrong, and he will wait for me.

I can still trust him? Right? Nathanael’s mind was still in conflict. He still felt a great number of bad feelings, and then some amount of relief. I’ll take my bath. If he is not there, then I was truly tricked. And that would be on me. But if he is still there. Then I was wrong.

Nathanael took his bath in the hot spring. And it felt great. Seth was still there once he was done inside the cavern. The old man didn’t leave. Nathanael had the wrong thoughts, but those thoughts could also have been right.