Chapter 221. Ruin in the Forest (1)
"A conversation, sure. I don't mind."
What could Alicia possibly want to talk about, pressing in this close against his back? But before Enoch had time to mull it over, she spoke first.
"Once we really do deal with Indiviltal this time, what would be the right thing for us to do?"
Her voice was so soft it tickled his ear. At her slender, forthright whisper, Enoch closed his eyes for a moment, then slowly opened them again.
"You still haven't decided?"
"Honestly, I'm not sure. Ummm, by all rights I thought we were definitely supposed to follow the Dragoons' orders, but now even that's…"
"What does your heart say?"
"It's, it's embarrassing to admit — I think I told you this before. But the truth is, my real feelings haven't changed."
She whispered softly from behind him.
"I think the Dragoons should have taken part in this operation. To protect the powerless people of the Outsourcing District!"
"……"
Her voice at his back was full of conviction, yet there was a trace of hesitation woven through it.
Lying on his side with his back to her, Enoch didn't turn around. He stared at the darkness with an expressionless face.
"It's just, I'm not sure anymore either."
"……In what way?"
"Up until now, I just vaguely believed it was right to faithfully follow the Dragoons' orders. But is that really true?"
Enoch glanced back at her for a moment.
In the moonlight filtering through the darkness, she was lying at his back, clutching one of her own arms, gazing up at him intently.
"I thought I had to stay faithful to my mission."
Mission.
The words she had once heard, from the memories he had inherited from the previous Sword Saint of the Waves, flickered through Enoch's mind.
[— To seek out for yourself the mission you wish to fulfill, and to hold firm to the will to see it through — that is what it means to be truly strong.]
[— I pray that you too, my lady, will find a true mission of your own within the life you live.]
Perhaps it was the influence of the memories Enoch had seen and heard then.
The thought that this very dilemma — the one he and Alicia were now wrestling with — might be a road the Sword Saint of old had walked before them, stirred an odd feeling in him.
A dilemma faced by a Sword Saint who had walked the path of the sword hundreds of years ago, or perhaps even longer.
Should he call this a kind of kinship, or mere coincidence? He didn't know.
"Lord Enoch, do you have a mission like mine?"
Alicia asked then.
"I'm curious. What's your life been like, as a Direct Lineage? I've heard the rumors a few times. That one of the Elsyde Direct Lineage is a non-mage. But how did you suddenly become like this…"
"Well, I think I've been asked that sort of question a few times before."
"Huh?"
There was a faint rustling from behind him, as if Alicia had tilted her head slightly. Paying it no mind, Enoch spoke quietly.
"There are reasons I can't tell you right now, but someday I might be able to."
"Ohhh! I see, that's how it is!"
From behind, he heard Alicia nodding earnestly, as if she understood perfectly.
He'd worried his answer might come across as awkward, but an Elsyde Direct Lineage laying bare his own past wasn't exactly a common occurrence. If anything, this kind of reply was probably the more natural one.
He glanced back to find Alicia watching him in silence, her eyes wide. He had no idea what she was thinking. Enoch lay flat on his back.
A vast night sky filled his vision.
Starlight poured down from countless stars beyond counting, spilling over the forest. Staring up at the sky with his dark-blue eyes, Enoch spoke quietly.
"Someday I may be able to tell you all sorts of things. What kind of person I am, how I've lived. And everything about just what it is I'm going through, too."
"Ah! That's a promise, then!"
Beside him, Alicia clutched the waterproof sheet tightly, her voice a little excited as she whispered.
"Yeah. But, at least not now."
Enoch rolled onto his side, his back to her.
That was when he noticed the rustling had drawn much closer. Turning his head slightly, he saw Alicia in the darkness, pulling the waterproof sheet up to her neck as she peered up at him with wide, fixed eyes.
Her expression made it clear she found this conversation rather fascinating.
Watching her — looking for all the world like someone with no intention of going to sleep — Enoch let out a quiet sigh and added calmly,
"For now, you should get some sleep. We'll have to move out as soon as it's light tomorrow."
"Then can I borrow your back for a bit?"
"……?"
He couldn't quite grasp what the "then" was doing there.
Without waiting for anything like his consent, Alicia slowly burrowed her way under the waterproof sheet Enoch had pulled over himself.
Since he had no real choice but to stay put, Alicia, looking quite pleased, pressed her forehead lightly against his back.
"What are you doing?"
"Ahaha, it's strange, isn't it? Maybe because you saved me, Direct Lineage, but I thought staying like this might calm me down a bit!"
"What do you mean… calm down?"
"Yes, ahaha."
Alicia smiled quietly and added,
"I know it probably doesn't suit a member of the Dragoons to be saying something like this."
Alicia pressed her head firmly against Enoch's back for a moment. Her slender hand lightly gripped the back of his shirt.
"The truth is, I'm scared."
Trembling.
Through the fabric, he could feel her fingertips quivering ever so slightly. Enoch half-closed his eyes.
"Scared. Of Indiviltal?"
"That too, but… it's a little different. More than the beasts, it's about my own mission."
With her forehead still resting against his back where he lay, she bowed her head and whispered quietly.
"If. If what I believe in turns out to be wrong, what am I supposed to do then?"
"Who knows."
Enoch spoke quietly, his eyes on the darkness.
"Agonizing over it like that is fine, but reality might not wait for you."
"Then I'd like to ask just one more thing."
She lowered her gaze quietly.
"May I ask, Direct Lineage, what it is you're fighting for on this solo mission?"
"Well…"
Enoch found himself equivocating without meaning to.
What was he taking up his sword and fighting for?
Simply to survive? Or if not that, then to uncover the truth of everything that awaited him in this world — the possession, the past, the prophecy, all of it?
He didn't know.
Maybe all of those were the answer. Maybe there was something more beyond them.
Still, there was one thing he could say to the girl behind him, the girl bowing her head and trembling faintly.
"Alicia, the reason I fight isn't anything grand. It's not as noble as a mission."
"Huh?"
A talent the Empire had, until now, never acknowledged.
Enoch, who had leveled nothing but a single sword at the darkness all this time — perhaps only someone like him could say these words.
"At the very least, if I didn't want to die. I had to."
Enoch spoke in even tones.
"Of course, I have no intention of dying, and there's a purpose I absolutely have to survive to see through."
"A purpose, you say?"
Enoch gave a quiet nod.
"That's right. I don't know if it'll be possible, but someday I want to find it out. There's a future I want to see."
"The future…"
"On top of that, I figured it was important to make the best choice in this operation, if only so that no innocent lives are lost in the Outsourcing District."
"Ah…!!"
At his words, Alicia's eyes widened for some reason. Watching her calmly, Enoch added,
"But that's my reason for fighting. It can't be your reason for standing on the battlefield, Alicia."
"That's… I suppose so."
"You're my squad. At the very least, I have no intention of stopping you from doing what you want to do. If the mission given to you and what you truly intend aren't the same thing…"
Enoch said,
"Then I hope you'll find your own mission. Alicia."
[— May you find a true mission within your life.]
As he spoke, the voice from the memory he'd heard while inheriting from the previous Sword Saint of the Waves seemed to drift past him once again.
"You're right, now that you say it!"
Alicia's voice rang in his ears just then.
When he glanced back, she was gazing at him intently, wearing a clear, bright smile that seemed to shine through the darkness.
"Thank you, Direct Lineage!"
"Thank you? I didn't really do…"
"No. Thanks to you, I think I understand just a little bit of what I need to do!"
Seeing her spirits restored, Enoch nodded.
"Good. I'm glad, then."
…Honestly, he'd been a little worried whether his answer had really been a proper one, but judging by Alicia's spirited reaction, it must have been a decent reply after all.
And really, that was enough.
Even if it hadn't been the right answer in any strict sense, so long as it could at least offer Alicia enough peace of mind to rest, that was all he needed.
"For now, let's focus on what's in front of us."
Enoch added in a composed tone.
"Nothing gets solved by sitting still."
"Ahaha, you're right. Somehow I feel like I know you just a little better now, Direct Lineage, and I'm glad of that!"
At his words, Alicia seemed to feel lighter. She gave a quiet, stifled breath and smiled brightly.
"So. Can you sleep now?"
"Yes. Probably."
She whispered softly.
"So, your back. Let me borrow it just a bit longer, like this."
"What?"
But before he could say anything, Alicia rested her forehead against Enoch's back and murmured in a drowsy voice.
"Your back, Direct Lineage, it's a whole lot wider'n I thought, so stayin' like this — I feel safe-like, ya know…"
Apparently that was that.
What was she doing, Enoch thought, turning his gaze to the sky as he lay on his side.
After all that conversation just now, he figured sleep wouldn't come easily for a while. He'd brushed it off as no big deal, but strangely enough, thanks to the soft sensation and warmth at his back, his awareness dimmed surprisingly quickly.
***
Beneath his eyelids, a bright flicker of light pulsed.
A gentle breeze carrying the crisp air of dawn brushed from the nape of his neck across his shoulder. Tree branches swayed, making sunlight flicker and fade between the leaves.
The weather today looked like it would hold.
Then he heard something flutter and flap in the wind, and with eyes half-open, he lifted his head.
The waterproof sheet he'd pulled over himself during the night had gone crooked at some point, no longer properly covering his legs, its edges snapping in the wind. Yet despite that, a warm heat could be felt against his body.
The reason was easy enough to find.
"Ah."
Beside Enoch, in place of a blanket, a beautiful girl lay right next to him. Close enough that their foreheads were almost touching, she was sound asleep.
Cheerful birds chirped, tweeting away. Light slanting through the branches fell brightly on Alicia's face.
Right before his nose, her uniform thoroughly rumpled, Alicia slept as peacefully as could be, even drooling a little.
She had both arms wrapped tightly around one of Enoch's arms, hugging it to herself like a pillow.
Her smooth, pretty leg, sheathed in her stocking, was draped right across Enoch's chest — apparently serving as her substitute for a hugging pillow on this side.
Turning his head ever so carefully, bit by bit, so as not to wake her, his eyes drifted — against his usual efforts to look away — to her chest.
The beautiful line of her collarbone, running from her fully exposed neck down to her slender shoulder. Beneath her uniform, the swell of her chest rose and fell softly, so close that a single movement would have made contact.
Alicia's graceful face was right before his eyes. Every time her soft breath brushed against the nape of his neck, the back of his neck tingled.
She was beautiful. He thought so honestly.
"……"
Her uniform blouse had come untucked from her skirt, exposing her narrow waist with two or three buttons undone. One of her stockings, revealing the milky skin of her thigh beneath her skirt, had slipped halfway off — from her sleeping habits, perhaps.
With her clothes so defenselessly in disarray and her pale skin so plainly on display, Enoch, not knowing where to look, reluctantly turned his head the other way.
And the next moment, he found himself at a loss for words.
"Hrkk…"
Right in front of where he'd just turned his head.
There, gazing down at him with steady, greenish-blue eyes, sat a silver-haired girl.
Sitting primly as she looked down at him, her gaze was cool as she spoke.
"You're awake, Young Master."
"Lien, don't tell me you didn't sleep at all?"
"No. I slept plenty, as I usually do."
After saying so, Lien quietly watched Alicia for a moment — asleep with both arms wrapped tightly around Enoch's arm — her eyes even and composed.
"Well, then. Shall we depart?"
Enoch nodded.
It seemed Lien had slept in REM-stage rest while keeping watch at his side through the night, on guard for a nighttime assault from the magical beasts. If she'd at least slept like that, it was something.
Just as he was worrying about Lien.
Beside him, Alicia's eyelids fluttered half-open, and she rubbed at her eyes briefly as if the light dazzled her. Then she quietly looked at Enoch.
"Ah, Direct Lineage. Good morn…"
And the next moment, when she glanced down at her own chest, she seemed to finally register her own posture and state of dress — her face went bright red, and her eyes flew wide in a startled jolt.
"Th-! That! A m- mirror! Do you have a mirror?!"
To Alicia, now stammering, Enoch silently pulled out his terminal and handed it over. She took it and, holding it up to check her reflection in the screen, began to clumsily set her clothes back in order.
"Ugh, what have I been doing…!!"
Come to think of it, Aslin had said last time that Alicia was hopeless with machines. Was she really unable to even open the mirror app on a terminal? Maybe she was worse with technology than he'd thought.
But at that very moment, a low and resonant howl echoed from far off, rolling through the branches of the forest.
— GRRRRRRRR!!
In an instant, all the bustling mood in the air vanished, and a sharp tension swept over the group.
A signal of threat that made it more than clear — this was still enemy territory, and the last of their rest was over.
Enoch, conscious of the black cloth bag he hadn't let go of from one hand even in sleep, planted it against the ground and rose to his feet as he asked,
"Alicia, how's your condition?"
"No problems! Just as you said, I should have absolutely no trouble carrying out the operation!"
Alicia grabbed the lance she'd left leaning upside-down against a tree, kicked up the tip with her foot, and spun it into her grip.
Then Alicia glanced back at Enoch.
"Let's move out! If we're going to break through the ruins to take out Indiviltal, we'd better start moving, fast and without stopping, from this point on!"