Chapter 62: How to Cross the Desert (9)

Ordinary people do not perceive it.

War.

How heavy a meaning is contained in that short resonance.

For most, it was text that would pass by fleetingly, but at least for those involved, it meant the complete end of life.

A scar that could not be erased for a lifetime.

Was it a holy war to realize justice?

Or was it just a means for adults' greed?

It was a meaningless worry.

It was laughable to examine the justification now.

What was important was that war broke out, and that countless children cried out loud.

The world was dyed with the light of despair.

<The war is over.>

<But too many people died to call it a victory...>

Even after the end of the war, the war continues.

Though it was said the dead were pardoned from life with death as indulgence, the survivors had to pay the price without fail.

The pus dripping imitates recovery with just the word "end of war".

While turning a blind eye even to festering wounds.

<Josh? A letter arrived for you.>

<I don't know the exact contents. It just seemed to be a letter from the hometown you used to sing about.>

The boy was the same.

A letter received one day.

Cruel reality does not discriminate against people.

When the carefully folded paper is carefully unfolded, even solid hope shatters into pieces.

Unbelievable contents filled the text in succession.

[The village was annihilated.]

A sentence written coldly.

The hometown village the boy had left with lingering attachment was completely destroyed by the enemy country's annihilation magic.

Those driven into a corner finally resorted to forbidden magic.

The hometown changed into an uninhabitable land overnight.

Due to the aftermath of the magic, the village changed like a desert, and magical beasts born containing twisted mana ran rampant.

People died one by one as if infected with disease.

A city that met destruction.

This was the identity of the desert we had wandered for days.

The old man smiled bitterly and said:

"I didn't intend to deceive you."

Time was imprinted on his old wrinkles.

The old man who had been caressing the gravestone for a moment soon looked at us standing with blank expressions.

"It was like that from the start. I began this journey to meet Rosalyn."

"......"

"......"

We were silent, unable to easily speak.

[Rosalyn Meriart, Rests Here.]

A single gravestone standing before our eyes.

The reunion of the two who had waited a lifetime was perhaps concluded with the sorrow they had least wanted.

The old man calmly continued his explanation.

"Isn't it strange? A single gravestone standing alone on such a remote hill."

His hazy eyes were lost in reminiscence for a moment.

It was a memory left in childhood.

<If we ever get separated, let's meet again at the brightest star in that night sky!>

<Do you mean that blue star visible there?>

<How about it? It's clearly visible so it's good, right?>

<How do we get to the star...?>

<I don't know either! But by the time we become adults, won't we know how to get to the stars?>

<That sounds plausible unexpectedly.>

<Then is it a promise?>

<Yes...!>

It was a promise made on this very hill.

Lying side by side among the bushes, counting the brilliantly pouring stars one by one.

It was also a moment the boy had lived without forgetting for a lifetime.

And

"She asked to be buried on this hill... when she died."

The girl was no different.

She too had lived reflecting on the 15 years spent with the boy until the moment she reached the end of her life.

The two had never forgotten each other even once.

"Like fools."

She should have forgotten such a promise.

She should have left this wretched village, seduced a handsome man and married, lived happily amidst blessings.

How could she not have met a single man until that age?

If I had known this would happen.

"...If I had known this would happen, I should have smiled even a little when we parted."

The last scene he remembered.

The part where they turned their backs on each other in anger.

It wasn't even an important matter, so why did they waste the moment of farewell on a mere emotional fight?

The old man gently stroked the gravestone.

"Where is there a life without regrets?"

Only a single sentence summarizes life.

The old man who had been chewing over contemplation for a while soon came to his senses and turned his gaze this way.

"Please don't think badly of me."

"Elder."

"I was sincere when I said I would guide you to a nearby city. If you walk in this direction for a few hours, you should come across a new village."

"Are you not going to come with us?"

"I have somewhere else to go."

"By somewhere else, you mean..."

"I have to go keep a promise."

He smiled along with incomprehensible words.

As he stood frozen like that, before long the old man coughed up blood.

Bright red blood poured onto the ground.

"Cough cough...!"

Though it was something we had experienced several times already, this time his condition was noticeably worse.

Legs staggering as if dizzy.

The old man soon sat down leaning his back against the gravestone.

It was a shabby collapsing appearance.

"E-Elder!"

We reached out our arms to support him, but the old man firmly refused help.

He just kept coughing and muttering.

"Cough! I'm, fine."

"It seems you've really reached your limit now, wh-what should we do? We need to get to the village at least to receive treatment...!"

"I was already, given a terminal, ugh, diagnosis... They said at most a month."

The old man showed not a trace of disorder.

His voice rang out calmly.

It was an end he had prepared for long and long.

As if belatedly realizing the meaning of his words, Regia was blankly tearing up.

The old man smiled.

"Why are you all making such sad faces?"

"......"

"E-Elder..."

"Cough... It would be nice if you smiled."

His pupils remained transparent.

It spread gently on the dawn wind with a soft resonance.

"It may look like I'm dying, but that's not the case."

"......"

"As you know, stars are very far away, aren't they? It would be difficult to go with this body. It's too heavy."

The star they had promised to meet at.

The old man... no, the boy was now going to meet the girl.

The single rose he had loved so much.

"So won't you congratulate me?"

It will be a splendid scene.

When the old man looks at the stars, all the stars will look like wells with pulleys.

All the stars will give him water to drink.

This was not death.

It was just preparation to set out on a long journey.

Now the boy from 50 years ago would gain new wings and set out on a journey towards the most brilliant star hanging in the night sky.

It was a page of a beautiful fairy tale even just imagining.

"Thank you for accompanying me on this long journey."

"It was my honor."

"E-Elder... hic."

We said our farewells.

As we listened to the coughing continuing for a while, suddenly a faint light lingered around the old man's body.

It was a mysterious color.

Rustle-.

The sickly body gradually became transparent, then slowly began to crumble into pure white light,

Like dust blowing in the wind.

The old man was scattering to become remnants of the desert.

"Ah,"

A faint exclamation flowed out.

Aged eyes blankly looking up at the sky.

He was spending the night with stars like in the old days.

Whoosh-.

Twinkling specks were densely embedded on the pitch-black background painted with darkness.

A group of stars lifting the curtain of deep night.

The million stars embroidered erased loneliness with a million lights.

Perhaps it was.

A moment representing one axis of a lifetime.

The old man stretched his arms towards the sky.

What his trembling hand pointed to was none other than the brightest single star in the night sky.

He vaguely recited.

"I'm coming to meet you, Rosalyn."

The old man closed his eyelids like that.

His body that had crumbled without a trace afterwards soon fluttered freely and flew high into the sky.

Towards the star where the girl would be waiting.

***

We stood in place for a while.

The old man who had set out on a long journey.

Regia was shedding tears.

As she had built quite a connection over the past ten days, the sadness of parting was enough to make the girl cry.

Even such fragmentary moments would become fertilizer for the protagonist's growth.

"Hic, huu......"

For someone it was dawn starting a long journey, but for someone else it was morning ending a long journey.

We had finally safely escorted the old man to his destination.

The episode's clear condition was achieved.

At the same time, a signal announcing the end dyed our ears.

Creak-!

A sound like hinges creaking rang out.

When we raised our heads following the sudden noise, a small door was wide open above the sky.

A door attached to the intact sky.

It was an alien yet mysterious scene.

It was time to leave this world now.

I took the sobbing girl's hand and carefully led the way.

Trudge trudge-.

Stairs that seemed to be made by folding the night sky.

As we carefully trod the air and climbed up, soon a door opening in the sky welcomed us.

Pure white light was surging beyond the door.

"It's all over now."

Though we hesitated looking back, we moved our steps towards the light.

Our vision dyeing brilliantly and fading to black.

[EP???. How to Cross the Desert]

-A Door Opening in the Sky, A Boy Spending the Night with Stars-

The episode ended like that.

***

When we opened our eyes again, we were standing in an empty alley.

"Hmm."

"Wh-Where is this...?"

We quietly looked around.

Familiar scenery appearing in view.

We had returned to the academy.

Unlike the ten days we had spent inside the book, not much time seemed to have passed in reality.

At most about 2 hours perhaps.

"......"

I quietly scanned the surroundings.

Though we had clearly been inside an old shop until just before leaving, somehow the building had disappeared without a trace.

Only an empty vacant lot greeted us.

As if such a shop had never existed here from the start.

It seemed to follow the original work after all.

Originally when an episode ended, the shop's records were cleanly deleted from the field too.

What remained for the player was only the reward item.

And the strange book picked up at the start.

"Y-Young Master... What on earth happened?"

"Well."

I picked up a book rolling on the ground.

It was a book covered in old leather.

The title [How to Cross the Desert] sparkled in golden letters on the cover.

I gently turned the pages.

Rustle-.

An illustration appearing on the very last page reached.

It was a picture containing the figures of a boy and girl.

Only a simple title was attached below.

[Josh and Rosalyn]

The two were embracing each other with dazzling smiles in some world as beautiful as the night sky.

They looked as if they had just reunited.

A faint smile spread on my lips.

I who had been fiddling with the page soon answered towards the girl standing beside me.

It was a voice gently dyeing the dark background.

"It was just the end of a fairy tale."

I closed the book.

Before I knew it, a new sentence was written on the cover instead of the original title.

It had changed in the moment I took my eyes off it.

I muttered that single line inwardly.

[Thank you.]

A greeting left by an unknown someone.

We looked down at those letters silently for a while.