Chapter 68

A covenant?

He was about to ask what that meant when a gentle light began seeping from the deceased hawk.

The light swept once over the pendant tied to the hawk’s ankle, then slowly rose toward the sky.

Quilbion watched the green light stretching high into the heavens.

Was it the hawk’s soul?

If so, it should be heading outward toward the wide-open beyond, not this stifling world.

Quilbion gazed at the green light, then carefully lowered the hawk’s head to the floor.

The light was circling through the air.

The circular trajectory was all too familiar.

It was the pattern the hawk usually showed when indicating direction.

“It seems there’s something it wants to tell me.”

“Go on.”

He climbed onto the railing and kicked off hard. His body cut through the air and surged upward.

He turned his head slightly and looked down.

Winte sat in his chair with crossed legs, the hawk fallen into eternal sleep, and Twella raising her right hand in a gentle wave.

Twella’s face was hazy, as if shrouded in mist. It had been like this once before, hadn’t it?

Twella lowered her waving hand and turned around. She walked along the railing for a bit, then soon disappeared into the darkness beyond.

After descending to the ground, Quilbion looked up at the sky again.

The green light was moving westward.

How long had he moved following the light?

He arrived at the special livestock pen overgrown with vegetation. There was no trace of human presence left to find.

The green light fell between the straight-standing trees. After memorizing the location, he moved.

The light was swirling around the upper part of a large tree. He kicked off lightly and climbed up.

“……So this was your home.”

There was a nest. Inside lay a baby hawk with fluffy down.

Sensing a presence, it raised its thin eyelids. It opened its unformed beak with difficulty and began chirping.

It seemed to be asking for food.

He caught an insect, lightly crushed it, and put it in the baby’s mouth. The baby hawk swallowed with gulping sounds and chirped happily.

The green light that had lingered on the tree disappeared. As if it had finally finished what needed to be done.

He brought the nest back to the dormitory.

The hawk that should have been lying on the rooftop was nowhere to be seen.

When he looked at Winte, Winte raised his finger and pointed at the sky.

“I sent it back to the sky. It wanted that rather than being buried in the ground.”

Winte held out his hand. What he passed over with the gesture of ‘take it’ was the cord and pendant that had been wrapped around the hawk’s ankle.

“There was a baby.”

“You’ve gained one more reason to stay alive.”

“I suppose so. I’ll have to care for it until it can hunt on its own.”

The baby hawk that had been briefly sleeping began chirping again. It had quite an appetite.

“Let me see.”

He handed the nest to Winte. Winte stared intently at the baby hawk, then wiggled his fingers.

A grating sound of wings came.

When he looked around, all sorts of insects were flying over in a line.

The insects crumpled themselves and entered the baby hawk’s mouth.

“It eats well.”

Winte smiled.

“Give this one a name.”

“I can’t do things like that. I just called the pigs I raised ‘first,’ ‘second,’ and so on.”

The baby, satisfied with its meal, closed its eyes and curled its body again.

“Rapfa.”

“What?”

“If you can’t name it, then I’ll have to. Names are important.”

“Rapfa—does it have some meaning?”

“A teacher for the foolish and a guide for the lost. It’s a decent enough name to be passed down to those who will see the farthest from the highest place.”

Winte’s golden eyes sparkled.

What was he seeing?

Winte handed the nest back.

“Take good care of it.”

“I’ve never raised a hawk before, so I’m worried whether I can care for it well.”

“It’s a sturdy and clever one. If it needs something, it’ll give you hints, so just take care of those.”

He went down to the bedroom and placed the nest on Drich’s bed. He covered the surroundings with blankets and made air holes.

He placed the pendant Winte had given him next to the baby hawk.

After arranging everything, he went back up to the rooftop.

Winte wasn’t there.

Where had he gone in the meantime?

He sat in the chair, stretched out his legs, and closed his eyes. It was when he was passing time waiting for sleep that wouldn’t come.

He felt his body sinking.

The premonition came. He was grateful it gave him warning.

He concentrated and held onto his consciousness. The faster he realized it wasn’t reality, the sooner he could return.

“……”

The gray landscape greeted him.

Was this the third time now?

It was a strange place. Swirling gray sand and occasional gray flowers, gray trees.

Even when he looked up at the sky, there was only gray.

In other cracks, there were various species and narratives that ‘Quilbion’ had experienced, but in this world of only gray, he couldn’t find anything.

Quilbion stood still and traced his memories.

There was one person living in this place.

But for some reason, he couldn’t remember their gender or even their face.

He felt like he’d heard some words.

He grabbed his throbbing head and began walking.

His footprints marked the gray sand. Quilbion looked back. Gray sand was piling up again over the long line of footprints.

As if nothing could leave a trace in this place.

Screeeee.

A welcome cry cut through overhead.

When he looked up, a vivid green light was moving rapidly.

Quilbion ran following the light. If he’d had his monstrous body from reality, he would have caught up to the light in a single leap, but here he had to bend at the waist after running for a few minutes as his breath gave out.

He wiped away the sticky sweat beading up and continued following the light.

“Hey! Slow down a bit!”

He shouted toward the sky, but the green light moved at the same speed.

Mischievous thing.

He ran and walked for quite a while. When his legs were trembling and he couldn’t walk anymore, the light stopped.

Quilbion placed his hands on his knees and drew ragged breaths. Saliva dripped from his open mouth.

So running was this exhausting. It was fatigue he was tasting for the first time in nearly 100 years.

“What do you want…… to show me……”

He lifted his head with effort.

Far in the distance, he could see a house. Gray flower beds were visible too. There was someone at the gray bench placed in front of the house.

It was a woman.

The moment he recognized her, the events that had sunk to the bottom of his memory rose up one after another.

When he’d first come to this place, he’d seen a woman who aged and grew young moment by moment. The second time he came, the woman had snapped him to his senses with ‘certain words.’

What had she said again?

He gazed ahead while tracing his memories.

The green light that had been circling above the house descended beside the woman. The light soon transformed into the shape of a hawk.

The massive hawk gradually shrank until it was small enough to perch on the woman’s lap.

The woman cradled the hawk lovingly. The hawk that had been tinted green gradually lost its light.

After losing its color and ceasing movement, it soon became gray sand and flowed between the woman’s knees.

Why?

A terrible emotion he’d long forgotten quietly raised its head. Sadness, anger? Or…

The woman raised her head.

Their gazes clearly met, yet they couldn’t exchange looks.

Quilbion recognized the woman, but the woman seemed completely unable to see Quilbion.

Who was she?

The question pounded loudly in his head.

Who was she?

Another voice answered the whisper of his questioning self. You know.

“Excuse me.”

He tried to approach while calling out.

After about ten steps, Quilbion realized the distance between him and the woman hadn’t closed at all.

“Hey! Can’t you hear me?”

He ran, stepping on gray sand. His body tilted as the fine grains dispersed his traction.

He fell spectacularly. Gray sand flowed into his mouth.

“Talk to me!”

He ran again while spitting out the sand.

He ran and ran again.

But the distance wouldn’t close.

It was like looking beyond the sky-barrier.

Clearly existing there, yet an unreachable space.

The woman stood up from the bench. She looked up at the distant sky, then soon sank down.

Her shoulders trembled finely along with the sound of crying.

Her body slowly crumbled until it touched the ground.

A sandstorm blew in.

The gray sand mercilessly covered everything around her.

The gray house, the gray flowers, the gray bench.

Everything was buried in sand and inserted into the uniform gray landscape.

Quilbion watched the process in a daze.

It seemed to have taken an extremely long time, yet it also seemed to have progressed in an instant.

Eventually the gray sand surged.

The woman who staggered out from within the sand began walking across the gray earth where nothing existed.

She grew more distant.

Toward a place he could no longer reach.

When he came to his senses, he could see the bright blue sky.

It was the rooftop.

Quilbion swept his hand over his head. His forehead was covered in cold sweat.

What was that?

He bent over and caught his breath. The world of only gray. The woman left alone there.

He recalled the green light that had raced through the gray sky. That was definitely the hawk. Why had his only companion appeared in that place?

Had he seen a crack, or something else?

He was confused.

Quilbion opened his palm. Gray sand grains slid smoothly to the floor.

“……Twella.”

He didn’t know why, but he called her name. She was a mental entity who always appeared when summoned. She’d only been dancing without speaking lately, though.

“Twella?”

He looked around.

She wasn’t visible. Suddenly he recalled her appearance before going to the crack.

The way she’d waved her hand as if saying farewell.

Why was he calling that name, that woman who no longer held any meaning?

He couldn’t understand.

That’s when it happened.

A voice came back to life faintly. A muffled sound as if transmitted underwater.

– I’m sorry. There was no choice.

His nape turned cold, then grew hot as if burned by fire.

I know that woman.

How could I not?

When I first went to the world filled only with gray, I saw that woman right before my eyes.

From childhood through old age.

That face that changed in an instant…

It was definitely Twella.

What was going on?

“Twella!”

He raised his voice.

He knew. A mental entity was an existence that came from within me. Even if I desperately called and made her appear, what materialized before my eyes would be fake, not real.

Even so, he had to search.

He needed an explanation.

He needed to understand how these damned events were entangled—Quilbion felt the necessity to find out.

“You’re watching, aren’t you? I know you’re listening! Come out!”

He could feel his thoughts splitting. Even while recognizing that meeting the mental entity wouldn’t reveal the truth, his throat kept crying out for Twella.

Afterimages flickered before his eyes.

An array of inconsistent events with no context to be found.

Quilbion pressed his clenched fist against his mouth and sat down.

Anxiety rushed in.

Twella, that woman, life outside, the surface realm, Winte, cracks, and the hawk.

Suddenly he recalled the conversation he’d had with Twella before ‘that woman’ descended to the ground.

She had said.

– Most went into the mountains to forage for food. I did too. I went to look for vegetables together with my close companion, a hawk.

A word embedded in the conversation he’d considered idle chatter was too significant to ignore.

His throat felt parched.

Quilbion stared straight ahead.

Winte was there.

“You have something to tell me, don’t you?”

Winte nodded and lightly flicked his wrist. Two coffee cups appeared in midair.

“Here, hot coffee. It’s the most necessary thing when watching a movie. Better than popcorn and cola.”