[Another Tail]
[This is yet another story.]
***
“Felix…!”
“…”
“Felix!!!”
“Damn it, I can’t! I just can’t do it!”
“Snap out of it! You know this isn’t something we want to do! It’s something that has to be done!!! Felix! If you don’t do it, everyone here will die!!!”
The woman reprimanding Felix was Tila.
Tila, the mage belonging to Felix’s party of warriors, had personally conducted the ritual of the “inquiring left hand” with her left hand but ended up being the first to be consumed by its power.
Despite her rigorous and meticulous daily care of her skin even after a hard day of camping, her skin was now marred with black spots.
“Listen carefully! It’s too late for me!”
“Tila, there must be a way to save you-”
“No!!! I know my body better than anyone! Unless you honor the request of the inquiring left hand right now, my fate is already sealed! Tell me, Felix! Do you think you can do it?!”
“…”
“Please… PLEASE!!! Just do what you must do!!!”
“Tila…”
“Don’t look at me like that. Promise me. Promise me you won’t feel any guilt for your actions. Promise me that you won’t blame yourself for what happens this time…!”
“But-…! If only I hadn’t taken an interest in this ‘inquiring left hand’! If only I hadn’t insisted on exploring this ancient ruin!!”
“Then! I wouldn’t have followed you. But because you were the foolhardy one who dared to step into the ancient ruins and show interest in its treasures—because you were the one who yearned to see more than anyone else—I followed you! The knight of insight, Felix! I will never regret following you! Everything I’ve experienced through you, everything I’ve seen by your side, has been the greatest fortune and blessing of my life!!!”
“…”
“Felix.”
Tila.
She grasped Felix’s hand.
She gave strength to the hand that held the Holy Sword.
“Are you sure about this?”
Tila looked into Felix’s eyes and spoke.
It was the ritual they always went through before Felix’s party embarked on their recklessly adventurous escapades.
“…”
Felix returned Tila’s gaze with his trademark cocky smile.
As usual.
“Come on, like I’d really die?”
Under normal circumstances, Tila would have recoiled and replied:
– If a situation like that ever arises, I’ll make sure only you die, no matter what happens.
But this Tila was different.
She gazed at Felix and crafted a bright yet fragile smile.
“Yeah, everything will turn out fine.”
…
Moments later.
Felix killed Tila.
To fulfill the demands of the inquiring left hand.
Yes.
All of this was done to meet the unjust and irrational requests of it.
The atonement for someone’s transgressions.
To pay the price for the city that had perished.
Felix looked down at the fallen Tila.
He looked at the Holy Sword stained with her blood.
“This… this is it…”
Felix tried hard to convince himself.
That’s when it happened.
Crack.
Crack.
The sound and motion of a dry branch breaking—grotesque and unnatural.
The inquiring left hand began to move again.
…And it began to issue its next demand.
“…”
The hero let out a bitter laugh.
That sneer soon erupted into a manic laugh filled with madness.
Felix realized too late.
Their arrogance.
“To pay the price for the fallen city…”
Thousands, perhaps tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands.
It was impossible that the deaths of a mere handful like them could possibly atone.
The requests of the inquiring left hand continued unceasingly.
Even if everyone present met their end—
Crack.
Crack.
It wouldn’t stop.
Because the price had yet to be paid in full.
***
***
Rustle.
It was like the flight of countless birds swarming the sky all at once.
Innumerable sheets of paper were scattered by some invisible force, twirling and spiraling.
In the midst of this vortex of paper stood a girl.
She was a girl with clear, profound eyes that seemed capable of holding everything yet being filled by nothing.
Her name was Poché.
I.
The spirit of the Sword of Insight.
This place was Fohena’s inner world, and the countless sheets of paper swirling around her represented the powers she possessed.
The power of insight.
It is the power that records everything experienced by the Holy Sword and its master, from the fleeting scent of a passing leaf to the sensation and texture of the ground underfoot.
And the feelings and realizations of the heroes.
A collection of special knowledge amassed over long ages, passing through the hands of many heroes.
Its vastness and value are comparable not to individual books but to a massive library or archival facility.
This power, which had turned an ordinary young man with merely strong curiosity and a spirit for adventure into an exceptional adventurer, was now displaying its true value in a different way.
“Bring me someone who wields a sword in the morning, delves into the mysteries of magic at noon, governs nature in the evening, and illuminates their surroundings with holiness at dawn.”
Fohena pondered the request from her left hand.
At this, the sheets of paper circling her began to flit past her face.
Like piecing together a scattered puzzle, words, phrases, and sentences continuously combined and broke apart again, slowly forming a picture.
The information Fohena sought.
The answer to the request from her left hand.
“Ugh…”
Fohena’s youthful face contorted.
Was this the cost for destroying an entire city?
As such, the request from her left hand was preposterous.
The power of insight, under great strain to find an answer to this demand, was struggling. Even within its vast knowledge, finding the answer was no easy task.
“So… a being who handles swords, magic, spirits, and holiness all at the same time…”
Fohena shook her head as if she’d heard a poor joke.
The Sword of Insight had endured for hundreds of years with the special beings known as heroes.
It had experienced countless meetings, and while an ordinary person might encounter a genius or a monster once in a lifetime, Fohena had met them countless times.
“I’ve never even heard of such a thing…”
And yet, she had never, not even once, encountered someone like what the left hand described—nor anything close.
Of course.
Even among them, anyone who could master just two of those elements would be exceedingly rare.
And four?
Normally, Fohena would have decisively rejected the notion based on her extensive insight.
Such a thing couldn’t possibly exist in this world, she would have said.
However—
Fohena understood the principles of magical contracts.
Impossible requests cannot be made, nor can impossible things be demanded as payment.
Thus.
The request from the left hand might seem impossible, but it was not truly so.
It was like how the power of a curse can bring an entire nation to ruin—something that seems impossible but has actually occurred.
Amazingly, the request from the left hand was valid and potentially fulfillable.
“How truly reassuring…”
An impossible request versus one that’s nearly impossible.
What’s the difference?
From Fohena’s perspective, who must fulfill this request, there wasn’t much of one. Both were equally perplexing.
Nevertheless, giving up was not an option.
The left hand.
Its immense power far exceeded their expectations. If they failed to meet the demands of the left hand, it would bring an inescapable doom upon all those involved in the ritual.
“Ugh…”
How long had the power of insight been working on this?
“Got it…!”
Fohena cried out in triumph. The power of insight had finally managed to deduce the answer to this seemingly impossible request.
Fragments of memories from different heroes, connected together, pointed to a figure from the past.
“Tarak of the Masks…”
He was an expert in rituals and blood magic, a necromancer who used dark ceremonies to imprison others’ souls within himself, wielding their powers as if they were his own. Tarak handled the souls of swordsmen, mages, spirit-talkers, and priests alike.
Somebody who “wields a sword in the morning, delves into the mysteries of magic at noon, governs nature in the evening, and illuminates their surroundings with holiness at dawn.”
The request from the left hand matched him perfectly.
The only problem—
He belonged to a distant era. Was there a way to bring him to the left hand right now, transcending both space and time?
Amazingly, there was.
The source of the information about Tarak.
It was a book whose pieces were scattered throughout the world but had been reconstructed through the power of insight.
This book, filled with Tarak’s misdeeds glorified as great achievements, contained a message from him to those who read it.
It was both a challenge to his challengers and advice to his followers.
Nothing less than a method for summoning Tarak’s soul.
There were not one, but two—
No, three heroes present.
And their companions too.
If they combined their powers, it would be possible to perform the necromancer’s summoning ritual.
But—
“Someone’s going to get hurt…”
—
Three holy swords and their masters had gathered in one place.
No matter how powerful a necromancer may be, the malevolent energy they wield inevitably loses its potency in the presence of the heroes.
Subduing the summoned necromancer was not a particularly difficult task.
The issue lay in the method of their summoning.
To summon Tarak, someone must offer their body as a vessel.
This entails accepting the presence of a powerful necromancer within oneself.
And in that state, the necromancer must be defeated.
Could one survive the ordeal?
“…No. It’s not just about being injured. With a high likelihood… one would lose themselves.”
The best outcome, with luck, would be permanent disability; without any miracles, it would lead to death.
Fohena was torn by this dilemma.
Was this truly the right course?
Was it right to sacrifice someone for the greater good?
Was it right to bear the consequences of someone else’s misdeeds?
She didn’t know.
The only certainty was—
“Even so, I can’t just give up without trying.”
Rustle—rustle—rustle—rustle—rustle!
The sheets of paper circulating around Fohena ceased their movement, then dispersed and vanished.
The accelerated thought process maintained by her Insight Ability came to a halt.
Fohena disengaged from her inner world and addressed her master, Felix.
“Felix! I’ve figured it out! The way to fulfill the demands of the Asking Left Hand!”
“…It’s alright now.”
“Felix! Goodness me! What do you mean ‘it’s alright’? Surely, you’re not considering giving up without doing anything!? That can’t be! I must have misjudged you! The Felix I know isn’t someone who would do that!”
“That’s not it… it’s already over.”
“No! It’s not over!”
“No, what I mean is—everything’s resolved.”
“?”
Only then did Fohena take stock of the atmosphere around them.
The oppressive aura, which had been racing toward calamity, had abated.
“Huff… Huff…”
Tila, who had been struggling against the invasive power of the Asking Left Hand, had regained her composure. The black marks spreading across her skin were fading.
As Felix had said, this was the scene that only appeared once the Asking Left Hand’s demands were satisfied.
“How…?”
Fohena’s bewildered expression returned within her inner world.
Felix and the others turned their eyes toward Rishe to answer her unspoken question.
At that moment,
Rishe approached Tila and extended a hand toward her body.
“…”
With everyone’s attention focused on him,
Rishe shook his head.
“Ah, it won’t work.”
“…”
Everyone present was perplexed by these enigmatic words.
“Wait, so how did you manage it…?”
Fohena urged Felix for an answer.
“…I don’t know, it just worked when Rishe raised his hand?”
“?”
What exactly was he saying? Instead of clarifying her doubts, Felix’s response only deepened the mystery.
Creak.
Creak.
“!!!”
Just then,
Everyone froze as their eyes snapped back to the Asking Left Hand. It had started moving again.
“Why!? Wasn’t that supposed to finish it!?”
Jane’s shout.
It was Fohena who answered.
“No. There’s no way something like that would be enough.”
“What…?”
“This was mentioned before. The price for the destruction of the city. Hundreds. Perhaps thousands. Perhaps tens of thousands. Or maybe—”
Jane’s eyes widened in disbelief.
The shock rippling through her slowly infected everyone around her.
“Could we… with less than ten of us, truly pay such a price?”
The atmosphere grew heavy, oppressive. Nobody dared to speak with hope.
Perhaps…
Their doom was inevitable—simply a matter of time.
“Bring hither a pillar that connects the heavens and the earth.”
Listening to the voice within, Rishe hesitantly raised his hand.
“Bring hither a renowned sword that has been stained with blood a thousand times, tempered in a hundred battles, and inscribed with glory a dozen times.”
Upon hearing the inner voice again, Rishe hesitantly raised his hand.
“… Bring an inexhaustible bag of gold.”
This, he didn’t know, but tried raising his hand anyway, just in case.
“…… Bring a piece of silk so vast it could cover the world.”
This too, he wasn’t quite sure about, yet still raised his hand for good measure.
“……… Bring a supreme sovereign upon whose feet even rulers would kneel in reverence.”
“Huh?”
Flash.
“………… This is the final request.”
