Behind My Words

I was woken up by the shake of the carriage and the harsh creaks of the wooden planks. Every slight movement made my muscles ache, especially where I had been hit, and wounds still covered my hand.

Yet, it felt good. It was proof of progress.

I slowly sat up and looked to the back of the cart, where the Armoured Guy checked the contents of the sacks.

Noticing I was no longer asleep, he turned to me and bowed, as if to apologise for waking me up.

He then whispered to me, “Tari lut,” ending with a smile. It was the same greeting I received while strolling across town.

“Tari lut,” I yawned, rubbing my eyes, and bowed as well.

After finishing, he bowed once more before hopping off the carriage. It wobbled and sprang back up as the weight shifted, echoing a slight shriek.

Outside, I could hear the crunches of several footsteps and the overwhelming chatter of the villagers, as well as the Rihors’ grunts beyond the carriage’s walls.

Since they were already attaching the creatures to the carriages, we would probably be leaving Mida after breakfast.

I got up and donned my cloak. I always took it off before falling asleep since I didn't want to risk damaging it if I rolled around too much. I then tucked the blanket in my bag and stretched.

It hurt, but the pain wasn’t so bad.

I peeked outside the carriage.

Most of the villagers had already left the inn and were waiting their turn to receive fruit and biscuits. It was the same food we ate yesterday morning.

Would the soldier bring me breakfast again? I was hopeful. But it wasn’t my main concern.

I felt a tinge of regret for leaving without saying goodbye to Etaxuos. If I had known we would be departing today, I would have said more.

I still didn’t know him, but he helped me so much yesterday, and I hadn’t been able to repay his kindness. I was always being left in debt to others.

I didn’t believe I had time to go over to him right now, and even if I had, it was still pretty early in the morning. He could still be asleep.

The Armoured Guy approached me and handed me my food before returning to the other soldiers’ side. Despite looking emotionless at first glance, his expression always felt so warm.

After a few minutes, as I finished eating, people began to board the carriages. A barrage of hollow thuds and groans resonated from the wooden structure as people climbed aboard.

Our carriage was filled with the same faces as before, sitting exactly in the same places.

I was still distanced from the others, but it was understandable.

When the soldier came back, he climbed inside and locked the hinged wooden board. Seconds later, all the carriages began moving, leaving the parking area one at a time.

I really hadn’t missed the constant wobble and the creaks of the wheels.

The carriages turned to the right as they left, passing through the town’s main intersection and continuing to turn in the same direction.

We were leaving by the northern exit. It was the same place I had chosen to train yesterday.

As our carriage passed by Etaxuos’ house, I immediately turned to face it. I wanted to grab the thin sliver of hope I still had left to be able to see him before departing.

As I craned my head outside the cart, to my surprise, Etaxuos was leaning against his front wall, watching the carriages cross by.

The moment he spotted me, an encouraging smile popped on his face. He quickly left the house and began waving at me.

I waved back. A tear dripped down my cheek.

Seeing him one last time, even briefly, brought a measure of relief.

I was able to tell him goodbye.

His sharp smile never faded as he waved.

His figure grew smaller and smaller as the carriages moved forward. Then the path curved, hillocks rose, and the town slipped from view.

We had left Mida and were now heading towards a different city.

The days blurred together, each marked by the same rhythm, halting for food and rest, just as we had done on the road to Mida.

People continued to shun me, something I already expected.

I was still myself.

I hadn’t changed from the strange figure that appeared one day, covered in blood and carrying a corpse.

The villagers steered away from looking at me and kept making comments to one another.

The same words, “xanture e anarit”, constantly echoed through their whispers. I didn’t know their meaning, but that was who I was. That was who I had been since they came to know me.

While they ate, I kept my distance and stayed inside the carriage. At some point, it almost felt like home. I rarely went outside, tucked away by myself.

Even though people came back inside after eating, spending most of their time here because of the travel, I couldn’t shake the feeling of being alone.

I lay alone in a home that wasn’t mine, yet felt like it was.

I had gone back to my previous life. I had returned to my small apartment in Tokyo.

This other world was a farce, never existing to begin with. Fabricated for me to escape my fears and solve my problems.

But I had returned.

This world couldn’t last forever.

However, it wasn’t true. I hadn't gone back to square one.

Time had passed, and so had I. I wasn’t stuck in the inescapable cycles of the clock’s hands. I was moving forward.

If life were a single, long path, ending beyond my sight and full of intersections, I would have been running along it.

I wasn’t still, watching the steady progression of the void behind me. I had been running on that road all this time.

Choices couldn’t always be perfect.

Humanity longs for perfection, yet such a thing doesn’t exist. It's the fact that perfection is unattainable that makes us human. At least that’s what I grew to believe.

I loathed myself. My insides were rotten. There was nothing I could do for my hatred to cease.

I had taken wrong turns. Several of them.

Still, the path ahead remained.

The Armoured Guy continued to feed me. Sometimes he laughed. Sometimes he simply smiled. Other times he didn’t show any expression at all, but he was there.

Hiding from the villagers' gaze, he was there.

The warmth I felt wasn’t a product of my imagination. It really did come from the soldier’s actions. Amidst the unfamiliar, I was still being seen.

I had been constantly saved, unable to help anyone, not even myself.

But I would repay them all someday.

All of the things done to bring me to the surface when I felt like drowning, I would make sure to repay them and pass them forward.

I couldn’t go back and undo what had happened or the things I had done wrong. The way back had already crumbled under darkness.

So I would get stronger and force myself through the right path this time. I wouldn’t turn the wrong way again.

“I would save everyone.”

While travelling, I didn’t have any opportunities to hone my spear, but I continued to train my mana. I was focused on perfecting it and learning magic as well.

Instead of focusing on controlling it, I decided it would work better if I trained to suppress it.

It was considerably harder, but that's why I believed it would lead to progress.

My inner mana grew day by day, easier to control. It didn’t drain me as much as it flowed vividly in my mind.

It glimmered brightly, cascading down my body, each pulse thrumming through my chest and limbs.

It seemed like I was going somewhere.

Was this progression normal in this world? I didn’t know. Were my mana levels the same as others’? I didn’t know. Would I be able to master magic, let alone use it? I didn’t know.

It was all so new and different. I knew nothing about it.

Nonetheless, I trained again and again, hoping it would lead to something in the future.

In these seven days of travel, we eventually left the plains and entered a new forest, but mana didn’t feel the same as the one before. It was less concentrated and flowed in differently.

It was definitely denser than the mana in the meadows, but it seemed to gather around certain spots instead of drifting with the breeze.

The scenery was all so different.

Slender trees rose high, branches spreading wide and blocking most light from slipping through. Grass, small bushes, and moss-covered rocks dotted the forest floor.

The wind carried the soft, fresh scent of greenery, its smell profoundly ingrained in my memories. The sunlight dappled through the treetops and cast a gentle shade onto the carriages.

The calming rustles and distant howls and cries echoed through the trees.

The creatures, the plants, even the mana itself all felt so pure, as if untouched by the outside. It didn’t seem like a high-density mana zone, just a forest focused on its species.

This world’s biomes held more mysteries than I initially believed. Each area seemed to pulse with its own currents of mana, shaping the creatures that lived there and the ways they had learnt to survive.

It felt strange to think that simply adding a factor to the genesis of life could change its entire development.

However, our time in the forest was cut short since, for a bit over a day and a half, we had been surrounded by vast plots of farmland.

The scenery glistened in deep gold with the swaying of the blades of wheat.

I was mesmerised by their soft hisses and the way moonlight rippled across the fields.

Were we approaching a big city? Large fields of crops were needed for the establishment of larger cities.

“Riges!” someone screamed from one of the carriages.

The sudden cry woke me from my meditation.

I gazed at the Armoured Guy as he rose up and cupped his palms before his mouth.

“Riges!” he shouted, informing the carriages behind ours.

It felt comically similar to our arrival in Mida.

He smiled and softly remarked, "Art estige~ su Riges," as he turned to us.

This time I understood him. We were reaching the city of Riges, likely our final destination.

As I peeked outside, a giant wall came into view.

This city was different from anything I had seen in my old world.

Its walls were imposingly tall, towering above everything I had come across. Its greyish tint dominated the scene, vividly cutting between the deep blue sky and the golden tract beneath.

My mouth opened in awe.

This was definitely the city the Old Man wanted me to see.

A tear rolled down my cheek as I watched the splendour of the journey’s end.

The carriages wobbled as the wheels crushed the earth, and the wheat ears bowed in the wind, welcoming us to the city.

These were the final moments of our long travels to Riges.