Are You Deaf When You Hear the Season’s Call? (2)

A flaming beehive buzzed in his head.... He didn't even want to get out of bed, but he forced himself to crawl out. Go to the bathroom, wash his face. Mouth too, wiping it out, he might not have thrown up, but certainly the feeling was the same.

Shuji changed clothes and went down to the second floor. There Luna was waiting for him. Just like last night, preparing breakfast for both of them. He, well...

He had to admit, it wasn't bad at all.

Not the fact of having someone to do that kind of thing for him, he hadn't asked for it at any point. But simply to have someone to wait for him. To greet him with a smile along with the new day.

Luna was a stranger.

She meant nothing to him, and in a month it was impossible for that to change. She didn't fill his gaps, but....

It made it a little easier to breathe, for the moment.

Smiling, he greeted her.

"Good morning.

Maybe it would be.

At least Shuji was glad he hadn't turned that girl into another regret that wouldn't let him sleep at night.

——

Shuji threw the line. The impact created ripples in the water. It reminded him of the times when he was a little boy, playing pebble-throwing on the riverbank. It didn't remind him of what he was doing now, precisely because this was the first time. And it hadn't even been his idea.

Relaxing. He supposed it wasn't a bad idea. The tranquility of nature.

Though if she thought this could change a suicidal person's mind, she was sorely mistaken.

He had to admit that Luna was a good person. She was trying with all her heart, even though he hadn't even done much for her. But her methods were very simple. For someone who had gone through a war zone, who had lost her home, her family (either through death or separation), she seemed to think the human heart was extremely simple.

She herself should be on the mend. What did she think she could do for him when perhaps she needed more help than himself?

But Shuji had listened to her. He had made it here, and along the way they hadn't encountered those damned rabbits or other threats. It seemed that they paid adventurers to clear these kinds of areas so that normal people could bathe or fish in relative safety.

From what Luna had told her. Anyway, she was from this world, so why wouldn't she know?

He'd come here to relax, in theory, but he couldn't stop thinking about stupid things. Anyway.

"Where did you live?" Luna asked.

"Why do you ask?"

"Just making conversation, that's all." She shrugged at the end, as if to say that if the topic bothered him, they could move on to anything else. Maybe it was true, or maybe she was trying to dig for information. He didn't care.

"Tokyo." Although not enough to tell her the whole truth, he didn't need her to think that pulling him back from the abyss was as easy as treating whatever mental illness he had.

"I've never heard of that place."

"Yeah. As I told you, my mother is far away." Too bad Shuji didn't have a convenient way to convince her how far away she really was, a phone or a laptop or something.

It would be something similar to what he had had to go through. That realization. Yes, he was a mean person. Or this world had made him that way.

He wasn't entirely sure.

Sometimes he looked back and wasn't sure about anything. Not even his mother's face. Or her voice. If only he could have kept a picture, a video. If only...

There was a short circuit. A defense mechanism kicked in, shutting down that thought before it could go too far.

"What was it like?"

"Packed. There were so many people everywhere that sometimes I thought I'd go crazy. It's so much easier to sleep at night...."

Or it should be.

But Shuji didn't rest at night either, even when he was asleep. He kept turning over the same useless things that kept him awake and agonizing, only in his sleep.

You are stupid.

If you hadn't touched that portal, none of this would have happened. But you were curious, huh? You had to ruin everything.

"In this place. The noise never stopped there."

If he told her there were millions in Tokyo, let alone the exact number, she wouldn't believe him. This other world may not have been a society stuck in medieval times, but there were no skyscrapers or anything like that either, from what he'd seen.

It was something in between.

It never ceased to amaze him the things for which there was advanced technology and the things for which there wasn't. He supposed it was an effect of the presence of magic.

"It doesn't seem to really bother you."

Shuji clicked his tongue. Sure, wasn't it obvious?

"Not anymore. I just want... I just want to go home."

It was said that you don't know what you have until you lose it. And it was true. Much to his regret it was true.

"Even if it's practically impossible, we can try."

Leaving aside why she was going to run the risk she imagined, that of crossing a world plunged into war again...

"It's not practically impossible. It is impossible. I... You wouldn't understand why. But let it go. Please."

In the end, Shuji suspected he'd end up telling her. Although there wasn't the remotest possibility that she would believe him.

"All right," Luna replied, simply. And for once it was even true.

For once she let things be.

Shuji looked away and back to the surface of the water. That was because it had rippled again. Apparently, a fish had taken the bait. He smiled slightly... As his mind went to a different place.

——

Shuji took another step forward, with difficulty.

It was as if all the weight of his body was concentrated on his axe, which was now scratching the ground in his path. He couldn't even lift it. That was the only thing keeping him on his feet and, at the same time, hunched over and barely able to walk.

Blood was running down the blade of the axe. It was leaving a good trail, but the monsters were already dead. And most of that blood wasn't his, anyway. Most of it. Just most of it.

It was... It wasn't right. He could barely get his head around what had happened in there.

Behind his back. In the darkness of the cave.

It had all happened so fast, after all.

"Wait. Wait!" A voice called out to him from the darkness. A voice that, of course, sounded familiar. He hadn't gone into that cave alone. But he had come out.

Maybe he was still confused. In shock.

Trying to process all this shit at once. But there was one thing he was clear on, clearer than his own name. After everything he'd been through in the darkness of the cave, where it would also be buried, he dared to beg him? To ask for his help?

Him?

He ignored that familiar voice.

Even after the pleas turned into wordless screams. Only agony.

But he couldn't walk much further than the entrance to the cave.

In the end he collapsed. Shuji turned around so he could at least look up at the endless blue sky. Anything was better than dust.

He hadn't thought it possible to feel this tired and weak. But he wasn't on the verge of death or anything like that. He had received injuries that would have killed any normal human being, but this world was crazy and had infected him. Of course, he was thankful for that, otherwise it would not be possible to return to his mom.

Someday. Someday.

When that day came, would he be able to look her in the eye? What had happened in the cave would stay in there, buried in the darkness. But it would never leave his mind or his heart. Would he be able to look her in the eye?

She would never know. She wouldn't have to know. But he... He would, Shuji would always know. He couldn't just forget what wasn't convenient for him. If that were possible, life would be so much easier.

As if it was the sign he had been waiting for, his consciousness shut down when the screaming stopped.