――.
――――.
――――――――――――――Ah.
The sensation of shaking impacts hit him in the face.
Shaking his consciousness awake from a blank void, Subaru woke up in reality.
Lifting his head, he moved to sit up but was stopped by the shaking. His hand slipped, and he once again fell down to the bed he laid on. A mass landed on his abdomen.
There was a heavy, hard sensation laying there. Moving his hand toward it, he found that it was a bag full of gold coins――and he remembered what had happened just before his consciousness had left him.
Subaru: “――Rem!?”
Otto: “Natsuki-san!? You’re awake!?”
Throwing the bag of gold coins that he held in his hand horizontally across the carriage, Subaru moved his four limbs to sit up and directed his gaze in a circle around his surroundings. The deep darkness was still present, and so was the abuse of the violent shaking; it was clear that he was still in the dragon carriage.
Turning his neck to look at the awakened Subaru in response to his cry was Otto. He shook his head at Subaru, and then moved to direct his gaze back to the front of the carriage,
Otto: “Please don’t move. If you raise your head you’ll leave the divine protection’s area. While the ground dragon is running at full speed I don’t have any leeway to be considerate to you, Natsuki-san!”
Subaru: “That kind of thing doesn’t matter! Rem, what happened to Rem!?”
Subaru’s eyes moved over every nook and cranny of the driver’s stand as he returned an angry voice to Otto. The carriage’s bed had been lost, because they had had to leave everything but the driver’s stand behind in order to bear the unbalanced state of the dragon carriage. The space people were able to enter was limited, and his gaze had landed on every part of it, yet her existence had not been conveyed to him.
But still, until he truly confirmed that fact, he would not acknowledge it.
Subaru: “Answer me, Otto. What happened, to Rem…!”
Otto: “That lady…”
Otto had apparently decided to not respond to Subaru’s rude voice, an agitated voice that sounded like he was ready to leap at him, due to the danger it showed.
With his breath catching in his throat, he came to a painful decision,
Otto: “For the purpose of letting us escape on the dragon carriage… She left to engage the White Whale.”
At those words, Subaru took only one breath, then,
Subaru: “Turn back.”
Otto: “Huh?”
Subaru: “I said turn back! Rem, I need to save Rem. Turn back right now!”
In the already narrow driver’s stand, Subaru shortened the distance between him and Otto by grabbing at him.
Even without having to deal with Subaru’s violent behavior, Otto already had his hands full controlling the ground dragon through the chaos, and so when he was grabbed by the collar he yelled, “Wait!” in a panic,
Otto: “A, are you serious!? Did… did you really say we should go back! Did you not see the terror of the White Whale, of that monster!? It’d be suicide!”
Subaru: “It’s precisely because I saw that monster up close that I said we need to turn back and save Rem!”
Shaking his head, Subaru refused Otto’s words with a bulging vein on his forehead as he yelled.
The threat the White Whale imposed was seared into Subaru’s memory. That huge swimming body that outsped the dragon carriage, and how with just one swing of its tail it easily blew away the large-sized dragon carriage. Making matters worse, the fog had easily taken over their surroundings, and when it had been hit by Rem’s magic it had sustained no considerable damage
Since he had fallen into this isekai, it was clearly his most formidable enemy.
In comparison, dealing with something humanoid like Elsa, or something numerous like when he challenged the pack of Juggernauts, all throughout those situations a plan of attack had been mostly visible.
However, a vision of gaining victory against that thing was entirely absent.
Subaru: “But that’s exactly why, leaving Rem in a place like this is…!”
Subaru knew full well the strength of Rem’s demon transformation.
That understanding spoke for itself. Even with her strength, against the White Whale she was as helpless as a weak person.
To leave her behind like this, was tantamount to losing her.
There was no point to it. There would be no point in Subaru surviving. Subaru had to go back, for the sake of rescuing her. For the sake of helping her.
In the future Subaru desired, her presence absolutely had to be there.
If Rem was not there, Subaru would lose sight of even his own self. He had to make it so. Subaru had to let her know that her existence was necessary.
Subaru: “Something like buying time sounds like a joke. If they want to run then everyone else can run away! Otto, turn back! Otherwise…”
Otto: “Are you seriously an idiot, you!?”
However, Subaru’s voice that was exceeding anger was blown away.
Moving his arm holding Otto’s collar as if it had slipped down, his hand moved up into an underhand grip; in that instant his foot was separated from the floor and his back was thrown against the driver’s stand.
Subaru: “Agh!”
Otto: “If the divine protection breaks while you’re in this state, you alone will be thrown out onto the highway. If you think you can persuade a travelling merchant through brute force, then you’ve made a great mistake.”
Having had his wrist seized and twisted, Subaru had been flipped over onto his face with his arm stretched as far as it could. Even through doing that Otto still held the reins with his right hand.
Subaru groaned at the unexpected counterattack while Otto roughly exhaled,
Otto: “Please understand. This is your present state. Returning while you’re in a state like this, what could you even try to do? If you left, that girl’s feelings that she left behind would be rendered futile, would they not!?”
Subaru: “You can’t talk about Rem! Abandoning Rem… it’s like you’re killing her, so you don’t have the right to talk! Go back! Right now, saaave Rem!!”
Otto: “Aah! It’s out of the question!”
Otto clicked his tongue at Subaru who was wriggling and writhing to try to untangle his outstretched arm. As he continued to stare straight ahead, as the ground dragon continued to run,
Otto: “Do you still not understand how terrifying the White Whale is even after seeing it! Do you know how many tens of years it has reigned over the world, and how many people have tried to kill it time and time again! Yet it still hasn’t been killed, so show me proof of your strength!”
Pouring his words down onto the unreasonable Subaru, Otto said, “Do you understand!?” with an extreme anger and a helpless emotion carried on his voice,
Otto: “Groups of hundreds of people armed with weapons have challenged it, but they still couldn’t kill it! In this place we don’t have any weapons and we don’t have any fighting power, so we can’t do anything! How are we supposed to help that girl that left!? We can’t do something like that! We can’t!”
Subaru: “We could have done something earlier…!”
Otto: “Is it still not obvious to you! The Kingdom of Lugunica formed a subjugation party… but even the previous generation’s Sword Saint was killed by that monster; there’s no way of winning against it… hk!”
As if he was squeezing out a confession, as if he was enduring against tears as he trembled.
Otto could never extinguish the resentment he held towards it. Even so, being hit with such anger, his companion’s continued existence outweighed it.
For the purpose of teaching the obstinate Subaru, he again spoke to his companion to make him aware, he repeated it to break through his mind.
Subaru: “The Sword, Saint… huh.”
Up until now, not one thing had caused Subaru’s position of making his wish come true to wilt with such force. While spinning his lips to try to surprise him, Otto had dropped a word that did exactly that.
The『Sword Saint』――since Subaru had fallen into this isekai he had learned that it was the title bestowed upon the strongest person; to Subaru it was the representation of strength itself.
Even though the previous generation’s Sword Saint was not the same person as Reinhard, if he had held the same title and looked after the same power as him,
Subaru: “If even someone like that was killed by the White Whale…”
Nothing less than Reinhard could do it.
Swiftly, Subaru felt the sensation of fear dominating his heart.
Reinhard’s existence, that strength, for someone like Subaru even wishing for such 『Strength』was impossible. Even for Reinhard, may have to yield a knee against such fearsome power, and if we assume his life would ultimately be destroyed――that,
Subaru: “That kind of thing, that kind of location… why would you do something like that…”
He wanted to save Rem, he wanted to rescue her. Even if he immediately turned back that wouldn’t come true.
As his heart came to that understanding, his essential fighting spirit stopped circulating through his arms and legs, and through his soul.
Looking at the collapsed Subaru with something similar to pity, Otto said with a small voice,
Otto: “I’m weak, and you’re weak. Because of that, we can’t save that girl. ――That girl’s strength, we can’t catch up to it.”
――However, Rem was not strong enough.
That was something Subaru knew, he knew it, and yet, he was not able to put his objection into words.
Hanging his head and yielding himself to the dragon carriage’s shaking, the ground dragon continued running straight ahead into the darkness.
Behind them, the abandoned Rem grew even more distant.
And so, without stopping, Subaru continued going away from her. He continued going away.
※※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※
Five minutes, Ten minutes, some time had passed since Subaru had begun to hang his head.
Otto: “Natsuki-san, that’s…”
Up until now there had been silence as the ground dragon ran, but Otto had discovered something and strained his eyes while he called out to Subaru.
Slowly, Subaru lifted his head and crawled next to Otto, he shifted his gaze towards the front just as Otto had. ――There, dimly lost within the darkness, light was visible.
Otto: “The fog is obscuring it… but that’s someone’s light!”
Subaru: “The fog, is fading…?”
Otto: “Even if it is fading, it should be night beyond it, so the light is artificial… It’s probably someone like us, who was swallowed by the fog…”
Otto’s guess was probably correct, and the other dragon carriage seemed to notice them too, as it began running at full speed towards them. Sure enough, after a short time, the dragon carriage lined up next to them and a voice came from someone sitting on the driver’s stand,
Man: “At last… At last, people…! Hey, this is, fog right!? That means the White Whale is around, right… gah, I just started my career…!”
Gossip bubbled out of the young man’s mouth, and he began to cry as he entered a panicked state.
He had been engulfed by the fog, and so it was as if he had found a bright future as he moved his dragon carriage towards them to line up next to them.
Hearing his voice, it was obvious that they had given him the mistaken idea that they were the rescue he had been searching for; knowing this, Otto shook his head,
Otto: “Yes, it’s the White Whale. We previously encountered it. We luckily managed to escape and the fog has begun to fade, but we don’t know where we are or what time it is.”
Man: “I, is that so…! Aah, this is the worst. Why, why did this kind of thing…”
While the man reached his wits’ end and was overcome by grief, Subaru, who was next to the explaining Otto, glared at his profile. The way Otto had said『Luckily』made it seem as if he had completely forgotten about the fact that they had abandoned Rem.
Feeling justifiable anger, though it was only an attempt to divert his mind from his feelings of guilt, Subaru called out to Otto with an, “Oi,”
Otto: “What is it, Natsuki-san?”
Subaru: “Don’t use such a jokey voice, Otto. Saying that we got lucky… Rem, how do you think Rem would feel about…”
Talking about Rem after abandoning her, made his heart ache as if thorns had wrapped around it. After fighting the White Whale she would make full use of the wisdom to return alive――even with that kind of wishful thinking, the memory of the danger he had seen floated up.
In this place, Subaru didn’t want to accept it.
Having left Rem behind in that place, for the sake of saving her Subaru would die――
Otto: “Who is Rem?”
That tragic but heroic girl’s readiness,
Subaru: “――Huh?”
Otto: “So, did you say Rem? There wasn’t another merchant with that name… Could you tell me more about that person?”
Subaru’s statement had understood, and Otto tilted his head to the side.
That gesture was clearly an act that trampled on Rem’s dying wishes,
――With the fist he raised overhead, he hit the side of Otto’s face as hard as he could.
Just then, a violent tremor hit the dragon carriage, and Subaru lost his footing and fell backwards towards the driver’s stand. Having similarly toppled over on the driver’s stand, Otto, pressing down on his face, promptly raised his gaze towards the collapsed Subaru,
Otto: “Wh, what did I do!?”
Otto’s eyes were open wide at Subaru’s unbelievable act of violence. However, his speech and actions were similarly unbelievable to Subaru.
Moving back, Subaru stood up, and said, “Don’t joke,” while biting his lip,
Subaru: “Do you really have the nerve to say that…! Rem chose to be left behind for the sake of letting us escape; saying ‘who is she’, don’t joke like that! You… I want to kill you…hk.”
Otto: “I said I don’t know what you’re talking about! You, so confidently and so suddenly, are saying such ridiculous words… Did you go mad after seeing the White Whale!?”
At Subaru’s words, Otto still continued to feign innocence.
Unable to continue bearing his fury, his vision became dyed with a deep red. Time seemed to move terribly slow as the intent to murder the man before him by breaking his neck gushed forth.
Raising his arm, he forgot about everything as it became clear that he would smash this ungrateful life――,
Man: “W, what do you think you’re doing! For now, let’s just say bye to all this fighting, okay!? Let’s make some noise now that we’re free, so, about the fog…”
Seeing the two’s dangerous shouting match end up transforming into a situation where they were trying to kill each other, the man on the dragon carriage running parallel to them raised his voice in dismay.
The man’s frantic attempt to control the situation did not reach them as they glared at each other. Without the man’s voice reaching his ears, Subaru tried to enact an action full of animosity upon Otto directly in front of him.
His action stopped just in time, and as expected, it was because of the adjacent dragon carriage.
However, it was not because the man’s eager persuasion had reconciled the two.
Man: “We escaped from the fog, now we need to get away from the Whi――”
As his body got a taste of his pragmatic escape plan, the ground behind him and the dragon carriage were swallowed and thrown into the White Whale’s mouth.
The dragon carriage and the ground dragon pulling it both were swallowed by the mouth aimed at them, and a horrible sound of destruction resounded from the White Whale’s mouth, signifying their last moments.
As it crushed lumber and iron and mashed flesh with its millstone-like teeth, the ground dragon screamed. The flattened man’s voice was lost among the sounds of destruction.
Otto: “Wh, a――”
Its huge body hadn’t made a sound as it had approached, leaving Subaru and Otto overrun with speechlessness.
Otto’s pupil’s swayed at the threat of having once again run into the White Whale’s imposing appearance, and Subaru,
Subaru: “Wha, t… are you, doing here?”
Blurting out a shaky voice, Subaru’s knees dropped to the floor while staring at the White Whale’s side.
Still in good health, the White Whale immediately looked horizontally at the two without a trace of interest, rather, it opened its mouth and smacked its lips, fully absorbed in its dinner.
Subaru: “You, if you’re here that means…”
For the sake of drawing its huge body away, they had abandoned that girl.
Before such an overwhelming existence, he felt that he had to try for an answer by asking it a question.
Of course, the form before Subaru’s eyes was unable to answer his question. Slowly swallowing the food in its mouth, the White Whale’s stomach decided on its next prey, and that huge pupil running parallel to the dragon carriage――looked down at Subaru.
Otto: “Uu, aaaaaaaah――――!!”
And, unable to withstand the pressure any longer, Otto lost his previously stable mind and screamed.
The ground dragon also understood the White Whale’s presence, and rose its speed in accordance with its master clutching the reins. For a moment, a gap was formed as they pulled ahead of it, and while panicking about the overwhelming mass following behind them,
Otto: “Why why why why why… is it so obstinately… following us… even after we got away… hk.”
Clinging to the accelerating dragon carriage, the exhausted Subaru paid no attention to the words Otto was leaking. His shouts and lamentations seemed to be an attempt to avert his gaze from his hopelessness.
Otto: “Why, only us…! In this darkness… why… hk. Something, there has to be some clue… there has to be something…!”
Crying, Otto let out a pained shout of refusal at his close approaching death. However, in Otto’s cry, Subaru didn’t fail to miss something that caused an image to well up in his mind.
The White Whale had been persistently hot on their heels. In regards to that monster, it was possible that there was a clue as to why. That was――,
Subaru: “No way…”
Rolling into the back of the driver’s stand, Subaru strained his eyes in the direction of the swimming White Whale behind them.
Deep in the darkness, in the world of pitch blackness even that huge body was concealed by the haze and wasn’t visible. However, in the middle of the front of its huge body, just the front part of the monster’s gaping mouth that pointed towards them was slightly visible.
Protruding from the White Whale’s head, was a warped and twisted horn.
――The Witch Beasts that had formed a group in the forest, the Juggernauts, looked like big dogs with something like a horn.
It was said that Witch Beasts were created through the Witch’s power, and the Witch’s scent that Subaru let off, caused them to attack him. So,
Subaru: “That monster… the White Whale, is a Witch Beast… too…?”
Tasting such an unbelievable possibility, Subaru was unable to react to such a hard truth and shook his head.
However, if he thought about it, it was consistent. It was the reason that of the scattered dragon carriages it had promptly zero’d in on Subaru’s. It was the reason that when he had jumped to Otto’s dragon carriage it had stubbornly aimed at it.
It was the reason that, in spite of Rem’s preparedness to die in order to buy time, it had caught up and aimed at this dragon carriage.
In the darkness, the White Whale was hot on their heels. As for that chasing figure, Rem had noticed it at that occasion but had hesitated to say it.
Subaru: “It’s, all… my fault…?”
Because of Subaru’s existence. It was because he wore the Witch’s scent that the White Whale was chasing them and why it had persistently aimed at this dragon carriage.
Rem, who had previously realized this truth, willingly got off the dragon carriage for the sake of protecting Subaru. For the sake of protecting Subaru. For the sake of Subaru.
Subaru: “Something like that, Rem… I… I, that kind of thing… was my fault…!”
Unable to withstand the strong pressure and the grief, Subaru covered his face and squatted down.
The truth was that Rem was gone, the truth was that he was the reason Rem had been lost, the inside and outside of Subaru’s body simultaneously criticised him. As that feeling of despair devastated him,
Otto: “Natsuki-san…‘
Otto approached him from behind, and as his quiet voice called to him a touch was felt on his shoulder.
With his fingertip trembling, his call was unclear as if to express his helplessness. That kind of hand weakly grasped Subaru’s shoulder,
Subaru: “Otto…”
Otto: “Please die.”
In the next moment, he regained his strength and pushed him, causing his body to lose its support, and he fell head over heels off of the dragon carriage.
――Huh?
His field of view inverted, and his thrown off body lost track of the sky and the ground as he violently spun.
In the world of only spinning up and down, with his hand extended towards him, he saw the form of Otto as he laughed. Even his white teeth were visible in his widely opened mouth, and as drool dripped down his face,
Otto: “Y, you, you’re evil! You, you, it’s your fault we’re being chased―cough―so this is your duty! Ahaha! Die, please die! Die, to save mee!”
Only upon seeing his form as he laughed in a frenzy did Subaru realize how worn out his mind was.
He had heard Subaru’s weak murmur, so he had clung to it and decided to push him off; he truly had been driven against the wall.
The moment he came to this conclusion, Subaru’s body reached the ground.
His back was mercilessly thrown against the ground, and all of the air in his lungs was forced out. His cry of pain overlapped with the sound of his bones breaking, his body continued rolling over and over as if to add insult to injury, and bloody vomit was thrown out of him.
Before he had fallen, he had thought the thick grass would have been soft, but now it provided no comfort.
The ground scraped the skin off of his forehead causing him to shed blood, he suppressed a cry of pain as his left shoulder was dislocated, and he felt the pressure of one of his ribs near his belly shatter. He felt the sensation of vomiting and opened his mouth, only for his back molars to pour blood onto the grass at the same time.
Even his awareness of his pain was taken away by the shock.
He vomited over and over, slowly lifted his head, and saw the light of the dragon carriage he had been thrown off of disappear faraway in the distance.
Resentment and amazement welled up within him.
The truth was that because of his pain and agony he shouldn’t have been thinking about such things, but that excluded how he mysteriously couldn’t bring himself to condemn Otto.
The only alternative had been being swallowed, and so it had to be done in order to live; deep down he might have let it happen.
Subaru: “――Phu, geh.”
That sentimentality stopped when he tasted that his mouth had filled with blood, and at once he recalled the sharp pain of his broken body.
Subaru: “――――!”
Before the fallen Subaru’s eyes it appeared, and its overly large body let out a breath.
――Looking at that overly large body, he keenly realized how foolish it had been to want to fight against it.
It approached to a distance directly in front of Subaru where if he reached out his hand he could touch it, a fishy and bloody smelling breath left its oversized mouth as it ascertained Subaru’s presence.
What was just a normal breath for the White Whale was like a windstorm from the point of view of a tiny human. Even if he hadn’t been injured, his body wouldn’t have been able to withstand the wind, and it should go without saying that the pain of rolling across the ground’s surface with his intricately shattered bones caused a violent explosion of sound to come from Subaru’s throat.
Looking down at Subaru’s agony, it seemed entirely as if the unmoving White Whale was toying with him.
Calmly and without trembling it demonstrated its overwhelming superiority, and yet no one could that call that out as carelessness. Among all living things, it really was abnormal.
It was the same as an ant challenging an elephant to a fight. It was like a human challenging a whale to a fight in the middle of the ocean. On top of that, the human had wounds all over their body; a scoreboard wouldn’t even be necessary to determine the winner.
――He was going to die. He was going to be killed.
Pain and the sensation of vomiting dominated him, and he was aware it was drawing near.
Time and time again he had tasted this sense of despair. The dismay of knowing he was going to be lost. Above all else he felt a sense of powerlessness at how he had once again not managed to accomplish anything.
With those familiar feelings drawing near, he moved his arm, and this time he knew he would be laughed at for his unsightly actions.
What had gone wrong? Even at this point he didn’t understand anything.
Only, now that Rem had been lost, Subaru had nothing left in his hand. Even his unsightly attempt to survive must have seemed foolish.
He was just an insignificant, dull, lowly lifeform that had managed to accomplish nothing.
Before him, he felt the White Whale’s nose draw near.
Inside its open mouth there were traces of the hard scales of the ground dragon it had easily pulled with its hard teeth; soon Subaru’s flesh, his bones, his soul, would all be chewed, eaten, and scattered.
He would be killed, the fangs would quickly reach him, but a taste of unwillingness to admit defeat spread throughout his mouth,
Subaru: “I don’t, want to die…”
Even with that true show of weakness, Subaru truly felt despair.
Up until now he had never felt such helplessness, and he felt a coldness creep into his heart. All the blood in his body chilled and froze, and he felt a feeling of despair at having lost hope,
Subaru: “No… I don’t want to die… help… I don’t want, to die! I don’t want to die, I don’t want to die I don’t want to die… I don’t want it I don’t want it I don’t want iiit… help, Rem, help me…”
Complaints and whines did not stop flowing from his lips as he clung to his disgusting nature.
In this already lost life, he continued to cling to the life that he had lost, because he was weak he could not do anything, because he had failed he hadn’t been able to accomplish anything, because he was trash he had failed to protect anything, but still he regretted and cried and screamed about losing this life.
Crawling, rolling, with his blood forming slimy pools, sinking his teeth into a rock, he threw away stubbornness and pride and everything; while wetting his pants, tears and drool mixed with scarlet blood, yet he still held his life dear.
He grieved. It was atrocious. His disgraceful behavior was exactly as had been pointed out to him.
Everyone had turned their backs on his ridiculousness, he had been hit with ridiculing words, and he had seen pain and slander take form. Yet despite it all he continued to cling to his life; it seemed so beautifully human.
It was miserable. His way of life had been compared to that of a tiny worm. To his disappointment, he had even had to soil his precious pride, only to have it referred to as the 『Greed of a Pig』.
Subaru: “N, no… I, don’t want, to die… help…”
But still he crawled, still he ran frantically to escape, still he lamented that he hadn’t been able to make his wish of increasing his chance of survival come true.
Before he had realized it, his body lost its strength and stopped advancing forward; his fingertips stroked the grass and the ground scraped off what remained of his strength. Even the willpower to wail had long since been wrung dry, and his body rolled horizontally as the last of his strength was used up.
Subaru: “i, don’t wa, nt to dieee…”
And so, having ended up facing upwards after rolling, a plea for his life passed through Subaru’s lips.
That was the end of his resistance. He could not do anything. He could not think of anything. He was unable to pick himself up, and had no choice but to resign himself to whatever was to happen.
Despite that, no matter how much time passed, nothing happened.
The familiar feeling of death, the fear of a future where he would be crushed, no matter how much time passed, it did not come.
Not knowing when the end would come, the fear of continuously waiting for the end, easily destroyed his mind.
His fear cut through his body’s agony, and with his body trembling Subaru moved his gaze in a circle in search of that despair.
Subaru: “...Huh?”
――Where the closely approaching White Whale should have been, there was nothing to be found.
※※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※
From there, Subaru’s single-minded obsession with his life caused him to keep running.
Subaru: “I don’t want to die… I don’t want to die, I don’t want to die…”
He was out of breath, his legs wobbled, and some dripping blood had stained his vision. However, even through all of that Subaru continued running. From the beginning his field of view had been lost in the depth of the darkness, lost in the depth of the fog, and nothing had been visible. Even the fact that blood had entered his vision, right now Subaru did not comprehend it.
The stars and the moon could not be seen in the strength of the night, and even Subaru’s own arms and legs were unable to be seen. As he firmly ran on the ground, he could not be sure it truly was the ground.
It was possible that, without Subaru noticing, he had already been swallowed whole by the White Whale and now he existed within it; it was possible that he would soon run into the end of its stomach.
Subaru: “Hic.”
Struck with terror from his own mind’s imagination, Subaru shed tears as he ran.
Whether the reason his tears flowed was from the pain or from the despair, even such a thing was unknown to him.
Within the darkness, Subaru was the sole person found anywhere.
Rem was lost, Otto was fleeing, and even the White Whale had ignored Subaru.
That he had lost all his value to society, that he was such an existence, was the reason everyone must have come to.
Subaru: “I don’t want to die.”
Why, he didn’t even know why he had that kind of thought.
To keep living, what kind of meaning does it have? What was the point of saying he didn’t want to die?
No one had rescued him or protected him. They hadn’t done a single thing.
That he was that kind of man, what kind of meaning did saying it hold?
The answer did not come. He did not understand anything. He did not even know whether or not there was a vague theory to answer it.
The answer would come when the sun rose. That was when he would seize it.
To escape his thoughts and to continue running, to distract himself from his pain and fear, he had built up a form of self defense. Otherwise, in this kind of a situation, he would realize how disgusting his soul was.
Continuously running. Continuing to escape.
Having left that existence as is, that powerful Witch Beast would continue swimming through the fog, and Subaru didn’t know when it would sniff out his stench and show up again.
Alternatively, the current Subaru would embrace the fact that he was unworthy.
Subaru: “――Huh?”
At about the time that his self-torturing thoughts and his abusive words stopped, something abruptly occurred.
――Moonlight suddenly thrust itself through the sharp terminus of the fog.
That the abrupt end of the darkness signaled the end of everything, that was not something Subaru could have faith in, and so his body continued running. While he continued focusing entirely on running, the soft moonlight did not disappear, almost as if it was suspicious of him.
After running for some time, Subaru finally clearly recognized that this was not a convenient delusion.
Having recognized that, his brain permitted him to face the truth that he had survived, and that his hands and feet still had blood flowing through them.
However, delight did not boil up due to the fact that he had managed to grasp his life,
Subaru: “Again… I…”
He felt only disappointment that yet again through shamefully flailing around he had managed to accidentally seize his life.
The fact that he had managed to satisfy his longing of keeping his life did not bring about any deep emotions. On the contrary, the fact that he couldn’t bear his guilt was forced up in his heart, he forgot about even his continued existence through the shame that burned his entire body.
Subaru: “Rem… Rem…!”
Covering his face, he couldn’t continue enduring his tears.
That requirement, that value, he did not understand it, and calling out that name did not bring Subaru any more comfort.
Dropping his waist, continuously weeping, he did not know how long he spent like that.
That was when a creaking sound slowly approached Subaru.
Subaru: “Y, you…”
It was covered in blood, it had lost the body it pulled, and the single dragon carriage wobbled as it was pulled by a ground dragon.
He remembered it without a doubt, it was the dragon carriage Otto had owned.
However, on the driver’s stand the ground dragon pulled, the young man that had pushed Subaru was nowhere to be found.
Subaru: “Why are, you… where’s that guy, Otto?”
Doubt rushed out between his lips, but it was only natural that no answer came.
As the dragon carriage unsteadily approached, Subaru stood up, and upon looking up at the cruelly damaged dragon carriage, he noticed it.
――Stuck into the outskirts of the driver’s stand, were many knives shaped like crosses with traces of blood upon them.
Having come out of the fog, he had been attacked.
In his frenzy, Otto had run away for dear life, only for an attack to come to him; he couldn’t imagine what kind of despair the ground dragon had seen.
Yet it was clear that it had gotten back up and had independently searched for him.
Subaru: “...Let’s go.”
Whispering, Subaru lifted his damaged body onto the dragon carriage.
He kicked out the blades with his foot, and picked up the torn reins with his right hand. Following what he had seen the others do, he swung them and gave instructions to the ground dragon.
Perplexed by the strange feeling of having a new master swing the reins, the ground dragon looked back at Subaru with wide round eyes. However, upon thinking about the figure repeatedly swinging the reins, the ground dragon slowly moved its foot, and began progressing along the side of the highway.
――Under the light of the silver moonlight, the dragon carriage slowly began running.
The two who had lost someone important came together as if to slowly, slowly lick each other’s wounds as they received the stars’ ridicule.
Slowly, slowly, the dragon carriage kept running.
It continued running.