"I wouldn't be surprised if my face were pale," Eídal muttered inwardly as he was dragged toward the city. "I don't even know how much longer I can stay on my feet."
The nausea caused by the thorcam [Suppress Emotions] was unbearable. A sharp headache had joined it as well, while a faint ache still lingered in the hand wearing the gauntlet [Request Objects].
Finding the heroine's group had not been easy. When Eídal saw the route initially traced by the thorcam [Track Objects], he had been confused to find that they had strayed from the main road. So, after activating the thorcam [Suppress Emotions], he gathered his strength and approached a group of rickshaw pullers, pointing to a faded map as he asked them what could be found along the road branching away from the main route.
Their answer was:
"Not much, really. But later on, around this area..." A middle-aged man pointed to a section of the map. "A market opens. Something like roadside stalls. You can find all sorts of gems and decorative trinkets there. Haah, it's a shame, but they don't allow minerals to be sold anymore."
Another man chimed in.
"Oh! You can use it as a shortcut from the main road. But you'll have to climb a steep incline to get back to the main route."
That conversation was where Eídal had gotten his excuse about taking a shortcut.
But it didn't do me any good. They didn't believe me in the end.
Returning to the present, he couldn't help but sigh. He was trying not to resist too much so the contents of his stomach wouldn't churn any further.
"Hey, you," said the girl dragging him along. "What's your name?"
It was the young woman he'd collided with.
I'm getting tired of this girl, Pia.
If I remember correctly, the man walking ahead is Adri... Adriano or something like that. And the Heroine... Luba. That's a nice name.
If Eídal was being honest, Luba, the heroine, gave him the impression of being a rather tough person. He couldn't deny that he found her attitude somewhat impressive, either. He had quickly realized that she was the kind of person who kept her words to herself and intervened only when absolutely necessary.
She moves and speaks like my tutor.
As they made their way along the gravel road toward the city, Luba calmly examined several gems from a leather pouch. She weighed them by gently tossing them up and down in her hand, testing their texture and even raising them toward the sun to examine what lay within.
"Hey, are you listening to me?" Pia insisted.
This girl, on the other hand, was anything but impressive. Her movements were clumsy, and her tongue was sharp.
She's a lunatic.
There had been no one like her in his village. Earlier, after being bombarded by her questions, he had finally snapped with, "You're too intense!" but that was only because he hadn't known what else to say.
I like it! How ridiculous.
For the first time, Eídal thought his heart might burst from the pressure. He couldn't deny that he'd nearly screamed from sheer distress, either. He had forced the thorcam [Suppress Emotions] so many times that the screen itself seemed burned into his retina. Whenever he lowered his negative emotions and exchanged even a few words with Pia, everything reset all over again.
Eídal didn't know whether that was normal. It hadn't happened during his experiments with the two drunkards, nor during his first encounter with the heroine.
If I keep using this thorcam over and over, is it going to exact some kind of price beyond the nausea and headaches?
He had used the thorcam six times in total already, half of those because of Pia.
"Are you seriously not listening to me?! I'm asking for your name!"
"Huh?! Oh, yes. My name..."
"Well?"
Eídal wasn't sure whether giving his name was the right thing to do. He could invent one, but something deep inside him refused.
"It's... Eídal. Eídal Granier."
He had even used his tutor's surname. Perhaps he was being foolish, but giving his name was his way of convincing himself that there would be no turning back from this adventure.
"Eídal," Luba murmured, glancing at him from the corner of her eye.
"Eídal? I think I've heard that somewhere. Wait, let me think. Mmm!" Pia scrunched up her face and grabbed her head, which, in turn, allowed Eídal to slip free of her grip. "Nope. Nothing comes to mind."
Eídal sighed.
Figures. That's Pia for you.
Suddenly, the rattling of wheels echoed across the gravel road. Eídal and Pia stepped aside. A cart pulled by a pair of horses passed them, driven by a middle-aged man dressed in a black tunic. Once it had gone by and the smoke had cleared, Eídal saw that the wagon was carrying several crates filled with small boxes.
Tabacco? I rarely saw anyone smoking back home, but I suppose it's a profitable business in the big cities.
From what Eídal had overheard during his long hours at the bar, a new method of smoking had recently become quite popular, replacing powdered tobacco and pipes.
They were called cigarettes.
Those crates contained hundreds of them.
When Pia resumed walking, Eídal didn't follow.
A tingling sensation had begun in his feet, creeping upward toward his stomach. Something was wrong. Not with the cart.
Something was wrong with the ground.
It was trembling, moving so subtly that the people walking along it could barely perceive it.
"Are you all right?" Pia called. "Ah! I see. So you're angry. But let me tell you something: if what you want is for me to pay for stretching your clothes, then..."
She clenched her fist.
"I'll beat you up!"
Eídal swallowed and activated the thorcam [Suppress Emotions] once more, the device secured around his wrist like a bracelet.
This sensation marked the hour.
The hour to act.
---
When Eídal activated the thorcam [Suppress Emotions], the familiar screen unfolded before him once more.
This was his seventh use.
Again, no one seemed to notice it.
The contents were unchanged, save for the percentages of several emotions. Eídal did, however, notice a tiny blinking light occupying a small portion of the upper-left corner.
Perhaps it was because he'd been using the thorcam so frequently.
This is the first time I've seen that.
Strange. I'll check it later.
There was no time.
Eídal suppressed fear and aversion among the primary emotions, then guilt among the secondary ones. Finally, he increased confidence and anticipation among the primary emotions, along with pleasure among the secondary emotions.
He did all of it in the span of ten to twenty seconds.
"Hey, you. Are you just going to stand there?! Do you want me to drag you again?!" Pia was beginning to lose her patience.
They were currently standing on a plain overlooking the main road. The city's walls could be seen in the distance. Other than the cart, the heroine's group, and Eídal himself, there was no one else in sight.
When Luba noticed that Eídal wasn't moving, she stopped as well. She had been watching him from the corner of her eye.
And just as she was about to speak, Eídal took a deep breath.
Then he ran forward.
Without saying a word, he ran.
"Hey?!"
Luba's eyes widened. Her hand moved instinctively, as though taking a defensive stance.
But Eídal ran right past her.
"What?"
His true target was Adriano, who was still walking ahead with an indifferent expression.
Without even giving him time to sense what was coming, Eídal slammed into him.
"What the hell?!"
It was curious how emotions could enhance physical strength.
The two of them fell and rolled across the gravel. The impact was clumsy, and the bags Adriano had been carrying spilled open, scattering gems across the road.
That was when the earth beneath the spot where Adriano had been standing only moments earlier let out a horrifying crack.
CRAAAGG!
The gravel sank as though it were sugar poured into a funnel.
Like quicksand.
Before his eyes, Adriano, who had been about to shout at Eídal, clenched his teeth. Luba, meanwhile, furrowed her brows in displeasure.
Pia still didn't understand what was happening.
Then a voice echoed through the area.
"Ex Luto..."
It was deep and reverberating at the same time.
It came from the hole that had opened in the ground.
"Ex Luto..."
"What the hell is that supposed to—?!"
"Ex... Luto... You who have been chained by my sin, come with me into the mud. Ex Luto..."
The prayer echoed in the distance, repeating again and again.
Then, suddenly, the sound of horses whinnying reached them.
It was the cart that had passed them moments ago.
When Eídal looked up, he saw the driver struggling with the reins.
Again, the prayer reached them.
"Ex Luto. Ex Luto. You who have been chained by my sin, come with me into the mud."
"Whoa! Whoa! Whoa!"
In an instant, literally everything—the man, the cart, its cargo, and the horses—was swallowed by the earth.
It happened so suddenly that Eídal could only raise a hand as though trying to stop it.
Something had definitely swallowed that man.
Luba, who should have been the first to act, simply watched, clicking her tongue in apparent annoyance.
Eídal stared at her with an expression that practically screamed, Why?!
But before he could put his outrage into words, the prayer sounded again, raising gooseflesh along his skin.
"Ex Luto. Ex Luto. You who have been chained by my sin, come with me into the mud."
"There it comes!" Pia jumped aside.
Adriano grabbed Eídal as well and leapt toward a rock beside the road.
Eídal couldn't help letting out a muffled squeak.
To be honest, he was surprised a human being could have enough strength in their legs to jump that far.
The ground where Pia had been standing sank.
It was the same pattern that had swallowed Adriano and the man with the cart.
Which meant the next move would be...
"Ex Luto. Ex Luto. You..."
This time, the prayer came from beneath Luba.
But Luba didn't move.
Instead, she held her pouch more carefully and, with exquisite elegance, raised one leg until it towered above her head.
Her skirt lifted in the process, yet somehow the sight was neither obscene nor ridiculous.
It was elegant.
Like watching an athlete or a dancer—someone possessing extraordinary flexibility.
Eídal even found himself wondering whether it was actually possible for a human being to raise a leg that high.
Looking down at the ground, Luba waited for the prayer to return.
"Ex Luto. E—"
The instant the echo emerged, Luba stomped down as though crushing a cockroach.
And just like an eggshell cracking beneath pressure, the gravel beneath her foot fractured.
"Ah!" Eídal cried out.
The road literally split apart.
Fragments of stone, along with Pia, Adriano, and Eídal himself, were thrown several inches into the air by the impact.
And that had been nothing more than a stomp.
Luba's elegant foot remained buried in the middle of the road.
Then, in less than a second—Eídal would swear it had taken only a fraction of one—Luba moved her buried leg as though she were digging into the earth.
Then she tore it free in a single motion, dragging several large stones from beneath the surface with it.
It was as though the rocks themselves were being drawn toward her foot, as though it had become a new center of gravity.