To find that white-haired woman who is small in size and runs about everywhere, he ran through all the markets that morning.

Out of the activity bases he heard of yesterday, this is the last. His whole heart is filled with a prayer, “You have to be here.” Whenever he sees a combination of a cart and an old lady, he will start staring at her face without hesitation. And yet he just has to make so many mistakes, now of all times.

Just as the market is about to end nearing noon, he finally finds the target he was looking for. A slightly comforting shadow flits past those foreign brown eyes.

“Hazel!”

“Oh dear!”

Hazel Graves puts down her cart, panting, and replies in simple English to the person she recognized,

“Morning, did you sleep well yesterday?”

“Not really. I thank you ahead for your concern, but there was an unexpected turn of events.”

“Unexpected…? What’s the matter, Weller, you’re all out of breath. And…”

An ominous feeling sneaks up on her suddenly, and so she peeks behind Conrad—there’s not even a shadow there.

“Where’s Little Buddy and the others?”

The mazoku guard hesitates a little, but quickly recovers.

“Yesterday night, we were attacked by strange creatures—the undead. There seems to be a houjutsu that can control those things in this country.”

“A houjutsu to control corpses, you say? What on earth is this? That’s blasphemy to G.o.d and the dead!”

“Hazel, I think you might be the only person to think that way here. Chalk it up to religious differences. And the mastermind behind those corpses seems to be His Majesty the Emperor’s mother.”

“Alazon? She was definitely a cold and cruel Empress, but I never thought she could use some terrifying houjutsu.”

Conrad waves all that away as unimportant with his right hand, hurriedly entering the main point from their discussion about the enemy.

“To me, though, the important thing is that my master entered the other side of wall.”

“What did you say!? The other side of the wall!?”

Hazel Graves is stunned into silence for a moment, but as expected of a veteran adventurer, she immediately recovers. Still, she can’t help but interrogate Lord Weller,

“I told you again and again and again, how… how did you let him run inside? Does he want the treasures in the tombs that badly? Wasn’t your mission saving those twins? If so you should have gone from the surface, unless your true motive was to hide from the guardians and quietly approach the tombs… But the problem is that child doesn’t seem like that kind of person!”

“Treasures? Such a misunderstanding would be very troubling to us. His Majesty never even considered getting those things. It’s just that one of his companions[1] was shocked into darting inside, and he can’t just leave that person there, hence he followed that person inside.”

“By companion do you mean that one? That orange-haired one.”

Standing in front of a silent Conrad, Hazel Graves twitches one eyebrow ever so slightly, then says, raising her chin,

“Fine, looks like there are still a ton of things you need to explain. On that note, you’re here, so why isn’t the Little Buddy you’re supposed to protect here? Aren’t you a bodyguard, Weller? Don’t tell me you just let that child run in by himself?”

Conrad looks as though just breathing is torture, frowning as he shakes his head,

“He’s not by himself, there’s a man more reliable than me by his side. However…”

Whether or not his expression is full of regret and hurt, it has nothing to do with Hazel. She says without holding back at all,

“If you can show this kind of expression, you shouldn’t have left someone else to protect him in the first place!”

And so his expression becomes even more pained, his fist gripped tightly and pressed on his sword sheathe. If you look closely, you could even see the slivers of flesh and splashes of rotting liquid.

“I thought I could catch up with them immediately, but the entrance wouldn’t even budge after it was sealed. Hazel, please tell me: How do I open that wall? What must I do to catch up with His Majesty?”

The old lady crosses her arms in front of her chest as she listens to him, soon after calling out to a slave she knows nearby,

“Come over here and help me pull this cart.”

“What’s up? Grandma, anyone who leaves of their own accord will be punished. I don’t want to be whipped!”

“Shut up. Show some manliness once in a while, coward! As long as you don’t say anything, no one will realize I’m gone.”

Hazel knocks the man’s shoulder lightly, wearing a creepy smile you don’t see on old grandmas.

“Or is your heart just like a little female bird hiding and trembling in the hay? Alright, young man, let’s go. Sorry for making you wait, all thanks to that sissy.”

Then she walks in the direction opposite to yesterday, saying in English with her voice kept low,

“I don’t know how to open the walls either, I stumbled across it by coincidence last time. No matter how much time you spend trying to find your way in, it will all be for nothing, because we can’t catch up with them anymore. It’d be faster if we take the surface route and wait for them there.”

“Wait for them there?”

“That’s right. Didn’t I tell you that the underground city seems to head towards somewhere? If we’re lucky, we may be able to intercept them if we go ahead to one of the caves along the way and wait. You have to leave the capital anyway, so do you want to give it a shot?”

“Of course.”

As Hazel stares at Conrad’s face, trying to gauge exactly how serious he is, she notices the scar on his right eyebrow. Suddenly, she remembers something she heard about mazoku ages once upon a time.

“I heard that you can’t tell a mazoku’s age from their appearances. Could you be older than me?”

Perhaps surprised at the sudden question, Conrad raises the scarred right eyebrow. Graves pats his arm with a wrinkly hand,

“But for some reason, Conrad, when I stand in front of you, I keep feeling as though I’m talking to my son or grandson. Isn’t that such a strange feeling?”

With that, she narrows her hazel-colored eyes and laughs from deep within her throat,

“Problem is, I don’t have any sons or grandsons.”

We’re scared stiff by the ‘Lemmings’[2], trying to get past the tunnel before the next wave hits us.

“How should I put it, at least they’re not huge.”

“Exactly. If they were huge then they wouldn’t be cute anymore.”

“They’re not cute to start with, okay?”

“Are a lot of things huge in s.h.i.+n Makoku?”

We’ve been walking for half a day since we came here from the red room, and even though we’ve only moved a small distance, the scenery in the underground city has changed considerably. Compared to before, the streets are practically straight now. The width and height are constant, too.

If the area around the entrance was a manmade farming village, then this area would be like a modern high-speed freeway. Although there aren’t any high-speed cars, that’s true.

Since we can easily touch the walls on either sides now, there’s no need to burn our hands with the friction. I hold the torch in my right hand, leaving the other hand empty to press against my chest through my clothes.

Maybe it’s my own body temperature radiating into it, but the maseki has had a strange sort of warmth since just now. Sometimes it’s so hot it makes me frown, sometimes it’s so cold it’s as though I’m standing outside.

Although there aren’t any houjutsu users nearby, this is still s.h.i.+nzoku land, filled with houryoku. If I threw the maseki into the opposing power, surely it would cause some sort of disturbance.

On the other hand, the pale pink ring Saralegui put on my finger has not budged at all, acting like a normal stone. Apparently it’s a precious houseki that can only be mined in Seisakoku, and yet it hasn’t reacted in the slightest. Of course I’m relieved that I don’t feel any more pain, but the fact that the ring which caused me so much pain back then is so quiet now, gives me a sense of apprehension too.

Since it’s a s.h.i.+znzoku treasure, it should be more excited, emitting more beautiful colors now that it’s back in the homeland it missed so much.

“…Whatever, it is a stone after all.”

Speaking of stones, there are still a lot of trenches.

Maybe it’s because the tunnels got wider, the stone slabs that act as floodgates are even larger. The difference is that now there are a lot of things that feel like switches on the walls too. If we move those, can we control the floodgates? But if they’re not used to block the rat swarms, what are they supposed to block? My suspicions intensify.

Or could it be that those slaves who were forced into a corner by their cla.s.s differences needed large scale defenses in the city the lived in? It’s just that from what remained of their possessions in their houses, we really can’t tell if the people who lived here were wealthy or otherwise. And besides, if they had the time and effort to make these fort-like structures, they probably wouldn’t willingly bend their knees and serve others.

The more I think about it, the weirder it gets.

I turn around slowly, unwilling to waste any more brainpower of these meaningless deductions. Forget it, right now I should worry about how long this precious torch can last. It has served as our only source of light since dawn, and now is so short that I can feel the heat of the flame on my hand when I hold it. That’s why we must find a replacement before the flame disappears. Pots and pans won’t do, so it looks like we’ll just have to burn things like clothing.

“Yuuri.”

“Don’t worry, I will strip like a man… Eh, what did you say?”

Upon hearing Saralegui’s voice, I come back to my senses and look at him. Underneath the light of the flame that burns even brighter near the end of its life, those golden eyelashes seem to be sparkling. Can he withstand this level of heat and light?

Ever since we entered this underground city, he seems to be a lot healthier than he was before.

When we first met and when we were travelling on the s.h.i.+p, he was physically healthy but gave people the impression of a pitiable, sickly boy. As soon as we stepped into this underground world, though, his face has gotten more color and his eyes brighter than ever before, and his spirits seem to have reached a new HIGH.

Not only does he still have his vision in the darkness, he noticed the living creatures before we did, so it’s hard for us to believe he doesn’t know houjutsu.

“Do you hear that? Yuuri, something seems to be approaching us.”

“‘Something’, you say, could it be more rats…”

It wasn’t easy, but I can finally hear some noises too. Judging from this deep tremor and impact, it shouldn’t be a swarm of small animals. Josak seems to have figured out the truth behind the sound, shoving my shoulder forward forcefully.

“Your Majesty, run!”

“Eh, what?”

“Don’t ask so much, just run! Don’t turn back!”

By the time I heard him it’s already too late, because just as my left foot steps forward, I turn my body around to look. In order to see clearly what it is chasing us down, I waste half a step’s worth of time.

In the beginning, underneath the torchlight, all I see is sand and dust. As I’m getting ready to run ahead, I hesitate and look back a second time. Only then do I realize that a large stone, about as wide as the tunnel, is thundering towards us.

Because its edges blur into the darkness, I can’t tell if it’s round.

“There’s no time to look anymore!”

“B-but, what is that thing!? Where did it come from!?”

Saralegui’s clothes are floating, touching my nose.

It’s the first time I’ve seen him run. Looks like even a natural born king, when chased into desperation by a large bolder in an underground tunnel, will still deign to start running. And he’ll run so fast until even his sleeves and clothes hem start flying too.

I turn around again, confirming that there is no distance between the rolling boulder and the walls, the ceiling… I purposely spent time to confirm this unhappy fact.

Now unless we can find a detour or a crevice to hide in, there’s no way we can escape this fate. And this tunnel hasn’t had any relief areas up until now. Add that to the fact that we never thought something like this would happen, and we had no choice but to keep on running despite knowing that there wouldn’t be any relief areas up ahead to escape into.

It’s all because we never thought about this, that’s why we practically dug our own graves.

At first we were even secretly glad that we entered an area that looked like a high-speed expressway, when in fact this was nothing to be happy about at all. Because the thing coming at us at high speeds isn’t a person or a car, but a huge boulder as large as the tunnel.

“I think I saw something like this in a movie before! That series of movies that had Harrison Ford running for his life.”

“…This is probably a trap.”

“Trap!? Who built it, and to, fight against, whom!?”

I run with everything I have and ask at the same time, so I almost end up biting my tongue. Logically, though, this is the place where those who were hunted by the countries on the surface lived, so why would they put so many traps!?

Suddenly, I think of what Hazel Graces would do in this situation.

Since she’s a treasure hunter, even if she came across a dangerous trap, she would probably avoid it as though it was nothing. At this time I think: Who knows how would Hazel and the granddaughter who inherited her legacy, as well as all the adventuring lads and ladies after her, handle this crisis.

An image of a rocket-wielding American even shows up in my mind. At a time like this j.a.panese don’t seem to be up to it.

“Yuuri!”

Saralegui calls out to me, panting. His voice seems to sound really happy, or maybe that’s just me.

“How far do you think we have to run?”

“How would I know!”

I yell back instinctively, before suddenly remembering that he has the ability to see in the dark, unlike the two of us who can only rely on the torch.”

“Sara, use your night vision to find somewhere we can hide! Like a junction or a hole in the wall or something, anything! As long as we can avoid that boulder!”

“There’s nothin’ like that at all.”

…I shouldn’t have asked.

The ball is flying due to its ma.s.s and acceleration, way faster than a human can run even with every last ounce of energy in their bodies. Even if this is a very gradual slope, there’s no avoiding it.

The impact of the incoming weapon is so close our feet won’t even listen to us anymore. If that thing was alive, we would already be close enough to hear it breathing.

Beside me Josak looks at his fingertips(3), and then closes one eye, something you only do when you’re resisting pain. And the suddenly, his body tilts towards the right.

“Josak!?”

I wonder if he was hurt somewhere, but it looks like he’s just leaning towards the wall.

“Keep running, don’t stop!”

Of course I want to keep running, but I can’t help but be bothered by Josak saying such a thing all of a sudden, at a time like this, so I slow down just a little.

His expression becomes a little surprised, and to comfort me, he even touches my face with his left palm, and then reveals a completely uncharacteristically happy smile, like in a Nativity painting.

“You gotta keep running, kay, Your Majesty.”

But, he stops.

“Josak…”

I don’t have time to slow down my run, so I tumble over in a sliding motion, kicking up a lot of dirt underneath my feet before I finally come to a stop. Just as I twist my waist and prepare to turn back, the large stone slate I looked up and saw many times before descends from above. With a sound like rolling thunder it sinks into the ground, thus separating this s.p.a.ce into two.

So he pressed the switch on the other side.

“Josak!?”

Just as I press my palms and chest to the slate, there’s the loud crash of metal shattering and stone colliding. The impact transmitted from the surface of the stone slab, bounces me away once more.

The torch goes out with a wisp of smoke, having flown from my hands. Even all the sound has disappeared, as though taken away with the light.

I sit on the ground in the dark, in the same position I was in that moment when I slid, scared to even make a sound. How I wish this was all a dream, so scared I am that a single move would make the dream reality, that I don’t dare to move even a finger.

At first I thought that as long as I waited patiently, the stone slab would rise on its own, and he would reappear in front of me, so I didn’t even dare to breathe.

But it’s nothing but darkness and silence around me, and no matter how I wait nothing happens at all.

After a while, light and quiet footprints on the sand approach me, and a soft voice calls me,

“Yuuri.”

Rage instantly rises in my chest. Because he dared to speak, to make a sound, so I almost vented that unreasonable anger on someone else.

But I don’t answer, slowly straightening up my body, using my hurting knees to crawl to the newly-formed corner of the wall. In that absolute darkness, I use my hands to advance by touch.

“…Josak?”

I kneel, feeling the smooth stone surface from whatever height I can reach. By the time I touch the lowest point, I reach out my hands to touch the ground, even softer than the wall. I explore the 90 degrees angle with my index finger.

I touch it several times.

After shouting his name once, I can’t stand it anymore,

“Why…!”

I start to move, trying to dig up the road made of mud and stones. But it’s no more than scratching the surface, no use whatsoever, yet none of that matters. Right now my head is filled with one thought, and that’s how to dig a path to the other side of the slab no matter what.

I yell his name without stopping, cursing Josak for not replying.

“Yuuri.”

I don’t notice someone putting his fingers on my shoulder, and I don’t spare a thought as to who it is.

“Are you crying?”

Only then do I sense a living person crouching down beside me, and I finally realize that person is Saralegui. His soft hair touches my face.

In the absolute darkness I can’t tell if my eyes are still open, and cannot possibly know what kind of an expression Sara is looking at me with.

“You’re digging in the wrong place.”

That familiar hand of his, grabs my wrist, and moves it to the left about an arm’s length away.

There’s something slightly damp there.

Saralegui’s fingertips brush past my hand to touch that area, the slightest movement in the air showing me his hand is moving.

Saralegui snorts a little with his nose, touching my left cheek with his damp fingertip.

That’s blood.