by Yusuke Kishi
“Blowdogs…!” I tried to scream, but only a hoarse whisper came out.
Kiroumaru was only six or seven meters away from Hammerhead.
Suddenly, the scene of Rijin’s death resurfaced as vividly as if it were happening right now.
The blowdog inflated. Its coarse black hair spread out and white lines of light showed between the bristles. If this warning was ignored, it would puff up one last time. Right before it died, its eyes rolled back in its head and saliva dripped from its mouth, a look of indescribable ecstasy on its face. As it reached its limit, the skin was stretched so thin that you could see through it in some places. Inside it, small blue and white sparks danced. (This was the first time I clearly saw the instant that the explosive powder in its body was ignited.)
Then the blowdog exploded.
The skin on its back was torn into pieces, and its head, still with a Cheshire Cat smile, was blown away in the blast. However, the shockwave kicked up great clouds of dust, expanding outward at increasingly high speeds. The blowdog’s sharp bone shards tore into Rijin and his body was shredded as if it had been scraped away by a coarse file.
I snapped back to reality. I thought I two or three minutes had passed, but it was actually only a second or two.
The blowdogs made their way in front of Hammerhead. Kiroumaru halted again. As if he sensed danger, he backed up nimbly. However, his honor as commander caused him to move just a second too late.
Skipping its final warning completely, the blowdogs went straight to inflating themselvs to the point of explosion.
“Satoru!” I gripped his arms tightly.
He opened his eyes.
All sound vanished and everything seemed to slow down. Time stretched out exponentially like in a dream.
The blowdogs had swelled up into two giant balls. White warning lines were visible between their fur.
Then, it would explode…so I thought.
A split second before it happened, Satoru halted it with his cantus. One was sucked back into the entrance. The second he couldn’t get to in time. He forcibly crushed the blowdog’s body as it tried to explode. For a fraction of a second, the two opposite forces clashed.
The blowdog rippled strangely as it was grasped by an invisible hand, and imploded.
The outward force of the explosion rebounded in on itself. But then it ricocheted back out again with greater force.
If that second explosion had been repressed too, what would have happened? When a seal is explosively broken, the stronger the seal, the more powerful the explosion. If the explosion had broken the cantus seal, no one would have been left alive.
Fortunately, the image that Satoru had created of a giant hand saved our lives. A jet of energy shot out of the gap between the index finger and thumb.
Around the same time, the second black ball that had been pushed into the nest rocked the air with its explosion and blasted large amounts of dirt from the ceiling.
A split second before the shock reached us, I used all my remaining to push the now-unresponsive Satoru into the ground.
As we waited for everything to settle from the blast, I thought about the look of pleasure on the blowdog’s face before it self-destructed, and irrationally decided that it must have been male.
The nest had become a giant graveyard.
The bodies that the Giant Hornets brought out were covered in extensive wounds. Of course, they were all dead. The blowdog’s bones couldn’t have traveled through the twists and turns in the tunnels, so they must have been killed by the shockwave (from the detonation that was going faster than the speed of sound).
There was a clamor from the excavating soldiers. One of them came running out ecstatically.
“The queen’s body has been found,” Kiroumaru said after the soldier had made his report.
He had been seriously wounded in the blast and the bandages around his back and shoulder were stained red with blood. The air was full of flies buzzing around the mountain of excavated corpses and they hovered annoyingly around Kiroumaru as well.
“I will go inspect it.”
He looked down at the ragged body at his feet. If it weren’t for the remaining shreds of the cloak, you wouldn’t be able to tell that it was Hammerhead. He had intended to take Kiroumaru down along with himself. Kiroumaru stomped derisively on the corpse and continued on his way. It obviously hurt to walk. But more than that, the pain of anger and regret at the sacrifices of his troops caused by his own negligence was hard to bear.
I looked at the unconscious Satoru. He didn’t seem to be hurt and his breathing was regular. He’d probably be okay if I left for a few minutes.
“Can I see too?”
For the first time since the explosion, Kiroumaru showed his disconcerting smile. “…I don’t really recommend it.”
“Please take me with you as well,” Squealer followed, ignoring Kiroumaru’s warning.
He seemed relatively unharmed from the explosion.
A large part of the nest had collapsed from the shockwave. We stood over the deepest crack and looked down. I gasped.
“Is that really the queen?” I asked.
Kiroumaru nodded. “Since the queen needs to give birth to so many nestling, her body is necessarily much larger. That said, I don’t think there’s ever been one this big in our country.”
It seemed impossible to lift her up out onto level ground.
However I looked at it, she was about as big as a mid-sized whale. Most of her bulk appeared to be her uterus. Her head was incongruously small in comparison.
“Let’s return,” Kiroumaru said, giving rapid orders to the soldiers working below.
The soldiers heaved in unison and flipped the queen onto her back. We saw her stiff face. It was similar to the Robber Fly queen, but much uglier. Her teeth, ten centimeters long each, were bared as if she had died in a fit of anger.
What was even more shocking was her abnormally long torso. There were innumerable nipples for feeding many nestlings at one time. But apart from that, I thought I also saw a large number of feet, like on a hornworm or a minoshiro.
“Why are there so many legs…?” I asked.
“Unthinkable…this is terrible,” Squealer said, “It’s absolutely unforgivable!”
“We already knew the soldiers were completely mutated, yet you’re surprised that the queen is also a mutant?” Kiroumaru said sarcastically.
“Mutant…? But how?”
“The queen can’t be! She’s the one who makes mutants. This queen was mutated by the previous queen who gave birth to her!” Squealer shouted.
“Huh? So…?”
Kiroumaru glared at Squealer, who was beside himself with anger.
Squealer cringed and shut his mouth. “I’m sorry, I cannot explain more.”
Turning toward me, Kiroumaru bowed.
“Why not? I’m a god!”
“I understand. Earlier, you saved my life. I will never forget that until I die. But the Ethics Committee has said that we are not allowed to let young gods know of any knowledge that might harm them.
It looked like I wasn’t going to be able to get more information out of them, so I gave up and went back outside to Satoru. As I was leaving, Kiroumaru was giving out orders on how to move the queen’s corpse. I wanted to know why they needed the corpse, but was afraid of what the answer would be. Suddenly I was so tired that I was about to keel over. I didn’t care about the queerats anymore. They could go kill each other for all I cared.
Before long, we were shown to the Giant Hornet camp. Even as two queerats carried Satoru around, he didn’t wake up.
I threw myself onto a bed of soft hay and fell asleep instantly.
Since yesterday, we had been thrown into one dangerous situation after another. But we were safe now. We were going home. Kiroumaru would guard us until we got to where the canoes were hidden, and then we would row down the river ourselves. I looked at Satoru sleeping soundly next to me. I wasn’t worried anymore. Even if he did
n’t wake up, I would bring him home.
Thinking of Shun, Maria, and Mamoru gave me a leaden feeling in my chest. I wanted to believe that they were okay, but in light of all the disasters the two of us had gone through, it was hard to be optimistic. If their canoes were still there, I’d have to ask Kiroumaru to go search for them.
But that could wait until I woke up. The Ground Spider threat had been dealt with. If the three of them were still okay, they probably wouldn’t run into any more danger.
With that thought, I felt myself finally relax.
I can’t stay awake any longer. Let me sleep for a moment.
Slowly, I slipped into darkness.
Right before I fell asleep, Satoru’s voice echoed in my head.
“Look, ever since last night, we’ve walking the line between life and death, right?”
“Uh huh.”
“But I’d wager that this is actually the most dangerous situation we’ve been in so far.”
What exactly was the danger? Wasn’t Satoru just being overanxious?
Now I was worried, but I couldn’t fight the drowsiness anymore.
I fell into a deep sleep.
Chapter 7
When I opened my eyes, the room was already dark.
Everything earlier seemed like a dream. Everyone was together. Father. Mother. Satoru. Shun. Maria. Mamoru. I can’t remember exactly, but there may have been others as well.
In a familiar dinner scene, the dining table was replaced by the ball tournament field. Satoru and I were on the side, trying to use our cantus to move the pushers. The opposing team was steeped in shadow, so I couldn’t tell who they were. Innumerable enemy pieces rose up from the earth and bore down on us. We ran blindly without knowing where the goal was.
The enemy chased us persistently, gaining territory while pressing us farther and farther back. We were slowly being driven into a corner. Soon, we were completely surrounded.
Just as I thought we had no way out, the nearest enemy piece was blown away with a solid bang. Then another. Then even more as if in a chain reaction.
It was unmistakably Satoru’s doing. Blatantly breaking the rules. No, even more than that…
I suddenly realized that the enemy’s pieces looked like queerats. Panicked, I tried to escape, but couldn’t without killing them all.
I stared dumbly at Satoru.
Part of his face was in shadow, and I couldn’t see his eyes. But there seemed to be a slight smile on his lips.
I woke up with my heart racing.
Then I recalled where I was. At once, the anxiety caused by the real world swept away all traces of the dream. How long had I been asleep? If Satoru’s intuition was correct, we were still in danger.
Listening carefully, there were no sounds other than Satoru’s breathing.
I realized there was something near my pillow. Two bowls on a wooden tray. I picked it up, but couldn’t tell what was inside. I sniffed it and smelled the faint scent of miso. Just then, my stomach let out a loud growl. Thinking back on it, I hadn’t eaten anything since lunch yesterday.
There were no chopsticks, but something roughly carved out of bamboo that looked like a lotus. I hesitated for a second, then put the lotus into the bowl and brought it to my lips. I didn’t know what was in it, so I tasted it carefully. It was extremely bland, like porridge with nothing in it, but before I realized it, I was spooning fervently from the bowl.
The bowl was empty in seconds.
In my hunger, I looked greedily at the second bowl. It was his share, but if he continued to sleep like this, he wouldn’t need it tonight.
Of course, I wouldn’t actually steal his food, but being only half full was even more unbearable than not eating at all.
I tried to wake Satoru. Though I knew that I should just let him sleep. To be completely honest, I wanted to shake him awake and tell him that there was food, and have him say that he didn’t want it so I could have it instead.
I shook his shoulder, but he didn’t wake up. It was pointless. He had single handedly stopped a blowdog from exploding and thrown another deep into a cave. On top of that, he had already been exhausted and wasn’t in any shape to be using his cantus to begin with. If he hadn’t managed to muster up the last of his strength then, we would all have been blasted to death.
Embarrassment flooded through me and I stopped shaking him.
Now I was starting to worry. Could pushing his body and mind past their limits leave lasting damage on his brain? On top of that, there could also be side effects from the haphazard hypnosis I used on Satoru to help him regain his cantus.
Satoru let out a quiet groan. I couldn’t see him clearly, but he seemed to be grimacing with pain.
I leaned in and kissed him softly. His face relaxed into a slight smile. There was a glimmer as his eyes caught the light. Although this wasn’t a prince’s kiss, it seemed to have the same effect.
“Saki…how long have I been here?” he asked hoarsely.
“I don’t know. It’s already dark outside.”
Satoru sat up slowly. “Is there something to eat?”
I passed the bowl to him. “How did you know?”
He put his finger to my lips. So the prince didn’t wake from the princess’s kiss, but from the lingering aroma of food. Satoru must have been hungry, since he finished the bowl even faster than I did. He looked like he wanted to lick the bowl when he was done, but noticed me looking at him.
“Hey, do you think we’re still in danger?” I asked the question that had been bothering me the most.
“Yeah,” he said without hesitation.
“But what danger? The Ground Spiders have been wiped out…”
Satoru put his finger to my lips again. Though for a different reason than before. “Isn’t there a guard outside?”
To be honest, I had not thought of that. We had been sleeping like logs inside one of the rooms of the Giant Hornet camp. It was a simple shelter with a thatched bamboo roof. The only entrance was covered with a hanging straw mat.
I crawled slowly over to the entrance and peeked outside. There they were. Two armored queerats standing guard. Silently, I crawled back.
“There is.”
Hearing this, Satoru pulled me closer and whispered in my ear. “If they’re low level soldiers, they probably won’t understand much Japanese. But let’s talk like this just to be safe.”
His breath tickled my ear. I put my lips to his ear.
“But why do we have to be so cautious? The Giant Hornet colony is…”
Before I had fallen asleep, I had thought of the same question.
“You’re right. They’re the most loyal to humans,” he whispered. “But that doesn’t mean they’re loyal to us. Kiroumaru and them are only unswervingly obedient to the adults, right?”
“So?”
“So in the end, their priority is what the Ethics Committee says,” he stopped abruptly.
“You don’t think the Ethics Committee wants to do something to us?”
His hand tightened on my shoulder. “We met the false minoshiro and learned things we’re not supposed to know about.”
“But that…!”
“Sh. You’re being loud,” Satoru was silent for a moment, his attention on the door. “Let’s assume what the false minoshiro said is true. It’s disgusting to imagine, but if humans really could attack each other with cantus, our society would be destroyed in an instant. So wouldn’t they use any method possible to prevent that, no matter how frightening?”
“But are they really going to do something to us?”
“Don’t people always say that they remove potential problem children before anything actually happens? In other words, they’re disposed of.”
“Disposed…it can’t be. Don’t say something so ridiculous. That can’t happen!”
“Think about it. In Harmony School and Sage Academy, students disappear every year, don’t they? It’s weird no matter how you think about it. If they’re not disposed
of, where do they go?”
I felt all my hairs stand on end. Although listening to what the false minoshiro said had been frightening, at the time I only half-believed it, so I didn’t think too much. But now I felt more terrified than I had been all last night.
“But…but, no one knows that we met the false minoshiro.”
Rijin was the only witness, but he had been killed by the blowdog explosion.
“There’s proof though,” Satoru said chillingly. “We had our cantus sealed, right? They wouldn’t do that unless we had broken a serious rule.”
“…so they’re not going to help us?”
If the town decided to get rid of us, it meant that we had no place to return to. Tears welled up in my eyes.
“No, there’s still hope. It should be possible to at least go back to the village. Our parents will help us somehow. Especially your mom, isn’t she the head librarian?”
“Y-yes, but,” my mind was spinning. “Then what exactly are you worried about?”
Seeing that I still didn’t understand, Satoru let out a sigh. “Kiroumaru will probably include us in his report about the Ground Spiders. If they find out that you can’t use your cantus, they’ll know that something happened. And if they decide to deal with us right here, they’ll command Kiroumaru to do it.
I felt that he was over-thinking it. “Getting rid of us…even though they have no proof for anything?”
“It’ll be too late once we get back,” his voice shook. “If we tell even one person about what we learned, the information will spread in an instant.”
“…but!”
“And if what the false minoshiro said about death feedback is true, then no one in the village can kill us. If they do, they’ll die too. That means that they usually go outside the Holy Barrier to get rid of problem children. …I think they use queerats.”
I was speechless. Would they really do something that terrifying?
Cold sweat ran down my back. Did the initiation at the temple take place outside the Holy Barrier for the same reason?
“Kiroumaru probably sends his reports by carrier pigeon since that’s the fastest. If the pigeon is quick enough, it can get to the village before sundown. Then the committee will discuss and send back a response by the next morning at the earliest.”
