Chapter 50 (1/2)

With an anticlimactic ease, the carriage pa.s.sed the ramparts and advanced down the stone-paved road.

By this time, the sun was already setting, dying the surroundings sunset red.

Under blue skies, the stores and houses on the streets of the inner capital would surely have been an eye-catching white. Now, illuminated by the red evening sun, every last one was weltering in blood.

The world inside the walls, in a word, was ‘strange’.

Almost every building was three, maybe four stories high, cl.u.s.tered so tightly together that I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to distinguish where one ended and the next began.

Our carriage rolled through what you might call a gap, or maybe a valley, between the buildings.

Though the road was certainly well-maintained, over the course of our journey from the gates to our current position, I’d already lost track of where we were going.

Again and again, we turned at intersections, pa.s.sed under archways; when I tried to pay attention, we were running on top of the walls, or slipping through tunnels. I could no longer picture the city as anything other than a labyrinth.

I can say with absolute confidence that if I were ordered to get off the carriage and return to the gate, I wouldn’t be able to make it.

For starters, I thought that we’d reach our destination immediately after crossing the wall, like at Leon’s estate. But that wasn’t the case. It was obvious when I really thought about it, but the inner capital was a city itself, of course. Or rather, it was the true substance of the Imperial Capital.

If I had to explain why I was so off the mark, I guess it’d be because I only ever spent time outside the wall.

That’s why I never gave much thought to the world inside. My entire impression of the city came from the outlying districts, not the inside of the ramparts. Hence my mistaken expectations.

“Somehow… it’s a different world…”

whispered Aira as she looked outside.

As dusk fell over the city, there was definitely something different about the residents. Their world was s.h.i.+fted out of alignment with ours. It was a sense of displacement I knew from experience.

Young women leading their children. Elderly men out for a stroll in their suits. A quartet of girls chattering energetically as they walked by — everyone was somehow relaxed, and at the same time, if I had to describe it… yeah, that’s right.

Completely free of desperation.

“H–Huh?”

Watching them, tears tumbled from Aira’s eyes as she made a sound of dismay.

A troubled half-smile on her face, she pressed her hands against her eyes, but she couldn’t hold back the overflowing tears. It was like that.

I could understand it, a little. Why she felt that way.

Palmira too, I bet.

Perhaps, Palmira might have seen this once.

“Mn.”

As a fl.u.s.tered Aira continued to cry for reasons she couldn’t understand, Palmira gave her a light hug and pulled her down to sit on the seat.

Then, gently holding the crying girl’s head, she softly and wordlessly stroked it.

It was too painful to watch.

A world all too different.

Aira, Palmira. And me too. We saw that.

For us, living meant fighting tooth and nail to survive. Or perhaps becoming slaves, driven to the brink of death.

And none of it was all that special. At least, not where we came from.

If you let your mind wander, it was very easy to die, to lose everything. A fleeting existence, living each day, each moment in desperation.

That was the world we lived in.

But things weren’t like that here.

Relaxed, without struggle — happily, even. Comfortably.

Privileges granted only to a special handful of people, I thought. So I endured. I resigned myself.

But even if everyone were afforded such privileges, in this world enclosed by the city walls, that would probably be seen as a matter of course. So, bitter as it was, it couldn’t be helped.

Driven to desperation over living, fighting for dear life in order to eat. Though that was a natural part of the world, here, we were heretics for it.

It seemed so terribly wretched.

Being forced to turn to such things to live — what the h.e.l.l did that make us?

The truth is, even when we were at the mansion, that feeling had been there, tucked into a corner. ‘This isn’t a place where we should be.’

Even so, as I see it now, that was still part of our world. Because it was still possible recognize that such ideals only held true in the mansion.

But this place was different. It was that kind of world.

A world encircled by towering walls, isolated from the outside.

That’s why, right now, I was conscious of the world’s absurdity again.

The emotions born within me as a result were misery, and grief, and perhaps — anger.

–

–

As my spirits took a thorough beating, the carriage finally came to a stop.

We seemed to have gone quite a distance. The sun had already sunk below the horizon, and our surroundings were quite dark.

“You must be exhausted. Today, please take your time to rest here.”

We’ve reached our destination, I guess. Honestly, I don’t remember being this tired before, even on the road. Even hearing Leon’s worried voice coming from the front of the carriage, I couldn’t find it in me to give him a proper reply.

Leon was as composed as usual, but I could tell that our visible exhaustion really did concern him.

But he probably didn’t know anything about the emotional breakdown we’d had in the carriage after getting past the castle walls.

And that might be for the best.

This was probably Leon’s hometown. Ordinarily, it would’ve been a place to brag about.

The fact we couldn’t sincerely think of it as amazing was definitely our problem. Besides, as someone who was born and raised here… that was probably something Leon wouldn’t be able to understand, I suppose.

“–ah–”

“! Are you alright?”

As I stepped down from the carriage, I stumbled.

I didn’t think that I was physically exhausted, but mentally seemed to be a different story.

Standing to the side, Leon immediately helped support me.

“Yeah, I’m fine, I’m fine. Just a bit tired, that’s all.”

Doing my best to camouflage my innermost thoughts, I smiled foolishly. All the same, his expression remained concerned, and I felt a little apologetic.

Averting my eyes, I looked at the building that seemed to be our lodgings for the night.

An white-walled mansion, unexpectedly cozy but not out-of-place in this city. At least, it was considerably smaller than the Telaberan estate.

If I were to compare them, it was almost more appropriate to call it a house rather than an estate. However, if I had to describe it, I’d call it ‘very elegant’.

“What a wonderful home, isn’t it?”

I heard Aira’s voice as she descended the carriage after me.