episode_0113

Illusions of memories, scattered like fog in every direction.

But the moment I felt a sticky ‘disgust’, an instinctive premonition told me never to touch those memories.

I stepped backward.

The memories slowly approached, as if to swallow me.

I had to run.

Crash!

I immediately turned around and left Tia’s house.

As I kicked open the wooden door, Marie, who was waiting outside, was startled.

“Ritsu Oppa?”

“Gasp— gasp—.”

“What’s wrong? Is something inside?”

“…….”

I looked back.

Tia’s house was exactly as it had been.

It stood perfectly normal, unchanged, as if mocking me for running out in a fright.

Marie held out a handkerchief to me as I caught my breath.

“You’re sweating so much.”

“Thank you.”

I took the handkerchief and wiped the sweat from my forehead.

Why did I try to run away?

I didn’t even know myself.

It was just… like knowing that the day was ruined upon seeing a slowly approaching storm.

I had simply realized that I needed to reject the approaching memories.

“Damn it….”

This was a failure.

I came to this house to find a clue as to where Tia went.

But here, I couldn’t read any memories related to her whereabouts.

Where did Tia go?

Swoosh—.

A spring breeze blew.

The sound of winter wind and spring wind are different.

A warm breeze swept between Marie and me, gently brushing past the meadow.

I turned my eyes along the path the wind was heading.

“…….”

Below Tia’s house. A small path cut through towards the stream.

Is that it?

I immediately walked towards where the ‘secret passage’ was.

Marie followed with quick, small steps.

“Ritsu Oppa? Where are you going?”

Instead of answering, I reached out and pushed aside the bushes.

Rustle!

Only 100 days had passed, but the secret passage was already completely blocked by overgrown grass.

It meant that no one had traveled this path during that time.

But it was clearly a ‘path’ that Tia had made.

With conviction, I stepped my leg into the thicket.

Marie hesitated and asked.

“Is there a path there?”

“Yes, there is.”

“Ritsu Oppa….”

“You go back to Ruyef. I need to check something quickly. I’ll be right back.”

“No.”

A tight grip.

Something grabbed my arm.

I thought my sleeve had caught on a branch, but Marie was holding my wrist.

“Marie?”

“I’m sorry. Oppa told me to stay by Ritsu Oppa’s side. And to tell him if your condition was strange….”

“…….”

I had nothing to say about Ruyef’s decision to have Marie monitor me.

Because I wasn’t arrogant enough to think I was completely sane myself.

“…You come too. There’s a path here.”

I gestured to Marie.

After hesitating for a moment, she jumped and crossed over the thicket.

I didn’t know if frail Marie could properly follow this perilous path.

If I couldn’t shake off the surveillance, then going together was the only way.

As we moved forward and the path became clearer, Marie asked, intrigued.

“Where does this lead?”

“To the general store.”

“…Huh?”

“It connects to Fosao’s general store.”

Marie asked again, as if unable to understand.

“Why is Tia Unnie’s house connected to the general store?”

“That’s because…….”

I couldn’t bring myself to answer.

An empty voice passed through my throat, piercing my chest.

I didn’t answer, but Marie didn’t press further.

She simply followed, quietly watching my expression.

Crunch.

Coming down the secret passage, I finally saw the general store.

“…….”

There was no need to be nervous.

I had expected it to be like this from the start.

Fosao’s general store had no owner.

No, to be precise, it had become an abandoned building, ownerless.

Seeing the winter leaves piled up on the roof and stairs, it seemed to have been neglected since before spring arrived.

It was strange.

When a building becomes abandoned like this, the windows or doors usually break.

But perhaps because no customers had come during that time, its exterior remained entirely intact.

Just like Tia’s house.

I wiped the dust from the window with my sleeve and peered inside.

Next to me, Marie stood on her tiptoes.

“There’s nothing inside?”

That was right.

The inside of the general store was truly empty.

The display cases once packed with strange items, the tables, even the dust-laden curtains—.

None of it was visible.

It was completely empty, leaving behind only traces that it had once been a general store.

I walked to the front door and grabbed the rusted doorknob.

Clank.

It was locked.

“Are you going in?”

“Yeah.”

“Wouldn’t it be better to break a window to get in…?”

“No. It’s fine.”

Thud.

I kicked the flowerpot next to me with my foot.

Shatter!

As the ceramic flowerpot broke, a key hidden underneath appeared.

Marie turned to look at me, her face surprised.

“…Oh, oh?”

I picked up the key and inserted it into the latch of the doorknob.

Click!

The heavily locked door opened.

Creak—.

The interior was revealed.

I thought, as always, that the smell of rotten mushrooms would waft out.

But my nose didn’t catch any scent.

Instead, there was no smell at all, only an empty air, like the hollow interior itself.

I stepped inside the general store.

“…….”

There was undoubtedly nothing there, yet to my eyes, the general store’s display cases appeared like blurry afterimages.

It was the moment I reached out my hand towards them.

[It’s me….]

Suddenly, a faint voice was heard.

“What?”

I looked back.

Marie, standing on the general store’s stairs, widened her blue eyes.

“…Huh?”

“Didn’t you just say something?”

Marie shook her head.

I wondered if I had misheard and turned my head back towards the interior, but then.

[C-come in, Tia.]

“……!”

A dull voice, thick with oil in its throat, pierced my ear.

This was a memory.

A vast memory pervading the general store.

Shimmer—.

A red-haired girl appeared before me.

Tia… had entered the general store.

[Exiled… you’re, you’re exiled?]

Then, Fosao passed through my body and approached Tia.

[Why?]

[…….]

This memory was… after Tia was exiled from Breezedon.

It was the point when she went to Fosao’s general store.

***

Tia recounted everything that had happened so far.

“R-Ritsu became like that? How could that be….”

Fosao shamelessly said such words.

Even though he had put me to sleep with poison and thrown me off a cliff.

Even though he had planned all of it.

He put on a genuinely regretful expression.

Tia, knowing nothing, continued to explain, receiving comfort from the hypocritical Fosao.

Clatter. Clatter.

While listening to the story, Fosao couldn’t keep his body still.

He gaped his mouth open like a toad and kept his legs fidgeting.

It seemed he wasn’t even listening attentively to Tia’s story in the first place.

That filthy face held various meanings.

A look that said he knew it would come to this.

And a snort of breath, as if he was going crazy with desire to defile the girl in front of him right then.

“……So I received an exile order and wandered through Tailden… and came here.”

“Hoo— nwaah— Is that so?”

Fosao scratched his balding head.

“A few, a few days ago, I saw a big smoke… so it was a forest fire, huh—. But, but exiling Tia is too much, I think—.”

“……I understand. It’s because of me.”

Even after being treated that way by people, Tia accepted it solemnly, saying she understood.

“But I can’t leave Ritsu like this. The doctor-nim said he would look for a way… but until then, I need to protect Ritsu… and I don’t know where to go….”

Tia’s voice trailed off, and she soon began to sniffle.

Fosao swallowed his saliva with a gulp.

“You, you have nowhere to go, right?”

“…Yes.”

“Money?”

Tia bowed her head silently.

“Th-then… do you want to, stay at my house for now?”

“……!”

Her tear-filled red eyes looked up.

“Can I… really?”

“O-of course!”

“…Thank you.”

It seemed Tia had been wandering Tailden without money.

If she had brought out and sold things like books or jewelry, she could have had extra money, but she had left all valuable items at home, so she had nothing.

I thought that was inevitable.

Tia… had no intention of selling them from the start.

She wasn’t the type to easily discard things that held ‘memories’.

She used to say that such items contained memories of herself and someone else, and carrying them made her feel as if they were always together.

…That’s why Tia carried her mother’s heirloom, the Rose Saber, wore the old leather belt her father made, and wore the ruby necklace I gave her.

There were no items Fosao had given her on Tia’s body now.

Even the white dress, the sapphire brooch, and the stiff new leather belt.

She hadn’t discarded them, but she had left them all at home.

The things Tia wanted to keep and cherish that much were….

In essence, the memories of her parents and me.

But…….

Scrape—.

Fosao pushed the table.

Then he pushed the separate chairs together to form one, and brought a mat and blanket from the upstairs bedroom to spread out.

“Ti-Tia can sleep here.”

“Thank you….”

“If you’re cold, you can l-light the brazier.”

“Yes….”

Fosao gave an awkward laugh.

“Why… why? Is it strange?”

“No… it’s just… it feels like it’s the first time I’m sleeping at Mister’s house.”

“Nwaah— W-what! You used to sleep often with Ritsu when you were little—!”

“Those were naps then… it’s the first time I’m sleeping through the night….”

“I-is that so? Hehehek.”

Fosao handed over the blanket and pointed to the back of the general store.

“I’ve, I’ve heated water in the bathtub. Warm yourself up.”

“I haven’t been able to wash for a long time… thank you.”

Tia got up and headed towards the back door.

There was a bathtub with steam rising from it.

It was a structure that received heat from a wall connected to a brazier.

Feeling uncomfortable, Tia immediately took off her shirt.

Because she hadn’t even been allowed time to wash while making medicine and organizing the warehouse.

Rustle—.

She took off her pants as well and stepped into the bathtub.

Tia, immersed in the warm water, stared blankly at the ceiling.

I could read her thoughts from her vacant gaze.

That this moment was exactly the same as when she received Fosao’s help in the desperate Deseo….

Trickle.

Tia began to wash thoroughly, pouring water over her neck and shoulders.

And I could hear.

“Heeheehek….”

He slowly walked out from the back door and went upstairs to the second floor.

Fosao’s figure was visible through the slightly open door crack.

That pig had buried his face in the floor.

And with one hand, he was roughly masturbating, letting out a disgusting laugh.

“Hehehehe…. Ti-Tia… bathing in my, my house…! Heeheehet!”

There was a hole drilled in the floor he was looking at.