The Wind Stopped, the Time Came

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"My turn, soon, perhaps."

"Held out far, you, Flander."

"Hah — surprised at my own fixation, even I am. Stronger by far than the original regret, this. — Will Merea, properly, survive."

"Merea will be all right. As far as strength goes. The question is whether the will to live is in him. Mind, currently it is — but after the lot of you are gone, will he properly stand back up."

"He'll be all right. Merea is serious about being alive. Having died once shaped the bearing, I think."

"…Right."

"That's right, Cortista. One thing — let me ask."

"What."

"Sky Dragon Cortista — is, perhaps, Merea's friend."

"— Who knows. That is between Merea and me. — A secret."

"Hah — that answer, plenty."

At the time when the wind blowing on the summit of Lindholm Sacred Mountain had grown especially fierce.

A Sky Dragon, settled in a corner of the sacred mountain, and a Heroic Spirit whose limbs were nearly gone, were in conversation.

"That you, intentionally, help with something may run against your pride. Even so, let me ask. — Watch Merea for me. I, by the look, will no longer be able to."

"Watching only — sufficient?"

"Watch — and if Merea looks pained, help him."

"As for me, I am, in my way, fond of Merea. The other-world stories I hear from him are interesting. The person of him I do not, also, dislike. — On as long as I'm so disposed, call it conditional, fine — I'll watch him. I owe you, from before life."

"Much obliged."

Flander's legs were already nearly gone.

"— Going, then."

"Mn — me, of all of us… last, perhaps."

"The other Heroic Spirits?"

"Almost certainly went, at separate places. I can no longer feel them. Everyone thinks the same, on the close. Embarrassed to be seen off by Merea."

"Strangely stubborn, the lot of you."

"Heroes are strong of will."

"Bad sarcasm."

Flander's arms vanished, and the face, finally, blurred.

On Flander's face was the usual smile.

Gentle, slightly troubled, with a hint of bittersweet — that strange smile.

"— Tell Merea — sorry to leave on my own."

"Just that?"

"Thank you — I have already written. At the place Merea first woke, I left the words."

"I see."

"Ah — and — about 〈Demon Lord Hunting〉, please tell Merea once more. I did explain, but the topic is one no number of tellings is sufficient for."

"Understood."

"Merea will, almost certainly, be classified as a Demon Lord. By your account, even one specialised or peculiar strength is enough, in this age, for the Demon Lord label?"

"Yes. Same as your Magic Eyes. You had real formula-craft on top, so it was less stark, but in this age, the 〈Magic Eyes of the Technique God〉 alone would have you classified. As long as the strength is useful in war, the rest can be frail. That sort of talk."

"Doing whatever they please."

"For the strong to obtain stronger strength, the word Demon Lord has been put to convenient use. That the certifying body is itself a powerful nation makes it the worse; any objection is crushed."

"Truly… a convenient word. Looks lofty, but inside, nothing. No real meaning exists. Knowing it, you cannot say it."

"Without winning, even your voice does not carry. That is the warring age. I do not remember which cycle it is, but it is, always, this. The winners set what passes for true. Objection to a strong country in this age is possible only from another strong country — or — from a foolish, sweet country."

"Foolish, sweet…"

"Said well — high-minded. The bearing that holds its pride."

"— Yes."

In that moment, Cortista and Flander each had, in their head, one country's name.

"Then — the country the chased Demon Lords should be making for is, surely, that sort."

"If they can make it. And if, having made it, they are not crushed. If such a country, even, can hold the line — yes, it could become a place for the Demon Lords."

"Then — the country that can possibly be that place — tell Merea about it."

"Stop the implicit phrasing here, of all places. If the country in my head is not the country in your head, it doesn't even land as a joke."

"Hah — fair."

Flander, threading the words on a voice itself fading like mist, his face merging into air —

"If Merea is classified as a Demon Lord, and at that moment is at a loss for a place — tell him to aim for the eastern continent's 〈Lemuse Kingdom〉. If that country still holds the sweetness of the older era, surely it will help Merea."

Cortista, confirming the country in his head was the same as the country Flander named, nodded with a settled air.

"Leilas's… home country."

"Yes."

"…You're not asking."

"What?"

"What that country has, now, become."

"— Yes. Whatever it has become, the fact that, on the present talk, Cortista mapped to Lemuse Kingdom the way I did, suggests — that is, in any case, the country with the highest possibility of being a place for Merea."

"Honestly — for one nearly gone, the head turns fast."

"And — even if it is Leilas's home country, it is, now, the present-day Lemuse King's country. Knowing only that the highest possibility lies there is plenty. Asking strangely could leave a half-formed regret, frankly."

"— Right."

"We are not, fundamentally, beings that should interfere with the era. The rest — leave to those who live the now."

Flander's wavering face looked up at the sky.

Cortista, copying, looked up too.

"That said — Leilas, going on ahead. Going before her husband — quite a move."

There was barely a face left, but, certainly, Flander threw a smile at the sky.

"Leilas had no settle about her, for her looks."

"Hehe — that's right."

Cortista turned a fond-recall eye and an exasperated smile on the sky too.

"—"

The wind stopped.

In that moment, the world's time, by feel, stopped too.

But — the parting moment, even so, came.

"— Right. I'll be off to her, myself, soon."

"…Yes."

The Sky Dragon Cortista's eye, just once, swayed.

"Right then — until next, perhaps. If we meet at 〈Empyrean〉."

"Yes. — Souls bound by lingering regret, now be released and go to the place where you ought to be. — Farewell, Heroic Spirits of the older era."

That day, in places Merea did not know, the spirits who had wandered Lindholm Sacred Mountain across long time broke their regret and ascended to the heavens.

Merea would learn that they had gone, some hours later.

---

While Merea was sitting absently in a stone-built hut on the summit of the sacred mountain, a familiar Sky Dragon's voice came in from outside.

He stepped out, and from Sky Dragon Cortista, Merea heard that Flander and the others had gone, and —

"—"

— lost his words.

But what surfaced on Merea's face next was a strange smile, very like Flander's.

To Sky Dragon Cortista, that smile on Merea's face overlapped, in his eye, with Flander's.

"— Knew it. I've not been with Flander and the others a decade-plus for nothing. I grew up beside them. …Of course I knew. Everyone… shy… aren't they… —"

A single drop slid from Merea's eye and fell.

"— I'll build graves for all of them, now. After that — I'll descend to the lower world."

"Graves."

"They were all Heroic Spirits of an older era. Some, I think, will have been forgotten. But that they certainly lived as proud heroes — that, I want to leave standing in this world. Betrayed, having failed — even so — they bore enough of a salvation-spirit for someone to wish me to become a hero. That, I think, is a significant thing."

"…Right. Sweet-folk, every one of them."

"So — I'll mark, here, that they were, certainly, heroes. Their thoughts alone, I will not let weather away."

"You'll descend to the lower world — and do what."

"That, I'll go to find."

"The age, now, is deep in war-colour. There is no universal value-set. By that, the universal hero Flander and the rest first sought, can no longer exist."

"Understood. Flander said the same. So — I will be a hero for what I want to defend. That was their root bearing. So — for now — I will be a hero for Flander and the rest. They wished for me to live. As the hero who delivers on that wish — let me, here, be."

"— I see. Then I, on my end, will pray that you, like that, can come to be a hero for someone other than the dead."

"Right — thank you, Cortista."

"There was, in that, a touch of sarcasm intended —"

"Cortista's sarcasm comes from caring about me, no?"

"Hah — never cute, you, in that corner. — Mind, fine. I, also, have spent too long alongside you. …A little — attached, perhaps. Just that. — Right. The clouds are climbing again. About time I went."

"Yes."

The clouds, in the sky over the summit of the sacred mountain, were beginning to gather again.

"— Until."

"Yes — at some point, again."

"— Yes."

Sky Dragon Cortista, leaving that line, vanished into the sky.

Merea, alone, remained at Lindholm Sacred Mountain's summit.

〈Merea Mea〉 — that day — finally became alone.