Epilogue: Returning to Nothing

Epilogue:
Returning to Nothing

 

ULTIMATELY, the chieftain’s death was confirmed several days after Loren and Lapis returned to the fairy village. Based on their firsthand account, the fairies held hope that the chief was well and truly done for, but Cornet wanted to be sure. Understandable, but it left Lapis and Loren stuck in the forest, waiting around until they could receive their rewards.

“We’re saving on room and board, I guess.”

Loren lived most of his life crossing from battlefield to battlefield, so it didn’t bother him if he couldn’t return to town. Lapis grumbled a bit, but Cornet had insisted and Loren accepted, so she relented and bottled up her complaining.

That being said, the fairy-kind village was made for people of a completely different stature. There was nowhere to house two grown humanoids, and they were forced to camp out a few days and nights in their tents and sleeping bags.

“We’re camping out, and the food’s… You know…”

Evil god of gluttony or not, Gula had been spot on; fairies rarely ever cooked their food. Lapis and Loren were mostly given raw fruits and wild plants. This was a bit much for the pair, so they had no choice but to build a fire on the edge of the settlement, subsisting off their rations and fish skewered in the lake.

It took so long to confirm the chieftain’s death because of the condition of his body. As soon as the gluttonous god had left it, it started rotting at a rapid pace, and it was soon so decomposed that it was impossible to determine whether the corpse belonged to the chief or some other creature entirely. It wasn’t as if the fairies were impervious to the smell either.

With little choice in the matter, the fairies gathered up flowers and fragrant herbs to keep themselves sane. They incinerated the rotten mean bit by bit, collecting anything that could serve as evidence until, finally, they reached the conclusion that the massive thing was undoubtedly their chief.

“You really saved us there,” Cornet said. “I don’t know how to repay you.”

She’d apparently made such a good show at rallying the fairies that she’d been appointed their next chieftain. Not that any of them particularly cared who their leader was.

As for the elves, they hadn’t yet been completely annihilated. Cornet managed to establish contact with another elf settlement in the Black Forest, and Feuille would be entrusted to them. He’d lost his family along with everyone he knew, but as an elf, he still had a long life ahead of him. Loren could only pray that time would eventually heal the wounds on his heart.

“Now about your reward.”

Cornet led them to a sort of warehouse in the corner. With a heave and a ho, the other fairies were hard at work ferrying out its contents. This was the only way to examine the stockpile, as neither Lapis nor Loren could enter the building, but it took the fairies a good deal of sweat and tears to haul out all the treasures contained within.

“As promised, please pick any one thing and take it with you.”

Lapis immediately began scouring the hoard. Loren, for his part, did nothing, simply watching over her as she picked up various articles and carefully appraised them. It wasn’t like he had the skill set to tell which gemstones were more expensive than others. Leaving it to the ever-knowledgeable Lapis was therefore the most efficient way to make the most out of their reward. But after she had scanned through quite a bit of the haul, he saw that her hands had stopped.

“What’s wrong?” he asked her. She turned to him like a rusty hinge. Wondering what could have possibly made her so stiff, he peeked over her shoulder and grimaced. “That’s…”

Lapis was clenching a translucent purple gem that didn’t look particularly valuable. It was decently large but had been arbitrarily faceted, and it didn’t look like the sort of thing Lapis would be shocked by. However, Loren dimly recognized it. He cocked his head, trying to remember.

“Mr. Loren, this…” She sounded lost, and Loren abruptly recalled what it was, his eyes widening in surprise.

“Is it really…that?”

He thought back to their last request at the adventurer training academy. The thing Lapis had nonchalantly obtained on the lowest floor and brought home with her had been identical to what she held in her hands.

“What part is it?”

“My right hand, probably…”

This gem was what had become of one of the limbs Lapis’s parents had snatched away from her before hiding them around the world. Lapis had regained her left arm at the academy, and it seemed her right arm had been in the fairy storehouse.

“I believe they found it somewhere in the Black Forest and picked it up…”

“That’s convenient.”

Lucky. She found what she was looking for, thought Loren, but Lapis was looking more troubled than ever.

“What’s wrong? Say you want it.”

He didn’t know what other treasures there were to find, but Lapis’s body parts couldn’t be bought for money. He didn’t see any other option and thought she would jump at the opportunity. However, Lapis’s opinion seemed to differ.

“I’ll give up on it this time.”

“Why’s that?”

“We can’t make any money off of this. Therefore, there is nothing to split, and you gain nothing, Mr. Loren,” Lapis said. She made to return the gem to the mountain of treasures, but Loren snatched it away from her. Before she could do anything, he held it up to Cornet.

“Cornet, we’ll take this as our reward.”

“You got it.”

“Hey! Mr. Loren!” Lapis protested.

Loren put the newly obtained gemstone in her hand. “If you’re that worried about it, why don’t you split the reward by knocking a bit off my debt?”

“But…if I do that…”

His debt would go down, sure, but they still wouldn’t make any money off the expedition. Loren might make up a bit of his deficit, and Lapis would regain some of her body, but money-wise they’d remain at zero.

“We’ve got the reward from the monster hunt they tallied up in town. That should be enough profit for us.”

“About that…” She looked at him apologetically, and Loren tilted his head.

Did something happen to it? he wondered. He was right on the money.

“The certificate was in my bags.”

“What about them?”

“Remember how we jumped in the water before we reached the village?”

Loren finally caught on. They had been underwater so long that their clothes and bags had been soaked to the core, and it was easy to guess what had happened to the paper.

“It got wet…”

“Yes, sopping wet. I tried drying it, but the ink had blurred, and it is essentially unreadable.”

“That’s, well… Tough luck.”

But there hadn’t been any other option at the time, as far as Loren was concerned. The results were unfortunate, but he couldn’t blame anyone. He gave up on the matter.

“Hey, I’ve got less debt, you’ve got your body. Let’s just say it ended well, eh? Even if you gave up this time, you’d have to come back for it eventually, right? Saves you the trouble.”

Loren placed a hand on her head, bringing an end to the debate. Lapis still looked lost, but she soon gave him a smile, holding the gemstone to her chest.

“I’ll cast magic on you properly, so you don’t get wet on the way out,” Cornet assured them.

“Please do. Wait, is the waterway the only exit?”

“The other one is blocked by the chief’s body.”

That was yet another thing Loren could do little about, and he gave up worrying about it as well. It was either diving into water or doing something about the decaying flesh. The water was far less painful, and with Cornet’s magic, it was hardly worth any thought at all.

“Then we’ll be heading out.”

“Loren, Lapis, I’m really grateful. If you two hadn’t done something about the chief, we also might have been taken by that strange power and attacked someone,” Cornet said as she circled around the two of them, casting her spells. “I won’t forget this debt.”

“We took a quest, you paid the reward. We’re even.”

“Even so. You had the option to pretend you hadn’t seen a thing and put the forest behind you. I, Cornet of fairy-kind, am truly grateful. Don’t forget that.”

“Sure, got it. If we ever meet again.”

Cornet saw them off with a sad wave before Loren and Lapis jumped back down into the waterway. On their way to the village, Loren had vividly felt the water’s cold against his skin. Now with the magic Cornet cast on him, he no longer felt an unpleasant dampness in his clothes, nor the cool sensation of water whatsoever.

“If only it was like this every time…”

He hadn’t taken a guild quest this time around, so he hadn’t failed. The certificate had been rendered illegible, so he didn’t have high hopes for that, but his only losses had been the equipment and food supplies needed to get them to the forest. That hadn’t been so pricey, really.

In fact, they had both gained something, Lapis a piece of herself, and Loren a reduction on his debt. What’s more, he usually found himself in a hospital bed at the end of every quest, but this time he was still conscious, and he didn’t feel much pain at all.

“I feel like we’re missing something…” Lapis murmured.

“Nope.”

“Curses, next time for sure.”

“Who the hell are you supposed to be?!”

“You say that, but the truth is, you actually like the hospital bed.”

“I don’t, just get swimming already!”

They could talk underwater thanks to Cornet’s magic, and tease each other as well. Loren gave Lapis a light push to get her moving. Still, he wasn’t badly injured, he was still awake, and he hadn’t faced a financial loss.

Not bad, once in a while, he thought as he slowly swam after her.