Chapter 116: A Journey Of No Return
Wheels rolled over the pebbles scattered across the gazebo; resting in the chair with a pale, exhausted face and neatly tied pale-beige hair, the now 17-year-old Yulei was pushed to Vanessa and Nemora's side.
Her remaining time etched itself onto her face.
Flamm's was killing- No, her Soul was draining.
The white crown floating above her head rolled with thick peals of white haze; her Soul was condensing, smoking, and coiling into the crown.
Not much time remained in her ailing body; the Curses prevented her Soul from escaping, but her body was falling apart as her Soul filled the crown instead of her body.
"Vanessa, how many times have I told you not to aggravate your friends?" Yulei's tired, hoarse voice released like a whisper into the girls' ears.
"B, but-"
"No buts, Vanessa. I won't ask you to apologi- Cough! Cough!" Yulei's face whitened into a sheet as she coughed her lungs out with reluctance.
Vanessa hurried to Yulei's side and gently rubbed her back, "There, there..." It was a shocking 180 in her demeanour, but, as Nemora watched along, she only felt that it was natural.
It made sense.
"...Your brother."
Flash!
Manic eyes surged back towards Nemora, demanding silence from her.
Nemora quietly obliged, shutting her mouth...
"Will you stop stalking Alora now?"
...only to open it right back up. This wasn't something she could let slip by; Vanessa's state of mind wasn't healthy, and it also didn't sit well with her to watch as her friend stalked Alora.
"Fine." Surprisingly, Vanessa responded positively to her request. Although it likely had everything to do with the ailing Yulei sitting by her side.
After Vanessa turned her eyes back to Yulei, Nemora watched Vanessa wheel Yulei away into the distance back to her carriage. She seemed to plan on spending the remainder of her day with Yulei.
Nemora wasn't going to stop her.
Instead, Nemora sat back down in her chair.
Sweeping her long hair backwards, she sighed and interlaced her fingers as she stared upwards at the roof of the gazebo.
"First, her brother. Then, Yulei. And now Alora...?" A terrifying conjecture theorised in her brain; one that held a multitude of terrible conclusions.
"If that's the case-"
She squeezed her hands together.
"-I need to find the common variable between them and figure out how to spot it. Otherwise..."
There was one thing she was sure about, though.
The common variable wasn'tFlamm's, or, as Alora stated, the consumption of their Souls.
It was something else.
Nemora did have one possibility in mind.
But, she didn't want to make it concrete.
Not yet, at least.
-----
Soft, pliable flesh bounced beneath my thighs. With each shift of her body, the contact between us increased ever so slightly with mind-numbing warmth.
As for who it was that was holding me-
"Sister... You've been at this for 3 days now."
-I upturned my eyes and stared into Esme's lovely golden eyes. She shot them sideways, avoiding my stare through the masks' eyeholes.
Correct, it wasn't Hilda with her voluptuous body holding onto me, but my slender, growing sister.
"I can be at it for as long as I want." So she said with her eyes still turned away from mine.
It somehow didn't sound quite convincing when she said it like that—it's as if the part of my adorable sister that exists in the realm of absolute straightforwardness is pushing her to say that, but the part of her that sees me as her sister is pushing her away.
Cute.
"You're the cute one."
I said that out loud again.
"You also said that out loud, too, my cute Alora."
...Oh.
Woops?
"That too."
Damn it, it's too difficult to contain my thoughts when the girl I love from the depths of pitch-black heart is holding onto me-
Ilovethisfeelingtoomuch.
Hehe, I didn't think that one out loud this time~
"You didn't think what out loud?"
"I was thinking about how pretty my sister is."
"Aww~" Nuzzling my scalp with her chin, Esme began swaying us side-to-side together; she completely ignored Hilda, who was sitting beside us.
And also ignored the dozen different eyes of the cohort.
Yep.
She was doing this in front of everyone during our meeting.
"Hey. You two. Can you stop? We have matters of importance to discuss." Nemora tapped the table with a flicker of... Disgust? It didn't feel like real disgust; it held a tinge of reluctance and helplessness to it.
"Fine."
"See, you should stop already, Esme."
"I already stopped."
"...I was just saying."
Clap!
Smacking her hands together, Nemora drew everyone's eyes to her, "Alright. Let's get this meeting started for real. First of all, we'll start with Hildekar. How is the progress with The Canary going? Are Elden and Jill aiding as I asked them to, or have they been interrupting you more than helping you?"
Responding, "They're getting the job done. The Canary is 90% complete. It should be all but done on the day we leave. But, I won't be completing it till the day. Something is slightly off with the way The Canary is sealed in the cavern walls. I don't think it's smart to do the finishing touches before the day."
"Off? How so?" Yulei asked.
Hildekar scratched his cheek for a moment to think it through before responding with, "It's sealed at the back of the cavern, first off. We don't know—no, we do know what's on the other end of the Domain of Light—and because we know, I don't think I should unseal The Canary until we are all on it and ready to depart."
"But you said 'off'. You wouldn't say that casually over something we already all knew. So what exactly is off?" Nemora had to take over and ask again; Hildekar was still holding back on his suspicions.
"...Well."
Shrugging his shoulders:
"I can hear things sometimes. Unpleasant things."
Everyone sat up straighter and tucked themselves closer to the table, their ears perked up as Nemora asked again, "What things?"
Shaking his head, "I don't know what exactly, but the closer I get to the end of The Canary, the worse it gets. It's unpleasant. Gratingly unpleasant."
"Fine, that's good enough. I'll move on to the logistics."
Nemora stood up from her chair, it squeaked and groaned across the marbled floor, drawing all attention to her.
Solemnly planting her hands on the table-
"This will be long, so get your notes ready."
-she eyed each person here once, then began her hefty list.
"First, I've procured a year's worth of preserved food and water. Clothing for all forms of weather. Spare material for construction purposes. Weighted ropes and anchors. Sand glass and chip log to measure time and speed. Oil lamps for the interior of the ship. Horns for cases of emergency where we need to signal to each other without the usage of Blessings and Curses-"
Nemora had to momentarily halt her speech to gather her breath. The sound of pens scribbling along paper echoed across the gazebo during the brief silence.
"-Vessels for water collection. Methods to preserve food via smoking and salting. Medical kits in case of Elden's absence. Harpoon and nets, I doubt the use of these in the endless dark waters, but better safe than sorry. Lines to tie around sections of The Canary to navigate in the dark."
She took a couple of seconds after that to give us time to finish taking notes before beginning her final tirade.
This time, her demeanour darkened.
The glint in her sparkling green eyes dimmed.
"This part is the most important, in my opinion."
Digging her hand into her pocket, Nemora pulled out a decorative dagger. It shone with a dark-golden hue and was embedded with onyx stones.
"An ornament. Or, in my case, this dagger. Something to keep you grounded in the journey through the night."
"We don't know when we'll see the light again."
"We don't know how long we'll spend on the ship."
"And we don't know if we'll make it out alive."
Squeezing her grip on the dagger, "For that, I want each of you to prepare something for yourself. Something to keep you sane in your darkest moments."
The scribbling pens soon came to a stop.
No one spoke up, but everyone felt it; The tension, the terrifying reality that was soon to be facing them.
"That's it. If anyone has something they want to add, feel free to speak up. Otherwise, meeting adjourned."
Silence reigned over the gazebo for a minute.
Perhaps some did have something to add.
Perhaps some did have some questions to ask.
But none had the mental capacity to do so at that moment.
-----
"What do you think, Hilda?" Carrying me on her back, Esme asked Hilda, who was walking behind us alongside Lily.
"...Do you mean 'how do I feel'?"
Esme's step faltered for a split second before affirming, "Yes, that's a better way to put it. I didn't know which was more fitting, but, you're right. That fits better."
I could feel Hilda's eyes staring at the back of my head for a moment before she answered the question, "I'm not sure. I'll miss my parents. I'll miss the fun days. I'll miss the Remmy collectables. I'll miss a lot."
Nodding faintly, Esme said, "I understand that. But how do you feel?"
"Feel..." Hilda mumbled.
Another moment of silence later, I heard her hair rustle, then she finally answered it from the bottom of her heart.
"...as long as she's there. As long as my friends are there, I'll be fine."
Hilda said that, and I believed her words, but each of us knew that there was another section to that sentence that she left out.
Instead of 'I'll be fine.', it should be-
I thinkI'll be fine.
No one knew what it would be like sailing upon the pitch-black waves.
But we all knew this;
We felt it in our bones;
It resonated within us as that day approached;
A journey of no return.
"...Indeed." Esme muttered at my leaked thoughts.