“August 12th.
Are you well, Master?
The sky is clear today as well. I am doing fine.
—From your inadequate disciple, Elijah.”
A small paper boat drifted leisurely over the stream water that scattered as bright sunlight struck it. It was a letter that didn’t even fill three lines, sent knowing full well it would never reach its recipient.
The hand that had been half-submerged in the clearly flowing stream water was suddenly withdrawn. The fingers that lightly shook off the moisture were excessively pale and slender.
The face glimpsed beneath the hood of an ash-gray cloak unsuited to the bright weather was pale beyond merely being fair and clean—pale like that of a sick person.
“Whew, done…”
Having finished the main task of his day, the man rose and lifted his head to gaze at the cloudless blue sky.
Elijah Ilisian.
Once the top disciple of a renowned great mage, he now stood isolated and alone in a world where no one remained to remember him.
“…It’s nice that it’s warm.”
Elijah muttered softly to himself as he pulled his hood down deeper. It was summer, when deeply ripened green leaves swayed gently in the breeze, scattering the sweltering heat.
For an ordinary person, the weather was hot enough to worry about heatstroke rather than finding it warm, but for Elijah, who was extremely sensitive to cold, this was the most welcome season.
He retraced his steps back to his small hideout, picking mushrooms that poked their heads out one or two at a time from the tree stumps and stuffing them into his sleeves.
This was also one of his main daily tasks—’meal preparation,’ so to speak. Though the forest seemed to contain nothing but trees, for some it was a place where food lay scattered everywhere. For a reclusive mage who hadn’t left this forest in 200 years, that is.
Elijah gathered up the hem of his cloak that dragged on the ground as he diligently walked the winding trail. Despite moving forward without hesitation on what seemed a familiar path, his slender body would slip even stepping on small pebbles and sway frequently.
After passing through the section of curved spruces along the waterside and going through the densely rising firs, a small cabin appeared. It was Elijah’s only hideout where he could rest at ease.
Only then did Elijah let out a peaceful sigh. Though he had walked a path that took less than 20 minutes round trip, he entered his shabby house utterly exhausted, as if he had sprinted dozens of kilometers at full speed.
The wooden door opened with a creak and shut with a thud. The glass window, covered with dust that seemed not to have been cleaned for centuries, trembled along with the vibration in the wall.
Six mushrooms the size of an adult’s fist clattered onto the oak table worn smooth from handprints. As soon as he put down the mushrooms he’d carried in the hem of his cloak onto the table, Elijah let out a sigh.
With the hood pulled back, his pale and neat face was finally revealed. His unkempt brown hair, grown long and scraggly from not being cut, rippled over his cloak.
“Phew…”
His lips trembled as he caught his ragged breath. After roughly gathering up his cumbersome dangling hair and tying it up, he swept the mushrooms from the table into a large pot.
After also pouring into the pot the water from the bucket he’d struggled to carry in that morning, and stirring around the burning firewood, he finally collapsed onto the bed like he could rest at last.
“Ah, sorry.”
Elijah suddenly apologized and turned over. Struggling to free his arm caught in the cloak that was too large for his body, he pulled out something that had been underneath him.
“I didn’t see you there.”
Except for the fact that its head was a pomegranate, it was just an old, ordinary stuffed doll. The shallowly carved eyes, nose, and mouth on the shiny red peel smiled at Elijah.
The pomegranate’s name was ‘Igrit, Avatar of Fire.’ Elijah’s only housemate and friend.
Elijah, who had seated Igrit on the drawer beside the bed, closed his flickering eyes.
He’d drawn water since morning, written a letter to his master, walked to the riverside to send that letter, picked mushrooms on the way back, and finished preparing two days’ worth of meals.
It had truly been far too busy a day for him.
Sunlight that passed dimly through the small window colored the narrow cabin in yellow. Small particles of dust floated between the beams of light crossing through the air. Slow, regular breathing filled the quiet bed, and his occasionally opening eyelids completely closed.
Unable to support the weight of its substantial head with its fragile stuffed body, Igrit toppled backward as if collapsing.
* * *
In the late afternoon, Elijah blinked his dazed eyes as he woke to the sound of the rusty wind chime creaking. He regretted whether he’d napped too much, but the morning tasks had been so exhausting that it couldn’t be helped.
Picking up Igrit, who had fallen backward, he suddenly sat up as if remembering something he’d forgotten.
“Ah…!”
He rushed to the kitchen and let out a sigh with a resigned face as if he’d known this would happen. The mushroom soup that had been boiling vigorously and then overflowed had burned black on the outside of the pot. Still, it wasn’t completely ruined—about half the contents remained in the pot.
“That’s a relief. I just need to eat sparingly.”
Having seated Igrit at the dining table, he forced away his disappointment.
“I didn’t mean to sleep this long, Igrit.”
The features crudely scratched with fingernails seemed to mock Elijah. Elijah, who had been quietly meeting its gaze, furrowed his brow with a displeased expression.
“What are you saying so much for?”
Elijah thought Igrit was criticizing him too harshly. You’re so foolish, Elijah. What exactly can you do well? The eyes, nose, and mouth carved into the red pomegranate face seemed to twist unpleasantly.
“It’s not like this happens often, do you have to scold me like that?”
People can make mistakes sometimes while living, can’t they? Compared to before when he’d completely burned the pot, he’d really improved a lot.
“Yes, I know. But I was too tired today.”
…He really hated completely burning the pot. A severely burned pot could never be used again. To buy a new pot, he would ultimately have to go down to the village where people lived.
Elijah shuddered at the mere thought. About 120 years ago, when he went down to the settlement to buy a new pot, how distressed he had been.
The world was too complicated and dangerous. People were too fast and cold. That day, Elijah lost the money pouch attached to his waist. What was inside was his entire fortune.
Unable to buy a pot without money, he wandered around and barely picked up an old pot from a junk shop. Even that wasn’t free, it seemed, as the junk shop owner came chasing after him in a rage.
Anyway, since he’d lost all his money that day, Elijah could no longer go down to the settlement. He had to use things as sparingly as possible and make most things himself in the forest.
“It’s still usable, Igrit. It’s not completely burned.”
He irritably set down two chipped bowls with a thud and ladled the soup from the pot into each. Then he placed one in front of Igrit and the other in front of himself.
Stirring the soup that had thickened from being reduced, Elijah glared at Igrit.
“Stop complaining. You know our financial situation. Even if we wanted to buy a new pot, we don’t have money.”
Shaking his head, he began eating the soup that tasted burnt. There was a mountain of things to do. After eating all the soup in the pot, he’d have to scrub off what was stuck to the bottom. Those who haven’t experienced it can’t imagine how hard that is.
Elijah temporarily set aside the work ahead and diligently filled his stomach. Having to finish Igrit’s portion as well, who wouldn’t even touch the soup out of anger, he was forced to overeat.
* * *
“August 13th.
Are you well, Master?
There are some clouds today. I am doing fine.
—From your inadequate disciple, Elijah.”
The letters hadn’t been this short from the beginning. For a few years after his master passed away, he had fairly diligently filled an entire page.
But isn’t that how daily life goes? Events colorful enough to scribble about in letters don’t happen every day.
Tasks like preparing meals in the pot and drawing water are just repetitive work. Writing about the contents of books he read each day lasted only a year or two; now Elijah no longer even read books.
Not reading books made his vocabulary poor, and not meeting people either meant there could be no new variables in his daily life.
So, omitting the commonplace things his master would obviously know, when he tried to write something new, only the weather remained. That’s why letters like this were born day after day, with nothing different from the previous day except the date and weather.
‘When I die, bury my body in the Lantes River. If you do it half-heartedly it’ll float away, so hang heavy stones all over it and make it sink to the deepest part.’
The wrinkled hands were dried like old tree bark. Elijah was calmly watching his master, who looked around the air with clouded eyes as if the place he was at now was the Lantes River.
‘I’ll definitely go to heaven. So I’m fully qualified to be buried in the Lantes River, aren’t I?’
‘Yes, Master.’
Elijah nodded in sincere agreement with his words. His master had been a great mage during his lifetime. He had taken in those with nowhere to go and personally taught them magic, they had undertaken countless great deeds together, and never once failed.
Except for the last mission. Because of that incident, all the other disciples died, and only his master and he barely survived.
