Mind Leave

 

All that was left behind by all who left.

 

… Honestly, I barely remember what happened after that.

The Spear of Ice conjured by sorcery vanished almost immediately, leaving nothing in Chryse's chest but a tiny, tiny hole no larger than a thumb.

No matter how desperately I called out to her, Chryse didn't so much as twitch, and blood poured ceaselessly from the wound.

I gathered her in my arms and rushed desperately to Nina's clinic.

The hospital was overflowing with people. The injured sat outside the building and even in the corridors, forming an endless queue. I ignored all of it and made straight for Nina. I didn't even have the composure to feel sorry about it.

I found Nina quickly. Her white coat was stained with blood, and she was firing off instructions to the other doctors in rapid succession while treating patients of her own.

I barged in on her work and begged her to treat Chryse.

The patient Nina had been treating was grievously injured. In terms of blood loss alone, probably far worse off than Chryse. And yet I couldn't bring myself to wait my turn. Not in the slightest.

Nina stopped what she was doing, listened to my incoherent explanation, looked at Chryse, and blinked twice with a dazed expression.

Then she looked at my face once more.

With trembling hands, she told me to lay Chryse in the room on the right.

Across from the treatment room, there were two rooms side by side.

The room on the left held patients with clearly critical injuries. As soon as doctors were available, patients from that room were wheeled into treatment. People came and went constantly, and the doctors' faces as they moved those patients were taut with urgency.

By comparison, the room on the right was quiet. There was little foot traffic, and it was hushed and still.

Chryse's wound must have been deemed low priority. Relieved, I carried her into the room on the right.

My assumption was not wrong.

There was no urgency whatsoever to Chryse's treatment.

Because—

— The room on the right was for those who were already beyond saving.

 

＊　＊　＊

 

Nina.

Even so, she fulfilled her duty to the end.

Without lamenting, without a single complaint, she saved every life she could… and let a few slip through her fingers.

Three days later, she came home and slept for an entire day without waking.

 

＊　＊　＊

 

Chryse's body, laid in its coffin, was slowly buried beneath flowers.

None of it felt real.

How many had I seen off by now? Hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of people.

Among them, close friends, beloved students — and a wife I loved dearly.

Some lived out their natural lives, some perished in unfortunate accidents, and some left this world as infants, never growing to adulthood.

And yet, a loss beyond all comparison had opened up in my chest, hollow as a void.

"How… why…"

I heard Nina speak in a trembling voice.

"Why…!"

Red blood trickled from her tightly clenched right hand.

"Why…! I…"

She didn't blame me. Not a single word.

"I couldn't even let this child call me Mom…!"

The only one she blamed, with every fiber of her being, was herself.

"If this was going to happen, I should have let her call me that as much as she wanted…! Over and over, over and over, I should have let her…!"

She didn't even bother wiping the tears spilling down her cheeks. Nothing but raw, wrenching grief consumed her.

"I was the only mother this child had, and yet…!"

"… Your feelings got through to her, properly."

After agonizing over whether to say it, I finally spoke.

"When you weren't around… she always called you Mom."

At last, Nina could no longer even stand. She sank to the ground and wept like a little girl.

… But we couldn't stay like that forever.

"Let's… see her off. Our daughter."

With those words, I urged Nina up and somehow got her to her feet. Through her hiccupping sobs, she gave a small nod.

We placed the lid on the coffin and lowered it into a deep hole.

In Scarlet, the standard practice nowadays is cremation.

But I insisted that Chryse be laid to rest the old way.

I wanted, at the very least, to send her off with my own flame.

Just as I was about to transform into a dragon, something tugged at my leg.

"… Hm?"

It was a stuffed animal I recognized.

Right, the stuffed animal with the armored bear's soul inside it.

"What… is that ugly thing…"

"True, you can't really tell if it's a bear or a dog, but… it's Chryse's keepsake."

Was the magic from back then still in effect?

It kept tugging insistently at my leg, so I picked it up.

The stuffed animal reached its little arms out toward Chryse's coffin.

"What is it? You want to go inside the coffin with her?"

I asked, half in disbelief, but it gave a clear nod. So I placed it in the coffin.

The stuffed animal hopped onto Chryse's body, cradled her cheeks with both hands, and pressed its lips to hers.

— In that instant.

Chryse's eyes snapped open.

"Sorry it's… ugly. I'm not… as good with my hands… as you are, Miss Nina…"

A rasping, halting voice. But it was unmistakably coming from Chryse's lips.

"Chryse!? Is that you, Chryse!?"

Unable to believe it, I asked with eyes wide open.

"The armored bear… gave up its place for me. As long as there's some kind of vessel… a soul can linger for a little while."

"And that vessel, does your own body count!?"

Nina seized on those words.

"You… fixed me up. This is much more comfortable… than the stuffed animal. I'll need to be embalmed, though…"

Gradually, Chryse's voice grew steadier. Her skin remained deathly pale, drained of all color… physically, she was surely dead. Even so.

"I'm a bit embarrassed to admit it, but… I've come back. Even a daughter like me… could I stay with you just a little while longer? Daddy, Mom."

We threw our arms around Chryse at the same moment.