Chapter 1 - 1-1
"Hey...!"
A gale disturbing the wilderness carried the old man's voice.
It was Nezumo's voice.
"Hey, come here for a second, it's terrible—!"
This was the second time today that Nezumo had declared things "terrible." If he faced black clouds covering the sky, Nezumo would foresee the end of the world. If he were struck by stomach pain, Nezumo would believe it to be an incurable disease. In either case, it was always "terrible."
Manam sighed.
"Here we go again."
In Manam's wrinkled hand, a single piece of crystal was gripped. Manam loved spending the quiet moments of the evening while idling with the crystal.
"Go on, go to him, Manam."
Across the table, Persa held a bowl. Persa had been licking the plate for a while now, determined not to leave a single drop of soup.
"Go and calm him down. If you leave that old geezer exposed to this cold wind, he'll catch a cold."
"I don't feel like it. It's cold outside. I am currently polishing this crystal. For seventy years, I have been fed up with his long-windedness."
"Seventy years? Has it been that long?" Persa retracted his tongue and tossed the wooden plate onto the table, muttering, "Damn, I'm hungry."
"Hey, you two! Come here! It's terrible!"
"Shut up, Nezumo!" Persa shouted back. "I'm starving over here!"
They were three abandoned old men living in a forgotten land. Their residence was a shabby hut patched together with scraps of wood. Every night, a giant mass of air collided with the hut. The pillars creaked, the windows rattled, and sometimes the candle flame would suddenly flicker out. The hovel, which would not be strange if it were blown away by the wind the next instant, was still trembling on the ground.
The three of them lived hand-to-mouth by taking in and caring for sheep from nearby villages. Even though they intended to work without sparing their bones, being able to eat once a day was a luxury. Despite striving to be frugal, every time winter came, they could not survive without being granted food.
The longer they lived, the more the suffering weighed upon them. Their joints, their internal organs, their lives, their environment—everything only grew worse, and would never again improve.
"How pathetic," Manam murmured, staring at the crystal in his palm. "The highest wisdom humanity can possess sleeps within this brain."
"That's right, the three of us could even conquer the world. And yet..."
"We don't even have a moment for quiet meditation."
"A moment?" Persa spat. "To hell with that. What we need is food, fine wine. And a woman to sleep with. Damn it. When was the last time I ate my fill?"
"How fleeting."
As he gazed at the transparent crystal pointed in a diamond shape, Manam felt as if he could see his younger self. Those days when he aspired to magic and occultism. Manam had studied. Not just Manam—Persa and Nezumo had been young too. The world had been enchantingly mysterious. It had been waiting for its secrets to be unlocked. It felt as if they could do anything. In fact, the intuition of the three had leaped over reason and approached the truth. They were on the verge of their fingertips touching the agonizing form of the world, its smooth sensation.
And yet.
"The era was just bad," Persa said, as if seeing through it all. "What we needed was a strong man. Someone to realize our dreams... a strong... damn! We were born in the wrong era. It's no good now. It's nothing but fools. The world is asleep. We are the only ones who know the method to awaken it. If we are buried just like this, human evolution will be delayed by a thousand years."
"Persa, I feel such regret. If it were as you say..."
Suddenly, there was a knock at the door. It was a knock that seemed likely to break the hut. A voice that sounded devoid of sanity blew away Manam's sentimentality.
"Manam! Persa! I told you to come! What are you doing! Get outside this instant!"
Nezumo's voice was full of energy, reminding them of him as a boy. Manam looked at Persa. Persa shrugged. The two of them stood up.
"Nezumo. Could you please be a little quieter?"
When Manam opened the door, Nezumo was already gone. The light of the half-broken moon illuminated Nezumo's back. Nezumo was leaping. He was running. He was heading toward the hill. The distant howl of a wolf could be heard from afar.
"What's with that guy? Has he finally gone mad?"
"He's always had a touch of madness," Manam said, beginning to walk.
It was a frontier with little rain; the grass grew only as high as their shins. Like the wings of a giant bird-god, the wind made a flapping sound and struck Manam. The grassland, turned blue-black under the moonlight, fluttered like the hair of the earth.
"Hurry up, get over here quickly!"
At the top of the hill, Nezumo was shouting himself hoarse. His arms, with sleeves rolled up and raised high, were as thin as grasshoppers. It was no wonder; with a life like this, if his mind had truly snapped, he would look after him until the end along with Persa.
By the time they reached the summit, both were out of breath. Their bronchial systems had grown considerably weak.
"Nezumo, you'll catch a cold. We aren't young anymore," Persa said, touching Nezumo's shoulder, then hurriedly pulling his hand back. "What's this? Your body is hot."
"I'm excited!"
Nezumo's natural voice was loud to begin with. The wind blew so fiercely it seemed it might tear away the old astronomer's white hair.
"Look up, look at the sky, look at the heavens!"
Nezumo stomped his feet and spread both arms toward the night sky.
Manam looked up. The wind was howling madly. For one full minute, he continued to stare at the sky.
"No way, is that..." A fresh surge of emotion pushed up from the bottom of his stomach to his heart. The stars scattered across the celestial sphere, each and every one of the stars filling the universe, were pulsing, cold and hot. They spread across the heavens in all their splendor, sparkling as they pleased. Though they were lights the size of grains, gravity and repulsion resonated and creaked, moving with a grandeur invisible to the eye, and the myths that had become constellations formed giant three-dimensional images in the immeasurable space. In that vast space, a single flame was lit.
In the direction of true north, there was a red star. It was as dazzling as lightning, flickering slowly as if beating like a heart. The red star was appealing to the three of them.
"Did you see it? Could you see it? Do you see it?" Nezumo raised his fist. "Our star! The red planet! Luv-Uu!"
"Impossible..." were the words that instinctively escaped Manam's mouth. He had finally been able to accept this life of a defeated man, a lifetime where nothing bore fruit, a life that ended as a dream, and yet, at this moment, the legendary demon star Luv-Uu? Impossible.
"There is no definitive proof that that is Luv-Uu, is there?"
"To hell with proof!" Persa roared. "Manam, open your eyes, it's just as Nezumo says, look, that thing is shining brilliantly!"
"Exactly! Do you understand what this means?"
"The power balance of the celestial bodies will change completely," Persa answered Nezumo. "The Holy Tree Palace and the Dog-Wolf Palace will be severed. It's a sharp malefic angle with the White Snake Palace. No, if that really is Luv-Uu... hey, this is terrible! It's terrible! It's a grave matter!"
"I told you so!" Nezumo laughed loudly.
"History will change," Persa's voice was buoyant. "The world will move."
"No way, no way..."
"Pull yourself together! You senile old fool!" Persa's wrinkled hand gripped Manam's shoulder. "You idiot! Damn it! The future king has been born! Damn, it makes me angry! Our era has finally come, we were made to wait forever, but our day has come! Damn it all!"
"The future king..."
"That's right. We have to find him quickly. Find him quickly and make him ours."
"If we do that..."
"The world..."
"We can rule."
Manam and Persa looked at each other. Beside them, Nezumo screamed shrilly.
"I'm going to go prepare for the journey!" It was a voice so energetic it was almost sickening. "We'll take it back, it's already far too late!"
"Yes, let's go! Let's take it back!"
Nezumo and Persa ran down the hill together. Manam was left behind under the starry sky. In the vast, desolate wilderness, there was only him and the red star. Because his right hand hurt, he opened his fist, and there was the crystal. Manam looked up at the red planet. He threw the crystal into the sky with all his might. It was intended as a meager token of gratitude to the goddess of fortune.
A gale that felt like it would slice the skin swirled in a vortex.
We made it in time. We actually made it in time. Manam's soul was trembling. Create a peaceful world. Rule this world with a peace that leaves not a single opening!
Luv-Uu was blinking. It felt as if the entire universe was pulsating. Manam felt as if he could even hear its breathing.