Toward the Light

I fall into deep, dark water.

Swaying back and forth.

Falling endlessly deeper.

Eventually the light can no longer reach me.

Cold water stings my skin.

I sink, slowly drifting downward.

There is no fear.

The silence feels strangely comforting.

At last, I reach the bottom.

I land in a thick, black sludge.

The black sludge clings to my body and begins to swallow me.

That is when fear suddenly grips me.

The unpleasant sensation of the slime clinging to my skin. The freezing cold that feels like it could kill.

I struggle desperately, trying to break free.

Then the slime changes shape, forming hands that seize me and drag me down.

Panic takes over and I thrash and fight to shake them off.

The slime changes again. It becomes the village chief, the village guards, the knight, the group of three adventurers, the adventurer skilled in fighting people, and the filthy man who stabbed me.

The slime takes the shape of the ones I killed, and as they spit curses they try to pull me under.

I fight with everything I have, but they swallow me whole. Silence in total darkness. A piercing cold that stabs into my skin.

Is this the punishment for killing? Is this their curse? The slime clings to my body and steals my freedom.

Strength drains out of me. Maybe this is for the best. I will not have to keep living in fear. I can finally rest.

I accept the darkness and quietly close my eyes.

No way in hell. I am not giving up. I will live and I will be happy. Anyone who gets in the way is getting smashed. Curse or evil spirit, I do not care.

I shake off the slime. Roaring, I struggle with everything I have. I am not ending this by dying. Even if it is pathetic, even if it is ugly, I will live.

I tear the slime away, punch the slime that has taken the village chief’s face, and desperately swim toward the surface, toward the light.

When I raise my upper body with a voiceless groan, a sharp pain stabs my side. Panic almost hits me, but I look around carefully.

Apparently I have been laid in a clean bed. A room filled with white, bright and spotless. Sunlight pours in gently from an open window.

A calm and warm space. A world overflowing with warmth, the exact opposite of that underwater darkness.

So that was a dream. I breathe out slowly.

It has been a long time since I had a nightmare. Even though I have lived in such harsh conditions, I rarely dreamed at all. Maybe I never had the luxury to dream.

Now that I have calmed down, fear rushes in. The burning pain of the poison, the paralysis, the insecurity of living somewhere nothing like Japan.

I thought I was really going to die.

Fear washes over me, and then joy follows behind it. I press my palm to my chest and feel my heartbeat.

I am alive. I am alive. I savor the joy of being alive as the thought fills me.

When consciousness was slipping away, when I felt death right beside me, the people I thought of were not my family or friends back in Japan, but Gonz and the others in my party, and Village Girl.

I am not Hitoshi Nozaki, the Earthling. I am Yajin living in this world. I realize that once more.

I remind myself that just because I survived does not mean I am safe, and I switch my mindset, letting my perception skill expand to full.

At once I sense someone approaching the room. The door opens, and I see someone I know.

“Well now, finally awake, are you?”

Since it’s Ms. Cleiarne, it looks like I managed to reach the clinic.

“You collapsed right in front of the clinic. The stab wound was shallow but the poison had spread through your whole body. You are lucky to be alive.”

“Thank you for treating me. You saved my life.”

When I bow my head politely, Ms. Cleiarne looks surprised.

“For an adventurer, you have good manners. Getting stabbed with a poisoned knife is far from normal, you know. I am relieved you are not like the usual rough types.”

“I only recently became an adventurer.”

“That makes me feel better.”

“Yes, I will not behave rudely.”

“No, I mean you look sensible enough that you will not skip out on paying the bill.”

I smile wryly at that.

Ms. Cleiarne is the lord’s foster daughter. Skipping payment at a clinic she runs is not the kind of suicidal move I could pull.

“I will pay in full, of course.”

“I appreciate that. There are plenty of poor folks who cannot pay for medicine. This clinic stays busy but does not make much.”

“You saved my life. Go ahead and charge me plenty.”

When I say that, Ms. Cleiarne blinks in surprise then bursts into laughter.

“Hahaha, plenty of patients have tried to haggle me down, but nobody has ever told me to overcharge them. You are a funny one.”

“You saved my life.”

“In that case I will not hold back,” Ms. Cleiarne says and smiles broadly.

A foster daughter of the lord named Ms. Cleiarne. The image is of a sheltered noble lady, but in reality she feels more like a big sister type. That is what comes to mind.

“By the way, you should thank Bell.”

“Village Girl?”

“She is the one who found you. You woke up several times, do you remember anything?”

“No, nothing.”

“You drifted in and out for three days with a fever. Bell took care of you the whole time. She wiped your body, fed you soup, even handled your waste with devotion.”

My cheeks burn red. Being cared for like that by a girl I used to like… gratitude and embarrassment hit me at once and my thoughts grow muddled.

“The stab wound is closed already. The poison was not too troublesome. It was made by boiling down medicinal poison herbs and numbing grass to a thicker concentration. A common poison. You probably spread it through your body by moving around. I gave you an antidote, so there is no poison left in you now.”