“I brought them, Captain. Just as you said, the outskirts of the forest were covered in spiderwebs.”
Iris approached with a basket in her hands.
“Good. You certainly brought plenty.”
The basket held more spiders than I could count.
“W-what are you going to do with those?”
Dana approached me with a puzzled look.
“I am going to teach you a song.”
“A song…… Were you a bard?”
“No.”
I shook my head.
“I am not a bard. I have never sung this song before, either. I have only heard it a few times.”
“……Pardon?”
“You will listen to my song, infer what song I am singing, and then sing it yourself. And, of course, you must imbue that song with mystical power.”
Dana stared at me with a blank look.
“Is that…… possible?”
“If it were possible, I would have brought it up from the start.”
I smiled and shook my head.
It was an absurd task.
Even asking someone who had never seen an elephant to imitate an elephant’s cry and beguile another elephant would not be this difficult.
“I am starting.”
I held my breath, then described ‘that song’ as carefully as I could.
“Kreeee! Kee-eh-ee-eee!!!”
The sound was closer to a scream or a shout than a song, and might even have sounded ridiculous.
Still, I dredged up every bit of my memory and reproduced it in the closest form I could manage.
“This is…… a song?”
“It is a song. It has rhythm and melody. I do not know how I am supposed to explain it, but it cannot be helped.”
“Ugh…….”
“Kill the spiders in this basket with that song. It is not enough for them to tremble or faint. Spiders this size must simply die. Only then can we move on to the next stage.”
“T-there is another stage too?”
“Yes. It is…… easier than the first task, but it may not be a task you can succeed at merely through effort.”
“That is…….”
“It is all right if you give up. But whether you succeed or give up, you must join our mercenary company.”
“……You are not deliberately giving me an impossible task to bring me into your mercenary company, are you?”
“If we are going to defeat Man-Eating Spiders with our current strength, you naturally have to achieve the impossible.”
Dana bit down hard on her lip.
“I will try first…… Watch me.”
She faithfully reproduced the sound of a pig being slaughtered that I had made. But I could only shake my head.
“I told you it was a song. It needs to hold mystical power, but first…… it is a song. It must be art.”
“What part of that is artistic?!”
“When you hear the real thing, it certainly is artistic.”
She had not heard the song itself. She had only heard my humming of the song.
“Ugh…….”
“You can do it. Keep trying.”
With those final words, I left Dana behind.
“Iris, let us move. We have work to do as well.”
“Understood, Captain.”
I did not think Dana would succeed easily, either. But I had bet on her succeeding.
That was why I had to act in earnest as well.
So that when she succeeded, I could show her the example of an adult who had nothing to be ashamed of.
***
“How am I supposed to do this…….”
The sun was setting. Dana continued to sing with difficulty from a rock some distance from the village.
There was no clue. No matter how hard she tried, she could not turn his strange scream into something resembling a song.
‘Is he just trying to swindle me?’
The condition that she had to join the mercenary company whether she succeeded or failed was more suspicious than anything.
Perhaps there had never been such a song in the first place. Perhaps he had never intended to save her sister.
‘It is suspicious that he covets an ordinary bard like me, too…….’
He might be a slave trader. She remembered her sister warning her, ‘You must be careful. Strange adults may try to take you away.’
Perhaps he wanted to take her not as a member of his mercenary company, but to sell her as a slave.
‘But that knightly sister does not seem like that kind of person…….’
It was strange that he called himself a mercenary company yet had only two members, and it was strange that he wanted to take Dana rather than some other adult.
Everything frightened her. Distracting thoughts seeped into her song.
“Ah…….”
Before long, Dana began to sniffle and cry.
“Sister, Sister……. I miss you…….”
If her dependable sister had been there as always, she would have stood before Dana with an axe and overcome the hardship for her.
But without her sister, Dana was alone. There was no one anywhere who could help her.
“Sister…….”
Then she heard footsteps. They were irregular and heavy, the footsteps of someone with an injured leg.
“I apologize. It seems I came at a bad time. Dana, is the test going well?”
Iris approached her.
“Miss Knight……. No matter how I think about it, this is strange. Does such a song really exist?”
“…….”
“Miss Knight…… Why are you following that strange man around?”
Iris gave a hollow laugh.
“When I was in despair, he reached out his hand to me. He showed me a new path and hope. Though I am wounded and sick, I will follow him until I die.”
Dana let out a deep sigh.
“……Is that so? I do not understand. I think that man…… made up an impossible condition just to take me away.”
Dana looked up at Iris with gloomy eyes.
“Does he really think this is possible? He is not making fun of me behind my back, is he?”
“That…….”
Iris sighed.
“The Captain himself was pessimistic about whether you would succeed. He appeared to think it was realistically impossible.”
“Just as I thought…….”
“Even so.”
Conviction filled Iris’s eyes.
“He is waiting for you to accomplish it.”
“That is different from what you just said!”
“I walked through the forest with him all morning. Can you see the traces of spiderwebs that have not yet been washed away here?”
White strands clung to Iris’s armor.
“The Captain and I scouted the forest. We moved along the outskirts, killed small numbers of Man-Eating Spiders, and deduced where their nest might be.”
“Pardon?”
Dana looked dumbfounded.
She had thought it could not possibly be done, that he was playing a joke.
“We do not have much money, but we spent it all to buy torches, oil, whetstones, and daggers.”
“That is…….”
“To cut and burn spiderwebs. To fight.”
Iris was always ready to respect honorable people.
And in her eyes, the Captain was certainly an honorable person.
“There is no money left, except for a week’s worth of inn fees. The Captain invested every coin in this operation.”
“…….”
“He has wagered on the possibility that you can succeed. It may not be much, but he has wagered the entire fortune of our mercenary company.”
Dana bit down hard on her lip.
“Is he…… an idiot?”
“…….”
“There is no way I can do it. There is no way I am such an amazing person—”
“The Captain believes that you are.”
“Pardon?”
“He said your talent was something that would not appear even if one searched the entire continent. If even the slightest possibility exists, then it is worth staking one’s life on that possibility.”
Dana lowered her head deeply.
That cold and rational man had made an impossible demand of her. Yet at the same time, he believed Dana could accomplish it. He believed that Dana possessed the power to turn the impossible into reality.
But Dana did not believe it herself.
“Still…… The sun will set soon. Let us return. There are still two days left—”
“Wait a moment.”
Dana steeled herself.
“Just once. I will try just once more.”
She believed in herself now.
“……Very well. I will wait.”
Dana steadied her breathing.
‘It is a song, a song…… It is a song…….’
Then she sang.
She reproduced the strange cry he had made and turned it into something more than that.
‘Ah, ah…… Ah!’
She cast countless doubts and distracting thoughts into a corner and focused solely on the song.
As though she had returned to a time when she had been purer, she felt as free as a bird flying through the sky.
‘……Ah.’
But there was no mystical power. Her song contained no strength.
“As expected, it will not—”
“Good. That is exactly what I heard. Let us try once more. This time, imbue it with mystical power as well.”
“Mister?”
At some point, the mercenary captain, Kale Wagner, had approached and was looking at Dana with serious eyes.
“Close your eyes and focus on my words. Get hold of the emotion. Do you understand?”
“Yes!”
“You are a bird now. A bird larger and stronger than any bird you can imagine. You are flying through the sky. The wind brushes past your wings.”
“I-I understand. I am a bird—”
“Look at the ground. A forest. Insects are moving through it. Wriggling grubs, crawling insects. Insects hidden among the leaves, and spiders. How does that make you feel?”
“Th-they are food……. I like them?”
“Yes. Good. You are happy. You will have a full breakfast. You will chew them, swallow them, and fill your belly. Remember that feeling, then continue. Will you fear the insects when you see them?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Insects crawl. I…… fly. I am much bigger, and my talons are sharp.”
“Good. Perfect. You are a bird. A predator. A hunter. Bugs that crawl on the ground cannot harm you. They are nothing but your food. You are delighted. You are happy. You find them laughable. From the sky, feel your superiority.”
“Yes…….”
“Feel that emotion, then sing again.”
“But…….”
“This song is not a song that imitates human sounds in the first place.”
“Then—”
“It imitates that bird. But how can human sounds and a bird’s sounds be the same? Birds can make sounds humans cannot, and insects can hear sounds humans cannot.”
“Ah…….”
“It is emotion. Fill it with emotion. You can do it, cannot you? There are emotions overflowing inside you, are there not? Put them into the song.”
“That…….”
“When I first saw you, sorrow filled your song. You sang of hope, but that song was not joyful. You can do it. You have already done it once.”
“Ugh…….”
“You become the bird. Fill the song with that emotion. You can do it. Insects are nothing but laughable creatures before you. Put power into it. You are not doing this to defeat insects. It is simply troublesome when the insects you are hunting run away.”
“I understand!”
She understood what he was trying to say.
Then she sang.
A song filled with exhilaration and joy, pride and confidence, passion and the hunt.
Sweat poured down like rain. She filled the song with emotion.
The instant she sang, she became a bird.
“I-it is…… over.”
Dana collapsed as though exhausted. Kale showed the basket to the fallen girl.
“Can you see?”
Every spider in the basket was dead.
“You did it.”
Dana had created a miracle.
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