"Ghost, Sleep On My Chest!" V3 - Epilogue
Tmp ... Tmp ... Tmp...
The slow and cryptic sound of footsteps echoed throughout the space. It was pitch black, and the space strangely vague — but it wasn't a large area. It was just... empty.
The burnt smells still lingered in the air. The Phonogolos compound had burned down, and only this basement remained unburned. The spilled water and muck had evaporated due to the repeated explosions caused by the photothermal waves, but the smell remained in the air. On the floor were the shattered pieces of glass from the aquarium tank, broken rubble, earth and sand, and his corpse.
Tmp... Tmp...
The footsteps stopped abruptly at the entrance of the basement. The owner of those footsteps held out his right hand, palm up, as if receiving something, and chanted.
"I bring forth, a tiny spirit!"
Fwoom...
And with that spell, a will-o-wisp the size of a fist emerged from his palm. The light illuminated the room — and the spellcaster. He was a dark-haired young man, about 20 years old. He had a dark, sly look in his eyes and a scowl on his face. But now — his expression was downcast.
He slowly opened his mouth.
"I was wondering if, by chance, you might be..."
His tone was as if he were asking a question. Someone responded to him.
"You mean me?"
The answer came from the huge corpse of a fish lying on the floor. It was motionless, its belly ripped open and splattered with discolored blood, but its voice was thick in timbre, as if it had only taken a nap.
"I knew you were alive. Phonogolos. I have a question. Or maybe three."
Orphen, the young man, mumbled with a sigh. He brushed back his bandana-covered bangs.
"First of all, there's something you failed to tell me. The statue of the goddess in the hall. You said something about it having deeper meaning."
"............"
Phonogolos was silent for a moment, but then—
"I'm a heretic, an apostate — Does that not answer the question?"
"But why would you go through the trouble of damaging the statue of the Goddess in the hall? It's not the meeting place of some religious society. You must have either cursed, or even feared the gods."
Phonogolos didn't reply. Orphen folded his arms in frustration, and asked his next question.
"Then I have a second question. Why did you decide to create those Creatures? Even if you say that their combat abilities surpass that of the dragon race, you couldn't even sell something like that in modern times, when there are no wars to be fought."
"... The answer is the same as the first question you asked. I was afraid... So I had to create something that was strong enough to counteract those fears."
"You were... What were you afraid of?"
"I cannot say. If I tell you, I'll die. I'm still going to die — in this body, anyway. I don't care, I just don't want to be in their hands. I don't want to lose my soul. If you must know—"
He spoke in a hollow voice, like the echoes of a mausoleum.
"You'll need to find out for yourself. I learned of it in Kimrak."
"The Church Headquarters...?"
Orphen asked back, but Phonogolos didn't answer. With a final sigh, Orphen was about to ask if he was Kief Phonogolos or Ramon Phonogolos — but realized that it was completely pointless.
He instead asked about what happened before.
"... Where the hell have you been getting your voice from all this time?"
The fish's body was just lying there limp, not even showing any movement when it spoke. It looked like a corpse. Yet still, his voice was definitely echoing through the room. In this basement...
There was no answer from Phonogolos, but Orphen suddenly thought he saw a vague figure — a tired old man in some sort of robe, slender and old, with a look of fear on his face — right above the body of the fish with its belly ripped open. He blinked, though, and could no longer see him.
... Perhaps he became a real ghost.
He muttered to himself and silently clenched his right hand. The wisp was drowned out as if it was being crushed by the palm of his hand.
"... Goodbye, Phonogolos."
Orphen said, turning his back to the fish. The sound of his departing footsteps once more echoed through the basement.
All that remained was the darkness, silently covering everything. The shards of glass, the rubble, traces of the sewage, the corpse of the fish creature, and the lone ghost drifting through the air. Everything.
"Okay, now, Dortin! He's gone!"
Vulcan exclaimed in a strangely forceful voice. Leaving the inn and following his older brother as he ran out of the village, Dortin was secretly mumbling to himself.
"... I doubt this is gonna end well."
It had been his plan to wait until the black-magic sorcerer left the inn, then escape from the loan shark. After being beaten up by the sorcerer, supposedly for no reason (apparently, he had said something dumb about how he'd gotten the wooden box), but he'd already recovered. Thirty minutes ago he'd been as good as dead with all his joints looking like they'd been bent backwards, but exactly 12 minutes ago, he'd sprung right back up on his feet. So, now they were running like rabbits.
His brother was as strong as a hammer.
"By the way, brother!"
Dortin called out, chasing from behind. Without stopping, Vulcan looked over his shoulder.
"What!?"
"Do you know where we're going after we leave this village?"
"Of course I know where I'm going!"
Vulcan firmly established. He pointed in the direction of the day after tomorrow.
"To a new hope of tomorrow! Vulcan, the Fighting Dog of Mazmaturia, gallops along the road of eternal victory!"
"You don't have any idea where we're going, do you?"
Dortin shouted back with an almost resigned look on his face. Vulcan looked at him hesitantly for a moment, but after that, seemed to have recovered and ran silently with his hand still pointing.
"By the way, brother!"
"What is it this time?"
"Uuumm!"
"What!"
"Just up there!"
"Oh—!"
"No, look at your feet!"
"What about my feet?"
"There's a rope... Oh—"
By the time Dortin had said it, Vulcan had already fallen, with a great deal of force to boot. He'd tripped over a rope that had been pulled tight across the ground about ten centimeters above it. His round body tumbled until he came to a stop with a terrible thud.
He rolled onto his back, glaring at him, and groaned.
"Tell me about these sorts of things sooner, you idiot..."
"I'm sorry. I kept trying to talk."
Dortin stopped just short of the rope.
"But who could have... played such a trick? I'm going to kill them with dried shiitake mushrooms, damn it..."
As his brother got back up, a black-clad figure appeared, holding the end of the rope (the opposite end was tied to the base of a tree on the side of the road.)
"Hehehehehehehehe."
"L-Loan shark!"
When his brother screamed the words in an overly-dramatic manner, the figure — Orphen, still smiling his sly smile, answered.
"I can see what you guys were thinking."
"Damn it, Dortin, I told you this hole-covered plan was never going to work!"
"When did you say that?"
Dortin mumbled with a deadpan look in his eyes, but apparently no one was listening. The loan shark rolled up his sleeves, his eyes strangely alive.
"I'll tell you what! Your loans have accrued interest! Now you're gonna pay me back, no question! So for now, I'm going to detain you here! There's no mercy for those who've made me wait this long!"
"When has there ever been mercy in your debt collecting?"
Dortin growled. His brother nodded.
"Yeah, yeah. Just — Give us a little longer!"
"That'd be pointless."
"Err... B-but, at least give us a little..."
"No."
The black-magic sorcerer smirked. Judging by his brother's expression, he was pretty scared.
"Well, umm, I don't suppose I could repay you with my body, could I?"
"Can I sell you to a butcher?"
As expected, Vulcan couldn't refute the question, only letting out a vague whimper. The sorcerer's smile remained intact as he continued.
Then—
Someone appeared from the other side of the road. A tall, beautiful woman with glossy black hair and a leather bodysuit. Orphen seemed to notice her presence and turned in her direction.
"Isn't it a little sad to bully them so much?"
She winked at Orphen. For her unexpected help, his brother cried out.
"Goddess!"
He jumped towards her as if to cling to her, but she easily kicked him to the side. She then put her hand on her forehead to stifle a laugh, and with her other hand free she lifted a leather bag, which made a metallic jingling sound.
"I've been looking for you so I could give this you, but you've been avoiding me, haven't you?"
"What is it, Hirietta?"
The sorcerer asked, his hands on his hips.
"You know what it is, don't you?"
She shrugged her shoulders.
"It's a reward. You did what I asked you to do."
"Ohh..."
Vulcan spoke up. The leather bag was apparently filled with heavy coins. Unlike Socket Notes, which were widely used in some places, coins didn't change their value anywhere on the continent. Whether they were copper or gold coins, Dortin did not know, but either way, he guessed that the contents of the bag would be a good deal of money.
— And he was sure that the loan shark couldn't have figured it out, either...
After a brief look of hesitation, the sorcerer shook his head.
"I don't want it."
"... What?"
"Whaaaaaaat?"
Vulcan let out an exaggerated scream. In this case, however, maybe it wasn't so exaggerated after all.
"You're always ripping people off and screaming for them to pay back their debts, but you don't take money from women and you're just trying to get in their good graces! I'll kill you with a rooster!"
The debt collector kicked his brother, who was about to hit him in the side. Looking at him, Hirietta asked curiously.
"Why? Ahh... It's not the kind of money you should be ashamed of, you know. It's money I took took with me when I ran away from home."
"Isn't that shady of you?"
Dortin blurted out, but Hirietta ignored him completely. Orphen looked away, a little bored.
"I'm not worried about that."
"Then what?"
"I'm not a handyman. I don't get paid for that kind of work. So, I don't want you to think that you can continue to use me for your convenience."
Then—
"Now! Here's my chance!"
Bam! At the loan shark's feet, Vulcan struck Orphen in the shin with his blunted sword. The sorcerer's face turned pale and he screamed out in excruciating pain.
"Owww!"
"Let's go, Dortin!"
Vulcan shouted and immediately fled. He watched his brother's back as he ran, then muttered with a sigh.
"I feel like I'm living in a series of moments these days..."
As he was about to start running, he was grabbed by the ankle by the sorcerer who'd fallen on the road. He turned his head in horror and saw the sorcerer give a terrible laugh, covered in sweat.
Dortin continued.
"It's always me who gets caught."
"Giiiiiiiveee — iiiiiiiittt — baaaaaaaaack—"
"Why do you have to say it like that. If I were a kid that heard that in the middle of the night, I'd be traumatized..."
"Wouldn't it be better to take this?"
Hirietta asked, bending down in front of the sorrowful sorcerer. She dangled the leather bag in front of him. Orphen, however, stubbornly shook his head.
"It's more fun this way."
"Is that why you do this...?"
Dortin asked doubtfully.
"You're so good at what you do, but you're so hard-headed. How about a reward for your labor? I'll help you with your work for a while."
"No, that's okay, I've got enough work partners."
Orphen answered firmly, pointing toward Vulcan, who was already a hundred yards down the road.
"............?"
As she looked over, she saw that Vulcan had just fallen over again, this time with a very loud thud, just as he'd done a few minutes before. It seemed that there was another rope across the road. This time, the one holding the end of the rope was a petite figure. She emerged from the side of the road — a girl with blonde hair that reached all the way down her back, and who put all of her effort into being 'energetic' for no real reason. She shouted in a way that made her sound just like the loan shark.
"Oh no you don't! I know what you're thinking! Majic! Get the net!"
"Here!"
Majic replied from the top of a tree standing on the other side of the road — which the other end of the rope was tied to. At the same time, she saw him carelessly cast a net down over Vulcan, who was lying on the road.
"Damn it!"
Vulcan was yelling. He also seemed to be cursing about a few other various things, but she couldn't hear him clearly from where they stood.
Then she heard Orphen mutter, almost proudly.
"They're the best, right? The worst — but the best."
Dortin didn't quite understand what he was saying, but Hirietta seemed to. She chuckled and tucked the bag behind her back.
Dortin looked up at the heavens, thinking about how it was such a waste. The sky was blue, and full of clouds, and the quiet suburban farming village stood quite peacefully under the sky, with a few more idle ghost stories for children to tell.
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