24

“Ow, ow, ow…? Huh, it does not hurt.”

The place where Beth had been swallowed and spat out was somewhere Beth knew very well.

It was the place Beth had taken walks, which had been used for the float display. It was deep in the forest.

Ezra had said this was the forest of spirits. Beth, too, somehow knew that this was not the human world.

(I was probably blown away by magic. Well, that is fine. It saved me the trouble of going back.)

Beth slowly walked through this thick, green forest, where she knew her way around, after returning for the first time in a while.

The moisture-rich air she breathed into her chest for the first time in a while was sweet and lovingly embraced Beth’s body.

Small particles of light gathered around Beth.

“It has been a while. Hello.”

When Beth gently held out her hand as though it were precious and took the light into it, the light hardened as it was, became a new life, and softly vanished into the forest.

“What is it? It is awfully noisy today.”

Even normally, this forest had an air lively with the murmur of life within its silence.

But today, the murmur of the light in the air, before it became life, was trying to tell Beth something.

Beth walked through the forest as though guided by the murmur.

(This should be the clearing with the graves.)

The forest she should have known felt strange today.

There were no trees in places where there should have been, and there was an unfamiliar pond in a place where there should not have been one.

Birds were swimming in the pond, and fish were flying in the sky.

(…It is distorted.)

Sometimes, this beautiful forest becomes distorted.

The law of space-time became distorted.

North became east, and up became down. The past returned to the present, and the future became an egg and appeared before Beth’s eyes.

When a distortion occurred, it was usually when something major was happening in the sky.

The last time this forest’s space was distorted was when a once-in-a-thousand-years comet fell from the sky.

Beth walked through the distorted forest, guided in the direction the murmur led her. The forest grew thicker and darker.

Apparently, the murmur intended to take Beth in the direction of that clearing she had tended.

(…Who could it be?)

It seemed the murmur had wanted to tell Beth that a guest had come to this forest.

The small clearing Beth should have tended had become an unfamiliar place.

There stood a large cedar tree with a hollow that Beth knew well. However, before that large tree, there was a white grave marker, and an unknown man was clinging to that white grave marker and sobbing.

Though Beth was a little surprised by the unfamiliar scene that had suddenly appeared, she fixed her attention on the man before her and tried to attune her heart to him and feel.

(…This person is very wounded.)

He was a deeply wounded life.

Beth felt that his soul was gasping and struggling in the midst of suffering.

Beth slowly advanced toward the man.

(…The one sleeping in this grave is a human who abandoned being human.)

That was what Beth sensed about the true nature of the one beneath the grave marker to which this man clung.

It was rare, but sometimes, lives like that, who had abandoned being human, came to this forest, were given a new form and a new life, and were born as fairies or spirits.

(What a pitiful person. A creature from a world with different laws cannot live together with him.)

Beth understood.

This pitiful man, while human, must have fallen in love with a life that belonged to this forest of spirits.

The laws of this forest were completely different from the laws of the human world.

Those who belonged to the world of spirits and those who belonged to the human world could not mingle with each other’s existence. Lives that did not share the same laws could not join together. They could not share their hearts.

Beth had known that very well since she was little. No matter how much Beth gave her heart, she had never had her heart returned by the living things here.

The lives here had never hurt Beth. They were simply kind on a whim, and paid attention to Beth on a whim. Beth thought they were very similar to insects in that way. They did not share their hearts with Beth the way Beth’s grandfather or Amy did.

—He did not know. He did not know that this was an existence from which one must never seek love.

Beth slowly approached the man.

Then she quietly stood behind the back of the sobbing man.

“You wanted to be loved by this life, as much as you loved her.”

Without being startled by Beth, who had suddenly appeared, the man answered like a child while sobbing.

“Yes.”

Beth slowly matched her breathing with the man’s and aligned her heart with his.

Before long, the man’s wordless wail echoed into Beth’s heart, which she had opened wide.

In the man’s place, Beth put into words what lay deep within the man’s heart and released it for him.

“…I see. You wanted to be forgiven by her. And you wanted to forgive her, who could not love you.”

“…Yes.”

From the man’s body, a light in the shape of a white bird flew away.

Because Beth had put its true nature into words, the great, wordless feeling smoldering at the bottom of the man’s heart was released.

“No one will forgive you. And you have forgiven no one. Ah, you do not know how to forgive.”

“I do not know what I should do.”

Like a lost child, the man cried sadly, helplessly, and sniffled.

Beth took a deep breath.

Small particles of light were drawn into Beth’s body. Beth spun words.

Beth’s breath became a golden exhalation, and life was given to her words.

“Then I will forgive you.”

Then Beth faced the sky and said,

“And I will forgive you too.”

The instant those words were spoken, the large bird with a woman’s face cried out with a wail-like call and flew straight away into the sky.

Beth held the man’s head firmly and lovingly as she spoke.

“It is all right now. You can receive it now.”

“Receive it…? No one will give someone like me anything I want.”

Beth smiled gently.

“That child loves you so much. He has been trying to give you the very thing you wanted so badly. You simply did not know how to receive the gift from that child.”

Noel, who had hidden himself behind the shade of a tree and was watching how things played out, met Beth’s eyes with a snap over the man’s back.

The instant Noel met Beth’s eyes, his body suddenly grew smaller, returning to the powerless form of a child.

The beloved girl slowly approached the small Noel and held his body tightly.

“I am scared. Scared I will be told I am not wanted again.”

Those words naturally spilled from Noel’s mouth.

Tears spilled down in drops, and the wound in his heart, which he should have forgotten, throbbed painfully.

“It is all right now. I am here, so it is not scary. Try handing it over.”

Beth smiled lovingly at Noel, gently hugged him, and said that.

Urged on by Beth’s gentle voice, Noel offered up something large, warm, and fragile made of light that he had kept shut away deep in his chest.

Thank you for entrusting it to me.

Saying that, Beth took that something carefully in both hands, walked up to the man, and gently, ever so gently, handed that something made of light into the man’s chest.

With trembling hands, the man received the light from Beth and held it inside his chest.

Light overflowed in abundance from the man’s chest and began filling him.

The man swallowed his words in stunned surprise, then simply shed a torrent of tears. Then the man ran to the small Noel as though tumbling forward and, fearfully, hugged him tightly.

“Noel… I am sorry. I truly did not know what I should do.”

“I was lonely.”

The precious thing had been received.

Noel felt the large wound that had opened in his heart heal before his eyes.

With the weighty sense of fulfillment that came from having what his soul had truly sought be satisfied, Noel’s chest was filled to the brim with something heavy and warm.

Suddenly, a great whirlwind rose.

From the center of the whirlwind appeared a creature in red clothing, with long black hair and large butterfly wings.

Its followers gathered one after another from throughout the forest, and the area shone dazzlingly.

“Hey, long time no see, Beth.”