A Journey Unwanted
Chapter 554 - 541: Humanity for you
[Realm: Álfheimr]
[Location: Heart Kingdom]
[Outskirts]
"The sky gets old quick..."
The words left Mikoto in little more than a murmur, so quiet they barely disturbed the silence surrounding him. His red eyes drifted upward for only a brief moment, following the gaps between the branches overhead until they settled upon the familiar blanket of lifeless gray clouds. The limbs of the surrounding trees obscured much of the sky; even so, he could see enough.
Enough to know nothing had changed.
Whenever he woke, that same sky was there to greet him.
It had become routine.
Oddly enough, he did not find it depressing. Nor did he pity the world stretched beneath it. A dying planet was still a problem, and problems had solutions. Sentiment accomplished little.
If the leylines were properly restored—if enough mana were fed back into the veins of the world—the planet would recover. Forests would return. Rivers would flow. The skies would clear. Life would begin again as though it had merely been sleeping.
The solution itself was laughably simple.
For someone like him, supplying enough mana to revitalize an entire world was not difficult.
It was everything that came afterward that made the task impossible.
"But with leyline disturbances scattered everywhere..." Mikoto muttered to himself, rubbing the side of his head before letting out a sigh. "Any excess energy would just spill back out. And when it’s my mana doing the spilling..." He clicked his tongue. "...that turns into natural disasters. Guess that’s the downside of being so damn strong."
He gave a small shake of his head at his own shameless self-praise.
There wasn’t even a trace of embarrassment behind it.
The answer sat well within his reach, close enough that he could almost grasp it, yet every path toward it ended with the same conclusion. His strength, the very thing that should have solved everything, had become another obstacle.
"Annoying." The word escaped him beneath his breath; there was little point dwelling on it.
For now, there was nothing he could do.
So Mikoto continued walking through the forest.
His heavy armored sabatons pressed against the brittle earth, surprisingly quiet despite the weight of the black plate that encased him. The old woods stretched endlessly around him, stripped of color and life. The trunks leaned at odd angles, bark weathered and cracked, while pale roots curled over the ground.
To anyone watching, he might have appeared to be wandering without purpose.
There were no landmarks or any visible trail.
Nothing that suggested he knew where he was going.
Yet his gaze never wandered. It remained fixed ahead, and it did not take long before the scenery changed.
The dying forest gradually opened.
The suffocating walls of gray timber parted just enough to reveal a small clearing hidden within the decay.
At its center rested a lake; it was pristine.
Its waters reflected the lifeless sky with impossible clarity, untouched by ash or rot. Around its edge grew vibrant grass, soft and richly green, bending gently beneath a breeze that seemed unable to exist anywhere else in this dead world.
It looked almost unreal.
Such a place simply did not belong here.
Mikoto slowed before coming to a complete stop, his red eyes narrowed ever so slightly as he looked across the water.
His nose wrinkled with annoyance.
"You can come out now, Nimue." His voice remained soft; there seemed to be no need to raise it.
The clearing seemed to carry his words across the lake.
Silence answered him; several seconds slipped by, and nothing moved. No birds sang and no insects buzzed through the grass. Even the Deseruit Beasts, normally roaming somewhere within the surrounding wilderness, had become increasingly scarce ever since a certain addition had joined their group.
The silence lingered just a moment too long.
Mikoto’s eyelid twitched.
"Don’t make me ask twice."
He remained perfectly still, though the impatience creeping into his expression became easier to notice.
At last...
The surface of the lake stirred; one ripple became another. Gentle circles spread across the crystal water before the center slowly rose.
Dark strands of raven-black hair emerged first, followed by an ornate blue headpiece, then came a pair of calm sapphire eyes.
Pale skin followed.
Black robes clung lightly to a petite frame as though the water refused to remain upon them.
Nimue ascended from the lake slowly.
When her bare feet finally touched the emerald grass surrounding the water’s edge, it almost looked as though she had never been submerged at all.
Her gaze settled upon Mikoto, his met hers without hesitation.
There was no greeting, smile, or acknowledgment beyond recognition.
"What’s with this random house call?" Mikoto asked immediately, folding one gauntleted arm loosely across his chest while the other rested against his side. "Couldn’t even start with a hello?"
Nimue remained composed.
Her hands folded neatly before her.
"I ask that you remember our conversation." Her voice flowed as smoothly as the lake behind her.
Mikoto sighed.
"Yeah, yeah, humanity and whatnot."
He gave an absent wave of one heavy gauntleted hand, dismissing the reminder before it had properly begun.
"I remember. More or less." His shoulders lifted slightly before settling again. "So what about it?"
Nimue studied him in silence for several moments; her expression barely shifted. Yet something in those blue eyes felt strangely heavy. As though she were observing something hidden beneath the armor rather than the person standing before her.
"You are slipping away with the passage of every day," she said at last. "So I wished to see how much."
Mikoto let out another tired breath.
"Yeah, well." He looked away for only a moment before speaking again. "You try being a celestial being with an incomprehensible true form." His words came more slowly than before. "It’s not nearly as easy as it sounds trying to stay human."
His fingers flexed inside the thick gauntlets before he folded both arms together.
"The angelic side of me isn’t exactly insignificant. Every day it’s a little stronger. Every day it gets a little easier to stop thinking like a person. If things keep going the way they are..." His eyes lowered briefly toward the ground. "...I’d be lucky if there’s much humanity left after another month. Maybe two if I’m strong enough."
He shook his head.
"It’s a tedious fight."
Nimue did not immediately answer; the silence between them settled naturally.
When she finally spoke, her voice remained as gentle and unwavering as the still waters behind her.
"Yet fight you must."
Nimue paused for a brief moment.
The silence between them settled naturally; she neither hurried to fill it nor appeared uncomfortable letting it linger.
Only after several quiet seconds did she continue.
"Yours was always destined to be a journey burdened by immense tribulation," Nimue said softly, her voice carrying neither pity nor comfort. "From the moment you stepped upon this path, there was never a world where it would become easy. To expect a road laid perfectly before you would have been a foolish hope. The hardships you face are not a mistake. Yet should you cease to struggle, should you simply surrender because the burden has become too heavy, then the battle you lose will not be your greatest battle."
She folded her hands a little tighter before finishing.
"It will be the most important battle you were ever meant to fight."
Mikoto listened without interrupting.
His expression scarcely changed, though his red eyes drifted away for a moment before returning to her.
"Right."
He scratched lightly at the side of his cheek with one thick gauntlet before giving a tired sigh.
"So, let me guess." His voice carried the smallest trace of dry amusement. "Those universe-destroying dragons, the immortal dirtbag, the other calamities, and everything else that will be trying to kill me, those don’t make the cut?"
His attempt at humor landed exactly as he expected.
Nimue’s expression remained unchanged.
"Battles won through strength alone have never been the only trials one is required to endure, boy." Her answer came without hesitation. "There are conflicts no sword may sever, no spell may erase, and no overwhelming power may simply overcome. Those are often the battles that determine the course of a life."
Her blue eyes remained fixed upon him.
"You remind me very much of a former wielder of the blade you now carry."
At that, Mikoto’s expression shifted ever so slightly.
"Hm." It was little more than a thoughtful hum.
Almost unconsciously, his left gauntleted hand rose toward his chest. The heavy alloy scraped softly against itself as his fingers rested over it.
He felt it immediately, that familiar resonance.
A steady thrumming.
Exactly the same as the last time he had spoken with her.
For a brief moment he simply listened to it.
Nimue noticed the movement but made no comment. Instead, she continued in the same calm tone.
"The man who carried that blade before you possessed extraordinary resolve." Her gaze drifted toward Mikoto’s resting hand. "He stood before countless enemies capable of ending his life. He endured wounds that would have broken most people. Yet those physical struggles, those battles fought against tangible foes..." She paused for a brief moment. "...were always easier for him than confronting the conflict within himself."
Her eyes returned to Mikoto.
"I believe much the same can be said of you."
Mikoto let out a quiet breath through his nose; he didn’t answer immediately. Instead, a thought crossed his mind.
("Yeah. Throwing a big-ass mana explosion sounds a whole lot better than sitting around feeling sorry for myself and talking about my feelings.") The thought almost made him snort, and he wisely kept it to himself.
There was little point voicing it.
Nimue would undoubtedly have a long rant waiting if he did.
"I’ll handle it," he said at last.
Whether he believed it entirely or not hardly mattered.
It was the only answer he intended to give.
He lowered his hand from his chest before looking back toward her with impatience returning to his soft features.
"So..." He tilted his head ever so slightly. "Was that seriously everything you came all the way out here to tell me?"
Nimue gave the smallest inclination of her head.
"Indeed." Her answer was immediate. "Your struggle to retain what remains of your humanity..." Her gaze lingered upon him. "...and your possession of that blade..." Only then did she finish. "...are the only matters that presently hold my interest."
There was no cruelty in those words; it was just her being honest.
"So continue to fight."
The conversation ended as quietly as it had begun.
Nimue offered no farewell or a further explanation. She merely turned with the same gracefulness she had shown since emerging from the water.
Each bare step carried her back toward the lake.
The surface barely reacted as her feet touched it; gentle ripples spread outward in neat circles. Then, without ceremony, she descended once more beneath the pristine waters. Her black robes disappeared beneath the shimmering surface.
Her raven hair vanished next.
Finally, even the blue of her headpiece was gone.
The lake became perfectly still once again, as though no one had ever been there.
Mikoto remained where he stood for several seconds; his red eyes lingered on the motionless water. He wasn’t waiting for her to reappear; he simply stared.
("Do I really have to struggle this desperately just to keep hold of my humanity?") The question echoed through his thoughts far more insistently than he cared to admit. He let out a slow breath as his shoulders dropped ever so slightly beneath the weight of the armor. ("If she bothered showing up out of nowhere just to tell me that...")
His brow furrowed.
("...then I must already be losing that fight.")
That realization settled uncomfortably in the back of his mind; he clicked his tongue.
"What a pain."
The words escaped him almost automatically.
Complaining was easier than dwelling on the possibility.
Much easier.
He turned his back to the lake.
The pristine clearing quickly disappeared behind him as he stepped once more beneath the twisted dead forest. There was no point standing around thinking himself into a worse mood. If he kept brooding, Nimue’s words would only replay in his head over and over again.
He had no interest in giving them that much attention.
("I’d rather think about literally anything else.") His thoughts drifted toward the newest addition to their peculiar little group. Finding them sounded considerably less exhausting than wrestling with his own mind.