They set out a little after nine in the morning.
Misaki had borrowed an old transport van from the medical unit. The back was packed full: an iron pot, a bag of brown rice, a large bag of rock sugar, more than twenty enamel bowls, a stack of bamboo chopsticks, and that old cassette recorder-it ran on batteries. Misaki said her mother-in-law had left it to her; its sound was warmer than modern digital recorders, just right for the children.
The children crowded into the van, chattering like sparrows freshly released from a cage. The little girl with pigtails sat in the front passenger seat, clutching the iron box in her arms-the cassette tapes and bronze bell were inside. Serina sat by a window in the back, her canvas bag on her knees and the broken watch hanging loosely around her wrist. Its hands ticked forward one notch at a time, as though counting the steps left to the Valley of the End.
Mitsuki did not ride with them. He said he needed to pick something up at the Hokage Building and would come later. Sakura had gone ahead on the medical unit's motorcycle, saying she would scout the foot of the waterfall in the Valley of the End to see where it was safest to light a fire.
As the van crossed Konoha Bridge, Dazujirō's grandniece-the little girl Serina had taught about "commas" at the bridgehead in the Land of Waves-suddenly leaned forward from the back seat and pointed out the window. "Serina! Look!"
Serina looked where she was pointing. On the bridge railing, some passing ninja had written a line in chalk:
"The breeze feels lovely today. A good day for porridge.-Anonymous"
Several crooked signatures followed it, some children's, some adults', along with a few markings that were