Ferris

The scene on the screen continued.

Natsuki Subaru walked into the cavern.

Water dripped slowly down the damp rock walls, splashing into the puddles left on the ground.

From deep within the cavern came the faint rattle of chains.

In the darkness, a pair of lifeless eyes stared blankly at the ground.

Ferris was chained there.

Iron chains bound his wrists and ankles. His knight's uniform was already stained with muddy water and blood, and an untreated wound marked his shoulder.

Some of the blood had dried, only for the dampness to soak it again, letting it seep slowly down the fabric.

With Ferris's healing magic, he could at least stop himself from bleeding any further, if he wanted to.

But he had not.

He hung his head, tears falling one by one, repeating the same words over and over.

"Someone..."

"Anyone, please tell me..."

"Why am I..."

His voice was so quiet that the sound of water almost drowned it out.

"Your Highness..."

"Why am I here?"

"There should be someone here."

"Someone should exist."

"If not, this is so strange..."

"So strange..."

He raised a hand, trying to press it against his chest, but the chains pulled him short.

The clashing of iron chains echoed through the cavern.

Ferris did not seem to hear it.

He simply stared blankly at his own hand.

"There's... a piece missing here. But why?"

"Why is it empty?"

"I should remember. I should know."

"Someone, please tell me..."

By the end, his voice had become choked with tears.

Outside the screen, Ferris stared fixedly at himself in the scene.

His face was terribly pale.

His lips moved several times, but nothing came out.

Of course he knew the White Whale could steal someone's existence.

He also knew that if Lady Crusch truly was swallowed by the White Whale, he would forget her name.

But he had never truly considered what would happen after he forgot.

So having her taken away did not make things any easier for him.

His self on the screen could remember nothing, yet he was still in so much pain that he was on the verge of breaking down.

He could not even find a reason for his tears.

This feeling was crueler than remembering everything.

Natsuki Subaru stood at the cavern entrance, watched him for a while, then raised a hand to scratch his head.

"Looks like this will take some time."

He sounded somewhat troubled.

"I thought having someone's existence erased by the White Whale's mist would leave nothing more than a slight sense that something was off."

Natsuki Subaru took a few steps forward.

His boot soles made soft sounds as they stepped through the puddles.

"But now it looks like, once important memories are gouged out, the hole left behind can't heal on its own."

He looked at Ferris.

"Is that why you ended up like this?"

Ferris did not respond.

As though he had not heard a word Natsuki Subaru said, he simply kept his head lowered and continued muttering to himself.

"Your Highness..."

"Who is Your Highness?"

"Why am I calling that out? Why do I want to cry?"

"Why can't I stop?"

Outside the screen, Ram's expression grew uglier little by little.

She rarely wore such an expression.

But this time, she could not even manage her customary cutting remarks.

She thought of Rem.

Rem, whom the world had forgotten.

Rem, whose name and memories had been stolen, her little sister who lay in bed unable to wake.

Ram had forgotten her.

But why had she not broken down like Ferris on the screen?

The moment that thought surfaced, Ram's fingers clenched sharply.

Was it because I didn't love Rem that much?

The question was too shameful.

So shameful that she did not even want to let it linger in her mind.

But Ferris was still crying on the screen.

He could remember nothing.

Yet that emptiness still hurt so much that he could not breathe.

Ram lowered her eyes, her eyelashes trembling slightly.

[Ram: Why did I...]

She could not write another word.

Betty saw that line of text, then glanced at Ram.

She said nothing.

Some kinds of pain could not be dealt with by a few comforting words from someone else.

On the screen, Natsuki Subaru had already reached Ferris.

He crouched down, carefully observing the person chained in the darkness.

Ferris was wounded.

His mind was also on the verge of collapse.

He was clearly one of the finest healers in the Kingdom of Lugunica, yet at this moment, he did not even have the will to heal himself.

Natsuki Subaru watched him for a long time before finally sighing.

"This is a problem."

He muttered under his breath.

"I barely had any contact with the key person who left you like this."

"Even if I go back and start over, I can't reach a point when she was still alive anymore."

"So I have no way of knowing exactly what happened between the two of you."

Ferris's eyelashes stirred.

It was unclear whether he had heard him or had merely reacted to the sound.

Natsuki Subaru looked down at him.

"That said..."

His voice paused.

Then that faint sort of smile appeared on his face.

"You are a pawn I went to considerable trouble to find, after all."

Outside the screen, Ferris's pupils abruptly contracted.

[Ferris: A pawn?]

The words practically slammed into view.

[Ferris: He called Ferris a pawn?]

No one immediately replied.

Because Natsuki Subaru on the screen had made no attempt to hide it.

That was exactly how he saw him.

Healing magic.

The remnants of the Crusch Camp.

A broken heart.

And the hole that could not be filled after the White Whale stole someone important from him.

In his eyes, all of those things could serve as reasons to use him.

Yet the next moment, Natsuki Subaru reached out and lightly touched Ferris's hair.

"It's all right."

He said.

"I'll fill every crack in your heart."

Ferris looked at him blankly.

Tears still clung to his face.

"Someone..."

"Please..."

"Tell me..."

"Why am I..."

"Why on earth am I..."

Natsuki Subaru looked at him and smiled, a smile that could even be called sincere.

"This time, I'll definitely find a way to keep you from killing yourself."

The sound of water continued in the cavern.

But outside the screen, everyone seemed to lose their voices at once.

There was too much information in that sentence.

This time.

Definitely.

Find a way to keep you from killing yourself.

In other words, in some of the loops they had not seen, Ferris had already killed himself.

Perhaps once.

Perhaps more than once.

And Natsuki Subaru had seen it.

He had seen how this broken healer went to his death.

Seen how he gave up on himself.

Seen what means he used to end his life.

Then Natsuki Subaru had returned here, carrying those failures with him.

Standing before Ferris again.

Searching again for a way to keep him from dying.

For a long time, no text from Ferris appeared.

He stared at himself on the screen.

Stared at that version of himself, huddled amid the chains, crying so hard he could not even finish a sentence.

That version of himself would kill himself.

The fact struck him so hard that, for a moment, even his breathing became uneven.

[Ferris: How could I...]

The text appeared halfway, then stopped.

How could he?

If Lady Crusch disappeared from the world.

If he forgot her.

If all that remained in his chest was a hole that could never be filled.

If he did not even know why he was suffering, would he really never take that step?

Ferris could not answer immediately.

He despised people who disregarded life more than anyone.

He despised people who treated lives as numbers more than anyone.

Yet that other version of himself on the screen could only be pulled back from the brink of death, again and again, by precisely such a person.

The feeling almost made him want to vomit.