Crossing through the village gate was like crossing the boundary between one world and another: outside it was the same cold, uneasy world they had been in the past couple days, but inside it was warm and comforting, oddly reminiscent of the feeling he used to get as a kid returning home to his parents cooking up dinner. No idea why, though, since there don't seem to be any people that age. Patxi studied the village. Come to think of it, there's barely anyone that I'd even call an 'adult'. It was strange to think that, at twenty years old, he was probably one of the oldest people in the village.
Before he could ask Gerda about it, a couple of little kids, a boy and a girl ran up to her. "Gerda! You're back! You're back!" They both yelled before tackling her with hugs. "I can't believe it," the girl said. "You made it back without getting squished, and you got the herbs!"
"Yep!" Gerda smiled. "Laura's gonna be okay now!" Bending down, she gave some of the herbs to the boy. "Stellan, would you mind running ahead and getting these ready for her? I need to help our guests settle in."
"Huh? Guests?" Noticing the Chaldeans for the first time, Stellan gaped. "I can't believe it! I've never seen people from outside the village before!"
"Where are you from?" The girl asked.
"They're envoys from the Goddess, Eva."
"Envoys? But isn't it early?"
"They must've come just to make sure Lauren gets better!" Stellan ran over to Fujimaru and vigorously shook his hand. "Oh, thank you mister envoy! You too, miss envoy and other mister envoy!"
"Stellan, the herbs?" Eva reminded him.
"Oh, right, I forgot! Could you maybe help me with them, Eva? Please? You're better at grinding them than I am."
"Of course!" The two of them ran off. Gerda giggled and shook her head.
"Those two, always in a rush. Hopefully this time they won't start bowling over all the sheep trying to get across the village faster."
Patxi assumed that 'sheep' were the animals the two children were currently weaving their way in and out of. Huh. Never would've thought animals would be so…fluffy.
"Kinda odd to see actual animals, isn't it?" Fujimaru looked over at the sheep before shifting his gaze to the larger, spotted ones in a pen farther to the left. "Sheep, cows, it's a nice change of pace from the Demonic Beasts and the Giants."
"It really is." Mash smiled. "Not to mention it explains why no one ever seems to go outside their villages, since they've got everything they need right inside." She pointed. "Look, there are even all sorts of crops!"
"Are things different in the other villages?" Gerda asked. "I always thought the Goddess made it so things were the same in all of them."
"It was definitely different where I'm from." Patxi looked at her. "Smolensk didn't have all these nice animals and plants to eat, so we had to go hunt."
"Smolensk? Is that the name of the village?" Gerda giggled again. "That's a weird name! Ours has just been called 'Village 23' as far as anyone can remember. Say, do you guys want me to show you all around? That's a thing you're supposed to offer to guests, right?"
"It is, but…" Fujimaru looked down. "That's odd. The communicator's beeping."
"Maybe the Border can get through to us?" Mash suggested.
"Whatever it is, we'll find out in a minute." Fujimaru took the communicator and held it upright.
With another beep it lit up, displaying the blue, semi-transparent figure of Holmes. "Ah, wonderful. Da Vinci managed to create a Mystic Code drone to extend our signal outwards, and I'm pleased that it seems to be working." Holmes looked down at something. "Although it seems the connection may be a tad spotty, so apologies if we lose you."
"Oh, wow! Another person? You're so tiny!" Gerda stared at Holmes' figure in amazement. "Are you another envoy?"
Holmes looked over at Mash, eyebrow raised, waiting for an explanation.
"We've been assuming that 'envoy' essentially means 'visitor from another village', although admittedly that's not entirely accurate."
"I see. In that case, I suppose I am an envoy of some sort." Holmes looked off to his side, attention grabbed by something. "Oh, hang on, it seems that the Director wishes to speak. But before I let you go, a word of warning - da Vinci detected a strange magical signature not unlike that of Brynhildr approximately an hour ago. It was weaker than that of the Brynhildr we know from Chaldea, and I wouldn't say that it was 100% the same, but it's still something worth noting in my opinion." Holmes stepped backwards. "And with that, I will leave you with the Director."
"Oh! Another tiny man!" Gerda exclaimed when Goredolf shoved his way into view. "And you're so fat! I take it this is what people mean when they say a person is 'chubby'?"
"Ch-CHUBBY? Why, you foulmouthed little brat!"
Patxi suppressed a snicker. She's not wrong, though.
"Ugh," Goredolf continued, "What kind of Lostbelt is this? If children don't even know that sort of comment is unacceptable, it's clearly barely able to be considered civilized!" Taking a moment to compose himself, Goredolf looked at Mash, Fujimaru, and Patxi. "Regardless, I am glad you are all safe and sound. I'll be sure to report that to everyone else, although I'm still expecting a detailed report from all of you." He looked directly at Patxi, who fought down the urge to look away. "Granted, since this connection's still spotty, I'm willing to wait for it. Say, come to think of it, while I have the chance there's something I really should do."
"That being?" Fujimaru asked.
"Why, interrogate a local, of course! You, little one. Would you mind grabbing your parents? I would like to talk with them."
"Uh…Parents?" Gerda looked confused. "What are parents?"
"You know, your mother and father. If not them, then whoever raised you."
"Do you mean the Goddess? She's everyone's mother, but she doesn't exactly live in the village, so it might be hard to get ahold of her."
"What? You - you mean you don't have any concept of parents? Fine then, just get me, uh, the village elder or mayor or something. Someone who's in charge of this place?"
"No one's in charge here." Gerda frowned. "I'm sorry, am I saying bad things again? I just don't know what you mean."
"I think Goredolf over there's just saying he wants to speak with the oldest person in the village." Said Patxi.
"Oh…I get it! I'll go get one of the 25 year-olds!"
Once she was gone, Goredolf turned back to the other Chaldeans. "Honestly, that child. I can't believe her - calling me chubby out loud! And the no-parents thing, too! I've never heard of a culture like that!"
"Not to mention that the oldest person here's only 25. We didn't exactly have the longest life expectancy back in Russia, but I knew some people who got to double that."
"And these people've got an easier time getting food with all the animals and crops they've got." Fujimaru looked at Mash. "Maybe they're all designer babies or something?"
"I don't think so. The readings I'm picking up aren't any different from the human baseline, and certainly nothing along the lines of me or a homunculus."
"I'll just ask that child whenever she -" Without so much as a warning beep, Goredolf's image vanished.
"Huh? Director? Senpai, what happened?"
Fujimaru examined the communicator. "Everything looks fine. Well, they did say that the connection wasn't going to be the best, so odds are it just dropped."
"And right before Gerda comes back." Patxi noted before pointing down the path. Gerda was returning with a young-adult man, and as expected he looked about 25.
"Huh?" Gerda asked when she and the man got back to the Chaldeans. "Where did mr. Chubby go?"
"Something came up." Fujimaru replied.
"Awww, that's a shame. What was it he wanted to talk about again? Something about the village?"
"Gerda," the man sighed, "if there's nothing to do can I get going? I need to get ready for the ceremony tomorrow, and besides that it's getting late. Why don't you go make our guests some dinner?"
As misfortune would have it Gerda's house was too small for Patxi to eat by himself, forcing him to swallow his discomfort and eat with everyone else. Dinner itself consisted of something called 'beef stew' served in a mostly-liquid form, alongside two rolls of bread for each of them and a cup of tea. Patxi slurped down all of his initial portion within half a minute, the loaves were gone twenty seconds later, and the second course of beef stew only lasted another minute before disappearing entirely as well.
"You know," Gerda opined as she watched in amusement, "you sure eat funny. And really fast, too."
Patxi swallowed his last bit of stew. "Where I come from, we don't - I mean, we didn't have the luxury of eating slowly or delicately. You just took what you had and ate it before someone stole it from you."
"I'm sorry. I can't believe the Goddess would let there be any villages like that."
"Speaking of your Goddess," Mash asked, "I'm assuming that tomorrow's ritual has something to do with her?"
"Yep." Gerda nodded. "Tomorrow the Goddess will send her valkyries, and they'll take all the adults to Valhalla. Them and anyone that's 15 years old but hasn't had a child yet."
"Where's Valhalla? Never heard of it."
Apparently Patxi was alone in that respect, because both Fujimaru and Mash stared at Gerda open-mouthed, looks of horror plastered on their faces.
"They… kill them? " Mash's spoon clattered onto the table.
"I thought you envoys would know that? But yeah, they all get smooshed flat by the giants."
"And the Valkyries just…watch?" Fujimaru looked like he was about to vomit.
"That and make sure everything goes the way it should - that the giants don't break through the gate and kill anyone they're not supposed to, and that everyone that needs to go to Valhalla gets there."
Patxi stood up, his own bowl and tableware clattering to the floor with a clash. "They what? They just sit back and let people get slaughtered because of the whims of some Goddess? And you're actually fine with that ?"
"Why wouldn't I be? It's the way things have always been, isn't it? Not to mention that being taken to Valhalla's a good thing."
Patxi was shaking again, this time with suppressed anger and disgust. It's just like with the Oprichniki. The exact same - people getting killed because of the whims of whoever's in charge while telling everyone else that it's for the greater good. "How the fuck is that a good thing? People's entire lives are getting cut short, and you all just stand back and accept it? What is wrong with all of you?"
"Patxi, stop." Fujimaru's voice was firm. "It's not Gerda's fault." Standing up, the human looked Patxi straight in the eyes as he stood between him and Gerda. "Calm down. I get why you're angry, but she's not the one to blame."
Looking over at Gerda, Patxi saw she was about to cry. Ashamed, he sat back down. "I'm sorry, Gerda, I shouldn't have yelled at you. It's just…I grew up with that kind of thing too, and the fact that you're so willing to accept it as normal, it…it pulled up a lot of things." Like the people in Moscow that mocked and jeered at me. Just because the Oprichniki said I was evil and needed to die, they all went along with it. He looked straight at her. "But…how can you be so okay with this? With any of it? It's just ripping everyone's future away from them."
"Their future?" Gerda gave one last sniffle and rubbed her eyes. "But isn't the future just, like, the next day and the day after that? What's so important about it?"
"I think what Patxi's trying to say is, what if you or someone else wanted to live past 25?" Mash put in. "Are there any hopes and dreams that you might not be able to fulfill by then?"
"What do you mean? Why would anyone want to be older than 25? And what do you mean about 'dreams'? Like…what you get at night?"
Mash shook her head. "No, I mean 'dream' in the sense of something you really, really want to do. Something that's important."
"Well…I would've said get the herbs for Laura, but she got them okay, so…I guess I'm fine? I'm sorry that's not the answer you guys seem to want." Gerda yawned. "I dunno. Maybe I'm just tired, and maybe I'll think of something in the morning."
"Perhaps. We could probably all use some rest after everything that's happened today."
The Oprichniki were pushing him forwards again, but this time instead of Moscow Patxi was being escorted through Village 23. Gerda was walking alongside him as well, a frozen, emotionless smile on her face. "It's alright, Patxi." She explained. "It's time for both of us to go to Valhalla, you see."
Patxi tried to scream, tried to protest, but the words caught in his chest, and they marched forwards, towards the gate. "OPEN THE GATE!" Stellan called out. "PRESENT THE SACRIFICES."
Outside the gate stood Ivan, imposing as ever, ready to kill the two of them.
"Isn't it wonderful!" Gerda cheered. "The Tsar himself has come to take us away!"
Still unable to say even a single word, all Patxi could do was stand, frozen with fear, as Ivan walked forward. And then he was a giant, and then three, all of them standing with clubs raised -
The clubs arced downwards, slamming into Patxi and Gerda. Patxi's left side exploded again and his vision began to fade, replaced with the ever-constricting darkness that flew inwards, choking him, snuffing out his very life -
Patxi awoke with a start, his breathing rapid and heavy. I can't breathe. I can't breathe. I can't breathe. Maybe it was the lingering smoke from Gerda's fire, maybe it was his body still trying to finish up healing, but Patxi felt like he was still being choked.
I need fresh air.
Quietly, Patxi tiptoed around the sleeping humans and left the building. On a whim he looked up -
And saw the most beautiful sight imaginable.
In that instant, his nightmare was forgotten. "Oh, wow. "
Patxi was looking up, for the first time in his life, at the stars. There's…there's so many of them. There were more lights in the sky than he could possibly count, bright ones and dim ones, large ones and small ones, blue ones and white ones. Streaking across the middle was what looked almost like a cloud, with an open fissure in the middle containing even more stars, arcing from one side of the horizon to the other. Is this what the night sky is supposed to look like?
Off to the North another flickering caught his attention. Patxi turned to it, and was rewarded with the sight of green and red ribbons of light arcing their way across the sky, spinning and dancing in the air in front of him.
It was the most amazing thing he had ever seen, and Patxi wished he could spend an eternity watching the stars flicker and shine above the dancing ribbons.
But it was not to be, for as he watched Patxi heard a noise coming from his right. He looked towards it and saw a being descend from the sky. She was hooded, but even in the darkness Patxi could make out her black hair and red eyes.
"So you are the Yaga. The refugee from another Lostbelt. My mistress wishes to speak with you."