Chapter 226

"They say you should not speak in the Fox Den."

The Pathfinder went on as he climbed the rugged mountain.

"That's the comfortable way. This bastard eats direction and order. Mages especially take a great deal of influence once they are shut in here. Being creatures shaped out of spiritual energy."

"Then is it all right for us to speak?"

"Humans fare a little better. The talismans you are carrying are devices to make the 'Fox Den' pass you by. They deliberately scatter the bearer's mystery so it cannot recognize you as food."

"But if that is the case…."

The new investigator hesitated, then asked,

"Would it not be hard for you to know direction either, Pathfinder?"

"I'm not finding direction. I'm finding, by elimination, the places unlikely to eat us. In here, having a 'purpose' gets you Offered easily."

"So you are saying the talismans alone are not enough."

"Those only help you behave something like a person in here. Speaking, eating, sleeping. Exactly that much. They won't protect anything beyond it."

"I shall bear that in mind…."

In places on the mountain there were often traces of people having trodden through many times, or spots where trees had been cleared and a path laid. But the Pathfinder said, "That is no grounds for a judgment."

The Pathfinder added this.

"Everything you see and hear and taste here is illusion."

"Is that not true of nearly every Labyrinth?"

"Take it that this one's worse by degrees. Those others at least prepare props suited to the Stage and the Script; the Fox Den greets a visitor with malice from the outset."

He clicked his tongue and went on.

"Since they say it is connected to the Foundation, everyone shrugs and steers clear."

"Er…."

The new investigator glanced sidelong and asked,

"When you say malice, what does that usually feel like? Is it very different from other Labyrinths?"

"For instance, in an ordinary Labyrinth, 'eat the food and you become an Offering' is a rule. In the Fox Den it isn't a rule but a trap. That's the difference."

"Rather more active, then."

"I'm glad you understand."

The Pathfinder nodded and asked,

"But this new face seems to have come without studying up on the Fox Den."

"Ah, my apologies. I was put in rather suddenly."

"There are places to be put in suddenly, and this isn't one."

While those two talked, the senior investigator, who had been silently examining the Fox Den, picked up the thread.

"There was a great deal of Dokkaebi mischief this summer. With the rain coming so often, the Water Wraiths' rampages were up sharply on last year too. The outskirts of Gyeonggi Province especially have a lot of rough terrain, so the losses among the martial officers were heavy."

"So you put in the most usable armed manpower you had. I assume the Sensitivity Bureau decided it sensibly enough, but there is nothing so urgent in the Fox Den right now. It was too hasty."

The senior investigator answered while checking the soil quality.

"He was seconded from head office, so the upper level judged he would be worth one person's share."

"Even so, when the Fox Den is as touchy as it is these days, I would think it better avoided."

"Since it has come to this, please do teach him properly. Assigned to the Fox Den, you will be seeing a good deal of each other. Only the beginning is troublesome; later he will be worth having."

"I shall at least help him avoid being Offered."

"Yes, if you would do that…."

The senior investigator's head came up sharply.

"……."

The raw smell of water drifted past.

"…Did Water Wraiths come out in the Fox Den this season too?"

"Hardly. Where in the Fox Den's territory is there a place fit for a Water Ghost to live, that you say such an odd thing? As you know, this is a fellow with not one water-related tradition to its name."

"The humidity seems higher than when I came before."

And that with no water anywhere.

"Fog alone should not do this."

"There has been a fair amount of rain lately."

The new investigator hesitated, then asked,

"But the ground is dry…."

"That's the Fox Den for you. Not much about it adds up."

The senior investigator surveyed their surroundings again.

As always, the 'Fox Den' was thick with fog. The deeper in they went, the more the fog seemed to seep into the ears, damp from inside the ear canal outward.

'Sound dies, and clothes grow heavy.'

That much had been so on his previous visit, but….

'The presence of a Water Wraith should have nothing to do with fog.'

There are Water Wraiths on friendly terms with fog, but there is no fog that makes a Water Wraith. That is the basic correlation among spiritual beings. As the investigator kept scanning around him, the Pathfinder spoke up.

"Shall we rest when we find level ground?"

"That would be the thing to do."

"The sun is about due to go down."

"Ah, understood."

At the senior investigator's easy nod, the new one asked,

"Is it not still an odd hour for that?"

"The sun here's up to the 'Fox Den.'"

Before the words were quite finished, the surroundings began to darken.

"No, but…."

"Why the face."

"Doesn't it carry on as though it were cutting the lights, and blatantly?"

"That's one of the 'Fox Den's' peculiarities, that it works the Stage entirely as it pleases."

"Most Labyrinths make a great deal of the Stage's plausibility, I thought."

"That's why they say the 'Fox Den' will evolve into a Dokkaebi before long."

Not long after, everything around them went completely black.

"Because flexibility serves as proof that a self is being made."

It was an awkward sort of nightfall to call a sunset. The west never reddened, the shadows never lengthened; the color simply drained away one layer at a time.

The Pathfinder cut in.

"In practical terms it does not extend as high as the upper air. The range in which the 'Fox Den' touches the sky is a very small part, and it can only tidy the portion directly above itself. This is merely this mountain's way of imitating night."

"Then it is right not to light a fire after all?"

"Yes. Light and smell are both invitations in here. There's no telling what would come, so it's better not to call."

They chewed and swallowed food that had gone cold, and got into their sleeping bags. The talismans from the Pathfinder stayed hung around their necks, and the Pathfinder set the watch rotation.

And only once everyone had gone quiet did the sound begin. It was weeping.

"Excuse me,"

Unable to bear listening, the new investigator asked,

"Was the 'Fox Den' always this restless a Labyrinth…?"

"That's always been there."

"It sounds like a person weeping."

There was no telling where the weeping came from. It went to the left and then rose on the right, and once in a while it came from right beside a sleeping bag.

"I know the 'Fox Den' is a Labyrinth that deceives people, but this one sounds rather young…."

"There's no such thing, so sleep."

"…Ah."

A 'sound' whose age and sex alike were hard to guess.

"It wasn't a person after all."

It was not a person's.

"Listening with that in mind, it really isn't. And nothing about it fits an animal's cry either."

"If you had to place it, it would be closer to running water or brush shaking."

"Aren't you frightened? You, Pathfinder?"

The Pathfinder answered with his eyes closed.

"I've been frightened for thirty years."

With that, silence settled.

***

On the second day, the survey went smoothly.

"So it is correct that nothing else has changed?"

"Yes, as you can see."

"And no villages have been added or lost recently."

"I have not looked that far, but who knows. I believe I have heard there are a few villages if you go deeper, though that is not certain either."

Calculating the structure of the mystery, the Pathfinder shook his head.

"Most of the villages held in the Fox Den's arms are that bastard's larder."

"That was a story I heard on the last visit as well."

"Unless a village is too big in head or body for it to manage, it does not let outsiders approach easily. Getting that far takes a more skilful Pathfinder."

"If we provided support, might you perhaps…."

"It's rather beyond me, anywhere that deep. I haven't memorized the structure that far."

Touching one tree after another, the Pathfinder asked,

"I have heard there are a few Pathfinders going into the deep parts lately. Not news of success, mind — only news of the missing, presumed Offered."

"Is there material in the Fox Den worth taking an interest in?"

"If anything, only that it is presumed to be where the Foundation's remnants once stayed…? I know no more than that myself; it is not a subject in my line worth taking an interest in."

They had been a group that faced down the world on the strength of very high technology and a great deal of capital. Someone might have come looking for what they left behind while retreating in haste during the war, or being dealt with.

"A recent surge would mean word spread along some particular line, but in any case I do not know. Anyone that skilled would have gone to a private firm rather than the Sensitivity Bureau."

"You're being rather too honest…."

The new investigator said it sourly, then looked up at the tree the Pathfinder was touching. The senior investigator's gaze followed, and he could see the thing hidden among the shadows.

A white bird perched on a branch.

"That."

"Ah, yes."

"What color are its eyes?"

"Red… they are."

"Quiet, is it."

"It's been, this whole while."

Having answered the senior's question, the new investigator turned back to the Pathfinder.

"Have we been walking along the sound of water this whole time, is that right?"

"Yes, that is so. Though it is not really the sound of water."

"Water on the left for an hour… but did you not change direction just now, after we passed the same pine twice? May I know what happens if you do not?"

"From the third time, that tree would have been counting us."

"That's grim."

"It is."

And around the third day, the Pathfinder stopped walking.

"What is the matter?"

"……."

"Pathfinder?"

The Pathfinder did not answer at once; he looked down at his feet. Then he stepped back three paces and came forward three paces again. As though measuring something.

Presently he said,

"From here."

"That requires more explanation."

"From here it's different."

"Different, you say…."

At the Pathfinder's words the new investigator looked around. There was only the same fog and the same trees they had been seeing all along. Leaving his junior to it, the senior investigator asked,

"Would you tell us concretely."

"It's light."

Gazing steadily at the ground, the Pathfinder went on.

"From the moment you cross this line, everything has turned gentle."

He indicated a certain point with his eyes.

"As things are, you could walk with the sound of water on your right instead of your left and still reach the ridge. You could pass the same pine five times and the Fox Den would not look at us, and though it is not a real sun, it will try to imitate one."

That was what the mystery weaving the Fox Den was telling him.

"Look at the fog."

"It's dropped."

"At this rate it's no cause to climb to the throat."

"Comfortable."

The senior investigator murmured,

"And all the more ominous for it."

He raised his head and looked at the Pathfinder.

"…Is the Fox Den changing?"

"……."

"Why, all of a sudden?"

The Pathfinder made no reply at all.

***

When the bathroom door opened, Lee Yeon-woo stopped mid-step, half-dried hair gathered in a towel. A white owl was sitting in front of it, round and forlorn.

"……."

Round, rather. Not forlorn.

'She really is remarkably round.'

"What are you thinking about so hard?"

"I was thinking that you have not one angular corner to you."

"I have a rough sense of the intent behind that remark."

"Dear me. How regrettable."

And he had made an effort to put it obliquely.

"Have you waited long?"

"A little?"

"My apologies."

"I heard you were washing, but do you even wash?"

"That is rude."

"I am sorry, but I was curious."

"Depending on my mood, I do wash."

Lee Yeon-woo headed for the small kitchen inside Room 404. Taking tea and a teapot from the cupboard, he added,

"The same goes for eating. Acts one need not perform, but which leave one feeling good or settled afterward. Those I still do."

"When I hear that sort of thing it makes me want to ask if you are all right."

"I am all right."

"Truly?"

Lee Yeon-woo considered the question a moment and answered.

"Yes."

"Hehe."

Coco sprang up out of his shadow and plopped down on his shoulder. It was smartly imitating a cat in full loaf mode. Truly a monster cat with a firm vision of its own aesthetic.

"Hello?"

"You are certainly better once you have washed."

Lee Yeon-woo brewed a cup of green tea for each of them and brought it out.

"……."

"You look like you have something to say."

"That is six cups in all."

"I drink four of them myself."

"Granted that one is the pitch-black co-owner's cup, what are the rest?"

"You have no idea how many are swarming about inside here."

"I am starting to grasp it."

Arranged out, they appeared to be for Coco, Seome, and Lee Yeon-woo (plus the blood-form Gu Poison, the Water Ghost, and the White Crow).

"Do you look after them like this normally?"

"Mostly I only see to the one in blood-form who lives in my body."

"Two servings minimum. That is not easy."

"Is that not simply how living goes?"

"You really do talk like a middle-aged man."

"What a cruel thing to say."

"Hmm…."

Seome tapped her cup with a foot.

"Since this body happened I have never gone thirsty or hungry, so it never occurred to me. In this case, ought I to petition for a bird waterer to be installed?"

"If the occasion to serve you tea arises again, I shall bear it in mind. Since you never particularly raised it, I left it as it was — do you need a uniform as well?"

"Are there uniforms for birds?"

"I should have to make one by hand."

"Mm, then, no."

The words jumped out without much thought.

"It seems as though I would get tangled in too deep."

And having said it, she added,

"I am joking."

"……."

Whether it was a joke or not, even Seome did not know, and not wanting to think hard about it, she decided to leave that for later. Lee Yeon-woo answered with his characteristic smile.

"I see."

"A name badge would be about right. A uniform is too much."

"You need not worry about it."

At those words — that she need not worry — Seome gazed blankly at her cup.

"It feels genuinely strange to hear that from you, Mr. Lee Yeon-woo."

Since signing the staff contract, Seome had been able to sense this person's state, at least faintly. Whether it was 'Lee Yeon-woo' now, or the 'General Manager.' Broad things of that kind.

So when he had returned to being the person she knew well, Seome had flown straight in from the village. She had told herself so the whole way, flying over the Fox Den. So perhaps….

'Perhaps I simply did not like being in that place so long.'

The thought scattered the moment she recognized it. Like the Fox Den's fog.

"…There was something I wanted to say, but it will not come together."

"You do not seem to have forgotten it, so I shall wait."

"Rather than that, would you not help me with it, Mr. Lee Yeon-woo?"

"If that is easier for you, gladly."

Lee Yeon-woo sipped his tea and asked,

"How was the village?"

He added,

"Ah, one moment."

"Go ahead."

"Before I hear your answer, I would like you to know only that I am in the middle of reflecting on myself."

"I am not sure this is a matter your reflecting will settle."

"The 'General Manager' sees most of the world as a 'game.' The angle of view differs a little, but the foundation is me. So I reflect first."

"If you say so."

The owl dipped her beak into the tea and drank, peck by peck.

"Oh, it works."

"It works."

"It works. Owl."

Coco joined in and the three of them marveled at it a little together.

***

The new investigator raised a finger toward the fog.

"Oh, there is something over there…."

SMACK—!

The senior investigator stopped him.

"Ow."

"I said don't point."

"My apologies."

The new investigator looked down at his finger.

"But nothing's happened, has it…?"

"Let me have a look."

The Pathfinder seized the new investigator's wrist and checked the fingers. All five, joints intact. Following the same gaze, the new investigator asked sourly, his face gone a little white,

"What exactly used to happen before?"

"Fingers gone, or severed, or bent back…."

"Uh, er…."

"All sorts. More than can be counted."

"What in the…."

Silent a moment, the new investigator closed his hand and opened it.

"……."

Only then did he laugh awkwardly.

"…Well, it's a relief it isn't happening now."

"You were lucky."

The Pathfinder went on quietly.

"Though I don't know whether this change is a phenomenon one may call 'good.'"

What the Fox Den's change signified, they had not yet worked out.

The survey was running long.

***

"Anyway."

Seome went on,

"The village children are adjusting well."

"They certainly looked firm of spirit."

"It has not been long, so it may be my imagination, but they seem to have put on a little flesh too. Whether it is because the Fox Den is lying flat, I do not know, but there are already shoots up in the fields."

Tilting the owl's head, Seome added,

"Back when I lived there too, I remember that when the Fox Den had been fed and was keeping quiet, it would sometimes hand down a 'blessing' like that, as an event. It lives on direction, so it adjusts the 'time in which a crop grows' as well."

Lee Yeon-woo thought a moment and answered.

"I think that is a good thing for the children."

"But those children call the General Manager a god."

"That is not so good."

Which was to say that was precisely the part he was reflecting on.

"It is my oversight."

To the Lee Yeon-woo of that moment there had been no reason to correct the misunderstanding.

"I want to correct it."

"I am not at all sure that will work."

"It is that far along already?"

"You told me about it yourself."

Seome combed her feathers straight with her beak and went on.

"That 'Lee Yeon-woo' cannot speak while he is inside the Fox Den."

"Nor can I make any expression other than a smile."

"Would that hold inside the village too?"

"The odds are high, unfortunately."

"Then persuading the children will be difficult as well."

Thinking it over, Seome muttered,

"Should we teach them sign language, perhaps."

"For reference, sign language differs by country."

"I would not know. I have never used it."

"Still, thank you for puzzling over it with me."

"Not at all."

Gazing at the empty air a moment, Seome added,

"And the children have settled something among themselves."

"I am afraid before I have even heard the content."

"That black lid you put over the well."

"You mean the well cover linked to Coco."

"They were polishing it very hard."

Before making any judgment, Seome decided to convey exactly what she had seen.

"Someone polishing it with a sleeve, and setting wildflowers down."

"One moment."

"And one child brought a tooth that had come out and laid it neatly at the edge of the lid…."

"One moment, please."

"I asked what they were doing and they said it was not an offering, it was a 'report.'"

"I did not brace myself that far."

"Since you told them offerings were not allowed, it seems they are working around it in the form of reports."

"……."

When Lee Yeon-woo fell silent, a sparkle effect came into Coco's eyes.

"Altar! Sacrifice!"

"Coco."

"Devotion! Faith! Loyalty!"

"Coco, please."

The other party was small children. As though she had caught his thinking, Seome went "ah" and put in a note.

"They look it, but they are probably a fair bit older than they seem."

"Then are they not small children after all?"

"Mages vary quite a bit in how they grow, so I could not say. All I can guess is that, given the Fox Den's nature, they may have stayed children a long time."

"In which case, surely they are simply children?"

"That depends on the angle, I suppose. You seem to see those children as something to be protected."

Seome looked steadily at Lee Yeon-woo.

"Now that I look at it, your common sense is oddly slanted in places too, Mr. Lee Yeon-woo."

"There are limits to meeting the world through books and theory, I find."

"Just how long were you shut up in…?"

Seome swallowed the rest there. It was a tearfully considerate act. Lee Yeon-woo took it lightly.

"It is all right. I know that much myself — that I am somewhat strange."

"That is not quite what I meant."

"Speak freely. Setting right and wrong aside, the only one here who will take my side unconditionally is this cat gentleman. There is no need for you to join in making me out to be a hopeless case as well, Ms. Seome."

Coco sprang upright.

"Coco! Help!"

"You see."

Seome nodded, satisfied.

"You are somewhat strange."

"To think you would apply it that fast."

"In any case, the way I saw it, that tooth was an offering too."

"I told them not to, and a tooth, no less."

"I think it was probably a milk tooth."

"Even so, a part of the body…."

Lee Yeon-woo swallowed a sigh and pressed the bridge of his nose.

"No. No, my communication was insufficient. I should not have let it be misunderstood that way to begin with."

"I do not think you need blame yourself quite that much."

"I only said I would take no price; I never told them where to put that feeling. When a thing has nowhere to go, it goes somewhere regardless. Being clever children, they will have wanted to find the rule."

"If I may offer a defense on their behalf."

Whom the defense was for, and on whose behalf, Seome herself did not know.

"Cult village residents do tend to be a bit like that."

"But why."

"As a fellow native of the same hometown, I apologize."

"No, Ms. Seome…."

Lee Yeon-woo swallowed a sigh.

"The apology should be mine."

He pressed his temple in weariness.

"It would have been better had I come to an understanding with the 'General Manager' in the first place. It is my fault for not looking deeply enough into myself. I am sorry to have put you through an uncomfortable situation again, Ms. Seome."

"Then shall we settle on neither of us apologizing?"

"I agree, for now."

"So, from what I saw…."

The sun was good, no one was frightened, and everyone was smiling.

"They are all right. All of them."

Seome went on,

"But the children are rewriting the existing faith and doctrine into the village's own language, among themselves. And I do not think it is easy to take that away from them either, myself."

"Because what the children are standing on now is that."

"Right."

The owl tilted her head.

"Speaking as someone who used to be a cult village resident, that is really hard to put down. And things there seem to have gotten much worse than when I came out, which makes it harder still. They need something to believe in."

Seome had been the same.

And when she was a mercenary, she had not needed that sort of belief. There had only been the day, with today's food and tomorrow's pay in it, and the compulsion to take care of the body her younger sibling had given her.

But now she is not thirsty and not hungry.

"So…."

And so she does not know what she ought to do.

"I think it will be the same for those children."

"I do not think the object of belief has to be a god."

"But a god is better. Omnipotent, does everything for you. Believe in that one being and there is nothing left to fear. And the children were born there, so that is their world. The rules are the doctrine."

"The rules are the doctrine…."

"Have you ever had a heart that believed in a god, Mr. Lee Yeon-woo?"

After some thought, Lee Yeon-woo answered.

"I have not."

"I thought as much."

"I respect everyone's religion, but personally—"

"I really do not know."

Seome stared at her teacup.

"What is right."

Shoots had come up in the fields, the children had put on flesh, and nobody had died. All of it rested on a faith built by serving the person Lee Yeon-woo as a god.

"And what is healthy, either, I… have never been taught."

"……."

"There is no chance to learn that sort of thing in the Gaps."

Lee Yeon-woo did not answer at once.

"Mm…."

He set down his cup, resettled himself once, and then said,

"Not knowing what you were never taught is not a fault."

"……."

"And you have already done it, Ms. Seome."

"…Done what?"

"You felt that it was strange, did you not."

"That was only my insides feeling odd."

"And that is why you came all this way."

Lee Yeon-woo went on in his characteristically calm tone.

"Not recognizing what the fault is, and not even knowing that a fault exists, are different things. You are not the latter, Ms. Seome."

"I am not."

"That is enough for a beginning."

Seome said nothing for a while.

"…You are very good at saying that sort of thing, Mr. Lee Yeon-woo."

"Dear me. I had thought that was what you asked for this conversation hoping to hear. No?"

"Have I ever mentioned that you look insufferable sometimes?"

"While we are at it, let me correct one thing."

Lee Yeon-woo said it firmly.

"On this matter, I know less than you do, Ms. Seome."

"Ah, sorry?"

"I have never believed in a god. As I said just now."

"Yes…."

"What it is to have a believing heart, and how hard it is to set that down, I do not know. Handing control of myself over to another being is not to my taste, so I will probably never know."

He pushed his cup aside.

"So on this matter it is right that I be the one asking."

"You, asking me?"

"Yes. You, Ms. Seome."

"I know nothing about it."

"A person who truly knows nothing cannot get out of a place like that."

"That is…."

Seome started to argue and stopped. Lee Yeon-woo added,

"To be honest, I am rather at a loss myself at present."

"I would think so."

"But decisions have to be made even while at a loss."

He said it and laughed briefly.

"We are adults, are we not?"

Seome had never given deep thought to what an 'adult' was. But the face saying it, young as it looked, looked genuinely like an adult's, and Seome found herself with nothing to say.

Lee Yeon-woo went on.

"So please look at it together with me."

"Has no one ever told you that you argue dishonestly?"

"A variant of the accusation of being insufferable. Well. Sometimes?"

Lee Yeon-woo had let the children misunderstand him for a god, and the children had been placed in a situation they could not endure without a kindly god. Even if one side had been settled, it would have come to this in the end.

That much had been decided the moment the Fox Den cast Lee Yeon-woo as the 'Fox God.'

"How a person deals with a person is not, I understand, a thing that can be settled by one individual's strength."

"I think I know what you mean."

"So let us think it over. What choice would be the most right, and the most healthy."

"Would that really be all right?"

"When treating an illness too, using a strong medicine all at once turns it to poison, does it not."

Together, that is.

"So if I go astray, please tell me."

Seome blinked.

"I do not know right from wrong, as I keep saying."

"You need not know. Only tell me it is strange."

Lee Yeon-woo met her eyes.

"As you did today."

Seome could not answer that straight away.

"……."

And a long while later, she opened her mouth.

"I will try."

"Thank you."

"Do not trust it too much."

"I shall try as well."

"That was a trap…."

Having said it, Seome regretted it a little.

Exactly why she felt the regret she did not know, but probably because a promise carries responsibility with it. This present promise had staying, and relationship, and communication as its premise.

It was strange that she did not dislike that either.

'It is not a bad thing.'

Seome did not trouble to reckon up what it was that was not bad.

"……."

And Lee Yeon-woo was watching her be that way.

***

That night.

The Pathfinder took an old notebook from deep inside his pack.

The notebook, with thirty years steeped in it, was dense with writing from the very first page, and the corners of the paper were worn dark with the grime of handling. To a man who had kept his life safe crossing in and out of the 'Fox Den,' it was as good as a talisman.

He quietly opened a new page so as not to wake his companions, asleep from exhaustion.

[The sound of water no longer matters.]

[You may pass the same tree any number of times.]

[Pointing makes nothing happen.]

Having written that far, he put away his pen.

"Ha…."

His hand had shaken, and the writing had gone crooked.

'All this time I have been writing down how to come back alive from the Fox Den, but this….'

What on earth is this.

The Pathfinder could not bring himself to carry the thought further even in his own head, and ran a fingertip over the rough surface of the paper. He only hoped this record would become a talisman that protected him once again.

And then.

"……."

The new investigator, leaning against a tree, was staring at that notebook.