“It started out as just a simple rumor.”
“Rumor?”
Mirash nodded in response to Dilaila’s question.
“There was a rumor that the Dragon had sent down a Saintess.”
“A Saintess… huh.”
Shane let out an involuntary chuckle at those words.
He already knew this, of course, but hearing someone else call her a saintess somehow felt absurd.
“At first, many tribes tried to kill the woman claiming to be the Saintess, saying it was blasphemy. So many of them went out to subjugate her, but… it ended up the other way around.”
“The other way around…? You mean, they all died?”
Dilaila asked, and Mirash shook her head.
“No, that’s not it. They were completely taken in by the Saintess.”
“Taken in? Then….”
“Exactly. They failed in the subjugation and came back, only to insist to their tribes that she truly was the Saintess. Some tribes deemed them guilty of blasphemy as well and executed them, but one tribe’s chieftain said he would see for himself.”
And as a result, one of the seven tribes became the first to side with the Saintess.
“What in the world did they see to make them switch sides like that?”
“It hasn’t been clearly revealed yet.”
“What? Then didn’t they just follow her blindly without knowing for sure?”
“That may be so… but it’s hard to say it was baseless, either.”
With that, Mirash searched her memory and continued.
“There were many so-called miracles performed by the Saintess. Some claimed that when she prayed, an endless lake appeared. Others said the lush, green forest of the past briefly returned.”
“Wait, that sounds like…”
“Exactly. We suspect that this so-called Saintess might actually be an illusionist.”
All of it sounded like a dream.
An endless lake or a forest from the past….they were the original features of the Nakar Desert, after all.
But as Mirash continued, Dilaila’s expression grew clouded with uncertainty.
“But the thing is, we can’t just write it off as nonsense either. The Saintess actually went to the Central Region herself, after all.”
“Central Region? What’s that?”
“At the heart of the Nakar Desert lies a sanctuary.”
Shane interjected at Dilaila’s question.
“A sanctuary? What’s that supposed to be?”
“It’s the only oasis in this desert. A remnant of the past.”
“Ugh… Don’t go around calling it a ‘remnant of the past’. It’s the glory of our past.”
“Not like anyone can enter it anyway.”
“How you say something makes all the difference, nya! It’s about respecting the feelings of us desert tribes.”
“I respect that.”
“Hmph-nya. Anyway, as I was saying….the sanctuary is where our god, the Dragon, sleeps. Unlike the rest of the desert, the sanctuary is a place filled with lush green forest.”
According to Mirash’s explanation, this so-called sanctuary was a truly mysterious place.
“No one who’s gone in has ever come back alive. Or more precisely, no one who’s ever set foot there has returned. We believe it’s because the Dragon’s wrath still hasn’t subsided.”
“Wait, but didn’t you just say that this so-called Saintess returned unharmed?”
“Exactly. That’s why we haven’t been able to make any rash moves. And not only that. The Saintess brought back all sorts of items from the sanctuary. They’re what we call holy relics.”
Stones that caused water to flow on their own, incense that repelled evil spirits with just a flame. Things that, by description alone, certainly lived up to the title of “holy relic”.
Hearing that, Dilaila twitched her shoulders for a moment before clearing her throat as if nothing had happened.
Shane glanced at her for a moment, then turned his attention back to Mirash.
“Some tribes still consider her blasphemous, but the common people no longer see it that way. Even among the tribe leaders, some have begun to waver because of these rumors…”
That was how powerful the presence of the Saintess had become.
In truth, setting aside all the other rumors, the most significant one was the fact that the Saintess had gone to the sanctuary, a place no one could enter, and returned alive.
To the desert tribes, the existence of the Dragon was that monumental.
That’s why Nameless had no choice but to kill Raviata in my previous life.
In the Nakar Desert, anything related to the Dragon was treated as sacred. So what would happen if a descendant of the Dragon appeared?
That didn’t align at all with Nameless’s plan to swallow up the Nakar Desert.
That’s why Nameless had used a corrupted dragon heart from the Great Mezaiya Forest to send Raviata into a frenzy and then had methodically killed the last remaining descendant of the Dragon in the world.
While Shane was lost in those thoughts of his past life, Mirash said no more as if she had nothing further to add and the group walked across the sandy desert in silence.
Only the scorching sun beat down on them.
***
Late at night.
Shane stepped out of the chilly camp to clear his head and was greeted by the cold desert air.
The desert at night was nothing like it was during the day. It was bitterly cold.
The once thick and heavy air now carried a cutting chill, sharp as a blade, creating a deadly environment where letting your guard down could mean freezing to death.
In this wildly temperamental desert, Shane gazed out toward the horizon.
And then, he sensed someone behind him.
“Here.”
When he turned, he saw Dilaila holding out a thermos filled with hot chocolate.
“Heh. This is seriously luxurious. I can’t believe we’re enjoying this kind of comfort while crossing the desert.”
With a smile, she handed Shane the thermos lid, now filled with hot chocolate.
At the same time, she stared intently at Shane’s mask, clearly trying to catch a glimpse of his face as he drank.
To be precise, she was hoping he’d remove his mask in the process.
How is it possible for her expressions to be that obvious?
That part of her hadn’t changed at all from his previous life.
Back then too she had always been honest with her feelings.
“….….”
“….…!”
Maybe that’s why, Shane suddenly felt the urge to tease her a little.
And so, he took off his mask.
Dilaila’s eyes widened like full moons in the night sky.
“Whaaa?!”
Startled, Dilaila fell backward, and the thermos that had just been in her hand hit the ground, spilling its contents into the sand.
Seeing that, Shane couldn’t help but curl his lips into a smile. It reminded him of Klein from the academy, whom he used to tease.
“Hmph.”
“Y-You smiled… No, more importantly, y-you’re—!”
The face beneath Shane’s mask was no longer the one with black hair and roseberry-colored eyes. Instead, it belonged to a middle-aged man with rugged features and a mane-like head of hair.
He looked exactly like Daniel from the Knights of Judgment.
“H-How is that possible?!”
“Why are you so surprised?”
“Wha—?!”
When Shane swept his hand across his face, it now resembled that of Dominic, the royal guard knight who had died in the Great Mezaia Forest.
“A disguise spell? Is that what this is? Ugh, geez! You scared me!”
“Did you really think I’d show my real face so easily?”
“Ugh, you should’ve just acted like usual instead of pulling a stunt like that! Seriously, your personality’s so weird…”
Shane was known for never removing his mask, even during meals, choosing instead to summon the Origin of Greed to consume his food.
Dilaila had expected him to do the same this time and let her guard down….only to be completely fooled.
She clutched her startled chest and looked down at the overturned thermos with sad eyes before picking it up.
“Ugh, what a waste…”
“I’m fine, so you drink it.”
“So now you give me the cure after causing the illness? You really like messing with people, huh. Hmph.”
Still, perhaps because she had a sweet tooth, Dilaila accepted the hot chocolate without protest.
“I didn’t mean to scare you. It’s just that I no longer have any reason to hide my identity.”
“Your identity…? But you’re still wearing a mask. What do you mean, reveal your identity?”
“At this point, isn’t this mask itself what defines me to Nameless?”
“You know… now that you say it, that kinda makes sense. Hmph…”
With that, Dilaila took a sip of the hot chocolate and spoke up again.
“I’ve been wondering… Can I ask you something? Whoa, geez! When did you change your face again?!”
Shane had now transformed into the face of a male from a race Dilaila had never seen before.
He let out a soft chuckle.
“Since when did you ever wait for permission? Go ahead.”
“Well… the Great Mezaia Forest, and now this Nakar Desert… Why haven’t they been reset?”
It was a question worth asking.
After all, the Cradle was a collection of dungeons.
That meant the Cradle should undergo the same reset process as a dungeon where slain monsters and destroyed terrain are restored to their original state.
In fact, before the Great Mezaia Forest was opened, the two other Cradles that humanity had unlocked through their own efforts would periodically reset themselves.
“To humans, Akasha may be the only god, but in truth, there were other beings who governed this world.”
“Hmm…?”
“They each had their own way of maintaining the world. Dragons and wyrms were among them.”
“……”
Dragons and wyrms were beings that stood at the pinnacle of all life and ruled over it.
“That’s why even Akasha’s seal is starting to weaken. Although the boundary of time separating this place from the outside world hasn’t collapsed so monsters and other races can’t break out, their own flow of time is permitted by the dragons and wyrms.”
“Ah… So basically, it’s because a dragon exists in the Great Mezaia Forest, and a wyrm in this Nakar Desert?”.
“Close, but not quite. The wyrm in the Nakar Desert is already dead. The reason time no longer rewinds here is because of Nameless. They too have beings that maintain the continuity of their world.”
“Oh…”
At that, Dilaila’s expression grew complicated.
Who in the world was this man, to know so much about Nameless?
Shane, watching her puzzled expression for a moment, turned his gaze to the night sky, where countless stars twinkled.
Seeing that, Dilaila couldn’t hold back her curiosity any longer and was just about to speak when suddenly,
“Time is relative. So then, how does one access a split timeline? Or rather, is it even possible for a mortal who isn’t a god to leap across different strands of time?”
“…What?”
What kind of out-of-the-blue nonsense was that?
As Dilaila looked at Shane with eyes full of such a question, Shane once again met her gaze.
“You won’t understand it now. But someday, even questions like mine will find their own answers.”
“…I mean, really. If you talk to yourself and convince yourself, what am I supposed to say to that?”
“Just remember it. You’re not slow-witted. A mortal can hardly keep their sanity across timelines. Clinging to it by force is nothing more than a foolish attachment.”
“…….”
Seriously, what is he even talking about?
That’s what Dilaila thought, yet she gave a vague nod to Shane’s words anyway.
She still had no idea who or rather, what he was. For all she knew, he might not even be human.
But one thing was clear: he knew far too much.
As Shane had said, Dilaila kept his words tucked away in a corner of her mind.
***
After walking and walking through the desert where nothing but uneven sand dunes and the horizon stretched endlessly, it was only about a month later that something else finally came into view.
“We… we’re here!”
The city of the Myo Tribe, one of the seven tribes of the Nakar Desert.
The Argato Oasis had begun to appear in the distance.
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