Eustar suppressed the rising frustration within him as he looked around with his hands on his hips. Suddenly, he undid his tied hair and mumbled with the hair tie between his lips.

“Laila, could you check the seeker again?”

Laila took out the seeker from her pocket and checked it, but it was useless. From the moment she had a strange feeling, she had been checking the seeker every three steps, but the needle remained motionless and quiet.

Occasionally it would twitch as if about to move, but it would suddenly spin a full circle and return to its original position.

Laila shook her head and said,

“It’s still not moving.”

Meanwhile, Eustar skillfully twisted his long hair, rolled it into a bun, and fixed it tightly to the back of his head.

As if the tie wasn’t enough, he took out a thin, pointed golden rod from his jacket’s inner pocket and firmly inserted it into the rolled-up hair to secure it.

Laila, who had been quietly watching Eustar fix his hair, said,

“With your hair like that, you look like a traveler.”

Eustar grinned at that. Seeing his smile, Laila suddenly felt her uneasy feelings begin to fade. Was it the power of his smile, or…

“Saying I’m a traveler isn’t completely wrong, is it?”

Laila frowned briefly like a pondering child and added,

“No, I mean like wanderers. You’re not a wanderer, are you?”

“Hmm, not in practice. But you know what’s interesting, Laila? I always think of myself as somewhat of a wanderer.”

“Why…”

Laila trailed off and closed her mouth. She thought she understood why he said such a thing.

Thinking of the grand yet somehow empty, and at times even desolate, palace of Sierou, it wasn’t unreasonable for him to feel that way.

A place where no one could sleep comfortably at night, where everyone equally suffered from nightmares until they opened their eyes to the morning sun as their salvation.

Eustar said,

“But that’s not what’s important right now… Laila, you’re right. We’re completely lost. It shouldn’t take this long to reach Bintoshis from the fork in the road. Even though Bintoshis is still right there, so clearly visible.”

He pointed towards Bintoshis, covered in a pale mist. Some roofs and houses were visible above the low-lying fog. They looked like skulls floating on a hazy swamp.

Eustar took out some of his magical tools, but like the seeker, they weren’t of much help.

Some didn’t even work, as if their magical power had been discharged. This was true not only for the seeker but also for the Rening-row—the eyeball he had used to find Laila.

“If we keep wandering like this, we’ll become the subjects of this village’s strange rumors.”

Laila nodded in agreement. She wanted to avoid that. The last thing she wanted was to wander eternally on this dark and ominous path until collapsing…

“There must be a good solution…”

As Laila listened to Eustar’s quiet voice, she suddenly pursed her lips with a determined expression.

It was a strange expression, as if she was holding back something she really wanted to say. Eustar wasn’t one to miss such a change, and he immediately stared at Laila’s face.

“What are you thinking, Laila?”

Laila, who had been pondering, glanced up at Eustar. Her cautious attitude suggested that if she voiced her thoughts, Eustar might jump up like a startled rabbit.

“There’s a method I learned from my mother long ago.”

Eustar’s eyes blinked a couple of times.

“What kind of method are you talking about?”

“A magic spell to find the way… when you’re lost. Actually, my mother didn’t teach me many spells. But this was one of them.”

“Why didn’t you say so earlier?”

Laila bit her lip hard and looked at Eustar again with a peculiar expression.

“Because a witch’s magic doesn’t always bring good results. If I were alone, I would have tried it as soon as I noticed something strange about the path. But now…”

“Is it because I’m here that you couldn’t?”

Yes. Laila answered only in her heart. Because she didn’t want Eustar to ask ‘why’… But her efforts weren’t particularly effective.

“Why?”

“I deliberately didn’t answer because I thought you’d ask that, and you did.”

Laila thought her voice sounded just like a grumpy child.

But Eustar didn’t seem to think so—or maybe he didn’t care—as he suddenly started laughing in a cheerful voice. It was a refreshing sound unlike someone who had been growing tired from the hazy view and repetitive paths.

“Of course I’d ask. What made you think I wouldn’t be curious if you didn’t answer?”

Laila mumbled with her lips. Eustar gazed down at her face, which was hard to tell whether she was troubled or annoyed, then smiled and took a step back.

“Show me, Laila. What this magic is. The only thing we can rely on now is your magic, right?”

“It’s not that simple. When my mother taught me this magic, she said…”

—Always remember that things other than the path might appear. Trying to find exactly what you want is just greed.

That’s what mother said. Laila thought. She knew better than anyone what “other things” meant. It could be magical beasts, malicious ghosts, or even more ominous or dangerous things. So…

“Laila.”

Eustar’s voice cut through Laila’s thoughts. Like suddenly bringing a blade to a tightly stretched thread, Laila was startled and dazed at the same time.

Eustar continued,

“Don’t worry about what your mother said.”

Laila’s eyes widened as if to ask what he meant. Suddenly, she thought she could hear her mother humming in her ear. Was it a signal not to listen to him? Or…

“Laila, remember the day we first met? Do you remember? That rocking chair in your house. I told you it would be better not to sit on it.”

Laila nodded. “Of course I remember.” She added, slightly frowning her eyebrows. “Come to think of it, I wanted to ask why you said that.”

Eustar nodded slightly, mimicking Laila, then folded his arms.

“That chair, you said your mother cherished it?”

“To be precise, it was cherished by my mother’s mother, and probably her mother’s mother too.”

“Right. For a very long time, witches raising daughters alone sat in that chair, knitting or reading books…”

Laila interjected,

“I don’t think they did any knitting, though?”

“It’s just a manner of speaking. Well, they might have been manufacturing dangerous tinctures or reading books about black magic. Anyway, they spent a long time like that. The reason why old objects often have strange stories associated with them is because the thoughts and souls of the people who use them seep in. Very slowly, layer by layer. They… how should I put it? They pile up and compress like old pie dough, and mold starts to grow quietly in between. That chair was exactly in that state.”

“Are you saying there was something bad in it?”

Eustar lightly rubbed his cheek with his fingertip.

“It probably wasn’t like that from the beginning. But it’s unlikely that all the people who sat in that chair over that long period only had happy thoughts, right? And negative things are absorbed faster than others. Into living things, or even non-living things. You know that principle, don’t you?”

“Yes, I do.”

Laila finally understood why he had said that. She briefly considered talking about the strange dream she had a few days ago but soon decided against it.

Eustar said,

“The reason I brought this up, Laila, is because you still seem to be bound by your mother. Even though your mother is no longer in this world, sometimes you seem to exist only as her ‘daughter’. Do you understand?”

She was about to argue that it was only natural, but Laila soon retracted that thought.

His words were right. Apart from the influence of the Deceptor… She needed to become an independent entity. This wasn’t Rizikus, and Laila was no longer just a witch’s daughter, but a witch in her own right. And she had things to do.

Besides picking mushrooms. Laila thought.

“Step back a little more, Eustar.”

Eustar noticed that Laila’s voice had changed slightly from before.

As he stepped back a couple more paces, Laila nodded as if to say that was enough. Then she rolled up the sleeve of her uniform jacket, revealing her white wrist. It was as thin and white as a daffodil stem.

“What are you going to do?”

Eustar asked. His voice was a mix of half curiosity and half anxiety. Laila glanced at him with her light red eyes and shrugged.

“Find the way. As I said.”

Then, she drew her thumbnail across her wrist. Surprisingly, a red line appeared on her wrist, and a drop of blood fell from that spot.

Eustar watched her with surprised eyes, then opened his mouth as he saw Laila’s drop of blood, which had seeped into the ground, move on its own like a snake.

The branches began to rustle and shake.

Laila let a few more drops of blood fall to the ground and then covered the wound with her palm. The moved blood drops formed a red circle, and within it, they twisted and tangled into a unique shape.

“My feet are wrapped in Inglord’s shoes. Before me lies a thorny thistle field. Go forth, Inglord. Where will you go?”

As Laila whispered the spell, the red patterns moved around and changed their form.

Watching this, Eustar suddenly felt an uncomfortable churning in his stomach. He felt as if those things might suddenly rush at him…

A rustling sound came from somewhere. The tips of Laila’s short hair lifted slightly in the wind, and then the fog surrounding the two of them parted like curtains and dissipated.

Eustar turned to the right with a surprised expression. Where there had been a forest just moments ago, a path had appeared. The entrance to Bintoshis was right in front of them. And…

Laila, who was looking in the same direction as him, said,

“I told you. That other things besides the path would appear.”