Source
https://kakuyomu.jp/works/2912051601476634937
Squeak—.
The old door slammed shut with a creak.
I slowly looked around the room.
The Guild Master’s office.
A room I’d used almost every day until five years ago.
…No.
It didn’t feel like five years ago to me.
It felt like just two weeks ago.
The desk.
The bookshelf.
The sofa.
The window.
Even the potted plants were the same.
Nothing had changed.
Nothing at all.
Or so it should have been.
“……”
There was just a sense of something being off.
There was a small scratch on the edge of the desk.
It was the scratch Mia left when she once burst in and bumped into the desk.
I remember it.
As if it were yesterday.
And yet.
That scratch had faded slightly.
So had the wood of the window frame.
And the corner of the desk.
Everything looked older.
Time I wasn’t aware of had definitely passed.
“Has it really been five years…?”
I muttered without thinking.
It didn’t feel real.
My head understood.
But my heart couldn’t keep up.
Emma set down the tea.
A soft clink echoed through the room.
I sat down in the chair.
The same spot as before.
The Guild Master’s seat.
But it felt strange.
Even though it felt like I’d only been away for a few weeks.
It felt as if I’d returned to a place I’d been away from for decades.
“……”
Emma sat down across from me.
Silence.
It was a heavy silence.
And then.
“Why?”
Emma murmured softly.
“Hm?”
Emma kept her head down.
Her clenched hands were trembling.
“Why didn’t you come back right away…?”
Her voice wasn’t angry.
It was filled with sadness.
Sadness that had built up over five years.
“Emma…”
“We’ve been waiting for you the whole time.”
She continued, still looking down.
“You said a month would be fine.”
“You said you’d come back right away.”
“Everyone believed you.”
I couldn’t say a word.
“But…”
Emma’s voice trembled.
“You didn’t come back…”
The room fell completely silent.
I exhaled deeply.
And then.
I began to tell her what had happened in the dungeon.
About the journey.
The newly discovered dungeon.
The ruins at the very bottom.
The magic circle.
And then.
That sensation, for just a moment, as if time had stopped.
How, before I knew it, everything had changed.
Emma listened in silence.
Without interrupting me.
Just quietly.
She listened to every word.
Eventually.
The story came to an end.
“……”
Silence.
Emma closed her eyes.
Then she let out a small sigh.
“I see.”
“Do you believe me?”
“I do.”
Her answer was immediate.
“Alt san isn’t the kind of person who would tell a lie like that.”
I felt a little relieved.
I took a sip of tea.
It had gone lukewarm.
“So—”
I looked up.
There was something I had to ask.
“What happened?”
Emma turned her gaze toward me.
“Over the past five years.”
“……”
“What about Leona?”
“What about Serena?”
“What about Lilia?”
“What about Mia?”
“What happened to everyone?”
Emma’s expression clouded slightly.
And then.
She slowly opened her mouth.
“First of all—”
Her voice was quiet.
“I’ll start from the day Alt san disappeared.”
I nodded silently.
Five years.
Five years I knew nothing about.
That was how it all began.
“The morning Alt san disappeared.”
Emma gave a slight, wry smile.
“Mia was the first to notice.”
—Master!
She burst into the room as usual.
And then.
She realized no one was there.
At first, apparently, no one thought much of it.
They must have gone out early in the morning.
That was the extent of it.
But then.
They found a single letter left on the desk.
And then.
Leona.
Serena.
Lilia.
Everyone gathered.
“I still remember the look on everyone’s faces at that moment.”
Emma’s gaze drifted into the distance.
“I’ll be back in about a month.”
“I’m leaving the guild in your hands.”
“Let’s all have a meal together again when I get back.”
The moment she finished reading the letter.
“Everyone got angry.”
“……”
I can kind of imagine it.
“Leona said she was going to chase after him right away.”
I couldn’t help but give a wry smile.
Just as I thought.
“He hasn’t gone far yet.”
“We can still catch up to him now.”
Apparently, she was serious.
Serena was angry, too.
Even though she’s usually so kind.
But on that occasion, unusually enough.
“There’s no point in consulting,”
she said, apparently in a rather bad mood.
Lilia was even more straightforward.
“Are you crazy?”
That was all she said, apparently.
As for Mia…
“Master!!”
she cried, trying to go look for him.
It makes me feel a little nostalgic for that room.
I could easily picture that scene.
“But,”
Emma continued.
“I stopped them.”
“Even if you stop him, Alt san will still go.”
“It’s no use chasing after him now.”
“If he’s coming back in a month, let’s just wait.”
That’s how she persuaded them.
In the end,
everyone agreed.
Of course, they looked dissatisfied.
Even so.
they believed.
“Alt san will come back.”
“He’ll keep his promise.”
“So it’ll be okay.”
Everyone thought that.
I lowered my gaze.
My chest felt a little tight.
“The first month was really just like any other.”
We took on assignments.
We trained.
We ate.
Just the usual daily routine.
Only one person was missing.
“I’ll get mad at him when he comes back.”
Apparently, that’s what they said while they waited.
“But—”
Emma’s voice grew a little quieter.
“Even after a month, he didn’t come back.”
The room fell silent.
“At first, I thought he was just running a little late.”
Two months.
Three months.
Half a year.
Even so.
He never came back.
“That’s when it started,”
Emma said slowly.
“That’s when everyone started acting strange.”
Leona began going to the gate every morning.
In case he might come back.
On rainy days.
On snowy days.
Without fail, on days when she had no commissions.
To the gate of the royal capital.
“Serena started gathering information.”
The temple.
The merchant guild.
Adventurers.
Travelers.
Every single place imaginable.
To find even the slightest clue.
“Lilia was researching search magic.”
Cutting back on sleep.
Forgetting to eat.
She was trying to create a spell that could search the entire world.
“As for Mia…”
Emma paused there.
“She searched every single day.”
From morning till night.
The royal capital.
The forest.
The dungeons.
Apparently, she was running all over the place.
“I’ll find my master.”
Repeating only those words.
I clenched my fist.
I didn’t know anything.
Behind my back.
That’s what had been happening to everyone.
And then.
Emma continued.
“It was around the one-year mark.”
“That was when, for the first time, the five of us started to drift apart.”
Emma spoke quietly.
“At first, it was just a minor argument.”
Leona said:
“We won’t find him if we just wait.”
“I’ll go look for him.”
Serena objected.
“There’s no point in searching blindly. We need information first.”
Lilia also had a different opinion.
“We won’t find him just by gathering information.”
“There has to be a more efficient way.”
And Mia said,
“I’ll do it all!”
“Back then, none of us had any leeway.”
“We all shared the same goal: to find Alt san.”
“And yet, little by little, the conflicts began to escalate.”
“And then—”
Emma lowered her gaze.
“Factions began to form.”
Those who supported Leona.
Those who supported Serena.
Those who supported Lilia.
Those who supported Mia.
The guild that had once been united.
The guild that had been like a family.
But little by little,
Little by little, it began to split apart.
“I tried to stop it over and over again.”
“But it was no use.”
Emma shook her head quietly.
“Everyone was desperate. They were tired of waiting. They were suffering because they couldn’t find him no matter how hard they searched.”
At that point, Emma lowered her eyes slightly.
“And above all… no one said it out loud, but everyone was afraid.”
“That Alt san might never really come back.”
The room fell silent.
I couldn’t say a word.
“And then—”
Emma continued.
“A year after Alto disappeared—”
“Wings of Dawn effectively disbanded.”
My chest tightened.
The guild the five of us had created.
The place we’d built from nothing.
Now its name was being mentioned in the same breath as “dissolution.”
That alone was painful.
But.
Emma shook her head.
“To be precise, it’s a little different.”
“Huh?”
“No one abandoned Wings of Dawn.”
Saying that, she looked around the room.
The faded walls.
The old desks.
And.
The spot where my seat used to be.
“Everyone set out to find you, Alt .an”
Leona, too.
Serena, too.
Lilia, too.
And Mia, too.
Each in their own way.
Each with their own thoughts.
“And all four of them started new guilds.”
“…All four of them?”
“Yes. Now, all four of them are guild masters.”
I instinctively clutched my head.
Just to look for me alone?
Would anyone normally go that far?
But Emma’s expression was serious.
“They were serious.”
The room fell silent.
“So then—”
I looked around the room.
“Why is this place still here?”
If they’d disbanded,
they could’ve just sold it.
They could just let it go.
That’s what I thought.
But Emma gave a small smile.
“No one would agree to disband.”
“Huh?”
“Because it’s the place where you, Alt san, will come back to.”
I was speechless.
“That’s why I stayed.”
Emma said quietly.
“Because someone has to protect it.”
Five years.
All this time.
All by myself.
In this place.
I found myself at a loss for words.
“Emma…”
“Yes?”
“Thank you.”
Emma looked slightly surprised.
Then she smiled, looking a little flustered.
“You’re late.”
Those words made my heart ache.
Silence lingered for a while.
Eventually.
I looked up as if suddenly remembering something.
“Are they still looking?”
Emma nodded without hesitation.
“I still am.”
“……”
“Even now, five years later.”
Her voice was earnest.
“Everyone’s still looking.”
I was lost for words.
Five years.
More than enough time to give up.
And yet.
Still.
Even now.
All this time.
They’re still searching.
But.
Emma lowered her eyes slightly.
“But—”
“Hm?”
“I didn’t believe in it the whole time.”
Hearing those words, I looked up.
Emma gave a pained smile.
“It was around the second year.”
“……”
“Everyone almost gave up at some point.”
The room fell silent.
“No matter how hard we searched, we couldn’t find him.”
“There were no clues.”
“We didn’t even know if he was still alive.”
Those days went on and on.
And then.
Someone said,
“Maybe…”
Emma paused there.
And then.
She continued in a small voice.
“‘Maybe Alt san abandoned us”
My chest tightened.
“That can’t be…”
The words slipped out before I could stop them.
“I know.”
Emma nodded.
“I didn’t think so either.”
“Leona was angry, too.”
“‘Alt san wouldn’t do that.’
‘He absolutely wouldn’t.’
That’s what she said, apparently.
But.
Time was cruel.
Three years.
Four years.
Five years.
Time just kept passing without me knowing anything.
“So, everyone,”
Emma looked at me.
“They wanted to believe they’d been abandoned.”
“Huh?”
“Because it’s easier that way.”
Those words weighed heavily on me.
Maybe he’d been in an accident.
Maybe he’s suffering.
Maybe he’s dead.
Rather than keep thinking about things like that…
It was easier to believe they’d been abandoned.
“But…”
Emma gave a wry smile.
“In the end, I couldn’t trust anyone.”
Not even Leona.
Not even Serena.
Not even Lilia.
Not even Mia.
Not a single one of them.
I just couldn’t bring myself to believe that Alto had abandoned
That’s why.
I’m still looking for him.
Emma said that and let out a sigh.
Then.
With a somewhat weary expression, she said,
“Everyone,”
She paused there.
Then she continued quietly.
“I’ve let things get pretty messed up.”
I gave a wry smile.
“You’re exaggerating.”
“……”
“I do think I did something wrong, though.”
It’s been five years.
They’ll probably get mad at me.
They might even hit me.
They’ll surely complain.
But.
If I explain it properly, they’ll understand.
That’s what I thought.
We’re longtime friends.
The five of us founded this guild together—we’re like family.
So.
If I just talk to them, surely—.
–
–
If you enjoy our content, feel free to donate, Thank you in advance !
Thanks for the chapter!
He’s cooked.