chapter02 · 049-ep43
Episode 43: The White Wolf Loves His Master More Than the Moon
The Book of the King. The page for the beasts in the King's direct service.
There was a concept sketch of a wolf, drawn in pencil.
A white coat. Long, slender legs. A fine, sharp-featured face with pale gold eyes like the moon. Only the fur around his neck grew a little longer, a little fluffier.
Beside it, written in my handwriting:
【Hati】
- A wolf that chases the moon, forever. Twin of Skoll (Skoll handles the sun)
- Child of Fenrir
- Can run across the sky. Because he chases the moon
- White. Incredibly white
- Loves the King dearly. Loves sleeping at the King's feet (fights Fenrir over the spot)
"There it is. 'Loves the King dearly.'"
He wrote it for the beasts too.
Me-from-back-then wrote that for every last one of them.
But right now, that's fine by me.
A wolf that chases the moon. A wolf that runs the sky.
When I'm fighting airborne, probably only this one can keep up with me.
"All right. Let's call him."
The moment I decided—
words rose up in my head.
Not one line. Not two, either.
Far longer than the soldier's or the Shadow Servant's, the words came pouring in, smooth and unbroken.
At the same time, the book in my hand warmed, spreading through my palm. In the margin at the bottom of the page, my handwriting carved itself in. One line, two, three, four.
"That's LONG."
It slipped out before I could stop it.
But reading it over, I understood.
To call a beast of the King, it seems, takes words of a fitting weight.
Me-from-back-then probably just loved that kind of tiering, too.
One deep breath.
I stood in the middle of the levee path and held out my right hand.
I was excited.
In a moment, I would meet a wolf I had only ever known in pencil lines.
I wanted to meet him. Soon.
So I chanted with everything I had. Deadpan.
"—One night chasing the moon; a thousand nights, never reaching it"
Beneath my feet, a line of light raced across the water.
"—Hungering, racing on, white fangs that never gutter out"
The line drew a circle. Inside it, unreadable script arrayed itself. A full size larger than the usual magic circle.
"—Cast the moon aside. Where thou returnest is my feet"
Outside the magic circle, a second ring drew itself.
Over the water, a dark light like a night sky spread and gathered.
"—Come forth, 'He Who Chases the Moon'! Run at my side!"
The magic circle flared, like something bursting.
Spray shot up.
No — not spray.
Something white came leaping out of the circle's very center.
A wolf.
Huge.
His shoulders stood about level with my chest. This was well past "large dog." Pony territory.
The coat was pure white. Incredibly white — exactly as the concept art promised. In the dungeon's dim light, that one spot glowed white, as if the moon had risen there and nowhere else.
Pale gold eyes looked at me.
Looked hard.
"Uh, um... nice to meet you?"
That was all that came out.
The soldier had dropped to one knee and said, "—My King." The Shadow Servant had knelt, quietly, too.
This wolf couldn't speak. The beasts in the King's direct service, I had written, take no human form and speak no words.
So I had no idea what kind of reaction to expect.
The wolf took one step forward.
Another.
His muzzle arrived right in front of my face.
Sniff, sniff — he took in my scent.
What if he bites me?
The instant I thought it—
Hati's tail whipped around.
Wag wag wag wag wag wag.
"Eh?"
The tail was going hard enough to fly off.
The next instant, I was flat on my back.
"WAAAAH?!"
A pony-sized wolf had pounced with his whole weight, rolling me over onto my back on the levee path.
My face got the full licking.
"Wait wait wait wait! My face — my face is drenched!"
He was not listening.
Whimpering — khhn, khhn — Hati kept licking my face. His tail slapped and splashed at the water along the path.
"Okay, okay, I get it. That you're happy — I get it, I really, really get it."
Loves the King dearly.
That's what I'd written beside the concept art.
Exactly as written.
No — beyond what was written.
It was five minutes before I was finally released and could sit up.
Face drenched, hair drenched, back covered in mud.
Hati sat pressed tight against my side. His tail still swayed, slow and easy.
"Right, then — properly this time. Glad to have you, Hati."
I scratched his head.
Fluffy.
Unbelievably fluffy.
Hati narrowed his eyes and pushed his head into my hand.
"Heh."
A grin broke out.
There was nothing to do but grin.
"All right, let's go. Today I want to reach Floor 125. Think you can keep up?"
Hati rose smoothly to his feet.
Then took one step — into the air.
He didn't fall.
Hati's paws stood firm on empty space above the water.
"Whoa. He's really walking on air."
A wolf that chases the moon.
Can run across the sky. Because he chases the moon.
I remembered that crude one-liner beside the concept art.
Hati looked back from midair.
The look said: hurry up.
"Fine — race you!"
I kicked off the air.
My body lifted. Behind my feet stretched a trail of stardust.
And alongside, the white wolf came running, kicking off the sky to match me.
He was fast.
Hati was absurdly fast.
In the time it took me to kick three times, Hati took five strides through the air. I was fighting just to keep up.
"Hati, you're fast! Hold up!"
Hati stopped dead and looked back.
Waited for me to catch up. Then broke into a run again.
He was going ridiculously easy on me.
Who was it that said "race you," again?
On Floor 91, a pack of Heron Knights came.
Four. Circling up near the ceiling, marking us.
Floor 89 came back to me — the one that came for my back.
"Hati — my back!"
Somewhere around "back," the white body was already moving.
Hati slipped around behind me.
I looked only forward and kicked off, diving dead straight at the first heron. The heron spread its wings to flee. The plate at the base of its neck shifted.
Kick, right there.
The light blade slid into the gap.
That instant, behind me — a hard GAKIN.
I glanced back: Hati had caught, in midair, the neck of a heron diving for my back. Clamped down through the armor, good and hard.
Then one violent swing of his head.
The heron was slammed into the water and stopped moving.
"Nice, Hati!"
Hati's tail whipped once.
My back felt light.
Just not having to worry about behind me — it makes this much difference?
The third came head-on. I kicked the thrust-out beak up from below, deflecting it. The heron's body drifted upward.
Right to where Hati waited.
Kicking off empty air, he bit into its neck, dragged it down with all his weight, into the water.
The fourth fled Hati — straight for me.
Cornered, the heron whipped around in a panic. Wings opening.
I kicked it down.
Four herons sank into the water in no time at all.
"Whoa. That was perfect."
Hovering, I met Hati's eyes.
Hati gave a single hop in midair.
He was delighted.
Probably about as much as I was.
I held out my palm; Hati tapped it with a forepaw.
Midair high five: complete.
Hati had one more special skill.
He would bring me the magic cores of the monsters we killed, carried in his jaws.
A core about to sink — he would dive out of the air, scoop it up, and carry it to my hand. Then set it softly in my palm and look up into my face.
"Oh — thanks."
A pet.
Tail wag.
Off to fetch the next core.
Bringing it back.
A pet.
Tail wag.
"This is straight-up fetch."
At my mutter, Hati gave a small, faintly offended snort through his nose.
He seemed to be saying: I am a wolf.
"Sorry, sorry. You're a wolf. A very cool wolf."
The tail wagged again.
Simple creature.
On Floor 95, I brought out two rice balls.
I bit into one and looked at the other — and Hati was staring at me, hard.
"You want some too?"
Hati's tail went wild.
I broke it in half and held it out; he ate it in one bite.
A scrap of seaweed was stuck to the corner of his mouth.
"You've got some — right there."
When I picked it off with a finger, Hati narrowed his eyes and gave my finger a single lick.
"You really do love the King, huh."
He gave a soft whine.
Somehow, that tickled.
I'm not the King. I'm just Ichinose Saku, borrowing the King's lore.
But to Hati, it probably doesn't matter either way.
As long as the one in front of him is the one who called him.
Floor 100.
At the center of a wide paddy, a transfer circle glowed.
"—One hundred!"
I held my Guild card over it.
Toda dungeon, Floor 100 — transfer circle registered
Triple digits.
"Triple digits. TRIPLE digits. That's pretty amazing, right?"
Hati was circling round and round the circle's glow. What exactly he found so delightful, I couldn't say — but his face said: if he's happy, I'm happy.
The clock read two in the afternoon.
Lv: 136
From 129 at Floor 90, to 136.
The XP from kills we made together was coming to me, properly.
"I can keep going!"
Hati barked — wan — just once.
First time I'd ever heard his bark.
Floor 105.
Floor 110.
And then, Floor 112.
At the bottom of the stairs, my feet stopped.
This was it.
The man from the queue three days ago. Seven years of coming here, he'd said, and Floor 112 was his deepest.
Past here, he just could not break through.
Floor 112 was vast. High ceiling, deep water, almost no levee paths. Above the surface, Heron Knights wheeled in numbers.
Six. Seven. While I counted, another dropped from the ceiling's dark to join the ring.
Wingbeats layered one over another. Basa. Basa. The whole floor seemed to be breathing, slow.
Diving normally, breaking through here would genuinely be brutal. Wade in, and the water seizes your feet; from the sky, the herons come.
Floating in the air with a sky-running wolf beside me — I'm cheating, and I know it.
But that was no reason to stop.
"Let's go, Hati."
Hati looked up at my face.
I kicked off the air.
Across Floor 112's water, a trail of stardust and a white wolf ran side by side.
The circling herons turned toward us as one.
"—Come!"
The first two came plunging down, one after the other.
I slid sideways past the first. Kicked the second's beak up, deflecting it. Into that deflected heron's neck, Hati bit from the side and hurled it into the water.
The one I'd slipped past turned just above the surface. Plates shifting.
I kicked in. Contact. The first heron hit the water.
This works.
The instant I thought it, the rest of the herons changed their movement.
They stopped coming down scattered. Keeping their ring, they began to circle around us — and as they circled, the ring slowly tightened.
No telling where they would come from.
Hati pressed close against my back. A low growl rolled in his throat.
One of the ring blinked out of my sight.
Above.
From the ceiling's dark, one plunged straight down, upside-down.
And at the same time — below.
One skimmed in just above the surface, thrusting its beak up from directly beneath.
Above, and below.
Both at once — impossible.
Something white flew downward.
Hati. He ran down to just above the water and met the thrusting heron's neck head-on, biting. Fangs rang — KACHIN. Dragged by the heron's momentum, his body plowed backward along the surface.
Even so, his jaws never let go.
Below — Hati had it stopped.
Above — mine.
Against the plunging beak, I kicked upward instead.
Just before impact, I twisted. The beak whisked past my flank. The wind of it set my clothes flapping.
We passed each other.
The heron down. Me up.
The ceiling filled my vision.
At the very last moment I kicked and stopped. Just above my back hung the dungeon ceiling's cool, close presence.
I looked down.
The heron that missed me was trying to turn above the water. Wings spreading wide.
The plate at the base of its neck shifted.
Gray feather showing, dead below me.
From here, all I had to do was fall straight down.
Beneath the ceiling, I kicked the air straight up.
My body dropped, dead vertical. The trail of stardust hung from the ceiling in a single line.
I drove the light blade into the gap.
There was almost no sound at all.
The heron's wings froze, still spread. Without a single flap, it slid quietly into the water.
A beat later, two splashes overlapped.
One was the heron I'd kicked. The other was the one Hati — jaws still clamped — swung and slammed into the surface.
Hati shook himself hard above the water. Spray scattered off the white coat.
The ring had broken.
The remaining herons came down in disorder.
Fun.
The ones in front, I kick. The ones behind, Hati bites. The ones that flee upward — just wait for the instant they turn.
The last one fell into the water.
My heart was still racing.
When I reached the stairs to Floor 113, I looked back.
Across the water, everywhere we had run lingered as grains of light.
The place seven years had never reached — I had just passed through it.
Whether that felt joyful or guilty, I honestly couldn't tell.
Hati pushed his muzzle into my hand.
Yeah.
For now — forward.
That man would say the same, probably.
He's the one who clapped my back and told me, "You hang in there, kid."
On Floor 115, we took a short break.
I sat down at the edge of a levee path, and Hati laid his head on my knee and closed his eyes.
Stroking the fluffy white fur, I opened my status.
Lv: 141
Nine to go.
Ten floors to Floor 125.
The clock had passed four-thirty.
"Hati."
Hati's ears twitched.
"Just a little more. We finish it together."
Eyes still closed, Hati's tail gave one single pat.
My legs were getting heavy.
But the warmth on my knee felt just right.
A little longer, just like this.
Five more minutes. That's all.