Just the Two of Us in this Vast World Volume 1 Chapter 1 part 20

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Chapter 1 — The boundary line, the marriage between a girl and a wolf. Part 20

It felt like I was on an express transport from the city to the forest, though I wouldn’t ever want to ride it again.

I couldn’t even scream as I was too busy keeping my mouth shut so as to not bite my tongue off, and I could feel my arms getting numb, making me feel as though I was about to fall off.

Whenever my hair got tangled up with a small rock or twig, it was painful, and by this point, I slightly regretted growing my hair out this much.

When he finally stopped, we were still somewhere inside the forest, but all I knew was that it wasn’t a good place to be at.

It felt like I had been taken back in time to a place where everything was covered in thick shadows and no human buildings were in sight. All I could feel was the cold, almost freezing air, accompanied by the smell of dried dirt and the distinctive scent of evergreens.

He finally let go of my leg when we reached this point, almost like he was throwing me away. I loosened my numb arms and lay spread-eagled on the ground.

“I lament doing this–––” he started off, though his monotonous voice indicated that he didn’t feel the least bit sorry, “–––but I need you to be still for a moment.”

“You are really rowdy, brother.” I was convinced that he wouldn’t like me calling him that, so I tried poking at it.

As expected, his face started contorting in disgust, but when he realized that I was grinning from his reaction, he relaxed his face and cleared his throat.

I moved my numb arms around a bit, then lifted the upper half of my body off the ground and carefully started fishing for the twigs and dirt that was stuck in my hair, using my fingers like a comb.

“Now then, what do you plan on doing with me?”

When I was finished with cleaning my hair, I took a tissue out from my pocket and wiped away the saliva that had clung to my leg, before shaking away the dirt on my uniform.

If even my summer uniform got ruined, then I really would have no more clothes to use for commuting to school.

“Nothing much. I just want Moon Eater to release my brethren who were captured by the humans.”

“And what if he can’t release them?”

“That’s an impossible scenario. No human should ever be able to stop him.”

“Even then, I feel like I would be the one more adequate for setting those guys free.”

“Don’t call them guys, they are wolves.” He didn’t budge at all—I guess he really did have a lot of pride.

“That was rude of me.” A cynical smile hovered over my lips. “But really, I believe that the wolves captured by the humans will be returned eventually.”

Yet, he shook his head in annoyance and replied:

“They have to return as the wolves they are supposed to be. They must come back like wolves. They can’t return like humans. If only it was like in the ancient times when animals and humans used to cohabitate the world, then they could have returned the way that you wanted.”

He sighed once, and then his face which was usually brimming with life started clouding.

“Back then, animals used to thank the humans, and humans had respected that show of gratitude. Yes, the humans used to live together with us animals. But now…now it’s completely different. Nowadays, humans and animals shouldn’t mix anymore.”

This was the first time that I had seen him show some form of weakness, a weakness that seemed to be filled with sorrow.

This grief that he felt towards this helpless reality was quite like what I also felt.

A resignation to live entrapped by despair, surrounded by a maddening wall that only grew taller as the days passed by.

“There’s nothing that can be done about this. It just so happens that at some point, the world became like this way.”

“It was like this from the very beginning for me.”

I said it with a frigid voice that didn’t sound like me at all, but the words simply flowed out so naturally from my mouth.

“I feel like I am perpetually killed inside, over and over again. It’s like this world and its incomprehensible logic keeps grinding and destroying me, as though mocking me.”

Why was I telling this to Silent Steps?

“But if I go against it, I’d get killed. So, I decided to throw everything away and go far–––”

All I wanted was to break free from this birdcage, away from this endless despair and boredom, and go somewhere beyond it.

I was certain that I had been born in the wrong time and place.

He silently chuckled.

“You speak just like Moon Eater used to. He was always looking for what was outside the forest. He was born in the forest, yet he despised it…I wonder why?”

“Why, you ask…”

“What is there outside? What is so bad about this place? Our kind doesn’t have a place in the human realm. It’s different from how it used to be, the past is long gone. Those days are history now.” That almost sounded like a monologue.

But now I felt that I could understand him a bit more.

“Hey, do you want Shiro to come back to you?”

Was that why he had gone through the trouble of coming to the city and abducting me to cut down our chances?

So, he would have to choose whether to live in the forest, or live in the city; to be with me, or to be with his kin.

However, I was certain what his choice was going to be.


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