Chapter 127

It was a tranquil world.

"..."

Was it not?

My teacher, who had died so horribly, was alive and breathing just fine, and he always prepared meals while waiting for Aria to come.

With the same voice as back then, he comforted her, and with his new children, he laughed, chatted, enjoyed himself...

She had no desire to chip away at this dreadful peace.

"... Giovanni."

No matter what happened from here on, Aria had decided to cherish this tranquility.

"My teacher."

"Yes, Aria."

Once the short meal ended, Jio returned to his blunt expression.

With a calm face that looked as though it had never once formed a smile, yet with familiar affection in it, her teacher asked,

"Do you need dessert?"

"Is it a dessert with heaps of sugar in it?"

"That is correct. It is very sweet."

"The cake I had last time was truly delicious."

"As it happens, what Aria wants is here."

"Here, there was always what I wanted."

"How clever you are."

He brought over a small cake.

"Is this what you wanted?"

"Exactly."

"You gave it to the human called Yu Seongun who visited this place before too, didn't you?"

"That is correct, and in return I received bungeoppang."

"That's quite a humble price..."

The word "price" coming from that mouth was like children playing house.

"For such a delicious cake, I mean."

The thing resembling a small round cake had an extremely light texture.

First, the cake layer was like that.

It had the fragile crispness of biting into a well-baked meringue cookie, and a soft texture that simply melted in.

The outside was smooth, with sweet powdered sugar sprinkled on top.

It was divided into four layers.

Vanilla cream, green tea cream, and mascarpone cream cheese.

It was said to have heaps of sugar in it, but perhaps because the harmony was so exquisite, it felt plainer than she had expected.

"I didn't know you had a talent for confectionery too, Teacher."

"My baking skills are not bad either, so I suppose that may have influenced it."

"That could be."

There was definitely a crispness when she bit into it, but its weight and texture were so light that she could not even tell when it passed down her throat.

It was an ecstatic texture on a level that humans could never create.

"Even if only the flavor you sense is humanlike, that won't be enough to hide the sense of wrongness."

"I do not know what you are trying to say."

"Do you have any advice to give me?"

"I just said it."

"I can't tell what you want to become, Teacher..."

The flavor was quite familiar.

When she spied on Earth, she had seen that this kind of sweet, soft cream was very popular.

Perhaps "Seo Jio" had wanted to imitate that.

Even so, Aria, an excellent analyst, knew what sort of strange act this was.

She could tell from just one bite of cake.

A human capable of imitating this texture would not appear so easily.

"I respect you, Teacher."

Jio was clever, but he was not someone who could be held by his surroundings.

He was even the sort of person who could bestow his own death as gentle mercy.

Ah, what an arrogant man he was.

"You can make cake like this too, can't you?"

"I am embarrassed to receive such excessive praise over a mere cake."

"If it's this delicious a dessert, you deserve even more praise."

"Would you like a cup of tea?"

"Was I not drinking tea yet?"

It had been so delicious that she had forgotten for a moment.

"Will you give me a cup of what you're drinking right now, Teacher?"

"I will."

A delicate, clear sound rang out, like beads carved from jewels striking one another.

Sunlight crossing in through the window shattered over the pale blue tea.

It seemed as though what was held inside should have been a jewel rather than liquid.

Even so, what Aria received was tea at a suitable temperature.

"..."

As she drank it, she looked around.

"... I cherish this place."

"I can tell without hearing it from you directly."

"But if you ask whether I like it, I don't know."

"I know that too."

"... Yes, Giovanni..."

Aria smiled as though grimacing.

"This must be sadness."

It was different from anger.

"And this must be what longing is."

"..."

"It is also the emotion called regret."

In this tranquil place, Aria felt those emotions.

"I wondered why I felt such emotions in a world this peaceful and quiet."

"A space where I can meet you again whenever I want, a cabin filled with sweet honey and fruit, where the beautiful songs of birds can be heard."

"A tree house filled with warm air."

It was simply good.

"Yet whenever I enter this place, my stomach churns."

Aria asked,

"Why does this place feel like a grave to me?"

"I am alive."

"It feels as though you will go off somewhere again."

"I will remain here."

"It feels so unfamiliar for you to speak of eternity like that."

Giovanni had never once put "eternity" into words.

That was proof that we had walked too long a road.

The one before her eyes had already died once, and would experience countless more deaths from now on.

And before the people he loved, he would surely reveal changes even more numerous than that.

That was how it would be.

"A human who longs for the dead has failed."

"Because they can never bring them back to life, they will spend their entire life buried in the past, and one who rebels against fate can no longer be called human, so they become a monster."

The current situation was exactly that.

"And I became that monster."

"You need not think about it so complicatedly."

"Jio, what about you?"

Are you human?

"Can you consider yourself human?"

"To answer with a question, how could I not?"

"Well."

Aria could not bring herself to say "no" to his face.

"You are always right."

The being drinking tea with me before my eyes is not human.

It might perhaps become human, but its very essence could not be called human.

In the end, the conclusion was that Aria's only human teacher was here, yet not the same as him.

Giovanni was alive while dead.

'He has been preserved.'

Like a faded portrait painted of the most beautiful days.

'How many more people's most beautiful days will be preserved from now on?'

She felt dizzy before that short, colorful life and the eternal changes to come.

Jio would not stagnate for a single moment, and Aria would always be busy trying to keep up with his changes.

Even as they drank the same tea together, she felt hurt.

He felt too far away.

"... Longing is such a strange emotion."

Aria went on.

"It feels like something good, but it turns your insides into a mire."

"That is because you have no immunity to emotion."

"Have humans grown used to this kind of emotion?"

"Everyone lives feeling longing, no matter what object they recall."

"It is horrifying to think I will live like this my whole life."

"It is not only horrifying."

Jio's voice was quiet, as though it had no sound.

"Because we long for things, we can have memories."

"Do you call even this a memory?"

Then Aria, right now.

"I suppose I have fallen into that memory."

It felt as though she would suffocate.

It felt as though she had become a fish in freshwater rather than the sea.

It felt as though she had become a human trapped in a world filled with nitrogen instead of oxygen.

It felt painful, and also peaceful.

It was a truly strange feeling.

"How should I define this peace?"

"Could you not enjoy it without worrying over it?"

"That sounds like a demon's temptation."

"It's a more cunning proposal than any demon I've seen."

"Oh, you have encountered demons."

As though trying to soothe his student, warmth entered his blunt voice.

With a gentle voice and smile, he asked,

"What were they like?"

"Well, their quality was much lower than yours."

In many ways.

"To be honest, I don't have the confidence to accept this peace."

"Even while knowing all of this is true, I think of it as a lie."

"I know it exists, yet I treat it as a mirage."

"Aria's trouble is that you think too much."

"From what I see, Teacher, you are the one who does not think deeply enough."

"I don't know what kind of mindset lets you declare yourself human without a single moment's hesitation."

"Is there any reason why my changes should not make me human?"

"There are many reasons."

"There are many, but I think Teacher would likely consider them invalid."

"Should I say that one thing about you, that stubborn tenacity, is truly reliable..."

Or should I call it ominous?

"You can accomplish everything you desire."

But compared to that ominousness, Jio was an existence she could neither control nor possess.

Even if this longed-for peace suddenly vanished one day, Aria could understand it.

And on that day, she would learn despair.

It was a fate already ordained, as proven by the long road they had already walked.

"I have already learned fear."

"How did that happen?"

"Because you were not in my dungeon."

When she had lived as a monster, believing he would not be there, believing he had already slipped from her hands, she had at least laughed it off.

But when her teacher, whom she could not grasp in her hands, hovered beside her with a smiling face, it was so frightening.

Once was enough.

She could not lose him twice.

There was no way she could endure such a loss again.

"Giovanni is that kind of person."

"He thinks of ideas ordinary humans could never even imagine, and despite that, he gives enough to tear off pieces of himself, understands even lowly creatures, and has patience beyond imagination."

He was a man who tried anything.

"But now, you don't stop at trying."

"You have gained the power to carry it through."

"I'm not certain whether you were always like that, or became like this afterward... and even so, you are ultimately my teacher."

"..."

"You will change again and again."

"Someday, you will disappear."

"You may die before me, or you may live longer than me."

"If you wish it, it will be so, and even if you do not wish it, you will merely enjoy fate."

"..."

"I acknowledge that."

"But Jio, don't you know?"

"Upon your death, we realized hatred, and we have killed and harmed so many humans."

"We endured all those long years."

"But what is this?"

Aria looked at Giovanni.

"You are too..."

It soon turned black.

"..."

"..."

Then it turned red again.

"...too fickle to reassure us about all those long years."

"You understand me well."

"That makes me very uneasy."

It had been too long a time.

"I have lived, enduring that long time with hatred and anger, and yet the teacher I unexpectedly met again does not answer that desire."

"If I had my way, I would put you in my dungeon, admire you without taking my eyes off you for even a moment, and spend every moment of passing time with you."

At that mermaid's desire, Arjio smiled slyly.

"That would be far too boring."

"I knew you would not be caught easily, and I knew any attempt would fail, so I did not."

Because Jio had not forgiven them, and because of that, he would not accept them.

That could not wound Aria.

She thought it was obvious and natural.

But because of it, the mermaids could not wholly obtain their teacher.

"In the meantime, who knows how you will disappear, Teacher?"

"That is what makes you uneasy."

"Yes, in the sense that the only thing I acknowledge and love is my only variable."

Aria smiled in much the same way as him.

"How can I believe in this peace?"

"I think that is the homework left to you."

"That is exactly what you would say."

The fact that a mere human had been invited here, the future in which Jio's colors would change countless times, and the mermaids' immense responsibility that they could not fully repay even after tens of thousands of years passed.

All of this was, in the end, no different from homework Aria had to handle.

Homework for the sake of believing in the present peace.

"I wish I had been a stupid human."

Then she would have believed.

"Don't you think so?"

"But that would be an unwise choice."

"... Would it?"

"Keep worrying and doubting ceaselessly."

His golden eyes curved with affection.

"That will prove you."

"As expected, you are..."

Aria smiled weakly.

"...indeed my teacher."

A human who was limitless in strange places, who always spoke of realistic futures, and who was always busy teaching something.

When she remembered that the one before her eyes was the same person who had been the only one to love us mermaids...

"I love you."

"So do I."

Only then did she feel at ease.

We are in our everyday life again today.

Giovanni had always said, "Learn as many emotions as you can while I am here."

"They will become proof of your life as a mermaid."

"Proof?"

"Emotions are proof of memories, of learning, and of all those recollections."

He said that would make you, a mermaid, grow.

"The emotions you feel now will show you the path forward."

"Jio, can't you just show me?"

"I, who am not completely the same as Aria, can be erased from and vanish from that life at any time."

"I will not erase you or let you disappear."

"In the end, even now, are we not envisioning different futures?"

"..."

"... Whether I am by your side or not."

Jio always said,

"I hope you will use that proof to understand more things."

But before she could understand those many things, Giovanni died.

Death took away far more than she had expected.

It meant there was no longer someone who would smile brightly at her when she woke in the morning, meant the person who would urge her to eat at set times for no particular reason had vanished, and meant that even when night had fallen, no one would pull the blanket up to her throat.

Each and every one of those things was truly ordinary, and yet great.

They were small, and yet many.

"..."

We had always learned about death.

And so today, too, was not a particularly different day.