1. Things Are Still Hot

Even with no clouds, the sun could only peek through the brownish curtain of haze, but it was still enough to scorch the land. The shadows cast by the trees, which had faded to the same brown color as the sky, helped to soften the air somewhat, allowing for a small respite.

“Ha..”

To the east, red sandstone mountains looked over the treetops, but it was difficult to tell where the mountains ended and the sky began. Attracted by the sour-sweet scent of the bougainvillea, when she looked at the leaves of the tree, covered in blooming red flowers, they looked so vibrantly green that it almost felt embarrassing.

“Fly to space..?” That’s right. The girl’s heart skipped a beat at the thought, and she wondered why she hadn’t made up her mind, even though that was still an option as well.?I don’t have any interest in going to space.

That isn’t true, the vermillion flowers replied, dispersing their petals vigorously and vividly into the air. The girl swayed.

“..I see..”

She didn’t know where she was. Even if it looked like a forest it was only a short distance away from the national highway, and beyond the trees there was supposed to be a vast wilderness people called a field.

A pale yellow flower fell, landing with a plop just in front of her toes.

Ah!?

Looking up, she noticed for the first time that she was leaning against a sal tree.

“..I’ve been so stupid..”

Feeling the muscles in her legs tighten, she now regretted running at full speed. After hiding the scooter with the dead battery off to the side of the cracked asphalt road, she ran blindly, before her thighs started cramping and she stumbled and fell. Maybe I’m going to die here in the wild, my insides pecked out by birds until there’s nothing left but bone, disappearing without even becoming nourishment for the soil..

She believed that it was her fate never to remember her parents, which was the reason she thought her soul might at least be reincarnated as a field mouse.

“..although the Buddha said that..death is void..”

It was the idea that there was no life after this one, a denial of the cycle of reincarnation.

The people who criticized that sort of thinking as devoid of dreams were those who had no concerns in life, people beholden to their egos. The sort of people afraid of death, hoping that they would have the same things in the hereafter. But for those who had spent the majority of their life in poverty, the people who had experienced emotional trauma or those reaching old age and the twilight of their life, the idea that they would be forced to keep going in the next life was a bitter pill to swallow.

The void was emptiness.

A void which couldn’t even be perceived was something that couldn’t be described by the term nihilism. In other words, the void was overwhelming serenity. I am emptiness—the path revealed by the Buddha was sacred because it brought peace of mind in life, while the endless cycle of reincarnation was a hell where one could never escape from suffering.

Why didn’t I notice that sound, the girl wondered. It was the ferocious racket of gasoline engines, coming through the trees and closing in around her. From the way they were approaching, the abandoned scooter must have been discovered and they were tightening their search area.

“Gwaak!” With a muffled cry, a peacock with magnificent plumage came running out from between the bougainvilleas. It seemed like the girl had dozed off. It hadn’t been a conscious action, but when she realized that she had fallen asleep the girl climbed up the sal tree she had been leaning on. It felt like the trunk of the tree was also telling her to climb, spurring her on. The thick clusters of leaves, along with the weeds at the base of the tree seemed like they would conceal her. Plus, the long branches were covered in ivy, which made it look even more climbable. If that wasn’t so, the tree would have never called to her.

Even if they found her she still had plenty of excuses, so she told herself that there was no need to be overly nervous.

?

It was entirely a coincidence that she had been able to escape from Cabas this morning.

When she awoke there was no lover in her bed, and the wind was gentle and didn’t sting her skin. When she went out onto the third-floor fire escape the breeze coming off the Ganges felt slightly damp. It was impossible to jump down to the road below from here. The jagged shards of glass embedded into the top of the wall put a damper on any such feelings of bravery. Besides, for the girl whose earliest memories were of growing up in an orphanage, any place that gave her food, clothing and shelter was precious. A few times a month she would sleep with the men she called her lovers, and as long as she fulfilled their requests her life at the place called Cabas was more than provided for. She had been taught that these sorts of people were “lovers,” and although she puzzled over the differences apparent in her reality when compared to the dramatized versions, the other women around her were doing the same thing, so there was nothing about it that she found disgraceful. In fact, the owner—her foster father—had gone through great lengths to pick out only “good” lovers for her, allowing her to even keep hold of her self-respect.

The Kama Sutra says so as well. A relationship of loving and being loved can’t happen with just anyone. You can’t fall in love if there isn’t the appearance of pride and modesty. Without a longing heart, the relationship is fruitless. Lovemaking is a union of people’s hearts.

That’s what the owner had taught her.

For that reason, in the spring of her seventeenth year, the person to become her first lover was an elite working for the Environmental Conservation Bureau, a young man unable to forget that he belonged to the Kāyastha caste.

“There must be a reason that someone like yourself, instilled with the virtue of pride, found themselves at Cabas. I’ll do what I can to have you brought to the fortress.”

Any lover who was capable of saying something like that so easily would not be able to bring the girl to the fortress. However, thanks to that young man she was able to become a woman without it being a repulsive memory for her.

Looking down from the fire escape into the courtyard, there was no sign of the usual lookout. It wasn’t until after getting on the scooter that she would learn the staff had left to take the remains of the eldest person at Cabas to the river. The scooter still had the key in it, and it would be mostly accurate to say that she found herself sitting on it because she was feeling mischievous.

“Oh?”

The quiet sound of the motor running made her think that she could get out, and when she pushed against the gate dividing the courtyard and the outside world it opened. She was probably fortunate to have only just woken up, dressed in a t-shirt and compression shorts and not even wearing makeup. She was able to make it through town without being spotted, driving onto the highway.

Just once did something catch her attention.

A submarine-like rocket, flying up through the brown haze. She knew about space from watching the news on television, so she was aware of things like that in the sky. However, at the time she never would have imagined it to be something that concerned her.