"I see." His voice grows cold all of sudden as he asks, "What if this city gets covered in red?""Huh?" I can only gaze at him in confusion as I hear that. Covered in red? What does that mean?
"Why are you so confused? I mean exactly what I said, Ms. Roswaisa." His smile grows wider and his hands start trembling, seemingly from excitement, as he says, "It"s time to Colorado."
*****
"Hey, you two!" a voice calls out, seemingly to the two of us. This voice is of a tall, old fruit-seller sitting in the shade of his tent while still wearing sungla.s.ses despite not needing to. His appearance reminds me of evil-old-men from American cartoons of more than two decades or so ago.
"What are you staring at? Can"t you see that I am talking to you? Come here!" With a grumpy voice and an uncharacteristically energetic hand swing, he calls us towards him. "What"s wrong!? Start walking already."
Even though his words are forceful and his voice kinda annoying, it feels like he has something important to say. The two of us take one glance at each other and then go to him.
"Good, good! You finally listened!" He says with a smile, "Youngsters these days seem to be so slow for whatever reason."
While that definitely annoys me to much extent, I feel like there"s something really important this guy has to say so I should probably keep my impulses inside me.
"Now, would you hold on to these for me?" he says as he gives one carrot to both of us. "Good, good!"
For what it"s worth, the carrots seem to be pretty normal. And even Danny, who is capable of detecting magic and all, doesn"t give any warnings. But then,
"Now you two die!" he says with a grin and suddenly, the ground starts shaking.
"What the heck!? An earthquake!?" Danny wonders as he holds on to the fruit-seller"s cart. I too think of the same possibility but,
"These things don"t go away!"
"Huh!?" Danny wonders what I am talking about and so,
"Danny, try to throw the carrot away!" I shout even though he is only a meter or so away from me. He nods and does as I tell him to, and the same thing that happened with me happens with him. The carrot does not leave the hand! It"s stuck to our hands!
"Hey, old man. What is going on here?" Danny asks as he turns to the fruit-seller but, "Where"d he go?"
He wonders, and I do too. The old fruit-seller who was sitting here just a moment ago is nowhere to be found.
"Just what kind of trouble did we get ourselves into now!?" I say with a dejected voice.
*****
"Ms. Roswaisa," the doctor straightens himself up as he asks, "Can you give an estimate on the number of Diamond Angels there are? Or do you actually know the accurate number?"
While the question is a bit unexpected, I do know the number and I don"t think there"s anything wrong with answering.
"The numbers are calculated every month by higher-authorities." I say with a lingering anxiety, "According to the latest counting, there are 3,198 Diamond Angels."
Hearing that, the doctor smirks and looks back at me as he says, "And isn"t that quite a big number? Isn"t it really unfathomable how I was able to summon specifically you out of all these 3,198 Angels?"
He"s not wrong about this being a question I can"t fathom. I have wondered about it but couldn"t find a single answer to it. I thought of asking him when I get the chance and this seems to be one so,
"Why don"t you tell me how you did it then?" I ask with my anxiety rising.
He smirks and says, "There"s only way to do something like that, Ms. Roswaisa. There"s only one way to summon one particular Angel or Demon out of all that exist."
Yeah, that"s true. And that way is to use something that belongs to that Angel of Demon as catalyst. But, being that this is time first time I have been summoned to Earth, how could he have found something that belongs to me.
Unless,
"As you have started to realize, Ms. Roswaisa, this is the time-period where you were alive."
No way!
"The catalyst used in this summoning was the real you, the human you, the one whose memories you have now buried under that visage of an Angel."
Wait! That"s … absurd. If that"s true then,
"Yes. If you remember who you were as a human now, there will end up being two people with the same memories in existence, and that will cause a paradox." He smiles as he continues, "However, in order to completely learn Absolute Frost Requiem, you"ll need to have your memories back. If you don"t have them back, you would fail the first request for your summoning."
Tsk!
"Now I wonder, what would you choose, Ms. Roswaisa?"
My hands tighten into fists ready to pummel someone, but they don"t move. My body shakes with anger but doesn"t move either. My teeth grit against each other but don"t move either. This doctor has left me in a deadlock and I can"t see any way to break out of it. Foolishly attacking this doctor won"t really accomplish anything either. What can I do in this situation?
Before I am able to come to any answers though, the ground begins to shake.
"An earthquake!?" I wonder to myself but,
"Not really, Ms. Roswaisa." The doctor says with a smile, "It seems like my accomplice has done his job – to trap the only people in this time-period you can rely on."
"Trap!? People I can rely on!?" I don"t know what he means at all and can only stare back in confusion. And to that reaction, he says,
"Ah yes, the people you can rely on, they are the ones who came to save your future-self from dying at the hands of a Demoness. But now, it seems that they themselves will be needed to pay h.e.l.l a visit."
*****