Translator: Dj2203
Editor: Dj2203
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I turned right onto the road heading east.
The north side, which I had glimpsed earlier, had what seemed to be a slum-like atmosphere, but I didn’t feel the same sense of danger here. Perhaps it’s safer here to a certain extent…
I don’t know how safe it is after dark, but I feel like it’s still okay here.
As I continued walking, I smelled something burning on the wind. There was no sign of anyone making a fuss or anything nearby, so I guessed it wasn’t a fire or anything like that…
As I got closer, I could see the woman’s condition. The woman on her knees was looking down, or perhaps her head was slumped, but she definitely looked dejected.
As I walked closer, I gradually understood the reason for the woman’s despair. There was a burnt smell that had been carried on the wind… The grief-stricken woman was gazing at the burnt ruins.
….
A cool breeze blew through the streets. The temperature had dropped a little since I arrived in town, and it feels like the wind is constantly blowing. …No, there’s no doubt about it, it’s getting stronger and stronger. For someone like me who has been walking, it feels comfortable, like the cool air from an air conditioner with the temperature set really low is being blown directly onto my body… Well, it seems like it would get chilly if I was exposed to it for a long time… That’s how it feels.
I looked at the burnt land. It was probably a place like that. It was completely burnt down, with only a few charcoal rods that seemed to have been pillars pointing towards the sky. The rest was piles of burnt charcoal and ash scattered on the ground around it.
If you look closely, you could see that some of them may have originally been pots or kettles… They were pitch black but not burnt… and had been bent by the heat, giving them strange shapes.
The other burnt remains were just scattered about as if on the ground, but the area around that mysterious object was heaped high.
Perhaps that was the case. A hearth made of stone should be reasonably strong even in the event of a fire. However, it is amazing that the stone hearth not only did not burn down while the ceiling and walls were burning and collapsing, but also that the pots and kettles placed on top of it did not fall. If the pots and other items were just molded, then the hearth must have been quite solid and extremely stable, making it a very good hearth.
Even so, it was a house on a large plot of land. This was something that would be unthinkable for a detached house in a modern Japanese city. It seems unusual to me, as I have seen houses built as close as possible to the neighboring houses.
The burnt remains were at a distance from the surrounding buildings. On the other side of the burnt remains was an old wooden building, but it was still intact. If the fire had spread, the area would have been completely destroyed.
Perhaps the buildings were built far apart as a fire prevention measure. As I was thinking about this, I found myself within a few meters of the woman.
Honestly, what should I do?
In this place that isn’t Earth, there is a complete stranger. Perhaps one of the inhabitants of this burnt-out area who is grieving. What can I do for someone like that? Even if I happen to say something clever as a passerby, the next moment… I’ll be gone somewhere.
If the woman involved can’t leave this place, then whatever I say is just a nice-sounding comment from a stranger. It’s just some self-satisfied person who has nothing to do with the situation butts in and then later feels pleased with themselves for thinking, “How kind I am.”
I just didn’t want to be that guy.
What should I do…?
Just as I was thinking this, the cold wind that had been blowing this whole time suddenly stopped. The next moment, “THUDOOOM!! … GRRRRRRR…” the tremendous sound of thunder echoed all around. Startled, I looked up to the sky and, with a “Plop!”, a large drop of rain fell on my cheek.
“…Drop! …Drop! …Drop, drip, drip!! …Drop, drip, drip!!”
This is like when a sudden downpour begins! It’s going to get intense in less than ten seconds! There’s no time! The wind that had stopped blowing once has now started blowing again, with even more force…
“Oh no! We’ve been hit by heavy rain like this today, following on from yesterday!”
I pressed the switch on the umbrella I was using as a walking stick, and it immediately opened. The sound of raindrops hitting the umbrella immediately began.
“Um… can you stand up?”
Looking over, he saw the woman who had lost her balance and was sitting on her bottom, apparently startled by the thunder earlier. He reached out his hand to her and called out to her.
At first, the woman was stunned, but then she came to her senses and nodded. Just as I took her hand and helped her stand, the rain began to mercilessly beat down on the umbrella she was holding. I helped her up and saw that she was an old lady, not very big.
“Is there anywhere nearby where they could get out of the rain?”
In this heavy rain, even with an umbrella, his body was getting wetter and wetter. I wish there was somewhere we could get shelter from somehow… As the rain gets stronger, we all huddle under one umbrella to avoid the rain.
“Oh, there’s a barn over there…”
She pointed to the edge of the property, where a small building was visible.
“Okay. Let’s go there.”
….
We took refuge in a building on the outskirts of the compound.
I dropped the woman off, and just as I was about to say “Well,” she stopped me. She said there was no way I was going to leave her outside in this rain. And now, the rain was pounding hard against the barn and the ground, and the sound of the wind stirring around and blowing against the barn was ringing in my ears.
The building we took refuge in was made of wooden boards, and although it looked unreliable, it was sufficient to provide shelter from the rain. There were piles of firewood neatly stored on the built-in shelves.
It hadn’t taken me that long to get to the barn, but I was pretty wet. It hadn’t even started raining hard yet, but it seemed to be raining harder than I’d imagined.
“Raindrops blown by the wind fall at an angle rather than straight down, and raindrops that hit the ground hard can bounce back and wet your feet up to your knees…”
I took a towel out of my backpack and handed it to the woman, telling her to use it to dry herself. Staying wet would make your body cold, and while it was still daytime, it would be a different story at night. Furthermore, from what I had seen up until then, it seemed there were no gas or electricity-powered facilities or appliances like streetlights in the town.
Leaving your body wet in the rain and worsening your health may be a more serious problem around here than you might imagine. The medical system may also be non-existent. Apparently, in the Edo period, it cost a lot of money to see a doctor… Either way, it’s best not to get sick.
But… how advanced is the culture and science in this area? At least as per Japanese history, it seems that it hasn’t even reached the Meiji era yet. In the West, perhaps it hasn’t even reached the Industrial Revolution yet…?
I didn’t take world history as an elective in high school, so I don’t really know what era it is set in. I wonder what era it could be… Middle Ages…
While I was thinking about this, the woman drying her body muttered something like, “Such a thick and soft cloth…” Ah… I see… Even in Japan, it’s the kind of fabric that’s often used in period dramas… Tenugui towels[1] are thin. If they’re using the same kind of material around here, then the thickness and absorbency should be on a whole different level.
There seems to be a huge difference between this town and the modern Japan I live in. I don’t know what will happen in the future, but it seems like it would be good to always be aware of this gap.
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[1] A tenugui is a traditional Japanese decorative towel made from a thin and light cotton. It dates back to the Heian period or earlier. By the Edo period, tenugui became what they are today; about 35 by 90 centimetres in size, plain woven, and almost always dyed with plain color or some pattern.
