“It’s not something you can eat,” Roa replied sullenly. “Hallucinating is something that happens when you eat weird food—you end up doing weird stuff. You dance like an idiot; you talk to someone only you can see; or in my case, I’m talking to my hand. —Ah! If only I really were hallucinating…”

“You must talk to your hand a lot, savior, since you like eating weird things. What is dancing idiotically? Do you do that as well?”

Roa raised his head to the sky and took a deep breath, all while rubbing his temples to ease his growing headache. He would lose his mind if they continued this discussion, so he opted to change the subject.

“Solitaria, what happened back there at the training grounds?”

“Eh? What do you mean? I don’t remember.” Solitaria replied. 

Roa was unable to tell whether she was playing coy, so he repeated her words,“—We were caught! We were caught! Ring a bell?”

“Caught? Ooh! Are we playing a game?”

“No!—Are you playing dumb!? Or do you really not recall?”

Inconceivable. Counting the time he was transported here, only a few hours must’ve elapsed. Roa could hear Solitaria’s grumbling, like she really was trying her best to fish out her memories. But how bad could one’s memory be to forget what had just happened?

“Then, can you tell me anything about how I came back from the dead? Or how is it that you say you are inside my arm?”

“Savior, you can come back from the dead!? Show me! Show me!”

“How about you come out from my arm? If you do, I’ll show you how to come back from the dead.”

“Ehh, no thanks—dying is no fun. They say it hurts, don’t you know?”

Roa raised his hands to his face and pulled on his cheeks, exasperated. What did he expect from this lunatic? He could waste hours going back and forth with Solitaria, but time was limited. If he took any longer then people would start flooding through Erduin’s root. It was best he ignored her and moved on.

A little while later, ahead of his path, were two small bushes that slightly shook.

One would have thought that it was because of a passing breeze, however, Roa’s keen eye caught a glint of something hiding in between them.

“He’s here. Time to greet the little runt,” Roa grinned.

He moved his hand up into the air, over his head, and then down to his side—his face followed the motion. A push of the left foot while his right foot slid forward; an arch formed from his back as he did a graceful leap.

“Savior?” Solitaria giggled in the background, “Is this dancing idiotically?”

Truly, Roa was moving in a way that resembled a rough dance. If one had to describe it in words, then a dog trying to do ballet would be a good fit. Roa held back on answering and continued with the performance, however, the flush of his face could not hide his embarrassment. 

He tried to console himself, ‘—Can’t avoid the eyes of this lizard, but I can endure the shame as long as nobody else sees!’  

As soon as the fear was voiced in his head, a chill ran down his spine. His ears caught a stifled laugh coming from behind one of the trees. However, he couldn’t stop the dance to check to see if someone was hidden as the two bushes ahead of the path had already begun to vigorously tremble.

‘I knew it was you! Hah! I wasn’t dancing for nothing! Hurry up and come out you little runt!’ Roa cursed with an eager and excited expression. 

His efforts had borne fruit; a pair of red, beady eyes glowed between the bushes. It belonged to the creature that Roa was coaxing out, one that he knew had a particular fondness for dance. It was ready to reveal itself, and when it finally stepped out from the foliage, the loudest shriek that Roa had ever heard rang inside his head and quickly arrested his consciousness.

Eyes rolling back, Roa grumbled, “You… stupid lizard…”