Ishiki sat hunched with the borrowed jacket draped over his upper body, his head burrowed down and eyes closed... just like a criminal waiting for the divine sword to slash their head.
Well, he wasn't a criminal... just a little pervert.
The woman sat on a half-collapsed concrete bench several meters away, staring at him with an expression too complex to parse.
'How did i end up like this just after coming back to earth?'
Ishiki sighed. 'I returned to Earth naked. In front of a beautiful woman who I just sexually harassed and who can kill demons by throwing swords like they are darts.'
The woman shifted, uncrossing her legs with deliberate slowness. "You are a Player, right?"
Ishiki looked up and slowly nodded.
The woman sighed and leaned back on the broken concrete. "You just returned from that Cruel Trial, didn't you?"
"Uh... yes. How do you know?"
The woman looked at him and grimaced. "Are you that dumb? I am player too idiot! How do you think i am so powerful, have you seen any human do such things?"
She shook her head, exasperation bleeding into her tone. "I've seen a bunch of returnees. They all said stupid things but..." she glared at Ishiki. "That was particularly stupid thing to say with your thing dangling down, you know."
Ishiki's entire body felt like it was sinking into the broken pavement, shame pulling him down like quicksand. "I... I'm so sorry!"
She sighed. "Well... congratulations on surviving and Welcome Back to this ruined world!"
The words should have sounded bitter, but they came out almost gentle.
Ishiki looked down at the broken pavement, fingers clutching the fabric of his borrowed jacket. When he spoke again, his voice had lost its defensive edge. "Can you tell me one thing?"
He paused, his throat tight as he asked.
"How long has it been? Since that day?"
The woman's expression softened just slightly. Her voice came out flat but somber. "A little over a month."
Ishiki suddenly felt a cold hand grab his heart... not from external climate, but something deeper. Its been over a month. An entire month. While his mom...
Ishiki opened his mouth, closed it and then asked with a bit of unease. "Where did that monster come from?"
That question felt like a burden to his mind... at some point he even considered that the vile creature had been brought here by him. But that was not true.
The woman lingered and then looked down. She gritted her teeth and started. "You know what... On that.. uh fateful day, when the old earth we knew shattered. The system came like a twisted savior. After a day or two, people who were chosen as players started returning with inhumane powers granted to them because they completed their trials.
Such a god sent thing isn't it?"
She paused, and Ishiki looked at her with curious eyes.
'Now... this is the pinnacle of unfairness. Why did some people just got it so easy?'
"Well... I was from the second batch to return... i came back on the fourth day after the Fall. A few others returned with me too... but then came the horror."
Ishiki leaned forward.
"People kept returning. And then one day, someone who'd just appeared started... changing. His skin turned green. His body bloated like something was inflating him from the inside. And then he transformed into one of those abominations."
She sighed heavily and then straightened. Ishiki meanwhile was stunned beyond belief.
"The system calls them Xenons, and they are the people who failed or died inside their trials. The system sends all of the failed people together once a week, like a swarm of damned creatures.
You wouldn't know i guess... after all you spent a month completing your trial—you must have had it pretty hard."
Ishiki shuddered and then said in a low voice.
"It was... pretty easy you know. I just happened to be lucky and... and an idiot to not notice it early on."
The woman raised an eyebrow but didn't press. "Whatever." She stood, brushing dust from her combat pants. "Come on. Follow me. We've got a relief camp about two kilometers from here."
Her expression turned stern. "And be careful—if you say one more perverted thing, I'm throwing the next sword at your head instead of a Xenon's."
Ishiki's ears turned red of shame. He stood and lingered for a long moment. The woman was already at some distance when she noticed the absence of the young man behind her.
"Hey! come on don't stand there like a lost rat."
Ishiki didn't say much before turning around... his expression was dark. "I... I have to go somewhere first. I will come eventually."
And then he walked away.
***
Some time latter he found himself walking alongside the beautiful woman in the sun's oppressive heat. It was too damn hot.
He had picked up some decent cloths from a nearby almost obliterated store. Still.
It was his first time experiencing real sunlight, not the artificial UV rays but actual solar radiation. His skin itched everywhere the rays touched, unused to this kind of direct assault.
'This thing... its so hot. How the hell did those people on Neo-Tokyo lived?'
He glanced at the woman and then asked, "Uh... what is that Relief camp you were talking about?"
"It's technically a government relief camp. Or at least, that's what the masses of normal survivors believe." She kicked a piece of rubble out of her path. "To be precise, there is no government anymore."
"What!?"
"Huh? Oh! yeah you wouldn't know. The President... well he died in a plane crash on the 'Day of the Fall'. Plus we don't have any kind of connection to the outside world, that assuming the people outside are any safer." She sighed.
After a bit of silence she added a last line with a smile.
"You can call it a... relief camp run by a certain ambitious princess."
Ishiki scowled. 'Huh? what does that mean?'
Well not like he would be in shadows for long... he will know find out soon enough. But more important than that was the thing at hand.
He gestured right and then jumped over a few collapsed debris. Then making a sharp turn, he froze, there was supposed to be an ally here. Not entirely and ally, it was just a forgotten gap between the buildings in the lower side of the sector.
Ishiki gulped... his heart was thumping like a wild beast. He was reluctant to move forward but he had to, he pushed a few of the broken rock and steel pieces with the help of the woman, who turned out to be very helpful and strong.
Making way he stepped inside a very thin road... narrow even for two person's to walk side by side. But it was wider now because the buildings that once hemmed it in were gone. At the end of the debris-choked path, Ishiki stopped.
Heavy silence wrapped around him. Sorrow, regret, and self-loathing crushed every other emotion as he stared at the rubble, expression darkening with each passing second.
The woman, who'd maintained respectful silence until now, finally spoke. "Is... is this your home?"
Ishiki stood frozen for a long moment. Then nodded, voice barely above a whisper. "Yes. Used to be. Now, as you can see..." He gestured at the destruction. "It's just a pile of cement, wood, and steel."
Without another word, he climbed onto the debris and began throwing chunks aside, digging with bare hands. Concrete scraped his palms, splinters bit into his fingers.
The woman sighed and joined him without being asked.
Hours passed.
The sun crawled across the broken sky, painting their shadows long across the ruins. Sweat soaked through Ishiki's new cloths. His muscles screamed and his hands bled.
But he didn't stop.
After several hours of digging however... they didn't find a single body... not even blood. No signs, if anyone had been here when the building collapsed. The apartment was simply... empty. As if his mother had never existed.
Ishiki sat down heavily on broken concrete, staring at the excavated pit that revealed nothing but more rubble beneath. He bit his lip hard enough to draw blood.
'Where are you, Mom?'
The question echoed in the hollow space where something called... hope used to live.
The woman stood nearby, watching him with an expression that suggested she'd seen this scene play out before. Maybe, seen other several people dig through ruins looking for people who were already gone.
She didn't offer empty platitudes, nor Did she say everything would be okay.
Because, nothing really was in a Ruined World.