Ch#62
The kindergarten was exactly as Tie remembered it.
Except for the fact that it was eerily empty with the lights off.
Tie instinctively headed to 'Quail Class' first. Because that was the most familiar space to her.
Proving it, her name was written on the praise sticker board on the wall.
But what good did that do.
“Ehwoo……”
Tie drooped her eyebrows.
Perhaps from getting drenched in the rain, her whole body was freezing cold, and she had no energy.
Suddenly, wooden block toys on one side of the floor caught her eye.
The familiar children's fairy tale book series and kitchen play set too.
Everything felt so familiar, as if she had been playing with them just yesterday.
But how on earth had things turned out like this?
Tears welled up in Tie's eyes as she pursed her lips.
Regardless, Berugon's voice kept drifting in through the gap in the window.
“Reveal yourself, Sovereign King……”
From threats of not letting her get away if found, to demands to prepare to forfeit her life.
Thoroughly deflated, Tie stood up from her spot.
Then she carefully opened the door and stepped out of Quail Class.
In the darkened shared play area, she spotted the clock hanging on the upper shelf wall.
The second hand inside the clock was still frozen, exactly as it had been when she first entered the building.
“……Can't just keep wunning fowevew.”
Tie muttered to herself as she firmly secured her kindergarten bag.
In truth, Tie had wanted to snatch Krazar's core from Berugon for quite some time now.
But she had no clue how to do it—that was the problem.
A direct charge seemed like it would just get her caught by Berugon.
And endlessly running away meant she'd never seize the core.
That suspicious magic stone was the key to turning the situation around.
‘Good idea, good idea…….’
Tie first took up position by the entrance, ready to flee at any moment.
After that, she plunged into deep thought.
How about persuading the factory chief?
Tell him he was being controlled by the red mist and to snap out of it quickly.
He might come to his senses upon realizing...
“No, no.”
She shook her head vigorously.
The idea she just had stood a high chance of failure and would give away her position to him, making it too risky.
Then what about digging a trap?
She had seen it in a folktale animation series.
A hunter digging a deep pit in the ground to catch a tiger.
But soon Tie had no choice but to shake her head again.
This place wasn't the Talochioum Empire. In other words, there was nowhere suitable here to dig a trap.
Asphalt roads where cars sped by.
Even sidewalks paved with blocks.
Where on earth was she supposed to dig a hole for a trap?
Forget digging a trap—she'd get nabbed by Berugon and the red mist just prying up a sidewalk block.
Tie gazed gloomily at the stopped clock.
‘If only my bone fwiends wewe hewe wight now…….’
Even the soul subordinates she had summoned in Pearl City would have made things much better.
‘But can't use any magic in this space.’
Tie slowly squatted down on the floor. It was then, as she hung her head in despair,
“……Huh?”
Across from her.
Something suddenly sparkled through the open door.
Confirming the light source was the staff room, Tie hurriedly peered toward the window, anxious that Berugon might have seen.
However, at that moment, Berugon's voice was fading away in the opposite direction from the kindergarten.
Then the light flashed once more.
Tie scurried toward it.
Entering the staff room, she spotted something on the stool in the corner.
“……Pad!”
It was the tablet the Quail Class teacher used.
Tie dashed over to the tablet.
And the moment she reached for the screen,
Static—
Suddenly, the tablet began playing a blurry video.
[Tie…… Dad, now…… answer that fiwst…… I'll wead the wetter I pwepawed.]
As the video gradually sharpened, someone appeared on the screen.
[Ah, questions too?]
Tie's eyes widened huge.
Dad appeared on the screen.
Tie hurriedly fiddled with the tablet to drop the brightness to minimum.
Then she muted the sound with the buttons before squatting in front of the stool to watch the video.
[Yes, it won't take wong. Tie is pwaying with fwiends duwing that time, so don't wowwy.]
Dad on the screen nodded.
Behind Dad, on the wall, was a placard made of cut colored paper.
<Love Video Letter to My Child>
Suddenly it came back to her.
Before coming to Talochioum—that is, around the time Dad went missing.
On a bizarre May day when the midday temperature topped 31.5 degrees, Dad disappeared.
Tie had missed kindergarten for three days because of it.
But on the fourth day, Grandma said it would be best for Tie to go back to kindergarten.
Saying Dad would return anyway, and they couldn't keep living like this.
When she returned, her friends she hadn't seen in a while chattered nonstop, delighted to see her.
And that day, she heard about it.
The Family Month parent observation class that had taken place while she was absent.
‘We ate banana chocowate bwead that day and watched wuv wetters togethew?’
‘Wuv wetters?’
‘Yeah! With cowowfuw papew stuck behind, pwotectow shows mom and dad’s faces on the waww, and they wead wetters.’
It was a special gift the Quail Class homeroom teacher had prepared for the parents picking up the kids.
Love video letters filmed here and there with the parents coming to fetch their children.
‘Too bad Tie missed it. Shouwd we ask teachiew to show Tie’s?’
‘Yeah! When teachiew tuwns on the pwotectow, watch! Tie’s dad is thewe too!’
The friends busied themselves trying to make it up to Tie for missing the video letters.
Some even dashed to the staff room to insist strongly.
‘Teachiew! Wet’s not do castanets and watch Tie’s dad’s wuv wetter!’
‘Tie’s dad is coow, so wet’s!’
The teacher looked troubled but soon asked.
‘Shouwd we? Weww, Tie was the onwy one who missed it that day. Tie. Want to see the video wetter Dad weft?’
Tie still remembered vividly the feelings from that day.
The teacher and kindergarten friends too.
No one knew it was day four of Dad's disappearance.
So they brought up Dad, whom she had been desperately trying not to think about, and asked if she wanted to see the video letter.
But even so, Tie hated the teacher and her friends so much.
‘……Don’t want.’
‘Huh?’
‘Tie doesn’t want that! Don’t wanna see! Why keep saying to watch it, waaah-!’
The friends looked shocked.
The teacher wore a puzzled expression too.
And so it became the one video letter Tie never watched.
But why was that video letter playing right before her eyes now?
[To Dad, what kind of existence is our Tie?]
At the teacher's question, Dad on the screen furrowed his brow slightly.
That was his habit when listening intently to someone.
Usually expressionless, but faintly smiling whenever talking about Tie... it was definitely Dad.
[Tie is…… honestly a burden. To me.]
Something felt off somewhere.
