Chapter 5
Page 4
“Sorry for being late.”
Page 5
“Today you-”
.
“Right,
It’ll be faster if we go through the forest shortcut.
.
“Ah, okay.”
Page 7
“Ah! Look!”
.
“Just right as Grandpa Calyan’s getting back.”
.
“I’ll go to greet him first.”
Page 9
“And I thought the golden-haired lad would
have returned home by now.”
.
“Don’t be like that, grandpa. This land is a fine place, y’know∼”
.
“Thank you for looking after me last time.”
Page 10
“Anyway, y’all most likely wanna ask about stuff related
to the Rebirth Festival, don’t-ya?”
.
“Yes, I heard from Meir that you are one Long Island’s few migrant natives,
If it’s alright, I would like to consult you about a few things…”
.
“Always like this, outlander folks,”
.
“Straight up runnin' to get their noses into any curiosities…”
.
“Ain’t there few books which have stuff about the island written in ‘em?”
.
“There’s a couple, but the details about the
Rebirth Festival are very vaguely mentioned,
even the notes from Meir’s dad weren’t very clear…”
Page 11
“And so? Wha-d’ya wanna know?”
.
“…I don’t know how much understanding you guys have about
the big cities on the West Coast.”
.
“Waves upon waves of people, with each their own hopes and dreams,
trying desperately to seize a better place-”
.
“-that’s the environment I was raised in.”
Page 12
“As I age, I find that seasonless sunshine and all the man-made abundance,”
.
“gradually turns into an oppressive force with nowhere to hide from,
as if your senses are being endlessly
paralyzed by a strong light.”
Page 13
“Until one day, when an eerie sound
reached into my ear,”
.
“It’s very difficult to translate the message I comprehended.”
.
“But once I came to my senses, my body moved on its own afterwards.”
.
“All of the discordant feelings compelled me to keep going forward,
every thread ultimately led me in the direction of that mountain.”
Page 14
“No matter what is or isn’t at that mountain,
I’d best see it with my own eyes.”
.
“What should I do in order to truly get to it?”
Page 15
“Alas...”
.
“There are as many reasons to reach the
Lodestone Mountain as there are people.”
.
“-Lodestone Mountain,
that’s the actual name of it.”
.
“All things in this world, they have an intangible force field surrounding them.”
.
“Ever since ancient times, that mountain has exuded a powerful magnetic field, which periodically undergoes fierce changes”
Page 16
“My ancestors believed that when the energy reaches the topmost peak, people can be one with the black-
which is also the summary of the Rebirth Festival’s origin.”
.
“The black?”
.
“Hey Meir,”
.
“Y’wanna take Carl for a brief stroll?”
.
“Seems like he’s been very giddy since he saw you.”
.
“Is that so? Carl?”
.
“Really can’t be helped~”
.
“Woof! woof!”
.
“Let’s go!”
Page 17
“Going to Lodestone Mountain would require a guide.”
.
“Otherwise you could only stay at the village on the foot of the mountain,
like the other visitors.”
.
“And the so-called guide refers to whom?”
.
“Someone who knows how to climb the mountain, because the
mountain doesn’t have any actual paths.”
.
“Could it be… in those years, Meir’s dad and you were... ”
.
“Indeed,”
Page 18
“It’s true that me and his dad were old friends.”
.
“He wrote about you in his personal notes...”
.
“Lad, d’ya’ think Meir’s gonna enjoy goin’
with ya’ to Long Island?”
.
“I gotta remind ya’, Meir and his mother have both
accepted that his father, Harvey, is gone,"
.
“And have decided to keep going on in their own way.”
Page 19
“Lodestone Mountain, and the Rebirth Festival,
they’re more dangerous than you think.
Do you still remember the first time we met, what did I tell you at the end?”
.
“Meir, wait.”
Page 20
“There’s something I want to talk about.”