“Whenever I recover one of these pieces, short memories come back to me. It felt like something that had been submerged was suddenly resurfacing.”


  The piece Dranste talked about fell in his hand and grabbed it.

  “That’s how I learned that I was a broken sword. The first piece I recovered taught me.”


  While saying that, Dranste kissed that broken piece as if he’s giving his gratitude to it. Looking at that, I became a bit confused. I always thought he was just a thoughtless, good-for-nothing dude. I could see how easy it was to misunderstand him.

  Anyway, birds of a feather…… he’s the same as my dad.

  I always yelled at him because I thought he was a jobless wanderer. If someone told his circumstances to me, I wouldn’t have said those things! I feel bad, but that made me want to tease him more. Whether I agonized or not, Dranste looked down at his sword piece.

  “I’m still searching for them even now.”


  “You didn’t find all of them yet?”


  He’s still looking for them?

  I see plenty of pieces floating right now…… but it seemed like that was not all there was to it. It surprised me. Dranste showed me an exasperated expression upon hearing my reply.

  “I wish…… but I still have a lot more to find.”


  I felt weak when I faced him.

  A sword looking for his own pieces. I had never imagined anything like that.

  “So, you were looking for your pieces when you disappeared for a long time.”


  “That and……”


  Dranste smiled. That smile looked like his attempt to lighten the atmosphere a little, but somehow, the words he uttered were not light at all.

  “I want to know what happened to my master. That and my name.”


  Dranste’s eyes were exceptionally blue when he said so. Fine. I forgave him for making me find him today. Anyway, if he wanted to know his name, did that mean his current name wasn’t real? As if to answer my question, Dranste continued his word.

  “Dranste is the name Caitel gave me when we made our contract.”


  So it was dad’s idea.

  It’s a nice name, though, considering Caitel thought of it.

  I wondered if he had to think about the name for a while.

  Somehow, it’s hard to imagine Caitel giving names to others. I think he made up my name on the spot, too, now that I thought about it. Perhaps dad had a knack for coming up with names.