Chapter 45
Bonnie was the prettiest girl in the village.
While the other girls brushed dirt from their hands by wiping them on their skirts, Bonnie would tidy her hair with hands untouched by dust.
Every man adored her, and so did the boy Bones.
But Bonnie was the village chief’s daughter.
And Bones? He was an orphan who lived under their roof, scraping up crumbs from the floor.
“Bones, look! Roasted potatoes. You’ve never had something like this before, have you?”
Still, Bonnie often came looking for Bones, handing him potatoes or…
picking at how he worked, pestering him for no reason.
“Pfft! If you build the chicken coop that low, the chickens will just fly off and escape!”
It was all petty teasing.
And yet, Bones found himself liking Bonnie even more.
But Bonnie had already been promised to the son of a wealthy man from a neighboring village.
Social status. Wealth. Education. Looks. Speech.
In every way, Bonnie and Bones were not a match.
The wedding day crept closer.
Then one day, as always, Bonnie approached Bones while he worked in the dirt.
“I don’t want to marry him. He already has three wives. What would I even be going into?
So… hey, Bones. Want to run away with me?”
“Me? That’s ridiculous. If we run away together, what about your father, the chief? Who’s going to take care of the chickens?
And your fiancé will send people after us—we’d have to live our whole lives on the run.”
There were countless reasons not to run.
But Bonnie saw it differently.
“You like me. I like you. Isn’t that reason enough?”
Bonnie and Bones.
There may have been a hundred reasons they couldn’t be together.
But even a single reason was enough to bring them together.
They ran far away.
To a land where no one remembered their names.
Across the sea—to Troy.
There, Bones settled down with Bonnie, and through backbreaking effort, he was finally accepted.
“Bones… I think I’m pregnant.”
“…Really?”
Good things kept happening.
Bones began to fear that he was too happy.
And maybe that’s why…
“Ships! Ships on the horizon!”
“It’s the Greek fleet!”
“The Greeks have come to invade Troy!”
It was a long, grueling war.
So long that the child born the day the warships surged onto the beautiful beach was now ten years old.
Their daughter, Libby, grew up never knowing those once-pristine shores.
The beach Libby knew was always shrouded in shadows—cast by the sails of warships looming in the harbor.
But then, one day…
The ships began to withdraw.
“Extra! Extra!”
“The war is over!”
“The Greeks are retreating! Troy is victorious!”
After all those years, the war had ended.
Bones, once a formidable soldier, let out a sigh of relief.
At last, he could teach his daughter what peace looked like.
But…
When soldiers sprang out of the giant wooden horse,
his hopes dissolved into a fog thicker than despair.
“On the final day of the Trojan War, the Greeks were especially brutal.
As if repaying themselves for years of hardship, they flooded the streets and slaughtered civilians without mercy.”
Captain Bones fled with his family from the bloodthirsty soldiers.
But the boat they had prepared by the lake… was already destroyed.
Ahead—soldiers.
Behind—the lake.
“Tch. Sneaky little rats. Why even bother running when we’ll catch you anyway?”
“They made us suffer. They won’t die quickly.”
Countless blades pierced Bones.
His tendons snapped. His insides tore.
Bones shattered.
He had every reason not to rise again.
But one reason was enough.
No… make that two.
“…Bones!”
“Dad!”
Bones burned his soul and prayed to every god in existence.
Prayed that his wife and daughter wouldn’t be crushed under the boots of those monstrous soldiers.
“I don’t know which god heard me that day.
But my wife and daughter turned into trees.
Thanks to that, they were spared the soldiers’ wrath.”
That day, Bones collapsed beside the trees his wife and daughter had become, and died.
But—
His wife and daughter, as trees, did not die.
And because they didn’t die… they never came to the Soul Society.
Bones wandered the Soul Society alone.
Honoring the memory of his wife and daughter,
living hundreds of years in solitude.
Then one day—
Perhaps by chance. Perhaps by fate—
a rift opened to the mortal realm, leading to that same lakeside from long ago.
“I never reported the rift to anyone.
Even though I had pledged to serve the gods forever in return for saving my wife and daughter…
The moment I saw those trees again, I… I couldn’t help myself.”
Bones came to visit the trees every day.
Even though he couldn’t speak to them.
Even just being near them made his hollow heart feel whole.
How long does a tree live?
Captain Bones worked hard in the Soul Society,
hoping that one day his wife and daughter might arrive.
He even prepared a beautiful new apartment for them.
But one year…
Ten years…
A hundred years passed.
He grew tired.
Lonely.
“By the time my wife and daughter finally arrive here,
I may have become a ghost who’s forgotten everything.
So I…”
“Captain Bones, no matter how many reasons you come up with,
You still broke the law.
You know you can’t escape punishment.
I’m part of the audit division now. I can’t pretend I didn’t see it.”
***
“Assistant Manager Joy, come have a smoke with me for a bit.”
One day,
Section Chief Hectorcalled me.
The rooftop garden.
After taking a few drags from his cigarette, he finally spoke with a heavy tone.
“Joy, I heard you personally reported Chief Bones the other day.
Because of that, he got fired.
Not only kicked off to a subsidiary, but stripped of his title altogether…”
“I was only doing my duty as a member of the audit team.”
“Sure, as an auditor, you did the right thing.
Even if it’s a superior who once did you a favor—when you see misconduct, you bite.
That’s how it works. But…”
He gave my chest a light jab with his finger.
“You’re still human, aren’t you?
You’ve got blood pumping hot through your veins. A heart that still races with emotion.
So tell me… Are you really okay with this?
Turning away from the cry of your soul for the sake of success?”
“……”
“I knew Bones when he was alive.
He was a personal friend.”
Chief Hectorlooked genuinely upset.
No doubt it was because Bones had confessed to illegally using the ground-world passage…
and got dismissed as a result.
“You did what was right.
But he was my friend. He had… a story worth sympathizing with.
So even if my head understands, my heart refuses to forgive.”
Even though he was nothing but bones, Chief Hectorhad a surprisingly big heart.
At that moment, the giant clock at headquarters rang for the end of the workday.
“Chief, then I’ll be heading home for the day.”
“……”
With narrow eyes, Chief Hector stared at me.
It looked like he wanted to say something more—but stopped himself.
I left headquarters quietly,
and with familiar steps, made my way to a certain lakeside.
“The air on the surface is always so refreshing.
No matter how many purifiers you run, the underground world can’t compare. The freshness here… it’s just different.”
There was a small hut by the trees—something that hadn’t been there before.
An awkwardly built shack with a sign that read “Guard Post.”
There, hammering the sign into place, was Chief Bones, the skeletal guard.
When he saw me, his eyes gleamed.
“Ah, Assistant Manager Joy! You’re here!”
“How’s the guarding going?
Not easy being back in the field after so long, right?”
“Haha, not at all!
I wandered far from home and tried many things…
but after all those years, I finally feel like I’ve found my calling.
I like this job, Joy. Thanks to you.”
“Me?”
“Weren’t you the one who recommended me for this post by the lake?
I heard you made a direct appeal to the Chairman.
Thanks to that, I can stay here without worrying about anyone’s gaze!”
As he said that, Bones tidied up a fishing pole by the lakeside.
Calling him “guard” was a bit of a stretch—he was more like the caretaker of someone’s private fishing spot.
“Joy, I’ve never met an employee as exceptional and admirable as you.
You might really become an executive one day.”
“Whoa now! Let’s not say scary things like that!”
“Haha, of course you’d say that.
Because your reason for wanting to become an executive…
is bold enough to shock everyone. Some might even say it’s blasphemous.”
“Whatever you’re thinking—it’s not the reason you imagine, Chief.”
“The tree you’re trying to climb is far too tall.
Honestly, I want to say it’s impossible.
A mortal, becoming an executive? That’s nonsense.
I could list a hundred reasons why you’re bound to fail.”
For a moment, it felt like I was being told off by a former rising star of headquarters—Bones himself.
But I actually welcomed it.
A hundred reasons I might fail? That just made the challenge more exciting.
“Still… I hope you succeed.
Which is why—lately, while chatting with a certain someone who’s been fishing by this lake…”
There’s only one person who fishes here.
Just hearing that already gave me a bit of tension, and Bones continued:
“They say their only daughter’s been down with a really nasty cold.
Imagine… your precious little girl suffering like that.
I can’t help but sympathize.”
…A cold?
But isn’t Lady Melinoe a goddess?
Can a goddess catch a cold?
Then again, Melinoe isn’t just any goddess.
She’s a nymph and a goddess.
So I suppose she can catch a cold.
“No wonder she’s been out of sight the past few days…
Even when she awarded me that commendation, her face looked a bit flushed.
It must’ve been the cold.”
“Wouldn’t this be the perfect chance to score some points?”
He was right.
Which meant I had to do… absolutely nothing.
Scoring points was not the goal here.
Still.
A goddess with a cold?
I mean, I did write a thesis on nymphs back in my Greek mythology days.
So this was personally very intriguing.
Shfff—
As I stepped through the dimensional rift, I noticed a skull standing at the entrance.
For a second, I thought Bones had cloned himself.
But this one…
was more elite.
You could call him a boss monster skull.
“Chief Hector?”
“I know eavesdropping is wrong…
but I heard your whole conversation with Bones.
Joy… you truly have a burning heart!
Willingly playing the villain…!”
Chief Hector’s gaze was practically dripping with tears.
He even pulled me into a tight hug.
“Audit duty vs. loyalty to your former boss.
Responsibility vs. compassion.
I can’t even imagine how hard it must’ve been to walk that line.
But you… you found the perfect answer.
I don’t think even I could’ve done that.”
No!
Now even a headquarters executive is starting to favor me?!
That’s not good!
When you get too many pluses… you’ve gotta defend with a minus!
I whipped out my terminal and made a hasty post online:
[Plant Gallery Forum]
Title: The Story of Two Trees
Do you know about the tragic laurel trees?
This goes all the way back to the Trojan War…
└ Chicoretta: I can’t believe trees carry such a heartbreaking story…
└ Chicoretta: Laurel leaves are good for colds. I should go pick some.
A bitter pill to swallow…
but I took it.
If the Chairman’s wife catches wind of his secret fishing spot?
Of course I’ll be blamed.
And then… just like Chief Bones,
I’ll be fired from the company—
and finally get to return to the surface.
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