As it turned out, the first impression wasn’t all that wrong. Ithiel’s office was a well-organized mess: Things were everywhere, but if you checked the titles, there seemed to be an order. Not one that any random person could recognize, though.

“I’m all ears.” Ithiel shoved some things from a sofa to make place for everyone. They sat opposite of him, with Spiderlily already being distracted by the books around her.

“The one we wish to help is an elf. He appeared very tired, with headaches and issues in concentration. He looked exhausted. His retainer said the illness is called Internal Fragmentation?”

“Eh?” Ithiel blinked again, very slowly. “...Internal Fragmentation, you say?”

“Yes.” Ice nodded, frowning a tiny bit. “That was what he said. It doesn’t sound like an illness, but…”

“No, it is, in a way… I know about it.” Ithiel grabbed the edges of his collar, fiddling with them. “It’s just… I never heard of that having such symptoms?”

“How much is known about it? What are the usual signs? Do you know the cure?” The surprise in Bloody’s voice was evident.

“Ah… Haha…” Ithiel appeared considerably awkward suddenly. “That… I guess you Foreigners don’t know… We all have this. I mean, everyone. Internal Fragmentation is the name of the sickness every inhabitant of Solstice is born with.”

The dumbfounded silence that settled over everyone made Ithiel nervous. He jumped up, running to a corner to fetch something, and returned. He put a heavy book onto the table between them. It was old, with the pages having yellow edges and the binding fraying.

Ithiel went through a couple of pages before stopping. He turned it towards them, displaying the illustration.

The image wasn’t printed. It was drawn by hand and with ink. A humanoid figure was hovering above numerous people. The expressions were only roughly drawn, but they conveyed the feeling as well as if it was a photograph. The people on the ground revered the hovering one, loving them, but the one above only had disdain.

“It’s said that a long time ago, we did something to make our creator angry and in return, were cursed for it. We are forever trapped in Solstice, never to explore the rest of the world again. You Foreigners can travel, can’t you? You don’t have the curse.”

Ithiel changed the page, now showing a group of people standing before a grave with empty faces. Here, he paused for a long time.

“The Interior Fragmentation… You asked about the usual symptoms? There are few. For example… We cannot cry over our lost ones. Whenever someone dies, we… just lose our feelings for them. Adoration and the like, they stay, but love, affection, hate, they vanish. We also cannot love our newborn immediately. Only with time can this feeling grow, as if all bonds that shouldn’t have been there don’t exist. The reason why we call it that… Is because we say that our feelings are fragmented. They’re broken. We know it should be different, but although we know, we cannot change it.”

Ithiel’s shoulders sacked. He returned his fingers to his lapel, nervously touching it.

“There is no cure. It’s a sickness born from a curse, and we cannot lift it.”

“Broken by design? Is this part of the world’s questline?”, Blackstone whispered. “It shouldn’t be an accident if they have an explanation like this…”

“Maybe it wasn’t programmed”, Little Droplet wondered quietly.

Opposite of the sad young NPC, Ice was unable to tear his gaze away from him. His thoughts kept on repeating Ithiel’s words, and the conversation they had had during their travels.

What separates a human from a fake one?

Is it that feelings could only be learned slowly? That they couldn’t exist without a logical build-up? That anything useless was discarded right away?

“If you found a cure for it, Foreigners, I’d be eternally thankful.” Ithiel laughed. It sounded fake. “That way, I… could maybe mourn my parents.”

“But aren’t you?”

The words came blurted out of Ice’s mouth. He kept on thinking about the words.

Ithiel made a confused noise, but Ice was willing to explain. “You say you lose all feelings for the dead. But, wishing to mourn them, doesn’t that mean you have feelings left? If there were none, why would you still bother to think about them?”

The young elf’s face turned completely blank. His body froze up, slightly unnaturally tilted. Seconds passed.

“He’s bugged?” Little Droplet threw the guess into the room. “This looks bugged to me…”

“Is it because you pointed out the bug that the AI crashed?” Blackstone worriedly waved a hand in front of Ithiel’s face.

The elf’s pale eyes twitched over to the hand. His body unfroze, shaking momentarily. His fingers clenched around his collar, a shaky smile on his face. “...I-I’m sorry. ...I blanked out for a moment there. What were you saying again?”

“...It’s nothing.” Ice did not repeat his words. Who knew what would happen.

Ithiel’s hands lowered to his lap. He pressed them down, obviously unsettled, and croaked out a couple of sentences. “Anyway, I cannot help you with that. Please find a conclusion on your own. I… I will take a rest now. I’m tired after lunch.”

The elf stormed off without another goodbye.

Ice’s gaze followed him. Breathing in, he was about to call for Bloody, but the beastman was quicker.

“There’s something?”

“Yes”, Ice said. “Could you wait outside? I want to try talking to him again.”

“What are you going to do?” Little Droplet smoothed the creases on their clothes.

The Ice Emperor didn’t want to explain. He quickly hurried after the vanishing elf, while the rest of the group stayed behind.

Owl

Cliff?