The April morning was so bright, with the pond’s surface sparkling, that it made you want to squint.
“Kopo, bro, where are we going?”
Without turning around, Kopo answered Minico’s question. “Haven’t decided.”
Last night, in Spice’s workshop, he’d accidentally glimpsed something — a screen filled edge to edge with a snowy plain. Black-and-white creatures lined up single file, walking on and on. Their destination was somewhere off-screen. And yet, every single one of them faced the same direction, and kept walking.
Minico asked nothing more, just followed along on his short legs, pattering.
The cherry trees along the river were already thinning, but the grass underfoot was soft, releasing the smell of spring with every step. They passed through the stone pavement, crossed the meadow slope, and finally, at the foot of Frog Mountain, the two of them came to a stop. The soles of their feet felt warm.
“We walked pretty far.”
Minico pressed a hand to his cheek. Kopo, a little out of breath himself, gazed at the distant mountain ridge. Amencho Town looked so small from here. The blue of the pond, the white of the weeping cherry — from this distance, they all fit neatly into one single place.
“Hey,” Kopo said. “Penguins walk dozens of kilometers, you know. Heading for the place where they raise their eggs. Every year, they come back to the exact same spot.”
“I know. Spice was researching it, wasn’t he.”
“…How do they find their way back, I wonder. They don’t even have a map.”
Minico thought about it for a while, then smiled.
“Maybe their bodies remember. There must be a place that just — feels like here.”
Kopo looked up at the sky. Hasshi’s black silhouette was circling, far off in the distance.
The way home felt shorter than the way there had. Back at the pond’s edge, Keromi was humming while gazing at the water’s surface. There were no words to the tune, but it melted into the spring light, a sound that seemed to warm you slowly from the soles of your feet.
Kopo slipped a hand into his pocket and quietly gripped a small stone he’d picked up along the way.
“Let’s come again,” Minico said.
“Yeah.”
That alone was enough.
Margin note: That night, Minico opened his atlas and wrote in small letters: “The foot of Frog Mountain.”
【Today’s Drop】
- World Penguin Day: Observed every year on April 25. This international day was established to coincide with the time when Emperor Penguins march 50 to 160 kilometers inland from the coastline, heading for their breeding grounds.
This is an English translation of “いちばん長い帰り道”, part of Tales of Amencho Town (蛙鳴町奇譚).