[Chrono Trigger Novel - Episode 19] The Mountain the Hero Fled From
At the tavern in Dorino, the song of a Hero no one had yet met had already acquired a third verse.
He cleaved open the gate of Magus's castle with a single stroke, rode upon the black wind, and felled a hundred Mystics with the wave of one hand. Whenever the song ended, drunken patrons clashed their cups together. In a corner, the families of soldiers applauded with faces that longed to believe its extravagant promises.
Marle waited for the song to finish before approaching the musician.
“Have you ever seen this Hero yourself?”
“Of course.”
He answered without hesitation, then amended the claim before she could offer him a coin.
“Well, strictly speaking, I met someone who had. A boy from Porre named Tata came into possession of the Hero Medal. By now, he'll be drawing the legendary sword from the Denadoro Mountains.”
“What kind of sword is it?” Lucca asked.
“The Masamune. The only blade capable of breaking Magus's magic.”
At the sword's name, the tavern voices fell low. One person clasped his hands before his chest; another raised an empty cup toward the south. No two patrons told the same story about the blade's shape or its origins, but every story shared one belief: the sword and the boy Hero would do what none of them could.
Congratulatory gifts and letters were piled all the way to the door of Tata's house. The moment visitors entered, the boy's father launched into a proud account of the new Hero's exploits.
“Our Tata was always different from other children. I knew he would accomplish something great. Wasn't it fate that placed the Medal in his hands?”
He smiled proudly, but his eyes kept straying toward the mountain beyond the window. An untouched bowl of cold soup sat on the table.
Marle looked at the empty chair.
“When did he leave?”
“Yesterday morning. The whole village was watching.”
“You sent him alone?”
The father's smile faded.
“He's the Hero.”
The words remained in the house like an excuse rather than an answer.
Beside the door, Crono noticed a pair of small boots. They were new, without a spot of mud. Tata must have gone to the mountain in shoes older and thinner than these. By the time the villagers finished assembling a Hero's costume, the boy had already left.
Once outside, the three headed first for the Cursed Woods. If anyone knew who could face Magus, it would be Frog.
The forest was wetter than on their previous visit. Small creatures sprang from puddles between the roots, and vines wrapped around ankles before pulling toward the swamp. Crono opened a path ahead while Marle froze patches of water into stepping-stones. Lucca kept her fire small. One spark in the dry inner bark could make the forest more dangerous than any enemy within it.
Beneath the thicket at the forest's deepest point, a narrow passage descended underground.
Frog's dwelling resembled a hiding place more than a home. It held little beyond a low ceiling, a cold hearth, a longsword propped against the wall, and a closed wooden chest. Frog sat at the edge of his bed, polishing a scar in the scabbard.
“We meet again.”
Marle made no effort to hide her pleasure, but Frog looked first not at their faces, but at their waists and hands. Only after taking in the new sword, Lucca's launcher, and Marle's bare shoulder without a bow did he raise his eyes.
“Thou hast crossed a battlefield.”
“We held Zenan Bridge,” Lucca said. “And we heard that Magus summoned Lavos.”
Frog's hand stopped on the scabbard.
“What is this Lavos?”
“A creature that destroys the future,” Marle replied. “We're going to stop Magus before he can summon it.”
Frog was silent for a long time. He did not look startled. He looked as though a fear he had carried for years had just been given a new name.
Lucca stepped closer.
“Do you know about the Masamune?”
The fingers around the longsword stiffened.
“Where didst thou hear that name?”
“The villagers say it's a sword that can break Magus's power. A boy named Tata went to find it.”
Frog lowered his head. The skin beneath his throat rose and fell slowly.
“The boy is no Hero.”
“Then who is?” Marle asked.
Frog did not answer. Instead, he glanced once at the closed chest. Crono caught the look, but said nothing.
“The Denadoro Mountains are no place for a child,” Frog said. “If thou meanest to go, make haste.”
“Come with us.”
Marle's invitation was simple and direct.
Frog did not reach for the longsword.
“I have no right to climb that mountain.”
“Why do you need the right to bring back a child?”
His eyes wavered at the question, but he did not rise.
“I beg it of thee.”
Crono saw the old cuts in the floor beside the bed. They had been made in the same place, over and over—the marks of a sword drawn countless times and stopped. Forcing Frog out now would not make him a companion. It would only give him another command to obey.
Crono nodded. Marle pressed her lips together, and the three left the underground room.
Outside, Lucca lowered her voice.
“He knows the Masamune. He hasn't just heard its name.”
“There was something in the chest,” Crono said.
Marle looked back. The thicket already hid the entrance below.
“Then we have even more reason to come back and ask. After we find Tata.”
At the foot of the Denadoro Mountains, a small figure came racing down the slope.
The boy wore a leather breastplate too large for him. Clutching the round Medal at his neck with one hand, he tried to outrun a boulder tumbling behind him. His foot caught on a root and sent him sprawling forward. A rusted axe spun toward his head.
Crono stepped between them and raised his sword.
The collision numbed his arm, but the blade held steady. The axe-wielding creature's head and shoulders were sheathed in a shell like the staves of a barrel. Crono slashed its flank, only for sparks to fly from the hard casing.
Lucca touched a spark from her fingertip to the shell. Steam rose with the smell of wet wood, and the startled creature dropped its axe. Crono struck behind its exposed knee and brought it down.
Marle helped the boy to his feet.
“You're Tata, aren't you?”
He started to deny it, then hid the Medal at his neck. An old sword emblem had been engraved into the round metal disk.
“I'm not going down. I was just scouting the enemies below...”
A monster howled higher on the mountain, and Tata's shoulders drew in.
Marle did not challenge the lie. She washed the cut on his knee with water and tied a bandage around it.
“Can you make it home?”
“I can go by myself.”
The boy pulled the Medal back out over his clothes, as though he feared he would look even younger without it.
“The sword is at the top. But there are strange children guarding it. They saw me and laughed. They said I wasn't real.”
“What wasn't real?” Lucca asked.
Tata looked down at the Medal.
“The Hero.”
He ran past them and continued down the mountain. Crono did not follow. The footsteps of a fleeing child sounded far more honest than those of a Hero climbing toward the summit.
The mountain path narrowed as it rose. A sheer drop opened on one side, while spray from a waterfall swept across the other. Winged creatures dropped stones from high branches, and warriors in bark armor rolled axes down the slope.
The three did not force their way upward through strength alone. Crono turned the axes' paths over the cliff edge; Lucca opened the seams in the armor with fire. Marle froze the waterfall into short-lived footholds against the rock face. The ice broke a few steps behind them, and each time it did, another path back down disappeared.
Past noon, Lucca's breathing grew ragged. Whenever she made fire, heat drove deep into her swollen wrist. The cold had drained the color from Marle's lips as well. Crono pointed to the shade of the nearest boulder.
“We rest.”
“Tata's on his way down. There's no need to rush,” Marle said, though the moment she sat, she tucked both hands between her knees.
Lucca gazed down the mountain. Zenan Bridge looked no wider than a thread. Beyond it, the smoke of war stained the northern sky.
“Those people believe one sword will end the war for them.”
“That belief is what drove Tata this far up the mountain,” Marle replied.
“But if the sword truly can stop Magus's power, we need it.”
Marle touched the pendant at her throat.
“Needing something isn't the same as letting it take a person's place. Even if we find the sword, we have to decide who carries it—and why.”
Crono wiped the blade of his new weapon with a cloth. Melchior's words returned to him. A good sword did not lend its wielder strength. At most, it spared his wrist once when he made a mistake.
As the sun leaned west, they reached a cave below the summit.
Inside stood a circular altar shaped by human hands. At its center, a sword missing half its blade had been driven into the stone. Even what remained was buried beneath old rust and earth. It looked less like the legend that would bring down Magus than a piece of wreckage someone had abandoned.
Two children sat on either side of the altar.
One rested his chin in his hand and watched the three travelers. The other sat on the altar, swinging his feet. They looked no different from the village children below, except that neither cast a shadow.
“Three of them this time.”
“They don't look like they'll run away.”
The children traded the words between them, then laughed together.
Marle spoke.
“Were you the ones who told Tata he wasn't real?”
“We only told him a lie.”
“You've got it backward,” the other child said with a giggle. “We told him the truth, and he heard it as a lie.”
Lucca pointed to the broken sword.
“Are you the beings who guard the Masamune?”
The children hopped down from the altar. One named himself Masa, and the other Mune. As their names echoed through the cave, the ancient sword trembled almost imperceptibly.
“Many people have wanted this sword.”
“But the person who needs it isn't always the person who deserves to have it.”
Crono stepped forward. The children's laughter ceased.
“Are you a Hero too?”
Crono shook his head.
“Then why do you want the sword?”
“To find out.”
“Find out what?”
Past the broken blade, Crono looked toward the mountain wall that hid the northern sky.
“Magus. And Lavos.”
For the first time, the two children looked at one another.
“More honest than the last boy.”
“But an honest person isn't always a strong one.”
Masa raised a hand. The wind in the cave gathered toward a single point. Beneath Mune's feet, stone dust rose in a circling ring.
“If you want the sword, show us.”
“Show you what?” Marle asked.
The children's bodies stretched long within the light. Blades appeared in their small hands, and their mischievous faces became masklike forms.
“What moves before the sword does.”
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