Chapter 15 — Wheels, Wet Rope, and the Road Away

Holger didn't wait for the hum to return. Even before the sun rose over the palisade, he stepped into the center of the yard, where the bonfire with the carcass had burned out yesterday, and began to act. With a broad gesture, the village elder pointed toward the forest—fingers clenched, palm slashing through the air as if cutting off the path back. Then he jabbed at the gray residue that yesterday's rain had washed toward the watering hole: a thin film of ash now lay on the surface of a puddle, as if someone had shaken the contents of an old stove into it. Finally, Holger turned toward the road leading to the quarry and slapped his thigh—the signal to pack up. There were no spoken arguments—only heavy boots creaking across the wet earth.

Arno and Bram immediately faced each other. Arno nodded toward the gates, pointing to the fresh claw marks at the base of the wall, then clenched his fist and jabbed it toward the palisade—as if saying, at least here we know where to expect them. Bram, conversely, jabbed his fist toward the quarry, then spread his arms to depict an open space and tapped his chest, as if saying, "There are fewer shadows there." The gestures were sharp, almost angry, but Holger simply stepped between them, placed a palm on each of their shoulders, and nodded toward the road. The decision was made. Leave. Before that which leaves emptiness in its wake stepped across the boundary. Alex watched this from the threshold of the stable, feeling how the attachment born yesterday by the communal hearth over a torn shirt now tightened in his throat. These rough, silent people were no longer strangers—and here they were again, deciding for him, only this time the decision was to save, not just to tolerate.

Alex stood by the stable, leaning on a crooked stick Kael had shoved into his hand. His leg pulsed so intensely that every breath echoed in his hip, but he didn't intend to sit idly by. When Ilsa began hauling sacks of grain to the wagon, he limped closer and tried to lift one—not the heaviest, but enough to make his shoulder scream with old pain mixed with the new. The muscles in his thigh twitched, reminding him of yesterday's claws, and he nearly dropped the load. Ilsa was instantly beside him, snatched the sack from his hands, and pushed him back toward the wall. Her gaze was stern, almost maternal, without a single word. Alex opened his mouth to object, but remembered that the language was still foreign. Instead, he pointed to himself, then to the wagon, and made a gesture as if carrying something light—a basket, kindling, anything, just so he wouldn't have to stand aside. Ilsa snorted, but something warm flickered in the corners of her eyes, almost like yesterday when she had adjusted the blanket in the stable. She made a short, guttural sound that Alex didn't understand. However, the meaning required no translation: she pointed to his injured leg, then resolutely pushed him back toward the wall. Alex blinked and raised his palms in surrender. His heart beat harder—not from pain, but from a sudden warmth. He wanted to explain that he understood her gesture and wouldn't try to play the hero, but instead only nodded, feeling irony tickle under his ribs: here he was, the isekai protagonist, being pulled away from a sack of grain like a kitten from a dangerous toy.

He stepped back, but didn't give up. When Kael brought a child—a little girl with tear-streaked eyes and a runny nose—Alex caught her on his healthy side and sat her on the straw in the wagon, carefully tucking a rolled-up blanket behind her back. The girl clung to his torn shirt, leaving smudges of dirty fingers on the fabric, and he suddenly realized that this touch was more important than any battle. Ilsa approached again, this time softer, almost cautious. She adjusted the child, smoothing the straw with her palm, then touched his hand—briefly, almost apologetically, her fingers lingering a moment longer than necessary. Ilsa spoke another short phrase; Alex recognized only the familiar softness of the intonation, not the words. She touched his hand, adjusted the edge of the blanket on the child, and nodded toward the wagon—he read the approval in the movement, not the speech. Something tightened in his chest—not fear, but that same attachment he had realized yesterday by the hearth. The language barrier wasn't cracking: it stood between them like a solid wall, and yet gestures were already carving a narrow path through it. Alex wanted to tell her that he wasn't a hero and simply didn't want to see this place burn or vanish under ash, but he could only nod. Then he added in his own language: "Thank you." She couldn't have known the word, but she seemed to understand from his face and responded with a slightly longer press of her fingers on his forearm. Ilsa stepped away to the next sack. In that moment, Alex realized: he no longer wanted to just survive and leave. These people, their gestures, even the smell of wet dog and smoke from the hearth—this was the beginning of something he was ready to hold onto. Irony stung: in the office, he had dreamed of portals, and here he had grown attached to a wagon and porridge.

When he tried to take a water skin off the wagon to move it lower, Ilsa silently blocked his path. She didn't push or point—she simply stood so that he had to stop, and shoved a light bundle of rags into his hands, which she had just picked up from the ground. Her gaze was tired but warm, almost like yesterday's palm on his shoulder; the gesture spoke clearer than words: You are already helping. Like this. Alex took the bundle, feeling the heaviness in his chest ease slightly. The language barrier was enough to keep them from arguing, but this time, for the first time, it lacked the previous detachment—only a short, almost intimate "understood."

The column assembled quickly but chaotically. Sacks, water skins, children, a few chickens in a cage flapping their wings and leaving feathers in the air—all of it was piled onto two wagons harnessed to oxen. The draft ox, the very one Alex had helped calm yesterday, now stood quietly, chewing cud, but a shadow of yesterday's panic flickered in its eyes. Alex limped between them, passing a basket of roots or a bundle of kindling, trying not to put weight on his injured leg. Every step echoed with a dull, aching pain in his hip, as if the creature's claws were still scraping against the bone. At one point, he nearly fell, catching his foot on a root protruding from the mud, and Arno caught him by the elbow—firmly, but without unnecessary force. The man said nothing, only nodded—as if saying, hang in there, we're with you. Alex thought that this was their version of "welcome." No speeches, no fanfare—only rough hands that no longer pushed away, but supported. The smell of damp earth, old manure, and a light bitterness from distant oven smoke hung in the air, reminding him of yesterday's routine by the wall. He inhaled deeply, wincing at the pain in his shoulder, and felt how this mixture now seemed almost familiar.

The wagon got stuck at the first pothole past the gates. The wheel sank into the soft clay up to the hub; the ox strained, muscles bulging on its flanks, but the wagon only creaked and stopped dead, as if it had grown into the ground. Holger cursed—shortly, gutturally, the word flying out like a stone from a sling—and everyone began to push: shoulders against the side, boots slipping in the mud, hands digging into the wet wood. Alex, standing to the side, suddenly saw how the load was positioned: the grain sacks were piled too high on one side, creating a tilt, and the water in the skins shifted inside, adding inertia like a living creature that hindered them. He stepped forward, ignoring the pulsing in his leg, and used gestures to show: remove two top sacks, move them to the other wagon, and shift the water skin lower, closer to the center, to balance the load. Bram frowned at first, his brows meeting in a thick line, but then he nodded and did as shown—the sack landed with a wet thud, the water skin gurgled as the liquid shifted. When the wagon rocked and climbed out of the mud with a wet squelch, as if breaking free from the maw of a swamp, Kael clapped Alex on the shoulder—not hard, but approvingly, leaving a smudge of mud on his shirt. For the first time, Alex felt useful not because he had rushed into battle with creatures or poured boiling water into a breach, but because he had simply looked at the mess and saw how to clear it. No heroism, no drama—just an office skill: optimizing chaos so the deadline wouldn't devour everyone. Irony stung under his ribs: in his past life, this saved him from reports; here, it saved them from mud and panic. He smirked to himself, feeling the pain in his hip recede slightly from this small triumph.

The road to the quarry went downhill; wet from the night rain, the ruts glistened like fresh wounds. The column moved slowly, people walking on the sides, children clinging to the sides of the wagons, their fingers leaving marks on the wood. Alex stayed close to the first wagon, where Arno sat with the child on his lap—the girl pressed against him, hiding her face in his bandaged palm. The rope holding the side rail looked frayed, fibers sticking out and saturated with moisture, but no one paid attention: everyone was preoccupied with not looking back at the forest, where yesterday's hum still hung in their memories like a damp residue. And then it snapped. A dry crack, like a shot from an old rifle, rang through the column. The wheel shifted sideways with a wooden screech, the wagon tilted, the ox jerked in panic, its hooves sliding in the mud, and the entire structure began to collapse right onto Arno and the girl. The wood groaned, straw spilled, and the child screamed—thin and piercing.

Alex saw it in a fraction of a second. The child screamed, Arno tried to stand, but his leg was caught in a tangle of ropes. Without hesitation, without pathos, simply because these were his people, Alex lunged forward, gripping the side rail with both hands—fingers digging into the rough wood, splinters piercing his skin—and pushed with all his might to the side. The wood slammed into his ribs, pain exploded in his hip as if the claws had returned, but the wagon changed trajectory—by only half a meter, but it was enough. Arno yanked his leg out with a wet squelch of mud, grabbed the child, and rolled away, his bandaged palm flashing in the air. The wagon continued to tilt, but now past them, the wheels creaking like old bones.

Then the wheel finally tore off the axle. The heavy wooden beam—the one that held the entire frame, saturated with resin and time—snapped with a crunch and flew downward, gaining momentum on the slope. Alex didn't have time to jump away. The beam hit him in the chest with a dull, wet thud, pinning him against a sharp rock on the roadside—the edge of the quarry, wet from the rain. The air was knocked out of his lungs in one sharp jolt, as if he had been hit by a truck again, only this time without headlights or the screech of tires. He felt his ribs give way, something inside breaking with a wet, disgusting crunch—not epic, not heroic, just like cheap office furniture under the weight of too many reports. The pain was dull, mundane, as if he had been jammed between a door and a frame in an old office, only a hundred times stronger, with the taste of iron in his mouth. Blood filled his mouth, warm and salty, flowing down his chin onto his torn shirt. He tried to breathe, but only a wheeze came out, wet and bubbling, like yesterday's hum from the forest.

Arno was already there, shouting something—the words merged into a drone, guttural and desperate, but now, in this final moment, Alex could almost discern the intonation: fear, anger, something close to "not now." Ilsa rushed to him, her hands, wet with clay and sweat, grabbed his palm—rough fingers, the same ones that had applied the salve and adjusted the blanket yesterday. Alex saw her face—distorted, without pathos, just human despair, eyes glistening with tears she hadn't had time to wipe away. The hum from the forest returned, low and wet, closer now, but it sounded like background noise, like the distant sound of rain on the stable roof. The shouts of the column were receding: people continued to leave, pulling the second wagon, leading the oxen, their boots squelching in the mud. No one could stop—the price was too high. Arno was already dragging Ilsa by the elbow further down the slope, but she twisted away for a moment, reaching her hand back; Alex only managed to see her wet palm, open toward him, before her figure dissolved into the moving crowd. Her palm had been rough, warm, real. Not the forest, not the creatures, not the ash. Just a hand that had adjusted his blanket yesterday and pulled him away from a sack. He wanted to say that he was glad he stayed, that this wasn't escapism but a real home, even if poorly ventilated, but the words wouldn't come—only a weak exhale.

The world began to darken at the edges, like yesterday's embers in the hearth. The smell of ozone, metal, and wet stone—the same one he already knew from the transitions—filled his nostrils, mixing with blood and mud. His body became light, almost weightless, despite the weight of the beam pressing against his chest. The last thing he saw was Ilsa's wet palm clutching his fingers, and her lips moving without sound, as if she were trying to hold him with a gesture. Then the world folded like an old map, pulling him further, into a fourth world where, perhaps, everything would begin anew. But this time, warmth remained in his chest—not heroic, but simple, human. He no longer wanted to just run. He wanted to return.