Pathway to Japanese Literature

Great Devil’s Domain “Devil’s Urine Puddle”

The Citroën expedition team of the French automobile company— Though not as large-scale as the American Geographical Society, this for-profit company had nevertheless achieved remarkable accomplishments. They first breached Africa's Sahara Desert with traction vehicles, then organized a grand caravan that advanced on caterpillar tracks through Persia and Central Asia all the way to Peking.

Now, as for their third plan, it was said that all selections had been finalized and they awaited only the end of the rainy season. Moreover, it pointed not to mere automobile journeys as before, but to an unexplored mystical realm shrouded in mystery, speculation, and darkness.

So where could it be? You may doubt whether such lands still exist on this Earth, dear readers—but they do exist, and in abundance.

As for "unexplored territories," there still remained four or five locations left as blank circles even on precise maps. As for those lands—mysterious realms that stirred the curiosity merely upon hearing of them—for surely if one were to set foot there, something earth-shattering would await.

Therefore, first let us list the candidate sites presented at the selection meeting. And thus, dear readers, let us make you clearly understand how the place where Citroën’s expedition team is about to go holds a transcendent status that surpasses even those.

1. The area of "Rio Folls de Dios" in the remote Amazon River region of South America.

2. The Land of the Dead known as “Ser-mik-Suah,” said to lie within an 8,000-shaku glacier zone in central Greenland near the North Pole. 3. China's Qinghai Province's “Puspamada”—the so-called Utopia within the Jinsha River Himalayas' Bayan Har Mountains.

4. ?

The first candidate—the remote Amazon River region—is translated as “Madness of the Gods.” To this place, an expedition led by Dr. Lamaby, Dean of the Faculty of Pharmacy at Columbia University in the United States, ventured—but they were ultimately repelled by the miasmic damp heat and decaying mist zone. However, it is said that giant carnivorous lotuses bearing white bones blanketing the river surface were captured through a telephoto lens.

The second mysterious realm was the abode of evil spirits in central Greenland where Eskimo natives drove their sleds like madmen. There stood aurora-lit peaks of eight-thousand-foot glaciers—a place where even Peary and Nordenskiöld had ultimately failed to reach, where one sensed a strange power emanating from deep within the ice. The third was rendered in Sanskrit as "Flower-Intoxicated Land." When viewed from afar, it manifested as a Great Milky Sea; entering it meant attaining nirvana while still living amidst billowing floral fragrances—the Utopia Lama monks yearned for. They called it the "Treasure Core Within the Lotus" and eagerly attempted ascents, yet not one person had ever reached it. Moreover, it had anciently been recorded as the dwelling place of One-Armed People in the Classic of Mountains and Seas. More recently, it could be regarded as the source material for the film *Lost Horizon*—truly, this was the great unexplored region of northwest frontier China.

However, as for what lay hidden in this place that even surpassed the three unexplored territories mentioned above—where exactly it was located and what secrets it held—dear readers must surely be burning with curiosity. It lay in northeastern Congo in Central Africa near the equator. Namely, it was called “M’lambuwezi” in the Congo Bantu language—translated as “Devil’s Urine Puddle.” It was said that there lay the Giant Beast Graveyard—the “Unknown Forest Graveyard”—a place no human had ever witnessed.

Now, as proof that this mysterious region was by no means the fabrication of a fantasy writer like myself, let us examine an article from the British aviation journal *Flight* that featured a lecture. The lecturer was a pilot named Fergusson from Wilson Airlines operating between Nairobi and Mwanza.

I too have attempted several assaults on Devil's Urine Puddle, but have only reached the miserable conclusion that even aerial conquest proves impossible.

"In this modern age of aviation supremacy where it was claimed no uncharted lands remained before aircraft—why then did they meet defeat solely at Devil's Urine Puddle? Turbulent air currents? That must have been one factor. Generally speaking, the northern side of Devil's Urine Puddle formed a great cliff. Above this lay an area called Zerzura—a quicksand zone where the air at higher altitudes became extremely thin, creating heat vacuums that often occurred in desert regions."

When reaching that point, the airplane began to stagger unsteadily. However, the swamp of Devil’s Urine Puddle spreading beneath the cliff was blanketed in thick, viscous vapor, making visibility utterly impossible. In that haze—whether mist, marsh gas, or some unknown gray sea—strange spots would occasionally appear.

During my final flight, I mustered my resolve and steeply descended for a closer look. Yet what I had believed to be thick fog or marsh gas turned out instead—to my astonishment—to be a dense cloud-like swarm of minuscule insects. A horrifying multitude of mosquitoes filled the sky over Devil's Urine Puddle, that thirty-mile-wide swamp. Malaria vectors, Dengue carriers, sleeping sickness flies, venomous midges, knife-proboscis horseflies called Tufwao—ah, that seething cloud!

Even if Devil’s Urine Puddle concealed gold mines or scattered diamonds—even if it housed bizarre creatures or primitive humans—to dispel this eternal cloud of poisonous winged insects that showed no sign of clearing would likely require engineers equipped with gas masks and full anti-insect gear—an entire division of them—working for several years.

This concludes the aviator’s observations of Devil’s Urine Puddle. Now we turn to the Giant Beast Graveyard said to lie beyond it. Dear readers, you are likely aware that gorillas, chimpanzees and other anthropoid apes—along with wild elephants—never reveal their corpses. Thus deep within some jungle impassable to humans must lie their final resting place. Devil’s Urine Puddle perfectly fits these conditions; but lest this be dismissed as authorial invention, let us quote a definitive passage from Lord Paraffin Young’s equatorial African travelogue *From Congo to the Source of the Nile River*.

On clear days, Mount Ruwenzori served as an excellent landmark... but once the rains began and veiled everything in mist, we simply let our feet guide us as we started wandering through the jungle. The mud, along with thorns and vines, gradually deepened, and we fell into waist-deep wild elephant footprints while avoiding ants with constantly dancing steps.

Then, about a hundred yards ahead, a dull reddish thing moved along, snapping branches as it went. It was a gorilla! Until I had come this deep into the Congo, I had never encountered a gorilla. Thereupon, I almost impulsively tried to seize the machine gun. Then a native leaped forward and grabbed the weapon,

“Sir! That gorilla’s our benefactor! To kill ’im—that ain’t how a proper British gent acts!”

The natives affectionately call gorillas by the nickname "Soko". I was so astonished I didn’t even raise my voice. “Why shouldn’t I?” “A chance to bag a gorilla is a once-in-a-millennium opportunity!” “That’s because...” “When you fell into that elephant pit and broke the compass, we’re now completely lost about how to get out of this forest.” “That gorilla showed us the way.” “He’s telling us the path we’re taking now leads north...”

"How would you know such a thing?" "That gorilla’s heading to the forest graveyard to die right now." "That means it’s in Devil’s Urine Puddle—a place we can’t reach." "Gorillas don’t walk around like that when it rains." "They just crouch there all dazed-like, hands on their heads." "We’ve watched gorillas since we were knee-high, but only ones marchin’ through rain like Death’s draggin’ ’em ever go north."

The mention of Devil’s Urine Puddle pierced my mind. Could it be that our current position was unfathomably deep? Come to think of it, at the edge of the jungle in the Manuiema tribe’s village, a massive swarm of mosquitoes they called “Kungo” had been hanging thickly like a dense fog. I shuddered with a chill as this realization struck me, and thinking how I might have died without that gorilla, I made the sign of the cross over this traveler to the graveyard—now walking with hands on head, dragging its feet heavily.

In this manner, Lord Young fled back in panic-stricken retreat, narrowly preserving his life. To press forward recklessly would mean encountering the north—a perilous quicksand zone that swallowed people instantly. The other three directions were blocked by a dense tangle of aerial-rooted parasitic trees that even a king snake couldn't slip through—the so-called "Anthropoid Ape Habitat Zone"—a vast primeval jungle.

But dear readers, there exists our Japanese physician who ventured into that place—miserably perishing yet miraculously leaving behind a monumental record. It is this expedition record that I shall now attempt to narrate in a story-like fashion, prior to its official publication by the Citroën Cultural Department.

The Appearance of Dodo, the Tailed Humanoid

Portuguese East Africa’s capital, Mozambique, was now in the very height of the rainy season.

People rotted; fungi resembling white hair sprouted from black skin—such was the terrifying humid heat unique to the rainy season that now sweltered over Mozambique. Rain—today too, this island town was drenched in a torrential downpour.

Inside a tightly sealed room in Zama’s laboratory—shut to keep out the poisonous Mabunga flies—was Professor Accorti. What could this professor—renowned in zoology from Italy’s Medona University—be waiting for?! Growing impatient, sweat dripped-dripped from his beard as he panted like a dog in this stifling humidity. “Zama, what exactly does Kirk intend to show me? I disembarked the ship because you said there was something that would make me gasp in astonishment, but…”

“It’s the secret of secrets.” “You may imagine it however you wish, Professor.” “So—an okapi? A gorilla?”

“Ha ha ha ha! If it were something that commonplace, I wouldn’t have detained you.” Zama merely smirked suggestively. He was a young scholar just past thirty—small in stature, with a large face and gentle-looking eyes. However, as one could tell at a glance from his skin, Zama was not pure Japanese. A triracial child—with a Japanese father who had been a grocer in Aden and an Italian mother of mixed Black and White heritage—even after completing his medical studies in Japan, he had not remained in his homeland but journeyed all the way to Mozambique to research tropical mental illnesses.

The place was teeming—women with the uncontrollable symptoms of chorea, men with Madagascar-specific conditions like *Sarimbavy* and *Koro*. Then, with the support of Amaro Mendoza, Mozambique’s wealthiest man, he finally resolved to establish himself locally and opened a research institute. Thus did Zama become a god to the Black people. Devoting his life to the madmen of the tropics—even if buried beneath jungle undergrowth—he strove to rescue Black people from their pitiful possession delusions; Zama was a champion of humanitarianism. And so, over six years in Mozambique, he grew close to a poacher named Kirk. Subsequently, through frequent expeditions into the interior with Kirk, he became acquainted with Professor Accorti as well. But why was Zama detaining the Professor who had just made a brief port call from South Africa? It was true he intended to show Professor Accorti something astonishing—but what in God’s name could it be?!

At that very moment, the door opened and a young man appeared. At first glance, his dusky skin—clearly that of a mixed-race individual of Black and White heritage—a sharply defined, ruggedly handsome face, and above all, the sprightliness of his limbs lent him the grace of an antelope.

Josias Kirk—a U.S. national but famously known as the Congo Ravager—was one of the most wanted men in the White Congo, hunting protected animals and selling them across regions.

Kirk gave an apologetic smile, keeping his right hand outside the door as he remained on the threshold. Before long, pulled by his hand into the room came a creature so utterly beyond anticipation that Professor Accorti’s eyes widened in astonishment—a being of unparalleled strangeness. Truly, Professor Accorti’s astonishment in that moment defied all description. With his monocle, eyes wide open and mouth agape, as if finally regaining his senses after some time had passed,

“Ah! A Tailed Humanoid!” he growled under his breath.

It had dark brown fur covering its entire body, stood about four feet tall like a child, and sported a tail roughly a foot long extending from the sacrum. Yet judging by its skeletal structure, it could only be described as human. However, its skull was low and slanted diagonally, with prominent supraorbital arches above the eyebrows. The nose lay flat with large nostrils, while the jawbone showed abnormal development. Even without close inspection, its male sex was unmistakable. Well, putting that aside, from this Tailed Humanoid emanated an unbearable body odor—likely several times stronger than what was described as the goatish stench of Black people—steeped in the sweltering humidity. Professor Accorti covered his nose with a handkerchief while fixing his eyes intently.

“Hmm, he seems gentle. And does he take to you?”

“Oh yeah, real well,” Kirk answered while blowing smoke rings. “So it’s been quite some time since you caught this one, hasn’t it?”

“No, it’s only been about seven days since he arrived here.” “First of all, it hasn’t even been two weeks since Dodo fell into my hands.”

“Dodo is…” “The name we gave this gentleman.” “Ha ha ha ha! So we’re calling him Mr. Tailed Humanoid Dodo now?” Even as Professor Accorti laughed, an inscrutable glint stirred in his eyes. Wild creatures—especially intelligent anthropoid beasts—becoming so docile in just ten days or two weeks? Could such a thing be possible?

“Now then, where did you catch this Mr. Dodo?”

“The location?” Kirk did not answer immediately, instead adopting deliberate theatricality as he began recounting the entire sequence of events that had led to Dodo’s capture. “Anyway, Dodo took a liking ’cause our first meetin’ went smooth.” “I thought I’d put the Professor’s Gorilla Periodic Melancholy Theory to use and went out determined to capture a full-grown beast over six feet tall this time.”

Professor Accorti had presented his Gorilla Periodic Melancholy Theory at last year’s academic conference, causing a major sensation in the field. Gorillas were said to experience periodic bouts of melancholy and phobia, during which they became most prone to violence. And when their anguish grew unbearable, it was said they would come to lick ‘Hyraceum’ to alleviate it. Hyraceum refers to the sticky mucus remaining after the moisture in urine that rock hyraxes deposit at their urination spots evaporates, and Kirk had attempted to set a trap in front of the tree hollow where this Hyraceum was located.

“I kept watch over that trap pit for four straight days and nights.” “Then, on the fifth day at noon, it finally came.” “I couldn’t tell its age through the thick undergrowth, but anyway, it came snapping branches toward the tree hollow.” “Then came a thunderous crash as an enormous dust cloud billowed up.” “Gotcha! A live gorilla’s worth a hundred grand!” I thought, then rushed out with the natives—only to find myself face-to-face with what should’ve been the fallen gorilla. “But it immediately ran off on all fours.”

“Hoho… So if it wasn’t the gorilla that fell into the trap… then Dodo?”

“That’s right—but when I peered in, even I was shocked.”

“I bet. Even someone like you—a relative of Congo beasts—would be shocked by this. However, he must have resisted at first.” “He didn’t. He was suffering from a severe case of strawberry pox. I couldn’t help but feel pity more than anything, so I promptly rubbed mercury ointment onto his skin, and he calmed down quite a bit. He no longer rubs his body against tree trunks or smears mud on his hands to scratch himself like before. He just narrows his eyes and gazes longingly at the mercury ointment jar in my hand. So I figured this guy would be useful, used that jar as bait, and finally dragged Dodo all the way to a nearby village without incident.”

“Indeed, that’s true mastery of the jungle!”

Professor Accorti involuntarily let out a voice of admiration.

“Furthermore, Dodo’s strawberry pox was completely healed by Zama-kun’s treatment. Therefore, he’s become quite attached not just to me and Zama-kun, but also to Ms. Manuela—the daughter of Mr. Mendoza, this institute’s patron.”

Just then, the door opened slightly, and a beautiful face peered in. It was Miss Manuela herself—the very person they had just been discussing. She was a girl who exuded cleanliness from head to toe, like a freshly laundered white bedsheet. She was engaged to Zama and deeply connected through their shared humanitarian work. “I came to inquire how you would observe Dodo, Professor.”

Manuela’s bright tone seemed to refresh Professor Accorti’s mood, and the professor immediately commenced presenting his observations.

First, pointing to the tail, he declared it to be a so-called sacral malformation—a soft-tailed body. Next, the dense fur covering its entire body was examined, with the arrangement of about three hairs per follicle being explained as characteristic of chimpanzees. Furthermore, while the marked thinning of Dodo’s occipital region closely resembled “chimpanzee-pattern baldness”… his ears too were the rounded ears of a chimpanzee. Next, the Professor stated that the high supraorbital arch in the eyebrow region was also characteristic of chimpanzees. Thus, Dodo was gradually being proven to be a human-chimpanzee hybrid.

Then, the Professor abruptly changed his tone and placed a hand atop Dodo’s head. “This, you see, is what’s called microcephaly.” “In other words, there’s no skull development and no brain volume.” “Therefore, this is similar to hominid fossils said to have low intelligence levels.” At the words “primitive human,” the entire room erupted into commotion. Before anyone else, Manuela was the first to ask a question.

“So Dodo is a primitive human then.” “...who should have gone extinct millions of years ago...” “In any case, I believe this can be argued in parallel with the theory of him being a human-chimpanzee hybrid.” “No, I shall assert.” “Since ancient times, among any savages, there has been no skull as inferior as this—”

A living primitive human—primitive human bones given flesh and blood—this had to be called one of nature’s great marvels. Then how had Dodo been born? From where had he come…? And if he were a pure human, how could his original form have remained unchanged through millions of years of transmission? First, let us consider Dodo as a human-beast hybrid child. Then why had he wandered alone, separated from any group? Had he been abandoned… or exiled…? Alternatively, had he been solitary since early childhood, he could never have survived unscathed in that jungle teeming with beasts and royal pythons. Moreover, not even a hint of nostalgia for his homeland jungle could be detected in Dodo.

What wild animal exists that doesn’t feel nostalgia? When captured and placed in a different environment, any creature would show homesickness by refusing food—yet mysteriously, this was absent in Dodo.

Then, Professor Accorti turned to Kirk and said. "I haven’t heard where you captured him yet. Exactly where did you find this Dodo?"

“That would be around 28 degrees east longitude and 4 degrees north latitude.” “It’s on the border between British Sudan and Belgian Congo… About a hundred kilometers northeast of Ituri’s anthropoid ape habitat, and roughly thirty miles from the demonic zone of the ‘Devil’s Urine Puddle.’”

Devil’s Urine Puddle—the moment they heard those words, the entire group fell deathly silent. Only the sound of heavy rain pounding on the roof continued to roar. “I see… Near the Devil’s Urine Puddle—” Having come this far, even Professor Accorti adopted a dismissive tone, as if he could readily abandon their efforts. For combining Dodo with the Devil’s Urine Puddle was no longer within the realm of scientists. Then the Professor—having resolved to abruptly return home for Dodo’s sake—left while hurriedly checking his watch. Afterwards, Zama and Kirk gazed vacantly at the rooftops with tired eyes.

Both the sugar-frosted mosque rooftops and the forest of masts in the harbor swayed beyond the curtain of rain, quivering like reflections in a warped mirror. At that moment came the faint sense of an Air Madagascar mail plane threading through the rain mist, slipping past at low altitude.

Zama suddenly sat up and said.

“You see, about that…”

“What about it? “What’s this about the airplane?”

“In other words, it’s about Dodo. Dodo never shows fear when he sees airplanes. On the contrary, he looks delighted and even lets out strange cries. Even so, there are no air routes near the Devil’s Urine Puddle. Both British Imperial Airways and French African Airways are separated by more than half a degree on the map. Strange. Dodo, called both an anthropoid ape and a primitive human, does not show fear of airplanes. And yet, when he sees king cobras or leopards, he becomes terribly frightened.”

“He must have seen airplanes from the Devil’s Urine Puddle expedition.” “But I don’t think he’d get accustomed after just five or six times.”

Dodo, who should have been living a primitive existence since time immemorial, showed no fear of airplanes—this was truly beyond mere strangeness. After all, just as Professor Accorti had once suspected, could Dodo be some sort of artificial creation? Thinking this and gazing at him, it began to seem that some horrific secret beyond all imagination lay hidden within Dodo’s flesh—so profoundly terrifying that it made one’s very soul shudder.

It was growing dark.

Then, from beyond the rain haze, a foghorn echoed faintly. The E.D.S. coastal ship Bengazi Maru had now entered Mozambique. But that ship was now carrying fate’s messenger—the one who would soon drive them all into the Devil’s Urine Puddle.

The Angel-and-Devil Lady

Aboard the Bengazi Maru was a Belgian youth named Jan Bedetz.

He was the son of an old friend of Manuela’s father and had been her childhood companion since their well-curb days, but whether due to incompatibility or not, Manuela detested him intensely. Moreover, he was a man who couldn’t settle down anywhere—until recently working as a co-pilot for Egypt’s Misr Air Company—but even there he apparently got into fights and returned to Mozambique. This was because Manuela’s father acted as his guardian while managing Jan’s inherited estate.

However, when Jan Bedetz arrived, the atmosphere at the research institute suddenly became chaotic. This was because Jan not only defiled and abused the patients but also showed a contemptuous attitude toward Zama and Kirk, deriding them as "this mixed-blood brat."

“Did something happen?” Once again today, wearing a worried expression and fiddling with a button on Zama’s chest, Manuela asked in her gentle upturned gaze.

“Earlier, Jan had a terrible time—he was panting while gulping water.” “Then Mr. Kirk was rubbing mustard plaster on his knuckles.” “So he did it after all?” “Kirk did say he’d take care of it someday.” “If he struck with the force of the Lord of the Jungle felling a wild ox, it must have hurt terribly.” “Still...if you were in Jan’s shoes—”

“Huh? Whatever do you mean?”

Manuela challenged. “In other words,” said Zama with clinical detachment beneath his empathy, “when he returns here after three years and finds an unexpected version of me existing for you, it’s only natural he’d want to lash out.”

However, Manuela gazed at him with sorrowful eyes, “No matter what notions that man concocts from his own selfish grudges, there’s no reason we should be dragged into them.” “Jan is Jan, and we are we—that’s all there is to it.”

As if making him smell her fragrant hair, she buried her cheek against Zama’s chest. “I respect your Japanese blood.”

Her way of speaking was just like that of an honest child. To Zama, it resonated like a weak electric current—pleasantly. Then Manuela abruptly changed the subject: “Oh right, I have to give this week’s report.” “But Dodo remains unchanged, you know.”

and began to explain the results of Dodo’s domestication training that she had undertaken.

“It was three weeks ago that he understood fire, you know. What about his manual skills?” “There’s no need to rush so much already… But what the Professor instructed has been taken care of properly. Lately, I’ve been observing exactly what mood Dodo is in—that is, his emotional expressions as well.”

“Hmm… Do you really think you can tell?” “Yes, first of all, Dodo dislikes being laughed at.” “Moreover, he recognizes colors and has reliable memory.” “Additionally, he possesses considerable learning ability.” “So—about that narcissus-colored envelope I always use—he began remembering to deposit it in the premises’ postbox around yesterday.”

“Oh, that’s quite an achievement! And what about the feed-based experiment the Professor mentioned?” Through this, they should have been able to clearly determine whether Dodo was a Primitive Human or a Human-Beast Hybrid.

Of course, this was under Professor Accorti’s direction—or, to put it in technical terms, research on “skin pigment migration.” For example, when they reduced the amount of fruit in the diet of Black people whose staple food was fruit, their skin color became lighter. Furthermore, when they reduced the regular intake of milk among dusky Hottentots, their color gradually darkened. Notably, anthropoid apes showed rapid changes; in other words, by reducing the amount of fresh fruit Dodo consumed, they aimed to observe the effects as quickly as possible.

When Manuela heard about the feed, she pursed her lips slightly and,

“That won’t do.” “Dodo is human.” “How cruel science is!” “Oh, give Dodo protein—if he has chimpanzee blood, he’ll immediately weaken—reduce his food to observe his skin color… Such things—I believe that’s what you do to animals.” “Dodo is unequivocally human—he’s my friend.” With a deep sense of sympathy and firm conviction, Manuela declared resolutely. Her bone-deep Catholic education would not permit her to yield an inch in such situations. Zama gazed at Manuela’s face in rapture for a while, as if beholding a pure lily flower.

Truly, Dodo would not leave Manuela’s side even for an instant. If she wasn’t there, he let out a sorrowful cry that could still be heard even now. “Miss, you’ll become entranced before long—” Kirk joked, but given how intimate the two of them were, one couldn’t help but want to say exactly that.

However, that night, a strange event occurred. When night fell, the temperature dropped somewhat, but the unpleasant lethargy and sweating remained. A halo of humidity surrounded the lamp’s light.

At times like these, even Dodo’s growls took on a different quality. It was truly a sweltering, unpleasant evening—the kind that could make anyone lose their composure.

That evening, Zama engaged in a heated debate with Jan. The idea was that selling Dodo would fetch around a hundred thousand or so, and by adding Jan’s assets to that sum, they could expand the research institute into a full-fledged general hospital in both name and function. In other words, Jan sought to commercialize the social facility that Zama was operating.

However, Manuela opposed this most vehemently. Even so, Jan scoffed, declared that he would persuade her father and come that evening, then left with an air of confidence.

And so, a crisis came to the research institute.

Then, that night, when Zama couldn’t sleep and was about to head to his study, he passed by Dodo’s room and found the lock unlatched. Just then, from the direction of the room where patient visitors rested, there came a faint rustling sound. Surely Dodo wouldn’t run away—he thought—as he quietly opened the door to that room. Zama was struck by such intense shock that he barely managed to suppress an involuntary cry.

The one there… was not Dodo.

As if they had forgotten their earlier animosity, Jan and Manuela stood facing each other, nearly embracing. Zama first doubted his own eyes. Next, he heard a conversation that made him doubt even his ears.

“Will you love me?”

Even Jan—usually so dissolute in his womanizing—said in a trembling voice,

“Yes—will you love me too?” Manuela breathed poignantly.

That Manuela—what a transformation from her daytime self?!

Just at that moment, Kirk came downstairs with a big stretch. Then Jan suddenly pushed Manuela away and disappeared through the far door while waving his hand. Zama stood frozen in place blankly, as if the world had gone completely dark. Just as he thought Jan had vanished, something happened that made Zama gasp once more.

For what Manuela began babbling—obscene matters one would never expect from the pure, innocent Manuela... nor even from an ordinary townswoman lacking ladylike refinement—she recited them as if declaiming to herself.

“Manuela!”

This was absolutely not a ghost—it was the real Manuela. The angel of humanitarianism—unyielding even when scorched by day—manifested in an unimaginable guise by night. Which was real? Which was the real Manuela? Zama shook his head like an idiot and walked out into the hallway.

The moment he stepped out, Kirk arrived leading Dodo by the hand.

“You’ve gotta speak properly to the young lady in charge of training.” “I forgot to lock it, so he got out on his own—and now even this guy’s all worked up.” “Where were you?”

“In the hallway by the wainscoting of the patient visitors’ room. Something must’ve happened to get him all agitated.” Indeed, Dodo was exhibiting a frenzy unlike anything seen before—an abnormal intensity of passion. His canine teeth were bared to the gums like iron hooks; his eyes glowed gold through bloodshot veins. Letting out a low, stuttering growl, he stood in such a state—the latent wildness within him threatening to erupt with such violence that even Kirk instinctively drew back his hand.

After putting Dodo inside and locking the door, Zama urged Kirk onward as they went outside. Eventually, they emerged at the famous Malagash Inlet, where the distance to the mainland had narrowed to about two cho (200 meters).

Scalding rain... A murky tide... Wave crests phosphorescently aglow came rolling in. And the tide’s retreating traces on the sand were beautiful as a starry-moonlit night. But Zama himself couldn’t comprehend why he’d come to this place with Kirk.

“What do you want to do, moping around like that…" “You didn’t come here to chant sutras over a dead cat’s corpse, did you?” Kirk said in a tone meant to lift the spirits of Zama, who was filled with a deep-seated uneasiness unlike his usual self. Then Zama suddenly turned around, “Hey, won’t you sell Dodo to me?”

“Huh?! Sell Dodo?!” Kirk was also quite surprised, “What for? “What do you plan to do by buying him from me?” As Zama involuntarily looked up, a flash of murderous aura passed fleetingly across his brow. I’ll kill him! If Manuela hadn’t been ensnared by that demonic entity, such a bizarre dual personality would never have manifested. And so it was Zama who had come here—unwittingly drawn by the stench of decay in this inlet.

Kirk, seeming to have already realized that, adopted a more solemn tone,

“Well then, I’ll take that proposal seriously.” “Then, first—before even getting to whether we sell him or not—there’s something I want settled.” “It’s about whether Dodo is a beast or a human.” “Is he an animal we can sell, or a person we must not sell… Well, Zama, which do you think it is?”

When told this, Zama’s throat gulped audibly. However, he only trembled slightly and couldn’t say anything.

“Human trafficking… slave trading… who in this modern age would even speak of such things?” “Or if we consider Dodo a human-beast hybrid—how would you judge that case?” “Mixed blood—same difference.” “If Dodo’s a mix of chimpanzee and human, then I’m half-black—and you’re a three-quarter mixed-blood.” “That we’re scorned as inferior to whites… and that you—acknowledging half-beast blood—order me to sell Dodo…”

While listening to Kirk’s words as they seeped into his very being, Zama, amidst the dark sea’s disheartening roar, secretly began to sob.

*

That night, he tossed and turned in bed, ultimately never sleeping a wink. The more he wrestled with thoughts of Manuela and Dodo’s bizarre behavior, the more his mind grew alert—sleep was utterly out of the question.

"Is Manuela's condition a dual personality like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde?"—as the tangled threads grew ever more complex, Zama had become like a demon in pursuit of answers. Or was it the result of having deepened his sympathy for Dodo too much? He hadn’t indulged in any imagination that would defile the lady, but could it be that some demonic influence of Dodo’s had entwined itself with Manuela’s affections? At that time, Dodo had been separated by a partition, but through it, he was manipulating Manuela inside from afar—such a feat would be child’s play for a native witch doctor. Moreover, there was something unfathomable about Dodo, who didn’t even flinch at the sight of airplanes.

Whether it was Manuela's inherent disposition or Dodo's demonic influence—the questions swirling like a revolving lantern in his mind finally vanished after exhausting his thoughts, and Zama noticed an unexpectedly large hole yawning open beneath his feet. Ah, it was neither dual personality nor Dodo’s demonic influence. It was simply Manuela’s betrayal. When Jan came and saw her pure white skin, then turned back and looked at Zama’s jet-black skin, Manuela came to wholeheartedly dislike Zama. Whore! Damned whore! In his bed, Zama roared with words that clawed and tore. At last, night gave way to dawn.

The rain began to gleam like oil in the faint light of dawn.

The following night, after summoning Kirk to his study, Zama began speaking in a charged manner.

“You—I intend to take a trip.”

“Fine. You were acting a bit strange last night, but I’m sure it was just exhaustion.” “Where are you off to?” “Switzerland or Vienna, perhaps?”

“No, I want to journey to the very heart of this continent.” “From Congo’s Ituri, straight northward—I will go to the Unexplored Territories.”

“Huh?”

“I’m going to the Devil’s Urine Puddle!” Occluder of the Nile’s Source Kirk stared dumbfounded at Zama, but eventually,

“Alright, I’ll hear you out. However, there’s no such thing as sightseeing that risks your life. Of course, you must have both purpose and prospects for this.”

“That’s right. By the way, Kirk—you enter the Congo to hunt prohibited beasts. So what’s the most you ever made?”

“Well, fifty thousand dollars, I suppose. When I caught an okapi, it was about that much.” “And gorillas?” “You can’t catch those. They might seem slow-witted, but they’re cunning, and on top of that, downright cruel—makes ’em a real pain to deal with. If they were orangutan-like professors or chimpanzee-like socialites, that’d be one thing—but these pessimistic, skeptical types are the hardest for a hunter to handle. However, even just shooting ’em dead would bring in twenty or thirty thousand.”

“Then… if there were a valley where countless gorilla corpses lay lined up…” “Roughly estimating six hundred universities worldwide—even if you sold one skeleton to each—you could become a millionaire.” “But that’s your job.” “My purpose lies elsewhere.”

“Don’t talk nonsense.” Kirk began laughing dryly. “If you’re getting cocky just ’cause I’m listening serious-like—if a place like that existed, you think I’d let it slip by?” “It does exist.” Zama declared with full confidence. “I say this trusting in your courage through our friendship. By the way—do you know the historian Herodotus?”

“Of course, I’ve never seen him, but I know the name.” “A learned man from ancient Greece, I suppose.”

“That’s right. However, within what Herodotus wrote, there is this account concerning the source of the Nile River.”

Herodotus once heard the following story about the source of the Nile from the governor of Egyptus at Minerva. The source of the Nile lies deep within a valley called the Crescent Mountains—two peaks named Crophi and Memphis located between Syene and Elephantine. In those Crescent Mountains lies a lake called "Colc," where King Bamektis is said to have lowered a rope thousands of "ogye" long without reaching the bottom. In other words, the source of the Nile is said to lie even further beyond that.

Furthermore, there lay the "Swamp of Tangled Roots" and the "Unknown Forest Graveyard," where dwarves dwelled and tailed humanoids existed. And that place was none other than the Devil’s Urine Puddle, where the diminutive tailed humanoids dwelling there were none other than Dodo—this was the conclusion Zama had reached.

“I see. But why don’t you explain that difficult Latin you mentioned?”

“You see, the ‘Swamp of Tangled Roots’ refers to a marshland of intricately intertwined roots. “It means that the swamp—a labyrinth of roots—lies beneath the jungle. “And the ‘Unknown Forest Graveyard’ refers to the final resting place of giant beasts. “It is said that elephants and anthropoid apes—those who never show their corpses—come there to sleep. “Hey Kirk, either way, it’s the Devil’s Urine Puddle. “Moreover, it’s the homeland of the Tailed Humanoid Dodo.”

Now that he mentioned it, Kirk had also heard a similar native legend about that. Ngumbe—a village near where Dodo was discovered—had an unfathomable cave called “Leo” on the northwestern mountainside facing the Devil’s Urine Puddle—this, they say, is the birthplace of humankind. In other words, their ancestors had emerged from that cave in ancient times alongside the animals.

Truly, now that he mentioned it, weren't they countless? The fact that such absurd legends were substantiated by expeditions—and that these very things had often served as catalysts, stirring exploratory desires and leading to great discoveries!

Here... beyond that cave now lay the Devil’s Urine Puddle. Moreover, that place was regarded as the birthplace of the hybrid Dodo. “How about it? The Devil’s Urine Puddle could remain pristine for hundreds of millions of years.” “There, both animals and plants remained as they were in the primitive Earth.” “Bestiality and slaughter were nothing more than natural laws.” “So I’ll take Professor Accorti’s theory one step further.” “In other words... Dodo must be a hybrid born from a chimpanzee and the primitive humans living there—those who share an affinity with them.” “First of all, if we consider one parent to be a Tailed Humanoid—there’s the tail.” “Apart from that, in appearance and intelligence, he’s exactly like a chimpanzee.”

Kirk, utterly overwhelmed, blinked dejectedly. Zama’s strange passion—so unlike his usual self—left him wondering where such intensity could have come from in such a quiet man... He stared blankly at the other man’s lips.

“And then,” Zama continued smoothly.

“Why Dodo feels no nostalgia—I think I’ve finally understood it.” “You see, he contracted Ichigatou disease and became aware of his impending death.” “And he went to the Forest Graveyard to die.” “Once that happens, they can no longer return... They instinctively understand that they must now venture into an unknown world.” “At that moment, Dodo took a different path.” “And so, unable to reach the Forest Graveyard, he fell into your hands…” “That’s why he doesn’t resist even you…” “Even coming to such a human settlement, he feels no nostalgia—” “Hey Kirk, I want to go to that graveyard—to the Devil’s Urine Puddle.”

"Primitive humans, anthropoid apes, elephants—they’d all do the same, wouldn’t they? When they sensed their impending death and tried to journey to the Forest Graveyard, they lost all instinctive desire to return home—this was Zama’s lucid speculation."

Yet this Zama was smiling with lonely melancholy. The hollow shell of love, instead of seeking death, must have chosen uncharted lands. Eventually, a firm pact was formed between him and Kirk. However, when he told Manuela about it, she unexpectedly suggested going along. When sacrifice tried to turn Manuela toward the happiness it desired, she unexpectedly kicked it aside and resolutely went forth. Zama became completely unable to understand.

Before long, with Jan—who followed after Manuela like a snake—added to their party and Dodo in tow, they first set out for Kondeloga, which would serve as their initial base.

“Lately, Shichiro—what’s happened to you?”

When she had something to discuss, Manuela called Zama into the shade where muscat fruits hung down to the ground.

Under the scorching direct sunlight following the end of the rainy season, all shadows took on a pale purple hue, while the sunlit laterite soil stood out vividly fresh, as if painted. That was the day before the expedition’s first departure from Kondeloga.

Manuela blinked rapidly with downcast eyes, as if suppressing the urge to throw herself into his arms.

“It’s nothing.” “I remain unchanged as ever, but…”

“No, you’re different.” “The Shichiro from before wasn’t such a cold person.” “Women are most sensitive about such things.” “Has something upset you?”

Then Zama found himself perplexed once more. Until that moment, he had been seething with fury toward Manuela over Jan and that night's madness. Yet what he now observed was innocence... awkwardness. Somehow it seemed he might have been misinterpreting things—even Zama began sensing this possibility.

After that incident, a palpable distance settled between Jan and Manuela. At the very least, such incidents seemed to have occurred only once, for the next day, she flatly rejected Jan’s attempt to establish a general hospital as his stronghold by relying on her father. Jan must have been just as surprised as Zama by this. However, he was not the kind of man to ever forget the sweetness of that single night. No matter how much he was given the cold shoulder and ignored, he did not leave the expedition, biding his time for another opportunity.

To Manuela, both Zama and Jan must have been thinking the same thing. She was a mysterious woman—was it dual personality or Dodo’s doing? As Jan shamelessly forced his way into joining the expedition, Zama continued erecting a stubborn wall against Manuela while remaining deeply conflicted over various matters.

Incidentally, the funding for this expedition came from Manuela’s father, who considered it nothing more than a sightseeing trip for Zama to recuperate from his fatigue.

Kirk, too, could feel the fierce winds heralding the great swamp’s roar... but to stake his life on exploring the depths of the Devil’s Urine Puddle—such a thought had never so much as crossed his mind. And Manuela, too, had been thinking the same way. Just that if he could take a break from work for a while… especially since Zama’s recent behavior had been so strange, she earnestly hoped this trip would allow him to recuperate—the matter of the Devil’s Urine Puddle had never actually crossed her mind from the start. Moreover, even Zama had been changing in the same way.

Just when he thought it would be only himself and Kirk at first, Manuela unexpectedly joined, and Jan came chasing after them. As he continued to behold Manuela’s beauty, this expedition had come to seem not an assault on the Devil’s Urine Puddle at all, but rather—with Jan excluded—a heaven-sent, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Jungle, rivers with crocodiles, wild beasts, venomous snakes. Here, all manner of things stood ready to act as perpetrators in their stead.

And it seemed Jan harbored the same notion. And so, the two harboring hostility in their hearts—along with an expedition that had strayed far from its original intent—departed Kondeloga several days later.

Now, regarding the route for attacking the Devil's Urine Puddle—it was bordered on its western and southern boundaries by Congo's "Anthropoid Ape Habitat Zone," on the north by a great precipice forming a dangerous Quicksand Zone, with only the eastern side lying under a jungle belt. However, all previous expeditions had vanished without a trace the moment they entered that place. Truly, as the old saying goes—"the mummy retrievers become mummies themselves"—for even as expedition after expedition followed, not a single survivor ever returned. Nevertheless, the group decided to proceed along that path regardless.

Two hundred porters—along with vehicles and livestock forming a serpentine column—advanced along the British garrison’s military telegraph lines, traversing a vast plain dotted with anthills. Under the earth’s glare and scorching direct heat, even inside the mule-drawn covered wagon, Manuela fell asleep. As they proceeded, there were traces where termites had gnawed through the grass. To avoid attacks by army ants, they turned it into barren land. If termites were near, then a marsh must be close by. Perhaps it was mere imagination, but the grass was gradually growing taller. Before long, a beautiful marshland that would become their first night’s campsite came into view.

At the water's edge, acacias stood among hollyhocks and morning glories. The water floated lapis lazuli-colored lilies across its surface while flesh-colored pelicans flocked with raucous cries. Manuela began darting eagerly along the water's edge, marveling that such a paradise could exist within the wilderness. At that moment, Kirk mentioned that he remembered something.

“From that marsh, beyond those thickets, about ten miles further on lies where Dodo was discovered.” “Hey Dodo, must be nice returning to your homeland after so long—let’s go.” However, Dodo hungrily followed Manuela’s every movement. Pure white calves, the beautiful symmetry when she stretched to pluck flowers. In the eyes chasing her lingered an unfathomable will tinged with tormented sorrow.

Moreover, since arriving here, Dodo had been hearing something's call. At times he would gaze fearfully at what appeared to be a lone stretch of primeval forest in the terraced Central Mountain Range, or startle at the slightest rustle of leaves—moreover, every wild thing seemed poised to awaken. Both Zama and Kirk had long been aware of this. "Dodo failed to reach the forest graveyard and fell into human hands," said Kirk. "But soon enough—whether the wildness he lost then grows stronger or he stays in our world drawn to Manuela—one path'll win out for sure. But we gotta stay sharp, hear?"

The expedition team had a purpose in bringing Dodo along. It was thought that if taken to the place where he had first met Kirk, he would likely remember his homeland and take the lead. If the team followed his tracks, they might be able to take the secret path to the Devil’s Urine Puddle—one undetectable to others—or so they theorized. However, that attempt ended in failure. Dodo had long since lost any desire to return home, having become aware of Manuela’s charm for the first time.

That night, for the first time before dawn, they heard a lion’s roar. In the thicket, they also heard the cries of a wild boar likely being attacked by a leopard. When they had crossed the thicket inhabited by dangerous horned snakes, a terrible misfortune swiftly descended upon the team.

All—save for the resistant mules and six water buffaloes they had hastily driven into the river—the wild oxen, camels, horses, and sheep alike were felled by poisonous tsetse flies. From that point onward, it became a true ordeal. The porters began clamoring for higher pay as the loads had grown bulkier; the earth was scorched crimson with cracks snaking across it, making it feel like the edge of the world—or perhaps hell itself. The shrubs too stood only sporadically across that wilderness. Occasionally, even when tall trees remained, they were withered—crumbling and falling with just a few bullets.

However, the area was already near the mountainous region. To the left, piercing through the chain of peaks, Congo’s Ruwenzori crowned with snow could be seen. Beneath it lay a sheer cliff of weathered granite, starkly crimson. From there, carved into white clouds and mountain shadows and stretching far and wide, lay the great sea of trees leading to the Devil’s Urine Puddle.

At dawn the following day, they heard a hippopotamus’s cry beside an ochre-colored muddy river. At that tuba-like sound from an instrument, Manuela found herself longing for her hometown.

But still, this was merely the threshold of Dark Africa.

The terrifying thorny grass they had seen in yesterday’s thickets—the giant venomous spiders weaving through their dense growth— But today—the gaps between trees narrowed—and with each step—the character of those sweltering depths grew more pronounced. And this three-day journey was just under forty miles. They entered what would become their final base—the Makonde village—in the afternoon of the following day.

From here, they should be able to see the eastern edge of the Devil’s Urine Puddle at an estimated distance of twenty miles within the mountain’s shadow. And at last, the peaceful journey they had undertaken thus far came to an end, and the assault on the Devil’s Urine Puddle—those twenty miles that rivaled a century’s journey—began.

“That’s absurd! Goin’ as porters’d be marchin’ straight to yer graves!”

The Chief was gulping down palm wine and smoking Indian hemp in extremely high spirits, yet even so, he refused to listen to this.

“Well, proof over arguments—let me show you then.”

When they went outside, the base of the mountain range was a sea of trees. At the distant end of the sea of trees, something like smoke or mist could be seen swaying and rising. Then, a nearby native cried out in a terrified voice. “Look! The smoke’s humming!” Perhaps it was just their imagination, but the swirling smoke seemed to emit a low hum. As the sun began to set, it glowed sulfur-yellow and by then had already thickened like a mass of clouds. The haze hummed—in the depths of the uninhabited sea of trees, this mist was said to rise daily near dusk. And ever since then, not a single expedition team that passed through this tribe to assault the Devil’s Urine Puddle had returned. However, when pressed about how far they could go, they finally relented—the next day began their push through the jungle with the porters.

The place was an impenetrable thicket of vines and creepers—dense enough to stop even a tiger—and the air hung thick and viscous with malaria-laden dampness. Avoiding attacks from giant ants, scorpions, and land tortoises while pursuing a troop of monkeys... After five hours of grueling travel—astonishing that Manuela had endured it—their field of vision finally opened up.

At the isthmus, the military wire bent at a right angle. In other words, whatever prevented extending the line forward must have lain beyond the newly encroaching jungle. As expected, the porters had come to a halt. When urged too forcefully with "Go on! I'll pay you!" some among them would start crying out, "Oh, Mama—"

In truth, it was here that the entire group had tried to turn back. No one retained any enthusiasm for the expedition; merely having reached this point under Kirk’s command could already be considered a great success by the entire group. Then Zama alone—for reasons unknown—strongly insisted they press on.

Murderous intent... enveloped this quiet man’s countenance, yet at that moment, no one noticed. This opportunity—he would kill Jan within the final jungle. And there stood a barrier of parasitic trees with aerial roots as tall as a man’s height, beneath which pooled viscous water thick with decaying leaves. Unaware that this act was destined to draw him into the flame like a moth, he nevertheless pressed forward, leaving the porters behind. At that moment, to chase a snake passing through the isthmus, Kirk set a wildfire ablaze. That smoke—which two members of the team had it been whose final glimpse of the mundane world was reflected in its haze? And thus began the final jungle trek.

Then, before long, the spaces between the trees began to glitter.

The forest ended—and at that moment, fourteen or fifteen figures who had been hiding God knows where surrounded the entire group. They were unfamiliar natives. Moreover, their leader was wearing short pants. "Well, good day."

Kirk stepped forward and greeted them amiably. Yet even this seasoned man choked up, his voice trailing off into a hoarse whisper. The pistol... its barrel pointed meaninglessly. Eventually, when yanked by the chin through the forest, below them spread a vast basin. Clusters of thatched roofs dotted the area, and among them stood even structures resembling warehouses.

“Where are we?”

Kirk spoke as if trying to keep the group from panicking. Then, unexpectedly, German words—"Unexplored Territories"—spilled from the man’s lips. When they saw his face—sunburnt though it was from tropical exposure—there could be no doubt: he was white.

“You must have been surprised,” “I’ve been here for over twenty years.” “We’re hiding here to block the Nile’s water source in case of emergency.” “I am a German man named Bayerthal.”

And thus, the hand of fate drew the four into the unimaginable horrors of the Devil’s Urine Puddle.

"A Night in Monkey Brew Hamlet"

The basin where the group was led resembled the bottom of a gorge, its reddish sandstone cliffs zigzag-carved with stone steps continuing far below. These staircases occupied one position on each of the basin’s four sides, while all other areas appeared unclimbable even to wild monkeys. Yet the five encountered no harm whatsoever. On the contrary, the eccentric Bayerthal remained in remarkably high spirits.

“To think I’d meet you white gentlemen here—it’s like a dream.” “How about trying some rare ‘Shushah’?”

With that, the eccentric man poured a viscous substance into a coconut shell,

“Hey, you must have heard stories about monkey wine when you were children, right? But when you come here, there exists something that can truly be called ‘monkey wine.’ This is secretly made by chimpanzees. They ferment wild grapes, figs, and such in tree hollows, and because they drink that stuff, they end up becoming those rowdy louts—ha ha ha ha! So I decided to name this place ‘Monkey Brew Hamlet.’” Saying this, he offered cassava starch bread to the hesitant group while taking swigs of “monkey wine” himself and smoked leaves of “Dagga”—a narcotic herb resembling Indian hemp—in place of tobacco. Seemingly quite intoxicated by both substances, Bayerthal was growing increasingly agitated. Based on the salt-and-pepper state of his hair, he must have been nearing fifty. Only his bold-looking eyes still glinted sharply even in his dazed, pleasant intoxication.

Eventually, when pressed with questions, he began recounting how he had come here.

“I was once a sergeant major in the German East Africa Garrison, but in March 1916, I was defeated at Lake Tanganyika.” “At that time, our unit lost our retreat route and kept heading north until we reached Victoria Nile.” “It was a journey so wretched it defies description—our unit of a hundred men dwindled one by one until finally only six or seven remained.” “They succumbed to fevers and were killed by poisonous snakes.” “So when we finally managed to flee this far, even the British forces stopped pursuing us.” “They must have thought we’d perished near the Devil’s Urine Puddle.” “But we survived.” “We lived like Robinson Crusoe—didn’t even know when the war ended—and even had a child to boot.” “Ha ha ha ha! Of course, my mother was a native woman.”

Having said this, Bayerthal stared fixedly at Manuela with eyes that glinted unnervingly. Due to the narcotic fumes, his enunciation had grown slurred, and his demeanor was buoyant to an unnerving degree. “Now, just two years ago, a missionary from Makonde stumbled in here. When I looked, he was a German.” The conversation took off. “I heard then that the Great War had ended and learned for the first time that my homeland had changed, becoming a Nazi-dominated, anti-Communist world. However, missionaries dispatched to foreign lands have a special mission—they engage in espionage and propaganda. He was that kind of man. So we decided to report that the entire tribe had been wiped out and fabricated a web of lies—mixing truth and falsehood—to spread word of it to the Makonde villages. In other words, we made sure to spread the word on our way back that this had become a dangerous place one must not enter. However, between me and that man, a firm agreement had been formed. Mark my words—no matter how savage the land, I’ll prove myself a model German citizen!”

Wondering what this modern-day Robinson Crusoe would say next, the group leaned in with keen interest, yet they all felt an inescapable premonition of looming danger. Bayerthal continued talking with feigned innocence.

“You see, in case of emergency—say if war breaks out with Britain and France—first we’d block the Blue Nile and Black Nile’s water sources in Ethiopia. Then I’ll emerge at the White Nile and block its upper reaches. And what happens then?! The Nile River—Egypt’s lifeblood—will dry up completely, leaving its bed exposed! Of course, irrigation water becomes insufficient and famine occurs. Because boat travel becomes impossible, transportation will be completely severed. When that happens, how will Egypt’s conglomerates and British forces contain the surging momentum of rebellion?”

At that very moment, a roar was heard low in the sky. Every evening, to ward off insect swarms from the Devil's Urine Puddle, they supposedly scattered soapstone powder and other dust mists from above. That was the true nature of the "Singing Mist" visible from Makonde. The reason Dodo showed no surprise upon seeing the airplane was likely because he had been nearby and knew of its presence; this was surmised. When they inquired with Bayerthal about the airplane... he proudly explained that it belonged to a British pilot who had killed his colleague at a garrison in British Kenya, stolen a single reconnaissance aircraft to flee here, subsequently attacked a transcontinental railway survey team at Yambure, and thus they would lack neither insecticide nor gasoline for the foreseeable future.

All the while, his eyes crawled over Manuela's hand resting on the sleeping Dodo's back as if savoring every inch, but gradually it became apparent this wasn't merely drunkenness. Suddenly, he began a shattering roar of laughter.

“You understand now, don’t you? I am the Nile Blocker.” “Ha ha ha ha! You’re all making such strange faces—probably thinking I’m some exiled madman banished to this island. Well, that’s fine by me!” “But here, there are weapons and explosives!” “Moreover, a contact plane comes once a month.” “A Savoia-Marchetti large transport aircraft comes flying from the North African Airlines route.” “There are warehouses; where there’s an airfield, there’s also a hangar.” “All have been concealed with ingenious camouflage so they can’t be detected from above.”

The expedition team gradually grew pale as they listened. They realized a terrifying crisis that might cost them their lives tonight was now drawing ever closer. Undoubtedly, the reason previous expeditions had no survivors was because Bayerthal had killed them here. Having revealed such a major secret that could determine a nation's rise or fall, there was no way he would let them return unharmed. Not a single person—starting with Kirk—made a sound; they had all become as despondent as corpses.

However, Zama alone—being a psychiatrist after all—observed things differently from the others. Listening to Bayerthal’s words, there were not infrequent instances where he would abruptly bring up unrelated matters—a phenomenon that could be regarded as flight of ideas. This was one characteristic symptom specific to the mentally ill. Even an ordinary person would lose the ability to discern minor falsehoods after spending half a month in such an isolated environment. In Bayerthal’s case, it had been over twenty years—no wonder he came to believe the missionary’s fabrications as truth. Moreover, he was numbing his brain with Indian hemp.

But now, it was no different from a madman's blade to us. No matter how they struggled... there seemed no choice but to become victims of his madness.

The insect control systems and airplanes felt like modern civilization pressed back-to-back against a mystical realm, but the Nile blockade and Italian plane communications were nothing more than brilliant yet insubstantial fantasies—like an aurora conjured by the madman Bayerthal. No—now, he who sat imperiously in this Monkey Wine Palace was in truth a pitiable, good-natured fool being puppeteered by the tongue of a devil-like pastor, or so Zama alone believed.

Before long, the group of five—now including Dodo—were confined to the hut. Yet no guards were stationed, nor were any locks placed. Their weapons and ammunition still remained in hand. This wasn’t due to any negligence on Bayerthal’s part, but rather because the four stone staircases stood heavily guarded.

In the depths of Africa’s night，the mountain chill thickened with despair. Amidst the listless croaking of toads and crickets，hyenas occasionally howled in the distant forest. If one thought this silent，still night might be the world’s last，not a single person uttered a word. At times，Jan would simply glare resentfully at Zama—as if their current plight was entirely due to you having proposed this venture.

As time passed and dawn approached, an unexpected event erupted upon Zama. At first glance, it didn’t seem particularly strange, but it held significant meaning.

Suddenly, Manuela began muttering something in German in a languid voice, as if talking to herself.

“Tomorrow, they say they’ll kill all the remaining ones except the female.” “Since they call it a humane method, they’ll probably use Akasuga poison.”

Surprisingly, the words were like a man's. Her tone was flat and monotonous, like a recitation. And strangest of all—Manuela now spoke German, a language she herself did not know at all. To fluently speak an unknown foreign language—such a thing—Zama, momentarily doubting his ears, stepped forward and began staring fixedly at Manuela.

“Manuela, what’s wrong with you? Snap out of it!” However, Manuela’s eyes remained fixed, reflecting a deranged wildness in their glassy stare. Perhaps her mind had become unhinged from overwhelming anguish. All the while, her delirious muttering persisted. “Do you think they’ll even try to escape?”

“It’s fine—we haven’t taken their weapons, so they must think they wouldn’t dare.” “For one, there are guards at the stone steps… and even if they tried escaping through there, the Makonde area’s like a spiderweb.”

When these eerie soliloquies ceased, the ghastly aura of darkness enveloped Manuela alone as the hour of death drew near. She paused briefly, then began again.

“The underground passage of the buffalo hut—ain’t no way to figure that out.” “What time is it?” “If it’s three o’clock now, that leaves two more hours.” Just whose words was Manuela mimicking? Zama gazed fixedly at Manuela with calm eyes, not moving a muscle, but involuntarily... shook his head at that moment. Then, Manuela shook her head in the same manner. Startled, Zama experimentally pursed his lips. Again, Manuela repeated the motion. Instantly, Zama pulled Manuela into a fierce embrace. Amidst choked sobs, tears streamed down where their cheeks met like a small waterfall.

“Oh, you…?!”

Kirk thought that Zama, who had been as composed as himself, had become unhinged as the hour of death drew near. Yet Zama did not loosen his grip in the slightest, alternating between weeping and laughing as if pouring out every ounce of his affection—a frenzy utterly beyond control. But Zama had not gone mad. In the midst of a great whirlpool of joy and sorrow, he was shouting these words brokenly: ("It's 'Latah'! Manuela has Malay blood—'Latah' is a hereditary disease specific to Malay women, a paroxysmal nervous disorder. Ah, now I understand everything! The cause of that night's madness with Jan... and now Manuela's seizure accidentally saving us...")

In Latah, mild seizures initially manifest during periods of physiological stress. At such times, even while fully aware of their actions, those afflicted feel an irresistible urge to mimic the speech of whoever stands before them and repeat their movements exactly—in other words, echolalia and echopraxia occur. As he considered this—that night from before—memories began surfacing one after another in Zama’s mind. At that time… when Jan had whispered, “Will you love me?”—Manuela had repeated those very words verbatim. Again, when he had tried to embrace her and put his arm around her, she had mimicked the same motion. Then those unladylike, obscene soliloquies—upon reflection—were also one of coprolalia’s symptoms. Ah—Manuela had Malay blood. Most likely, Malagasy blood of Malay descent had mixed into her lineage several generations back. And now, after those generations had passed, it had manifested in Manuela.

The curse of blood—Manuela too was not purely Caucasian after all. However, in this hut where no one else was speaking now, why had she spoken in German—a language she didn’t even know? That was the truly strange aspect of echolalia. Even sounds too distant and faint for normal ears to perceive would resonate in hearing that had grown abnormally acute during such episodes.

When Zama saw that Bayerthal’s two subordinates had just clattered past the front of the hut, he knew Manuela must have mimicked their conversation. This meant the underground passage beneath the buffalo hut was indeed the sole unmistakable escape route.

Thus, all doubts surrounding Manuela were resolved. Whether it was the Jekyll-and-Hyde-like dual personality, Dodo’s eerie apparition that evoked the grotesque, or even the five figures now trying to emerge—all ultimately stemmed from Manuela’s charming madness. Zama, weeping at the intensity of his rekindled affection, realized there was no more time to delay.

“Everyone—we might survive. Anyway, let’s head to the water buffalo hut immediately.”

First, to prevent Manuela’s coprolalia from being heard, they gagged her and, taking Dodo with them, stealthily slipped out of the hut. There, winding its way up from underground and emerging on the eastern cliff face, was an underground passage barely wide enough to crawl through. In this way, the group narrowly escaped with their lives from Monkey Wine Land.

As dawn began to break along the treeline of the sea of trees, they found themselves forced to flee—contrary to their pursuers’ likely path toward Makonde—deeper into the jungle drawing nearer to the Devil’s Urine Puddle.

Crumbling Earth

The jungle grew ever deeper and darker. The leaves of the Giant Sloth Plant—as large as calves—and the thickets of giant kudzu vines adorned with spike-like thorns stretched upward to the dense foliage that blotted out the sun. And there, in the shadow of those leaves, loomed the roots of a colossal tree—imposingly coiled like a giant octopus. Moreover, countless aerial-rooted parasitic trees hung down, tangled like a palisade and knotted like gnarled growths, forming a monstrous barrier that could only be called one of nature’s wonders. Moreover, below lay a thick, viscous swamp, and within the mire that submerged them up to their shins lurked horned venomous snakes.

Centipedes as thick as arms thudded down, while mountain leeches assailed them with a sound like rain pelting against an umbrella as they sought to suck blood. Their escape from Bayerthal’s devilish grasp had been but temporary, and a new despair began tormenting the group.

“Kill me, Zama.” Manuela finally started saying such things. She would let out hollow, raucous laughter and occasionally shoot sharp sidelong glances at Jan, whom she despised. She too was gradually beginning to lose her sanity.

Alone among them, Kirk kept swinging his axe tirelessly to clear a path forward. Yet even this child of nature, accustomed to miasmic jungles and torrential rains, was utterly exhausted—advancing a mere ten yards required two or three hours of life-or-death struggle. A single horse vine root lay four or five *cho* ahead; cutting it made the jungle groan deeply with a low rumble, followed by an eerie rustling sound as if something were pursuing them. Kirk had exhausted all his energy and slumped limply against a tree.

“What should we do? Do you have any ideas—like if we try this or that?” “What do you mean ‘what should we do’?! What the hell are we supposed to do?!” Jan turned around with bloodshot, bulging eyes.

“We should’ve just let Bayerthal kill us.” Far away lay a single pencil-thin stripe of sunlight. Beyond that, this jungle—so dark it verged on utter blackness—seethed with insects like a swirling dust cloud churning swamp vapors. When they tried shielding themselves with mosquito netting, the swarm clung to the mesh. The Devil’s Urine Puddle could not be far now. Yet amid these unspeakable trials, Dodo alone thrived. He carried Manuela on his back and scaled trees to gather nuts. Embraced by the jungle and whispered to by primal forces, his wildness surged back with ferocious vitality.

Jan saw this and sneered.

“It’s for this bastard’s sake. To send this freak back to his damn homeland, four people are going to end up dropping dead. Hey beast! You bastard must be thrilled to have a bride like Ms. Manuela, huh?”

Thus, as they continued wandering aimlessly, day eventually gave way to nightfall, marking their first night. Kirk, thinking to avoid the dangerous ground and select a suitable tree, casually glanced upward and noticed branches that had been tied together. A gorilla’s nest. However, gorillas had the habit of building new nests elsewhere after staying just one day. Thus, it made for the perfect shelter.

The second day—.

The entire group endured the dawn in the throes of severe diarrhea and sleeplessness. The swamp’s miasma induced cholera-like symptoms; their eyes sunken from a night of wasting away, the four walked feebly onward like hollowed-out husks. They were caked head to toe in mud with overgrown beards, and even Manuela exuded a gag-inducing stench.

And from this point onward, the giant trees withered away, and the world became one dominated solely by parasitic plants. This was the grand spectacle of the jungle, found only in Panama, Sumatra, and Central Africa.

In other words, parasitic plants and creeping figs of the Ficus genus would twine around the giant trees, ultimately strangling them to death. Afterward, though appearing as towering giants that scraped the heavens, they became as light as wicker baskets stuffed with cotton, swaying unsteadily with the slightest push. The forest swayed. A single movement traveled through the vines until hundreds of trunks rustled in a place resembling a dark seabed's kelp forest. All four of them felt as though they were witnessing an illusion.

Around noon, they came across large footprints resembling those of wild elephants. Crushed thorn stems and leaves rotted in the muddy water, and the pool-like depression had turned coffee-brown. However, beyond that point—where fallen trees also lay—the path had opened up slightly. However, it merely led straight west toward the Devil’s Urine Puddle... a veritable straight path to hell. Weariness and despair were gradually turning the men into beasts. Jan insisted on sharing Manuela and was punched by Kirk. But even Kirk was breathing in a strangely labored manner, staring at Manuela with bloodshot eyes—his face twisted into the ugliest of expressions.

The third day—. From that day onward, Jan began exhibiting pneumonia-like symptoms. Wandering, mud, miasma, and terrible fatigue first stretched death’s hand upon this man. While delirious with a raging fever, clinging to tree trunks and staggering forward with Zama’s shoulder for support, the surrounding landscape transformed completely once more.

Large mammals had completely vanished, leaving a world dominated by reptiles—king snakes, horned lizards, and their kin—creatures whose movements stayed sluggish despite their substantial bulk. The vegetation’s arboreal character had transformed entirely, now crowded with bizarre giant trees whose upturned roots defied convention—aerial roots thrusting vertically skyward rather than dangling earthward. Moreover, the ground beneath their feet trembled incessantly, as if shaken by perpetual minor quakes. Had the soil grown unstable here, or was this terrain prone to landslides? Considering how this zone marked the boundary where giant beasts disappeared, such fears could no longer be dismissed as baseless—they had solidified into legitimate concern. With each step they found themselves lightening their tread, bracing for the earth to collapse beneath them in a sudden rush. Yet even as they seemed to glimpse traces of the Devil’s Urine Puddle ahead, the forest only deepened around them—darkness swelling into an abyss without end.

Then, in what felt like a valley between peaks of fever, Jan quietly led Manuela into the foliage.

“Don’t you want to return to Mozambique?”

At the suddenness of it all, Manuela stared wide-eyed through her mosquito net veil. Why would he try to make her remember now of all times—even her tears shone with resentful brilliance.

“What’s wrong? Why won’t you speak?”

“I’m exhausted. Even if I try to speak, I can’t put it into words.”

“No, there’s only one sure way to return to Mozambique.” “It’s turning back to Bayerthal’s place.” “Hey, that man wants a white woman.” With that, Jan leaned in with lizard-like eyes. His legs were unsteady, his face—emaciated by illness—now a living skeleton. Manuela felt a shudder of revulsion creep over her. Moreover, Zama and Kirk had not gone to catch mud turtles.

“If you and I go, why would Bayerthal kill us? If we resign ourselves and stay there, an escape opportunity will surely come someday. Look—with just your good sense, we can return to Mozambique. Or will you keep playing loyal to those bastards and rot here like a stray?” “But I don’t understand what you mean at all.” “That won’t do. Those two—I’ll finish them off tonight. When my fever breaks, they’ll be keeping watch—you see.”

As he spoke, Jan pressed closer to Manuela inch by inch. Yet to Manuela, this seemed nothing but sinister opportunism—a final plunder from those doomed to die—born from despair as thick as mud reduced to its dregs through boiling. When she struggled to evade his feverish breath, the ground swayed unsteadily. And in that instant... Jan let out an entirely unexpected scream.

It was Dodo. He bared his canine teeth like fangs, let out a ferocious growl, his lips stained crimson with Jan’s blood from the bite. Rage had returned Dodo to his primal state. When the desperate Jan tried to draw his pistol, Dodo leaped at his hand again in a flash. Locked together, they began rolling across the ground. In the forbidden earth-shaking resonance where even large beasts dared not tread, suddenly the ground beneath their feet began roaring with tremors.

And then—ah, what a horrific spectacle! Suddenly, the entire swath of ground before their eyes began collapsing with a rumbling roar. Manuela’s feet were swept out from under her; she thudded down but frantically clung to a vine and looked up—only to see the forest sinking before her very eyes. As the treetops descended inch by excruciating inch, a dreamlike pallid light streaked swiftly through long striped fissures—light both dull and foreign. The forest was sinking! Manuela forgot the men’s struggle entirely and stared in blank astonishment.

As the earth’s fissures spread like centipede-like cracks, the groundwater that had burst forth gushed with a roar toward the sloped direction. However, the trees upon those collapsing strata somehow remained standing upright. Bound tightly by climbing vines, they probably wouldn’t fall but would instead slide down as they were—or so she had thought, but even that expectation was betrayed in an instant.

The gushing water rapidly eroded the soil, exposing the trunk roots. Even as the supporting roots several feet below became exposed… she began to feel the strange illusion that they were rising from the ground entirely, roots and all. What kind of tree was this? Manuela gazed at the terrifying roots that seemed to reach into the earth’s very depths as if they were monsters. At that moment, Zama’s voice sounded by her ear. “Oh, the Fukai Roots!”

Was that not the extinct species known as the old-root tree? This African species—whose roots were said to extend twenty times their height underground—should have long been on the brink of extinction since the early days of the black slave era.

And in an instant, their field of vision opened up.

The sudden collapse generated a gust of wind that tore through the haze clinging to the earth. In that instant, the three of them gasped sharply, their breath caught. The jungle, which until then had seemed to stretch endlessly behind the haze, here sheared off into a collapsed pit.

Devil’s Urine Puddle—.

And the three of them forgot themselves in a blinding exhilaration. They had reached the edge of the wall of this great unexplored region—where sinkholes and the treacherous terrain of the Great Swamp were said to repel any expedition. No sooner had they thought this than they began to peer intently into the vast caldera-like terrain spreading below their eyes, searching for any glimpse of something visible.

Yet there it remained—a swirling gray sea of haze and insect fog, where even the countless fissures in the cliffs vanished midway, leaving no way to discern where it ended or where its depths began. Measuring this great unexplored region was forbidden. Only the tangled roots of the old root tree—which had shed its withered trunk—could be seen swaying amidst the haze. While the sturdy, pyramid-shaped roots supported the trunk, the trunk withered, and its remains that had fallen to the ground looked just like tangled spider silk filling the ravine. Before long, even that withered color had faintly blurred into the insect fog now enshrouding everything. The great unexplored region known as the 'Devil’s Urine Puddle' offered but a fleeting glimpse of its edges, yet steadfastly refused to unveil its ancient mysteries to humankind.

The three of them stood for a while, profoundly moved. But when they noticed, Jan and Dodo had vanished in the midst of their struggle. Perhaps they had fallen into the sinkhole while still locked in combat—Manuela’s thoughts raced—but soon she wove a wreath from crimson vine flowers and cast it with a kiss into the fathomless grave for Dodo, who had died trying to save her and return to his homeland. And so came a loneliness akin to a missing tooth, but as another collapse seemed imminent, they had to withdraw from this place. However, the three of them spent that entire day in a drunken-like state. When they considered that they—having come to this unexplored eastern edge to peer into the Devil’s Urine Puddle—were likely the only three in all of recorded history to do so, they felt as though they had trampled upon nature’s majesty and might. But more than anything, escaping this place and returning to human habitation had now become their most pressing concern.

If they were to head south to Congo’s “Anthropoid Ape Habitat Zone,” they would only repeat this torment there. Considering this, they would head to the great cliff at the northern edge—where the American Geological Society’s expedition should currently be...

And so the plan was settled and they proceeded—though hacking their way through giant grasses and thorns as before might take several months. In the meantime, they would never last in this weakened state, and above all, they had been relentlessly targeted by the king cobra these past two or three days. “It’s remarkable how long things hold out when you think about it,” Manuela gazed at the tattered axe, let out a sigh, then gave Zama a meaningful look that seemed to urge him to speak. Then Zama spoke up in a voice tight with urgency,

“Actually, Kirk, Manuela and I have discussed this. Here, I want you to take independent action.”

“Why?”

Kirk widened his eyes in surprise, “This is all too sudden—I can’t make heads or tails of it.” “It’s like this: You could escape from here and reach human habitation. Precisely because we two are deadweight, you’ll end up losing that precious life of yours. I’m begging you—tomorrow, could you leave here without worrying about us?”

“I see.”

For a while, Kirk stared at the other man in dumbfounded silence, but— “Abandoning you all would be easy enough, but what do you intend to do by staying here?”

“Manuela and I intend to venture into the Devil’s Urine Puddle.”

“What?”

At this, even Kirk was taken aback, “So you’re planning to throw yourselves into that giant sinkhole……” “That’s right—we’ll stick to our original resolve. After all, this began with my own indecisive half-measures—of course I intend to reap what I’ve sown myself. Manuela will also gladly die with me. But you—even as a friend—I simply can’t bring myself to drag you into our fate.”

Kirk turned to Manuela. Her eyes, filled with a clear ecstasy born of utter resignation, gazed at Zama with a faint smile. As perhaps the only two in all humanity to set foot on the bottom of the Devil’s Urine Puddle, their eyes would behold horrors beyond the reach of pen or imagination—and yet also see a beautiful dream of a lovers’ graveyard. Kirk fell silent and pondered for a while. The jungle echoed with the occasional low, rumbling sound of a king cobra passing through the twilight darkness as still as death.

Then, suddenly, Kirk slapped his knee and said.

“Zama! I’ve got a brilliant idea! You won’t have to spout such nonsense to me anymore!”

“Huh? What is it?” “We’ll use these vines as a ‘Kintefwetefwe’.”

…………

“In other words, it means ‘natural vine bridge’ in the Congolese dialect.” “Ah, why hadn’t I noticed this until now?”

In the section on Livingstone’s Manyuema expedition, the details of that "Kintefwetefwe" were recorded. —In the vicinity of Manyuema, there were instances where rivers became covered by living vine bridges. That is to say, vines from both banks would tightly intertwine, and in wide rivers, they would hang down close to the riverbed. When stepped on, they felt soft and springy like a futon, requiring one to lift their feet as if extracting them from snow while advancing.

Here, vines and great creepers towered over twice the height of a man, packed together like a fortress. The three—having finally regained their vitality—set out across that natural bridge, eventually hoisting Manuela up to stand upon it. They had never imagined viewing this Devil’s Urine Puddle from above, yet such was the grandeur of the vista that they paused for a time. The horizon began and ended with a sea of trees. A single hue of deep green outdarkened the sky; nothing obstructed the view as far as the eye could see, nor existed to disrupt this monochrome. And thus they finally succeeded in breaking through the Devil’s Urine Puddle.

With ease, they traversed more than ten times the distance they had covered thus far, circled around the northern slope, and emerged atop the cliff. Looking down, the Devil's Urine Puddle spread out below them like a sea of gray. Its horizon burned with the beautiful afterglow of the setting sun, while the Ruwenzori's sheer peaks floated like solitary islands. But just when they had escaped the miasmatic swamp and began to relax, they found themselves in a scorched wasteland without a single blade of grass.

The red, hellish soil was scorched and crumbling; where one might expect the occasional grassy area, there lay dreadful quicksand. And from there emerged a sand river that becomes a stream in the rainy season, disappearing into the ground near the cliff.

“Thank you, Kirk. How much we’ve been saved because of you!” “It truly is.” Zama and Manuela thanked him from the depths of their hearts. It was because they had been rescued from that terrible thirst—not a drop had passed their lips since arriving. Kirk had finally remembered that beneath the clay layer of the Sand River lay an underground stream. Moreover, when they reached this place, they brought large branches and managed to erect a modest hut. In this way, they avoided heatstroke, obtained water, and occasionally shot birds to fill their stomachs. Yet what troubled them most was the lack of green vegetables—the looming threat of scurvy was beginning to weigh on their minds.

Then, on the afternoon of the sixth day, an airplane came flying overhead. It appeared to belong to the long-awaited American Geographical Society. As the three rushed out waving their jackets, a message cylinder dropped smoothly from the airplane. When they ran up and opened it, it read: "Tomorrow afternoon——" After enduring prolonged hardships, they could finally return to Mozambique.

Manuela, overwhelmed with emotion, began to cry like a child.

However, at that moment, the shock triggered another Latah episode. This time, with Kirk present, there was no hiding it—Zama didn't sleep a wink that night. (Poor, pitiful Manuela. Even if we were to survive here, what would become of us? She would never recover—she'd likely descend into true madness.) In the darkness, his eyes fixed on the campfire, Zama felt himself wasting away. Soon enough, if she began shrieking obscenities, the beautiful Manuela would die—reduced to nothing but an object to arouse onlookers' lust. Even if she survived, only an empty husk would remain. Her body would persist solely amid shame and corruption...

At that moment, the face of a wild ox manifested as an apparition before Zama’s eyes.

It was when they had just departed Kondoroga and were hunting wild oxen in the shrublands of the plains—they fired buckshot into the herd that raised clouds of sand as it moved in orderly formation under female leadership. Then, when one beast—seemingly struck in the belly—writhed in agony, the others risked danger to leap upon it, mercilessly goring it to death with their horns. After all, even beasts practice compassionate killing to spare the doomed from suffering. Even among physicians, euthanasia exists as a veiled form of love.

Beyond the campfire, hyenas crouched as if sneering. Suddenly, he felt as if a sinister ghost were watching him. When at last a dreamless, pitch-black sleep began, Zama harbored an unshakable resolve in his heart.

The next morning, when they were to leave this place in just a few hours, Manuela stood at the cliff's edge. Attempting to preserve the grand vista of the Devil's Urine Puddle on paper, she sketched feverishly. There, Zama crept up stealthily from behind. The heat haze enveloped Manuela like dancing flames. His head burned, his eyelids scorched; even were he to plunge into hell itself to send Manuela heavenward—Zama squeezed his eyes shut and released a shriek that resembled a scream.

Moreover, whenever he saw Manuela, his resolve would falter again. As he steeled himself with thoughts of grand love and drew closer, before he knew it, Zama had entered the Sand River. There lay a single chance occurrence—the would-be killer had perished while the intended victim remained alive. He had not known sand could shift without water. Gradually his body was carried forward until, in less than an instant, it disappeared from the earth.

And so, Zama’s figure never appeared again. The fact that he had vanished in mere moments left even Manuela with no choice but to think of it as if cursed by the unexplored "Devil’s Urine Puddle".

Finally, the "Devil’s Urine Puddle" was conquered.

Zama died, and the remaining two were saved.

Manuela, worn out by exhaustion and grief, had taken to her bed, but one month later, a letter came fluttering in. The outer envelope bore the inscription "British Army Survey Department stationed at Nuyangwe," and upon opening it, inside was another letter. It was smeared with mud and blood, but what made her doubt her eyes was the inscription: "To my beloved Manuela, from Shichiro Zama――".

With trembling fingertips, Manuela broke the seal.

Manuela, divine punishment was visited upon me. When I could no longer endure making you suffer further from "Latah" and resolved to quietly push you from that cliff... I was carried by the sand flow and fell into the earth. It was a dark river that welled up from within the earth and vanished back into its depths.

How many hours later—or perhaps days—I awoke in the darkness. The terrible cold—I thought this must be what they call the path to the underworld. And somewhere, there was the roar of flowing water like a waterfall. However, the fact that I was not yet dead became clear when I eventually tried to move my body. My joints throbbed as if burning. Even so, I finally managed to get up. Groping around, I felt across my body and found a haversack. Inside were a lighter and solid alcohol. Ah—with this short pencil, I cannot write in detail.

There, when I tore a piece of fabric from my clothing and lit it with solid alcohol, my surroundings came dimly into view. Everything appeared pure white. I doubted my eyes. Then, something like snow began to fall from the ceiling. When I tasted it, a sharp acrid sting spread across my lips. With that, I finally understood. I had fallen from the Sand River into a layer of rock salt. It was a salt cave formed by groundwater dissolving rock salt. Manuela, you could never imagine. Rolling terrain like mountain ranges or dunes on the moon, stalagmites, countless pendulous formations hanging from the ceiling—when light struck them, they suddenly glittered like snow. So pure... I truly thought it would be a blessing to die amidst such surroundings.

There were ridges too. Inside, there were also ice crevasses. Occasionally, hail-like pellets would scatter down, or I would be showered with powdered salt as if by a small waterfall. Then, when I suddenly looked at the wall beside me, I involuntarily caught my breath. There, a huge jet-black hand covered in coarse hair jutted out as if to grab me.

Manuela, this is the Devil's Urine Puddle’s mystery—the "Unknown Forest Graveyard." When the anthropoid apes thought this was the sorrowful place where they came to bury themselves, I desperately clawed at that wall. Then with that noise, everything came crashing down in an avalanche. Ah Manuela, when I rose covered in salt like snow, they emerged one after another like bas-reliefs—gorillas and chimpanzees preserved in their final moments, some standing, some crouching, some with arms bent. In this cave ceaselessly reshaped by water erosion, could these be from hundreds or thousands of years past? At any rate, submerged in salt without decay, they've kept their original forms to this day. Ah, I am the sole man among all humankind who has penetrated the Devil’s Urine Puddle and witnessed its deepest mystery.

And so, forgetting even myself who would soon die, I savored the greatest rebellion humans had ever committed against nature, melting away in rapture.

Then, the waterfall plunges down into the earth's depths. When I learned this, I was utterly disheartened. For if that groundwater had emerged at the cliff face, I could have glimpsed the grand vista of the Devil’s Urine Puddle from there; and had its position been lower, perhaps I might even have escaped. But it was no use. Amidst the dark roar surging from below, I finally realized there was no exit—that I now lay sealed within walls of rock salt. Indeed, the cave's form appeared to be perpetually transforming through water erosion.

Then I became acutely concerned about the low temperature here. For animals it might be different, but humans risk freezing to death if they're not careful. To freeze to death in the depths of Africa during summer—even though this place lies dozens of feet underground—I found bitterly ironic.

Then, an idea occurred to me there. To voice this is truly repugnant, but there existed no other means of obtaining warmth now. I fixed my gaze upon the anthropoid ape corpses.

As for what happened next, I will spare you, a lady, the details. In any case, those who came here to die and survived for a considerable period have almost no layer of fat within their bodies. In any case... I decided to try burning them. First, I inserted solid alcohol into the oral cavity and lit it. Soon, the fire spread toward the brain, and the eyeballs began to burn. With a roar, the two hollows began erupting orange flames. The cave interior was being tinged with an indescribable beauty indeed. The shadows of fissures and striations rose up all at once, and there a subtle blue hue—like that of glacial crevasses—lay stagnant. A pale red womb... countless blue earthworms crawling within. However, the corpses were completely desiccated, with no trace of putrid stench.

In that way, I warmed myself and ate meat. However, the meat—perhaps due to its desiccation—tasted as unpleasant as chewing leather. Manuela, I wonder if you'll forgive me no matter what I do. However, when I had burned about three and tried to pull out the fourth, the ceiling suddenly collapsed like bedrock. Avalanches broke out throughout the cave, plunging it into hazy darkness. When that haze faded, the depths of the collapse site glowed faintly—a hole. After that, following twists and turns, I emerged near the entrance. There lay four or five of them—appearing recently deceased. Manuela, I breathed the outside air for the first time after exiting the cave. At last, I had emerged into the Devil's Urine Puddle.

It was night. In the sky, through a thick layer of mist, the moon appeared ocher-red, hanging hazily with a magnificently large halo. I have never before witnessed such supernatural radiance. A blurred diffused light permeated the zenith, yet despite its presence, the ground remained pitch-black.

Then, into this serene realm of death came the sound of a distant roar. It lingered neither near nor far, continuing endlessly with a truly mournful tone. And then, not long after—just as the first light of dawn was finally beginning to break—a pitch-black thing suddenly appeared before my eyes. Startled, I stared at it while retreating inch by inch.

Manuela, what do you think it was? It stood as tall as Kirk, was more corpulent than my father, and walked with one hand atop its head, each step landing with ponderous weight. At times it would bend both limbs and sweep the ground with those elongated hands while streaking forward like a tempest—a gorilla. The moment this realization struck me, an icy shudder ran through my veins; my jaw quivered uncontrollably as my knees threatened to buckle. I desperately threw myself into the cave's maw, scrambling to find what appeared to be the foremost hollow to conceal myself. Yet this supposed refuge proved but a shallow cul-de-sac. To compound my peril, the gorilla now squatted directly before the cavity's entrance. When dawn's first light finally seeped through, our gazes collided across that cramped space. Had that monstrous hand already descended to crush me?

Manuela, after a while, I began to laugh—you see. Even I thought myself such a careless fool. I had forgotten why that gorilla had come to the Forest Graveyard. When the gorilla first saw me, it let out a low growl but merely watched without making any move. Over seven feet tall, its head nearly all white hair—it appeared to be of considerable age. In other words, I finally came to think that it had come to the Forest Graveyard due to old age. When beasts come here, they lose their fighting spirit and seem to feel none of the fear that would otherwise drive them into a frenzy. And without eating, starving all the while, they quietly proceed down the path to death. Manuela, here I gained a companion on the road to the netherworld.

"Soko——" I tentatively tried calling the gorilla by that name. This "Soko" comes from Congo's native tongue—more an affectionate term for their kind. Then even when I shouted "Wakhe, Wakhe"—those calls used for caged gorillas—the old beast wouldn't so much as glance back. When family-like mournful roars echoed distantly—continuing nearly nonstop for four days and nights—it would perk its ears as if compelled, yet this remained mere motion without any expression. Thus our life together—the gorilla and I—persisted wordlessly for over ten days. I've never encountered so aloof a cohabitant showing such utter indifference.

Now, my pencil was nearly exhausted. From here on, I intended to write concisely until the end. Then, I wanted you to convey to Professor Accorti in particular how I had observed the gorilla as a psychiatrist. Day after day, the gorilla remained in that spot without moving, merely gazing at me listlessly. Due to debility, it seemed unable to even move anymore. Even when I checked its pulse, it just listlessly allowed it. However, this was not merely due to an instinct driving them to the Forest Graveyard; gorillas were inherently predisposed to constitutional melancholy. In other words, there existed "an abnormal predisposition to readily succumb to despondency." Ah, the pencil lead broke again. I could no longer continue writing this.

Here I must quickly write of my love for you, my friendship with Kirk, and that I will soon die. I had contracted scurvy from prolonged meat-only consumption. Now the bleeding in my gums grows worse each day. That's right! Not only were there none of the green vegetables that caused this illness—there wasn't a single speck of green in this Devil's Urine Puddle. The insect fog made even midday as dark as twilight. Below lay only salt marsh crystals resembling sores, overgrown with ancient root trees' withered roots.

If only I could traverse those roots like a gorilla—but being human, and in my current state, I lacked such physical strength. In all honesty, there might be tailed humans lurking in some corner. Somewhere else, elephant carcasses likely lay scattered about, their devouring swarms of insects possibly forming that very insect fog. Yet confined to this limited area, I could comprehend nothing. I knew only this—that here lay the Forest Graveyard, a place where ruin whispered death through all creation.

Today, I caught a pelican—a rare occurrence. I vividly recalled how you had trained Dodo to place envelopes into wooden posts. So I decided to write this letter, put it in that envelope, tie it to the pelican, and set it free. By some miracle... though such a chance was scarcely one in ten thousand—if this reached your hands, it would be by love's power.

As the first human to be buried in this graveyard... as the first man to enter the Devil’s Urine Puddle... and as the only person to bond with a gorilla... I take pride above all in my devotion to you...

Now, though afternoon had come, a great thunderstorm had begun. I would continue this letter one more day and delay releasing the pelican.

Manuela, delaying by this one day has become a terrible calamity. That said, I am not about to die now. The value of all things I had directed my heart toward—somehow, I can no longer feel them at all. Whether it be you, Kirk, or even the conquest of this Devil’s Urine Puddle—all things of the past now appear as trivial as dust. What has come over me? Even when I steel my heart against becoming like this, the strength drains away as though cursed. Manuela, surely this is my soul being stolen by the Devil’s Urine Puddle. Perhaps it is simply that for an animal called human to come to the Forest Graveyard and think of lovers or long for the world of the living is something displeasing to the god of the Devil’s Urine Puddle in the first place. It is a commandment. Having broken it, I am of course being punished. And so, from today onward, I have resolved to abide by the rules of the "Unknown Forest Graveyard." No—I was compelled by a terrifying force.

This morning, the gorilla died exactly two weeks after arriving. I was at the edge of the salt marsh, away from the cave, when an unfamiliar sound began echoing intermittently from that direction. When I rushed back to investigate—for the noise came from the cave—the gorilla lay beating its chest with failing hands, striking nearby stones to create an eerie rhythm. Though I'd heard rumors of gorillas creating music, this sound held a mournful quality, as if crying, "Now I journey to a far, far place."

Suddenly overwhelmed by unbearable pity, when I tried to cradle the gorilla in my lap to watch over its final moments, I effortlessly lifted it up—startled by its unexpected lightness.

Truly, it must have been an excess of strength in that moment. Due to long-term starvation and salt-induced emaciation, the gorilla had been reduced to skin and bones. Even so, it was nothing short of miraculous that I—who had grown just as gaunt myself, let alone suffering from scurvy—could lift this elderly giant beast. Could it be that during my time here, I had become a man of the forest? Even emaciated, I effortlessly carried a creature weighing over two hundred pounds, and when I looked at my hands, I felt a mud-like intoxication.

I held the gorilla. And then, everything comprising human society appeared diminished. Individuals, achievements, even notions like love—all became as dust scattering with a breath. Manuela, this constitutes the law of the Devil’s Urine Puddle’s grave. Beasts shed their wildness, humans relinquish their humanity—what distinction remains between me and a perishing colossus?

Thus, I conquered the Devil’s Urine Puddle—and in turn was conquered by it. But Manuela, I can still say goodbye.

Zama’s notes had ended here.

By the miasmatic aura of the Devil’s Urine Puddle, he had been compelled to obey the forest’s law—even had he lived on, he would have become a man of some distant realm. Strangely, not a single tear fell from Manuela.

She picked up another letter from the British Army Survey Department that had been enclosed inside.

Dear Lady—In sending you the enclosed correspondence, I must relate an unusual tale. For at the base of the Nuyangwe post station at this point of origin, there lay a bizarre skeleton clutching the enclosed letter in its hand. It was a peculiar creature, standing about four feet tall, neither clearly human nor anthropoid ape. This region constitutes a fearsome breeding ground for ants; corpses from morning are devoured by evening—not merely the flesh, but even the marrow of their bones. However, given that the skeleton proved such a peculiar specimen, I have appended this information for your perusal.

“Dodo!” Manuela shouted at the top of her voice.

Dodo had fallen into the sinkhole with Jan, but he had survived after all. And then, when he captured the pelican that Zama had released and saw the envelope tied to its leg, he suddenly recalled that training and went to the Nuyangwe post. And along the way—having exhausted every ounce of his strength on the hundred-mile journey—he finally arrived only to collapse and be devoured by those cruel ants.

She thought of the bones exposed to the grassland's scorching winds and silently let fall a single tear—a tear she had never shed for Zama's experience of surpassing grotesqueness.

Then, pressing her lips to the envelope stained with Dodo’s blood, she gently made the sign of the cross—a heartfelt gesture of kinship for Dodo, nobler and purer than any human.