Dragon Raja 5; Chapter 173: Leviathan’s Song (10)

Dragon Raja 5

Schneider sighed silently. A fortnight or a month was indeed considered fast for a patient’s recovery, but their polar expedition had limited time. It was already approaching the end of summer, and the polar temperatures were dropping daily. The longer they delayed, the more difficult it would become. The Arctic Ocean was vast; if Leviathan truly roamed the land, it could reach Canada in a fortnight or a month.

But we can’t force this child who is on the verge of collapse to question her. That would undoubtedly be mental torture. Besides, the information that a guide’s daughter can provide is limited.

“Take good care of her.” Schneider said, turned and left.

The others followed suit, leaving Abbas with one last peek through the crack in the door. That glance left him stunned. Caesar had already taken two steps when he turned around and noticed Abbas’s expression wasn’t right. He also peeked through the crack in the door and froze.

The puppet-like girl raised her head, her large, seemingly blank yet frightened eyes fixed on them. To be more precise, she was staring at Abbas. Caesar and Abbas were basically in the same position. At such a distance, it was impossible to tell which of them the girl was focusing her attention on. But for some reason, Caesar knew she was looking at Abbas.

In the eyes of that girl, the noble heir of the Gattuso family did not exist at all. She looked at Abbas, only at Abbas, with a fierce and attached look.

No one could resist that gaze, so Abbas and Caesar exchanged a glance and walked in. Caesar locked the door behind him, so that, in the girl’s view, the conversation was limited to her and Abbas.

Abbas squatted outside the sterile room’s tempered glass door, his hand pressed against it. They stared at each other from a distance for a long moment, and the girl cautiously crept closer. It felt a bit like reaching out to feed a skinny stray cat.

She leaned against the tempered glass door, still staring at Abbas, as if examining him. Her large eyes were like blank mirrors, intimidating.

“My name is Abbas. We are an Arctic expedition team. We have no ill intentions and we will not hurt you,” Abbas said.

He didn’t know what language the girl could speak, so he used the most common English. The girl didn’t respond, perhaps because she didn’t understand English, or perhaps because her mental state was abnormal and she was too numb to information from the outside world.

Abbas was a little overwhelmed. In addition to English, he could speak Arabic and Chinese, but it would be foolish to speak Chinese or Arabic to a child he had encountered in the Arctic. But after a moment of silence, the girl spoke.

“Talini…” Her voice was so soft, as soft as a breath. This was the first word she had spoken since being rescued.

“What did you say?” Abbas didn’t understand.

Caesar, who was listening in on his Kamaitachi outside, didn’t understand either. Leveraging his innate advantage, Caesar possessed a profound mastery of languages. While others might be fluent in two or three languages, Caesar could master two or three language families. But not only was he unfamiliar with the word Talini, its pronunciation and spelling didn’t match any of the languages ​​he was familiar with.

“Talini…” the girl repeated the word.

Caesar immediately tapped his earphones. “EVA, search for all spelling combinations of the pronunciation of Talini. Search for the target that matches it in language libraries around the world, including obsolete ones!”

He instinctively realized what crucial information this was, a mysterious word that might even have come from Dragon Script, and that the girl might have heard Leviathan’s song with her own ears.

When they were in Japan, they also called on this function of EVA. At that time, EVA searched all the language libraries in history within ten minutes and deciphered the three words “Takama-ga-hara”.

This time, EVA responded in less than half a second. “Talini, that means ‘snow’ in Eskimo.”

“Eskimo?” Caesar was stunned.

Why the hell hadn’t he thought of that? The girl was Inuit, so of course she spoke Eskimo. But what did “snow” mean? This was the white Arctic, and there was snow everywhere.

“Eskimo belongs to the small ‘Eskimo-Aleut’ language family. Because settlements are scattered and there are many dialects, although it is still a language in use, few people study it. There are about 70 words in Eskimo that mean ‘snow’, and this is one of them. Specifically, this word is often used to name people, especially women.” Eva continued, “It should be added that Inuit people usually have more than one name, and their formal names are usually the names of their ancestors. Names like Talini are usually used as nicknames, called by family members. If someone tells you her name like this, she probably considers you a very close person.”

Caesar was stunned for a moment. It turned out that the girl wanted to tell Abbas only her own name.

Was it because of trust? Because he had once thrown himself at her, Abbas was the only person she trusted on this ship. Perhaps, just like in “Saya no Uta,” everyone on this ship was a demon in the girl’s eyes, except Abbas.

“Talini, which means ‘snow’ in Eskimo, is her name,” Caesar whispered. Abbas also wore the same headset as him so that they could stay in touch at any time.

“Talini, I will protect you.” Abbas said softly.

Abbas spoke in English, and the Eskimo-speaking girl should not have understood. But when she said this, the girl suddenly burst into tears and was no longer a little wolf grinding her teeth.     

She didn’t make any sound, but everyone was moved by her silent sadness. That sadness was like… a stubborn child finally waiting for her father to come and pick her up.

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