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“Ah, welcome. You must be Mr. Phainon the Traveler talked about,” the teal-haired clinical psychologist said as she rose from her seat, her practiced smile adorning her face. “Please have a seat,” she added as she gestured her patient to a seat near her with her open palm.
The patient scratched the back of his head groggily as he muttered, “Yes,” before his feet brought him to the designated seat. As soon as he lay down, his blue eyes caught the calming painting on the ceiling. It was merely clouds overlapping with each other, but something about the colors and how it was drawn brought peace to his mind.
“I’ll start easy,” she began, a faint smile plastered on her face. “Please relax and answer my questions with honesty to the best of your capability,” she continued as she put her notes aside. She knew from the Traveler that Phainon was unlike her other patients. She specifically noted, and she recalled, that ‘the more you write, the more overwhelmed you would be.’
Although Mizuki did not exactly understand what the Traveler meant by this, she decided to follow her instruction. “So, what’s been on your mind lately?” It was a simple question, as she promised, yet it set the foundation for how the therapy would go.
As Phainon answered her questions with patience, Mizuki gradually understood her patient’s background. He came from a world full of tragedy albeit his life began normally, peacefully even. However, like in many tragedies, his peaceful life did not last long, not until a swarm of creatures she assumed like the Abyss rampaged his home village, forcing him to be soaked in his cherished neighbors’ blood, pushing him to tread the path of vengeance. Even then his journey was far from its end. He had to lose even more of his companions, his treasured friends, his beloved teachers in the very same path of vengeance he was forced to walk on.
To Mizuki’s ears, Phainon’s life was far from life, it was more akin to a nightmare, a torture in and of itself, and it was vividly mirrored by the dishes in front of her; roasted mushroom and bread, tuna tataki, and a mango cheesecake. These dishes would be inviting in the eyes of many, she would too if she did not know what story it told. The roasted mushroom depicted the death of his home village, charred and barren. The red of tuna depicted the blood dropped by his neighbors before then absorbed by the land of Amphoreus. Lastly, the cheesecake depicted another drop of blood, but of his and his companions, the Chrysos Heirs.
Saying that she felt bad would be far from sufficient to picture what she felt listening to Phainon’s story. She kept listening to the endless story of Phainon’s journey because that was what clinical psychologists do. They listen, they understand, they help, and Mizuki was exactly like them. She was more than willing to help Phainon sort his feelings in order to live a better life, to learn to process his feelings slowly and carefully. Although, even after this two hour session she still could not understand the Traveler’s earlier warning.
That was until Phainon dropped a keyword, ‘Eternal Recurrence.’
“So, what’s this Eternal Recurrence you just mentioned? Is it your way of explaining something that you refuse to remember further, or???” A mistake, perhaps, on her end. But he still explained to her with great patience; what exactly Eternal Recurrence is, what caused it to happen in the first place, what sacrifices he had to make in order to create Eternal Recurrence.
As he told another story, the food gradually piled up as a result of his trauma, sadness, and anger laid bare. Various foods were presented in front of her. At first it was tolerable, she could handle it although it pushed her limit. But as his story progressed, the dishes– appetizer, main dish and dessert alike, were starting to fill her room. It was suffocating, like a grand buffet of bread, fish, sweets, and nothing in between was presented in front of her and she was forced to eat to the last bit of it.
Mizuki was left feeling unsure whether she was able to guide Phainon through all his trauma for the session or was she instead drowned in his story, unable to respond, unable to help. She felt her current condition, unfortunately, led her to the latter. That was not a good sign. She had to regain her composure as soon as possible to help him digest his feelings. But the path ahead was too dark. It was pitch black instead of filled with disturbing things she encountered a few times, and she felt better when she faced the latter because then she knew how to manage the emotion.
His emotion was too abstract and too clear at the same time that it reflected nothing but darkness. A complete darkness that was ready to devour. His emotion– or rather mental state was akin to nonexistence. If it did not exist, what was there to fix? How could she fix it? How could she help him?
Only silence followed after Phainon’s detailed explanation, yet it was a wrong and uncomfortable silence. It was only when Phainon started to listen attentively to his surroundings that he caught a heavy sigh followed by another sharp inhale that he realized Mizuki was having a hard time breathing.
“M– Miss Mizuki,” he panickedly called as he rushed to her side. Her breathing was harsh, jagged, uncomfortable– suffocating, he noted. “Miss Mizuki, please listen to my voice and my voice only. Inhale…” so far she was not responding, she could hardly control her breathing.
“Miss Mizuki,” he called again. “Slowly. Focus on my voice. Inhale…” his voice turned soft so as to not further stress her. He patiently waited for Mizuki to respond to him before he heard a long and slow inhale from her. “Exhale,” he said as three seconds had passed. He repeated the technique Hyacine and his attending psychiatrist back in Amphoreus taught over and over again, patiently guiding her until he was sure Mizuki breathed evenly and comfortably.
Phainon sat himself back on the provided lounge, his body facing his therapist who was in a bad shape compared to when she greeted him. “Uhmm…” he groggily began. “I guess we can call it a day here?” He suggested, voice full of uncertainty. He had no intention to decide on behalf of anyone, he did not want to be seen as rude in their first meeting– not that he wanted to be seen as one in the next meetings, so he left the decision still to his therapist.
Mizuki weakly nodded her head, agreeing and thankful for Phainon’s understanding. “Yes. Maybe we should call it a day. I need some days to recharge myself,” she began, her hand busy massaging the bridge of her nose, unwillingly making her patient worried.
“A-are you okay? Ah… I shouldn’t have just dumped everything. A psychologist is still a human. They have limits,” he groaned, scolding himself for his lapse in judgment. “I’m sorry,” he said as he bowed deeply.
Mizuki immediately woke up from her trance and shook her head, now she felt bad for making her patient worried. “Ah… no, no. It’s fine,” she dismissed. A psychologist should have been prepared for everything their patient had, but Mizuki was partially sure no psychologist was trained enough to receive such immense and intense emotions. Still, she felt incompetent as a clinical psychologist for making her patient worried over her. No trained psychologist did that.
She then let out a heavy sigh before placing her hands on top of each other on her lap. “When our emotions are ready enough, come visit me again and let’s continue our session,” she said with a genuine smile despite feeling weary as she bowed to which Phainon reciprocated.