End of the World Broadcast

My bag, which is larger and sturdier than most bags even when emptied of its contents, has always been a reliable ally for me wandering alone.
But that reliable ally is now extremely fat, hindering my steps as I walk through the snow field.

“…Haha, maybe I should have listened a bit to you all who called me greedy.”
Just standing still, I feel like I’ll be crushed by the weight on my back.
Fortunately, the walking stick I picked up at the train station serves as a support, so there’s no major issue with walking apart from it being difficult.
But if my foot gets caught on a ledge or object buried and invisible in the snow, I’ll fall forward before I can even regain my balance.
It’s been about two hours subjectively since I left the city, and I’ve already fallen five times.
And all of this is of my own making.
The bag, much larger and heavier than when I first entered the train station, is a manifestation of my greed and survival instinct.

“I suddenly remember a video I saw long ago. A hamster needed to pass through iron bars, but its cheek pouches, filled with food, got stuck and couldn’t go through…”
When I stood in front of the mirror to adjust my appearance one last time before leaving the train station.
Although I was clearly facing the mirror, I witnessed and ignored the strange phenomenon where the area of my bag appeared larger than my body.
Since I had plenty of resources for once and didn’t know when I might get hungry, I wanted to pack as much as possible.

“They say moderate greed is a driving force that makes you move forward, but excessive greed blocks your path and makes life tiring. I’m exactly like that hamster now.”
I’m walking much slower than usual, but I already feel my stamina hitting rock bottom.
If this were inside the city, I’d probably look for a place to rest, saying ‘this is enough walking for today since it’s tough,’ but there wasn’t a place to rest here yet.

“The difference is… that hamster can freely remove the food from its cheeks since it’s on its way home anyway. But I don’t know how far my destination is, so I can’t randomly throw away items from my bag.”
I should organize the items in my bag according to the exact distance to the destination.
But my only landmark was the towering black tower, which was so high it distorted my sense of distance.
How many more kilometers do I need to walk to get there?
Even if I lighten my body by reducing luggage and walk quickly, will I be able to arrive before the luggage in my bag runs out?

“But it’s scary to put down my backpack and organize things a bit before going. I can’t shake the thought of what if my poor judgment puts me in a life-threatening situation.”
An ordinary person can make sensible, rational judgments only to the extent that they can vaguely predict the results and sequence of processes their actions will bring.
But to me, this snow field and this world are completely ‘unknown.’ I dare not predict even the results that my small actions will bring, let alone the past and future.
And all choices and their consequent results are always tied to my life, making me, who is just an ordinary person, even more passive.

[With so many ownerless cars around, it’s a pity that none can be used.]
Haah, as I sighed deeply and silently moved my legs, a message arrived.
At such a relatable statement, I immediately nodded my head up and down repeatedly.

“Really, if any of those cars, snowmobiles, or even motorcycles had been in good condition, I wouldn’t have to struggle like this.”
I may be greedy as people say, but I’m not stupid.
So while increasing the luggage in my bag, I consistently looked for modes of transportation in case I couldn’t walk properly due to weight.
Of course… I have neither a driver’s license nor knowledge about operation.
But there are no people in the city anyway. Couldn’t I just learn while driving carefully in the snow field?
So while looking for items to put in my bag, I consistently went back to the city to check if there was a properly functioning car.
…As you can see from the fact that I’m walking bare-bodied now, it was all a bust.

“It’s disappointing, really disappointing. Of course, it was wrong to expect a functioning car that operates with a ‘car key’ to remain in such a world.”
Easily replicable keys or smart keys with the risk of theft have become things of the past.
Very occasionally, vehicles operating with keys appeared, perhaps pursuing antiqueness or nostalgic sentiment… but setting aside not knowing where those keys were, most of them were in a mess from appearance alone.

“But it feels wrong to damage… dead people. I haven’t fallen to the point of doing such things. And I don’t intend to.”
In the end, to find a functioning vehicle, I’d have to solve security devices through elements not externally visible, such as fingerprints or iris recognition.
For that, I would inevitably need the finger or… eyeball of a dead person.
Dead people feel neither pain nor anything else.
And I have items like Maximus or a survival knife that could easily cut off fingers.
But still, I didn’t want to commit such acts that damage humanity.
Even if the result is being crushed by weight created by my greed in an endlessly spread snow field.

“Haah, indeed, when the stomach is full, strength comes.”
I briefly put down my bag, sat on the ground, opened a can and ate, then lay down like dried squid on top of my bag to give my struggling legs a short rest.
The sky was still blue, and thanks to the sunlight, the temperature felt warmer than usual, making me strongly tempted to take a nap right there.
But turning my head, I saw distant, hazy clouds slowly approaching.

“Tch, it seems the world doesn’t want to give me much time to rest.”
I’ve seen snow and darkness to the point of boredom, so they’ve become my daily life now, but just as no one welcomes a difficult daily life, I sigh involuntarily every time I see them.
When the weather is good, I need to find a place where I can go a bit further and sleep safely.
Carefully shouldering the heavy bag, I stand up and move my legs again.

“I’m really glad I brought the walking stick.”
Due to the snow piled up to my calves, I can feel my legs getting tired with each step.
It was really fortunate that the walking stick distributed the weight somewhat.

“Sigh, while the sun is out, I wished it would melt at least some of the snow here.”
The city seems like it will eternally snow, but as can be seen from the clear sky now, even here, the sun occasionally rises, and very occasionally, the snow on the roads melts.
It’s a natural story. Let’s say the accumulated snow never melted and new snow just kept piling on top of it.
Then unless the world perished just before I woke up from my long sleep, the world should already be covered in snow.
While a wide snow field has space for snow to accumulate, in cities crowded with buildings, the snow would have piled at least higher than my height.
Or… like in Antarctica or the Arctic, all that snow would have become blocks of ice, and I would have died without even being able to leave the building I woke up in.
In that sense, the sun and clear weather were nothing short of a blessing to me.
Beyond making me feel good, they allowed me to somehow survive in this harsh world.

…Of course, if the sun rises and then a blizzard hits the very next day, it feels colder than usual and is painful.
Or occasionally, corpses that aren’t buried in snow or happen to be in places with good sunshine are decomposed by above-freezing temperatures, revealing bones.
And it makes me see horrific sights such as various insects, including maggots, filling the inside of the skin, but still.

“I hope the sun rises again while I’m in the snow field. Not only is it nice and warm, but when the surface snow melts and flows in one direction, and the sky reflects in it… it’s truly fantastic.”
Every time I see the path I’m going to walk and the path I’ve walked connected by flowing water, I imagine the end of this journey.
What will the city at the end of this path, which goes forward and upward at the same time, look like?
And conversely, where does the water that flows away arrive, in a place without a common river in sight?
All cities are enclosed by fences, with designated entry and exit points.
And each city is separated by snow fields connected by railways and roads.
And the path is so flat that you can’t even notice it’s an incline, and there are no rivers or mountains in sight.
In the middle of the snow field, there are occasionally hills low enough to be called mounds.
But such places always have half-built buildings, making me doubt whether they are naturally formed mounds.

How much of it is natural, and how much is artificial?
What am I walking on right now?
Hoping that the answers to all these questions exist at the end of my journey.
Slowly but surely, I move forward.