The bad weathers were caused by Angor’s illusions. With them, Angor mostly ascertained that the man’s memory was damaged.
This guy couldn’t remember his past. He tried to avoid cold or rain due to human instinct. Yet he didn’t know how to use an umbrella… which meant he had forgotten common senses.
The man had to know about umbrellas before since Angor saw many of such items in Pocratee. However, Angor didn’t understand why people needed umbrellas underground.
Procedural memory loss.
Also, it seemed that the man could remember how to use words. However, he couldn’t talk normally.
“It’s not really amnesia… I’m afraid you’ve become an idiot.”
“Idiot” was something Angor used to show his discontent. What he meant was that the man had become “empty in the brain”, like a newborn child.
Maybe the man could pick up human knowledge again by undergoing proper educations and become anew. In that case, it would be another philosophical debate about whether the man would still be his “old self”.
…
Thankfully, the man still knew how to satisfy his basic needs like eating and dumping. He would eat anything Angor gave him, and if he were still hungry, he would stare at Angor with puppy eyes.
With both of their stomachs fed, Angor prepared to resume his travel.
As for the coffin man…
Angor considered and decided to take him along. A man in such a condition would meet a quick death in this deep forest on his own.
…
Angor kept groaning in distress along the way. Previously, he hoped that this coffin man could answer his questions. Now he got himself a huge burden instead.
He silently decided that he would drop the man somewhere as soon as he found civilization.
Angor kept trying to trigger the man’s memory while walking. He even used the extreme approach of presenting Pocratee’s destruction in front of the coffin man’s eyes in the most brutal way.
And it didn’t work well. Angor didn’t really see how Pocratee was ruined, and he mostly based his illusion on what happened in Twilight Well.
Until he placed the parasites and rainbow dragonflies in the illusion.
The coffin man then began to hesitate. While Angor waited for a result eagerly, the man collapsed.
When the coffin man woke up again, he had forgotten everything he saw. And when Angor brought up the dragonflies again, the man didn’t react at all.
“I overdid it and caused the opposite result?” Angor rubbed his temples and gave up on the “violent” means of restoring one’s memory. Actually, all the books he read about strongly suggested against using such a method.
Angor had lost interest in looking into the coffin man’s past. It wasn’t important anyway. Forgetting painful events was probably the better choice.
Angor began to talk about random daily topics with the man, even if the respondent only repeated his words. The coffin man probably needed practice.
It was dull, but it was welcomed during the boring journey.
Also, Angor gradually grew interested in the coffin man’s special accent.
The man’s voice sounded clear and gentle, but every end of his pronunciation was upturned slightly.
It seemed to be the accent from a remote village. Angor felt that he might have heard something similar before. But he didn’t remember where. Maybe he only heard it from a random passerby by chance?
At least Angor was sure that the man used the universal language as his mother tongue before. Otherwise, there was no way the man could mimic his words so fluently.
Angor took a test by speaking Mandarin, but the coffin man twisted his tongue badly and did a poor job at it.
This meant the coffin man had to have originated from the wizarding world.
As for the exact location… Angor needed to get to civilization to find out.
…
With the coffin man still in his memory loss condition, Angor kept walking along the riverbank.
They walked for two days and nights.
The river ended at a large lake. Or… sea?
Angor couldn’t see the edge of the water, and they didn’t have another way to go. Their sides were blocked by the extending mountain range.
They could either walk around the mountains or climb them, or they could go into the water too.
The first option seemed too far. Traveling by water seemed to be a good choice… if Angor didn’t have to consider the “idiot” that tagged along with him.
He chose to climb the mountains. Something told him that there were people behind.