[Even after Kim's many descriptions of it, Matoba feels that he cannot grasp the true nature of what exactly the "Pale" was- it felt to him like how he imagined the Sightless must feel about describing ayakashi to them. Nothingness, yet containing everything. Something containing knowledge, but unaware.]

[He felt that he would like to see it someday.]

I haven't gone to look, [Matoba finally comments, although now he finds himself curious. Perhaps, when there is something to be..... seen, he will give it a try.] I wonder why it is that they speak in such hushed tones of the wastes. If it's just a desert, it shouldn't be anything that despairing.

There must be a power to it that not even the ayakashi who will dwell in places abandoned by humans will touch, if it's treated as something like capital punishment to be sent there.