“Charles!” Claude catches them both, then sets them down in the chapel, whose floor is now bare earth. Hastily running to them, Aileen puts her ear to Charles’s chest, trying to listen to his heart, and is relieved to hear a heartbeat. Although both Charles and Machina are covered in cuts and bruises, they’re only unconscious. “That Evare lout escaped, hmm?” Baal descends to the ground, holding Estella. Claude sighs. “For now, let’s get everyone treated. Then we’ll restrain them so we can get the story out of—” Before he finishes his sentence, there’s a boomf, and Claude transforms into a young dragon. Silence falls. Baal presses an index finger to the spot between his eyebrows. “Look, you… No doubt this is because we lifted our barrier, but at least try to consider the time and place.” “Skree!” Aileen picks up the disgruntled young dragon and turns to Estella. Estella is looking steadily at Charles, who’s still lying there with Machina in his arms. The emotion in her eyes is too complicated for Aileen to read. However— “You will talk to us, won’t you?” “Yes… Although, I know almost nothing about this.” Estella lowers her eyes, then looks up again. Aileen smiles at her. In the early morning sun, the color of her hair and eyes are just like Baal’s, while her dignified bearing and firm gaze are nearly identical to Roxane’s. “In losing my memories, I’m afraid I’ve caused you a lot of trouble. I’m not certain, but I believe getting too close to the past version of me confused my sense of self.” In Principal Consort Roxane’s palace in the harem of Ashmael, Estella begins her story. The table in front of her holds tea for three, provided by Roxane. Aileen, Estella, and Roxane are the only ones present. Apparently, this is not an ideal place for Claude to turn back into a human, so Baal and Claude are in another room. Rather than waste time waiting for everyone to reassemble, they’ve decided to hear Estella’s story first. “Confused your sense of self…?” “Yes. I haven’t been born yet, but I’m alive inside you, Mother.” Roxane looks down at her own belly. Estella is perfectly impassive. “It’s all right if you don’t believe me. Since I’m interfering with the past, the future may be different. The child you bear might not grow up to be like me. After all, neither you nor Father has ever mentioned meeting me.” “Do you mean…this version of you will die?” Roxane’s eyebrows come together. Estella nods. “That’s always a risk. I made my peace with it before I came.” “And what compelled you to do something so dangerous?” Estella is intelligent, and Roxane can’t imagine she’s acting purely by choice. The girl looks down at her hands. “…I came because I wanted to know that myself, actually.” Roxane and Aileen exchange looks. Estella’s delicate eyebrows come down slightly; then seeming to make up her mind, she raises her head. “I’ll tell you what I know, from the very beginning. Or the bare minimum of it anyway, so that it won’t affect the future too much. —Less than twenty years from now, an engagement will be proposed between myself and Master Charles, who has been tentatively named crown prince of Ellmeyer.” “What do you mean, ‘tentatively named’? Was it someone else before?” “Master Claude.” Her husband has returned with Baal, in human form again. “Master Charles is the youngest child,” Estella tells him. “He has an older brother and sister.” Estella won’t give them any more details about their family. She wants to interfere with the past as little as possible, and they should respect her wishes. Aileen doesn’t interrupt again. “Prince Charles himself is against it, so it’s still only tentative. He’s holed up in the old castle in the forest, ignored the ceremony for the appointment of the crown prince and everything else, and is prepared to fight an all-out war with His Majesty the emperor…” “So he defied the demon king, did he? That’s some spine.” With a rather astounded smile, Baal sits down beside Roxane. Claude takes a seat next to Aileen, crossing his long legs. From what they’ve been told so far, Charles is Claude’s son. Just as she’s feeling impressed that he decided to defy him, Claude puts in a quiet remark. “He probably takes after his mother.” “Did you say something, Master Claude?” “You aren’t going to tell us he loathed the idea of becoming crown prince so much that he fled to the past, are you?” Ignoring Aileen’s critical eyes, Claude prompts Estella to continue. The girl shakes her head. “I don’t know… I’ve only spoken with Master Charles a handful of times.” “Even though you’re engaged?” “The engagement was decided only recently. It was a little before his tentative appointment as crown prince was made public… As a student at the Divine Maiden Academy, I didn’t have much contact with the outside world in the first place.” It seems like no boys are allowed at the future academy, either. However, Roxane interrupts. “Still, it seems a little unnatural for you to have spoken so little. Imperial Ellmeyer and the Kingdom of Ashmael are friendly nations. If we have children, Lady Aileen, don’t you think we should let them get to know each other from infancy?” “Yes, in terms of national interest, I think that would be my choice as well.” Estella seems unsure whether she should respond to Aileen and Roxane, but in the end, she does. “As you say, our families met several times before our engagement. However, Master Charles always avoided those occasions entirely or slipped out in the middle, and I didn’t have the chance to speak to him.” “Could he be unexpectedly shy…?” murmurs Claude, who is unexpectedly shy. He sounds as if he has mixed feelings about it. “His older siblings are brilliant, so until now, everyone has been lenient with him. However, if he is to be crown prince, he must refrain from such behavior. As his fiancée, I’ve cautioned him about it several times, but he must have found it annoying. One day, out of nowhere, he sent me a notice that our engagement had been dissolved.” Estella’s voice is growing chillier, and Aileen and Claude exchange a look. “The marriage of an imperial prince and a royal princess is a contract between their nations. It isn’t the sort of thing anyone may break for self-centered reasons, and certainly not with a single piece of paper. Growing angry, I marched into Imperial Ellmeyer. I am the daughter of the holy king, after all. For me, destroying the barrier around the old castle was simple.” Estella speaks impassively, her eyes set. For no particular reason, Aileen sits up straighter. It doesn’t seem real to her, but this is an offense perpetrated by her son. She must hear her out in good faith. “Master Charles wasn’t there, so with no other recourse, I tried to intimidate the nearby demons into telling me where he was. However, Master Charles had given them strict orders not to say, so they refused to tell me.” Claude also uncrosses his legs and sits up straighter. He’s picked up on Estella’s anger. “Then unable to stand by and watch, Master Charles’s attendant told me he’d headed for the underground ruin at the Divine Maiden Academy. At that point, I remembered: A little while earlier, for some reason, Master Charles had stolen into the dormitory of the Divine Maiden Academy at night to visit me.” “He what?! He’d better not have done anything inappropriate.” Anxiously, Baal leans forward on the couch. Roxane frowns slightly. “Master Baal, let us listen to what she’s saying for now. In addition, I think it’s a little hasty of you to worry like that.” “W-well, yes, but… We mean, now that we’ve been told she’s our daughter, no matter what we do, it—” “He doesn’t have the spirit for that sort of thing,” Estella responds coldly. Baal silently takes his seat again while Claude’s gaze goes distant. “He only asked me a question. ‘Is the Daughter of God’s body really not in the underground ruin?’ I told him it wasn’t. There was no need to hide it. Everyone knows her body isn’t in the ruin. I’d heard from Father and the others that it had been moved to a safe location before I was born.” “Moved…? You’re sure you don’t mean ‘stolen’?” Aileen asks, trying to match the situation to their current one. Estella nods. “I don’t know the details, either. However, in my era, it’s true that the body isn’t in the ruin. I thought it was odd that he’d ask about a thing like that, but he only said, ‘That’s good,’ and left…” She pauses for a moment, as if getting her thoughts in order. “Due to that incident, his attendant’s statement seemed plausible, so I went after Master Charles. In my time, although the underground ruin is on the grounds of the Divine Maiden Academy, anyone may tour it. I saw that man—Evare—and Master Charles enter it together.” It had already been very late at night. In the darkness, Estella had stolen into the chapel after the pair, and that was when she overheard them talking. “The man said, ‘Change the past. That’s the only way there is.’” Findin’ you here was a stroke of luck. Still, it looks like the Daughter of God’s body ain’t in this era, neither. And the World Unity sect’s nowhere to be found. In the first place, since you’ve been born here, maybe it’s already too late. “I had no idea what they were talking about. Still, Master Charles seemed to understand…” I have to go back further into the past and do stuff over. Yeah, I know: If you help me, I won’t erase your family or your brother and sister or your country. That’s a promise. “While what he was saying mystified me, I knew better than to expect a suspicious stranger to keep his promise. I thought, Danger is bearing down on Ellmeyer’s imperial family.” As a matter of fact, as Estella feared, Evare has just broken his promise to Charles. “No doubt Master Charles didn’t believe him, either. He told the man he was going with him.” You go on and look for the Daughter of God’s body and the sacred sword. I’ll seal Ellmeyer with a barrier, so you can’t touch it. Claude covers his face with a hand. “…So he did that to protect Ellmeyer from Evare?” “I believe so. However, I didn’t think that would be the end of it. Particularly when I heard the Queendom of Hausel’s floating palace come up in conversation.” All eyes turn to her, and Estella looks down. “My parents told me of the war with the Queendom of Hausel. The floating palace is a structure—no, a weapon that we don’t yet understand. That’s what I was taught. They said it was located in territory that we absolutely must not enter. I don’t know where the palace is, either, but that was what the man said they had to obtain. He also said he was going to leap to the past. That, as long as a girl called Machina was with him, he could travel through time.” “Only the gods may do that,” Baal mutters. Estella nods. “Yes. However, both of them—Master Charles included—disappeared along with Machina. Or rather, it felt as though they had been wiped out of existence. I was sure it wasn’t merely teleportation. Since I was supposed to become the holy king, I don’t think there’s any mistake.” “You were supposed to?” Aileen asks. Estella looks startled, then promptly bows her head. “I’ve said something uncalled for. Please ignore it… At any rate, I was very anxious, and I rushed back to the old castle. If Ellmeyer’s crown prince vanished, there would be an uproar. Because Master Charles had holed up in the old castle, his absence wouldn’t be discovered immediately, but it wouldn’t be long. First, I asked his attendant and his master—his teacher—for advice.” “His teacher… The boy’s emotions seem to have no effect on the weather or nature. Should the credit for that go to his teacher?” That’s all Claude asks; he doesn’t really seem to be expecting an answer. Estella is probably hoping they won’t ask more pointed questions. It’s dangerous to know more than they need to about the future. “His teacher told me the demon realm presented a way to go after Master Charles. An individual with strong sacred power would probably be able to enter the demon realm and make it out safely, but there was no guarantee. When he asked if I still wanted to follow him, I said I did.” As Estella speaks, her gaze is clear and firm. The teacher and attendant had shown Estella to the basement of the old castle. Aileen had already heard that there was an entrance to the demon realm there from Luciel and Grace. When she fell into that pit, the world seemed to turn over. The very first thing she saw was a palace that looked like a reflection of the old castle, with the sky as the boundary between them. The horde of demons that surrounded her told her to go to it. “The demons are Master Charles’s allies, but they didn’t try to stop me. They must want me to bring him back as well… I entered the castle that floated in the sky of the demon realm.” The next thing she knew, she was in a space that was pitch-black both overhead and underfoot. All that was there was a large door that only someone with sacred power could see. Even the way back had vanished. She had no choice but to go forward. However, neither pushing, pulling, nor hitting the door with sacred power was enough to open it. Deciding it must have some sort of spell on it, Estella abruptly remembered a saying. “I won’t reveal who it was, but someone once taught me a spell that would open sealed doors, so I chanted it.” “—‘Hear, O past. Open, O future. I am the maiden who inherits the regalia of saints and demons’?” Aileen recites from memory. Estella’s eyes widen, but she smiles without responding directly. “After the door opened, you know what happened. For just a moment, I thought I saw a pure-white room. Then light enveloped me. The next thing I knew, I was in Ellmeyer, which was covered by a red barrier…” “Thank goodness for that. The story alone is rough on our heart.” Baal, who’d been listening in silence, covers his face with his hands as if he’s exhausted. Frowning slightly, Estella apologizes, “I really know almost nothing, and you’re all very busy, and yet I’ve talked for so long. I’m sorry.” “No, that’s not it… Good grief, did you get that denseness from your mother? We mean we’re glad you’re safe. What a dangerous thing you’ve done… Do you have a way to get back?” Estella looks troubled. “I don’t even know how I got here to begin with.” “We hope the future holy king isn’t having a breakdown over this. Will he come to pick you up?” asks Baal. “I really don’t know. I felt I needed to settle the matter before it was discovered, so I came without even reporting it to the emperor… Um, I’m very sorry.” Estella conscientiously apologizes to Claude. She’s earnest to a fault, and as Baal has pointed out, she tends to get things just a little wrong. Claude shakes his head. “I remember none of this, but don’t worry about it. That teacher is probably handling things. More importantly, when Baal finds out you’ve vanished, too, he’s going to be a pain… We’ll have to cover it up somehow.” “Yes, Master Claude, you’re right. Our son has done something foolish, and he’s dragged someone else’s daughter into the mess. How can we gloss it over?” “Hey, Demon King and spouse, we can hear you! Is hiding the truth all you can think of?!” “It’s nothing to concern yourselves over. As I am Master Charles’s fiancée, it is my duty to stop him,” Estella declares. Everyone else falls silent. The odd hush seems to puzzle Estella. She tilts her head. “Have I said something strange?” “No… We, er, think that’s fine as well, but… Your duty, hmm? Yes, we see.” “We understand what you’ve told us, Estella. However, even if that red barrier isn’t harmful, we don’t know why he was capable of cursing Emperor Claude. That will be a problem. He is the demon king, you know. Even if they are blood relatives, I think it must have been something rather peculiar,” Roxane points out. Pulling himself together, Baal nods. “Come to think of it, he did repel both sacred power and magic as if it were nothing.” “Yes,” Estella says. She seems satisfied with the direction the conversation is taking. “I’ve never seen it, since it’s hidden by that eye patch, but I’m told Prince Charles’s eyes are different colors. One is red, the other purple.” “…The same as my father, hmm? No wonder he’s strong.” Claude sighs. Aileen heard that when Luciel was a god, he had one red eye and one purple one as well. If his eyes are the same color as a god’s, that would explain why he’s stronger than both Claude and Luciel. That, and how he managed to shoulder the full force of Machina’s self-destruction and get by with mere injuries. “Nn…” Sensing that someone is waking up, everyone’s gazes go to the corner of the room. Charles’s eyelids flutter, opening slowly—and then with a jolt, he registers the fact that he’s wrapped in chains. “What is this?!” “Good morning, Master Charles.” Rising to her feet, Estella crosses to Charles, who’s lying on the floor. His hands are bound behind him, but he manages to sit up. There’s a deeply unhappy look on his face. “Estella…” “How are you feeling?” “Rotten, obviously. What happened to Machina?” Estella frowns. In her place, Aileen answers from her chair. “Lady Sahra—do you know who that is? At any rate, the Daughter of God is tending to her in another room, so don’t worry.” “All right, then. I’m glad she’s safe.” Charles looks relieved. Quietly, Estella asks, “What is your relation to that girl?” Charles averts his eyes rather obviously. “It’s none of your business.” Estella’s aura grows colder than it’s ever been. “You’ve caused an uproar this serious, and you’re still saying irresponsible things like that?” “Irresponsible? You’re more irresponsible than I am. I don’t exist, but you do, even if you’re not born yet. You could have ended up with a whole lot worse than amnesia.” “It could all have been avoided if you hadn’t done this.” “How did you get here, woman? Even you don’t have the power to go back in time.” “Answer my question first, please.” “No, woman. You don’t know how to get home. What are you planning to do?” “…I’ve told you time and again not to refer to me that way.” “We should probably stop them, don’t you think? This isn’t much of a conversation,” Claude murmurs, looking a little appalled. Aileen rises to her feet. “Stop that, both of you.” Estella’s eyes are wide, and her expression is menacing. Roxane puts an arm around her shoulders, gently leading her away. Aileen crouches down in front of Charles. The boy’s lips are pressed together tightly, and he’s looking at Aileen defiantly. Aileen gazes back at him, then sighs. “Well done, future me… He’s a really lovely child.” “Huh?” “Charles. Who gave you that name? Was it myself? Or your father?” Keeping his guard up, Charles thinks for a while. “…Father. I heard he got the name from Uncle James.” “I see. Yes, when I first met him, he was calling himself James Charles.” There must have been some meaning in it. Aileen nods in satisfaction. Charles narrows his eyes. “Does that matter right now?” “Yes, it matters. After all, it’s related to you. Sahra has healed your wounds; does anything still hurt?” “If you’re being kind to me so I’ll get careless, it’s pointless, Mother.” Charles snorts, as if he’s mocking her. “I know how you work. I haven’t been your son for years for nothing.” Aileen chuckles right back. “You’re my son, all right. I don’t suppose you’d care to remove the curse on Master Claude?” “No.” “Not even if I pat you on the head and tell you you’re a good boy?” “How old do you think I am? Gross.” He’s a formidable opponent. Just as she’s thinking, He’s definitely our son, Claude joins them. “Aileen. Would you leave this to me and Baal?” At the sound of his calm voice, Aileen and Charles both look up. “Of course, but… What will you do if you turn into a young dragon again, Master Claude?” “That’s why Baal is here.” “What are we, your babysitter?” “There are questions you want to ask, too, right? We’ll have a man-to-man talk.” Baal scowls, then glances to the side and nods. “Very well. Roxane, let us borrow this room for a little while. In the meantime, prepare a place for Estella and Aileen and the others to rest.” “Very well.” Prompted by Roxane, Estella gets to her feet. She’s being quiet, but dissatisfaction is written all over her face. Aileen thumps her shoulders lightly. “Let us leave this to Master Claude and your father.” “We don’t need to talk.” As Estella finally managed to start moving, Charles spoke behind her, as if to prove her concern is right on the mark. Claude is calm. “You’re saying there’s no room to negotiate? I’m fairly sure this situation already falls outside your plans.” “There’s no point in talking like you know and trying to pry information out of me. I won’t say a thing, and I’m not taking that curse off you, Father. The barrier over Ellmeyer stays, too.” He’s young, but his expression is dignified, and his words hold strong conviction. She doesn’t know what he’s struggling with privately, but they’ve raised a fine, strong-willed child. Claude seems to have thought the same thing. Calmly, he looks down at Charles, who’s completely shutting him out. “So you won’t explain the situation, no matter what… Then you leave me no choice. First, I’ll guess the name of the girl you like.” He isn’t mature about it, though. “Wh-what…?!” “I’d really prefer not to. If I were in your position, I wouldn’t be able to take it. The moment she hears it, the shame will probably make you die an agonizing death. I don’t want to put my son through a thing like that, but…” “Well, if he’s going to be recalcitrant with us, there’s no way around it.” Baal and Claude both nod. When it comes to this sort of thing, they’re weirdly on the same page. Poor Charles turns pale. He tries to speak several times, but nothing comes out, and finally, he turns bright red. “Wh-what the hell are you talking about! Does this look like the time for that?!” “We can hardly tell whether it’s the time for this or not if you won’t talk.” “Just so you know, this doesn’t mean we’ve accepted you for our daughter. However, you’re free to love whoever you wish.” “D-don’t talk nonsense! I—I don’t even have anybody I l-like!!” “So this is puberty. Well now, Baal, who do you think it is?” “You’re going to make us say it? Maybe we don’t look it, but our feelings about this are complicated. Very well. The girl this fellow loves is—” “St-stop it, don’t say it! Fine, I’ll talk, just don’t you dare say it!!” Charles screams. Estella tries to look back, but Aileen pushes her along, and they both leave the room with Roxane. “You mustn’t listen. It’s a conversation between gentlemen,” Roxane warns her. Aileen nods firmly in agreement. Her son is probably about to get his pride shredded by his father, and as his mother, she’d like to protect him as much as she can. Even so, Estella is distracted by what’s happening behind her. “But, um, is it really all right to leave this to them?” “It’s fine. Let’s do what we can while we have the chance.” “What we can do? But there’s nothing…” “Lady Roxane, I have a favor to ask. I would like to go to the Divine Maiden Academy once more.”
Chapter 111
21 min read