I have been waiting for you.
Your Majesty, Queen Octavia Draine of the United Empire of Ercadia. By the grace of God, queen of Ercadia, Defender of the Faith, etc.
Glorify Our Majesty’s victory.
Octavia nodded. Quite right. Don’t worry. I won’t let you heirlooms, who fought to protect our world, fall under our god’s curse. Nor will I let you kill the angels who betrayed us.
“Young lady, come on, now. Breathe.”
We may have lost our kingdom, where you would have served alongside your queen, but I will always be your queen. To ensure that you tools never betray humanity, I will never betray you, either.
“Octavia! Hey, Octavia! Don’t let too much of the map’s magic build up inside you. Spit it out!”
“I guess it can’t be helped,” said another voice. “Forgive me, Your Majesty.”
“Huh? Why, you... Ah—!”
Something soft was pressed against Octavia’s lips. She remembered the time her grandmother had pressed a squishy marshmallow against them. Yes, that was a sweet memory, but her grandmother was no longer with her. The feeling was kind and sweet, and it made her want to cry.
Octavia opened her eyes. She suspected that the soft sensation she had just felt had not been a dream. After all, right before her eyes was a stranger’s masked face. On her lips still lingered that unfamiliar sensation, which she had felt just then for the first time. Soft and sweet. She felt something trace her bottom lip gently, and then she came back to her senses.
H-Have I just been kissed? The moment she finally realized this, her body started moving on its own. More specifically, she moved to grab the man by his head and snap his neck. Before she could, the man stepped back lightly to evade her.
“If you have the energy for that, then I suppose you’ll be fine.”
“Y-Y-You... What do you...?!” Octavia was so shaken that she couldn’t get the words out.
From atop her head, Hat cried, “Octavia, take your gun back out! You can even use the land mine! I’ll kill this bounder!”
“I was helping you. That was just assisted breathing, magical edition. You weren’t breathing, you see.” Though the man’s mask obscured his face, he seemed to smile mischievously.
Her whole body still trembling, Octavia glared at the man. “Y-Y-You,” she breathed, “surely intend to take responsibility for this, don’t you...?!”
“Take responsibility? There’s no way a phantom thief would ever do that.” Seeing the man sneer at her, Octavia felt a blood vessel burst in her head.
“Hat!”
“Leave it to me!”
“Now, then, it looks like it’s about time.”
The train rocked violently. A patch of the darkness around them peeled away, and light streamed in.
“We’re returning to the mortal realm.”
The darkness continued to fall away in pieces as the scenery around them was rebuilt. Once more they saw the indigo blue sea, painted over by the sunset. The sky was still in the interval between day and night, the red sun gradually descending. It was exactly as Octavia had seen it from the dining car a short while ago.
“Well, I’ll be taking my leave. You had better return quickly, too.”
Octavia—who, in spite of herself, had been transfixed by the sight of the sea—returned to her senses. Before she realized what was happening, the masked man had kicked off from the roof of the train and was floating up into the air. In a panic, she shouted, “Don’t you dare run away! Get back down here, you coward!”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“Th-That was the first time anyone’s ever kissed me!”
The masked man blinked, looking for a moment to be lost in thought.
A strange feeling of embarrassment welled up inside Octavia along with her anger, and she cried, “In spite of that, do you really mean to run away, without even giving me your name?!”
“Crow, the Phantom Thief.”
Octavia shut her mouth, hearing this familiar name. Then she asked quietly, “Are you...the same phantom thief who’s after the Imperial Heirlooms?”
“I hope you will find me a worthy opponent.” Crow chuckled faintly; it struck a nerve for Octavia.
“You scoundrel! Come down here so I can show you how to take responsibility for your actions!”
“Well, I suppose I really did lack restraint, this time. Sticking my nose into this mess, just for fun, without even sending a letter of notice, is an act unbefitting the character of a phantom thief. By way of apology, allow me to tidy up your troubles. That way, you’ll be able to reach the Royal Capital safely.”
“You’re the only thing troubling me right now, though!”
“See you again, Miss Detective.”
“No, I’m telling you, you need to take responsibility—” She broke off. “Hey, don’t run away!”
With a whirl of his cape, the phantom thief vanished, just as the last of the darkness peeled away. At the same time, an intense light suffused the space around Octavia, turning her vision pure white.
“Octavia... Octavia!” Someone is trying to wake me up. As Octavia realized this, she remembered that kiss—the height of irresponsibility—and sat up quickly, her eyes opening wide in anger.
“I’m awake, all right!”
“I-I see. That’s good to hear.” Octavia saw Raven’s face. He batted his eyelashes in surprise. She was no longer on top of the train, exposed to the roaring wind. She was back inside the dining car.
Octavia looked around. Many people were still slumped on the floor beneath their tables, but as she worked her way around, calling out to them and shaking them awake, they all began to rouse from their slumbers. The conductor, remembering his own duty, called out to the passengers, asking if anyone was injured.
“It looks as if everyone suddenly fainted, somehow.”
So I’ve returned. With this confirmation, Octavia breathed a sigh of relief. Atop her head, Hat said, “It’s all right. In our reality, not even a second has passed. Don’t give us away—this is reality, right here.”
Reality. Comprehending the word, Octavia remembered. “By the way, what happened to the men in black?” Those men had caused the commotion in the first place.
As Octavia remembered this, Raven screwed up his face. “The thing is... Just look.” Raven glanced over to where he wanted her to look, where everyone else’s attention was gathered, too. Octavia looked up as well, and she blinked.
The picture frame that had been broken by the men in black suits was still broken, and the map that had been inside it was gone. Of course it was—Hat had just registered it. However, in the map’s place, someone had slipped a card inside the frame.
I’ve helped myself to the Imperial Heirloom.
From Crow, the Phantom Thief,
To Detective Octavia, with love.
As Octavia stood there, dumbfounded, the voices of the other passengers, looking at the same thing, began to reach her ears.
“Don’t tell me those men in black suits from before were sent by Crow, the Phantom Thief?”
“Where did those men disappear to?!”
“Hey, was anything else stolen?”
“Who’s Detective Octavia...?”
“Everyone, please be calm! We’ll be making an emergency stop at the next station, so for now, make sure your own belongings are secure!”
The confusion and excitement dissipated in the blink of an eye as the passengers all hurried away. Rising unsteadily to her feet, Octavia read the message in the broken picture frame one more time.
“But the map was...?”
“It’s in our hands, Octavia. Don’t worry. In fact, we should be thanking him. With this, we needn’t be caught up in the commotion surrounding the missing map. It seems the men in black have disappeared, too. That was probably the Phantom Thief’s work.”
By way of apology, allow me to tidy up your troubles.
So those words had been sincere. She should probably have felt grateful. But what welled up in her heart was indignation—the indignation of the encounter having ended with her being toyed with.
As a detective, suffering that, of all things, from a phantom thief? But Octavia still wasn’t a detective, so it didn’t count. She wanted to think that, but she couldn’t. With love? What’s that about? Don’t tell me he’s decided to take responsibility for that irresponsible kiss.
“Detective Octavia... Would that be referring to you?” At this murmur from Raven, Octavia clenched her hands into fists. This letter was a challenge to her.
“That’s right.”
“Don’t tell me you’re acquainted with the Phantom Thief?”
“Of course not. But that man...” She wanted to grind her teeth, but she kept them apart somehow. She groaned, “I swear, I’ll break both his legs—and I’ll make him take responsibility for his actions!”
“Somehow, I feel like that’s exactly what he wants,” murmured Hat, his voice muted. Octavia didn’t hear him. Nor did she notice, naturally, that the young man behind her smiled slightly as he licked away the lipstick stuck to the corner of his lips.
Around an hour after the scheduled time, the overnight train arrived at the station in the Royal Capital. News of Crow, the Phantom Thief, had evidently already been circulating there; the train was quickly surrounded by journalists. Of course, the conductor was quite beset upon, but so were some of the passengers, and they each gave some sort of comment.
“Crow—the Phantom Thief—was in cahoots with those men in black suits! After all, they vanished at the same time.”
“One of them took out a gun, all of a sudden! After that, the map just vanished.”
“Would you happen to know a Detective Octavia?”
Gingerly, as if she were herself a criminal, Octavia slipped past the crowd. The vast station called to mind something like a theater, with its many train lines and covered platforms. It was so crammed with people that Octavia had to walk carefully to avoid bumping into anyone, so if she simply kept her head down as she went, she wouldn’t stand out.
But on all sides was a landscape she was seeing for the first time. As she flipped over her map of the Royal Capital, Raven snatched it from her. “I’ll see you off. You can take a coach from over here.”
“R-Right.”
“Lady Octavia, I presume.” A hooded man, whose presence she had completely failed to notice, appeared in front of her, a coach behind him. Octavia tensed up reflexively.
Raven reacted just as quickly, coolly opening his mouth to speak. “It is impolite to be so abrupt. Who might you be?”
“You have been summoned by Princess Eliza,” announced the man dispassionately.