He had been dreaming, a rarity for him. He returned to the waking world, opening terribly heavy eyelids.
He was in the middle of a dense forest. Hidden by the leaves, in an abyss without even moonlight, Tsushima strained his eyes and surveyed his surroundings.
How long had he been out? Still not fully conscious, he touched his wound. Along with a faint pain, he felt a soft sensation at his fingertips. At first, he thought his guts might be spilling out, but that didn’t seem to be the case. Intrigued by the strange feeling, Tsushima looked down at his hand.
The surface of the wound showed signs of forced cellular division to promote healing. It didn’t seem to be bleeding, and the injury itself was fully closed.
However, it appeared to have been treated in a great hurry. The scarring was rough and uneven.
“Where’d she go?”
Trying to think with his sleep-addled brain, he turned his head and saw Lupus emerge from the shade of a nearby tree. She was covered in wounds and had mud clinging to her cheeks. She looked utterly exhausted, but she quickly ran over when she saw Tsushima had woken up.
“You’ve regained consciousness. Thank goodness. I was wondering what I’d do if you died.”
“If I bite the dust, just leave me somewhere. The animals will eat my body to clean things up.”
“Don’t say that! It’s bad luck.”
Tsushima had meant it as a joke, but apparently his quip had been inappropriate. Lupus glared angrily and drew closer to him.
“Where are we?” Tsushima asked her, returning his gaze to the forest. Lupus tilted her head curiously.
“You brought us here. Do you not remember?”
“My memory cuts out around the time we jumped out of the train. It’s all fuzzy after that.”
“I see. Things were pretty rough past that point.”
Lupus put down the bundle of twigs she had been carrying under her arm to use for firewood and began to explain.
“After we got off the train, you carried me and walked along the bottom of the river for ages to escape. You kept going like this for hours while generating air using the river water and nitrogen. Canus’s monsters were pursuing us that whole time.”
“Is that what happened?”
Lupus glanced at Tsushima with concern as she arranged the firewood to start a campfire.
“Then about an hour after entering this forest, you suddenly collapsed while we were walking. I thought you were dead!”
“Must have been the blood loss and Code execution overload that got me. Sorry for worrying you.”
Sniffling, Lupus looked up at Tsushima. She must have been feeling hopeless. She didn’t say as much, but she had a forlorn expression.
Tsushima rubbed the poorly treated wound on his abdomen. It had been severe enough that it couldn’t have been healed by normal means, yet now the bleeding had stopped entirely. Based on its appearance, the wound could only have been treated by an Informationist.
Wanting to get things straight, Tsushima posed a question to Lupus.
“You’re an Informationist?”
Lupus lowered her gaze, looking just slightly guilty, before answering his question.
“Yes. I treated your wound as soon as we fell into the river, but we were moving so much that I had to treat it over and over again. It doesn’t look great, but I hope you can look past that.”
“So that’s what happened. That explains the crooked healing,” Tsushima said as he touched his injury.
“Maybe so…,” Lupus muttered with dissatisfaction. She seemed to be sulking a little. Even Tsushima realized he should add something to smooth things over.
“Still, you saved me. Thanks.”
“I should be saying that. To be honest, I didn’t think we’d be able to get away from Canus.”
Canus. One of the Six Imperial Swords. Tsushima wondered if he would cross blades with him again. Protecting his wound, Tsushima brought his hand to the firewood.
The coldness of the night was relatively mild, but since their clothes were wet, they needed to warm themselves. In the shade of the forest, a little firelight would probably go unnoticed.
Executing a simple Code, Tsushima started the small campfire. He took a seat across from Lupus and remembered he had things he needed to reconfirm.
As he rubbed his scar, Tsushima stared intently at Lupus’s face. She noticed his gaze but kept her eyes on the fire out of apparent awkwardness.
“Seems there’s a lot I should go over with you.”
“Yeah. How should I start?” Lupus said, falling silent for a little while. She added more firewood to the small campfire while thinking deeply.
The sound of birdcalls came seemingly out of nowhere, and Lupus took a deep breath, as if she had made up her mind. She turned right to Tsushima, setting honest, unwavering eyes on him.
“I’m Lupus Filia, the daughter of Emperor Balga and Third Princess,” she said, revealing her real name.
Lupus Filia. She was one of the emperor’s many children, a virtuous and compassionate princess who had strong support from the people, even domestically.
Most of the imperial family had golden hair and red eyes, which also served as proof of their lineage. However, the girl in front of him had silver hair and blue eyes—completely different features.
Now that Tsushima was looking at her, it all clicked into place. The Lupus Filia he had seen in images and photographs was indeed sitting right across from him. Frustrated at his own idiocy, Tsushima sighed and put a finger between his brows.
“From what I remember, the Third Princess has golden hair and red eyes. Which is your natural appearance?”
“I executed Codes to make my hair golden. My eyes really are red, but I’m making them blue with Code execution to keep them from standing out. I guess I’ve also done my makeup differently. Without the symbols of the imperial family, nobody noticed my identity, surprisingly.”
Having revealed one of the secrets she had been hiding, Lupus smiled, perhaps feeling that a little weight had been taken off her shoulders.
Looking straight at her, Tsushima returned to the conversation.
“How did a Balga princess wind up trying to defect to Elbar? Depending on the circumstances, your case might be beyond my capabilities.”
Lupus’s face clouded slightly at Tsushima’s cold choice of words. Then she smiled weakly and poked the firewood in the campfire.
“I got tired of the succession battle to decide the next emperor of the Balga Empire. In that world of daily plotting and scheming, I had to keep winning to stave off death. I was sick of that life.”
As she spoke, Lupus clutched something at the base of her neck. A gold necklace had become visible at her disheveled neckline during their intense escape.
That explained the gesture she had repeated several times before; she had been clutching her necklace. Tsushima kept an eye on her as he listened attentively.
“I’m the child of the emperor and an Informationist. In the imperial family, we’re taught the blood of Informationists is impure. I’ve had to live while hiding my true identity. Naturally, I haven’t had many allies, even within my own family. But there was just one person who protected me since I was a child—a knight. He was the only person I trusted. He knew my story yet stood by me as my only ally that entire time.”
As Lupus spoke, she removed her necklace. Hanging at the end were two rings—one gold and one silver—that were designed to form a single shape when put together.
“Do you know what these rings mean?”
Lupus looked at Tsushima with sad eyes. He quietly nodded.
“If I recall correctly, the Balga imperial family members have the authority to appoint knights. These rings symbolize the vow made between a member of the imperial family and their knight, don’t they?”
“Correct. I knew you’d be well-informed.”
The relationship between a member of the imperial family and their knight wasn’t simply one of protector and protected; it was also a partnership in which both people were bound by a shared fate. Knowing this, Tsushima understood the weight of those rings.
However, those two pieces of jewelry should have been split between a member of the imperial family and their knight. So why was Lupus carrying them both? The reason was easy to imagine.
“Your knight betrayed you?”