* * * But she looked like an entirely different person. It was like the princess had changed entirely. Shadows fell on her eyes, her shoulders sagged, and the smile she’d worn in front of the people in the plaza as she sang had withered away. She looked weary. It was as though she was disgusted by everything around her. I could see it all in her face. But how did I know? It was because I’d seen that same expression every day of my life on my face. “It’s like looking into a mirror when I see her eyes.” “Huh?!” The princess suddenly raised her head. Had she heard me? That was unexpected. She’d looked distracted, but it seemed she was paying enough attention to reality to hear me murmur to myself. “Who’s there?!” Well, fine. I wasn’t going to give her a proper answer, but I at least walked over to the edge of the light. “…” “Are you a burglar?” She probably thought I was a dirty man. It seemed only fitting she would immediately make such an accusation. In fact, her composure and courage as she talked to me in what should have been a tense situation shocked and awed me. “You’re lucky it’s only me here.” That was likely enough to relay what I meant. She’d know I wasn’t an assassin after her life or a thief. As I thought, I saw some of the tension leave her. “Oh, good… Then are you one of my fans?” “Is that what I seem like?” “Yes.” The princess with emerald hair giggled. “Since I did see you in a plaza listening to my song in the past.” “Huh?!” How did she remember something from so long ago? Actually, did she remember every face in that crowd of hundreds of people? I’d only arrived toward the end of the concert. I’d just been one face replacing someone else in a packed crowd. If she could keep track of everyone moving around in the crowd, she had to be a very talented woman. A princess blessed with everything except astral power could banter about something so impressive as though it were trivial. “Unfortunately, I happened to be there by coincidence.” “Oh, that’s too bad.” Princess Elletear shrugged, seeming disappointed. “Then who are you?” “Who do I seem like?” “…” The princess went silent. She remained sitting on the bench as she stared into my eyes. “You seem agitated.” “Hah!” I couldn’t hold back the laugh. She was entirely right. It seemed she was a good judge of people, too. “Amazing.” I clapped for her. “There are two things I simply can’t stand. Until now, first place was me, but today, first and second have been reversed. What I can’t stand…is this country.” “The country…?” Elletear blinked in surprise. “Are you sure you don’t mean the Empire?” “I don’t care about a country across the horizon. What’s in front of me is this country.” I could feel that seething at the bottom of my gut again. The results letter I’d crumpled into a ball—instead of throwing that away in a trash can somewhere in a plaza, I tossed it to the princess. “Oh, I see…” She straightened out the paper. After quickly reading it, she nodded as though she understood. “So you were trying to volunteer for the astral corps. But now you’re sulking because you were rejected.” “That’s it.” “Don’t feel too dispirited. The astral corps are the cream of the crop. If you try again—” “This was my third time.” “…Huh?” “I have astral power deficiency. It seems someone who can’t use astral power isn’t allowed to stand on the battlefield.” “Pfft!” I likely would never forget Elletear in this moment. She burst out laughing. The princess, known for being extraordinarily noble, let out a vulgar guffaw, and not only that, she even clutched her stomach as she did. She was just like a regular citizen at a tavern. “Y-you failed three whole times?! And you didn’t give up despite astral power deficiency?! A-ah-ha-ha-ha-ha! Ha-ha…oh, sorry. I didn’t think I would revel in someone’s misfortune like this.” She laughed so hard that tears gathered in her eyes. She was laughing so hard, she could barely breathe. “Oh, how adorable… I’m in the same conundrum as you. I can’t believe I find it so funny.” Right at that moment… I heard several sets of feet approaching me from behind. “Hurry, over here!” “We can’t assume he was acting alone! Hurry and bring reinforcements!” They were the palace guards. They must have been friends of the three I’d had a run-in with. They changed their tune as they came upon Elletear sitting on the bench. “Lady Elletear?! What are you doing here?!” “I was enjoying the evening breeze.” The princess grinned. She had the same exaggerated smile that she’d given the crowd in the plaza. “What’s wrong? Why are you all in such a rush?” “Please be careful! We found three guards unconscious in the courtyard. We believe someone assaulted them.” “Oh my. What a violent person.” Elletear sounded surprised. I was sure that only I realized she was feigning it. “But I’m fine. I haven’t seen a single person as I’ve sat here. I’m sure they must have left the courtyard.” “Thank you! We’re very grateful for the useful information. Now, hurry!” The guards left. I waited until their noisy footsteps disappeared into the night, then crawled out of the bushes. The princess squinted as she watched me. She seemed to think this was hilarious. “Did you need to protect me?” “It’s a thank-you for making me laugh.” Her voice lifted as she replied. But then the emotion disappeared from her beautiful face, making her look almost frightful. “I hate this country, too.” Those were likely her true feelings. I immediately realized that she was telling the truth. Princess Elletear had no chance of ever becoming the queen. Knowing her background, anyone could have guessed that. “I hate astral mages… I can’t help but find this country horrid for deciding everything based on astral power. It’s more despicable than the Empire.” I understood. But that seemed like too clichéd of a response, so instead of saying that, I replied, “Then we think alike.” “…” The princess went silent for a moment. She turned away from the sky she’d been looking up at to stare silently at me. “Do you know what I was thinking about until you appeared here? I thought, ‘I wish this country and the Empire could both be destroyed.’” Those were radical words. As I thought that, I nodded. “Let’s get rid of it all.” That was… …just meant to be an empty reply to her. I was certain she was joking. Even in the case of the slightest possibility she actually had been thinking that, it wasn’t as though someone like me agreeing would result in her seriously engaging with me about it, not with my social status. She would most certainly laugh it off just like she had before… “Do you mean it?” she asked. It all happened in a flash. But by the time I had realized it, her quivering eyes had captured me. “Do you mean it? Do you really believe the same thing?” Elletear’s voice wavered. She was like a rain-drenched, shivering kitten. Her feeble voice told me how much courage it had taken for her to squeeze out those words. And that in itself… …was beautiful. More beautiful than the goddess-like smile she had used to entrance hundreds of people in that plaza. Her eyes, which seemed so ephemeral that she could break down crying at any moment, yet were also still so noble and clear…seemed beautiful to me. That was because, deep in her eyes, I could see the determination I lacked. ……She’s serious. ……Princess Elletear, do you really want to destroy the Sovereignty? This was treason. What if the guards came back? If they had heard her saying this, she wouldn’t be a princess the next day. ……It’s such a big secret. ……But she still told me. So she chose me to confide in. The moment I realized that, I… “How would you like to destroy it, Princess Elletear?” I… …got on one knee before her and lowered my head. “Just tell me.” “You’ll help make it happen?” “You will be the one who makes it happen. I’ll be your arms and legs.” Something in me had cleared away. Because this princess who had been sitting on this bench at night in despair, with no one she could ask for help, was someone I wanted to save. “I want to help you.” “…” Elletear went quiet. She hadn’t chosen to not answer. It seemed she wanted to tell me something and was looking for the right words. “You snuck into the palace on your own at night and made your way to me. You must think it was all a coincidence, but I’ve been waiting for you.” “You were waiting?” “Of course.” She looked slightly embarrassed. Under the light, she seemed bashful as she spoke. “I was waiting for the knight who would liberate the princess kept locked up in this terrible castle.” “…” “So that’s why I’ll tell you a very important secret.” She placed her hand on her chest. Still sitting on the bench, she looked in the air as though making an oath. “I want to become a witch.” “A witch?” “I want to become the monster that destroys the Sovereignty. No matter what I need to sacrifice.” I didn’t understand what significance that held. But I didn’t bother asking for an explanation, either. If that was what she wanted, then… “All right. I won’t let anyone in the world mock you for your wish.” “Then lower your head.” And so I did. She touched my head with the tips of her fingers. Princess Elletear stood from the bench and affectionately caressed my head as I knelt. “Tell me your name.” “Joheim Leo Armadel.” “Then Joheim, from this moment on…” The next morning, I entered the palace as the First Princess Elletear’s personal guard. 4 It had been one month since I’d become her personal guard. All Elletear ordered me to do was become strong enough to protect her from any trouble. She didn’t limit me at all. My standing as her personal guard was all for show. Instead of staying by Elletear’s side, I devoted myself to training. I trained even harder than before, so I would be prepared when the time came. I honed both my body and mind. “Let’s go out, Joheim.” She suddenly summoned me. Dressed in a disguise, Elletear took me to a neutral city. It seemed this was not a trip for official business. But it was no vacation, either. I realized that because Elletear steadily spoke less and less as we approached our destination. I realized something was off. Where were we going, and what would we do there? “This way, Joheim.” Elletear did not hesitate to head toward the outskirts of the neutral city once we arrived. We headed to a deserted-looking house and entered through the back door. “I was waiting for you, Princess.” A woman in an old-looking white coat greeted us. She knew Elletear was a princess. Based on the white coat, she must have been a doctor or a researcher. “Oh? And who is this red-haired man?” “Kelvina, this is my guard.” “Princess, you cannot reveal the treatment you are about to receive here to anyone in the Sovereignty. Didn’t you remind me of that yourself?” “Yes, that’s right,” Elletear said. “Well, fine… I suppose we had a rare turn of luck.” Kelvina shrugged. She glanced at me but wouldn’t meet my eye. It seemed she didn’t care who I was. “Well, come in. If we talk outside, others will see us.” She led us through the back door. We should have entered a living room, but when I felt dizzy, I scowled. “What is this?” Every wall, and even the ceiling, was filled with monitors. I saw beakers and flasks on a desk, holding a liquid of some strange color. An exam table stood at the center of everything. I’d never seen an exam table fitted with restraints before. “Are you a doctor?” “No, no.” Kelvina didn’t face me. As she turned her back to me, I noticed her white coat was dirtier than the one I’d been wearing in the streets. “If a doctor is meant to fix people, then I’m no doctor.” “…?” “Because I make people better versions of themselves. A doctor turns a minus into a zero. But I research making a zero a plus.” As she answered, she drew blood from Elletear, who had sat down on the exam table. Then she fed that blood sample into a large machine that seemed to be measuring something. “Amazing.” Kelvina’s voice quivered as she looked over the numbers listed on the screen. Her eyes glittered, and her lips twisted up into a crescent. “Oh, how wonderful, Princess Elletear. You have potential.” “Hey.” I couldn’t stand it anymore and grabbed her shoulder. I wanted her to cut this out. I didn’t care if she wouldn’t meet my eye, but what was she looking for when she drew blood from Elletear? “Is that your research? What are you researching when it comes to Elletear?” “It’s just a simple patch test.” Kelvina turned around. She smiled. When her eyes had glittered while taking Elletear’s blood and looking at the monitors, she’d easily looked like a mad scientist to me. “The Eight Great Apostles will be jubilant, too. We have a new subject.” Every word out of her mouth sounded worse and worse. The Eight Great Apostles? A subject? And what was the patch test for in the first place? But I wouldn’t get any useful answers from the mad scientist. “Elletear, what research is this?” “It’s what will make someone a witch.” “Is it?” I couldn’t forget that. The night Elletear and I had met, she’d said the same thing. ……A witch? ……That wasn’t just a disparaging word used for astral mages? It probably was different. I could tell that whatever was being done in this dilapidated house had to do with human experimentation, but I had no idea what it meant to be a witch. “Heh-heh.” Kelvina seemed amused as her shoulders shook. She kept stealing glances at me. “Looks like you’re not very trusted. By Elletear, that is.” “What?!” “No, that’s not true,” Elletear protested. The moment I clenched my hand into a fist, Elletear enveloped it in her own. “Guh.” “Please believe me, Joheim. I just didn’t have the courage to tell you until today. So I’ll tell you what I’m doing now.” “You just told him, didn’t you?” Kelvina said. “The princess has lofty ambitions but not the power to achieve them. To get that power, she’s going to go through experiments that will make her a monster.” “That’s what this experimentation is for?!” “For better or worse, we’ve found that Elletear is a perfect subject. That was what the patch test was for. Want to try it, too?” She gave me no time to argue as she picked up a syringe. In it, a light purple liquid that seemed to be a medicine of some sort undulated in the glass. She pushed that into the vein of my left arm. Before I could count to three, I felt my heart seize as though someone were squeezing it. It hurt. “Uh?!” Then I was assaulted by a chill and nausea. Next, I felt like my whole body was on fire. It was pain I’d never experienced before, and it brought me to my knees. What was it? What had she put in my body? “Was that poison, you shrew?” “Poison? I guess it could be. It’s the most dangerous poison on the planet.” Through my hazy vision, I saw her smile. “The astral power in you rejected the concoction. Oh, don’t worry. That reaction proves you’re a normal human. In other words, you’re not compatible. You can’t be one of my subjects.” “What did you say?” “Elletear, on the other hand, was able to handle a concoction seven times stronger for her test.” “Wha?!” I couldn’t help but cry out. As I was dumbfounded, Kelvina looked down at me and pulled a beaker from a desk. The liquid was a dark purple. It looked much more concentrated than the one she had injected into me. “As you can see, Elletear is fine, isn’t she? That’s what makes her special. She has the makings of a witch. Now all we need to do is slowly increase the dose.” “I’m afraid I don’t have the time.” “Hm…?” Kelvina didn’t even have the chance to turn around as Elletear stood from the exam table. She headed to a desk of five beakers, picked up the darkest one, and removed the lid on it. Elletear drank the liquid in one gulp, like it was wine. It all went down her throat, leaving not a drop behind. “What?! Elletear?!” I shouted before I knew it. Just a few milliliters of the liquid had been enough to make my body reject it. Elletear had drunk an incomparable amount, and it was at a higher concentration. She would die. I really believed that. However… “Don’t worry, Joheim. Look.” She wiped away a drop of liquid on her lip. Then, she even licked that up with her tongue. She gave me a composed smile. See, I’m fine, it seemed she was saying. “Impossible…” Kelvina staggered. In awe and wonder, her smile twitched up. “You could withstand that? You drank that solution…ha-ha… You really might become a monster.” A drop of sweat fell from her forehead. I understood that Elletear had done something unthinkable. Kelvina was likely more in awe than I was. “Well then, Princess, I invite you on a short trip. We’ll leave in two weeks. Please prepare to be gone for a while.” A trip? Where was she taking Elletear? Before I could ask, Kelvina shrugged. “My lab is in the Empire, after all.” “The Empire?!” I doubted my own ears, but it also made sense. This rundown house in a neutral city was a camouflaged lab. I’d known that it was seedy, which made sense if it was involved with the Empire. ……The Sovereignty’s enemy. ……And they’re my enemy too, of course. But it would be worse for Elletear. Was she in her right mind to go to the Empire? The Empire would be eager to have a princess from the Nebulis Sovereignty. If she was discovered, she would be captured immediately and put through humiliation worse than death. “…Elletear.” I stared at the princess, who stood still with her hand on her chest. “Are you really going to the Empire? They’re the worst country in the world for you to be involved with.” “That’s right, Joheim. And that’s the only place I can obtain the power I want.” I only learned later that Elletear had already traveled to the Empire several times in order to research the effects of the drug on her body. “…Okay, I get it. Then I’ll go, too.” “Oh, wait, wait.” Kelvina let out a dramatic sigh. “Are you trying to play knight in shining armor for the princess? I’m only taking Elletear with me.” “What?!” “Just think about it. Do you know how hard it is to bring a Nebulis princess into the Empire?” “…Guh!” “There are astral energy sensors in every corner of the airport and guards patrolling the entire country. Smuggling one person in is hard enough. And you’re not even a test subject. You’re just an ordinary human. I’m not a nice enough person to do all the work of arranging your passage just because.” I had nothing to say to that. If having to arrange my travel somehow made them discover Elletear, there would be no point in me going. I didn’t want that to happen, either. “So I’ve even been rejected here…” “Oh, don’t be so down. I’ll make sure the princess makes it to the Empire. She’s a very important subject, after all. I wouldn’t hand her over to the Imperial forces.” “Then we’re in agreement. But I have a requirement to add.” “Hm?” “You won’t be Elletear’s guard, I will.” I turned my back to them and reached out my hand. I was headed for the five beakers on the desk. Elletear had consumed the most concentrated one, so I picked the second-darkest beaker. I wrenched open the top. “Hey, what are you—?!” “Joheim?!” Kelvina and Elletear both opened their eyes wide. Before they could stop me, I poured the liquid on my thigh, where my astral crest was. ……Sizzle. Smoke floated up into the air. Next, pain I’d never felt the likes of before assaulted me, and I almost lost consciousness. “—?!” I felt as though my right leg had been pulverized right down to the bone. Even if I had been stabbed by a thousand swords or tens of thousands of bullets, the pain I was feeling probably couldn’t compare to this. “Guh……urgh……!” “What did you do, Joheim?!” Elletear reached out to support me, but Kelvina grabbed her hand. “Wait, Princess… Let’s see…” She’d likely realized that there was white smoke coming from my astral crest. As my body was wracked with intense, fiery pain, my astral crest steadily disappeared. Good. Now I could go with Elletear. “Kelvina or whatever your name is…you said before…” I felt like I was about to lose consciousness from the pain. I gritted my teeth, clenched my hands into fists, and focused all I had on speaking. “This drug is poison to astral power…so I figured my astral crest would disappear if I doused it with the liquid…” “A gold star for you.” Clap clap. Kelvina was applauding me. “A procedure to remove an astral crest. The concentration wasn’t enough to remove all the astral energy in you, but it is enough to get rid of your astral crest.” “So I won’t get caught up in the Empire’s astral energy sensors now, right?” “If you’re lucky.” Kelvina’s reply was blunt. “I see. So you’re going to leave me to transport the princess while you find your own way into the Empire?” That was exactly it. If Elletear flew, I could go by land. I just needed a car to travel by highway to a checkpoint, where I would cross the border. ……I had astral power deficiency from the start. ……Now that I’ve burned off my astral crest, I don’t think I’ll be caught by the astral energy sensors. I didn’t have any attachment to the Sovereignty, anyway. “Elletear.” I gritted my teeth. I was out of breath, but there was something I needed to ask her. “I’ll repeat this again. If you’re going to the Empire, then I will be too, unless I’m just in your way?” “…” Elletear was silent for a while. Her mismatched green and yellow eyes looked me over. “You’re a fool.” She suddenly smiled. “If you were in the way, I never would have brought you here.” “…I see.” Good. That was all I needed to know. That was enough for me to jump into certain death. Even if that meant heading into enemy territory like the Empire. “I have good news, bright and shining knight.” Kelvina was staring at a monitor as she typed something in at lightning speed. “The Eight Great Apostles have shown an interest in you.” “The Eight Great Apostles?” “They’re sponsoring my research. They want to use you as a spy both within the Empire and the Sovereignty.” Kelvina handed me a scrap of paper. They were detailed instructions for how I would enter the Empire. It detailed the gate number of the checkpoint I would enter and the route I would take afterward. Right down to the minute and hour. “Burn it after you memorize it.” Kelvina joined Elletear’s side. When she put a hand on Elletear’s shoulder as though they were friends, I silently bit my bottom lip. “I’ll be waiting in the Empire. With your precious princess,” she said. 5 A month passed. I arrived in the center of the Empire, the Imperial capital of Yunmelngen. Everything had gone according to Kelvina’s notes. All that I experienced there was novel to me, including the place I visited over three miles underground. There, I met them. The supreme authority of the Empire that had the country under its thumb. “You did well coming here. Joheim Leo Armadel.” We were in a dark assembly room. I looked up to see eerily glowing monitors covering an entire wall. “Welcome.” “What do you think of enacting a drama in which a man abandons his astral crest and country to join the Imperial forces as a Saint Disciple? We could even work killing the Lord into it.” “…” In the past month, Elletear had told me everything. Including that, in the core of the planet, there slumbered a calamity that transcended the astral powers. It seemed Elletear and the Eight Great Apostles had conspired to use that power. ……The Eight Great Apostles supposedly died a hundred years ago. ……And they want to use the calamitous power to out-plot the Lord and Founder. It didn’t matter to me. My duty was to be loyal. I needed the Eight Great Apostles’ absolute power to enter the Empire. Now I would keep silent and act like a dog. “Then it’s decided.” I heard a content voice from the monitors. I would allow them to put me through the humiliation and abuse of using me as their hands and legs. In another place, Elletear was fighting agony way beyond my shame. “We’ll recommend you to Imperial headquarters.” “Joheim Leo Armadel, we will recommend you to become a Saint Disciple. You will be a gem in the rough we discovered outside the Empire.” And that was how I became a Saint Disciple after the Eight Great Apostles recommended me from outside of the Imperial forces. There were those who were jealous of me, of course. I received looks from the Imperial forces and even the other Saint Disciples. But luckily, I came when Lord Yunmelngen was asleep. Without a word from the Lord, no one could object to the Eight Great Apostles’ recommendation. “Congratulations, Saint Disciple Joheim.” “Now you have the right to go anywhere you wish within the Empire.” I had an Imperial forces ID. It was something I’d always wanted. Now I wouldn’t be suspected, no matter where I went within the Empire. I used that privilege to pay a visit to Kelvina’s lab. 6 We’d been separated for over a month. I was going to see Elletear again after so long. I felt elated and slightly nervous. Even I knew that wasn’t like me. “This is Kelvina’s lab…?” It was an old house. After years of being exposed to the elements, the exterior paint had started to peel. It was an eerie relic. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was rumored to be haunted. I unlocked the door I’d been told to enter ahead of time and headed into the building. “Is it in the basement?” Was Elletear locked up in this gloomy place? First, I’d complain to Kelvina. As I decided that, I descended the stairs. “Who are you?!” There, I found a monster. It had the silhouette of a human girl. However, it was clear like a jellyfish so I could see the door behind it, and its hair seemed almost like a gemstone or molten metal. A human’s muscles and skin couldn’t be see-through like a ghost’s, of course. ……What is this monster?! ……Where is Elletear?! And Kelvina?! “Hm? Where did you come in from?” The beast turned around. When it looked at me, it gave me a belligerent and provocative smile. “Well, not like I care. You can burn violet.” “An abomination…” I pushed off a nearby table and just barely retreated to the basement’s wall. I let out a gasp. Calm down. What had surprised me was that this thing had leaped on me when I’d expected to see Elletear. If we were going to fight… “I have no reason to hesitate. I’ll settle this in a flash.” “Hah! Now you’re talking!” The monster flung out its arms. “Wait, Vichyssoise.” A voice resounded from behind the monster. Kelvina yawned as she approached. Her white lab coat, which looked as threadbare as it had a month ago, covered her shoulders. She’d come from a back room. “He’s one of our allies, that man.” “What? This guy? But he’s wearing an Imperial forces uniform.” “He’s Elletear’s dog.” “What?! Then he’s from the Sovereignty? I don’t feel any astral energy coming from him.” “He has no astral crest.” Kelvina pointed at my leg. “He burned off his astral crest with the solution.” “What?! Ah-ha-ha-ha! You really did that?! You’re a hoot! Were you that desperate to sneak into the Empire?!” The monster laughed. It was a discordant shriek I couldn’t even call pleasant as a form of flattery. I silently knit my brows. “Kelvina, what is this monster?” I asked. “She’s a witch, just like what Elletear wants to become.” “…What?” For a moment, my brain froze. I thought of the goddess of beauty that was Elletear and this horrible witch. I simply couldn’t connect them together in my mind. “I’m the monster?” I heard the low rumble of Vichyssoise’s laugh. “Why don’t you call your master that? She’s right in the back, where Kelvina came from. Just take a look.” “Elletear!” I dashed off. Was it because I’d wanted to see her this entire month we’d been apart? Or… …were my feet compelled to take me to her, because I couldn’t believe the mad scientist and the witch? I entered a small room at the end of a hall. When I saw the old exam table, I stopped without thinking about it. Elletear writhed on it in the nude like a beast. She scratched at her throat. Her lustrous hair was in disarray, her eyes were wide-open, and she let out strangled screams. “Elletear?!” “…” She stopped screaming right then. The room went quiet. As she lay on the exam table, she weakly turned to me. “Jo…heim…?” “Elletear! It’s me! Are you all right?!” I ran to her. She didn’t even try to hide her body, slick with sweat. She probably didn’t have the strength to. I covered her with my jacket. “Kelvina! What did you do to Elletear?!” “I’m pretty sure I already told you. She’s going through the procedure to turn into a witch.” I heard footsteps. Kelvina was joining us in the room. “Her body has already started to transform into something that isn’t human. If I was to liken it to anything, it probably feels as though her entire body has been infested with parasitic insects that are eating her alive.” “Will she end up like the witch from earlier?” Was she going to turn into a monster? Though I had to squeeze out that question between clenched teeth, Kelvina scoffed at me. “She’ll become something even more atrocious.” “…What…?” “We’ve given Vichyssoise the calamity’s power diluted to 0.0002 percent, which resulted in that. Elletear has a concentration five hundred times that.” “Five hundred?!” “That amount wouldn’t kill a normal person—it would obliterate them entirely. It’s amazing that she can withstand it. So no wonder she’s in this state.” “You!” My entire body moved on impulse. I kicked aside the chair in front of me and grabbed Kelvina, who was just past it, by the throat. However… Even as she turned blue from asphyxiation, Kelvina’s expression looked serious. “We can’t have a misunderstanding now. Elletear was the one who wanted me to administer it.” “Guh…” As my hands trembled from anger, I let go and reluctantly released Kelvina. She wanted to destroy the Sovereignty. That was why Elletear wanted to become a witch. I knew that for certain. “Joheim…,” she rasped. I turned around to see Elletear lying face up and trying to reach out to me. Whether from cold or pain, her hand spasmed weakly. I took her hand. Her eyes asked me to do it, and I’d awkwardly obliged. This was a first. She had never offered her hand to me before. And I’d never taken it into mine before, either. “………” “Ngh!” Elletear silently looked up at me. I realized what she meant with that motion. It wasn’t enough. Hug me. It hurts too much. Her eyes were wet with tears. Her face was flushed from fever. Even without words, it was clear to me what she wanted. It was only natural. If I couldn’t figure out something as small as this, then I had no business being her guard. But still… “…” I hesitated. Elletear was barely covered by my jacket where she was lying down. We were so close together, almost skin-to-skin, that for the first time since meeting Elletear, I realized the different positions we were in. ……The person in front of me is the first princess. ……In comparison, before Elletear picked me up, I was nothing but a bum. Was I allowed to do this? Could I allow myself to hold this noble princess in my arms? I hesitated for a moment. The princess leaped from the exam table with such force she flung aside my jacket. “Huh?” When I came to my senses… I realized Elletear had leaped into my arms fully nude. “Were you lying back then?” she asked me. “Huh?! ……It wasn’t a lie! I was just…!” I… “I want to be here for you…” I enveloped her delicate shoulders in my arms and hugged her. I held her close, and she held me. I held Elletear with all my strength as she—still writhing in pain—clawed at my back. “Joheim… I’m sorry…” “I don’t remember anything you need to be sorry for.” As her voice seemed close to fading, I simply answered with exactly what was in my heart. “I only feel grateful to you,” I said. “…” “Thank you for choosing me.” That evening, I held Elletear as she groaned. Skipping to the end, Elletear hadn’t changed at all since that night. She never turned into a witch with a monstrous appearance. I was relieved by that. I felt complicated emotions about it. “It takes time to nurture something great.” It was as though she had seen straight into my thoughts. Kelvina had a serious look on her face as she looked up at a monitor on the ceiling. “If you felt repulsed by Vichyssoise, then you should be prepared. That was nothing. Elletear will look even more ghastly and hideous. Right now, she’s in a transformation period. It’s like a larva in a cocoon, but you can’t assume that a beautiful butterfly will emerge.” “…” Each of her words rubbed me the wrong way. However… This was Kelvina’s way of being nice. My master would become a monster. She didn’t want me to go in unprepared. “I don’t plan on being swayed off course.” “All right then.” She kept looking up at the ceiling. “Joheim, do you know what a catalyst is? It’s a scientific term.” “I never got an education. I was never interested.” “Well, listen to this lesson. Say you have a chemical reaction in which combining substances A and B results in substance C. So, a catalyst serves the role of accelerating the chemical reaction, resulting in A and B turning into chemical C.” “I said I wasn’t interest—” “You’re the catalyst.” “What?” “It was my mistake. I mean, at first, I had no interest in you at all.” I heard her shoe clunk against the ground. Kelvina turned around. “Substance A, Elletear, combined with substance B, the calamity’s power, results in substance C, a witch. You don’t belong in this equation, but you have a role. You keep Elletear stable as she transforms into a witch.” “…” “The catalyst is emotion. It’s a source of emotional comfort. Because you are here, Elletear is suffering much less.” “…” “You should be by her side later, too. It’ll be good for my research.” I couldn’t reply. I turned my back on her as she stared at me. “I don’t care about your research. I’m staying by Elletear’s side, for our sakes.” Then I started to walk. I went to her room at the back of this gloomy underground lab. Tap. As soon as I knocked on the door, I heard a response. “Come in.” “How are you feeling?” “Terrible, but not as bad as the other times I’ve felt terrible.” Elletear wore a plain shirt. She sat on her bed and bent forward, holding her head. She was also holding a hand mirror. “What?” “I was ready…” I heard a crack. The mirror had slipped out of her hands and shattered. “…But I’m afraid now that the time has come.” She would become a monster. The time when she would abandon her incomparable looks and status to be reborn into a monster was approaching. “No, Joheim.” Elletear raised her head. “What I’m afraid of isn’t turning into a monster. What frightens me is that you’ll be frightened as you see me in the process of my transformation. I can’t help but imagine it…” She smiled but was crying. Her gorgeous lashes were wet, and her eyes were red and puffy. “…I’m sorry.” She staggered up. She leaned against a wall in a dark corner of the dark room as she breathed out. “I could bear anyone in the palace betraying me or gossiping about me behind my back… But it’s odd… If you see me when during my transformation into something hideous and scream…for the first time in my life, I feel I would regret my decisio—!” I stopped her mid-word. I grabbed her and pulled her toward me, enveloping her with my own body. “Don’t be afraid. Don’t be afraid of me.” “…” “Rely on me. Use me. Take pride in me. Believe in me. I’ll prove to you that you weren’t wrong to choose me… I’ll always stay by your side…” “Thank you…” Elletear’s voice returned to her. She hugged me back as I hugged her. “You’ve become a fine knight—my knight.” So I was a knight now. Come to think of it, that was what she had said when we’d met. “Have I really become your knight now?” “Yes. You’re the ‘Flash’ Knight Joheim. My one and only knight…” From that point on, Elletear stopped eating. She no longer needed to drink water or sleep, and she steadily, moment by moment, left the bounds of what it meant to be human. Meanwhile… The day finally came when I had my audience with Lord Yunmelngen. “So you’re Joheim, then?” I was in the Lord’s office, the deepest part of the Imperial capital. I was greeted by a silver beast. They seemed to have a face that looked like something between a cat’s and a human girl’s. I also saw peeks of foxlike limbs from their clothes. I could hardly call them human, given their fur-covered tail. ……So this is the Lord. ……The result of astral power and a human merging together during a vortex a hundred years ago. Had this been the first time I was seeing them, I would have undoubtedly cried out. But I’d already had an unfortunate encounter with Vichyssoise, the monster, and had built up my tolerance. “Hmm?” The Lord looked down on me silently as I knelt. Lord Yunmelngen’s eyes opened to near-perfect circles. “I wonder what this is… It’s very faint, but I feel astral energy on you.” “Huh?!” Impossible. Anxiety, a feeling I’d forgotten, made sweat drip down my back. Had I been seen through? Had it sniffed me out? I’d burned off my astral crest. None of the Empire’s sensors had been able to detect me. ……Of course the Lord would know. ……The Lord is a monster in a different way from Vichyssoise, just as I can see. So what would I do? The Eight Great Apostles had ordered me to kill the Lord immediately if my identity was uncovered, but would I be able to manage it against this opponent? “You seem dangerous.” “…” I chose to remain silent. I was a thug when it came down to it, after all. I didn’t have the wit to think of something clever to say to fix this. The Lord watched me for a while. “Hwah… So, about that first seat you’ve been wanting…” The silver beast let out a long yawn. “You’re right that it’s been empty for a long time. I’ve sent Crow out, but who knows when he’ll be back. So, I’ll grant your request.” “Huh?! You’ll grant it…?” The first seat of the Saint Disciples. I didn’t know why it had been unoccupied for so long. But after making a direct request for it, certain that I would be turned down, I’d been granted it. I had been prepared to be rejected. “Now you’ll be the closest at my side.” The recumbent Lord rose up. They crossed their legs and sat, watching me from a step above. “Remember this. When you look up at me, I’m also keeping a close eye on you. Don’t be too inconsistent with your actions.” The Lord had seen through me and knew the Eight Great Apostles were backing me. If I was reporting back to the Eight Great Apostles about the Lord, the Lord also expected to see what the Eight Great Apostles were attempting to do through me. But that was exactly what I wanted. “Understood…” The Lord and the Eight Great Apostles would keep each other in check. But I was on neither side. Because I had only one master in the world—Elletear. After that, we only had a short time left together. 7 Elletear had become less and less human. Each day, her condition grew worse. She always felt “horrid,” but rarely, she had “tolerable” horrid days. She had a good day when she could just barely manage to stand. And there was a day when the skies were clear. Both these miraculous events happened to coincide one morning. Somehow, my instincts told me this would be the last day. So… I took Elletear to a hill in the countryside. The smell of the grass wafted to us as it rustled. The morning light that showered over us was blinding but also warm. This was the Empire. I was grateful that the enemy territory I ought to have hated had a hill that was so blessed with nature. That was because… “This feels nostalgic…” Elletear smiled. She’d been stuck so long in the stagnant, suffocating air of the underground laboratory that she’d slowly lost the ability to show her emotions. But now, in front of me, she smiled. “I haven’t seen the sky in a while, or the sun, or a field of flowers. I don’t remember the wind being so nice, either…” Then she started to run. “Ngh. Elletear, don’t run—” “I’m fine! Look!” Her glamorous long hair was in disarray. Her white dress fluttered in the summer breeze. She waved her parasol around. I heard her laughter ring out into the blue sky. Who else had seen her like this—as excited as a child? She wasn’t Princess Elletear Lou Nebulis IX. She was my beloved master. ……Yes. ……I’m…I’m sure… I’d wanted to share this final moment with her to see this. That was why I’d brought her here. “Ah-ha…ha-ha…ahh… I’m so tired from running.” She slowly turned around. She was out of breath. Her face was red, as though she were slightly bashful. That moment that passed in a flash was something I would likely never forget.
Chapter 31
37 min read