I awake in a field surrounded by mountains of rubble. The destruction is total. Hard to believe that this was the stadium just a little while ago. The block of ice I had been frozen within has disappeared without a trace. After regaining consciousness, my mind slowly begins to shake off any lingering traces of drowsiness until I can once again think clearly.
My parents, Maris, and my subordinate Knights are crouched beside me, tears streaking down their faces.
“Ah! Sir Alois! I am so, so glad to see you alive!”
I sit up. A few of the people around me support me as I do so, placing their hands against my back, neck, and shoulders. Looking around me, I see others who fell in battle, lying on the ground in various states of injury. That’s far more than I imagined...but none appear to be dead, fortunately. Here and there scurry individuals skilled in healing magic, tending to all those needing their care. Zenon and my other friends seem unharmed.
“Nanalie—! Nanalie—!” Despite everything else going on around her, despite being carried to the first aid tent to be healed herself—Feltina wails out Hel’s name, over and over.
Where is she, anyway? What happened to her? I seem to recall that right before I’d fallen, I’d said I was “leaving the rest to her,” or something else equally irresponsible. Our only hope of victory had been having her blast that devil with her power. Regardless of how highly others may praise me and my abilities, my power is nothing compared to hers. And yet, was it really right of me to say that to her? Was I not asking her to risk her own life by fighting that thing to the very end? My heart pounds hard in my chest, shaking my whole body as I realize what my last words to her had really meant.
“It’s no use. She’s completely unconscious, and isn’t responding to my attempts to wake her.”
In a flat, undisturbed part of the field, the nurse from the Royal School of Magic is casting a spell on Hel. Next to her is that man-faced fish I’d met back in the Land of the Sea, along with Bella of Seleina and many others who know Hel well, standing in a ring around her body. From what fragments of conversation I overhear, I learn that something—what, exactly, I don’t know—happened to her. I slide through the small crowd to check on her myself, and I see that thanks to the healing magic, there’s not a scratch on her pretty form. She’s lying on the ground, flat on her back, looking as though she’s fast asleep. The only obvious difference in her appearance is her hair color: her aquamarine hair has, for some reason, turned a dark brown.
That’s the same color it was before she incanted the semeion charm, isn’t it? I’ve never forgotten how she looked with that color of hair. I wonder, though—would she be surprised if I told her that as a child, I’d already known what she’d look like as an adult?
Three days later, in my capacity as the Chief Magician of the Royals, I am made to participate in a Court conference concerning the attack and its aftermath. Before the King can announce how he intends to treat the Hel family from here on out, however, I request that he postpone his judgment on the matter. No one is arguing against the Kingdom treating her family as high-ranking foreign nobility, but I remind the King that he has promised to grant each of the heroes of the assault one wish, in honor of their service fighting to protect the Kingdom. If he plans on granting a wish of Hel’s as well, then she will certainly ask him for nothing more than an ordinary life. Her ordinary life.
“Alois, do you really think that’s what she’ll want?”
“Well, we shall have to wait until she wakes up to be sure. She does seem rather set on being a receptionist lady.”
With Hel’s parents currently away in the Land of the Sea, it would be unwise of us to determine how we are to treat them, given we do not know the mind of the Sea King.
＊ ＊ ＊ ＊
Zozo Parasta has a playful smile on her face when she looks over at me, obviously amused.
“Come on you two, make eye contact at least...?”
“She’s the one who isn’t looking at me, though.”
It’s been a full month since Hel woke up. Every day since then has been peaceful, with nothing out of the ordinary. That said, it’s only “peaceful” in the sense that demons are only spawning at normal levels throughout the Kingdom; they’ve not been completely banished. I’m visiting Harré today so that I can check on the recent spawn statistics—and there she is, sitting at her receptionist desk and looking as happy and healthy as the last time I saw her.
That last time was, in fact, at the celebration party on the Royal Isle. She’s doing an excellent job of helping a sorcerer as I walk in—only to immediately turn her head as far away from me as she can once she notices me standing there.
“Why, Mr. Captain! What do you say to taking a break, right now, and heading into town with me? I know a nice place we could go!”
“No way! I’m first in line for the Captain—!”
Female employees of the sorcerer’s guild grab onto my arms. I know I wished for the freedom to marry whomever I wished, but I didn’t expect this many women to start talking to me like this. It’s not necessarily a bad thing, but neither is it good. I know, I know—if someone heard me going on like this, I’m sure they’d say, “don’t go wishing for the freedom to marry if you can’t handle the consequences,” but I know I made the right decision.
I gently extricate myself from the women’s grasping hands and approach her. A faint, red flush touches her cheeks, eyes still averted from my own as I ask her a question.
“Have you eaten lunch yet?”
“No, not yet...”
“There’s this all-you-can-eat place nearby, what do you say to a game? Whoever eats the most, wins. Sound good?”
She perks up at the word “game” and finally faces me.
“Shall we?”
A little while passes before she gives me a nod.
I suppose this is how our relationship will be from now on.
It’s not so bad. Not so bad at all.