The village is burning.
Accompanied by ten soldiers on horseback, we sallied forth from the castle in the gray of pre-dawn without telling Günter. I’m sitting behind Wolfram, but his horse-riding is so wild that we covered a painful distance in just the first day. I’m getting pretty good at riding in tandem, so I’ve somehow made it through even the rough trip.
Wolf’s followers, ridiculously beautiful to a man, are soldiers from his private army. Right, I guess they must all be pure-blooded Mazoku with proper pedigrees.
I feel a gaze on me, and look up to see one of the Kotsuhizoku following slightly behind us. I wonder why I feel him—it?—looking at me even though there’re only holes in the cranium where eyes should be?
“My elder brother’s already arrived, so everything should be resolved—he must be working on counter-measures. I don’t think it’ll be especially dangerous, but anyhow, since you’re a wimp, don’t go where I can’t keep an eye on you.”
“...Don’t call me a wimp...”
But when we arrive in the late afternoon, the village, the houses and fields are burning. The flames are so strong that they stain the cloudy sky a bloody scarlet. Soldiers are running around working to prevent the fire from spreading to the forest, and the villagers are gathered in a group a small distance away from the fence.
There are only women, children, and the elderly standing there, all of them frozen and speechless. A single elderly woman is wailing.
“You told me that everything would be resolved by now.”
“That’s strange, it should be...”
“But we can already see it right in front of us. Aaah, what should we do? Everything’s burning, I wonder if they’re all okay?”
The village is several dozen meters in front of us; we need to hurry and come out of the forest—just then.
“You’re completely ignorant of the ways of the world as usual, little princeling.”
An amused, familiar voice comes from behind us where only our soldiers should be.
“...American football macho?!”
Accompanied by only three horsemen is the Denver Broncos I met on the first day. If I remember correctly, his name is...
“Adalbert, right?”
“Huh, you’ve got a pretty good memory. When we first met I thought that you were just a simpleton.”
“Well, sorry for looking like a simpleton.”
I seem to be the only one interacting with him; when I turn around to take a look, all the beauteous soldiers are sitting unmoving on their horses as if they’ve been frozen there. Even Wolfram sitting stiffly in front of me is so still that he doesn’t even blink.
Adalbert slowly approaches us and speaks as he scrutinizes Wolfram’s profile.
“This is why you’re naive. Can you really protect the king with only ten horsemen? And all of them pure-blooded Mazoku who are easily caught by the Houjutsu magic seal. This is when you have to choose that last soldier on whom magic has no effect.”
Which means that right now, everyone except for me has been put out of commission by this magic seal thingamajig?! I can’t believe it, the goal is right in front of us. It’s like a car that runs out of gas and stops dead on the road with the gas station in sight.
“Yo, we meet again, Your New Maou Majesty.”
“Yeah, hi.”
I’m not sure whether or not he’s an enemy, so I give him a vague greeting for now. Though he seems hostile towards the Mazoku, I have to say he’s been rather kind to me. When we first met, he interceded for me with the villagers, and he taught me the language, too.
And besides, his full name is Adalbert von Grantz. Which really sounds Mazoku, doesn’t it?
“...Is it because of you that they can’t move?”
“Well, you might say so. Just a bit of magic-sealing Houjutsu I learned. Why are you riding behind him? How in the world did you tame the third princeling who only wags his tail for his mother and eldest brother?”
I don’t think he’s been tamed at all. But this man is an acquaintance of Conrad’s, and judging from what he just said, he knows Wolfram and Gwendal too. Then why is he hostile towards them? I pose the question.
“You’re actually Mazoku, aren’t you?”
Adalbert’s eyebrows rise, and he scowls as he answers curtly, “A long time ago.”
“Then why is your relationship with them and with Conrad so bad? Why do you purposely interfere?”
“Because I hate them.”
Hate?
“I hate the Mazoku to death. I am sick of their ways. That’s why I’m going to save you from their filthy hands. Now, pitiful sacrifice from another world, let’s hurry and leave this place.”
“Save...me...?”
“You were brought here without warning from another world and coerced into being the Maou, weren’t you? The Maou is the humans’ enemy. He is the fiend who corrupts and ruins this world. Someone like you, a young, innocent human, will be made out to be that villain. Atrocious, isn’t it? Don’t you think it’s a bit too much?”
He confirmed that I was a human when I first came to this world. I’m just your average first year senior high school student; I don’t carry the Maou’s soul like Günter and Conrad and Lady Cäli are hoping. That’s what they keep telling me, but no one really believes it.
“They need a scapegoat, you see—a sacrifice to put on the throne. And for that they need a pure young man who doesn’t know anything, who cannot offer any resistance or defiance. You’ll be set up as the target for the hatred of all the humans who oppose the Mazoku—that’s the only reason they need you to be the Maou.”
“...I...”
Adalbert comes up beside us. His words echo twice, thrice in my ears.
“You’re a good person, a human. That’s why the magic seal has no effect on you. Isn’t that true?”
“...Yeah, I’m human...not Mazoku...not the Maou...”
“Don’t listen to him!” Wolfram forces out a shout, and my shoulders tremble.
“Ah, eh, y-you can talk?!”
“Don’t listen to anything he says! That man...!”
It’s not just my shoulders that are trembling; with my arms wrapped around his waist, I can feel his whole body quivering. He is still frozen in place, facing forward. Beads of sweat drip from the nape of his neck.
“That man...betrayed us...! He’s trying...to win you over...too!”
“Wolfram, if it hurts too much, don’t try to talk!”
“That’s enough, little princeling!”
The man who was just labeled a traitor draws his longsword in one smooth motion and points its tip at the throat of the Mazoku prince.
“Don’t force yourself. I suppose your power is a bit too high for me to control completely. If you relax your consciousness a little, you can have some fun like your subordinates.”
I twist my head to see. The unfocused gazes of the Mazoku cavalry that we brought with us are wandering giddily in midair as if they were drunk.
The proud Wolfram looks like he’s about to pop a vein.
Adalbert delivers the final blow.
“Look, the humans you hate so much are setting the Mazoku land ablaze. Wolfram, haven’t you always said: What can those humans do? It’s a mistake for those worms to strike back at the Mazoku. Haven’t you?”
“Humans?!”
I lean forward on the horse.
With just more one kick we could’ve left the forest. Through the gaps in the trees I can see a scene of despair and hatred. From the direction of the fire, an arrow-like shadow draws a trail against the sky as it comes flying. Someone is attacking someone else without engaging in close-quarters sword fighting.
A mother lies flat on the ground with her child in her arms. Soldiers rush over, low to the ground, and draw their bows to the limit in a counterattack.
This is war.
I can’t believe that it’s happening right before my eyes, and I mutter to myself over and over, “They’re at war, they’re fighting a real, honest-to-goodness war...”
A battle of this scope would probably be called a dispute rather than a war. But this is the first time in my life I’m seen the ‘scene’ with my own eyes, and I can’t think of it as anything but a war.
“...Where and where are...I mean, who’s fighting whom? Mazoku and humans?”
An old man sprinting for the cover of the trees goes flying, his back arched. He collapses in front of us. An arrow is sticking out of his waist. He’s not dead. Though he’s a distance away, our eyes meet.
“Why is he being shot at? He’s not a soldier...he’s not a soldier however you look at it. He’s one of the villagers, the people living here are refugees, aren’t they?”
Humans are transforming the Mazoku soil to fire.
But only human children and women and elders are making their living from this soil.
My voice trembles. With shock or horror or something similar.
“You, are you fighting humans like yourselves? Are human soldiers attacking this village where refugee children are just quietly living their lives?”
Wolfram spits bitterly at Adalbert: “This is your doing, isn’t it!”
“I merely gave them some suggestions.”
I lose my balance and totter precariously. The chestnut shifts slightly. I grab two fistfuls of its reddish mane.
Looking at the terrible scene, the man branded a traitor tells me, “One could say that this is a commandment to not turn your back on the teachings of God. Did you know? Last year they had a recording-setting bumper crop, and there was a tax increase in their country. This year they are being taxed the same amount, which means they don’t even have enough left to eat. They have only two choices: do they starve, or do they provision themselves? They came seeking my advice. So I told them. The village just next to theirs is on the land of the cursed Mazoku. They would not anger God if they take from those who live on the Mazoku’s land and till the Mazoku’s fields. He would turn a blind eye even to the grave crime of stealing from one’s neighbors.”
“But they’re all human, aren’t they?! The villagers are all human, just like the people attacking them!”
“No, not just like. The people of this village are humans who have sided with the Mazoku. Those who ally themselves with the Mazoku can no longer be thought of as one of us.”
I wearily slap my thigh, my hands clutched together so hard that my thumbs hurt.
“I don’t understand you!”
“You don’t have to understand. In any case, I came to take you away. You’re human, not Mazoku, right? You’re only a victim who was brought here from another world because your hair and eyes are both black. They’ll put you on the throne and make you their scapegoat. If you take the side of the Mazoku, you will no longer be one of us.”
Adalbert jumps off and lands on his horse’s left, maybe intending to give me a hand. Now that he’s off his horse, we may be able to put some distance between us. Wolfram murmurs in a low voice without turning, “Go.”
“Huh?”
“They apparently don’t intend to kill you. You’ll just cause more problems if you get hurt trying to resist uselessly. Do what he says for now.”
“But what about you and everybody...”
“Don’t worry about us.”
I swallow further protest. What would happen to them if I left them here?
Wolfram repeats in a low voice, “Hurry up and go, Yuuri!”
Adalbert slowly comes around from the opposite side and holds his hand out to me.
“That’s true, isn’t it, Wolfram. Even if you lose him here, all you’ll have to do is summon another kid to replace him. You’ll get a slap on the wrist from your brothers for letting the Maou-presumptive escape from under your very nose, but that won’t matter as long as nothing happens to you. It’s a much smarter choice than risking your life to protect him.”
Wolfram only bites his lip and says something softly as I unclasp my arms. I’m not even sure if it’s with my ears that I hear the words.
“...I’ll come get you back, no matter what happens.”
In the space of my next heartbeat, I speedily take in all that I know and all that I feel, looking for guidance on what I should do. Looking for the best course of action for this moment right now, regardless of the consequences later.
Which of these choices can I take that I will not regret later?
“Don’t think I’m going to ride with you just because you’re giving me a hand.”
I jump down and land athletically on my feet, as if the pain of long hours on horseback has given me elasticity. I step up to a horse in the back, pretending to look for a good rider among Adalbert’s followers.
“I hate well-built machos like you. It arouses my inferiority complex. And I lose when it comes to looks, too.”
“Then who will you ride with? Or will you ride alone?”
“Alone? No way!”
At the last “way”, I slap the foot of a drunken subordinate as hard as I can. He doesn’t seem to wake up, but his spur hits the belly of his horse, and the dappled gray neighs and springs forward. It leads the other horses into a gallop. Those who stop, faltering, I kick into a dash.
Suddenly there’s the sound of hoof beats all around us, and the herd of ten-odd horses gallops swiftly in a chaos of enemies and allies towards the forest exit. Wolfram’s chestnut is caught up in the stampede, and only Adalbert and I are left behind.
“...Why did you do that?”
“Wolfram did choose the last person. You just didn’t notice that that person is me.”
Aah, unfortunately, now that I’ve turned into the last person, I notice that they never gave me any weapons I might use to protect myself.
“Yuuri, I told you that I want to rescue you from the Mazoku for your own sake. Why would you want to deliberately waste my good intentions, eh?”
“I’ve already decided to stay until the end. In this nightmarish attraction. But you’re not the one I want to stay with. I don’t need you on my team.”
Since he’s not part of my game plan, I’m giving him due notice that he’s dismissed from the team.
“Hey hey, that’s not true.”
Adalbert advances on me, swinging his gigantic two-handed sword.
“And here I was trying so hard not to frighten you. I should’ve just threatened you and broken one of your arms at the start and taken you captive.”
“M-my right arm is my throwing arm, so I hope you’ll spare that one.”
“The left one is fine, too. But the best way to finish this up quick and easy is...”
I guess my personnel selection was on the money where he’s concerned.
“...to just get rid of the Maou.”
“Eek!”
Even I think it’s a pitiful scream. But I’ve got no chance against that humongous longsword he’s brandishing when I’m totally lacking in swordsmanship experience. And his weapon is probably not a practice sword. Probably? It’s absolutely seen real fighting.
“W-weren’t you going to rescue me from the Mazoku?! It’s still not too late to do that, right? You don’t have to change your mind so suddenly! You don’t have to kill me, ’cause I can leave this world by walking out on my own feet!”
“You’ve decided to throw your lot in with the Mazoku, haven’t you? Which means you’re my enemy. If I allow the Mazoku to keep a Maou with real power, it’ll make my life that much harder!”
“But didn’t you tell me earlier that I’m just an average person, that they’re only giving me the position of the Maou because I happen to have black hair and eyes? You said that I’m just an ordinary human being summoned here from another world, a victim!”
The blade whistles with terrible weight as it changes direction.
“Did you really think the Shinou is one who would play around with something like this?”
“Then then then then it was a lie?! You were just making some random speech about me being an ordinary human being?!”
“I said it to see if I could win you over to my side, but...” Adalbert adjusts his alignment with perfect efficiency. “You’re the real thing, I’m sorry to say.”
I back into a dry tree trunk. There’s no escape behind me now. I can maybe dodge him once or twice, but I’ll still be in a futile situation. This is not the same as my duel with Wolfram; there’s a good chance of me getting wounded or killed, and the difference between our skill levels is exceptionally high.
The shadow of his upraised sword falls on my forehead. I close my eyes in resignation.
The air vibrates as if with the passage of a fastball, and I hear a dry sound like a dead tree branch being severed. Splintered fragments fall with dry rattles on my feet and arms where I’m crouched. A ball-shaped object rolls into my lap with a rustle, and I slowly open one eye.
“Ko...!”
The Kotsuhizoku who followed us all the way here was “broken” by Adalbert’s huge sword. He’s almost completely smashed into pieces like maybe he took a critical hit and had his spinal cord severed. His skull is lying in my lap, and his light-brown wings are convulsing.
He...protected me?
“Kohy, why did you...?”
“This is the first time I’ve seen such behavior from the Kotsuhizoku. It gave its own life to save its master? Feh, so I cut down some weird thing.”
“What do you mean, some weird thing?!”
Apologizing silently to Kohy, I stand with a part of him (probably a femur) clutched tightly in my hand. Of course I don’t think bone can stand against a sword. But if I wait for the next life with eyes closed, it’d make his death meaningless.
“What the hell do you know about Kohy?!”
Well, not that I know much, either.
No longer concealing his true nature, Adalbert gives a true villain’s laugh.
“You’re pitying something that doesn’t even have a will of its own? The Maou this time is truly a king of the masses, huh?”
“Shut up! I’m selling the king of the masses idea—I’m gonna promise to lower the consumption tax!”
As I position the bone...the weapon, a group of riders who probably wouldn’t be happy even with 3% approaches. They’re not princes on white steeds, but Lord Weller and Lord von Bielefelt’s troops.
“Unfortunately, since I’m vastly outnumbered and have only one horse, I can’t escape with you as hostage,” Adalbert concedes, and disappears before the reinforcements arrive. Conrad sends several of the troops under his command in pursuit and instructs them to ascertain Adalbert’s destination: Be sure not to approach him more than necessary, and don’t move against him even if you think you have a chance. It would put your lives in peril.
“Though he’ll probably throw them off.”
Then we exchange embraces that would put foreigner actors to shame. For some reason, Wolfram throws sand at us.
“Yuuri, thank goodness we arrived in time. I thought we might be too late this time.”
“I’m happy you got here, too! I finally get why guys hug each other like you see in movies.”
Because that’s how I feel. Conrad says gingerly as we—pak pak—slap each other’s backs, “By the way, what is that hard object hitting my back?”
“Aaah, this? It’s a bone.”
“A bone. Ah yes, I see, a bone. Um, Your Majesty, what were you planning to use that for?”
“Weeell, I thought I might use it as a club.”
He quickly draws back from me, forehead creasing.
“You weren’t planning to fight Adalbert with that, were you...?”
“Yeah, well, I wasn’t just going to stand around and let him kill me.”
“Augh, Your Majesty, you do realize that this is totally different from your duel with Wolfram?! He and Wolf are on completely different levels!”
“Well, sorry for being on a different level!”
The third son dismounts from his chestnut and kicks the undergrowth unhappily. The effects of the magic seal seem to have been removed, but his face can’t be said to have a healthy color even generously.
“Are you all right, Wolfram?”
“Humph, I don’t need you to worry about me.”
“Then I won’t worry about you—”
“He’s suffering the consequences of his own actions, deciding on his own to bring the Maou to a place like this.”
The rebuke by his youthful older brother doesn’t evoke a particle of bashfulness from Wolfram. Since I was the one who asked him, I quickly change the subject.
“Anyway, how did you get here so fast?”
“I think we were much too slow. We were in the middle of battle near the border on the other side of the village when our party’s Kotsuhizoku heard the predicament of its fellow. I’ve mentioned that they have the unique ability to transmit intentions, so that they can communicate with each other across distances with the mind alone, right? So I left matters over there in Gwen’s hands and galloped back. We met Wolfram along the way...”
“That’s right! What do we do about Kohy?!”
I scrape together the fragments scattered around the tree’s roots and softly place the skull in the middle.
“Poor Kohy...you gave up your own life for mine...I’m so sorry, you probably have a wife and child too...”
Speaking of which, I’m not even sure if Kohy is male or female. But at least I can make a simple grave and bring him flowers on the anniversary of his death and during equinoctial week; sorry, but—I start digging in the grass with his own femur.
“Aaah, wait, Your Majesty, don’t bury it.”
“What are you talking about? I’m not going to just let Kohy lie out here to get bleached and weather-beaten!”
“We have a responsibility to put it back together. If you bury it, it won’t be able to fly anymore.”
“Huh?”
“Because if you reassemble the Kotsuhizoku properly, they’ll be able to fly like before.”
“H-he’s not dead?”
“There are really a great many things we do not understand about their existence.”
“Really? They’re really that much like plastic models? Then if you put a weird bone in a weird place, won’t you be creating a new life-form?”
“It’s all right, we have specialized experts.”
Pro modelers? But I’m glad. I’m just happy that he’s still alive.
When we finally leave the forest and return to the village, Conrad admonishes me to be careful repeatedly and in great detail before going off to deal with the enemy soldiers who were too slow in escaping: “We’re close to a resolution, but there are still pockets of resistance. So please do not go where I cannot see you. Because there have been those who’ve lost their lives to stray arrows.”
“S-stray arrows, huh?”
Speaking of which, I wonder what happened to that old man who got hit by the stray arrow-like object. Taking care not to leave Conrad’s field of vision, I head for the corner where the injured have been gathered.
The first-aid tent made from fire-repellant cloth looks like something out of an athletic meet. But the atmosphere beneath its roof is not so festive; there are more than twenty injured people stretched out directly on the grass. More and more people are carried inside as I stand there in dumbfounded surprise.
It doesn’t matter if they’re Mazoku or human or villagers. They’re screaming and moaning and crying.
A girl with pale skin hurries busily to and fro by herself—one of the Healers, as Günter called them. I guess that means she’s an orderly? It looks like both men and women alike go to the battlefield in this country. They’re strangely progressive on that point.
“If there’s anything I can do to help...”
The girl looks up and is taken aback at the sight of me. She appears to be around Wolfram’s age, but she’s almost certainly older than me.
“Oh no, Your Majesty! That would be unthinkable, I can manage here by myself.”
“But there’re more and more people being carried in.”
“Um, um, I’m so sorry that Your Majesty must see such an unsightly place. Please, Your Majesty, return to the army and command our troops.”
Shaking my head, I step into her territory.
“It’s not unsightly at all...everyone here is injured and in pain—and besides, I’m not really the type that can command an army.”
As yet another person is brought inside, the orderly seems to change her mind. She hands me a box that looks like a first-aid kit and points at a man near the entrance.
“I’m really sorry about this, but in that case, can I ask you to use this liquid to disinfect that patient’s wounds? They’re relatively minor. Please be sure to wear gloves. Cloth and pincers are over there. Um, Your Majesty, do you have any experience treating wounded soldiers...?”
“No, but I don’t think I’ll faint, at least.”
Since I have seen injuries caused by pitches and slides and spikes. Reassured, the female soldier heads over to examine a seriously-wounded patient. I sprinkle disinfectant boldly on the man with a gash in his thigh. This is nothing like a cut from a spike; you can see the pink color where the flesh is open.
“I was pretty unlucky, I guess, to be hit where I had no armor. But don’t worry, it’s a shallow cut. Look, you can’t see the bone or the muscle.”
My hands are shaking.
“Oh no, Your Majesty, that’s be a waste...”
“A waste? The medicine prevents it from rotting. Hey, wait, is this a salve?”
The girl nods at me. I coat a largish piece of gauze with yellow gel from the kit and wrap the wide bandage around the man’s thigh the way they taught everyone in Health and Physical Education or Boy Scouts as he continues to repeat that it’s a waste. Next! I psych myself up, and look for the ones with laceration and burn injuries.
They’re all relatively cheerful, but to somebody like me who’s never encountered more than scratches and bruises from club activities, this counts as a “field hospital.” After treating several patients with minor injuries, I turn to a man lying face-down on the ground.
There’s a slanting cut across his back, but thanks to the chain mail he’s wearing, the bleeding is comparatively light. He looks like a merchant attacked by a samurai to test out a new sword. Bright tawny hair falls to his dirty collar. He’s wearing a leather cord around his neck. The coin attached to it is lying at the back of his head. Maybe it’s a good-luck necklace or some country’s currency; I pick up the glittering 1 yen coin without thinking.
“Don’t touch it!”
“Eh, ah, I’m sorry! I wasn’t going to steal it or anything, I just thought it was pretty...”
“Don’t touch me! You’re going to kill me either way, aren’t you?! There’s no way a Mazoku would let a human live.”
“I...I’m not going to kill you or anything...”
He tries to get up and grimaces and moans with pain. I can’t understand any of the curses he hurls at me. He doesn’t look at me.
“Are you human?”
“Of course I am, dammit, don’t put me together with you Mazoku! Damn you, kill me now if you’re going to kill me.”
“I’m not going to kill you! What, you’re an adult already, are you so afraid of having your wounds disinfected?”
“Disinfected? Don’t pretend to be good guys now, the Mazoku would never help humans! You cursed Mazoku kill humans, that’s why we’re returning the favor.”
I ignore him and pour the liquid onto his wound.
“I’m not gonna kill you, so shut up already, geez! And besides, the people living in this village are humans, aren’t they? If the Mazoku kill humans, then how come those people are alive! You’re the ones who came to destroy the peaceful lives they worked so hard to build!”
That’s right, they attacked a human village, turned their swords on humans. Shot arrows at them.
Though they’re all human.
The man twists his head, trying to look at me. I stand and look down at him.
“That village should be destroyed! The people there sold their souls to the Mazoku—it doesn’t matter if we steal from them; putting it to the torch is a matter of course! God forgives us, he lends us the power to punish the Mazoku!”
There’s a touch of hysteria in his voice, perhaps from the pain and loss of blood.
“God has chosen humans!”
“...And what kind of a god is that?”
A soldier next to him with a bandage around his forehead rises, swaying.
“...How dare you...say such things to His Majesty...”
Without even giving me the time to say “wait”, he seizes his sword and swings down at the shouting human’s neck.
“Don...!”
“Stop it!”
The blade whistles sharply through the air and thrusts into the soft earth. The man’s head is still attached to his body; luckily the sword was broken. The female orderly lifts the man’s chin and nimbly holds a wet cloth to his nose. The injured human goes limp, and his head drops with a soft thud to the grass.
“I’m sorry, but we have to put injured people to sleep if they get too excited.”
She smiles, not at all upset, as if she’s seen a lot of these kinds of quarrels.
“I’m very sorry if he offended you, but they are always skeptical. And you, please moderate your behavior as well. You are a patient in my ward. All of you are equal here, and I will not allow you to harm anyone! Oh, Your Majesty.”
She peers at me as I stand there overwhelmed, looking at the stone swaying at my throat.
“Did His Excellency Conrart give that to you?”
“Eh, ah, yeah.”
“Ah, I see.”
She nods slightly as if at a memory, and begins examining the next patient.
“It suits you, very much so.”
I totter over to where Conrad stands directing his troops. A soldier wearing a uniform burned in several spots comes to give a progress report on well-digging.
“All right, don’t try to go too near. Dig as extensively as possible, and put up a fence around the entire area.”
His subordinate runs off after sketching a brief salute. Wolfram, arms crossed, doesn’t look very serious at all.
“When Elder Brother returns, we should just have him swallow the village into the earth. That’ll put out the fire and leave the forest unharmed.”
“And what about the villagers’ homes and land? The fields they worked so hard to clear?”
“Humph, humans like them put it to the torch, so there’s nothing for it now but to abandon them.”
Humans like them.
Suddenly exhausted without reason, I sink wearily to the ground where I stand, my head between my knees.
“Your Majesty.”
Conrad drops to one knee and places a hand softly on my back.
“Why did they do something like this?...Because they needed food? I thought that some Mazoku like Wolfram and Gwendal who looked down on humans attacked the village out of hatred.”
Wolfram snorts as if to say that that’s a ridiculous idea.
“Why would we do something that pointless? This land has belonged to the Mazoku for a long time—setting fire to it would destroy the environment. And if the fire reaches the forest, the damage wouldn’t be reversible in just a year or two.”
Flames and black smoke rise from the houses. One by one, they eventually collapse into smoldering, heartbreaking ruins. The fields that glittered green and gold when I visited here just days before are now scorched black. The livestock have taken refuge within the forest.
“Why would humans do this to each other...?”
Conrad grasps my shoulders and pulls me forward to shield me from falling sparks.
“The hostility between you Mazoku and the humans is not a good thing, but it’s not like I can’t understand it. I mean, um, I can’t say this very well, but it’s like killer whales and dolphins not getting along...but the animosity is there because of the differences between you, right? At least I can understand that. But why would humans fight each other?”
The hysterical laughter of the man from earlier echoes in my head.
“It’d be like dolphins hurting each other, right?! Why doesn’t it anger God when people do something that pointless and cruel?”
He who stands between the Mazoku and humans says in a voice so low that I cannot read its tone: “Then—”
A voice weary from dispatching his soldiers, despairing. Wheat burnt to ash whirls into the air.
It falls in heaps on the grass, only to be scattered and sent dancing again by hoofs.
It happens again and again. Until it returns to earth for the last time.
“Then do humans never fight each other on the Earth Your Majesty comes from?”
“...Well...”
A rider approaches, illuminated by flames. He’s accompanied by only three of his followers, and he’s dragging a large cloth-lump behind him. He throws it down in front of us and turns his gaze towards the group of villagers.
“What...!”
The lumps of cloth are people, not rags. One is dressed in a soldier’s uniform. There are arrows sticking out of his shoulder and right foot, and blood flows from his forehead until even his eyes are scarlet. The other piece of luggage is a man who looks like a farmer. He’s mumbling in a low voice, face pale. He doesn’t have any obvious external injuries, but his arms and feet are bent at odd angles.
The bones are—
I narrowly swallow down bile at the thought of the pain he must be in.
“Everything is pretty much resolved. Though the majority escaped over the border.”
Gwendal’s expression barely changes even under such terrible circumstances. He’s as dour and graceful as ever, and bears no evidence of the battle other than the blood of others on his clothes. His eyebrows rise a little at the sight of his youngest brother and company; then he begins to speak of the state of the battle to his other brother, the acknowledged military man.
“This man admitted that Adalbert was the instigator. It’s no wonder they were so well-trained. A considerable number of former soldiers participated. One among them was apparently a fire-wizard. That’s why the force of the flames.”
“There’s no indication of it weakening at all. We received word from the Kotsuhizoku around noon that it will take a considerable amount of time yet before our own magic-users arrive. I’m not sure if we can hold out until then. No matter what, we must protect the forest.”
“Then they came not to assist us, but simply to gawk? Or...”
Realizing that I’m the one he called a gawker, I hang my head and bite my lip. Gwendal alights gracefully and commands a subordinate to lead his agitated horse away from the fire. He straightens and looks at me.
“How about you summon that magnificent water-Majutsu you used last time to suppress the fires raging in the village?”
“What are you...”
Water Majutsu I used last time? What does that mean? Uneasiness smolders inside my chest. Günter said something about water, too. And stuff about elements and covenants and avatar-forms.
Did I do something during that gap in my memory I haven’t taken responsibility for?
“Elder Brother, he apparently doesn’t remember,” Wolfram says briefly as if it were nothing important. “He was unconscious at the time, so it can only be called a lucky miracle. In other words, right now Yuuri is a greenie who can’t use either sword or Majutsu, or even ride a horse.”
“Miracle, me? What kind of amazing miracle did I perform?”
Conrad looks at me apologetically. I know something about that look—it’s the look my homeroom teacher gave me when she came to the student counseling office with me. You don’t have to look like that, since I’m the one who hit the baseball coach and was kicked out of the team. I don’t regret what I did at all. My mom, when she was called to the school, apologized to the coach and the dean of my year for the punch, then smiled and asked: So what did the coach do? Something unpleasant happened to make this boy angry enough to hit the coach, right? Ah, Yuu-chan’s always been like this. He may be a child, but it’s like he has a policy or some such odd thing, and when something breaches it, the blood goes to his head. And then, well, I guess he forgets himself and thinks only about protecting the word “justice”.
I think the teachers concluded that she brought me up that way.
If you’re to believe my mother, I’m acting according to my middle-class sense of justice.
Though right now I can’t seem to call up even a shred of it...
“If you’re not going to help, then at least don’t get in our way.”
The eldest son seems to never have seriously expected anything at all.
One woman well-advanced in years is pulled stiffly out of the group of villagers huddled together. Her cheeks are lined with loose strands of blonde hair and tears, and she cowers in front of the man whose beauty and position are lofty even among the Mazoku. A soldier hands her a sword and leads her towards the cringing enemy.
Gwendal tells her, “They burned your village. You can kill them, hang them, do as you like to them.”
“What?!”
He glares at me as if to say “You again?” But I can’t just leave this alone, me being me.
Until I got transferred to another world, this is what society taught me to do.
But this is who I am.
I clench my fists and stand between the woman and the wounded soldier to challenge the power at the head of the Mazoku alone.
“No, you can’t! I mean, he’s a prisoner of war, isn’t he?! There are rules about the treatment of prisoners. The Healer girl said earlier that all injured people are equal, too.”
“Conrart, do something about this loudmouth.”
“I’m not going away!”
I guess he’s a bit irritated; he says with a hand against his forehead, “That applies to the regular soldiers, but these are the ringleaders.”
“They should be treated in the same way even if they are the ringleaders, you can’t just sentence them to death! They should have proper lawyers and be given a trial to decide whether or not they’re guilty...”
I turn to the woman who can’t even lift her weapon and plead desperately, “Madam, you can’t listen to these insane people. No matter how important or great the other person is, there will be times when obeying him will be wrong and times when it’ll be wrong. Like not killing a prisoner out of hand—you learned as a part of your compulsory education, right? In junior-high History and Social Studies and stuff, they told you that it’s prohibited because it becomes lynching, right?”
“But I...don’t...”
“She never received any education. Because it would cause defiance and trouble for the nobility, the humans dislike giving their common people too much knowledge. The idea that they’re obligated to provide education is absurd.”
“There’s no compulsory education?!”
What happens to human rights in a sword-and-sorcery world?
I can’t say that it’s because of my pleading, but the woman only stands frozen, hesitating, so the lynching seems to have been prevented for now. I brush down my jacket and look around, trying to figure out what I can do. Like forming a fire-extinguishing squad around the village or organizing a bucket relay like I originally planned. But I don’t see water anywhere. Everyone is digging.
“Why not use water to put out the fire?” I ask Conrad casually.
“There is no well nearby. And magical fire cannot be extinguished by a small amount of water. It will burn the target set by the wizard who started it to nothing, so the conflagration will spread more slowly than ordinary fires, but it cannot be put out without a great deal of water. Gwendal’s expertise is earth-magic, so we thought of forming a barricade out of soil, but the effect underground would be too great, and the forest might be compromised...that’s why there’s nothing we can do right now but wait for someone who can manipulate water.”
Manipulate water. Is that something I did? In that totally blank gap in my memories?
Standing with his hands on his hips, Wolfram asks his brother excitedly, “Can we use this invasion of our land as the pretext for a declaration of war?”
“...Well, it can be one of the pretexts.”
Declarationofwar?
Declarationofwar, de-cla-ra-tion-of-war, declaration of war. These are words I’ve rarely heard in my day-to-day life of fifteen years, and I have to ruminate over them for a moment before I understand their meaning.
Declaration of war?
“Declaration of war?! As in, us commencing battle?! Tell me you’re joking!”
They ignore me.
“...Think a bit more about the big picture, Wolfram. None of the soldiers from the regular army were involved. If we use this raid as the main reason, they can get away with sacrificing a single village. What we need is certainty.”
“Then we just stand around biting our thumbs and watch them they do what they want to our borderlands?”
“You guys, listen to me!!”
They glance at me, but don’t look like they intend to take me seriously at all.
The blood is rushing to my brain at reckless speeds. If someone cut my veins now I’d lose it all. Even while I’m trying to stay calm and search for the right words, my throat is convulsing, and my voice ends up shaking.
“Don’t you guys know anything about a non-aggressive defensive policy?! It means that you only protect! It means that you never ever provoke battle! Modern-day Japan is built on pacifism, we’ve renounced war, and that’s written in the constitution, out-and-out! I was born Japanese and I grew up in Japan, so of course I’m against war! And not only am I against it, I’m strongly opposed!”
I point at Conrad, my voice rising, “You told me that people fight each other on Earth, too, right?! Yes, they do, of course Earth isn’t completely free of war. But when it happens, there’re always people trying their best to stop it! The majority of people in the world wish for peace!”
I begin to shout, half out of frustration. I’m not sure who’s more hot-tempered: Wolfram or me.
“What are you trying to say?! That you’ll just stand around watching until you’re certain we’re going to war?!”
“...Stop shouting.”
Gwendal scowls as if he’s trying to hold back a headache. But my nickname is the Turkischer Marsch.
“Why don’t you sit down and discuss it, talk to each other! The citizens of your country burned our fields. What will you do, how will you guarantee that it won’t happen again? We want to avoid war, so how will you deal with this problem within your own borders such that it’ll never happen again? So I’m saying that you need to discuss it to reach a resolution!”
“Stop shouting, Other-Worlder!”
“No, I’m not shouting, you’re the one shouting! I’m Japanese until I’m twenty, so even if I’m carrying the Maou’s soul, I’m a Japanese citizen until I’m an adult. I think Japan is superior to this country when it comes to peace, so I’m gonna talk even if you tell me to shut up! I’m against war, I’m against war, I’ll be against war my whole life, I’m against war even if you kill me!”
“Then why don’t we kill you for a bit and find out?!”
“No thanks!”
All right! I think to myself. Cool, even though Gwendal treats me like a little punk who pisses in the courtyard, I’ve gotten him wrapped up in my argument. Now that we’ve gotten to this point, I’m not backing off. Even if I have to put on the Maou act and threaten him a bit.
“You have no business barging into a conversation about this country when you have no intention of becoming king! My responsibility is to protect Shinma Kingdom, thinking of the national interest is my duty! Why don’t you go protect your own homeland with these exaggerated morals and half-hearted measures from this place you call Japan? We Mazoku have our own ways of doing things!”
“Then I’ll change them! I’ll change the Mazoku way of doing things, starting from square one!”
The air here is unpolluted, the earth here is unpoisoned, the forest here is untouched, this world is beautiful. But there’s something weird about it.
“You guys are beautiful and amazing, but your uber-bad personalities are a total problem! Like this discrimination of humans and your dangerous customs and this privileged class consciousness and liking war. That’s why being at peace with humans is so unthinkable to you! And humans even think that attacking other humans is fine if they’re living on Mazoku land! What kinda stupid reasoning is that?! Is there any religion so disturbing that it says God will lend you power even if you’re going to war?!”
“Your Majesty.”
Among the three brothers, only Conrad calls me Your Majesty. His eyes: yellow topaz with holes poked through them.
“They’re also absolutely wrong, but that’s why we can’t just let ourselves get carried along. We should at least do the right thing, going to war would be a mistake.”
Sorry Conrad, the Marsch can’t be stopped at its climax. I’m giddy from lack of oxygen. Who are we? Which group have I put myself in? Aren’t I supposed to be human?
“If the king says that we must not go to war, the people of the kingdom will obey, won’t they?” I ask, my voice going lower and lower.
“Your Majesty!”
Then I shout: “...I’ll become the Maou...!”
“Yuuri?!”
“I’ll become the king of Shinma Kingdom!”
If I don’t give the signal, the game will never start.
Behind us, the fire has spread to the fence. A woman’s scream covers a small explosion-like sound.
“What...”
I bend over, coughing violently just as I’m about to turn. The punch to my right ribcage blocks the oxygen from entering my lungs.
“Don’t move!”
My chin is forcefully held in a double headlock. Heavy metal presses against my throat and chest, and someone breathes right next to my ear.
The ringleader cowering on the ground a moment ago has stolen the weapon out of the woman’s hand. His blood-reddened eyes are glinting, and he pants wildly in excitement and pain. There are still arrows sticking out of his shoulder and foot.
“Nobody move, or I’ll slit his throat.”
I move my eyeballs as far as they can go, trying to see the man’s face.
“You, don’t try to resist!”
“All right...”
Heart of a mouse, that’s me.
“Or does the great Maou, His Majesty the lord of demon lords, hear anything underlings like us have to say?”
Someone clicks his tongue. Who was that?
The man says with a half-laugh as he pulls me along, “If you’re really the Maou, should this be so easy? And me a mere private?”
“...!...”
“Taken hostage and kidnapped somewhere? Why don’t you guys try a curse? It’ll probably kill me, but I’ll take him down with me! Don’t even think about betting on who’ll get it first, I’ve been a soldier for twenty years!”
A pain like fever runs across my neck, probably a shallow cut against my skin.
At a prudent distance from the Mazoku, the man demands a horse, water, and provisions.
“Since it looks like I’m gonna die anyway, what I wanna ask is, didn’t you say this kid here’s the Maou? Even though it looks like he can’t use a sword or magic—do Maous like this really exist?”
“Not...like...I can...help it....”
My throat hurts where the tip of the sword touches it, but my ribs hurt more. Tears leak out of my eyes every time I breathe.
“Well, whatever the case, he’s the only bearer of the Twin Black in this world. Even if he’s not the king, he’ll easily make my fortune. Did you know? There are people who’ll give you however much money you want for the Twin Black, because he who obtains the one with black hair and eyes holds the power of everlasting youth and everlasting life.”
I heard. Three, six days ago. I’ll spend the rest of my life as somebody’s miracle drug, with no control over even my own life or death—what kind of an absurd life would that be? I squeeze my eyes shut tight.
I’m sorry for yelling earlier—I’ll apologize, so please save me now. I plead as hard as I can with my eyes, but none of my allies raise a hand from where they stand surrounding us at a distance. They’re not doing anything but respiring.
A horse is tugged over and a small amount of water poured into its saddlebags.
Could this moment be my first and last chance? We can’t both mount at the same time, to say nothing of doing it with a sword in front of me. So maybe now is my only chance?
“Get on.”
The man circles the sword to my back. I guess he’s now positioned to run me through from behind. I can’t even tell him that I can’t get on the horse without help, and timidly lift my foot up to the stirrup.
In the moment my right foot is about to go over the saddle.
A small black shadow nimbly dashes towards us and pulls out the arrow extruding from the man’s foot.
The man croaks like a frog. His blade nicks tawny hide, and the cowardly dappled gray neighs loudly. It rears and throws off its ‘luggage’ before running off in terror.
“Ack...!”
I thought my body was floating in midair, but it’s actually already landed on hardness that’s not the ground. My bruised ribs ache, and I gasp painfully for oxygen.
“...Wh...!”
Something warm falls on my fingers as I clutch my chest.
It’s blood.
With the sun behind him, I can’t see anything of Conrad but his shadowed back. There’s another shadowy lump at his feet.
The man lies crumbled on the ground with fresh red blood flowing out of him, cut into two.
“...Is he dead?”
“Who knows.”
The voice comes from beneath me, and I hurriedly shift my rump to the grass. Gwendal brushes the mud and ashes off his clothes. Why was he lying under me? I don’t have the time to ask.
Because I spot the small forlorn form of my savior, who was probably knocked away by the dappled gray.
The flames are already bearing down on him, but the boy lying on his face doesn’t move a muscle despite the heat.
“...Hey...”
Blond hair sticking up out of his head, a well-built kid.
“Brandon.”
“Yuuri, it’s dangerous, I’ll—”
I shake off Conrad’s arm and stagger towards the flames. A child, people are going to be burned by this spiteful fire set by some unknown person, by this cowardly inextinguishable fire.
“Brandon!”
Gigantic flames leap at us from one side, but Conrad somehow mows them down.
“Brandon?!”
I turn the boy over and lift him to my lap. His eyes flicker open slightly, and his lips move. He’s alive!
“...Your Majesty...”
“You don’t have to call me your majesty.”
“...But you’re...going to be...the king...aren’t you...?”
“Brandon.”
I’ll protect this village, I’ll protect all of you—that’s what I promised. I promise.
Something falls drop by drop onto the child’s cheeks.
“I promise.”
“You’ll...teach me...how to throw...too...right?”
“I promise!”
As if timed to synchronize with my shout, thunder suddenly splits my ears.
A sweet, gentle, joyful murmur in the inner parts of my semicircular canals.
We would give you our last drop...
Rain strikes the ground.
A rare downpour.