[Chapter 37] - Franken Stein (3)
Several hours had passed since the princess’s “I hate Fran” declaration.
Fran said posture was important first, and rather than begin with dancing, she started by correcting the princess’s posture. She instructed the princess in various ways, from standing on the tips of her toes to finding her center of balance.
After time passed like that and evening arrived before we knew it, a maid knocked on the door from outside to announce that it was mealtime.
Just as I was wondering where I should hide Fran, Fran did not hide at all. Instead, she opened the door herself and greeted the maid. The maid, who found herself face-to-face with Fran when the door opened, was startled and flinched.
“Oh my, who...?”
“I am Her Majesty the Queen’s personal maid.”
“Huh...? Did we have someone like you...?”
“You did.”
As I rubbed my face in dizziness at the sight of Fran stubbornly insisting she was a maid, for some reason, the maid looked at Fran as though she had remembered something, let out an “Ah~,” and welcomed her.
“Ah~ right~ I must have forgotten. Oh, this isn’t the time. Your Majesty the Queen. It is time for dinner. Would it be all right for me to escort you to the dining hall?”
“Uh, huh? Ah, yes. Today, I intend to eat in my room with the princess, so would you bring it here? The princess doesn’t seem to have the strength to go all the way to the dining hall.”
The maid looked at the princess lying limply on the bed and, seemingly surprised, covered her mouth before nodding and answering that she would do so. After the maid left, I stared at Fran with my eyes wide.
“It is a simple spell witches use when hiding themselves in human society. It is quite useful once learned, so I recommend you learn it later.”
“I see...”
Was magic supposed to be that all-purpose in the first place? I had learned that witches used magic by borrowing the power of fairies, yet Fran was casting spells one after another without any help from fairies.
‘Well... she did say she was an artificial human. That must be why. Let’s not worry about it for no reason.’
Feeling like I would only make myself dizzy if I dug too deeply, I patted the princess, who had collapsed beside me, on the back. The princess must have been truly exhausted, because even when I stroked her back, she showed no intention of moving whatsoever.
Unlike me, who thought I should let her rest a little since she was tired, Fran drove the princess mercilessly. Before I knew it, Fran had slipped her hands under the princess’s armpits and forcibly lifted her upright.
“Princess, you must put in a little more effort. With your current skill level, how can you feel sleepy?”
In the end, that one sentence pushed the princess’s patience to its limit.
The princess, who was being held by Fran, raised both hands high into the air and shoved Fran’s face away as if slapping it with her palms. Then, in a voice I had never heard from her before, she shrieked.
“I can’t live like this!!!!”
After slipping out of Fran’s arms, the princess ran out of my room as though fleeing.
Well... watching Fran’s teaching methods from the side, I had thought the princess might run away like this someday...
But I never imagined that someday would be now.
When I got up from the bed to go look for the princess, Fran stretched out both hands toward me and stopped me. When I raised my head to look at Fran, her expressionless face somehow seemed darkly shadowed.
“...I will go find her.”
“...All right. She’s probably in her room... You can find your way there, can’t you?”
Fran nodded just like that, then ran out of the room to look for the princess. I felt like I finally understood why Fran had first introduced herself as a “third-rate human.”
‘She said she was an artificial human, and it seems she really doesn’t understand human emotions very well.’
*
After arriving at the princess’s room, Fran carefully opened the door and checked inside. Once Fran confirmed where the princess was, she flinched and stopped for a moment, as if startled.
The place where the princess was hiding was under the desk. She had draped a blanket over the desk so that it hung all the way down to the floor like curtains, then piled up books and objects to keep the blanket from falling. It was a secret base.
Inside, she had decorated the space with pillows and cushions, and with the remaining books, she had built a barricade to block the entrance. The princess sat inside her very own secret base, wary of Fran.
“Princess.”
When Fran called to her, the growling princess picked up a pillow and kept Fran at bay. It meant that if Fran came any closer, she would throw that pillow at her.
Fran hesitated for a moment, then crouched down, looked at the princess, and bowed her head. The princess said nothing and simply watched Fran warily.
“...I apologize. If I have done something wrong, would you tell me?”
“......”
“...As I told you, because I am an ‘artificial human,’ it is difficult for me to understand human emotions. I was trying in my own way, but it seems I offended you, Princess.”
Did Fran’s sincerity get through to her to some degree? The princess put down the pillow she had been holding and stared quietly at Fran. Fran still wore an emotionless expression, but even the princess could tell this much.
Fran was truly dejected.
The princess’s heart weakened at that expression, and she remembered hitting Fran in the face earlier. She had hit her because she had been too angry, but seeing Fran now, the princess thought she had gone too far.
The princess slowly cleared away the barricade she had piled up beneath the desk, then patted the cushion beside her with a pang-pang sound. At the princess’s signal to come inside, Fran slowly entered.
The space beneath the desk, turned into a secret base, was cramped for the two of them, but for some reason, it felt cozy and comfortable. The princess fidgeted for a moment, then looked at Fran’s face.
Seeing the red handprint on Fran’s pale face, the princess was at a loss for a moment. Then she lowered her head deeply and apologized to Fran.
“I’m sorry for hitting you...”
“No. I was the one who offended you, Princess. You did nothing wrong.”
The princess thought so too.
No matter how she thought about it, she did not think she had done anything wrong.
But hitting was still hitting...
After hitting Fran in the face, the princess had been terribly flustered. No matter how angry she had been, she had not meant to go so far as to hit Fran.
“But I’m still sorry...”
“......”
Silence settled beneath the desk for a moment. Fran turned her head, looked down at the princess sitting close beside her, and gently placed a hand on the princess’s head, beginning to stroke it.
“As I said, I am a created ‘artificial human.’ A slap from your palm, Princess, is nothing to me.”
“But... your face turned all red...”
“It is nothing.”
Looking at Fran, who calmly said it was nothing, the princess decided not to worry about it anymore. She simply gave up, thinking, ‘Fran is just that kind of person.’
Once again, the conversation between Fran and the princess came to a halt.
The princess sat there blankly for a while, then suddenly grew curious about what Fran meant by “artificial human.” Fran said she had been made, but no matter how the princess looked at her, Fran was the same as an ordinary person.
Aside from spitting out strange lumps of iron, her wrist coming off, and her peculiar way of speaking, Fran’s appearance did not seem all that different from other people’s. The princess glanced up and asked Fran.
“You said you’re an artificial human, Fran... What is an artificial human?”
“It means exactly what it sounds like: a human made artificially. In my case, my father, ‘Dr. Victor Frankenstein,’ made me.”
The princess tilted her head as if those words were difficult to understand. Fran thought deeply for a moment, then suddenly pulled off her wrist and held it out to the princess.
And in that instant, pop! A bouquet of flowers sprang out from her wrist. The princess, startled by the flowers that had suddenly appeared, tried to leap to her feet and bumped her head lightly against the underside of the desk.
As the princess rubbed her bumped head, Fran began explaining herself again. The reason she had been created, and various things from her past.
“In truth, I was once an ordinary fairy.”
“A fairy? Like Sylphy?”
Fran nodded.
“When I was originally a fairy, I admired humans. I envied the way they lived and watched them every day. While I was living like that, I met my father, ‘Victor Frankenstein.’”
Fran reattached her wrist and began telling the story as she recalled the past. The princess listened while looking back and forth between the bouquet in her hands and Fran sitting beside her.
“My father dreamed of a world where ‘humans and fairies lived in harmony.’ He said that fear is born from ignorance, and believed that once humans came to know fairies, their fear of fairies would also disappear.”
“Humans and fairies... together? I always lived just fine with Ainsel, though? Is that different?”
“It is not different. However, ordinary people cannot see fairies. That is why my father began researching how to make me.”
Fran patted her own chest, indicating herself. Her own body, half human and half fairy.
“He believed that if a fairy possessed a ‘human body,’ everyone would come to know one another and begin to coexist.”
“Umm...”
Even though Fran explained it simply, the princess still clutched her head as if it was difficult. Fran looked at the princess, then stroked her head thoroughly, as if to say it was all right even if she found it hard.
“The first successful result of research into making a fairy into a human. That is me, ‘Franken Stein.’ I truly believed that after I succeeded, many younger siblings of mine would be created, but—”
Fran stopped speaking for a moment and lowered her head. The princess felt Fran’s expression gradually darkening and patted Fran’s shoulder.
“...Unfortunately, not long after I was born, my father passed away in an accident. There was a fire in the laboratory, and the research that created me was also completely ‘lost.’”
At the mention of losing her father, the princess’s expression began to darken as well. She had been reminded of the funeral of her royal father, which had not been so long ago. The princess hugged her knees tightly and began listening to Fran’s story.
“...I carry on my father’s will and dream of harmony between humans and fairies. It is still difficult, but I live with the hope that someday, it will come true.”
“...I hope it comes true.”
“In truth, I believe it has already come true to some extent.”
“Huh?”
The princess, hugging her knees tightly, rested her head on them and looked up at Fran. Fran looked down at the princess and, for the first time, lifted the corners of her mouth in a smile.
“I was originally a fairy, and you are human. Just the fact that we can sit so close together and talk like this makes me think my dream has come true, at least to some degree.”
“Huh? Is that how it works?”
What Fran said was far too difficult for the princess. She simply tilted her head, looking as though she truly did not understand.
Fran looked at the princess, then, as if the conversation had ended, slipped out of the secret base and offered the princess her hand.
“From now on, I will continue the lessons while reflecting your opinions as much as possible, Princess. So, will you continue taking my lessons?”
At the word lessons, the princess frowned again, pouted her lips, and glared at Fran.
To be honest, the princess did not want to take Fran’s harsh lessons. Lessons so harsh they would not even let her rest were something she had grown thoroughly sick of ever since the marchioness.
As she hesitated like that, just as the balance in the princess’s heart was tilting further and further toward “I don’t want to”...
“If you take my lessons, then at the very least, when you dance with Vivian—no, with Her Majesty the Queen, I will ensure you do not show an embarrassing side of yourself.”
At those words, the princess’s ears perked up.
Just as Sylphy had suggested, the princess was planning to ask “Her Majesty the Queen” to dance at the ball that would be held for her birthday party.
So she wanted to show Her Majesty the Queen, perfectly and without making even the slightest mistake, how hard she had worked until now.
“...Really? You’ll make me like that?”
“...I will do my best.”
The princess hesitated for a moment at the answer, which she somehow did not like, then took the hand Fran had offered as though she truly hated it but had no choice.
Fran was a “person” whose way of speaking was strange and whose actions were strange, but the dance Fran performed was truly beautiful.
The princess wanted to learn so she could imitate Fran’s dance even a little. Just as Fran had said...
Because when she danced in front of Her Majesty the Queen, she did not want to make a mistake or show an embarrassing side of herself.
*
Time passed, and now less than a week remained until the ball.
I let out a small sigh as I looked at Ainsel, who still groaned every night and showed no sign of waking. According to Fran, she should have opened her eyes soon...
It had already been two weeks since Fran diagnosed Ainsel, yet Ainsel still had not regained consciousness. At first, I had been happy just to see Ainsel’s figure reflected on the surface of the mirror, but...
It would be a lie to say I was not worried.
Today as well, just before falling asleep, the moment I looked at Ainsel and let out a small sigh—
—Vivian...?