The desert night was dark and cold, like a transparent glass bead. A heaven and earth made only of sand were round, and the ground beneath one’s feet felt precarious enough to crumble.
—The preparations are almost complete.
Standing at the center of it all, I quietly look into the mirror.
Reflected on its clean surface is a scene of Epherene and Julie.
—How is it? I made it well, didn’t I?
—……Yes.
—Now we just have to test-run it once. If that succeeds, we’re done.
Epherene, designing a “container” large enough for one person to enter, and Julie, merely nodding as she watches her.
—Oh……
Julie, stroking the container with wide eyes as if fascinated, is unnecessarily cute.
“…….”
A small smile rises to my lips, but I already know what the two of them intend to do.
I think about it from time to time as well.
—Will it be over in one attempt?
—No. You’ll have to stay inside for about one or two weeks. I have to extract something called “time energy” from my mana and inject it into the container.
If all of Julie’s memories until now were to disappear, and only that “time” were rewound.
“……You will forget me.”
She will come to forget me.
Not Deculein.
Because I am not Deculein. Because I, who at some point was swapped in, am not the Deculein Julie had known for so long.
She will truly forget “me.”
“……The you of all those years will die.”
Forgotten memories do not come back.
Even if records are left behind in things like diaries, the memories piled up in the heart over a long span of time cannot be replayed.
All the emotions that made Julie Julie will not be restored.
—You’ll be able to see the professor while you’re no longer in pain.
—……Is that so. But whether I can realize myself merely by reading a diary……
—Of course you can. Don’t worry. I trust your mental strength, Sir Julie.
It is going against the natural order of humanity, and it is also fleeing from death.
She is killing her present self in order to save a life that is not herself.
“Even so.”
I wish for that.
I wish for her to give herself up.
If only you can live.
If only you can breathe in this world.
If only, in place of those countless pains, you can move forward in search of another happiness.
I am thinking that it is fine if you forget someone like me……
“Count.”
A voice calls me from behind.
It is the knight “Delric.”
A knight who was with me in Reccordak, who greatly helped Epherene’s regression, and who had, truly “somehow,” and of his own volition, become my loyal retainer.
“What is it?”
“We have intelligence that a hideout of the Red Track, one Idnik frequently visits, has been discovered.”
“Idnik.”
“Yes.”
Idnik is a wanted criminal.
Externally, it is only natural since she is Rohakan’s disciple, but recently, as the charge of aiding the Red Track was confirmed, her rank has been raised to that of a “black wanted criminal.”
“Here. This is a location map identified by one of our Guards.”
As Delric says, “our,” the desert is now divided into factions.
One side is the military faction headed by General Bell, and the other is the nobles and knights centered around me.
Because of that, competition over achievements is fierce.
Bell’s faction launches expeditions several times a day and obtains results, but I am restraining the knights of my faction as much as possible.
“He has talent related to tracking, so you may trust it.”
At Delric’s words, I looked at the map.
“…….”
I silently nodded.
Delric’s expression brightened.
“Then our side will prepare to sortie as well.”
“Do so.”
“Yes!”
I watched Delric salute and withdraw, then called out quietly.
“Delric.”
“Yes.”
He immediately came to a sudden stop and turned back toward me.
“Lately…… Lia. How has that one been behaving?”
“Yes? Ah…… There has been nothing particularly unusual.”
“……I see.”
Lia.
That girl is leaking internal secrets.
Of course, I led her to do so. Among these Guards as well, there must certainly be a Red Track agent.
“Is something the matter?”
For some reason, Delric asks with concern.
His face is strangely serious.
“Who knows. Perhaps because of training. It seems she has been going quite deep into the desert lately.”
“……Ah. Yes. She does so often. She seems to enjoy reckless things.”
I nodded.
As if to prove she was based on Yu Ara, her personality is similar as well.
“Her personality too, then.”
“…….”
At that, ahem—! Delric cleared his throat and straightened his back.
“In that case, I will monitor—”
“No. There is no need.”
In any case, for the survival of the desert, it is right that the secrets be exposed.
That the spy is Lia is unexpected, but since she is highly capable, it may rather be for the better.
“Return.”
“……Yes.”
Delric steps across the sand and goes back without any further words, and I look up at the desert stars.
There are many lights rippling like waves, as if trying to cut through the darkness. Like a line of poetry I once read, each star seems to rise as a person of its own.
“……How complicated.”
I murmured quietly.
* * *
The next day.
Lia, who woke early in the morning, is performing mana circulation in the desert training ground as usual.
“Phew……”
Sitting cross-legged, she reviews the 「Elementalization」 formula Deculein taught her.
As she learns it, she feels that if she just masters this properly, her level will grow by several stages—
“You little rascal.”
Thump—!
In that instant, a light rap strikes her forehead.
Startled, Lia looked up.
“Who…… ah?”
“It’s Delric.”
“I know. Sir Delric.”
The knight Delric, whom she had seen in Reccordak and often encountered in the Imperial Palace. Deculein’s confidant and a key figure of the Imperial Knights.
He is Lia’s direct superior.
Lia, too, follows the Guard’s hierarchy in the desert in her own way.
“But why? I’m training.”
Lia asked back. Delric frowned and shook his head.
“This time, it’s somewhat serious. Don’t think you can get past it by acting like a child. Listen.”
“……?”
She is a little puzzled, but despite how she may look, she is the type to listen well.
Lia answered with an equally serious expression.
“Yes.”
“Lia. Have you been going far out into the desert?”
“…….”
At that moment, her heart leapt.
Thump—!
No way, had the leak of confidential information already been discovered?
Thud-thud-thud-thud—!
Her heartbeat surged wildly.
“Yes. But why…… are you asking?”
“…….”
Delric’s eyes narrowed. It was an ambiguous gaze half mixed with suspicion and exasperation.
Lia gulped.
“The Count asked.”
“The Count……?”
“Yes.”
Thwack—!
Delric rapped Lia on the head again and added, as if sighing.
“He worries a great deal about you.”
Those words are a question to Lia.
Worries?
A great deal?
Blinking, Lia stares at Delric. At his mouth, which still seems to have more to say.
“Far more than you think.”
“…….”
For a moment, Lia considers the meaning of the word worry.
Deculein’s worry. Did such a contradictory thing exist in this world?
Delric cleared his throat with an ahem, belatedly taking note of their surroundings.
“He asked me.”
“……Asked what?”
It is so unexpected that even her tongue twists.
“About your behavior, Lia.”
“My behavior?”
Delric continued quite seriously.
“He was worried that you were going deep into the desert.”
Worried.
The second time that word is used.
Could Delric be speaking however he pleased? But Delric is far too openly Deculein’s confidant to suspect that. Both of them are named figures, and their personalities match strangely well too.
“……Really? That man, about me?”
Lia asked back, unconsciously using Ara’s way of speaking.
“Yes. He even……”
Delric closed his mouth for a moment.
As if hesitating whether or not to say this.
“This is a secret, but…… he even said it was ‘complicated.’”
“…….”
“You know as well, don’t you? Why the Count would say such a thing.”
Lia blankly nods.
Fiancée.
But I thought he considered me and Yu Ara completely separate.
“Lia. Know your place.”
Delric said. Lia looked up at him.
“You were not chosen by the Count because of your talent.”
As she hears those words, several facts make Lia feel guilty.
The leaking of confidential information.
Of course, she had done it because she was certain it would benefit everyone—truly, this “entire continent”……
“The Count teaching you, and sometimes speaking harshly to you.”
Perhaps Deculein was still seeing Yu Ara in her.
Even if he pretended otherwise, one part of his heart was always.
In the adventurer called “Lia,” was he seeing the person called “Yu Ara”?
“All because you resemble his former fiancée.”
If so, he may be the only person in this world who remembers “Yu Ara.”
No, the only one who can remember her.
……Of course, that Yu Ara is not me.
“Not only your appearance, but even your personality.”
“Personality…… too?”
“Yes. That too was something the Count himself said. So don’t go too deep. If you are going, at least take a radio with you.”
“…….”
“I’m telling you not to cause him concern.”
For a moment, Lia silently looked out over the training ground.
She saw Deculein, who had finished his morning exercise, straightening his clothes.
“Answer.”
Delric urged her.
Still looking at Deculein, Lia carefully nodded.
“……I won’t go out too often.”
“Yes. Good.”
Delric put on his armored helmet. Lia quickly asked back.
“Where are you going?”
“We are sortieing.”
“Sortieing……?”
“Don’t even think of going. The professor is worried.”
Delric cut her off firmly, then spun around and ran to Deculein.
Lia quietly watched the two of them.
—We are ready, Count. Shall we sortie immediately?
—Do so.
A sortie.
She does not know where they are going, but the atmosphere is rather serious.
—Everyone, attention—!
At Delric’s shout, Deculein’s faction gathers in one place.
“Well, I suppose.”
That side has been lacking in military achievements lately, so their position is becoming shaky…… because of me……
Step—
At that moment, a footstep settles down close behind Lia.
Lia turned that way and flinched in surprise.
“……Deculein certainly has quite a lot, doesn’t he? A former former fiancée, a former fiancée, and even you, who resemble his former former fiancée.”
Sophien, dressed in a robe and turban.
She stares fixedly at Lia and snorts.
“Hmph.”
“Ah, Your Majesty. That is……”
“You speak better than expected, too.”
“…….”
Lia licked her lips, which had gone completely dry.
Sophien shook her head.
“Well, you do not matter. Deculein must feel only pity for one as young as you.”
“……Your Majesty. For what reason have you come out?”
“We shall personally join Deculein’s sortie. Of course, that fellow will naturally refuse, so we shall hide along the way.”
“……It is dangerous, Your Majesty.”
Lia stopped her without realizing it. Sophien gave a mocking smirk and took a tiny knight statue—no, a figurine—from her pocket.
“It is fine. A knight is always by Our side.”
“Do you mean Sir Keiron?”
—That is correct.
The knight figurine spoke.
It was a miniature Keiron.
“……Ah.”
Lia was at a loss for a moment, but soon nodded.
To begin with, the current Sophien was also a powerhouse no less than Keiron.
With two people on the level of the strongest in the world, worrying would be a luxury.
“Yes. Then I shall also—”
“That will do.”
Sophien placed a hand on Lia’s head.
“We have no need for you, who makes him recall an old love.”
“…….”
“Stay here. We cannot stand the sight of the professor’s heart being made uneasy because of you, the sight of him worrying or the like.”
With a crooked smile, she shook Lia’s small head a few times, then furtively followed after Deculein’s sortie.
This, too, was a rather interesting situation, but.
“……Deculein is worried about me.”
Right now, that thought alone fills Lia’s head.
* * *
—Are we not following from too far behind?
……A vast expanse, a desert even more distant than a boundless sea.
Across an immense stretch of sand, Sophien is walking with Keiron.
“He has a keen sense for presences. If we do not wish to be discovered, we must maintain at least this much distance.”
Beyond that sand, Deculein’s expeditionary force has grown so distant as to be nearly invisible. On top of that, she is even wearing the 「Robe of Invisibility」.
—Why are you trying not to be discovered?
“……Keiron. What you said that day.”
Sophien had no choice but to admit Keiron’s words.
She had wanted Deculein to be the first to yield. She had wanted him to apologize to her and return.
Thus, she had deliberately damaged his face. She had trampled on his pride.
“I thought those words were somewhat correct.”
—So, are you going to let him win?
Let him win.
That sentence feels a little unfamiliar to Sophien.
“……Let him win.”
Let him win.
Truly, it is a phrase she has never once considered in her mind.
Her ennui and indolence, in truth, are fine with losing. Winning does not particularly move her either.
However, she has never thought of letting someone win.
To deliberately let someone win at something is that bothersome.
“Let him win, is it……”
Thus Sophien ponders.
Letting him win.
Has she already lost now, or is she “going to lose”?
“……It seems I need to think about it.”
Watching the emperor murmur so, Keiron hides a smile.
Sophien is becoming human now.
Perhaps it is an emotion unsuited to a sovereign, but the more human she becomes, the freer she will surely be.
And Keiron wishes more for Sophien to be humanly happy than for Sophien to be a sovereign and a tyrant……
—Your Majesty. Surround yourself with Mana Armor.
At that moment, Keiron’s serious words.
Sophien nodded and clad herself in armor of mana.
It was because hostility and signs of presence were felt at the same time.
—Assassins. It seems they have detected us.
“We know.”
The instant she answers so, a stabbing killing intent surges up from beneath the sand.
A flash of mana lightning digs through the sand and hurtles forward.
Clang──!
It had been rushing toward the back of Sophien’s neck. However, before either Keiron or Sophien could defend.
It is caught by a “blue metal” that approaches from somewhere.
Kwaaaaa——!
Flames of extreme heat rise and burn away the mana, and freezing cold of absolute low temperature chills the assassins’ arms and legs.
It is the defense mechanism of the 「Snowflake Stone」.
——.
The assassins freeze without even letting out a scream.
In this way, the reflexes of the Snowflake Stone, now one with the body of the 「Iron Man」, are virtually invincible. It can respond to any instantaneous ambush at speeds beyond Mach……
“…….”
However, because of that, Sophien falls silent.
For some reason, her face turns red.
—Ahem.
Keiron cleared his throat.
—It would seem.
……Indeed.
—The professor appears to have known from the beginning.
There is no way that wily fox of a Deculein did not know We were tailing him.