Chapter Three: Elvia and Amatena

“Whoooooaaaaaaa!”

Elvia-san was on all fours, clinging to the neck of the Faldra—the name Loek-sama had given to this creation, short for “false dragon.” There was nothing to hold her in place. Elvia-san’s tail was wagging wildly; from excitement, I supposed. For my part, I was very anxious: it looked like she might tumble off at any moment.

The rest of us were sitting on the Faldra’s back, but we were using leather straps with metal fasteners to secure ourselves. Even so, we were up high enough that looking down at the ground made me distinctly uneasy.

That ground, though, was amazing to see. The mountains that had seemed so thoroughly intimidating on foot now spread out beneath us as if a child had built them out of sand—as if we could sweep them aside with a motion of an arm. They seemed so impossibly small.

During our ride with the Dragon Knights, we had been more or less boxed in by cargo, so there hadn’t been much opportunity to take in the scenery. But now, exposed to the gusting wind and rich sun, it truly felt like we were flying.

Maybe I couldn’t blame Elvia-san for playing around a bit.

We would soon enter Bahairam territory. Crossing the border had turned out to be almost comically simple.

The cloth “skin” of the Faldra would make it look, from below, almost like a real dragon from a certain distance. On that note, the wyverns the Dragon Knights rode carried saddles and armor that gave them a very distinctive silhouette; no one in Bahairam would have mistaken what they were looking at. As it happened, there were many types of dragons and lizards native to Bahairam, such that some of the more docile ones were even bred to pull their carriages, or so I had heard.

“We’ll be heading down soon!” Minori-sama shouted against the wind. “Land it in that forest.” She pointed to a small copse of trees standing smack in the middle of the landscape of sand and rocks below us.

“Roger that!” Loek-sama said, and then he and I began using our wind magic to decrease our speed and altitude bit by bit. Romilda-sama changed the angle of the wings, helping the Faldra to a nice, gentle landing. The branches of the trees rustled as we came down, some of them snapping off as the huge creature passed by them, but we managed to come down in a relatively open area. We were still going a bit too quick and kicked up a lot of grass and dirt as we slid along, but soon the Faldra came safely to rest.

“Phew...” Minori-sama let out a sigh of relief. She must have been more nervous than she’d let on. “Good work, everyone. I’m sorry to say this, but there’s no time to rest.”

“Right!” Loek-sama and Romilda-sama nodded.

“Obviously we can’t go riding this thing into town. Loek, Romilda, you cover the Faldra with leaves and branches so it stays hidden, then wait here with it. We’ll leave about half the luggage, too, so you’ll need to stand guard.”

“Huh? ’Fraid not,” Loek-sama said, shaking his head. “I’m going with you, Minori-sensei.”

“No, you’re not. We’re dealing with genuine covert activities from here on out. One wrong move and you could get stabbed in the back. I won’t be able to look after everyone at once. The fewer people we have with us, the better, and anyway, we need someone to look after the Faldra and the cargo.”

“B-But couldn’t you have Romilda do that?”

“Stop trying to delegate, branch brain,” Romilda-sama said, frowning angrily.

“No,” Minori-sama said. “You both promised to follow my orders, right? Stay here and keep watch—together. There’s always a limit to what one person can do alone.”

Loek-sama looked ever more distraught. Minori-sama spared him a dry smile and said, “And if we need you to rescue us, I’ll call you with this.” She gave him a long, rectangular object that looked like a cross between a box and a stick. If I recalled correctly, it was called a communications dee-vyce, a way for people who were far apart to talk to each other. Ja-pan’s equivalent of a magical item.

“What’s this?”

“I’ll show you how to use it later. If we happen to need to make an emergency escape, we’ll need you to come get us on the Faldra. Can I trust you to do that?”

“Y-You sure can. Leave it to me!” Loek-sama said, putting a hand to his chest.

Minori-sama nodded at Loek-sama and Romilda-sama, then turned to Elvia-san. “All right, Elvia, get the luggage. The leather pouch. The hemp pouch we can leave. Sorry, but can I ask you to handle half the cargo?”

“...Yeah, sure,” Elvia-san said, with a distinct lack of enthusiasm. I assumed this was about more than having to carry bags. She had to be upset that when she finally came back to her home country, it was essentially as a traitor.

“Myusel and I will handle the rest of the luggage.”

“Sure.”

“Loek, Romilda, you get on hiding the Faldra. Elvia, Myusel, put the bags on your backs. And then let’s blow this scene!”

“Right!” we all (except Elvia-san) answered eagerly.

I was in my room, sitting vacantly in my chair. Clara had been with me until just a little while ago, as she always was... but then, for some reason, she left. Maybe she had something to do. So now I was alone, and I promptly lost myself in thought.

It had been two days since I attended the wedding, and in that time I hadn’t been able to figure out what I would do from here.

In this country they called the king their “father” and proclaimed that all the nation’s citizens were equal as family. That wasn’t necessarily a bad system as far as it went. The sense of unease I was experiencing might simply have been because I was an outsider. Amatena and the others didn’t see anything especially unusual about the arrangement.

And yet...

“I can’t help thinking I smell something fishy...”

They claimed all the people in the nation were equal, but by definition, the existence of a state system implies some measure of difference. The closer you are to the seat of power, the better life is likely to be for you. In our world, even communism, which is probably the most aggressive political philosophy as far as promoting the equality of all people, tends to end up like that.

The whole notion of complete equality is an ideal, not a reality. Brains. Brawn. Sensitivity. Beauty.

These represent differences between people, who naturally have more of some and less of others. People aren’t even born equal. In fact, they can hardly be more different. You have people who turn out to be geniuses in a specific field, and on the other hand, you have people like me, whose only talent is for weird otaku stuff.

So if you had a state that tried to eliminate such differences in ability by force... Well, it would essentially be repression towards people of exceptional talents, a kind of discrimination all its own.

“I guess if the system worked as advertised, they wouldn’t be coming to me to beef up the father-ruler’s charisma.”

Amatena had told me to create some work that would strengthen the father-ruler’s grip on the people and make the Bahairamanians even more loyal to him.

In other words, propaganda.

Obviously, though, Bahairam didn’t have the equipment to make a movie, so we wouldn’t be able to do the same thing I had done in the Holy Eldant Empire. They were effectively asking me to make up a story that would cause the people to respect the father-ruler unquestioningly.

Considering the state of magic around here, even if a movie wasn’t feasible, it might have been possible to create a shadow play or something. In a world that seemed to have few entertainments, even that might be enough to get a pretty big reaction out of the populace. Think about the Arabian Nights in our world: long before movies or even the printing press, stories had the power to move ruler and subject alike. And there are lots of similar examples.

But if the father-ruler already had a pretty good hold on this country, there was probably no need for those sorts of tales. In order to “reeducate,” or at least further educate, the people, we would need a myth that imputed even more authority to the father-ruler. Or looking at it the other way around, if we failed to tell such a story, resentment against the father-ruler might boil up among the people.

“Hmmm...”

No matter how I looked at it, all I could see was a bald grab for despotic power.

They said the majority of the country’s population were farmers. That made me think of that poster child of evil, Pol Pot. Not that I’m implying there’s a direct comparison between Cambodia under Pol Pot, with all the attendant international circumstances, and the nation of Bahairam. Nor did I think Bahairam was in the process of killing off an entire intelligence operation that had turned against the government.

But anyway, that’s beside my point.

In the end, I resisted the idea that I—or rather, my knowledge and experiences as an otaku—should be used as a tool to control people. Maybe that sounds questionable, coming from someone who had already allowed himself to be an accomplice to cultural invasion once, but I just didn’t think culture should be a political tool. Obviously there was no way to completely separate culture and politics, and I knew that. But still...

“Kanou Shinichi.”

As I sat in thought, there was a knock at the door—the door that led outside. Before I could answer, the door opened, and Amatena came marching in.

“Have you come to any conclusions yet?”

“Conclusions?”

“Clara reports that you appear to have been thinking about something. We decided to give you some time alone.”

“Oh...”

So that was why Clara had disappeared.

That also meant she was keeping an eye on me, after all. Which wasn’t all that surprising, really.

“Have you been able to formulate any ideas for the creation of myths about the father-ruler?”

“..................Myths?”

It wouldn’t do to laugh at that moment, despite the idea that a pack of lies some random otaku came up with might become a genuine legend. Then again, it was surprising how often myths started like this. Told and retold over the course of hundreds or thousands of years, it might dry up, gather dust, and actually become pretty mythic.

Think about how many myths were sexy, and/or involved harems or even supernatural powers. Heck, just set one at a school and you pretty much had a light nov—

You know what? Forget about it.

“Hey, Amatena,” I said.

“What is it?”

“There’s one thing I want to be sure about,” I said, measuring my words. “Exactly what kind of ‘myths’ do you have in mind?”

There was a question in her eyes; it didn’t seem like she had expected me to ask that. She frowned in thought for a moment before replying, “For example, we have a story about the first king of our nation. Our people had no way to resist when an enemy country invaded, but the first king invoked the words ‘Victory be to our people,’ whereupon a whirlwind sprang up and swept away the cruel enemy soldiers.”

“Ahh... I get it.”

So I was right: this was about asserting authority. Coherence wasn’t a big concern. The story didn’t offer a scientific explanation for why the king could do such a thing, and it didn’t matter. “Lord Whoever could do that because he was great and just. Long live Lord Whoever!” That was all the explanation a story like that needed.

But...

“Uh, I just had a thought.”

“What?”

“This country seems to have a lot of... differences. Odd inconsistencies, if you know what I mean. Like the clothes you’re wearing versus everyone else. And the ceremony at that building. I feel like it all lacks a certain unity.”

Amatena only frowned.

“Could it be... and this is just a guess on my part, but... however many generations the current king represents... did things in Bahairam change drastically under him?”

The desolate look of the city.

The simple, plain clothing of the people.

The weirdly traditional-culture-esque buildings.

The wedding ceremony, with its seemingly deep roots in popular custom.

Everything I had seen so far somehow seemed to represent different extremes. Too different.

Did it suggest that the current king, coming after however many of his ancestors, had chosen to take his country in a very different direction? Maybe even do a 180-degree shift in policy?

To take examples from our own world, after the Cultural Revolution, things in China were... well, I won’t say completely different, but very, very different. And changes in the Japanese government after the country’s defeat in World War II, brought about mostly at American insistence, were said to have had a significant effect on the culture.

Amatena was silent for a moment, thinking about something. Then she said bluntly, “So you know?”

“I can guess... More or less.”

So Amatena proceeded to fill me in. This is what she said:

Bahairam was not an especially bountiful country, in the beginning. In fact, the land didn’t yield much, so for the most part people migrated from area to area like birds, chasing scarce water and food. When one place dried up, they would move along to another until the first place naturally regained its abundance. This was the way the people had always lived. The king’s travels from city to city were also, I gathered, a relic of this time.

Starting several kings back, though, there had been a major change in national policy. The long-standing solidarity of the people was what caused them to embrace this new policy, which aimed at a bountiful nation and a strong army. Bahairam attacked neighboring countries, absorbing their territory along with rich water resources, versatile land, and secure sources of food. The population increased.

This all meant that the people of Bahairam no longer had to wander from place to place; they could settle in just one spot, and many did. The abandonment of their nomadic lifestyle further increased the population, and they found themselves with the spare resources to improve the land and do other, similar tasks. Almost before anybody knew what was happening (including Bahairam), the country was almost as big and as strong as the Eldant Empire.

That king from several generations ago was, therefore, revered as a hero in Bahairam.

However, when lifestyle changes, so too does culture. Banding together to make the nation more powerful became the most prized principle in the land, while individual inequalities and grievances were suppressed as “threatening harmony.” Old customs and rituals were quickly abandoned—or rather, cast aside because they were seen as getting in the way.

The result of all this was the Bahairam I saw now.

“You’re really something, Amatena,” I said when she was finished talking.

“Hm?” she said.

“It’s like, you know how sometimes it’s hardest to know your own self? A lot of times people who live somewhere aren’t able to take an objective view of that place. But you seem like you can.”

For one thing, it could be hard to personally get a handle on changes that had happened over such a long period of time. It can be hard to grasp the big picture when you’re in the picture. There were probably a lot of Bahairamanians who didn’t have the knowledge or the comprehension to explain why the country was the way it was.

But to me, Amatena’s voice as she described the history of her nation sounded almost objective. Like a third party talking.

“On account of my work,” Amatena said after a moment, “I often have occasion to travel outside my country.” What I thought might be a wry smile played across her face for a second. “If anything, I frequently see this nation from a place rather unlike one of its subjects. It’s not a good habit. All I can say is that perhaps I’ve been poisoned by the twisted thinking of other countries.”

I didn’t say anything. But I wondered, was that really true? In the end, who was it that was really twisted?

It had been about half a day since we’d emerged from the forest.

We worked our way across a wasteland of sand and rocks until we arrived at a road, then followed it toward the closest town. Once in a while, we might see inhabitants of Bahairam, or sometimes what looked to be traveling merchants coming or going from some other country, but for the most part the road seemed deserted. It was almost hard to believe that it was leading to a town or city.

“I’m almost certain the... the ‘eastern city’ or something is supposed to be this way.” Minori-sama pulled an item out of her bag, something called a ‘sumart fone’ or something. Shinichi-sama had had one, too, although his was a different color.

“According to the Eldant Empire’s information, it’s not the capital, but it’s a pretty big town. Maybe the size of Nagoya or Osaka, in Japanese terms. I’m not exactly sure how likely it is they took Shinichi there, but...”

If there was one word to describe Bahairam, it was big. We assumed they wouldn’t have taken Shinichi-sama to some little farming village, so it made sense to try for a bigger city where there might be a military or government installation. But there were several of those in Bahairam, and strangers like us wouldn’t know much about them.

“What do you think?”

“I... I don’t really know either...”

Despite my eagerness to go and rescue Shinichi-sama all by myself, I didn’t actually have any good way of finding him.

“I figured. I guess we’ve got no choice but to ask a local.” Minori-sama turned to Elvia-san. “Elvia. Where do you think Shinichi-kun is?”

Elvia-san, though, kept silent. She just stared vacantly into the distance, across the street.

She was, incidentally, carrying almost twice as much baggage as either me or Minori-sama, so she was quite a sight to see. It didn’t look so much like she was walking as like the cargo was stumbling along, and she happened to be stuck to it. But the arrangement didn’t seem to tire her out. She looked more... unenthusiastic.

Minori-sama and I shared a glance.

It seemed less like Elvia-san was ignoring us and more like she had something on her mind and wasn’t paying attention. She didn’t look like her usual, bright self; ever since we had arrived in the Kingdom of Bahairam, she had seemed under a cloud.

“Elvia?” Minori-sama got right up close to her.

That seemed to bring her back. She blinked and looked at Minori-sama. “.........Uh, oh, yeah? What is it?”

“We were just discussing where Shinichi-kun might be.”

“Wh-Why’re you asking me?”

“Well, you’re a spy from this country, aren’t you, Elvia?” Minori-sama said with a grin. “I have to figure that whoever you were working for, it was probably special ops from that group that kidnapped Shinichi-kun. I somehow doubt a place at this cultural level has a bunch of competing spy organizations. I’m betting you’ve got a sense of where they would take a hostage. I just wondered if there might be a place like that in this ‘eastern city’ we’re getting to.”

After a very long pause, Elvia-san answered, “I... I don’t really know.” Then she looked away from Minori-sama and went quiet again. She didn’t look very happy. Was I right? Was it because she didn’t want to betray her home country by helping us? I had to say, I could sympathize with that feeling.

“Me,” she whispered, “I’m not... I’m not like my big sisters Jiji and Ama. I’m not as... good as them.”

Jiji? Ama? She called them her sisters. They must have been part of her family.

“I’m always just the gofer.”

Maybe she was trying to explain that because she wasn’t “good,” she’d had to accept the lowest assignment: spy.

“So I really don’t think you’re gonna find I’m much help...” She looked sadly at Minori-sama, who let out a breath that suggested how much all of this disturbed her.

“Um, Elvia-san,” I said. There was something I wanted to know, and know now. “Do you love Shinichi-sama?”

“Huh? Come again?!” She sounded shocked. Maybe she hadn’t expected the question to come from me.

I ignored her and went on, “Or do you hate him?”

“Th-That’s not—” She waved her hands frantically and shook her head. “I mean, I sure don’t! How could I?! I owe my life to Shinichi-sama! And he lets me do my drawings, and has me draw all these interesting things, and—”

There she paused and looked at the ground for a moment.

“A-And... he said he was ‘moe’ for me, y’see...” She was practically whispering. “My ears and my tail... He said they didn’t bother him.”

This word Shinichi-sama used, moe. It generally meant “cute” or “lovable”—and those were not things that human men usually said about demi-humans. Everyone—not just in the Holy Eldant Empire, but everyone everywhere—knew that humans were the most beautiful and the most desirable, and demi-humans would never be on their level.

That was why Shinichi-sama’s words were so surprising. Not just to Elvia-san, but to me.

“I feel the same,” I said, putting a hand to my chest. “I’m a half-elf and a maid, but Shinichi-sama never let there be a distance between us. He acted toward me just like he acted toward everyone. He even taught me how to read and write Ja-panese. He took my side when Her Majesty was angry at me. And he’s so kind to Brooke-san and Cerise-san as well...”

I was very happy, and very proud, to be with such a man. Since meeting Shinichi-sama, my way of life—indeed, my very life itself—had changed. If I had never met him, I would have gone along hating myself for what I was, cursing my mother and father for bringing me into the world. It would have been a sad way to live.

“It has to be Shinichi-sama. No one else,” I said, my hand clenching in front of my chest. “If I can’t be at Shinichi-sama’s side, that will be it for me.”

“Myusel...” Elvia-san was looking at me, taken aback.

“I’m going to help Shinichi-sama, no matter what it takes. No matter what I have to do. I know what we’re asking of you isn’t fair. I know it’s like betraying your country, and I don’t blame you for not wanting to do that. But for me, asking you to do this unfair, impossible thing... Right now, it’s my only choice.”

Elvia-san looked awfully distraught, but she didn’t say a word.

It was Minori-sama who spoke instead. “I want to help Shinichi-kun, too. Partly, it’s true that I do bear some of the responsibility for his disappearance. But even if I didn’t, I’d like to think I still would have come here to save him.”

“Minori-sama...”

“The first time we met, I wasn’t sure we were going to survive each other,” she said with a grin. “He was immediately all about my chest. It was... kinda harassment-y. But I’ve gotten fond of him, and I don’t just mean because it’s my job to look after him. I know how he can come across, but he’s actually got a strong heart. He’s an otaku, but a surprisingly together one.”

Minori-sama glanced up at the far-away sky for a second as she said, “Kindness alone doesn’t do that for a person. They have to do it for themselves.”

I was dumbfounded.

Shinichi-sama said that Minori-sama was an “otaku,” too. Unlike me, she had been born and raised in the same world as him, spoke the same language, and was also an otaku. So maybe she could see things about him that I couldn’t see.

To be perfectly honest, the thought made me a little envious. Jealous.

“I do feel bad for threatening you into coming along. Let me ask you again. Elvia, if you don’t hate Shinichi-kun, like you say, then help us to help him. If we end up having to fight other Bahairamanians, then Myusel and I will stand and you can run away. But please at least stick with us until we find Shinichi-kun.”

Elvia-san stared silently at the ground for a while. Her tail drooped weakly.

“You’re a cheater,” she said softly. “That’s not a fair way of asking...”

Her head hung for a few minutes. Then suddenly—

“Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhh! Hell!”

She turned toward the sky and nearly howled.

“Fine! I’ve come too far to turn back, anyway. Might as well do everything I can where I am!” Her tail sprang up again. It was that tail, more than her words or even her face, that spoke to her true feelings. Maybe she had finally resolved herself.

“When I said I don’t know where they took Shinichi-sama, that was the truth. Garden-variety spies like me aren’t in the loop on what the brass is doing. But I think I know someone who might know what happened to him.”

“Oh?” Minori-sama said, leaning forward.

Elvia-san nodded. “It’s a bit of a walk, but just follow me!”

“Huh? W-Wait, where are we—?”

“Hey! Hold on, Elvia!”

Elvia-san set off so quickly it was as if she didn’t even notice the bags she was carrying. Minori-sama and I hurried to catch up.

You can pick your words as carefully as you like, control your expression as carefully as you’re able. But sometimes—sometimes, you still can’t keep your true feelings from showing through.

It was just sort of an intuition, but I somehow got the sense that Amatena didn’t actually believe that things in Bahairam were fine the way they were. When she talked to me about the country’s past and present, I could sometimes detect a hint of hesitation.

But Amatena belonged to the Bahairamanian military. And not as a “farmer-militiaman,” but a proper professional soldier. She had an official position to consider, and that meant keeping her mouth shut even if things didn’t quite feel right to her, or if she had some sort of issue. All the more so if the country was in transition like this one was—any kind of mutterings then could be considered rebellion or treason.

And so...

“Anyway,” Amatena said, “I think that should give you a general understanding of our country. I want you to finish your job as quickly as possible, you piece of filth.”

I didn’t have much to say to that.

My job.

In other words, produce some kind of work that would increase solidarity among the people and make them ever more loyal to the king. Think of a myth that would praise the King of Bahairam to the high heavens. It didn’t have to be plausible. It didn’t even have to be coherent. It just had to do the job.

I sat in silence. I didn’t like this any better now than I had earlier.

Even setting aside my insistence on individualism, helping to create an obviously flawed story went against my dignity as an otaku. There was only one thing to do.

“I’m sorry,” I said. I couldn’t even meet Amatena’s eyes; I looked at the ground instead. “I don’t want to do it.”

Yes! I said it!

I was a little embarrassed by the tremor in my voice, but I had managed a clear and direct refusal. Yes, this was a real sign of how much Kanou Shinichi had grown. I’d become “The Kanou Shinichi Who Can Say NO”!

And Amatena? She simply nodded.

“I see.”

Huh?

“In that case, there’s nothing to be done.”

“What...?”

I was thrown off by how... ready she seemed to be for this.

I had been set for a fight, and now I felt foolish. Maybe Bahairam was a more generous place than it looked. Maybe if you just explained things logically, they were willing to accept them. But then... why would a country like that engage in kidnapping?

I was mulling over all this when Amatena said, “You have a choice to make.”

She was expressionless. Well, she was usually expressionless, but somehow it was scarier than usual.

“Help with the myth,” she said. “Or refuse, and kill Clara.”

“...............Huh?”

For a second, I was totally lost as to what she was saying. Clara? How did she fit into this?

“What are you—”

“If your disgusting self will not do as you’re told, we will have no choice but to find alternative means of persuasion.”

“No, wait, hold on. I mean, what’s Clara got to do with anything? Let alone killing her?”

Amatena’s expression (or lack of one) didn’t change. I had thought Clara was absent to give me some time to think. But maybe she was being held somewhere as a hostage.

But again: why her? I guess obviously I would feel guilty if someone were killed on my account. But the whole point of a hostage is to threaten someone your target feels close to.

Sure, living together for ten days had caused me to feel a certain affection for her. But Clara was Bahairamanian. I was closer to the Eldant Empire, so if anything, she was effectively my enemy.

So here was Amatena, threatening to kill Clara. But from my perspective, it was basically an enemy soldier with a knife to the neck of her own comrade. It just seemed sort of... pointless. Why was she telling me this?

“Look, I just don’t understand...”

“Are you telling me you can simply ignore the death of a woman to whom you’ve made love?”

“...Huh?”

“...Hm?”

The two of us shared a profoundly odd moment.

“Still not getting it.”

“I’m asking, will you abandon someone with whom you’ve had relations?”

“Do all beast people use that word so casually?!” I exclaimed.

Wait! Not the time for a vocabulary lesson!

“R-Relations? Listen, we... We haven’t, you know... had relations.”

“What?” Amatena asked, shocked. Well, her expression (or lack of one) still didn’t change, but that made the disturbed raising of her eyebrow all the more expressive. “You haven’t? After ten days living with her, you haven’t had relations? Not even once?”

“For the love of God, what is it with you guys and your relations?!”

Hearing that word so many times from so many girls was going to shatter all my dreams! She could at least find a nice euphemism. To do it or to do that or something. Or maybe she could blush a little as she said it—that was an important point! Very important, in my opinion! That’s Kanou Shinichi’s argument!

......Okay, sorry, forget about it.

“Whatever word you use, no, we haven’t done it!”

“No relations at all...?” Amatena said. There went the eyebrow again.

“Nope.”

“Are you not... interested in women?”

“Wrong-o!”

“Don’t tell me some illness prevents you from achieve an erec—”

“Working fine, thanks!”

I’m begging you! Stop! I don’t want to hear words like that from someone with Elvia’s face!

Even though her absolute coolness makes her, like, way totally different from Elvia, and.................................... huh?

Maybe this is actually okay?

As my mind started to wander off in the most perverse of directions, Amatena brought the eyebrow up one more time, this time in annoyance.

“Then why?”

Why? She wanted to know why?

Well, then I would tell her.

I would speak my truth.

“Yes! Lolita!” I cried, holding my right arm at an angle as if to say Na** science is the best in the woooooooorlllld! “NOOOOO TOUCH!”

Phew. I did it.

That was perfect. Flawless.

I looked at Amatena with a relieved smile, but she looked back at me with deep suspicion and no sign of being convinced.

Um...

“Did Clara not invite you?” Her tone was ice-cold.

So this was how it felt to put your heart and soul into something and have it fall flat. I was not liking it.

“U-Uh, well, yes...”

She had definitely “invited” me, but... well, you don’t look a honey badger... I mean, a honey trap in the eye and say yes.

You know what I mean by honey trap, right? I read somewhere once that there are basically two tricks that have been used everywhere throughout human history to cause the betrayal of groups and countries: money and women.

So a spy organization sends a beautiful female agent to some man to pillow-talk him out of crucial information he has. Or maybe they send a handsome guy to the wife of someone in a high position, then kidnap her and get the information that way. This stuff really happens. Although I don’t know if it’s a good idea, given how often it ends up in gunfights... at least in Hollywood movies.

And that was what had happened here: Amatena thought she had set a trap for me in the form of Clara. She assumed that over the course of ten days together, we would naturally end up in a certain sort of relationship, and she was trying to threaten me on that basis. She probably should have checked with Clara on that. But then, maybe Clara really believed I had some disease that would kill me if I got intimate with a girl, and was under the impression that she had gotten “close” to me with all the other ways she had found to help me.

“Clara was a plant. You wanted her close to me so that I would do what you said.”

“She’s my subordinate. I knew I could trust her.”

“I should have figured.” I heaved a sigh.

I hadn’t laid a finger on Clara, but I admit it had made me sort of happy the way she tried so hard to do things for me. Finding out definitively that that was just another part of the trap was a little disappointing. Of course, Clara’s tail had already given away that she was a lot closer to Amatena than she was to me.

“But why Clara?”

“What do you mean, why?”

“It’s just... You know. She’s so... young.”

Wouldn’t you normally pick a luscious older woman to try to seduce someone? Of course, I did have a major soft spot for those sort of did-they-have-a-chest-or-didn’t-they lolita types.

“Is that not the type you prefer?”

“Me? Uh, well, y’know...”

“I’d heard you were one of the concubines of the Eldant Empress.”

“Excuse me?”

“The Eldant Empress, Petralka. Are you not her lover?”

“One of her—whaaaat?!”

We were pretty good friends, sure! But definitely, definitely not anything that sounded so, you know... So sordid! Even though yes, I did kind of dig her!

“I’m telling you, that’s not the way it is between us.”

“Oh no? I suppose some spies give better information than others.”

I guess so, when you consider someone like Elvia a spy. Anyway, rumors and hearsay are bound to get mixed up in whatever an intelligence agent reports.

“So you’re with some intelligence agency, right, Amatena? Trying to find out what’s going on in enemy countries and all? Can I assume Clara is part of the same group?”

“You can,” Amatena said, though she seemed to wonder why I was asking about this now.

“Well, look, I know it’s her job, but sending kids like Clara to have r... relations? With people they don’t even care about? I don’t think that’s a good thing.”

“In the prosecution of one’s duty there is neither good nor bad,” Amatena said.

We were talking about a country where having your partner for life picked out by the “father-ruler” was considered perfectly normal, so maybe I shouldn’t be surprised if they had different ideas about chastity, too. One thing was for sure, though: I didn’t think I was ever going to quite feel at home in Bahairam.

“Anyway.” I decided to push my advantage. “Clara’s useless as leverage. We haven’t done anything together, so I don’t have any special feelings for her. Threaten to kill her—I don’t care. You guys can do what you like. If you don’t think I’m telling the truth, just ask her.”

On one level, these words sounded impossibly cruel; my better nature made my heart ache as I spoke them. But at the same time, if I hesitated now, there was no question: I would be made head of the Father-Ruler Promotion Bureau, over my objections.

Just stay cool. I have to pretend my conscience isn’t my guide, here.

When they realized Clara served no purpose as a hostage, they would see there was no need to kill her, right?

That, at least, was what I was telling myself as Amatena remained eerily silent.

She was obviously thinking hard, her brow furrowing deeply. Finally she said, “I see,” and nodded.

Oh! So she sees!

Maybe I could even capitalize on this momentum to negotiate my release, or—

“You leave me no choice, then. This is the one thing I didn’t want to do, but...”

“Uh...?”

She was practically expressionless. I reflexively took a step back, but found a wall immediately behind me.

Elvia had already proved that I was powerless against a werewolf girl on a mission—although I assumed Amatena had something other than seduction in mind at this point.

“This is the one thing I didn’t want to do...”

What could she possibly describe like that?

“Um... Uh... Amatena...-san?”

But of course, she didn’t answer.

I could only watch helplessly as she got closer and closer. I felt things spiraling out of control in the worst way possible.

Amatena brought me to a grey building on the edge of town.

The building stood smack in the middle of a forest, as if hiding from prying eyes. It was immense, probably bigger than some castles. Certainly several times the size of the hall where I had seen the mass wedding.

I noticed something else, too: the walls had gentle undulations to them. From above, maybe the place looked like a domed baseball stadium or horse racing track.

The one thing I didn’t understand was what on earth it was for.

There were what seemed to be guards by the entrance, so this was probably some sort of military installation. But other than the people posted by the door, I didn’t see anyone who looked like a soldier anywhere. Don’t most military installations have, like, attached training grounds, and aren’t they usually crawling with soldiers?

“Where are we?” I asked. “What is this place?” But Amatena, who was walking a little ahead of me, gave no answer. She didn’t even look back. Maybe she was angry?

If she wasn’t even going to look in my direction, I briefly considered taking advantage of the fact to run away, but I soon gave up on the idea. I suspected Amatena was a much faster runner than I was, and even if I managed to get a head start without being noticed, there were soldiers right there at the door.

And so my only choice was to follow Amatena obediently.

The hallway inside was dim and totally spartan. The walls and floor were all made of either stone or brick, with no decorations anywhere. The sturdy but bleak appearance of the place suggested a prison. Were they just going to throw me in jail for not listening to them? Was I going to go from a cute little one-story flat with a cute little roommate to a prison cell? I guess that’s what happens when you defy the state in a dictatorship...

“Are you planning to put me in prison?” I asked, but Amatena, of course, didn’t answer.

She did, however, glance back at me over her shoulder, never slackening her pace.

“Huh? Wh—Wha?”

Was I seeing things? Or was that pity in the look she gave me?

So... not jail? Did they have something even worse in mind?

Surely not... execution?!

Guillotine. Hanging. Firing squad. Well, this world didn’t have guns, so probably not firing squad. Boiling alive, maybe. Buried up to my neck in the ground, after which they would saw off my head. Tied to a team of horses that would tear me apart—I’d read about that somewhere, hadn’t I? No, no, no, stop.

I reviled my own imagination, which kept conjuring the worst possible fates for me.

As all these visions swirled in my brain, we went down a flight of stairs, and then down another hallway, until...

“Now, look,” Amatena said, coming to a stop.

We were at a balcony—or rather, sort of a catwalk, which jutted out from the wall two stories up. Below was a five-meter drop... down to a massive round pit that had to be at least fifty meters in diameter.

This, too, was made of stone—or maybe, like Eldant Castle, it had been hollowed out from a giant piece of rock, because just like that building, I saw no seams anywhere. Here and there I saw steel tablets engraved with lettering that looked a lot like the characters on my magic ring. They were some kind of magic device, but what?

No—the details didn’t matter here. What was really important was the thing sitting in the middle of the pit.

No again—not thing. That was...

“A puppet drake...!”

It was a dragon with a magical spike driven into its forehead, just like the one we had seen on the set of our movie not so long ago. It seemed to be unconscious or something, because it was lying placidly on the floor, not so much as twitching. The gentle rising and falling of its back, though, made it obvious that the dragon wasn’t dead. It was breathing. It was alive.

“So you recognize it,” Amatena said.

“Er... Yeah. There was one that got into Eldant a while ago...”

Garius had speculated that maybe it was some new magical weapon Bahairam had developed, and it looked like he was right.

“This is where our military does its research,” Amatena said. “And what we’ve chiefly been researching lately is puppetry technology.”

“So you can control dragons with spikes like that?”

“Not just dragons,” she replied. “Dragons are quasi-sprite beings, so magic has a minimal effect on them. That’s what necessitates such a large control device. The technology isn’t perfect yet, but its practicality has been amply demonstrated. A less massive life form might require only a spike small enough to hold in the palm of the hand.”

“A less massive life form...”

I didn’t like where this was going.

Pretty much any life form would be “less massive” compared to that dragon. Say, for example...

“A human,” Amatena said.

“Wait... Y-You can’t mean...” My eyes went wide. “You’d put a spike like that in a human’s head?”

“Indeed. As we will in yours.”

That caught me completely off guard; I could only swallow heavily.

Okay, maybe not completely off guard. I might have had an inkling. After all, it only made sense that technology like this would get smaller and smaller, until the point when it could be used on a person—and then it would practically be a cliché to use it on the protagonist’s friends or family and turn them into his enemies and oh no, what is he going to do?!

Right. Maybe not the time to be worrying about tropes.

“Wh-What the hell?! No way, quit it!”

“This decision comes from my superiors.”

“Superiors?! I thought everyone lower than the father-ruler was supposed to be equal!”

Calm down, self! This wasn’t the moment for smart remarks.

But calming down was a lot easier said than done.

“You’ve brought this on your own disgusting self by refusing to accede to our demands,” Amatena said. “But I couldn’t bring myself to make you a puppet while you were ignorant. I brought you here so you would understand.”

“I think your kindness is little misplaced!” I shot back, but Amatena’s expression still didn’t shift.

Argh... I didn’t know how big a spike for human use was, but if they were going to be pounding it into my head, I figured any size was too big. Presumably, being made a puppet meant I wouldn’t be able to move my own body anymore, but what would happen to my consciousness? Would I disappear while they controlled me like a machine, or a zombie?

Heck, that pretty much meant I was going to die!

............

............Hey.

Hang on a second.

“If—If you spike me, how can I make your story or myth or whatever? My consciousness is going to disappear, right? A doll can’t come up with a story!”

“I’m afraid that’s no longer the issue,” Amatena said. “We’ve given up on that.”

“What, already?!”

“However, we did invest a certain amount of time and resources in bringing you here. We can’t simply write that off. We need some kind of return on our investment.”

“B-But I—”

“From what I hear,” Amatena said, narrowing her eyes at me, “you come from another world. You got to Eldant through some sort of ‘hole.’”

“.........Uh, well...”

So what?!

Wait, hold on. Did Bahairam even know about that?!

I guess it wasn’t exactly top-secret information, but still...

“Consider this a test of whether our puppetry magic is effective on offworlders. It will be good to know in the long run. Because after we conquer the Eldant Empire, Kanou Shinichi, I have to assume that our next target will be through that portal.”

“Wha—?!”

They had territorial ambitions that would have made Toyotomi Hideyoshi blush!

As I stood there in shock, two soldiers came up beside me and took my arms.

“Take him away.”

“Ma’am!”

The soldiers began to drag me off.

Whoa, wait! You’re gonna do it right now?!

“Take him to Solitary Seven in the second tower. Kanou Shinichi, when a date is set for your conversion, I’ll let you know. Until then, make yourself ready.”

“Oh, so, not right now. Phew. That’s a relief. ...Wait, no it’s not!” I flailed about as best I could, given that my arms were pinned. “I give, I’ll do it! I’ll write your story or your myth or your epic poem or whatever you want!”

I wasn’t proud of myself, but sometimes life doesn’t leave you with any choices. I was just desperate not to die. And also not to have a magical spike pounded into my skull that would turn me into an unconscious doll, which was as good as dying.

Amatena glanced at me as I struggled. Had my pathetic begging worked?

“What has been decided cannot be revoked.”

“Oh, shi—!”

I tried to resist with all my might, but all the might of a former home security guard isn’t much compared to two professional soldiers. I kicked my legs like a tantruming child as the soldiers marched me down the hallway.

As she watched me go, I heard Amatena murmur, “I wanted to avoid this outcome.”

“Well, you still can! Do something!”

But she only looked at the ground.

Dammit, why did she have to be so quick to give up on everything?!

“Nooo! I don’t want any surgery! Just five minutes with a laser scalpel! Actually, that would be pretty awful, too!”

I had stopped making sense even to myself. For some reason, “Dona Dona” started running unbidden through my mind as the soldiers dragged me helplessly down the long corridor.

Elvia-san led us to a place called Borfoi, the “eastern city.” We arrived about when sunset was turning everything red.

In the Holy Eldant Empire, the streets would be busy this time of day with people coming back from their jobs and merchants trying to make one last sale for the day. Smoke and friendly aromas would be billowing from the stoves of all the houses where people were making dinner.

But in Borfoi, none of that was happening.

Yes, we saw people, and we did smell dinner cooking. But it was all... almost frighteningly homogenous. The people all wore identical clothes and walked in straight, silent lines, going back to houses that all looked the same. Smoke rose from every house, but instead of all the different smells of different dishes mingling together, a single simple, spicy aroma prickled our noses, as if every house was making the exact same meal.

There was no question the city was attractive and orderly. But it was... a little too orderly.

And...

“So,” Minori-sama said.

Elvia-san was guiding us through a series of back streets where we wouldn’t have to worry who might see us. She said she had lived in Borfoi for a while and knew the place pretty well.

“You think this is the city, Elvia?”

“Yeah,” she nodded. “The younger of my older sisters lives here. She’s with the military, and she’s doing pretty well for her age. I bet she might know something about Shinichi-sama.”

“The older sister is a soldier, and the younger a spy,” Minori-sama said. “Is your whole family military?”

“Well, yeah, kind of.” Elvia-san scratched her cheek as if embarrassed. “My father and mother are both soldiers, too. And my sisters. Pretty important ones. I’m... kind of the only one who hasn’t made anything of herself.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m just not that interested in fame or martial arts or anything. If I can draw my pictures, then I’m happy.”

But, it seemed, artistic pursuits were deemed to have no practical value in Bahairam, and therefore to be worthless.

“No matter how good I get at my art,” Elvia-san said, “it won’t feed me or my family.”

It was understandable, then, that she might feel ill at ease in a military household.

“Is that why you became a spy, Elvia?” Minori-sama asked.

“Yeah, pretty much.”

Spying would allow her to draw as part of her work. And it would keep her from being compared to her siblings or her parents. And so...

“Oh! There it is,” Elvia-san said, coming to a stop and pointing at a particular house. Even with her pointing, I couldn’t tell it apart from all the other houses.

“Looks like she just got back,” Elvia-san said.

True, if I squinted, I could make out some lights through the window, and what appeared to be a person moving around inside.

“I’ll go have a chat with her.”

“Hold on, Elvia,” Minori-sama said. She produced some kind of small stick from her bag. “Take this. Attach it to yourself like this.” As she spoke, she stuck the stick to Elvia-san’s chest.

“Whazzis?”

“Just a little magic item for you. There, all set.” She gave Elvia-san a pat on the chest. “Good luck!”

“Sure. You two just wait here where no one can see you.”

Then, leaving her baggage with us, she set off toward her older sister’s house. I wondered if she would be able to find out from her where Shinichi-sama was. For that matter, I wondered if her older sister even knew.

I heaved an anxious sigh.

“Myusel,” Minori-sama said. She had something in her hand—her sumart fone. She was running her finger across its surface. “Perfect. Got it.” She nodded to herself.

“What’s this...?”

“That fown-ten-pen-shaped thing I stuck on Elvia’s chest is sending us video over the ayr wayves, so... Er, I guess this isn’t making any sense to you. The point is, it’s magic that lets us see what’s happening inside.” Then she showed me the fone.

It was showing “video,” a sort of moving image much like what we could see on the tell-evision and compyuuter at school. Elvia-san was just meeting her sister. We saw a girl with white hair.

“Wow,” Minori-sama whistled. She must have been surprised. I know I was.

On the sumart fone was someone who looked exactly like Elvia-san. The only difference was, her hair was as white as an elderly person’s. That simple contrast made her look like a completely different person—but her face was identical to Elvia-san’s.

It felt very strange.

“Sorry, Myusel,” Minori-sama said. “My magic ring won’t work like this. Think you could interpret?”

“Oh, yes.”

The rings could only communicate meaning when two people were speaking face-to-face. Because everything was being sent over the fone, Minori-sama could no longer understand what Elvia-san was saying.

“I ask you, Elvia. What is the meaning and reason for your coming here?”

“Umm...”

In my mind, I struggled to make sense of what I was hearing. Bahairam’s language was basically the same as that of Eldant, or at least, it sprang from the same source. But their accent was extremely heavy, and the conjugation rules were different. Combined with some unusual ways of speaking, I found I couldn’t translate it into neat Eldant. It was all I could do just keep track of what everything meant, and it all came out sounding oddly stiff.

“Your end of mission time is not yet, I understand. Why, why?”

“Agree, agree. But, but, I...”

Elvia-san sounded a little overwhelmed. Her “mission” must have been her spying. She floundered a little longer before saying:

“I hesitate. Big Sister Ama...” She seemed to collect her resolve, then said, “I ask you. Kanou Shinichi. You know this name, yes, no?”

Even I understood this much. She was asking very directly.

But her sister didn’t respond. Her face, which seemed largely expressionless, twisted into a look of anger. By which I mean she furrowed an eyebrow.

“Why? I shall ask, why do you know the name of Kanou Shinichi?”

The image shook. It must have been Elvia-san wincing with shock.

“Big Sister Ama—I shall ask, do you have some connection to Shinichi-sama?”

Elvia-san’s sister appeared to get bigger until all we could see was her chest. Elvia-san must have gone closer to her. We couldn’t see “Ama’s” face, but we could still hear her.

“I shall ask,” Elvia-san said. “Big Sister Ama, you know where Shinichi-sama is, yes, no?”

“‘Shinichi-sama’?” Her sister’s tone changed to one of suspicion. “I shall ask, of what kind is the connection between you and Kanou Shinichi?”

“I o-owe my... my life to him, probably.”

“Your life?”

“My status, that I am a spy, was exposed. But Shinichi-sama, he, he protected me!”

“You...” Her sister’s eyes narrowed. “It can’t be.”

“I shall ask. Big Sister Ama, are you connected to Shinichi-sama’s kidnapping?”

“If I am, you will do what? I ask.”

“I will seek, Shinichi-sama’s return! Back to us!”

“‘Return.’ ‘Shinichi-sama.’ ‘Us.’” Her sister spoke softly, one eyebrow raised.

“Big Sister Ama, I seek. Shinichi-sama, he—”

“Unfathomable!” her sister shouted. “You underachieving good-for-nothing! You shame the Harneiman household, also the entire family of Bahairam! You fail to complete your mission, and become instead the kept dog of an enemy nation! Such failure is difficult to forgive!”

She sounded immensely angry. I found myself shrinking back, even though there was a sumart fone between me and her.

“I refuse this is betrayal. I, I, seek only Shinichi-sama’s rescue—”

“I would call that betrayal! Do you turn against the father-ruler?!”

“I...”

Elvia-san’s voice grew pinched.

“A fool and a fool is what you are! Examine your own words! What you absorbed in Eldant I do not know, but—”

Suddenly, Big Sister had a sword out.

She had drawn it so fast I hadn’t even seen her move. I doubted Minori-sama had, either. It was as if we heard it after it happened.

“I cannot endure to have this living stain upon us any longer! Judgment upon you I shall execute myself!”

I assumed the tip of the sword was at Elvia-san’s neck. A careless movement could cut her throat.

But Elvia-san shook as if she were trying to hold something back, then shouted, “Shinichi-sama! To him I owe my life! He has accepted me! Is it wrong to repay this debt?”

At the other end of the outstretched sword, her sister appeared surprised. The two siblings glared at each other, a painful silence descending between them.

Finally, to my surprise, it was Elvia-san’s sister who looked away, sighing wearily. She returned her sword to its scabbard.

Then she said, “You are already too late.”

“What...?”

“It has already been decided of Kanou Shinichi, he shall be subjected to the puppet spike.”

“Puppet spike...?”

I immediately thought of the dragon that had attacked our movie set. Shinichi-sama and Minori-sama had called it a “puppet drake.” They had said it might be some new magical weapon Bahairam had developed.

Were they going to put a spike in Shinichi-sama’s head just like they had with that dragon? The very thought made me queasy with fear.

“It is a magical nail that when inserted into the head of a living being makes them a puppet.”

“Big Sister Ama! You would do such a thing to Shinichi-sama? Why, why?”

“For he does not listen to or accept our demands,” Elvia-san’s sister said flatly. “Abilities such as his are not to be found in our nation. Our spies in Eldant report that his talents are quite valuable. They shall be useful in increasing the loyalty of the children to the father-ruler.”

Elvia-san didn’t speak.

“But that vile creature has refused us. It demanded time and money to bring him here, and we shall not be left empty-handed. We seek only practical benefit. Thus, he shall serve as a test subject for a human-sized spike...”

“Refuse! Stop! Absolutely—absolutely! Shinichi-sama saved my life! Big Sister Ama, will you take revenge on the one who saved your younger sister?”

“Silence, betrayer.” Her sister’s eyes narrowed again. “Or have you had relations with Kanou Shinichi?”

“I—”

Even I could tell Elvia-san was thrown off by this.

“I hear that in Eldant, the partner for relations is highly valued. You time as a spy too long, have you been poisoned by Eldant customs? Fool! Idiot! To be so attached to the partner of your relations that you would turn against the father-ruler—against the family of Bahairam! Fool of fools!”

“Family? What family?”

Elvia-san’s voice had taken on a dark cast. Bitter, almost hateful. Aggressive. It was the first time I had ever heard the normally cheerful girl sound that way, and it shook me.

“Are you and I family, Big Sister Ama, yes, no?! We are sisters by blood, born of the same parents! But a good-for-nothing is not part of the family?”

“It was you who first sought to betray—who first sought to be out from this family of Bahairam...”

“It was you who first abandoned me!”

For the first time, her sister seemed lost for words.

“Shinichi-sama accepted me, this I shall never forget! Without blood connection, without community or family, though I was of another race! He accepted and recognized me for who I was, and I shall not forget! My heart, my body, my very self, he—”

Elvia-san’s sister still didn’t respond.

“Ask me now who my family is, and I shall answer: it is not Bahairam, nor you, Big Sister Ama. It is Shinichi-sama and his household, Myusel, Minori-sama, Brooke, Cerise! All those who have accepted me!”

Her sister’s face twisted in what seemed like pain, perhaps even regret.

“I—”

“Begone,” her sister spat.

“I—”

“Begone, I order you!” There was a slam! as she punched the wall. “Gone! You good-for-nothing! You traitor! Very now I deny your words. You are not my sister nor my family! You are my enemy!”

There was a very long, tense pause from Elvia-san. “Well understood, but, Shinichi-sama’s location—”

“Out! Even at this moment! And twisted once-sister, once-family, I shall show you a final act of mercy. That I do not cut you down here with my blade, consider to be my final act of mercy!”

“Big Sister Ama...!”

“You worthless stain on the name of Harneiman! I do not stoop even to kill you so that you leave here a corpse! Run to your Eldant Empire, run to the edge of the world! Run like the shame you are!”

Elvia-san’s sister appeared to get smaller—Elvia-san must have backed away. It was just a step, and yet to me it looked like an unbridgeable gulf between them.

“Now begone!”

The sister’s form disappeared from the top of Minori-sama’s sumart fone. Elvia-san must have turned around. We could see the image on the fone shaking violently...

“Well, that could have gone better,” Minori-sama muttered.

The next thing we saw was Elvia-san emerging from her sister’s house at a dead run.

Day two of my imprisonment.

They were keeping me in a stereotypical jail: stone floor, walls, and ceiling, and a door of iron bars. The cell was a surprisingly roomy ten mats, but maybe that only made sense. This was a facility for developing their puppet magic. It didn’t actually have “solitary” cells. What it had was cages for observing the animals they were testing on—it wasn’t designed with humans in mind. The space had to be big enough to house a large test subject.

Close inspection revealed several round openings close to the floor, each roughly the size of a fist, through which dirt could exit. When the floor of the cage started to get covered in excrement, they could just flush the whole thing out with water.

The only illumination came from a single lamp on the far side of the door; the place was dim. The only furniture in my room was a wooden chest apparently intended to serve as an impromptu bed. Well, there was one other thing—a bucket-sized cylinder against the back wall.

“Now what do I do?” I sighed, sitting on the bed.

I had initially worried that imprisonment might mean being put in manacles or restraints, but it seemed I was free to move about my cell.

“A jailbreak... is easier said than done, I guess.”

I had learned two spells from Myusel, so I wasn’t completely defenseless even though I was unarmed. But the wind spell Tifu Murottsu, the only offensive magic I knew, couldn’t be used several times in quick succession—or at least, a beginner like me wasn’t capable of it. Plus, there was no telling what might happen if I used it in a confined space like this. It certainly wouldn’t have any effect on the bars of the door, and if it bounced off the hard stone walls I could end up hit by my own magic. And how stupid would that be?

There was something else, though. If I squinted and ran my fingers along the wall beside my bed, I could make out tiny depressions and bumps in the surface. It obviously wasn’t just decoration, and it felt vaguely like the characters inscribed in my magic ring. Chances were good that the wall itself was enchanted.

I recalled Petralka saying she had magic-resisting spells on her own body, so maybe Bahairam could do the same sort of thing. Something to neutralize magic seemed especially important when you were working with creatures like dragons, which could absorb magical power and control fire sprites.

Long story short, any plan to break out of this jail using Tifu Murottsu was over before it began.

In movies, people have all kinds of ways out of prison: faking illness, hiding behind walls, ambushing the guard who brings their food. As for me, I didn’t know the layout of the building, so even if I managed to get out of my cell, I would have no idea how to actually escape.

No, stop. Negative thinking makes even the possible look impossible. And when the alternative is just sitting around until you get a spike stuck in your head, turning you into a living corpse, even a doomed plan is worth a shot.

“What the heck is this, anyway?”

I would have to use every single thing at my disposal. With that in mind, I went over to the only other object in the room besides my bed: the cylindrical bucket. It appeared to be ceramic. And yes, it was about the size of a bucket, with two handles. It had a lid on top.

Wondering what it was, I pulled the lid open... and my nose was immediately assaulted by a disgusting stench.

I squeezed one eye shut as I looked inside, but it was empty. That must mean the smell had soaked into the material of the container...

“Wait... Is this a chamber pot?!”

This was supposed to be my toilet?!

I quickly slammed the lid back down, sighing at how pathetic the whole thing was. At that moment...

“Shinichi.”

I heard someone call my name through the bars. I didn’t have to look to know who it was. There were only two people in this country who knew my name: Clara and Amatena. If they didn’t use -sama, then it had to be Amatena............ But wait. Didn’t she usually call me by my full name?

“I want to talk to— No. Let me start over.”

Amatena was on the other side of the bars. She looked away, unable to meet my eyes.

“Huh?” What was the story with that?

In my failure to understand, I briefly dropped my gaze to the ground, where I saw the chamber pot.

“Wh-Whoa, wait! It’s not like that! I wasn’t trying to... to do my business or anything!”

I jumped as far away from the chamber pot as I could. Amatena still wasn’t looking at me. Why was it that she could talk about “relations” with a completely straight face, but was embarrassed to walk in on someone answering nature’s call? Not that I was eager to be seen like that or anything.

“I was just like, I’ve never seen one of these before, I wonder what it is? So I...”

“I see.” She turned toward me again, the misunderstanding resolved. Standing there on the other side of the bars, Amatena looked... tired, somehow.

Her expression was as flat as ever, though, so maybe I was just imagining things.

“There’s something I want to ask you, filth.” She leaned back against the wall and crossed her arms.

“Ask? Me?”

Insofar as she was granting me a stay of execution (by which I mean she hadn’t come to tell me they had set a date for my surgery), I was little relieved. Of course, she could always lead me away to have the procedure done the moment we were finished talking...

“Do you know Elvia?”

“......Huh?” Of all the possible topics I thought she might conceivably raise, this was not the one I expected. “Why bring her up now?”

“You don’t want to talk about her?”

“I don’t mind, it’s just...”

What was it she was really trying to ask? Maybe they really were sisters, and she was trying to find out how Elvia was doing at her spying job. (Sadly the answer was, pretty poorly.)

“She is the youngest of us sisters,” Amatena said. “Is it true that you saved her life?”

“Huh?” (Again.) “Er, ah, y-yeah... Yeah, I guess you could say that.” I gave a noncommittal nod.

Truth be told, I had just been so moe for my first beast girl at that moment, not to mention loath to lose Elvia’s artistic abilities, that I didn’t really think of myself as saving her life. More like I just happened to do what was best for me, which also just happened to be what was best for her not being executed.

I explained all this to Amatena.

“What is this moe?”

“Oh, uh... In my country’s language, it means... like, ‘cute’ or ‘highly attractive.’ Elvia is so cheerful and outgoing, and super adorable. Okay, so she gets ahead of herself sometimes, but even that’s kind of charming.”

Amatena didn’t say anything.

“Plus, she’s really good at drawing. It worked out great for me, because it was really convenient for my work, having a capable artist around. I just thought it would suck to let them go and execute her...”

“And that was your reasoning?” Amatena shook her head as if to say I made no sense at all. “You should know, Elvia is—”

“Come to think of it, when I first saw you, Amatena, I thought maybe Elvia had changed her hair color somehow.”

The two of them really, really looked like each other.

That was when I realized what I had just effectively said.

Elvia is cute. Elvia and Amatena look like each other. Therefore, Amatena is cute.

What was I saying? What was I saying to someone who belonged to a group of people that wanted to pound a magical spike into my head?

What, did I expect Amatena to blush and giggle like we were in some gal game, then help me escape? I mean, that would be exceedingly convenient right about now, but even I wasn’t stupid enough to think it might happen. I didn’t even remember tripping any flags for Amatena.

“I see,” Amatena said after a moment. Was it just me, or had her voice and expression softened ever so slightly? Was she just happy to hear me speak kindly about her sister?

“You two... You and Elvia. You really are each other’s spitting images.”

“Of course we are,” Amatena said. “We are triplets.”

“Triplets?!”

“Why is this so surprising?” Amatena looked at me questioningly for a moment before she seemed to realize what was going on and said, “Ah, I see. Among humans, it is normal to bear only one child at a time, is it not?”

“Huh? Are twins and triplets more common for werewolves?”

“It would be quite unusual to have only one cub in a litter.”

“Uh... huh.”

Now that I thought about it, dogs were a symbol of safe birth exactly because they tended to have easy deliveries despite bearing a lot of young. It was perfectly typical for dogs and cats to have several offspring at once, and werewolves did appear to be more like dogs or wolves than humans.

“So you became a soldier, Amatena. What about the third child?”

“My older sister, Jijilea, is also a soldier. As are my mother and father. There are many such in my family. You could say the only one who didn’t become a proper soldier was that little fool.” She whispered, pained.

Oopsie. I had to say, I couldn’t picture Elvia as a soldier.

“She was a failure. She became a spy in hopes of escaping that fact.”

So that was it: two successful, distinguished sisters, and the runt. That couldn’t have been any fun for Elvia. Thanks to my life with Shizuki, I knew what it was like to have an endlessly gifted sister. I hadn’t been thrilled.

You had the ones who became soldiers and stuck around Bahairam. Then you had the one who became a spy infiltrating into enemy territory. Yeah, they were both technically military, but they were very different positions.

Had Amatena deliberately been avoiding the subject of Elvia until now? Maybe she hadn’t wanted to even acknowledge that “failure” existed? Amatena was so serious, and having a younger sister who couldn’t hack it wouldn’t have done her any favors while she was trying to get ahead in the world...

Amatena was muttering to herself now. “I can’t believe this. She was always so soft and indecisive, just following along behind everyone else. And then she would pick the strangest times to show resolution, to rebel... When she became a spy, she did it without even talking to the rest of us...”

I didn’t feel like I heard any anger or hatred toward Elvia in her voice. It was almost like... “the more hopeless they get, the cuter they are.” A sort of fond resignation. Then again, maybe I was just reading too much into it.

I wasn’t completely sure, but I thought just maybe, for the first time, I was hearing how Amatena really felt.

“She’s family. She’s your sister. Of course you’d worry about her.”

“Indeed. But that idiot—”

Then she stopped cold. She frowned; it was obvious she’d said more than she meant to.

Finally she let out a single sigh and heaved herself off the wall.

“I’ve been here longer than I meant.” She took a step closer to the iron-barred door—a step closer to me—and said, “Incidentally, your spiking has been set for tomorrow.”

“Guh?!”

What was with the informational ambush?!

I thought we were just getting to a good place! Give me back my expectations! Wait a second... Tomorrow?! Like, the day after this one? Like, ashita?! She was kidding, right?!

“That was what I came to tell you in the first place,” Amatena said. Then she turned away from me and made to leave, her footsteps tapping hurriedly over the stone floor.

“But tomorrow is—”

I looked at my watch. It was currently six in the evening. I didn’t know exactly when tomorrow they had in mind, but one thing was for sure: within roughly the next thirty hours, I would have a magical spike in my brain.

The one thing I definitely did not have was any way out of this situation.

“Oh, man...”

Now, at last, despair washed over me. Unable to withstand it, I threw myself on the bed. I didn’t know exactly what Bahairam’s magic was like, but I suspected having a spike pounded into your head and being turned into a zombie was likely to rank just below dying on the Fun-O-Meter. Not to mention, I was guessing this meant no going back to Eldant or Japan for me.

I think normally, a person would think of their parents or lover at a moment like this. But what I saw was the faces of all my Eldant friends.

Myusel. Minori-san. Petralka. Elvia. Brooke. Cerise. Garius. Prime Minister Zahar. Everyone at school. Even Matoba-san...

I wondered what they were up to at that moment. I liked to think they were worried when I suddenly disappeared. (Well... Maybe not Matoba-san so much.)

I gazed up at the bare ceiling of my jail cell and let out a long, disconsolate sigh.

The city was already draped in the darkness of night. We could see the bluish glow of sprite-powered lamps here and there, but they weren’t very bright, leaving swaths of the town in darkness. Somehow, the panoply of shadows lying over the cold, gray town made it seem like there was a series of bottomless pits waiting for us to fall in. It was terribly eerie.

Maybe I only felt that way because we were in Bahairam. Or perhaps...

“She’s here,” Minori-sama whispered. We were right next to the home of Elvia-san’s older sister, Amatena-san. We were in a deserted back alley, hiding in the shadows. Elvia-san was with us, of course. “Just like we planned.”

“Got it,” Elvia-san said, nodding to Minori-sama.

Amatena-san had already refused to tell Elvia-san about Shinichi-sama’s location once, but we had nothing else to go on. With no idea where he was or when they might be planning to put the magical spike in him, our only option was to get the information from Amatena-san.

By force, if necessary.

Minori-sama and Elvia-san stalked out of the shadows together.

They stopped right in front of Amatena-san, who was just coming down the street toward her house.

“Big Sister Ama!”

Amatena-san didn’t appear at all surprised, but only raised an eyebrow at Elvia-san. “Who’s this woman? An Eldant soldier?”

“I’m not technically from the Eldant Empire,” Minori-sama said with a shrug, “but I guess you could say I’m in about the same position as Elvia.”

“Hmph. Another offworlder.”

“You got it. So you guys do know about that.” Minori-sama sounded a bit disappointed. “Looks like it’s leaks left, right, and center... Arrgh!”

“Big Sister Ama! I want you to tell us where Shinichi-sama is.”

“You’re wasting your breath,” Amatena-san spat. “I have no intention of telling a traitor anything. You should be grateful I haven’t yet reported you to my superiors.”

“So you really won’t tell me?” Elvia-san asked, not quite able to look at her sister. “You won’t help, no matter what?”

“I told you to stop wasting your breath. What do you think you can do if I refuse?”

I suspected Amatena-san had some idea. She had to assume there was a reason for Elvia-san showing herself again. Even from a distance, I could feel the air between Amatena-san, Minori-sama, and Elvia-san get tense.

“Force it is, then!”

Minori-sama and Elvia-san moved almost simultaneously. Minori-sama let loose a spinning roundhouse aimed at Amatena-san’s abdomen. It moved so fast I thought I could hear it whoosh through the air, yet Amatena-san blocked it with her upraised left arm.

“You—!”

With her other hand, Amatena-san went for the sword at her hip.

But Elvia-san was coming at her from the opposite direction. Her fist appeared to be aimed directly at her sister’s face.

“Yaaaahh!”

But she changed direction in mid-strike, driving her fist toward the stomach. Amatena-san must have seen the trick coming, though, because she brought up a leg and sent Elvia-san flying with a kick.

“Ugh!” Elvia-san gasped.

To my surprise, though, Amatena-san grimaced and grunted, “Hrm?”

It was because she no longer had a sword. Elvia-san had grabbed onto it with all four limbs when she went flying, pulling it away. That had been her objective all along.

“Hah!”

“Hrr—!”

Minori-sama was already moving into her next attack. Her fist flew with tremendous speed, but Amatena-san blocked her with the palm of one hand.

Minori-sama let loose another blow, and another and another. Fists, feet, elbows. But Amatena-san deflected or blocked most of them, and Minori-sama never managed to hit her anywhere important. Yes, she landed a few glancing blows, but nothing decisive.

She’s so strong!

I was sure Minori-sama wasn’t holding back, yet she couldn’t defeat Amatena-san. And this was the woman who had gone hand-to-hand with a dragon!

Perhaps seeing that she wasn’t getting anywhere, Minori-sama backed off and made some distance.

A human couldn’t best a werewolf when it came to stamina and sheer brute strength. If the fight went on too long, it was undoubtedly Minori-sama who would run out of steam first.

“Elvia is predictably disappointing, but you—” Amatena-san said, narrowing her eyes. “You are a talented fighter. Who are you?”

“I don’t have to answer that,” Minori-sama said. “For that matter, who are you? I assumed you’d be a pushover like Elvia—”

“I encourage you not to underestimate me. I’m embarrassed even to hear myself compared to that good-for-nothing failure.”

“Eeyaaahhh!”

Elvia-san flung the sword aside and launched herself at Amatena-san once more. She closed the distance immediately, her limbs flailing wildly in hopes of landing a blow on her sister. The violence of it was incredible; she used the full strength and agility of a werewolf. If she’d been attacking me, I probably would have gone down in a single hit. Every strike had the power to kill, and they came in a flurry almost too fast for the eye to follow.

But of course, none of that mattered if the blows didn’t land.

Amatena-san blocked and passed every single one of Elvia-san’s strikes without so much as appearing nervous. It was abundantly obvious that Elvia-san alone would never beat Amatena-san. The difference in their abilities was simply too great.

“Pathetic, as ever,” she said. “Haah!”

She sent Elvia-san flying again with another kick.

Elvia-san was in the air, and then, an instant later, so was Amatena-san, jumping straight up.

“Hrk—?!” Minori-sama, who had somehow gotten behind Amatena-san, gave a tremendous sweep through the place where the other woman had been standing until an instant before.

Her defense was impenetrable; it was as if she had eyes in the back of her head. What was more, Amatena-san twisted in the air so that she came down behind Minori-sama. A trained tumbler couldn’t have done it better. Minori-sama turned and punched, but this too Amatena-san blocked. In fact, unbelievably, she grabbed the fist in midair, leaving Minori-sama’s movements constricted.

“Hiyah!” With a sharp exhalation, Amatena-san drove a punch straight into Minori-sama’s solar plexus.

“Hrgh!” Minori-sama tried to pass the strike, but with her right hand immobilized, she didn’t have a chance. She wasn’t able to brace herself; with a painful little gasp, she dropped to one knee.

Amatena-san was truly powerful. Too powerful.

Almost unable to believe what I was seeing, I felt a tremor run through my body. We had known that a werewolf like Amatena-san was going to be physically powerful and very quick. That was why we had decided to have Minori-sama and Elvia-san attack her together. But we had never counted on Amatena-san being so tremendously skilled in unarmed combat.

Now Elvia-san was lying on the ground, and Minori-sama was down on one knee. Amatena-san, however, didn’t look like she was planning to finish either of them off. Most likely, she felt she had made her point: even when they attacked her simultaneously, she had gotten the better of them with almost no effort. This wasn’t a show of pride; it was a simple fact.

But it was also—not an opening, exactly; but just what I was looking for.

I had already chanted my spell. This was why I had stayed in the shadows. Now, when Minori-sama and Elvia-san weren’t involved in combat with Amatena-san, was my best opportunity.

“Tifu Murottsu!”

The moment my magic activated, I saw Amatena-san make a movement as if she were tossing something.

I realized almost immediately that it was a bladed object glittering in the moonlight. Almost before I could think, my hand was pointing toward it. The wind sprites gathered in my palm went where my fingers were pointed—in this case, flying at and knocking away the small object.

It was a shuriken. It spun away from me and buried itself in the ground nearby.

Startled, I began to intone a second spell. If you used the same spell twice in a row, you could execute it the second time with less than half the incantation necessary for the—

But in the next instant, Amatena-san filled my vision.

“Eeek!”

I felt myself being grabbed by the collar and spun around in a wide arc before I slammed against the ground. I had fallen on my back, and the force of the impact knocked the air from my lungs. For a fraction of a second, I felt myself grow faint from the pain.

I let out a gasping cough.

“Myusel!” I heard Minori-sama calling out to me, but I didn’t have the wherewithal to call back. More specifically, I was coughing so hard that I couldn’t form words.

“Ugah!”

My situation got worse when Amatena-san followed up by wrapping my neck in a choke.

It was the natural and indeed necessary thing to do against an enemy who could use magic. First, you stopped them from breathing so they couldn’t incant any spells. Using throws and chokes instead of strikes allowed you to attack while simultaneously preventing the use of magic.

“Aggghh!” I grabbed at Amatena-san’s arm, trying to pry it off my neck, but my physical strength was no match for that of a werewolf. My vision was starting to turn red when suddenly, Elvia-san jumped at Amatena-san from behind.

“Let Myusel go!”

Amatena-san, however, kept her right hand wrapped around my neck while executing a half-turn and using her left to grab Elvia-san’s face. Elvia-san’s fist never reached Amatena-san; instead, the elder sister used her grip on the younger’s head to force her to the ground beside me.

“Ee-eyowowowow!”

It seemed like she was hurt less by going to the ground than by the fingers digging into her cheeks and grasping her hair. Elvia-san struggled and flailed her limbs, but Amatena-san never let go.

“Give up, Elvia,” Amatena-san said, her face impassive.

“I won’t,” Elvia-san managed to gasp. “I won’t! I won’t! I never will!”

“Elvia—”

“I never, never, never will!” she shouted, thrashing wildly.

“Idiot! Is this man so important to you?” I thought there was a hint of annoyance in her voice. “Is he so—”

“Yes!” Elvia-san finally stopped her ineffectual writhing, instead planting both her hands on the hand Amatena-san was using to hold her face, as if she thought she could simply crush it.

“Hrrgh...”

They might not have had equal skills, but they were still both werewolves. In a simple contest of strength, they might be almost equal. Pain began to twist Amatena-san’s expression.

“Myusel! Elvia!”

No sooner had we heard the shout than a blinding flash washed over us. Amatena-san had looked back at the sound of the voice; the light had probably blinded her.

Even so, she didn’t loosen her grip on my throat or Elvia-san’s face.

“Hiyah!”

That was when I saw Minori-sama, a shadow against the light, send a kick flying at Amatena-san.

She immediately brought up her hands in an attempt at defense, but couldn’t take up her stance quickly enough—so Minori-sama’s blow sent her flying.

“Urgh!”

There was a dry thump as she rolled along the ground. Maybe the kick hadn’t been square enough, though, because she rose up immediately; even though she was still on one knee, I see she was ready to fight.

“Myusel, Elvia, are you okay?” Minori-sama asked, moving over to us. She was still focused on Amatena-san, and there was some kind of short, black stick in her right hand. It seemed to be this stick that had produced the light.

“Jeez,” Minori-sama said, “I was worried there. I wasn’t able to use my pistol. Good thing I brought my SureFire from home, huh?”

“Huh? Huh...”

She obviously thought I should agree with her, but I didn’t really know what I was agreeing to. In any event, Elvia-san had already climbed to her feet and lent me a hand as I got off the ground.

Amatena-san, meanwhile, seemed wary of the light; she took up a fighting stance but didn’t make any big movements. Now that we knew exactly how strong she was, though, we couldn’t afford to attack her indiscriminately, either. I could try chanting magic, but without the element of surprise, Amatena-san would just dodge me.

That was when, to my surprise, Minori-sama suddenly turned back, the hand with her “SureFire” waving. There was a screech of metal and then a flash.

Two shuriken buried themselves in the wall of the nearest building. They were the same sort of weapon Amatena-san had used earlier, but this time I was sure she hadn’t moved. They seemed to have come from the opposite direction.

“Elder sister, are you all right?” someone asked as they emerged from the darkness. This new person was a weretiger girl wearing a military uniform much like Amatena-san’s. However, she appeared to be about ten years younger, and her hair and fur were a light brown.

“Clara,” Amatena-san said quietly. That must have been the girl’s name.

Clara produced two more throwing stars from her sleeve and prepared to use them.

“This looks bad,” Minori-sama whispered.

This still made us three on two. But if Clara was as powerful as Amatena-san, then our numerical advantage wasn’t going to be much advantage at all.

In fact, I could hear footsteps rushing in from every direction. It seemed the sound of our fighting had attracted other people in the area. There was no way we were going to win now. It looked like we had been caught.

“I think it’s time for a tactical retreat,” Minori-sama said softly. “Myusel, Elvia, hold my hands.”

Then she took some kind of cylinder out of her bag, pulled a needle-like thing out of it, and tossed the cylinder on the ground.

What in the world was she doing?

No sooner had the question crossed my mind than a thick smoke began billowing out of the cylinder.

“What?!” Amatena-san exclaimed.

The white smoke immediately filled the narrow alleyway, until I couldn’t even see my hand in front of my face. I suspected our opponents couldn’t see anything either. Minori-sama pulled me and Elvia-san by the hand down the street.

“Sister!” I heard Clara shout through the smoke.

“Don’t pursue them, Clara!” Amatena-san said back. “I need you to contact the research facility holding center. Inform them that bandits may be targeting Kanou Shinichi. Tell them not to take their eyes off him until he’s at the treatment center for his conversion tomorrow at noon!”

“Ma’am!”

I could hear the patter of Clara’s feet as she ran in another direction.

“Minori-sama,” I whispered.

“Yeah, I got it,” she said. I couldn’t even see her face for the smoke, but I could hear the smile in her voice. “For as bad as she beat us up, you’ve got a pretty nice sister, Elvia.”

“Huh?” Elvia-san sounded genuinely surprised. “Nice? What’s nice about her?”

“You heard her, right? Shinichi-kun is in a research facility holding center They’re going to move him from there to some sort of treatment center at noon tomorrow.”

“Oh...”

The droop in Elvia-san’s voice made it sound like she probably hadn’t realized what her sister was doing.

“Eh, I guess it could be false information to lure us into a trap,” Minori-sama said.

“If it was, she was awfully obvious about it.”

We got away from the smoke and let go of Minori-sama’s hands. Then we set off running through town.

There were lights on in several buildings, perhaps people alerted by the commotion. We made out several faces watching us, but nobody seemed to be moving to stop us. I guess a little shouting and thumping wouldn’t be enough for everyone to know we were enemies.

“Elvia, what do you think about this?” Minori-sama asked as we ran along. What she meant was, could we trust what Amatena-san had told us?

“Wh-Why’re you askin’ me?”

“Out of the three of us, you’re the one who knows her best, right?”

“Yeah, I guess so, but...” Elvia-san sounded hesitant. That was understandable. They had been fighting, really and truly in combat, just moments ago. How would you know whether to trust someone like that?

We kept running in silence.

Huffing and puffing, I looked back, but it didn’t seem like anyone was coming after us from the direction of town. At length we reached the shadow of a huge boulder sitting in the wilderness outside of town, and we were finally able to stop and catch our breath.

“About Big Sister Ama,” Elvia-san said suddenly. “I don’t think she’s lying. If she was just going to lie, why tell us at all? Or why not wait until we were gone to tell that girl what to do?”

“Good points. I agree,” Minori-sama said, a smile splitting her face. Then she patted Elvia-san on the back as if to comfort her.