u/AgentV1967

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Tauro’s going all out in his battle against the elves, who are coming for the World Tree growing in his garden. Unfortunately, with the Knight Corps away, it’s just him, Ponytail, and Lightning protecting the Kingdom against the elves’ sex-powered shape-shifting knight. Who will come out on top? Find out in the thrilling and scintillating climax!

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When Hiro returns to the imperial capital, Chris has a lot of questions. In fact, she’s set on grilling him—less about his mercenary adventures, and more about Colonel Serena. If Serena herself gets wind of Chris’s prying, there’s no way she’ll let Hiro smooth things over. In fact, the prim and proper colonel will probably blow a gasket.

But Hiro will need to deal with something that poses a much greater threat than Chris’s pointed questions: an assassin who’s found their chance to strike. The situation has gone from awkward to deadly—and Hiro will have to fight tooth and nail to leave the capital in one piece!

Which god their prayers had reached, there was no telling.

“There. Get in there.”

Captured by the black-cloaked men, Tokushima and Edajima were marched off — without being roughed up, at least — to a small building tucked in a corner of the port’s warehouse district. Inside, dim and sparsely furnished, stood a plain wooden table and the barest minimum of fittings. Judging from the stationery and documents scattered about, it seemed to be some kind of office.

“I’ve been waiting for you two.”

Startled, they turned to find a man in a suit standing there. Tōdō Tetsuo, a Foreign Ministry official.

“Oh, it’s Tōdō-san. Don’t tell me you got caught too?” said Tokushima.

“Why are you here?” asked Edajima.

“You two — not like that—”

Tōdō prompted them to speak in the Special Region language, so that everyone around them could follow the conversation. Speaking in a language no one else understood would only invite suspicion that they were plotting something. Tokushima, taking the hint, asked his question again, this time in the Special Region tongue from the start.

“Why is Mr. Tōdō here?”

“Because we at the Foreign Ministry are in a cooperative relationship with these people.”

“These people, meaning?”

“They’re Tinaean government agents — the populace calls them Negri Ma. In Japanese, that would be, let’s see...”

Edajima raised a hand slightly.

“Black Hand... would that be it?”

“That translation fits perfectly. From now on, let’s use that name in our reports.”

“So in short, Mr. Tōdō, you weren’t captured — you’re working together with these people, is that it?”

Tokushima summed up the situation as best he’d pieced it together from the exchange so far.

Tōdō nodded, “That’s right” — but the black-cloaked boy corrected him.

“That’s a mistaken impression. We are not working together with you Nihonjin. We’re only doing this as a favor, and a reluctant one at that, because it came recommended and requested by the Empire’s Privy Council. Frankly, thanks to you, a perfectly good opportunity has been ruined.”

“I do apologize,” Tōdō said, bowing deeply.

“What do you mean? What did we do?” Edajima asked, and Tōdō explained.

Plagued by pirates, Tinae had been using the current buildup toward the Odette’s launch as an opportunity — setting a watch to catch whatever pirate spy might come sniffing around to learn her departure date. Given Captain Caipirinha’s widely renowned reputation, the pirates were certain to be paying close attention to his movements. So by casting a net around him, they should have been able to net the ring of spies nesting in Nasuta.

Instead, Tokushima and Edajima had walked straight into the trap. A trap could only catch one prey at a time — and so the real target had slipped away.

“A once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. And you’ve cost me it. I resent you for it.”

The word the boy used — resent — carried a chill in it that struck straight through anyone listening.

“S-sorry! I’m so sorry!”

Tokushima bowed his head at once. Edajima followed suit immediately.

“Even though we had no way of knowing, this was truly inexcusable of us. We had time to spare before our appointment with Mr. Tōdō, and I let greed get the better of me, wanting to learn even a little more about this country. That was the mistake.”

The black-cloaked boy listened to their apologies and let out a small sigh. Then he went on.

“You two were also the ones who slipped ashore at Robessa’s pier early this morning, under cover of fog — together with Aquas and the others, weren’t you?”

“How did you know that?”

“We received a report. Please don’t underestimate our nation’s intelligence network. Slipping a small boat deep into the harbor, fog or no fog — that’s a reckless thing to do.”

It seemed their landing had been observed by someone all along. If anything, it was entirely possible that the naval base’s thin security had been left deliberately weak, precisely to lure in pirate spies.

“Still — to be able to connect the landing of some unidentified persons to us so easily. The organization called Negri Ma is... no, perhaps it’s you personally... quite capable, it seems.”

“Flattery won’t get you anywhere with me.”

“So it was flattery, was it? Rather sharp, for someone so young.”

“...”

The boy made a face like he’d bitten into a bitter insect and looked away.

“In any case! Consider this a debt owed. I’ll be collecting on it someday.”

“Y-Yes, understood.”

“Anything I can do personally, I’ll do without limit.”

“I too, within whatever power I have, will make amends,” Edajima and Tōdō said, echoing Tokushima’s answer almost in unison.

At that, the black-cloaked boy accepted the apology, if grudgingly.

“So, Mr. Tōdō — how did it go?”

Seeing that the boy’s anger had cooled, Edajima steered the conversation back to their actual mission.

“The other party’s a greedy sort — saw us over a barrel and drove the price up considerably — but we managed to reach an agreement somehow. All that’s left now is for us to hand over payment and take receipt of the goods. We’re due to call on him this evening. Which reminds me, Mr. Edajima — you brought the payment, I trust?”

Tokushima set a duralumin case on the table.

“Right here.”

Edajima produced a key and opened the lid.

“It’s been kept exactly as entrusted to us by the Foreign Ministry. Please confirm.”

“Ah, yes.”

Tōdō peered into the duralumin case.

“Ah—”

Even the black-cloaked boy, glancing casually into the case, let out an involuntary sound. Inside, it was packed edge to edge with Special Region gold and silver coin.

“You’re paying that much for a mere slave? Is he some sort of tremendously wealthy man, then? Or a minister — a noble? Either way, for a bureaucrat to come all this way to retrieve him, he must be someone of real importance to Nihon, is that it?”

“No — he’s neither wealthy nor a minister. In fact, he isn’t even a citizen of our nation, Nihon,” Edajima said.

“Then what is he?”

Tōdō asked, sounding at a loss.

“A journalist.”

“A jaanarisuto? What’s that — some kind of privileged class? A priest of some temple?”

“How should I put it...”

Tōdō looked toward Edajima and Tokushima with something close to a plea for rescue. But neither of them could summon a suitable way to explain that particular breed of person to this world — all they could do was shrug.

Notice that I used Tōdō-san the first time, and then Mr. Tōdō afterwards. That's because Tōdō-san told Tokushima and Edajima to speak in the language of the Special Region, in effect a language switch. The characters stop speaking Japanese and begin speaking the Special Region language in-universe. That way the reader can feel the language switch without ever being explicitly told about it. IMO, It's a neat solution to a problem that is otherwise very difficult to convey in translation.

Because English cannot directly represent that switch, I need some other marker. So my solution: “Oh, it's **Tōdō-**san. Don't tell me you got caught too?”, then Tōdō prompts them to speak in the Special Region language. After which “Why is Mr. Tōdō here?”

But note: I used the words Nihonjin and jaanarisuto because they are considered loanwords in the Special Region. Nihonjin is written in the original text as ニホン人 instead of 日本人, and when Edajima said "journalist," it is in katakana as expected (ジャーナリスト), but when the boy, hearing a strange word for the first time, repeats it phonetically (jaanarisuto) and it is written in hiragana(じゃーなりすと), indicating that it is a foreign term.

The JMSDF submarine Kitashio, having rendezvoused with local cooperative members of the Aquas tribe—also known as mermaids, including Kemy — set course westward toward a shallow sea region marked on charts as the Eastern Barrier Reef.

The Eastern Barrier Reef was part of a vast coral reef system found in several areas of this special region.

The average depth was around ten meters, and in some places, coral grew so high that at high tide it nearly broke the surface. Countless such corals formed hidden reefs, strongly repelling any approaching vessels.

Unaware ships entering the area risked running aground at best — or at worst, having their hulls torn open and sinking. It was truly a treacherous sea.

Incidentally, in the “Ginza-side world,” there is a similar reef off northeastern Australia known as the Great Barrier Reef.

Captain Kurokawa surfaced the Kitashio, posting lookouts even atop the sail and dive planes, and carefully navigated through canyon-like gaps formed by sheer coral walls.

But standing on the bridge, Kurokawa felt a deep sense of dread.

No matter how hard he strained his eyes, the night sea revealed nothing.

Even with night-vision devices, one could not see beneath the surface. Though various instruments like sonar imaging were being used, handling the ever-changing seabed was difficult, and beads of sweat formed on Kurokawa’s forehead.

“Edajima… this is no different from walking along a cliff edge blindfolded.”

Edajima, standing behind him, replied:

“That’s precisely why we have the Aquas. Living on the seafloor where light does not reach, they possess highly sensitive perception. Even in complete darkness, they can sense coral reefs as if it were daylight.”

What Kurokawa and the others could make out among the waves were not the heads of Kemy and her companions — but rather the lights they held.

The ten Aquas led by Kemy were holding lights like floating markers, forming lines to the left and right.

Red to starboard, green to port. As long as she stayed between them, the Kitashio could make her way through safely without touching the coral.

“We can trust them on this, right?”

“Mochiron daijōbu desu yo. She may look like that, but she has the important things well in hand. We wouldn’t keep using them otherwise.”

Edajima vouched for them without hesitation, but Kurokawa still couldn’t shake his unease. Something about the mermaid who called herself Kemy gave him the distinct impression that even a serious safety-related blunder might get brushed off with a cutesy “tee-hee, my bad!”

Still, Edajima had known them far longer than he had — in fact, no one among the JMSDF’s senior officers understood the people of the Special Region better than he did. That was precisely why, even though he had long since reached a rank where most men warmed a desk chair with their backside all day, he could still be found out here in the field.

Kurokawa found this genuinely enviable.

That said, it was also thanks to Edajima that Kurokawa had returned to the post of captain in the first place.

Operating in the waters of the Special Region demanded a crew in which not a single member was unfamiliar with the ship, and a captain with sound judgment and deep experience. It was Edajima’s recommendation on exactly this point that had spared the Kitashio from being decommissioned and given Kurokawa himself the chance to prove himself in those same waters.

“Conn, this is the bridge. Tori-kaji ten degrees.”

The IC operator relayed the officer of the watch’s order over the battery-less telephone.

Slowly, the course shifted to port, and the stars overhead drifted to the right.

By this point, Kurokawa decided to cast aside the doubts he had harbored about Kemy.

The Kitashio was, in effect, being led forward by the hand. Blind as she was — for that was what it amounted to — the mermaids were all she had to rely on. But that meant taking the utmost care for their safety, keeping the hull well clear of them at all times.

The sweat that had been dripping from Kurokawa’s brow was not only from the sultry southern air, but also from the constant, fine-grained shiphandling the situation demanded.

“Omo-kaji, five degrees.”

“Omo-kaji five degrees, yōsorō.”

The hull’s distinctive hydrodynamic shape meant that the seawater running along its sides flowed smoothly aft toward the enormous propeller turning at the stern. Get careless, and anyone too close could be drawn into that spinning blade and torn to shreds. That was a fate he could never allow to befall them.

It’s worth adding, by way of explanation, that this is also why submarines make poor rescue vessels.

One person adrift in the water might be manageable, but if a ship were sinking nearby with many people struggling in the water around it, a submarine would have a hard time closing in to recover them. Force the attempt carelessly, and it could end up harming the very people it was trying to save.

Once clear of the Eastern Barrier Reef, the Kitashio, still surfaced, cut her diesel-electric engines.

On deck, three sailors from the navigation division each peered through a sextant up at the night sky.

The sight made fine entertainment for the mermaids out setting the buoys, though fortunately the darkness kept the crew from being distracted by their audience.

“Steeeeady... mark!”

At the signal from the executive officer, who kept his eyes fixed on his wristwatch, they all measured the altitude of their target stars.

“Hey, hey, Tokushima. What are they doing over there?”

Tokushima, saddled with the job of supervising the Aquas mermaids, fielded the question from Kemy.

“They’re measuring how high the stars are in the sky, like that — it’s how they work out where the ship is right now.”

Tokushima held a diver’s qualification, which let him work underwater alongside them, and that was why he’d ended up spending so much time with them. This time, too, if truth be told, he’d been in the water with them that very night, wearing a wetsuit with a cylinder — an air tank — strapped to his back.

“You guys can’t even tell where you are without doing all that?”

“Well, what do you expect? Once you’re out at sea, the view’s the same in front, to the right, to the left — everywhere.”

“Yeah, now that you mention it, I guess so.”

In the Special Region, with neither GPS nor LORAN (a system that fixes one’s position using long-wave radio signals transmitted from multiple stations), there was no way to establish one’s location except by this kind of old-fashioned celestial measurement. That was why Tokushima’s very first assignment in the Special Region had been gathering the data needed for this sort of star-sighting. Fortunately, the astronomers of the scholarly city of Rondel had already built up a detailed body of observational data, so all that was needed was to obtain it from them — without which the JMSDF would still be limited to primitive coastal navigation even now, and could never have made it as far as the Avion Sea.

“So how do you and the others figure out where you are, or which way home is?”

“We can pretty much tell by the shape of the seafloor. There’s mountains, there’s valleys... unlike the surface, the scenery down there isn’t all the same.”

“Naruhodo nē.”

“Tokushima-san! We’re done setting the buoy!”

Just then, three mermaids came paddling back, splashing at the surface as they swam.

“Nice work. All right, everybody up on deck — I’ve got food ready...”

“Yay! We love the food Tokushima makes, it’s so good!”

Tokushima climbed up onto the deck, pulled the meals out of the insulated container in their plastic bags, and handed them out to the Aquas one by one.

The mermaids each settled onto the deck with a chorus of giggles and squeals and began to eat.

Tokushima joined them, of course.

Surrounded by the Aquas like that, Tokushima naturally drew looks of envy and resentment from the rest of the crew.

“What’s with that guy...”

A muttered dig or two even drifted down from the lookout up on the bridge.

But women — no matter how beautiful — become considerably harder to manage once there are more than about three of them around. Especially if even one of them has a temperament like Kemy’s.

“Hey, hey, Tokushima. Seems like Yunō’s got a thing for you — what do you think?”

“I mean, ‘what do I think’... that puts me on the spot.”

“What, you got a problem with my daughter? She’s totally attached to you! She keeps going on and on about how ‘I’m gonna be big brother Tokushima’s bride’!”

“No, I mean, she really is attached to me, but she’s just... too young, or something...”

Within the large, polyandrous-polygynous Aquas family, the Yunō Kemy spoke of was her youngest daughter, not yet even four years old. Aquas mature early, so in appearance Yunō looked something like a ten-year-old human, but even so, she was far too young to think of as a woman. Tokushima, twenty-six this year, considered his target range to be, in human terms, somewhere from eighteen up to under thirty.

“Then what about my daughter?”

“What about mine?”

One mermaid after another began peppering Tokushima with the same question.

On the surface it looked like teasing, but underneath it, they seemed to be seriously trying to gauge whether he was actually a prospect.

For reasons of their own, the village of Pido, where they lived, was essentially one big extended family among all its residents. Combined with the economic pressures that forced them to work away from home as local JMSDF cooperators, the mothers’ efforts to find spouses for their daughters outside the village were dead serious.

Serious enough that their eyes gleamed at Tokushima even in the darkness of night, and words like “civil servant” and “steady income” could be heard whispered back and forth. Every instinct Tokushima had was sounding the alarm that giving a careless answer here would end badly for him.

All the more reason, then, that when the poisonous glares came at him from his fellow crewmen off in the distance, Tokushima wanted to fire back with this:

“Any of you want to swap places, I’ll swap anytime. Damn you all — just don’t come crying to me about what happens after...”

That, in truth, was Tokushima’s honest state of mind — even though, to any outside observer, his situation looked purely enviable.

The three sailors from the navigation division each reported slightly different figures, owing to instrument error and differences in individual observational skill, but the executive officer — who doubled as navigation officer — combined them all and worked out their position as 28°17′ north latitude, 14°50′ east longitude.

The Kitashio had safely reached her intended position. Here, Edajima and Tokushima were to disembark.

“Conn, Tokushima-nisō. Report to the wardroom.”

The announcement played out from the control room speakers.

Tokushima, already finished with his preparations, shouldered his gear and headed for the wardroom.

There he found Edajima waiting, dressed like a local civilian. Tokushima, of course, was dressed the same way. Look closely enough and their skin and hair color differed subtly from the locals’, but in a world where all manner of demi-human races lived mixed together, no one paid that small a difference any mind.

“Ready to go, Tokushima?”

One look at Tokushima made it obvious his preparations were already flawless, but Edajima tossed out the standard line anyway, partly to gauge his subordinate’s readiness and mood.

“Hai. Departure preparations complete.”

Edajima nodded, satisfied with the answer.

“Shall we, then?”

“Hai, let’s.”

The two of them left the wardroom together and made for the ladder toward the stern.

In the cramped passageway, crewmen were hauling a boat outboard motor, working to pass it up the ladder and out through the hatch. Another sailor was lugging out an attaché-sized duralumin case, grumbling under its unexpected weight: “Hey, Tokushima — this thing’s ridiculously heavy. What the hell’s in it, anyway?”

Tokushima answered with a laugh.

“Careful with that one. Drop it, and you’ll really regret it.”

“Wait, seriously?! Is it gonna blow up or something?”

“I mean that if the contents scatter everywhere, cleaning it all back up would be an enormous pain. So please, handle it carefully.”

Edajima added a clarification that it wasn’t anything dangerous.

Out on the main deck, it was still dim outside, though the sky near the eastern horizon had begun to pale faintly, a sign the sun was not far from rising.

Captain Kurokawa, out to see them off, called out to them.

“Edajima, take care out there. Tokushima-nisō, I’m counting on you to look after this man.”

“Yes, sir. Edajima being... well, being himself is nothing new. I’ll manage.”

Since he was out of uniform, Tokushima bowed his head rather than salute.

Turning around, he saw that the outboard motor had already been fitted to the rubber boat, with Chief of the Boat Tagami aboard as its coxswain. Loading of the duralumin case was finished as well, and Kamy and the other Aquas girls were waiting eagerly for Edajima and the others.

Tokushima went first, working his way down the rope rigged along the submarine's curved hull, and crossed over into the rubber boat. Edajima, the senior-most of them, went last.

Tokushima dipped one hand into the sea and brought his fingers to his mouth.

“Just as salty as the sea back in Japan.”

“Well, it’s the sea — it’d be weird if it tasted any different, wouldn’t it?”

Different world or not, the sea’s still the sea, isn’t it? Kamy said.

“Still, the taste really is a little different, somehow.”

“For real?”

“Yeah — this side’s sea tastes better...”

Just then, Chief of the Boat Tagami started up the outboard motor. Before long, the boat pulled slowly away from the Kitashio’s side.

“This way!”

And so, guided by Kemy and the other Aquas, they set off toward the land waiting beyond the horizon.

 
What's the difference between Rose's translation and mine?

Rose's translation frequently prioritizes how the translator wants the scene to feel over what the Japanese text actually says. My approach instead aims to preserve both the language and the institutional culture of the JMSDF. As a result, the prose is often denser, not because it is less readable, but because it attempts to carry across more of the original's information, terminology, and organizational context.

I was actually laughing a bit when I was translating Kemy's speech. So Kansai. What makes Kemy particularly amusing is that she's often the most practical person in the room despite sounding the least formal.

It was right then that a sudden peal of thunder crashed around the perimeter of the command tent.

Before and after it came the sound of metal clashing together, of something propped upright toppling over with a loud crash. And after that — total, abrupt silence.

“What was that!? Report — what’s happened out there!”

Borhos shouted. But outside the tent, there wasn’t so much as the sense of another living soul. Some thirty or forty headquarters personnel should have been posted just outside — standard-bearers, messengers, drummers, buglers, supply personnel, and a guard detail — and yet not even the sound of footsteps remained.

Borhos let out a deep, resigned sigh, the kind that carries a note of quiet acceptance, and drew his sword.

“They’ve come.”

“The enemy mage!?”

Albain drew his own sword as well. Even Canfort and the others, disarmed as they were, smashed apart the nearest chairs and armed themselves with the broken legs as makeshift clubs, bracing themselves against the overwhelming presence swelling up just outside the tent.

“Who goes there!?”

Borhos called this challenge out toward the outside of the tent.

What stepped inside in answer was a young girl in black priestess’s robes, hefting an enormous halberd over her shoulder.

“A p-priestess of the Temple of Emroy — why is she here?”

Utterly caught off guard, Borhos found himself unable to either strike or lower the sword he still held raised. It was Albain who corrected Borhos’s mistake.

“You’re wrong there, Captain Borhos. This is none other than Emroy’s own Apostle, Rory Mercury… isn’t that right, Your Holiness? It’s an honor to meet you at last. I am Albain, legitimate heir of the Seamist chieftain. Waiting behind me here are my own companions.”

Saying this, Albain dropped to one knee and bowed his head low, then introduced Canfort, Greidel, Sniist, and Zuzuzu one after another. Borhos, too, once he realized the figure before him was a demigod, wore a bewildered expression but bowed his head to show proper respect.

“Such fine manners~. I’m very impressed.”

“To receive Your Holiness’s praise is a truly overwhelming honor. And might I ask what business has brought Your Holiness to grace such an unrefined place as this?”

“I’m here lookin’ for one of my own followers~. That’d be Canfort and Greidel standin’ over there, wouldn’t it? I heard about it, you know~. That you two treated my follower well?”

“Your Holiness’s follower — meaning whom, precisely?”

Canfort tilted his head, unable to place who was being referred to at all.

Nina, who had come in trailing behind Rory, offered a supplementary explanation: “She means Itami Yōji.” At that, Canfort was stunned.

“That man!? He’s Her Holiness’s follower!?”

“Wasn’t he supposed to be the crown princess’s bodyguard?” Sniist asked.

“He’s on loan for the moment, that’s all~. What that one truly is, at his core, is my own follower~.”

Borhos, who knew nothing about Itami, was the only one utterly unable to follow the conversation.

Hoping someone would explain, he asked Albain and Canfort directly, “Who exactly is this man Her Holiness is searching for?” — not asking Rory directly himself, no doubt because doing so would simply have been too great a strain on his nerves.

It was Canfort who answered.

“The crown princess — no, the man traveling with Rose.”

“Is that man not an Imperial knight?”

By all expectation, that role should have belonged to Gray Co Aldo. But Rory cut Borhos off with a cold reprimand.

“Don’t make me say the same thing twice~.”

“My apologies… but, Your Holiness, the ones we’ve been pursuing are the pirate Rose and her associates. I have no knowledge of any crown princess or bodyguard.”

“What you happen to call it doesn’t concern me in the slightest, you know~.”

“I see. Is that how it is, then.”

Borhos realized, at last, that playing dumb simply wasn’t an option with this demigod.

“You understand now~? Then stop chasin’ after my follower, and call your men back.”

“I cannot. I too have my own duty as a soldier. Having received orders to capture Rose, I must carry them out.”

Borhos declared this and settled back into a ready stance with his sword.

“You get told you’re inflexible a lot, don’t you?”

Tuka, arriving a little behind everyone else, said this with a look of exasperation. The bolt of lightning that had felled the soldiers outside the tent in a single strike had been Tuka’s own spirit magic.

At that, Albain let out a mocking laugh.

“In this man’s case, constantly.”

“Would you mind steppin’ aside~?”

“To abandon my duty simply because I cannot win would be a betrayal of every soldier who has already fallen. If it is my fate to fight Your Holiness here and fall, then I will accept that fate gladly. Lord Albain, forgive me, but I must ask you to see to what follows. I have found, here today, the finest place to die that I could ever have hoped for.”

Through all his years as a defeated, wandering soldier, he had carried with him the sense that he’d somehow failed to die when he should have. But here, now, he could finally fight and fall without a single regret left unresolved. There was no want of a worthy opponent, and to fall in service of his duty was the very highest honor a soldier could hope to attain.

Borhos stepped forward, his expression suddenly clear and transparent, as though every last shadow of regret had lifted from him at once.

“Ohh, that’s lovely~. That’s really lovely.”

Rory, too, seemed a touch excited, her cheeks flushing faintly. Fighting a man of such proud, unbending conviction was, for her, one of life’s truly unmatched pleasures.

“Borhos… since we’re here, go on and announce your name properly~. I’ll carve it into memory here, myself.”

Rory said this with solemn formality, giving her own chest a light tap.

“Then, if I may be so bold. Formerly Chief Centurion of the Imperial Army, and presently Captain of the Seamist Watch — Borhos.”

“Borhos. I myself shall guide your soul before the presence of the Supreme God.”

Fighting spirit swelled in both of them at once. If Rory’s vast, overwhelming will to fight was the sun, then Borhos’s own was, by comparison, nothing more than a single small flame. But in this moment alone, Borhos’s fighting spirit burned fiercely, shining with a vividness that matched Rory’s own without shame.

Borhos raised his sword.

Rory swung her halberd around in a horizontal arc.

But right then, Izumo — who very much wanted to avoid any actual bloodshed here if at all possible — cut in.

“Hey, Rory. Should someone maybe mention that the soldiers lying around here are just unconscious, nothing more?”

Rory’s halberd sliced empty air and split the ground open, and Borhos, his own sword swinging clean through nothing but air, spun a full two and a half rotations in place from the sheer momentum of his own missed swing.

“Wh-what did you say?”

Kurata piled on right after.

“Cap’n~! None of the soldiers are actually dead, you know. Still got a good reason to keep fightin’, huh?”

Looking more closely, the soldiers lying scattered here and there were, in fact, still breathing. Some were even letting out faint groans. Believing that his men had all died in the line of duty — and that this alone left him with no way to retreat — was the entire foundation of Borhos’s resolve to fight. And with that foundation gone, his fighting spirit collapsed completely.

“No — I still have my duty. That’s not something I can simply abandon.”

Borhos struggled desperately to shore up his crumbling resolve. But it wasn’t working.

“Kurata. To get a stubborn old rock-head like this to bend, you’ve got to hand him an excuse. Just killing his motivation alone won’t cut it.”

“So what do we do, sir?”

“Like this.”

Izumo pressed his pistol against the side of Albain’s head.

“You and I have met before, haven’t we, in a rather similar situation?”

“Y-you!? It’s you, from back then!”

The place had been Tanska. Izumo, having taken part in an operation to rescue a Japanese hostage, had once taken a high-ranking official named Godasen hostage and threatened Borhos, demanding he clear the way

“Well? Remembering it now, are you? Then you’ll also remember that we’re perfectly capable of resorting to such cowardly tactics as harming a hostage. This man’s the legitimate heir to your chieftain, isn’t he? So — what’ll it be?”

“ Borhos, save me! I’m the chieftain’s own son! If anything happens to me, it’ll be an absolute disaster! I’m supposed to be someone you’re required to protect above all else, aren’t I! Please — save me — I don’t want to die—!”

Albain let out the most pathetically theatrical wail of a plea imaginable, milking it for all it was worth.

Had this been genuine terror, or, conversely, had he shouted something like “never mind me, just fight!”, it might well have stoked Borhos’s fighting spirit rather than the opposite. But Albain, thoroughly enjoying himself now, had his eyes clearly, unmistakably crinkled with laughter the whole time.

This total absence of any real tension was exactly what broke Borhos’s fighting spirit for good. To lose his life over a farce like this would only drag his honor and pride as a warrior into the dirt instead of elevating it.

That clear, unclouded, almost enlightened composure he’d felt only moments before had, by now, gone thoroughly murky — shattered completely.

This is the last excerpt I am giving for GAIDEN 1. I have already finished translating the first volume. It will take two to three of weeks to read through the whole thing, proofread and do the ebook.

Tuka, on her return, was half out of her mind.

Out on the road, she had run into a JSDF patrol on routine rounds and been told that Itami had been lost at sea off the coast of the Glass Peninsula. From that moment, she had ridden almost without a single break for a full day and night, driving her horse relentlessly, until she made it back to Alnus.

Half-tumbling off her horse as she dismounted, Tuka staggered to her feet and, gasping for breath, kept repeating the same words over and over.

“Father — Father’s going to die!”

From there, she went straight to the Ground Self-Defense Force Special Region Deployment Force Headquarters together with Rory and the others, and pleaded to be allowed to accompany any search party that was sent out.

But Lieutenant General Hazama refused her.

“Search and rescue will be handled by us. I need you all to wait here.”

“No! You’re telling me to just sit around some place like this and wait for word to come!?”

“That’s right. The site is far away, and it’s dangerous besides. Nothing can be allowed to happen to any of you as well.”

At that, Tuka screamed, “No! I can’t just sit here and wait for word to come!” and clung to Hazama.

“Let me go!” she cried, pounding at his broad chest with her fists.

Hazama, a career soldier hardened through the ranks, didn’t so much as budge under the blows of a slip of a girl like Tuka. Because of this, rather than physically restraining her by force, he simply stood there and absorbed her violence.

Even so, it apparently became too much to watch, and Yao and Rory stepped in to hold Tuka back. It was only once Lelei used magic to put her to sleep that she finally quieted down.

“I’m so sorry about this~…”

Rory bowed her head to Hazama.

“No need. This is nothing you need to apologize for. I understand well enough myself what kind of agony it is to simply have to wait for word on whether one’s own family is alive or not.”

“You’ve had that experience yourself~?”

“More times than I can count, doing this line of work. I remember every single time I’ve had to tell someone that their family had met with tragedy.”

“I see~… so how does the search stand~?”

“At present, the Hugo — having freed herself from her grounding — is searching the surrounding waters. We’ve also begun an aerial search. However, dispatching personnel to search the area on land requires the consent of the Kingdom of Elbe, and that hasn’t yet been secured.”

“The ruler of the Elbe kingdom — that was Durán, wasn’t it~?”

“Yes. We’re currently negotiating with the kingdom’s royal court, requesting permission to establish a temporary relay base within their territory.”

“You can’t just fly straight there~?”

“No. Without refueling along the way, we can’t make it all the way to the site.”

“Machines really are inconvenient things, aren’t they~.”

“We haven’t yet built anything quite that convenient, I’m afraid.”

“There’s going to be another commotion when this girl wakes up, isn’t there~.”

Hazama looked down, together with Rory, at Tuka lying limp on the ground, and ordered his subordinates to bring a stretcher.

“I never imagined Tuka would fall apart to this degree.”

Hazama remarked that, from her usual demeanor at work, he never would have guessed she was capable of this — he’d had the impression she was a good deal more level-headed than this.

But Lelei answered coolly:

“Tuka is only able to stay level-headed because of him. Tuka is psychologically dependent on him. This outcome was foreseeable.”

“Then all the more reason we can’t let her anywhere near the site. If anything were to happen…”

“It’s fine. Yōji is still alive~. That much~, at least, is certain~.”

“You can tell?”

Rory nodded quietly.

“While you’re at it, can’t you tell his location too?”

At that, Rory shook her head regretfully, and turned Hazama’s own earlier phrasing back on him with a slight twist:

“I can’t be quite that convenient~.”

“I suppose one shouldn’t lean too heavily on divine favor. Still, being able to trust with certainty that he’s alive changes things considerably. For those of us on the search side, the lifeblood of the whole effort is the survivor’s safety.”

Hazama promised that they would give the search everything they had.

It was the following morning when civilian participants were requested for the search party.

Durán, king of the Elbe Kingdom, had set a condition for permitting the JSDF to establish a temporary supply base within his own territory: more than half the members of the search party had to be civilians, not military personnel.

Even as a vassal state of the Empire, the Elbe Kingdom still had its own sense of appearances and pride as an independent nation to maintain. This mattered especially to the military hard-liners and a certain faction of the nobility. Even the fact that the JSDF had entered the kingdom’s territory to subjugate the Flame Dragon — despite having done so with Durán’s own permission — was something they had been openly voicing displeasure about, day after day.

“Even with just our own strength, we could have brought down that Flame Dragon.”

“If His Majesty hadn’t gone and acted on his own, the glory of destroying at least two of the newborn dragons would have been ours.”

Taking full advantage of the fact that the Flame Dragon was already gone and couldn’t contradict them, they went on making such claims and criticized Durán for having handed Japan mining and crude-oil extraction rights within the territory in exchange for his reinstatement to the throne.

And now, this time, even with the perfectly legitimate cause of searching for and rescuing a missing person, they loudly objected — insisting that having a foreign military roam freely through their territory amounted to an infringement on royal sovereignty, an act of invasion.

Durán, for his part, wasn’t running the nation single-handedly, so he couldn’t simply ignore them outright. What he came up with, in order to placate these hard-liners, was the pretext that since the great majority of the search party wouldn’t be military personnel, it wouldn’t count as a military operation at all.

“We have all sorts of thinking within our own kingdom, you understand. I’d ask that you settle for this much, if you would.”

Durán told this to Colonel Kengun, who had come to negotiate, framing it as the absolute limit of the concession he could offer.

Hazama accepted the terms. He then set about recruiting civilian volunteers in Arnus to assist with the search. Beyond that, he also arranged to have several of his own personnel change into civilian clothes, out of consideration not to provoke the kingdom’s people any further.

Naturally, Tuka declared her intent to join this call for civilian volunteers. Rory, Lelei, and Yao all wished to go as well. And once the scheduled departure time was announced, each of them began preparing to set out.

The elves, having readied their own traveling gear, watched Tuka dash off toward the civilian-volunteer registration desk, and discussed among themselves what they ought to do.

“So what are we doing, Bahl?”

“What do you mean, what are we doing? Why should we have to go somewhere dangerous just to go looking for a man like that?”

Deo said they ought to simply leave it be.

But Famas checked him, calling him “naive.”

“This is a huge opportunity, you know.”

“An opportunity, you say?”

“That’s right. Consider — what if that human, Itami, turned out to be dead?”

“Well, that'd be wonderful news for us, wouldn’t it.”

Yuro said this, openly expressing his delight.

At this ugly display of taking pleasure in another man’s death, Bahl and the rest of the elves wore sour expressions.

“But it’s not only that, is it? Even though she was — as it were — brainwashed by some suspicious technique, Miss Tuka is bound to be shocked. She’ll surely be deeply wounded by it.”

“Well, that’s probably true.”

Everyone seemed able to agree with that much, at least, and nodded together.

“And that’s exactly when you get close by her side and treat her gently. Once that happens, don’t you think her heart’s bound to fall completely for you instead?”

And if he turned out to be alive after all, well — then they could simply negotiate with Itami directly on the spot, exactly as originally planned. Even then, they’d be able to play the card of having braved danger to come help search for him, and use that as leverage to make her feel indebted.

Hearing this, Bahl let out an extremely deep sigh. Then, meaning to convey that Famas shouldn’t rate his own cousin-niece so cheaply, he struck the back of Famas’s head.

Famas clutched his head and protested, “What was that for!?” — but Bahl struck him again all the same.

“What is wrong with you, that you can only ever say things like this?”

But Famas shot back loudly:

“Spare me the noble talk. If you don’t like it, then stay behind here. We’ll go without you.”

Where Famas pointed as he said this, Adam, Shiida, and every other one of their companions, without a single exception, were already lined up at the volunteer registration window.

“Hey, aren’t you coming, Bahl?”

Beta, standing at the very back of the line, called out for Bahl to join them.

Even Bahl couldn’t quite bring himself to say he alone wouldn’t be going.

 

“You’ll really come with me?”

Tuka took the elves’ hands and offered them her thanks — “Thank you” — and the elves spoke up, one after another.

“Of course we will. He’s someone precious to you, isn’t he?”

“Leave it to us. We’ll find him for certain.”

Not knowing the elves’ true intentions, Tuka led them, all gathered at the helipad, aboard the Chinook.

Tuka, having already flown many times before, was used to the noise filling the cabin, the pressing closeness of the ceiling, and sitting shoulder to shoulder along the troop seats. But the elves, faced with a vehicle unlike anything they’d ever seen, stared wide-eyed in bewilderment.

“What is this thing?”

“A ship that floats in the sky — does that make sense to you? Everyone, please sit down.”

While all this was going on, the rear hatch began rising up. It didn’t close all the way, staying slightly open, so it wasn’t quite as though they were being sealed in — but for people with no idea what was about to happen, every little detail was enough to stir up both astonishment and unease.

“Taking off now!”

Before long, along with the sensation of lifting off, the airframe shuddered. The view through the windows tilted sharply.

“Eh!? W-wait a second!”

“Uwaaaaaaaaaaaah!”

By the time everyone had pressed themselves against the windows to look outside, the ground had already fallen far, far away below them.

As many of you well know, I am translating Gaiden 1 and I came across the name Sumanson Ho Eel (スマンソン・ホ・イール, Sumanson Ho Iru). Someone pointed out to me that it sounds it has the expression まん (suman), a casual or abbreviated form of すまない (sumanai), meaning "sorry," "my apologies," or "excuse me." While not an exact phrase, the name evokes the sound of 「すまん……」 ("Sorry..." / "My bad..."), creating the impression of someone perpetually apologizing. The joke is obscured if the name is normalized to Smanson, as the connection to the Japanese expression becomes much less apparent.

The name therefore functions much like several other pseudo-foreign names in the series that conceal Japanese phrases beneath a fantasy veneer, such as ダーレス (Dāresu) or Darles, the Oprichnik whose head got blown off during the rescue in Volume 8, which echoes だれです？ (dare desu?, "Who is it?"), and マジレスカ・ホントウスカ (Majiresu Ka Hontōsuka) or Majiles Ka Hontouska in GATE:ZERO, which resembles マジですか？ 本当ですか？ (Majiresu ka? Hontō desu ka? "Seriously?" / "Really?"). Preserving Sumanson rather than further localizing it helps retain the author's wordplay and signals to attentive readers that the name is intentionally constructed as a joke.

The name Sumanson fits, as in the scene where he first appears (Chapter 9 of Gaiden 1), he serves as the sensible and conciliatory member of the group, repeatedly attempting to moderate the discussion and propose reasonable compromises. The contrast between his level-headed behavior and a name suggestive of perpetual apology may itself be part of the humor. For that reason, the name has been retained in a form that preserves its underlying Japanese pun.

“If you’re that bothered about whether that woman is really Rose, why not just go and talk to her yourself right now?”

Itami had put the idea to Canfort and the others. The men looked surprised. It apparently hadn’t occurred to any of them to simply go and confirm it with the person herself.

“That woman is in the castle dungeon.”

“Is there some reason you can’t go in and out of there?”

“No, nothing like that. We’re Lord Albain’s companions. We can come and go pretty much anywhere.”

“Then you can at least get as far as the cell where this Rose woman is, right? You could talk to her, couldn’t you? At the very least, it’s a lot more constructive than sitting here drinking with faces like you’ve bitten into something bitter…”

“But would a prisoner tell the truth even if you asked?”

“Maybe not, but you’d get some kind of impression from talking to her, wouldn’t you?”

“That’s fair. And sitting here grumbling certainly isn’t going to get us anywhere…”

As Canfort said this and rose to his feet, Greidel asked if he was serious.

“Hold on, hold on — the castle’s right in the middle of the banquet right now.”

“I’m not planning to go anywhere near the banquet. We just go in the back way and get to the dungeon without being noticed. That shouldn’t be a problem, should it?”

“Fine, I’ll tag along then.”

“It’s not like it’s going to cost anything.”

“Fair point.”

The men got to their feet one after another. Having apparently finally filled his stomach after three servings of the seafood platter, Zuu’s expression had sharpened into something considerably more composed.

This, one felt, was what it looked like when people were bound by a genuine, strong bond. Itami rose to his feet as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

“I’m curious about this Rose myself, actually. Mind if I come along?”

“Ah… I’m not sure about bringing an outsider into the fortress.”

Canfort hesitated, understandably — but Greidel answered for him with “sure, why not.”

“Hey, don’t just go making decisions.”

“Lighten up. He’s the one who suggested we do this in the first place. Besides, an outside perspective might come in useful for something.”

Canfort shrugged in resignation. And so Itami’s company was approved.

The main entrance to Seamist castle faced the land side, but at this hour it was crowded with banquet guests and their attendants. So Canfort and the others went around to the back, to the sea side, and came to a stop in front of a small wooden door just barely low enough to duck through.

Greidel knocked on it with the pommel of his sword. A moment later, a peephole slid open.

“Hic — who’s there… oh, it’s you lot. What’re you doing here at this hour?”

The gatekeeper’s ears and nose were red. Drunk, most likely. He’d probably been helping himself to liquor pilfered from the banquet and sneaking a quiet drink.

“We need to see Migel the stable hand. Got something to sort out with him about the new horse. …Bogo — you’re not drunk, are you? A gatekeeper drinking on duty isn’t going to look good.”

“Oh relax, it’s just a drop. Up there they’re all eating and drinking and having the time of their lives. What’s wrong with us getting a little something out of it too?”

“If the new guard captain hears about this, you’ll be in real trouble.”

“Bolhos is busy keeping order at the banquet. He’s not coming down here.”

The gatekeeper said all this while opening the door.

Albain’s companions filed through one after another.

“Hey, hold on just a second. Don’t you lot seem like more people than usual?”

They had quietly been hoping that the drink would have dulled his attention — but the gatekeeper had apparently noticed that there were more people with Canfort than normal.

Greidel, however, played dumb.

“What are you talking about, Bogo? How many people does the bard’s tale say are in ‘Lord Albain and his companions’?”

“Lord Albain, Canfort, Greidel, Sniest, Zuzuzu — five of ‘em.”

“And how many of us are standing right here?”

“One, two, three… five.”

“Then it’s right, isn’t it.”

The gatekeeper tilted his head and thought for a moment.

“……Yeah. …Yeah, yeah, that’s right. Go on through.”

Greidel gave Itami a look that said that’s all it takes.

The five of them — Itami included — proceeded down the narrow, long corridor without being stopped by anyone.

The staircase descending to the lower level admitted no outside light, making it necessary to rely on the torches mounted on the walls. The wavering, shifting flames sent shadows stretching and swaying along the corridor, requiring more careful attention to one’s footing than usual.

Eventually they came to a stout-looking door — thick timber set in an iron frame.

Greidel knocked. A peephole opened, as it had at the back gate, and the visitor was challenged.

“Who’s there?”

“It’s us, Modа.”

“What, Canfort? What are you doing here?”

Unlike the drunk at the back gate, this one showed no sign of intoxication. Talking his way past the way they had before wasn’t going to work so easily. So Canfort came clean about their purpose.

“We’ve got something we want to ask the Rose woman.”

“What kind of something?”

“It’s, well…”

He hadn’t expected to be asked for reasons, apparently, and Canfort found himself at a loss.

The fact that he was checking up on someone Albain had ordered imprisoned as Rose was effectively the same as doubting Albain. As conduct for a companion, that was the kind of thing that invited suspicion.

To see Rose, he was going to need to come up with some other reason convincing enough for the guard.

And at that point, Itami spoke up.

“If she’s a famous pirate, I figured she must have some treasure stashed away somewhere. Interested in where that might be?”

“What!? Hidden treasure? Where exactly—”

Moda’s eyes lit up with a glint of naked greed. Itami pitched his voice into the cadence of a street-corner schemer.

“That’s what we’re here to ask her, see. Want to come along and hear it for yourself?”

“Of course I do. I can expect a cut, yeah? And this juicy little tip — you’re not going to go reporting it to Lord Albain, are you?”

Itami put on a suitably villainous smile.

“Unlike Lord Albain, we’re all just trying to scrape by in a hard-knock world. If you don’t want to spend your old age worrying about where the next meal’s coming from, you’ve got to earn what you can while you can, right?”

“Can’t argue with that. All right, in you go…”

Moda, apparently convinced by Itami’s reasoning, threw open the door to the underground cells.

Having passed through two sets of locked doors, Itami and the others stepped down into the dungeon.

The castle’s basement had several cells, but at present it seemed Piña was the only prisoner.

Moda went first, torch held up, and warned them as they went.

“Watch your ears, you lot… I scared her a little to keep the Rose woman quiet, but that woman got so spooked by it that she keeps screaming her head off at the slightest thing. She’s been threatening to bite off her own tongue if anyone comes near her. The place echoes something fierce — it’ll hurt your ears.”

“That’s more than just ordinary fright. What exactly did you say to scare her?”

Canfort asked.

“Said her hanging was already decided. And that before the hanging, she’d be taking clients around the clock without a moment’s rest… that kind of thing.”

“Come on… you actually said that?”

Even Itami’s expression changed.

“It’s the best way to keep a female prisoner quiet. Besides, I wasn’t lying. It’s the normal procedure — female prisoners are put to work taking clients before their execution.”

“What!? Ode… Ode won’t allow that.”

Zuzuzu bristled with indignation.

“What, you didn’t know? Well, I suppose you lot always cut down your enemies on the spot when you fight them. You never bring them back here as prisoners, so it’s only natural you wouldn’t know. Death-row prisoners — men go to gladiatorial betting matches, women take clients. Even Canfort there was a gladiatorial slave. He must have fought condemned men before.”

“Is that true, Canfort?”

“It is.”

“I knew about it… it’s just common knowledge, isn’t it.”

Greidel looked to Sniest for agreement. Sniest shrugged as if he couldn’t believe anyone didn’t know.

“The food we give them in here isn’t free either. They’ve got to earn enough to cover their own keep.”

“That said — Rose hasn’t been touched yet, has she?”

“Right. Not yet. That bastard Bolhos told us not to let anyone near her, not to lay a finger on her. So we’ve been left twiddling our thumbs, thanks to him.”

“Which means Bolhos really does know something.”

Canfort spat, making no effort to hide his irritation.

Itami let out a quiet breath of relief to know Piña was still safe. But things couldn’t stay this way — sooner or later, she was going to end up in a terrible situation. Before that happened, he needed to get her out, by force if necessary.

“…This is the cell.”

Moda hung the torch on the corridor wall in front of the cell.

Beyond the iron bars it was dark and hard to see anything clearly. There was only the sense that something was lurking in the shadows at the back.

When Itami tried to peer through the bars, the something issued a warning.

“Stay back!”

It was Piña’s voice.

“C-come any closer, and I’ll bite off my tongue and die!”

“That’d save us the trouble of building a gallows. Go on then — do it, do it, give it a try!”

Moda egged her on.

“W-well, cleaning up my body afterward would certainly be a great deal of work. I have seen many corpses on the battlefield, and disposing of them is no small undertaking.”

“Then shut up and do as you’re told.”

“No. Stay back! I would rather truly bite off my tongue and die than endure any humiliation.”

“God, what a pain. We didn’t come here for any of that today.”

“‘Today’… you say? Then why come with so many people? You’re here to restrain me by force, aren’t you?”

“Hah? These lot have some questions they want to ask you, apparently.”

“Qu-questions? An inquiry? Thank goodness… I am called Shandy Gaff Marea. I am not a pirate by the name of Rose. This Rose you speak of attacked the merchant vessel Hugo off the Glass Peninsula, was repelled and captured. Investigate and you’ll find this to be the case.”

“There she goes again. We know you’re Rose.”

Guard Moda turned back to Itami with a look that said ask her about the treasure.

Itami crouched down in front of the bars and spoke.

“Shandy Gaff Marea. She died defending Emperor’s bedchambers to the last at Italica, Your Highness. Why are you using the name of a loyal retainer who gave her life in service?”

“Th-that voice — Lord Itami!?”

Piña came flying out from the deepest, darkest corner of the cell with enough force to nearly throw herself against the bars.

She clung to the iron grating and called out his name.

“Lord Itami! Lord Itami!”

“I know. I’ve come to rescue you.”

“Is that truly so? It isn’t another coincidence — not ‘I happened to be passing by’ or ‘I stumbled in here by accident’?”

“No — this time I’ve come specifically to rescue you, Ms. Piña.”

“Oh, thank the gods! Lord Itami has finally come to rescue me. Ueeeeeeeeeeeeeeeh!”

“You’re actually crying from happiness?”

“But Lord Itami is always so cold to me — I thought you’d abandoned me…”

“I wouldn’t do that. I said it’d be fine, didn’t I.”

While Itami and Piña were exchanging these words, Canfort and the guard quietly put distance between themselves and Itami, their hands moving to their swords and weapons. The story wasn’t what they’d been told — and now that it was clear Itami was an ally of the woman in the cell, their reaction was entirely natural.

But Itami turned around and addressed the five of them in a calm, measured tone.

“All right, allow me to make an introduction. This woman — and I won’t hide it — is not the pirate Rose. She is Crown Princess Piña Co Lada of the Empire.”

All five of them went blank. Guard Moda shot back that he was talking nonsense.

“Y-you — of all the things to say, you’re telling me this woman is the Empire’s crown princess? There’s no way I’m believing that. Besides, what would an imperial princess be doing in a backwater like this?”

“The Empire decided to send a special envoy to Tyuumeren, to try to calm them down before they started a war. That envoy was Princess Piña. But her flagship ran aground while sailing south along the Glass Peninsula coast. She climbed into a cutter to escape the danger, got swept away, and eventually washed up here… would you believe that?”

“Given the current situation on this Glass Peninsula, I can’t say it’s impossible.”

Sniest nodded at that — but Greidel rejected the idea that she could be the crown princess.

“If she were the Empire’s crown princess, why did she attack us instead of identifying herself properly?”

“Let me take that one.”

It was Sniest, not Itami, who answered.

“In the current state of this Glass Peninsula, if she’d announced who she was, she’d have been taken hostage immediately — used as a bargaining chip in negotiations with the Empire. In some scenarios, she might even have been handed over to Tyuumeren.”

“What? Why would anyone be allowed to do something as underhanded as taking a woman hostage?”

“Because that’s politics. The world doesn’t run on good intentions alone.”

“Damn. Then the reason this woman didn’t give her real name was…”

“Well, obviously.”

Once everyone appeared to have grasped the point being argued, Itami stated his position plainly.

“So what I want is to take her and get out of here.”

Itami glanced at the lock on the cell door. It was shaped like a large padlock, the kind opened by inserting a bar-shaped key. Built purely for durability — not something a person could break easily by force.

Greidel turned to Canfort.

“Hey, Canfort. If this woman’s true identity stayed hidden — what happens to her?”

“She gets hanged as the red-haired Rose.”

“That won’t do. Hey, you — if you really are the crown princess, just come out and say so. Even as a hostage, at least you’d keep your life.”

“If I am the crown princess, do you think I would do anything that places the Empire at a diplomatic disadvantage?”

“But still! You’d be put through terrible things. You’d be hanged. If you’re a princess, can’t you just lean on your father!?”

“That, I will not do. Nor will I betray my country to save myself. And besides — announcing who I am doesn’t guarantee my safety. ‘Do as we say or she dies’ — that is precisely what it means to be a hostage.”

Piña’s unflinching resolve left Greidel both impressed and somewhat exasperated.

“What an impossibly stubborn woman.”

Canfort gave a quiet “mm” and, without taking very long about it, made his decision.

“All right. I understand. We’ll help the princess.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa! Canfort — you’re going to let this woman go?”

“What other choice is there? Can you stand by and watch a woman who is not Rose get subjected to terrible treatment as if she were, and then be hanged? Can you watch the Empire’s crown princess be used as a tool for hostage diplomacy without a word? That is not right. It goes against Lord Albain’s own principles as well.”

“…But… this woman… she attacked Ode and the others.”

“That was nothing but a misunderstanding. This woman saw the devastation at Pido, was moved to outrage, and fought to free the captive girls — she is on the same side as us.”

The sun blazed down mercilessly, scorching both of their skin without mercy.

Piña, lying limp in the bottom of the cutter, had pulled the cutter’s canvas cover completely over her head in an attempt to shield herself from the unrelenting sunlight.

Itami, too, had pulled the top of his combat uniform over his head, fending off the brutal glare from above and its blinding reflection off the surface of the sea. His service cap and helmet had both been left behind on the ship. All he had on him now were the wallet and small personal items he’d already had on his person beforehand, along with his ammunition belt, sidearm, and rifle.

“Sir Itami… which direction do you suppose land might be?”

“Beats me… honestly, I really can’t say.”

Two full days and nights had passed since they’d been set adrift, and today already marked the third day.

The cutter had been loaded with neither water nor food. The only thing aboard, left there by who-knew-whom, was a single ten-liter commercial-use whisky cask, made of aluminum. Piña kept wanting to drink it in place of water, but Itami firmly, absolutely forbade it.

“Why on earth not!?”

“Alcohol takes moisture along with it when it evaporates. You know how your throat gets unbearably dry the day after you’ve had too much to drink? That’s exactly why.”

Itami, too, had once been part of the Special Forces Group, after all. He’d at least picked up enough knowledge to know what not to consume under survival conditions.

“Just a little, surely. Just enough to wet my throat a bit…”

“No. I can already see exactly how this goes — one sip turns into two, then three, then four, and there’s no end to it.”

“Mmnghh, Sir Itami is so mean… such a stubborn old block of stone…”

“Mean and proud of it.”

Pouting and fuming with indignation, Piña lay back down once more in the bottom of the cutter.

Itami had ordered her to stay lying down as much as possible, to conserve whatever stamina and bodily moisture they could.

“I wonder how the Hugo’s doing. I hope they managed to get themselves off that reef somehow.”

“It’s pretty impressive that you’ve got the spare capacity to worry about other people right now, Sir Itami.”

“Nah, it’s just that if the ship’s okay, that gives us some hope they’re out looking for us.”

“I see… that’s true, I suppose. There’s no way Hamilton and Grey wouldn’t be searching for us.”

“Man, I never would’ve imagined the cutter would actually end up getting swept out to sea like this.”

The two of them had climbed aboard the cutter tied to the ship’s side, relieved to have found a refuge — only for the rope suspending it to snap with a sudden crack, perhaps already weakened beforehand, sending them tumbling straight into the water below, where the current swept them away from the ship in no time at all.

“If only we could at least catch some fish.”

When he spotted what looked like a shark-like sea creature passing close by, its dorsal fin breaking the surface, Itami tried taking aim with his Type 64 rifle to bring it down.

But the shark-like creature, the moment it took the bullet, simply sank smoothly straight down into the sea. And it never resurfaced again.

“Didn’t know sharks don’t float.”

Still gripping his rifle, Itami hung his head.

“Guess I just killed it for nothing.”

Piña didn’t blame Itami for it; she simply accepted, with quiet resignation, the plain fact that they hadn’t managed to secure any food.

“Waaaaahhh! Which way is land!?”

From time to time, as if seized by a fit of madness, Piña would grab an oar and try to head toward land.

But what the two of them were aboard wasn’t some leisurely pond rowboat. It was a cutter built to carry a dozen or more people at once. There was no way one or two people paddling alone could ever build up sufficient speed, and pushing forward blindly without even establishing a direction was never going to make land magically appear on the horizon, either.

In the end, it always ended the same way: Piña, utterly exhausted, collapsing in a heap.

“I’m tired…”

Itami, who had been staring up at the sky, spoke to her.

“You really shouldn’t move around so much. Every drop of sweat is moisture leaving your body for good. You’ll end up dying early at this rate.”

“Ugh… hearing you put it that way just makes it feel even worse.”

Piña said this, then licked at a bead of sweat on her arm.

“Ugh, it’s salty.”

“Sweat’s got salt in it, you know.”

“Say, Sir Itami — there’s no guarantee we’ll be saved just sitting here like this. If I’m going to die shriveled up and parched anyway, I’d rather try my luck, however reckless it might be.”

“You’re surprisingly proactive about this.”

“It’s just my nature. Come now, Sir Itami. Won’t you work together with me toward land?”

“No thanks, that sounds exhausting.”

“You really are a lazy one, aren’t you.”

“Yeah, that’s just my nature.”

Piña let out a low chuckle.

“How very like you, Sir Itami.”

“I’m not exactly the brightest guy around, you know. If someone like me suddenly turned into a hard worker, I’d end up doing all kinds of stupid stuff and causing trouble for everyone around me. For an idiot like me, the best thing I can do for the world is just sit quietly and be lazy.”

“Is that your excuse for it? It’s a rather strange piece of logic, but I suppose it’s true enough that fools, left to their own devices, tend to meddle and end up wrecking everything in sight. In that case, I suppose it really would be better for someone like that to simply remain idle.”

“Right?”

“But by that same logic, I suppose I’m a fool too—one who throws herself wholeheartedly into foolish things. In truth, I’ve meddled in matters I shouldn’t have, time and time again, only to regret it afterward.”

“Damn it!” Piña cried in frustration, slamming her fist down against the gunwale of the boat.

Naturally, this was followed immediately by “Ow…” and a half-tearful rubbing of her own fist.

“Why on earth did I ever say I wanted to see the Glass Peninsula?”

It had been Piña’s own idea to ask the captain to bring the ship in close to shore, wanting to view the disputed Glass Peninsula from the sea. If she hadn’t said any such thing, the ship would never have approached the shallows in the first place, and never would have run aground at all.

“You’re not a fool, Your Highness. Out of everyone I know, you’d rank pretty high up on the not-foolish list, honestly. Though you do tend to be a little too earnest sometimes, to the point of running yourself ragged for nothing.”

“Is that really true?”

“Yeah. If anyone says otherwise, bring them to me. I’ll set them straight myself.”

“Hearing you say that puts my mind at ease.”

“A normal fool never even considers that they might be a fool, you know.”

“Is that how it works?”

“Probably. That’s exactly why they go and do whatever they feel like doing, without a shred of shame, and end up causing all kinds of trouble for everyone around them. The worst kind of person in this world is a hardworking fool who’s utterly convinced they’re in the right.”

“I see. Then perhaps I’ll be all right after all…”

Piña let out a relieved sigh and licked her parched lips. But the lack of moisture had already begun affecting even the inside of her mouth—no saliva came, no matter how much she licked at her lips, leaving them barely any more moist than before.

Piña slowly pushed herself upright, leaned out over the side of the boat, and dipped a hand into the seawater. She gazed at her salt-wet palm for a moment, then finally brought it up to her lips.

“It’s salty.”

“It’s seawater. Drinking seawater just makes you thirstier, you know.”

“Ahh. Everything I want to lick at is forbidden. No liquor, no seawater. Ugh, at this point I’d give up gold and silver and every treasure I own for just a single drop of water.”

Piña let her body collapse flat against the bottom of the boat with a thud. She didn’t even bother pulling the cover back over her head anymore. She simply let the sun scorch her skin as it pleased.

“Sir Itami. Before I die, I’d like to offer you my thanks. You’ve done nothing but help me, time and time again. That time, and that time, and that other time too, and now this…”

“I’m not sure which specific times Your Highness means, but it’s true enough that you and I have had a strangely persistent connection through all of this.”

“Could you perhaps do something about that ‘Your Highness’ business of yours, by now? If at all possible, I’d like you to simply call me Piña.”

“Drop the honorifics for the crown princess herself? Are you sure that’s all right?”

“There’s no one left in this entire world right now except you and me. What reason is there to hold back formalities between two people who are about to shrivel up and die alone together?”

“Then, Ms. Piña, I suppose.”

“Ms. Piña… now that’s a strangely ticklish thing to hear.”

Perhaps it wasn’t quite what she’d been hoping for, Piña let out a long sigh, as if her very soul were escaping along with it.

“If we’re dropping formalities, then it’s about time you came clean too, Ms. Piña.”

“Come clean about what?”

“That state secret of yours.”

“Ngh… of all moments, you choose now to bring that up.”

Piña let out a resigned sigh, hauled herself upright with effort, and opened the lid of the trunk case that had been stowed in a corner of the cutter. From beneath the underwear and clothing, she pulled out a large brown envelope.

“Here it is…”

“What’s that?”

“Look inside. And, d-don’t laugh…”

“I won’t laugh.”

Itami took the envelope and drew out a bundle of Kent-paper sheets from inside.

“Th… this is…”

Whether due to heatstroke, dehydration, or some combination of the two, Itami felt a wave of dizziness wash over him the very instant he laid eyes on the drawings.

It was, unmistakably, a hand-drawn original manuscript of what was commonly known as “yaoi dōjin manga.”

A staggering intensity of desire and passion practically radiated off the page, clearly welling up from somewhere deep within the artist. But the artistic skill, the composition, and various other technical abilities simply hadn’t caught up to that intensity. As a result, to Itami’s eyes, the work honestly looked like little more than a doodle by some elementary or middle schooler.

The fact that Piña had been clutching a manuscript like this so preciously close to her heart, all this time—

“I really hope I’m wrong, but, this is…”

“Mm, I drew it myself. Once contact with Nihon was severed, I could no longer read any new works of art, could I? To satisfy the hunger welling up inside my heart, there was nothing for it but to try drawing art of my own. I’d already purchased paper, ink, and pen nibs, after all. So I gave it a try, and, well, um… what do you think, having read it?”

Itami hesitated. He agonized over how he might phrase his evaluation in a way that wouldn’t wound her.

“Well, for starters, it’s impressive.”

“Isn’t it!?”

“Though, maybe we could work on the art a little more.”

“Ngh… I’m well aware of that myself, actually.”

“You’re aware of it?”

“More than aware, believe me… AAAAAAAAHHHH, that’s exactly why I never wanted to show this to anyone!! Laugh if you want to laugh. I already know perfectly well I’m terrible at drawing!”

Piña clawed at her own hair. Crying “state secret, state secret!” she snatched the manuscript back from Itami, shoved it forcibly into the trunk, and collapsed face-down.

“So this is the state secret, huh…”

Itami felt a splitting headache coming on and lay back down flat against the bottom of the boat. Given how dramatically it had been billed as something “trivial,” he’d been expecting something at least a little different from this.

In fact, what Itami had actually pictured, given that Emperor Fusto’s secret (the example Piña herself had cited) had turned out to be a matter of physical insecurity, was something more along the lines of wondering whether Piña’s bust might possibly be artificial.

But it turned out to be otherwise.

Once he knew the truth, the whole thing felt like a letdown. Not that he couldn’t understand the fear and shame of having one’s own creative work seen by someone else — but even so, that was no reason to classify something as a state secret. After all, it wasn’t something physical, like losing one’s hair or failing to develop a chest.

Itami felt a slow, simmering anger beginning to well up inside him.

“Ms. Piña!”

At that, Piña spread both arms wide toward him, wearing a smile like a merciful mother ready to receive all things.

“Ah, I thought as much. My secret was so utterly trivial that it has sent you into a towering rage. Very well — I shall receive the full force of your anger with my whole body. Do with me as you see fit.”

But Itami took hold of both of Piña’s outstretched arms and fixed his gaze intently on her eyes.

“Huh?”

Since Piña had never imagined Itami would do anything like this, she could only stand there bewildered.

“Listen. Setting aside the question of artistic merit entirely — drawing ability is something that improves with practice, up to a certain point, without exception. So let’s just practice. If you do, you’ll reach a point where you won’t have to hide it anymore.”

“What on earth are you talking about?”

“That’s what I’m saying! If you practice, you’ll get good enough that you can show people your work with confidence!”

“You really think so?”

“Yes. I’d stake my word on it. There’s a condition — only ‘up to a certain point’ — but that much is a place anyone can reach. Beyond that is where natural talent and real artistic sense come into play, but up to that point, the road is open to anyone!”

“R-really!?”

“I’d almost like to show you what Risa’s drawings used to look like.”

“Impossible! Lady Risa? That can’t be.”

“And yet, as a matter of fact, the point where her drawings actually became decent was honestly only quite recently—”

“If that’s truly the case… then I might be able to reach at least something like Lady Risa’s level? Oh — if Sir Itami is saying this sincerely, what an encouraging thing to hear. What a thing, what a thing… I feel, for the very first time in my life, that I truly understand what hope is. What happiness is.”

Piña said this and flung herself at Itami, clinging to him.

The force of it was more than Itami could brace against, and he toppled over flat onto his back.

“So, anyway — let’s do our best to survive, first of all. Don’t go thrashing around aimlessly. Stay still and wait for help. That’s all we can do — but right up to the very last moment, we keep holding on without giving up.”

“Are you truly sure it will be all right?”

“Yes. It’ll be fine. As long as we don’t give up, it’ll absolutely be fine!”

“A-all right. I’ll stop losing my head and flailing about.”

Piña nodded, her face still pressed against Itami’s chest.

Notes:

a shark-like sea creature – The original term is フカ (fuka), a regional or colloquial Japanese word for “shark,” distinct from the more standard サメ (same). While the distinction carries subtle dialectal or lexical nuance in Japanese, English does not have an equivalent variation that would be meaningful to preserve in this context.

It is therefore rendered simply as “shark,” with the added phrasing “shark-like sea creature” already conveying a degree of uncertainty or unfamiliarity appropriate to the fantasy setting. The regional flavor of the original term is not retained, as it does not contribute significantly to tone or characterization in a way that would justify a more marked translation.

 

“Guess I just killed it for nothing.” – What Itami says in the original text is 「無駄な殺生をしてしまったな」 (“Muda na sesshō o shite shimatta na”).  無駄な殺生 (muda na sesshō) means “a pointless or wasteful killing,” while 殺生 (sesshō) carries a slightly heavier, Buddhist-inflected connotation referring to the taking of life, often associated with the moral prohibition against killing living beings.

In this context, the expression suggests not just regret over the act itself, but a sense that the killing was unnecessary or lacking justification. It is rendered as “killed it for nothing,” which captures the Itami’s casual regret and awareness of waste without introducing explicitly religious or philosophical phrasing that would feel out of place in his internal voice.

 

The fact that Piña had been clutching a manuscript like this so preciously close to her heart, all this time— - In this sentence, the yojijukugo 後生大事 (goshō daiji) is expressed through “so preciously close to her heart,” indicating that she is treating the manuscript as something deeply valuable and worth protecting. Knowing that Piña is a fujoshi adds an important layer to this: the manuscript represents not just any creative work, but something tied to her personal passions and desires, particularly her interest in BL (やおい) content. This explains why she is so emotionally invested in it and why she guards it so carefully. At the same time, from Itami’s perspective — who sees the work as amateurish — the phrase retains a subtle ironic nuance. The contrast between Piña’s intense attachment and the actual quality of the manuscript reinforces the meaning of 後生大事 as cherishing something perhaps more than it objectively merits. This gap creates a gentle humor while also making Piña’s sincerity and vulnerability more apparent.

 

wondering whether Piña’s bust might possibly be artificial - The key word behind “artificial” is 偽乳 (nise-chichi), a colloquial term referring to artificial/fake breasts (e.g., padding or implants), used somewhat crudely. In context, Itami is trying to guess what kind of “secret” Piña might be hiding, based on her earlier buildup about something embarrassing or personal. Because previous examples involved physical insecurities, his thoughts turn to the possibility of a concealed bodily imperfection, leading him to imagine that her bust might not be natural. The use of 偽乳 here reflects a casual, somewhat blunt internal monologue rather than a formal or technical term, and it contributes to the comedic tone of the scene. This moment also contrasts sharply with reality — Piña’s actual “secret” turns out to be her self-drawn dōjinshi — highlighting how far off Itami’s assumption is and reinforcing the humor through misdirection.

 

a smile like a merciful mother ready to receive all things – Translated from 慈母のような笑み (jibo no yō na egao), an elevated, literary simile evoking the image of a gentle, all-embracing maternal figure. The phrase carries a tone of serene compassion and unconditional acceptance. In context, however, its grand, almost sanctified imagery is humorously disproportionate to the situation: Piña frames herself as dignified and self-sacrificing, adopting the pose of a noble, martyr-like figure despite the fundamentally light and comedic nature of the moment. This contrast between elevated diction and trivial reality heightens the humor while also revealing her dramatic self-perception.

 

“My secret was so utterly trivial that it has sent you into a towering rage.” – The phrase “towering rage” renders the classical idiom 怒りが心頭に発して (ikari ga shintō ni hasshitewhich literally means “anger rising to the very top of one’s head,” and corresponds to expressions like “to fly into a rage” or “to be overcome with fury.” This idiom has a distinctly literary or elevated tone, fitting Piña’s formal, somewhat aristocratic manner of speaking. The translation preserves the sense of anger reaching an extreme peak, while maintaining natural English flow. Notably, the line is humorous because Piña is completely misreading Itami’s actual state — he is not enraged but rather bewildered or exasperated — making her grand, dramatic phrasing disproportionate to reality and reinforcing the comedic tone of the exchange.

 

“Beyond that is where natural talent and real artistic sense come into play, but up to that point, the road is open to anyone!” - The phrase “natural talent” renders 天賦の才 (tenpu no sai) , a formal compound meaning “heaven-bestowed talent,” referring to innate ability granted by nature rather than acquired through effort. This term carries a slightly elevated or philosophical tone. The addition of “real artistic sense” reflects the original pairing 才とかセンスといったものが必要 (Tenpu no sai toka sensu to itta mono ga hitsuyō), in which innate talent (才, sai) is explicitly linked with “sense” (センス¸sensu), i.e., intuitive artistic judgment or aesthetic instinct. The translation captures both elements naturally in English, preserving the distinction between learnable technical skill and inborn aptitude, while maintaining the explanatory, encouraging tone of the original statement.

 

“I’ll stop losing my head and flailing about.” - The phrase “flailing about” renders 盲動(mōdō), meaning “blind” or “reckless action,” i.e., acting without clear thought, direction, or plan. The term itself carries a somewhat formal or literary nuance, often used to describe impulsive behavior driven by panic or confusion. In this context, however, the translation softens that register into the more natural and slightly self-deprecating “flailing about,” which better matches Piña’s tone as she reflects on her earlier oar-grabbing outbursts. This choice preserves the core sense of uncontrolled, directionless action while aligning with her sheepish acknowledgment of her own behavior, maintaining both character voice and conversational flow.

——Imperial Palace, Imperial Capital ——

 Inside the Crown Princess’s office, Piña Co Lada sat at her desk.

As she sharpened pencils with a small knife while humming to herself, she looked remarkably cheerful.

Imported Kent paper lay on the desk, beside three pencils sharpened to needle-like points.

Piña held another pencil in her hand. Erasers, parchment sheets, and bottles of ink were arranged neatly nearby.

“Your Highness!”

The moment Hamilton’s voice rang out in protest, Piña hastily hid the Kent paper beneath a stack of documents. Her cheerful expression instantly transformed into an irritated one.

“What is it? If you’ve come to scold me again, I’ve heard quite enough already.”

“But Your Highness!”

“I told you not to bring it up!”

“However—!”

“I know, I know! But this is one matter that cannot be helped!”

“Yes, it can. All you need do is declare that you already have a man in whom you’re interested and that no further matchmaking is required!”

“But if I say that, the next question will be who this man is. I cannot answer that, because no such person exists.”

“So Your Highness would truly allow some unknown nobody to be thrust upon you?”

“Calling them nobodies is rather harsh. For example...”

Piña searched desperately for an example. Her eyes darted across the room before landing on a document atop her desk.

“Yes, for example... Count Elmiere’s son or Baron Madore are both Imperial nobles.”

Hamilton immediately seized the opening.

“Those two have only just been elevated to the nobility! Furthermore, Count Elmiere’s son is a Dark Elf, and Baron Madore is a Dwarf. Are you seriously considering introducing demi-human blood into the Imperial House!?”

“That reminds me. Lord Cicero said something similar and opposed the idea with incredible enthusiasm. His speech lasted nearly an entire day. I felt as though I were being tortured by drowsiness.”

“On the matter of speech length, I agree completely. As for the substance of his argument, however, I agree with him entirely.”

Hamilton launched into a detailed explanation.

“If Count Elmiere became Your Highness’s consort, his extraordinary lifespan would allow him to dominate politics long after Your Highness’s reign ended. Your children would likewise live far longer than ordinary humans. The succession cycle of the Imperial House would cease to align with that of the Empire itself. Can you imagine the problems that would create? That is precisely why everyone keeps presenting you with prospective spouses!”

She thrust yet another list onto Piña’s desk.

“W-What? More candidates?”

“Yes. And there will certainly be more.”

“That’s troublesome. If I have to meet every single one of them, nothing else will ever get done. Even meeting two people a day, this would take over a year.”

Hamilton spoke patiently.

“That is why I keep saying it. Please issue a declaration that you will choose your own spouse and require no introductions.”

“I wouldn’t object to that, but let me ask you something. Suppose I personally chose an ugly fellow like an Orc. What then?”

Hamilton visibly stiffened.

“If... if that were truly Your Highness’s wish... then I would accept it. No matter who he was, if he were the man Your Highness chose, I would respect him as Your Highness’s husband and serve him faithfully...”

Tears streamed from her eyes as she spoke through clenched teeth. Despite her words, she looked utterly miserable.

“Don’t force yourself, Hamilton.”

“But I have no right to be selfish...”

“Quite right. I am the Crown Princess, after all. The man I choose concerns not only myself but the future of the Empire. What matters is not what I want, but what I ought to do.”

“Would you truly sacrifice that much of yourself?”

“Yes. One of the former Emperors left behind a saying: becoming Emperor means that even the things once in your own hands cease to belong to you. This body and this heart are not mine to do with as I please. Had I been merely an ordinary woman, I might have acted as Bozes did. But I cannot. I shall entrust myself to whoever brings the greatest benefit to the Empire.”

“But what about Your Highness’s own feelings?”

“Those can be fed to the dogs for all I care.”

Hamilton had no reply to Piña’s despairing words.

Piña had resolved to carry the entire Empire upon her slender shoulders.

Perhaps it was her resentment toward her brother, who had coveted the throne merely to satisfy his own ego and nearly ruined the Empire. Perhaps it was also the sense of responsibility that came from having been the one to overthrow him. Whatever the cause, it had driven her to an almost extreme sense of duty.

As things stood, Piña would not even listen unless a proposal could be justified in terms of the national interest.

Faced with such a stubborn mistress, Hamilton wondered how she could possibly loosen that resolve. Hoping to discover what sort of man Piña considered ideal, she ventured a question.

“What sort of person would Your Highness consider your ideal partner?”

“Did I not just say? Someone who brings benefit to the Empire.”

“Yes, but what sort of man would that be, in Your Highness’s eyes? There is no cost in speaking frankly here, so please, indulge me and tell me without reservation.”

“Let me think.”

After a moment’s consideration, Piña began describing her ideal.

“The Emperor must unite not only the human races, but many different peoples and species besides. Therefore, I would want someone whom both humans and the various demi-human races could accept without hesitation. The sort of man whose mere presence at my side would persuade others to accept my rule. Yet I would also prefer someone without an ‘I, me, mine’ sort of ambition. Excessive ambition divides nations, and if he were to start wars on his own initiative, the Empire’s strength would only suffer. He must not have expensive tastes, either. Most important of all, he must be tolerant of my artistic interests. And it would be reassuring if he possessed overwhelming military power as a backing. The second or third son of a great power rivaling the Empire would be ideal. That alone would quiet some of the neighboring states that have become rather overconfident lately. And besides that…”

Hamilton could only stare in disbelief at a description so impossibly convenient.

“Does a man with that much power and no ambition even exist?”

At that moment, an officer of the Imperial Guard entered and snapped his heels together with an audible click.

“What is it? Have you come to volunteer as my husband?”

“No, Your Highness. While it would be a tremendous honor, I lack the qualifications. Besides, I have no desire to spend my life as a well-fed breeding stallion. And if I may add, I have absolutely no understanding of the ‘art’ currently fashionable among you noble ladies!”

“Then what do you want?”

“A letter has arrived from Lady Bozes. I have come to deliver it.”

Presented upon the officer’s palm, the item drew a wry smile from Imperial Crown Princess Piña Co Lada.

In every respect except one, the letter perfectly conformed to Imperial etiquette, convention, and protocol. The message had been written on parchment, rolled up, sealed with wax, and prepared with flawless formality.

The exception was its size.

It was so tiny that it looked more suitable for a fairy or a doll than for a human recipient.

Pinching the miniature letter delicately between thumb and forefinger, Piña carefully unfolded it. Even the parchment itself was unusually thin. A careless movement might tear it apart.

Having completed his duty, the guards officer withdrew with a visibly relieved expression.

“I wonder this every time. What exactly is Bozes thinking when she makes her letters this small?”

“The secret behind their astonishing speed may well be their size. Messages from Alnus arrive in roughly three days.”

“At this point she could at least tell us how it works. Every time I ask, she says it is still experimental or not yet ready to be revealed.”

“Well, the Palesti family undoubtedly has its own interests to consider. They probably intend to complete development first and secure a monopoly on the rights to this communication technology before announcing it.”

“If they are using such an important secret to send this message, then it must contain something quite significant.”

Bringing the parchment close to her face, Piña narrowed her eyes.

The tiny sheet, scarcely larger than a memo slip, was packed so densely with writing that reading it required considerable effort.

“Ugh... the handwriting is far too small.”

When she finally finished, Piña tossed the letter onto her desk and rubbed her temples.

It seemed her eyes were not the only thing exhausted. Leaning heavily against the back of her chair, she let out an enormous sigh.

“What did Lady Bozes write?”

“It concerns Sir Itami. He is coming to the Imperial Capital. Apparently he will accompany Lord Sugawara as part of the delegation dealing with the Tumaren affair.”

“I see. That gentleman.”

“Yes. That man.”

As Piña spoke his name, her lips curved into a gentle half-smile.

“And apparently the black one, the white one, and the golden one will not be accompanying him this time. Nor the dark one.”

Hamilton immediately understood.

The black one was Rory, the white one Lelei, the golden one Tuka, and the dark one Yao.

“Well, it is official business. That is only natural. And what did Lady Bozes say?”

“She wrote that this may be the first and last time that man comes to the Imperial Capital alone. That I must not let this ‘opportunity’ pass me by. And indeed... it is an opportunity.”

“What do you mean?”

“I was thinking that perhaps I should accompany the delegation to Tumaren myself.”

“Wait a moment. How did we arrive at that conclusion?”

“I would like to establish some diplomatic achievements before ascending the throne. Purely for political reasons. Besides, if I leave the Imperial Capital, the matter of finding me a spouse should quiet down for a while, should it not? It would give everyone time to cool their heads.”

Hamilton found the explanation rather strained.

Each reason made sense individually, but in context the conclusion appeared far too abrupt. If this was truly an ‘opportunity,’ then Itami’s presence had to be part of the reason.

Could it be...!?

At that instant, Hamilton received what felt like a divine revelation.

She suddenly understood whom Piña was thinking about, and what she intended to do.

Surely Her Highness doesn’t mean Sir Itami...?

When she considered it, Itami fulfilled a surprising number of the conditions Piña had just listed.

Because he had slain the Flame Dragon, he was respected not only by humans but by the demi-human races as well.

Yet despite that, he showed no trace of ambition.

His hobbies consisted of grinning at silly comic books and illustrated stories. Such interests cost almost nothing.

As for tolerance toward Piña’s artistic pursuits, the root cause of those pursuits was his ex-wife in the first place. Of course he would understand them.

In other words, all those conditions Piña had listed pointed directly at Itami.

Seen in that light, the meaning behind Bozes’s warning not to miss this opportunity became perfectly clear.

So too did Piña’s sudden desire to travel to Tumaren.

Hamilton was shaken by her own conclusion.

What should I do? What can I do?

Unable to calm herself, she fidgeted restlessly.

Indeed, it was an opportunity.

As Bozes had written, circumstances could scarcely be more favorable for Piña to spend time alone with Itami.

Yet Hamilton tilted her head.

“Wait a moment. If that’s true, then why doesn’t Your Highness simply make Sir Itami her leading marriage candidate?”

If Piña cared for him, and if Itami satisfied all the political requirements for a marriage alliance, then surely the straightforward solution would be to negotiate openly.

The Emperor and the Senate would grumble, perhaps, but if Piña stood firm they would not oppose her too strongly.

That was how great the hero’s reputation had become within the Empire.

So if she was not doing that, there had to be a reason.

After a few moments of thought, Hamilton suddenly struck her palm.

“Of course. Sir Itami is a commoner...”

A political marriage only works when both parties carry the weight of nations, territories, or noble houses upon their shoulders.

A commoner, free to marry according to personal affection, would hardly respond to a proposal based solely on political convenience.

Of course, it was premature to assume such a thing without asking.

Yet Piña herself had likely already convinced herself that she would never be considered a suitable match.

“So that means Your Highness...”

That was why Piña had suppressed her true feelings and resigned herself to accepting a spouse she did not truly want.

The reason she never spoke strongly on the matter of marriage was likely because she had already given up.

Anyone but the one she truly wanted would do.

But Hamilton could not accept that conclusion.

It still failed to explain why Piña intended to travel to Tumaren.

If one truly wished to abandon a hopeless love, then the sensible thing would be to keep one’s distance.

Seeing the person again, hearing their voice again, would only awaken feelings that had finally been locked away.

Such emotions would race out of control unless brought to a proper conclusion. That was simply the nature of a maiden’s heart.

“I see. Her Highness has decided on a desperate charge.”

Hamilton’s speculation reached its final stage.

“She’s going to gamble everything on one last chance.”

To settle her feelings once and for all, Piña intended to make one final attempt.

If she succeeded, so much the better.

If she failed, then at least she would have a clean ending and could finally move on.

But Hamilton could not accept that conclusion either.

“No! Absolutely not!”

If some strange man was going to become Her Highness’s husband, then Itami would be far preferable.

True, Itami fell far short of Hamilton’s ideal.

Yet compared to an ugly brute like an orc, he was vastly superior.

Indeed, if Piña loved him, then surely he was the ideal choice.

“What should I do?”

Hamilton began desperately searching for a way to bring Piña and Itami together.

In the end, everything depended upon one question:

How did Itami feel about Piña?

Piña’s feelings were already decided. The simplest solution would be to make Itami return them.

Unfortunately, that was precisely the difficult part.

“Come to think of it... men without ambition are a nuisance.”

At the very least, there was no hope of tempting him with Piña’s authority or immense wealth.

If he could be swayed by such things, he would no longer satisfy the requirement of being free from ambition.

Titles and prestige, which normally enhanced a marriage proposal, became little more than burdensome handicaps when dealing with a man like him.

In other words, Piña would have to fight using nothing but the advantages she had been born with: her beauty and her character.

“Fight? Against whom!?”

The moment that thought crossed her mind, Hamilton finally understood why Piña had already given up, convinced that someone like herself had no chance.

Her rivals were Rory Mercury, Tuka Luna Marceau, and Lelei La Lalena. And on top of that, Yao Haa Dushi would also be in the running.

Frankly speaking, they were a terrifying lineup of opponents.

Even as Crown Princess, Piña was still only human. No matter how much authority or dignity she possessed, there was no way she could rival Rory, an apostle of a god, in sheer charisma or exalted presence.

Nor could she hope to match Tuka the elf in beauty. She could not compete with Lelei, who had earned the title of mage at such a young age, in intellect. And if the contest came down to feminine allure, Yao, a mature dark elf, was waiting in the wings.

“I see. So that’s why Your Highness…”

Piña must have looked at the overwhelming strength of her opponents and fallen into despair. That was why she had surrendered before the battle had even begun.

Hamilton found Piña’s quiet resignation almost unbearably endearing.

“But no, Your Highness! There are no forbidden moves in love!”

No matter how a husband and wife came together, what mattered in the end was that their hearts met and they found happiness. That was Hamilton’s firm belief.

Her own parents were proof of it.

Hamilton’s parents had entered into a political marriage. From the very first time they met, each had thought, “I like this person.” Yet because the match had been arranged politically, the formal relationship of husband and wife came before they had truly communicated their feelings.

As a result, things became more complicated.

“I care for this person. But they probably don’t care for me nearly as much.”

That uncertainty made each of them overly considerate of the other. Their unnecessary caution worked against them, creating awkwardness and distance, and their marriage steadily grew colder.

Fortunately, a small incident eventually allowed them to understand one another’s feelings. After that, they became so close that no one would ever have guessed their marriage had begun as a political arrangement. Even now, they were so affectionate that Hamilton found it embarrassing to watch.

Her mother often told her the same thing.

“If only I had been a little more honest, we wouldn’t have taken such a long detour.”

That was all it took.

Just a little honesty.

Because she had witnessed such an example firsthand, Hamilton wanted Piña to end up with someone she genuinely loved.

If Piña was willing to sacrifice herself for the sake of the Empire, then surely she should at least be allowed to choose her own spouse.

“Very well. If it has come to this, then I, Hamilton, shall step forward on Your Highness’s behalf.”

With her resolve firmly set, Hamilton thumped her chest.

She would use every trick at her disposal to bring Piña and Itami together.

No matter what.

Absolutely no matter what.

After all, if a human man was going to choose a mate, surely a human woman was the better choice.

And except for that little mage girl, all the others were over a hundred years older. Those older women could go find suitably aged old men for themselves. Naturally, Itami would prefer someone young and full of life.

That would leave only the little girl from Luludo as a rival. Piña would have more than enough chance of victory.

“Besides, Your Highness wins in the chest department!”

If necessary, she could follow Bozes’s example and establish the relationship first, then force the issue afterward. In the worst case, there was always the option of giving both Piña and Itami an aphrodisiac, locking them in a room together for two or three days, and calling it a success.

No, calling that the “worst case” was far too timid.

If anything, she ought to deploy the ultimate weapon right from the start and make sure Itami had no avenue of escape.

In other words:

“Starting at the climax.”

“I wonder if Fetoran aphrodisiacs can be bought in the pleasure district…”

Apparently Hamilton had spoken that thought aloud, because Piña tilted her head curiously.

“Hmm? Fetoran? Hamilton, what exactly are you thinking about?”

“Nothing at all, Your Highness.”

“If you say so… In any case, keep yourself together. We’re heading to Tumaren, remember.”

While Hamilton had been lost in her schemes, Piña had reached a decision of her own regarding the journey to Tumaren. To her, it was probably a journey to create one final memory.

But Hamilton had no intention of letting it end that way.

The last chance?

No.

She would make certain that this would instead be remembered as the moment fate first began to change.

The prospect of the coming battle filled Hamilton with excitement.

“I’ll make the arrangements for Your Highness’s departure to Tumaren immediately.”

“Very good. I’m counting on you.”

“Leave everything to me. I’ll make sure it all works out.”

Hamilton flashed a confident grin.

Believing wholeheartedly that she was acting for Piña’s sake, she dashed off at full speed.

Toward a direction that would prove enormously troublesome for everyone involved.

NOTES:

Kent paper - Kent paper (ケント紙, Kento-shi) is a high-quality, smooth drawing paper widely used in Japan for illustration, drafting, and manga artwork. The scene strongly implies that Piña is secretly working on drawings or manga-related projects, a recurring aspect of her otaku-influenced characterization after exposure to Japanese culture.

 “Those can be fed to the dogs for all I care.” - The original is 「そんなものは犬にでも喰わせろだ」 (“Sonna mono wa inu ni demo kuwase-ro da”). This is a deliberately coarse and self-denying expression. Literally, Piña says that her own feelings can be “thrown to the dogs.” The line underscores how completely she has subordinated personal desire to duty and reason of state.

 “an ‘I, me, mine’ sort of ambition” - Piña says 「俺が俺が」 (“ore ga ore ga”), an expression describing someone who constantly pushes themselves to the forefront: “Me! Me! Me!” It conveys egotism, self-promotion, and a desire to dominate attention. Her rejection of such a personality reflects her experience with Zorzal and the civil war.

 “a well-fed breeding stallion” - The guards officer jokes that he does not want to be treated as a 「飼い殺しの種馬」 (“kai-goroshi no taneuma”). Taneuma (種馬)literally means a stud horse kept for breeding. The image humorously reduces the role of imperial consort to that of a politically useful reproductive asset rather than a husband.

 “…the ‘art’ currently fashionable among you noble ladies!” — In the original, the officer says 「貴『腐』人方の間で流行している芸術」 (“ki-‘fu’-jin-gata no aida de hayatte iru geijutsu”). This is a written pun on the respectful term 貴婦人 (kifujin, “noble ladies”), in which the character 婦 (“lady, wife”) is replaced with 腐 (“rotten”), creating a visually distinct but identically pronounced fujin.

The substitution alludes to the otaku term fujoshi (腐女子, “rotten girls”), a self-deprecating label for female fans of male–male romance fiction. Since Piña and her circle are known for their enthusiasm for such works, the officer is teasingly addressing them as kifujin while simultaneously inviting the reader to interpret it as fujin. The result is a joke that remains outwardly respectful in speech while subtly likening them to fujoshi.

This wordplay cannot be fully preserved in English. The translation “noble ladies” accurately conveys the surface meaning but necessarily loses both the visual pun and the fujoshi reference. The humor exists entirely in the written form; when spoken aloud, fujin is indistinguishable from the ordinary word for “ladies.”

 “And apparently the black one, the white one, and the golden one will not be accompanying him this time. Nor the dark one.” – The original line reads 「しかも、今回は黒と白と金色いのが同行しないそうだ。ダークのもいない」 (“Shikamo, konkai wa kuro to shiro to kin’iro i no ga dōkō shinai sō da. Dāku no mo inai”). Piña refers to Rory, Lelei, Tuka, and Yao entirely by color. This reflects how familiar she has become with Itami’s entourage. The shorthand is affectionate and slightly teasing, as though everyone involved immediately knows who is meant without further explanation.

 “Her Highness has decided on a desperate charge.” - Hamilton’s phrase evokes military language. The original 「捨て身の突撃」 (“sutemi no totsugeki”) literally means a “self-sacrificing assault” or “suicidal charge.” Hamilton humorously interprets Piña’s romantic intentions as a military operation, fitting both the novel’s military setting and her own dramatic imagination.

 “men without ambition are a nuisance” - The original 「欲のない奴ってやっかいね」 (Yoku no nai yatsu tte yakkai ne) is ironic. Throughout the passage, Hamilton realizes that all the usual tools of political matchmaking—status, wealth, power, influence—are ineffective precisely because Itami lacks interest in them. What would normally be a virtue becomes, from the perspective of a scheming matchmaker, an obstacle.

 “There are no forbidden moves in love!” – The original text reads 「恋には禁じ手はありません！」 (“Koi ni wa kinjite wa arimasen!”). The expression 禁じ手 (kinjite) literally means a “forbidden move” or “prohibited technique.” It originates from games and martial contexts, where certain actions are illegal or unsporting. In modern Japanese it is often used metaphorically for tactics that are morally questionable, unfair, or considered “off limits.” Hamilton humorously applies the term to romance, declaring that all restraints are suspended when it comes to helping Piña find happiness. The line signals her transition from concerned advisor to self-appointed matchmaker.

 the little girl from Luludo – In the original text, ルルドの小娘 (Rurudo no komusume). Hamilton is referring dismissively to Lelei. 小娘 (komusume) literally means “young girl,” but when used by an adult woman about a younger rival it often carries a mildly disparaging tone, akin to “that little girl” or “that brat.” Hamilton has mentally transformed what she sees as a diplomatic problem into a romantic competition and is already ranking Piña’s supposed rivals.

 “Starting at the climax.”  - Translated from   「最初っからクライマックス」 (“Saisho kara kuraimakkusu”), this s a pop-cultural reference familiar to many Japanese readers. It echoes the catchphrase 「最初からクライマックスだぜ！」 (“Saisho kara kuraimakkusuda ze!,” “It’s climax from the very beginning!”) associated with the protagonist of the tokusatsu series Kamen Rider Den-O. The phrase is used humorously to describe skipping all buildup and immediately deploying one’s strongest measures. Here, Hamilton’s increasingly absurd schemes escalate from matchmaking to outright kidnapping and aphrodisiacs, making the reference especially fitting.

 “I wonder if Fetoran aphrodisiacs can be bought in the pleasure district…” – In the phrase フェトランの媚薬 (Fetoran no biyaku), 媚薬 (biyaku) refers to a love potion or aphrodisiac, a common trope in fantasy fiction, romantic comedy, and light novels. Hamilton’s casual consideration of obtaining one demonstrates how far her imagination has spiraled. The humor comes from the contrast between her outward role as a refined court secretary and the increasingly reckless methods she is willing to contemplate in service of Piña’s love life.

 Toward a direction that would prove enormously troublesome – The original reads はた迷惑な方角に向けて (hatameiwaku na hōgaku ni mukete). はた迷惑 (hatameiwaku) refers to behavior that inconveniences or troubles bystanders rather than the person responsible. The narrator is wryly commenting that Hamilton’s enthusiastic efforts, though motivated by loyalty and affection, are likely to create chaos for everyone around her. It is a classic example of the omniscient narrator’s dry humor throughout GATE.