novelraw Chapter 183 : Chapter 183
Chapter 183 : Chapter 183
Chapter 183: What to Prepare Before Departing on an Adventure (5)
Silence fell.
Monica blinked as she looked at Abel. It seemed she was expecting some kind of answer. Abel shot a glance at Dietrich for a moment, then, arms folded, let out a sigh.
"Return, Dietrich."
"Understood."
It was a pleasure meeting you, and.
Dietrich whispered softly as he reached out his arm. With his gaunt hand, he turned the wheels of his wheelchair. Dietrich slowly made his way toward the archway door of the office. Monica held the door open with a sullen expression, and Dietrich responded with a faint smile.
Thud.
The archway door closed before long.
'I've heard it before.'
Monica thought, watching Abel.
The Mother God's Right Hand, and the Mother God's Left Hand.
She had heard of them from Lizer. She had even tried asking what they were. At the time, class had been starting, so she'd been unable to get an answer, but now there didn't seem to be any need to ask after their meaning.
"Monica, I......"
"It's some kind of code, isn't it?"
At Monica's words, Abel's expression went blank.
With her index finger raised, Monica began to go on.
"It was strange how Senior Lizer suddenly showed up, and how I ended up going with you to Portsmouth. There's no reason for someone about to graduate from the Department of Elemental Studies to be assisting a professor. The way he reacted as if he knew me was a little suspicious too. Now that I think about it, it seems you two were already acquainted."
Is this tied to some secret mission?
The Hero, or the Mother God's Right Hand, or the Mother God's Left Hand......,
To me it all sounds like a code.
"It only makes sense that you'd converse in codes. You are the Sword Saint, after all. Senior Lizer must be some kind of collaborator, right? A little young to be called a Sword Saint's collaborator, but since he's clearly no ordinary human, I can accept it. In that case, what does 'Hero of Epezeria' mean? That probably refers to your star pupil......"
"Monica."
Abel let out a sigh.
He couldn't listen any longer. Up till now he must have been working to convey the truth to Monica. Why had he failed time and again? Rather than forcing himself to accept the shambolic logic unfolding before him, it might not be bad to quietly ask himself.
Am I the Hero, and.
"Hand over the bag. You've packed far too much."
"What are you talking about. These are all things I need."
Really, I do.
Monica muttered with a pouty expression.
She set the bag she'd been carrying on her back onto the round table.
"Hero."
Abel reached out his hand.
Unfolding the bag and inspecting it, he opened his mouth.
"If you were the Hero, how do you imagine you would feel?"
"How am I supposed to know. I've never been one."
"At least try to imagine. You've read plenty of fairy tales about the Hero. Try thinking of yourself as that insufferable blond fellow in the fairy tales."
"First of all, the Hero has plenty of good fortune."
Monica leaned back in her chair.
She crossed her legs and folded her arms. The black leather armor Abel had gifted her. The body clad in it began to be dyed by the hue of sunset.
"You seem to be seriously mistaken, Professor. The reason I like the Hero isn't that I can project myself onto him. It's not because I can imagine what it must feel like to be the Hero. It's actually the opposite."
It's because I absolutely cannot project myself onto him.
What it would feel like to be the Hero. It's because I could never imagine such a thing.
Monica murmured.
"Some things are radiant precisely because you can't reach them. Jewels are like that too. They're at their most beautiful when you don't have them. Even if you get your hands on the real thing, it's useless. You'll only start wanting a more radiant jewel. In that respect, the Hero is a reassuring figure."
Stronger than anyone......,
Kinder than anyone, nobler, more radiant......,
Also more thoughtful, more courageous, more considerate......,
"He's so magnificent that I can't dare to imagine him. That's exactly why he was chosen by the Holy Sword."
"Rubbish."
Like the goods stuffed into this bag of yours.
Your story is hollow, and the things you've packed are hollow as well.
Abel murmured.
"Bandages aren't needed. Recovery spells will suffice."
Whoosh.
Abel flung the bandages behind him.
Inwardly, he thought. Does she revere the Hero the way one clings to a hope with no grounding?
"What did you pack syringes for. Planning to inject some banned drug?"
Clatter.
Abel sent the syringes scattering.
Inwardly, he thought. Just as it's hard for a pauper to picture themselves becoming a member of the imperial family, she must be incapable of so much as entertaining the possibility of being the Hero.
"A rainwater filter isn't needed either. We'll be heading to a place where it hardly ever rains."
There was room to understand it.
For Monica, the scope of the miraculous must be narrow. A life of hardship impoverishes not only the belly but the imagination too. Escaping her subsistence in the slums to be admitted into CIAR was already an upheaval beyond what she could have hoped for. Every day she had spent as a student of CIAR was, for Monica, already a miracle in itself.
'Either way, she'll come to realize it soon.'
At the very least, before this journey is over,
Monica would have to realize the whole of the truth.
Thinking so, Abel reached out his hand, and,
"This 'BRAVE QUEST' board game......"
What on earth did you pack this for, and.
Just as Abel was about to ask,
"I need it."
Monica pressed her lips together as she spoke.
It seemed she couldn't bear it any longer. Watching her packed-in belongings be cast aside one after another.
"I need all of it. These are all things you absolutely need to survive in the wilderness......"
"They are not needed."
Abel let out a sigh.
The board game with illustrations of the Hero on it. After placing it back in her bag, he held the bag out toward Monica.
"We are going on an adventure. The lighter the load, the better. The rest can be procured on site."
"Where are you suddenly telling me we're going?"
"The western border city, Dauane."
"......Right."
I'm not even surprised anymore.
Monica muttered as she slung the bag over her shoulder.
Off to a western border city overnight. If anyone but Abel had said so, she would have snapped back asking what kind of nonsense he was spouting.
"Is this part of the training too?"
"No. It is an adventure."
Every adventure is the real thing.
Murmuring so, Abel stepped forward.
Carrying the backpack containing his own belongings.
[Professor Argento. I have just returned.]
Meanwhile, Fabien revealed himself as he opened the archway door.
He seemed to have stopped by the capital's commercial district. The basket Fabien was carrying had all manner of office supplies piled high inside.
[Are you heading out somewhere?]
"I am. Did I not say I'd be away for several days?"
[Of course you did. May I ask your destination?]
"The western border city, Dauane."
[......Right.]
I'm not even surprised anymore.
Fabien muttered, cradling the basket in his arms.
Off to a western border city overnight. If anyone but Abel had said so, he would have taken it for some sort of metaphor.
"Monica."
Then, Abel came to a stop.
He turned back to look at Monica.
"The things to prepare for an adventure."
Monica had been in the middle of bowing her head toward Fabien.
Fabien and Monica gazed at Abel with blank expressions, and,
"The first of them is......"
A smile.
Abel murmured.
"Hardships will pile on, and predictions will become meaningless. The romance that fills travelogues is nothing but bluster. So a smile is enough. There's nothing else we can prepare anyway."
So smile in advance, and.
After whispering softly, Abel walked on ahead.
"How ridiculous."
Monica brushed her hair back.
Smile, he says. Is now the time for that? When I'm being dragged off to the far edge of the west without any idea why. She could have managed a forced chuckle easily enough, but the smile Abel was demanding wouldn't be that sort. Monica followed after Abel with her face scrunched up.
"You aren't smiling either, Professor."
***
"All of you, what's with those faces?"
Abel looked back.
Music, and cheers, and, along with them, prayers.
Even things upright and earnest became unruly once entangled beyond measure.
He had just broken through the performances of countless military bands. He had just turned to face the crowd of faces loudly bestowing their blessings. He had just peered into the hopes resting in every one of their hearts. And so a road lay before him. At the end of the road lay a clear purpose.
"Really, I can't look at this. Why the long faces?"
The subjugation of the Demon King.
It was an adventure begun to achieve that end.
Abel and his companions were taking their first steps of the journey.
"The things to prepare for an adventure."
There he goes again, that damned bastard.
The mage, Leon Baibars, thought.
He scratched the back of his neck and furrowed his brow.
His eyes were drenched with radiance, and his silver hair looked like a skein of the finest thread. The man Abel Argento was always like that. No impression of beauty came with it, though. All he did was laugh ludicrously and bend his face about clown-like.
"The first of them, none other than a smiling face."
Aah, how long does he intend to go on like this.
The inspector, Vanessa Spencer, thought.
She let out a long yawn and mustered a wry smile.
If one were to speak of the order of good, Abel Argento could not be left out. It had been so since their days as apprentice knights. While he cleaved through bloated monsters one after another, he'd squander his gold coins because he couldn't bring himself to wave off a single beggar's cry.
"As for hardships — we'll overcome them, and we need only proceed as we predicted. Think of the romance crammed into travelogues. So for now, a smile is enough. In the days ahead, we'll accomplish a great feat."
His words are too long. What a blockhead.
The strategist, Maurice de Olfrange, thought.
Arms folded, he let out a sigh.
Does he mean to bleach even our shadows? If it's Abel Argento, he probably would. He seemed to be nothing but a lump of cloying affirmations. On the off chance he were one day to stand before his own death, would he smile then too? Likely so. If it were not someone else's death but his own about to descend.
"So let's smile in advance."
The Hero, Abel Argento, smiled.
It was an immaculate smile, the cleanest one imaginable.
"Come on! Everyone smile in advance."
Of course. That's how you ought to be.
The Saintess, Ion Blanche, thought.
She took a step forward wearing a smile that resembled Abel's.
It was only a moment bound to fade someday. Memories endured roughly through the current of time, but once they reached a certain point, they would shed and vanish without a trace. Not just Abel, but everyone following Abel would come to forget this very moment. All memory would be gone, and only time would keep circling. And if one day this present came back to them, if the time that had encompassed the whole world suddenly flashed through their minds, by then,
'I wonder if it will all feel like a hallucination.'
Ion thought, folding her hands together.
She gently closed her eyes and prayed. Toward the time on the other side of memory.
'If, by any chance, all of this is reduced to a hallucination......'
Then may our adventure, too,
Continue on like an everlasting dream.
***
"It's over."
The top floor of the Orléans family villa in the capital, Naflansee.
Smoke from a cigarette rode on the winter wind, swaying.
Only the sunset light that slipped in through the window managed to warm the air, faintly, and,
"It's all over, Stanzi."
Iris lowered her head.
The cigarette wedged between her lips was crumpled.
If the burning tip of the cigarette was a heart, then its pitifully shriveled remainder was like a withered body. At least to Iris. For it resembled the shape of the corpse laid out at the center of the bed on which Iris was perched.
"You wanted to become a professor who looked after children, but......"
Iris reached out her hand.
Konstanze von Theresia. She stroked the corpse of her dear friend, who had barely been clinging to life.
"You could not, and you barely lingered on while staying by my side, but......"
Her flesh had long since shriveled.
Konstanze's body was wasted as though pulled from a mire.
"You could not live otherwise, and you wished at least to face the doll that had made you this way, but......"
Yet her heart alone was red.
It was not beating. It was merely emitting a red glow, shining. Meaning that the spell Konstanze had failed at was still in operation.
"......You could not accomplish even that."
The master was dead, but the dolls had not died.
What an empty life this was. Iris thought as she crushed the cigarette in her grip. Someone dies because there is no other way, and someone else survives by any means necessary. Staying by a Saintess's side did not mean being freed from death, and if someone did die at a Saintess's side, the Saintess could only wander in search of another to save.
"I'll be going."
And so Iris rose to her feet.
The hem of her cumbersome dress brushed the floorboards.
The dress, needlessly billowing, cruelly constricting her whole body — she was going to shed it, and next it would be time to dress herself in attire truly befitting her.
"I......"
Have to go on an adventure.
Iris murmured.
"Because......"
I have to save them.
I have to save those I can save.
Because that is a Saintess's duty.
"On, and on, and on, and on, and on, and on......"
Or, endlessly.
For as long as it takes.