The next day arrives, and with it the long-awaited Great Reincarnation Festival.
The Great Reincarnation Festival is a celebration offering prayers of gratitude to the Saint and wishing for her reincarnation.
Its true meaning is ‘to show humanity’s flourishing to the Saint, watching over us from beyond the veil.’
The humans the Saint saved at the cost of her own life have, through deep reflection, achieved tremendous development and built an advanced civilization.
Her salvation was not meaningless——it carried great significance. This festival exists to proclaim that to the world.
And so in the imperial capital, the heart of the Empire, lively festival music and traditional dances color the streets through day and night alike.
The time is noon——Luna, Ro, Sarko, and Wendy are walking down the main boulevard at the center of the imperial capital.
“Ohhh, so this is the Great Reincarnation Festival! (Festivals in this era are so much more gorgeous than three hundred years ago!)”
Luna’s eyes sparkle——
“Hm, it’s got a nice energy to it.”
——Ro lets out a low whistle——
“As expected of the Empire……. It’s a little galling, but whatever they do, the scale is just different from the Kingdom’s.”
——Sarko grinds her teeth at the gap in national power——
“If there’s any shop that catches your eye, please don’t hesitate to say so.”
——and Wendy, walking at the front, calls back to everyone with a smile.
People move busily up and down the main boulevard, and along both sides of the road, temporary stalls line up shoulder to shoulder.
(Yakisoba, takoyaki, cotton candy, chocolate banana, candy apple……. Hehe, with this many shops it’s hard to know where to look!)
After that, Luna, Ro, Sarko, and Wendy buy food from the stalls, play ring toss and shooting games and goldfish scooping, and enjoy the Great Reincarnation Festival to the fullest extent possible.
And currently——the Saint is licking a large candy apple with a very pleased and contented expression.
(Going to the festival with everyone……this is so fun. The Albas Empire really is a wonderful place!)
Luna’s image of and appreciation for the Empire has shot straight up.
“Hm hm hm hmm hmm……!”
She is humming along as she walks when——from within the crowd, a woman’s raspy voice reaches her remarkably clearly.
“——Hey, young lady over there.”
She glances to the side and meets the eyes of a beastman in a black robe.
“Um……are you talking to me……?”
“That’s right, you——the one with the soft face.”
Looking more carefully, she is a black wolf beastman.
A long muzzle, dull black fur, a high voice slightly worn with age——she appears to be quite elderly.
“Luna……?”
“What is it?”
“Did you spot a stall you wanted?”
Ro, Sarko, and Wendy turn around, and Luna points smoothly toward the beastman.
“It seems that beastman over there is calling me.”
At the four sets of eyes directed at her, the black wolf beastman lets out a wheezing laugh.
“That young lady of yours has such an unusual face on her, it’s got the fortune-teller’s blood in me all stirred up. If you wouldn’t mind——might you let me read your fortune, just for a bit? Oh, don’t worry about payment. This one’s a request from my end, so it’s free, and I won’t take much of your time.”
It is a rather dubious proposal——but.
“……Free……”
For Luna, born into a poor farming family in her past life, those words carry tremendous power.
“Fortune-telling, huh——that sounds a little interesting.”
“Free is awfully generous.”
“Since the opportunity’s here, why not give it a try?”
Ro and the others, spirits high from the festival, all express agreement.
“Yeah, I think I’ll try it. ——Excuse me, I’d love to.”
Luna is, after all, a girl of that age.
Star signs, blood types, palm reading——she has a perfectly ordinary level of interest in ‘fortune-telling.’
“Heh heh, thank you, dear. Now then, come sit here.”
Prompted by the mysterious fortune-teller, Luna settles into a rickety wooden chair.
“First, a little introduction——I’m Marda Babara. My true name, naturally, I will not be sharing.”
Marda says this with a wheezing laugh.
Beastmen are a people who hold ‘names’ in particular reverence, and their names come in three parts: the given name, the true name, and the family name.
The given name is the personal name granted by one’s parents.
The family name is the name of one’s lineage, passed down through generations.
The true name is a precious name granted by ancestral spirits at the moment of a beastman’s birth, and is not something to be casually revealed to anyone.
The only person to whom one may reveal this true name is a single person in the entire world——the lord to whom one has decided to pledge lifelong loyalty.
“Now then, young miss——what is your name?”
“Luna Spedio.”
“Oh……Luna Spedio, that’s quite an unusual name you’ve been given.”
“Is it, really?”
“Yes, it’s a name you’d almost never see among beastmen.”
“W-well, I am human, after all……”
Luna gives a strained smile.
“Right then, let’s get started. Luna, tell me what you’d like me to look into.”
“Hmm……let me think……”
She props her chin on her hand and considers for a moment——then a good question floats up to the surface.
“……Actually, I lost a certain ‘item’ a good while back……. I’m desperately trying to track it all down right now, but do you think you can tell where it is?”
To gauge whether the fortune-teller Marda is the real thing, she deliberately withholds the details of what she is looking for.
“A lost object, is it. Hold on.”
She holds both hands over the crystal ball and stares into it intently.
“…………Oh. Oh-oh-oh, I see it, I can see it, it’s coming into view. Hmm……is this a book? No——a notebook.”
“Y-yes, that’s right! (Amazing……! This fortune-teller is the real thing!)”
“But how strange. For a mere notebook, it’s being kept under remarkably tight security.”
“Can you tell where that notebook is——even just which country it’s in!?”
Luna leans forward with her question.
Recovering the original is one of her top priorities; her enthusiasm rises naturally.
“Heh heh, I can’t say ‘right here!’ down to the exact spot, but I can manage a general location. From the way it’s reading, it’s far to the south of the Empire……judging by the architectural style of the buildings, that would be the Grandize Holy Nation.”
“The Grandize Holy Nation……! (My dark history is there……!)”
It is entirely a ‘windfall from the heavens.’ Luna carefully writes the information down in the notepad of her mind.
Meanwhile——
“A notebook……?”
“Something lost in the Holy Nation?”
“The distance from the Kingdom to the Holy Nation is rather significant……?”
Ro, Sarko, and Wendy, who know nothing of the dark history’s existence, tilt their heads in puzzlement.
“W-well……it’s a bit of a long story……”
Luna is smiling vaguely, at a loss for a response, when a purple cloth is draped over the crystal ball.
“——Well, sorry for taking your time, dear. I enjoyed myself, thanks to you.”
“Oh, already?”
“Yes, I’ve seen plenty——thank you.”
“……?”
After that, Luna thanks the fortune-teller for the free reading and disappears into the festival crowd.
The moment Luna and the others are gone——Marda lifts the cloth from the crystal and stares into it closely.
(……Strange, strange. Why can’t I see any of it……. Sixty years as a fortune-teller and this is the first time something like this has happened.)
Throughout the entire time, Marda had been attempting simultaneously to locate the lost object and to read ‘Luna’s past’——but.
No matter what she tried or how, she couldn’t see ‘anything definitive.’
And now, trying once more in exactly the same way——the result is no different.
“Hmm……have I gone senile? Or has my skill slipped? Or perhaps it’s time to replace the crystal ball?”
Three years, five years, ten years——she tries tracing back through Luna’s past, but the crystal ball shows no reaction whatsoever.
As if the girl had not existed in the world at all during that span.
“Hahhh……what’s gotten into it.”
Marda sighs, deflated, and skips far back through time at random——and at a certain era, the crystal ball shows a reaction for the first time.
“Oh……oh oh……!?”
The emerging image is badly blurred, far too unclear to make out properly.
Still, she can read something——fragments of a few scenes and something that seems like emotion.
“‘Betrayal’……’the cross’……’void’……? Could this, perhaps, mean……that girl is the Sa——”
At that thought, she gives a self-mocking laugh.
“Heh heh heh, no no, that can’t be. That vacant, simple face being the reincarnation of the Saint……that could never happen even if heaven and earth turned upside down. Hahhh……it seems I’m just worn out today. Getting old really is something.”
Luna’s empty, nothing-going-on-in-there expression had, miraculously, prevented a Saint exposure.
Parting ways with fortune-teller Marda, Luna and the others continue straight up the main boulevard for a while——and emerge into an open plaza.
“Phew……I might be a little tired.”
Luna exhales softly.
Not physically tired, of course.
She is naturally an indoor person, and the unusual experience of walking through a crowd has given her a kind of mental fatigue.
“With that many people around, it’s hard to walk through.”
“There’s plenty of space here, so let’s take a little break.”
“Yes, agreed.”
Luna, Ro, Sarko, and Wendy shift to a corner of the plaza.
“Still, the Empire really is such a fun and wonderful place.”
Luna murmurs this with feeling, and everyone else agrees.
“The festival atmosphere is part of it, maybe——but this place has this incredible sense of ‘freedom,’ doesn’t it. Maybe because the buildings are spread out nicely?”
“Over the past ten years, the Empire——the central part of the imperial capital especially——has been pushing redevelopment under His Majesty the Emperor’s leadership. By setting low building coverage ratios to reduce density and placing greenery throughout, they’ve achieved exactly the spacious, open feeling Ro is describing.”
“Sarko-san, you’re remarkably well-informed about the Empire. You might know more than I do, and I grew up here……!”
Everyone is chatting happily when——at the edge of Luna’s vision, a group of about ten people in white robes catches her eye.
(……What’s that……?)
The mysterious group exchanges glances with one another and draws in a long, deep breath.
And then——
“——On a certain sunny day, I came home from the fields to find a letter had arrived at my house.”
“——To my surprise, it was a love letter. The sender was Third Prince Bas Senchuri. I had, unbelievably, received a marriage proposal from royalty.”
“——Oh my, whatever shall I do. I was terribly troubled. For there is such a very great difference in our social standing.”
In carrying, resonant voices, they begin reciting a world-famous ‘certain story.’
The next instant——
(Ahdjfksajflkdsajfdj……!?)
Luna’s capacity for language collapses.
“Th-this, this this this this this this this——(This clumsy writing is unmistakable, this is my personal fiction——the ‘Red Book’……!)”
“Luna, is that……an impression of a chicken?”
“My, how skillful.”
“Are you alright? What’s wrong all of a sudden……?”
Visibly agitated in every possible way, Luna zeroes in on Wendy, who has lived in the Empire the longest, and grabs her sleeve with both hands.
“W-Wendy-san……! What on earth are those people……!?”
“Those people……? Ah, the ‘Recitation Society.'”
“The……Reci……tation……Society……? Are they some group with a deep grudge against the Saint?”
“Not at all, quite the opposite——they’re a gathering of devout people who love and revere the Saint.”
“……Huh……?”
If they truly hold her in reverence, the Saint had one heartfelt wish: please erase all memory of the Red Book immediately.
“As you know, Luna-san, the Saint Eradication Movement resulted in the disposal of almost all relics connected to the Saint. Humanity is a foolish species, so there’s a chance the same mistake might be made again. Those people are the safeguard against that.”
Wendy raises one index finger and continues the explanation.
“The members of the Recitation Society have memorized the Red Book in its entirety and perform it at events like this. Even if the original Red Book were stolen by someone, even if all the copies were destroyed, they pass the Saint’s prophetic words down from parent to child, child to grandchild, generation after generation, through oral tradition.”
(Is this bullying?)
Luna’s candid assessment.
(Oh no, this is the worst……)
She grips her trembling head in both hands, eyes spinning.
(Even if I recover the original, there are still countless copies out there. Even if every copy in the world were disposed of, my dark history would be passed down to future generations as a song and story. ……At this rate the only option is to wipe out all of humanity……!?)
Driven to the wall by her own past, the Saint is beginning to harbor dangerously Demon-King-like thoughts.
While she is on the verge of falling to the dark side, the recitation reaches its climax.
“——Oh, Your Highness, you mustn’t……! We have only just met, you and I.”
“——Love has nothing to do with time. I knew it the very instant I laid eyes on you——’destiny’……”
“——His Highness is such a romantic, and my heart went thump with a flutter.”
Being wooed by a fictional prince, in a story she wrote herself where she is the protagonist.
Having that excruciating scene read aloud under open sky to a large crowd——was, to put it mildly, ‘hell.’
(Hah, hah……it’s no good……! If I stay somewhere like this any longer, I’m going to lose my mind……!)
Luna, shaken to the point of nearly hyperventilating——
“Th-that way! It’s just——well, there’s a thing, and the thing is——let’s go that way!”
——says something with vocabulary as woeful as ever, takes Ro, Sarko, and Wendy by the hand and breaks into a run.
“Wh-wait, Luna!?”
“What’s gotten into you all of a sudden……!?”
“Luna-san, where are we going!?”
Over everyone’s protests, Luna runs.
She runs desperately until she can no longer hear the dark history being recited.
“Hah, hah……this should be far en——hup!?”
She looks up——and there, gripping sacred crosses in their hands, is a group she has seen somewhere before.
“——Everyone, today is the joyous Great Reincarnation Festival! Put in even more effort than usual, and offer your prayers to the Saint!”
The moment the apparent leader says this, every person gathered there unleashes a voice that could split the sky.
“[Everyone]: SAINT-SAMA……! SAINT-SAMA……! SAINT-SAMA……!”
Luna knows this particular group of intensely committed zealots.
“Th-these people are……!”
“Ah……the Saint Church.”
Wendy answers with a troubled look.
“I feel like I saw them at the museum in the Kingdom too……?”
“The Saint Church has bases of activity all over the world, so they’re literally everywhere. Their horizontal network is abnormally strong——there’s a saying that ‘if you see one, there are a hundred nearby.’ ……Honestly, they’re known for aggressive proselytizing, so I’d recommend not getting involved.”
She says this with a gentle word of caution.
(Kgh……I’m surrounded……)
From the front: the fervent Saint-sama chanting.
From the rear: the Red Book recitation.
(I take it back. The Empire……is the worst country there is……)
Luna’s assessment of the Empire plummets to the very bottom.
(If I stay somewhere like this, I’ll die of embarrassment……)
Luna takes everyone’s hands again and breaks into a run——veering one street off the main boulevard of the imperial capital’s center, and stopping once she is away from the chaotic noise.
“Hah, hah……I’m sorry. For some reason my head and chest were getting so constricted, so I just bolted somewhere with fewer people……”
Luna apologizes with great remorse, and Ro and the others smile as if to say ‘it’s no problem.’
“You got a little crowd-sick maybe? Well, Luna is an indoors person.”
“But these back streets away from the main road have such a wonderful ‘local feel’ to them!”
“This is a back alley that regular tourists don’t really know about——mostly used by locals——so these kinds of places might actually give you a better taste of the Empire.”
“Ro, Sarko-san, Wendy-san……”
Luna, touched by everyone’s kindness and consideration, comes slightly close to tears.
After that, they stroll the quieter back streets and enjoy the more knowing side of the Great Reincarnation Festival——Saint-themed goods that are a festival staple, sweets popular at the Imperial Saint Academy, a local hardware shop——savoring it in their own way.
And so time passes——until ‘three o’clock.’
“Hmhm……now then, how will you move? Proxy of the Saint?”
Emperor Adrinus’s malice spreads through the imperial capital.
“——Eeeaaaaaah!?”
Shattering the pleasant festival music, a man’s tremendous scream rings out.
The people nearby freeze for an instant——and stare with eyes wide in shock.
“GRRrrrrr……!”
“GWO-GWO-GWO……!”
“GH, GH, GH, GH, GHGHGHGHHH……!”
An enormous number of magic beasts have appeared suddenly at the heart of the imperial capital.
And not just ten or twenty.
By a conservative estimate, easily over a hundred.
“H-how did magic beasts get all the way here……!?”
“Send word to the Emperor……to the palace guards and Holy Knights……!”
The next instant——
“[Beasts]: GRRAAAAAAAAaaaaaaa……!”
As if receiving a signal all at once, the magic beasts break into simultaneous rampage.
Devouring people in their path, destroying whatever buildings catch their eye, trampling the imperial capital on pure instinct.
“[People]: KYAAAAAAAAaaaaaa……!?”
The Great Reincarnation Festival is plunged into an unprecedented panic.
“Luna-sama——she’s not here!?”
Ro spins around frantically and moves to secure Luna’s safety——but.
Her mistress, who had been right behind her just moments ago, has vanished as if she were mist or smoke.
(Why does that girl always disappear at moments like this……!)
Ro bites down hard and breaks into a swift run to look for Luna.
(……She’s moving on her own. Just as His Majesty deduced——Ro Steinclaw is the Saint’s reincarnation……I’ll continue the surveillance.)
Just as Wendy moves to begin her tailing——
“Kyaaaaaaaaah……!?”
From far behind, a small child’s scream is heard.
She glances for just an instant——and sees a mother and child being attacked by a massive cyclops.
“M-Mom……!”
“You——run, quickly……!”
“But……!”
The mother, shielding her child behind her, grips something like a stick and stands her ground before the cyclops.
A hopelessly amateur stance——what awaits her is clearer than fire.
(……The mission comes first.)
In this turbulent world, tragedies like that one are nothing unusual.
Wendy kills her emotions and cuts her gaze away to chase Ro.
In that instant——the trauma of ten years ago flashes through her mind.
[M-Mom……!]
[Wendy, just you run, now!]
[But……]
[I said go, hurry……!]
By the time she realized it——she was already running.
Her body was moving on its own, against her will.
(What am I……doing……)
Nine chances in ten, this chaos was created by the Emperor.
What she should be doing now is surveilling Ro Steinclaw, not rescuing a mother and child.
This is a clear violation of orders.
She understands that in her head.
But her body won’t listen.
The image of a mother and child being attacked by a magic beast overlapped with that day’s——her own younger self and her mother.
Wendy is moving right now not on ‘reason’ but on ‘heart.’
(Neutralize that cyclops as fast as possible, and then find Ro Steinclaw……!)
Having chosen the best she can do right now, she draws her specialized throwing needles and takes aim at the target——then notices something terrible.
(Those dark red eyes……could it be——a ‘Mutation’!?)
Standard cyclopes are quite weak, but the Mutation variant boasts terrifying strength, agility, and regeneration, and is considered to require the skill of a Holy Knight battalion commander class to bring down.
(I could never beat something like that alone……! At the very least I’ll use to buy time for that mother and child to escape……!)
Wendy swings her magically reinforced right arm and hurls a volley of needles toward the cyclops’s shadow.
But simultaneously——
“GWOOooooooooo……!”
The Mutation cyclops breaks into a run toward the mother and child at staggering speed.
(That’s——fast!? How can something that big move like that……!)
Wendy immediately swings her left hand and throws a second volley of needles at full force.
(It’s no use, I won’t make it……!)
The next instant——a flower of flesh and blood bloomed.
Wendy’s hadn’t made it in time.
Blood, bone, and viscera scattered, and a tragic, look-away-worthy death arrives——
But there is no scream.
What there is——is confusion.
“……Huh?”
What had been blasted apart in a horrifically spectacular fashion was——the Mutation cyclops.
The mother and child are both completely unharmed.
“Phew, that was close——gah!?”
“……L-Luna-san……?”
Standing there, impossibly——was the benefactor who had dispatched the Mutation in a single blow.