In the end, we failed to prevent the disaster. Because we became the disaster.
"You've done a fine job."
"Find them! They went this way somewhere!"
"There's nowhere to run!"
"... Indeed."
An attic in some mansion. Hidden in that cramped space with Karos, I watched as the Imperial guards swarmed below like a hive of bees. Looking through the tiny window beside me, I could see the sun rising.
I felt like I was dying of exhaustion from not having slept a wink, but— Looking only at the result, we had succeeded.
All through the dawn, we had run around like madmen, knocking out every noble, firmly planting the idea of brainwashing in their minds, and creating a reason for the princess to bind the nobles with the crime of treason.
Compared to that, the people who woke up thinking a war had broken out and were crying their eyes out, and the garden trees that were slightly burnt, were nothing. Seeing the Imperial guards slowly heading this way, I sighed and made a request to Karos.
"It's all over now, so please just drop me off at the cabin outside the Empire. I did everything you asked, so I think it should be fine."
"No." "What is it now?"
"Her Highness the Princess has summoned you."
Ugh.
So it came to this. As I groaned, Karos broke down the small door, then picked me up and leaped lightly onto the roof.
"I can't just leave, can I?"
"You cannot. One way or another, it is a fact that you resolved this situation. Though I still don't quite know what methods you used."
Karos looked down at the soldiers swarming below, sighed, and bent her legs. It looked like she was about to jump. From here, to another roof.
"Is that even possible?"
"You'll know when you see it." -Thump!
A leap.
A leg strength unbelievable for a human made the impossible possible. We reached the Imperial Palace in an instant. As soon as they saw Karos, the guards opened the gates as if they had been waiting.
Even as I walked down the beautiful paths of the Imperial Palace, I tried to resist.
"I'm a little... very tired."
"Endure it."
With those harsh words, Karos went up to the highest floor of the Imperial Palace, stopped before the largest and most luxurious door, and adjusted her armor. -Knock, knock, knock. A steady knock.
[Come in.]
It was a different voice than before, but still gentle. I opened the door and went inside to find the princess. It was our first meeting in the Imperial Palace, but her face itself was different. - Not that her previous face was ugly.
But her current blonde hair, soft eyelashes, and overall features were so beautiful I could have mistaken her for a doll. It was breathtaking, but I tried my best to enter nonchalantly.
"I've heard the details through the reports. Jern, you've done it."
"... Yes."
"You did a truly wonderful job."
"It was nothing."
Fortunately, she seemed to have chosen to leave the specifics alone. I glanced around; for the Imperial Palace, the room was far more frugal than I expected. On the desk, there was only paper and a pen for writing, some documents, and a dagger, probably for opening those documents.
Can I go now? As I was thinking that and looking for the right time to get up, the princess looked at me with a wide smile.
"... Is there something you wish to say?"
"Jern, is there anything you desire?"
"....?"
"Something I desire?"
"Yes. I am the princess of the Empire, and though it may be a disrespectful thing to say, in some areas, I have already surpassed my father."
That's to be expected. If the princess possessed the power of prophecy, even the Emperor would gladly accept it. Sharmia, with a bright expression, held out a sheet of paper.
"You were a great help in resolving this situation, weren't you? I couldn't just send you away empty-handed, so I was thinking about what to give you and drew up this contract last night."
"Hmm..."
I took the contract and groaned inwardly. Because this wasn't a contract. It took the form of one, but there was nothing written on it.
"So this is..."
"To be honest, I still don't know what you like, Jern."
Click.
The princess rolled a pen over to me.
"So please, write down what you want."
I had heard of a blank check, but never a blank contract. The only thing written at the bottom was the fact that Princess Sharmia guaranteed this contract. It was a declaration, half arrogance and half foolishness, that she would give me whatever I wrote.
There was no way someone like the princess didn't know the importance of a contract. This meant she would accept it even if I forced upon her a ridiculously unfair contract filled with dozens of poison-pill clauses. It meant she would give everything for my sake.
And as long as I didn't write something absurd like, ‘I want you, Princess,’ Sharmia had the power to fulfill whatever was written. I hadn't known her long, but she wasn't the type to make empty promises. It was a golden opportunity I couldn't miss.
After a brief, not-quite staring contest with the smiling Sharmia, I picked up the pen.
"You said it yourself."
"Yes, but this is a little scary. I didn't think you were the type to seek reconfirmation like this, Jern~" She's subtly acting close to me.
In a worldline I don't know, we might actually be close, but not now.
"I've finished writing."
"Oh, already? Not even a minute has passed..."
"I thought Your Highness would have seen it with your prophecies."
"I don't do that for something so trivial..."
The princess's smile faded slightly as she took the contract, still smiling. I straightened my posture and waited for her answer.
"Is it possible?"
"... Hmm, it's not difficult. No, perhaps it might be a little difficult..."
"I beg of you."
I bowed my head low and pleaded. It was something I absolutely had to get.
"Then explain your reason."
The princess, not angry, not dumbfounded, not pleased, but simply curious, pointed to the single clause written on the contract.
[Forget everything about Jern Aspandil. Do not interfere, and do not attempt conversation. Do not accept any requests. If circumstances force interference, both parties will respond to each other with complete disregard.]
"Do you think I am not helpful?"
"From the beggar in the back alleys to His Majesty the Emperor, there is no one in the Empire who would not need Your Highness's help. I could not say such a thing."
"Then, do you dislike me?"
"Thanks to you, Your Highness, I was able to protect someone precious to me. I consider myself indebted to you; I do not hate you."
"... Why?"
The flustered Sharmia truly seemed not to have anticipated this situation. I answered calmly.
"It is because of that very point."
"What?"
"Your Highness is hiding many things from me."
Sharmia's expression darkened slightly.
"I can't... deny that. Were you hurt?"
"No. I don't think that's a bad thing at all. In fact, it's because of that my opinion of you has changed a lot."
"Even with a card you must play, you have a side that doesn't reveal everything. That is why you will become an outstanding Empress."
"Then why—" "I will probably find it all out."
"What do you mean?"
Taking advantage of her question, I took a sip of tea and muttered.
"Your Highness worked hard, but you have already revealed much."
"Your foresight which cannot see outcomes, the design of this current situation, looking into and returning from hundreds of possibilities. Even that ability."
There were dregs left in the teacup. Impurities that are no longer needed after brewing and can be filtered out. If not, no matter how strong the tea, they become visible after you drink it.
The traces left at the bottom.
"In this situation, Your Highness did not particularly need my help."
"The cards you showed me were likely just a tiny fraction. I judged that there was no reason to use such a troublesome method that relied on luck."
"You showed me the image of a lively young woman living without a care, but such a person could not be the superhuman who single-handedly prevented disasters hundreds of times over ten years and brought a golden age to the Empire."
"Hmm, Jern, are you trying to state your conjecture?"
The princess looked down at me with a benevolent gaze. It was a look that said, ‘Everything is just your delusion.’ It was so natural that if I hadn't been certain, it would have worked.
"Yes, you may think of it as simple paranoia, or megalomania, the pathological lying of an orphan who doesn't know his place. But the reason Your Highness handled this situation this way... no matter how I look at it, there was only one."
Jern Aspandil.
The only fallen one the princess could use. A means to counter the Red Lotus. Isn't that it?
It's just a guess. At least, I couldn't find a reason why she would go to such great lengths for someone like me. However, that was the result.
The truth is always the one thing that remains at the end.
"Your Highness set aside all the means at your disposal and took the long way around, assigning hundreds of prophecies to a fallen orphan whose identity you barely knew. And in the end, you believed everything that boy said and handed him this contract."
"Even if it's not the truth, you must have lost all affection for a boy who reached such a foolish conclusion, so you can just sign it, send me out, and forget about me. It's not a difficult thing to do."
I said, pushing the contract toward her. Sharmia picked it up with a composed expression. -Riiip! While still wearing a gentle smile, she tore it up effortlessly.
As I furrowed my brow, Sharmia spoke.
"No. Don't lower yourself."
"Your Highness."
"You were right. I didn't entrust everything to you, but... while trying to solve this case, I saw you and decided I had to recruit you, no matter what. It's true. You could even call it a test."
Along with her refreshing admission, she threw in words one doesn't hear easily.
"Jern, come serve under me. I will provide all means to heal your body. You may refuse any order I give. Literally, just talking with me once in a while would be enough."
The conditions were beyond unconventional; they were absurd. That was the reason for the blank contract. The princess had wanted an unfair contract from the start, so it didn't matter what kind of terms I wrote.
"There will be no one who values you more highly than I do. Because they cannot see the future. Wouldn't this be a contract that can satisfy us both?"
"That is close to the truth."
I nodded in affirmation.
"In that case, may I receive one assurance?"
"Of course. What might that be?"
I spoke calmly to the puzzled Sharmia.
"Since Your Highness has told me a secret, I will tell you mine. It's an incomparably pathetic and meaningless fact, but... my world is the Deep Sea."
"The Deep Sea...?"
"Yes."
The princess asked, bewildered.
"So, you are expressing the pitiful situation the fallen ones are in, right? But the term Deep Sea... hmm, it doesn't quite resonate."
"It seems you have only seen small worlds until now."
It seemed this was the princess's first time seeing a fallen one from a Great System.
"I literally live within the Deep Sea. If you can promise to save me, I will entrust my fate, my very life, to you. I will obey and offer whatever you command."
"Ah, yes, we are currently working hard on developing ways to save the fallen ones. Could you explain the exact burden you face?"
"I cannot breathe."
"?"
"Because you cannot breathe underwater. It's only natural."
"Just a moment."
Sharmia took out a piece of paper and a pen and began to take notes.
"Then how are you alive right now?"
"With my Master's help, I had a golden pipe inserted into my body. I must constantly circulate my mana for my entire life just to stay alive."
"I see. If it's just that, I think we can solve it."
"That is not all."
I shook my head.
"It is very cold here. I might freeze to death soon."
"Ah, is that so? So the temperature actually drops."
"My surroundings are gradually growing darker. I might lose my sight at any moment."
"I-I see."
"Every time I use my abilities, no, just by staying alive, the water pressure gradually increases. I don't know when, but soon a pressure strong enough to crush steel will crush my body."
"That—that's just too unbelievable..."
Shhhk.
I unwrapped the bandages I was wearing. The bruises covering my entire body were visible. To be precise, they were injuries I got from being transported to the Deep Sea for a moment.
I could visibly see Sharmia at a loss for words.
"There are many other burdens besides these. Your Highness, do you have a way to save someone like me?"
"... If we try, it might be possible."
Sharmia did not lie. She had judged that there was no way to save someone who had fallen into the Deep Sea.
"Thank you for not making an empty promise. But what you're suggesting is not much different from my current situation."
"If you are with me, the quality of that effort will be much higher."
"Those who are with you, Your Highness, are entrusting their very lifeline and their way of life to you."
"What?"
"I don't know if I should call you a prophet, but that ability to see the future is an overwhelmingly asymmetrical power."
"Your Highness will only show the path forward out of goodwill and provide the unerringly correct answer."
"Yes. That's right."
"That is not a path I have chosen. It is not my own struggle. It is merely trusting and following Your Highness."
"If you were certain, perhaps, but as long as Your Highness is not—I cannot find any meaning in following you."
"I wouldn't mind dying while struggling on my own, unable to defy fate, but I could never be satisfied dying by following another's words without a will of my own."
There was also the reason that I couldn't trust the princess, but I left that out. I wanted to avoid revealing my world if possible, but since she already knows I'm a fallen one, it doesn't really matter whether she knows the details or not.
In fact, it's better to say this to make the princess value me less and give up.
"Thank you for valuing me so highly. But if there is one thing you are mistaken about, it is that you do not need me, Your Highness. You have done well until now, so you will continue to do well."
As I started to get up, the princess added.
"I am not a god."
"I can see that."
"No matter how many times I looked, I couldn't stop the birth of the group known as the Red Lotus."
"To stop them, I would have had to be born at least a few hundred years ago. As a 10-year-old, it was impossible for me."
"... Is that so."
Why did the terror attacks succeed when the princess was here? It was because the Red Lotus's existence itself had been planned for hundreds of years. Even if she somehow managed to protect one city, the Red Lotus would simply target another.
It was something even a prophet could not stop.
"The cards they prepared over those long years... in order to counter, no, just to respond to them, I also need to make every possible preparation. Have you seen Karos?"
"Yes. She is a truly outstanding knight."
"A knight who wouldn't exist in the original world. Because of the persecution she suffered as an orphan, she fell and became a member of the Red Lotus."
"Was she a mage?"
"There are those who sympathize even if they aren't fallen ones. Soon."
"... The investment in the orphanage was."
"I didn't know where she was, so I tried that first."
Sharmia smiled gently and held out her hand.
"Let me hold on to you. Whether as a weapon, a card, or a talent. I will make you shine your brightest."
This must be Sharmia's true intention.
"I regret to say, Your Highness."
That is why I, too, answered with my true feelings. Dersia, Brimdal, Elysia... Would the princess be as valuable to my survival as they are?
I don't know if she could help me reach them. But in a situation where I've already obtained them?
"I feel that Your Highness's conditions are too meager for me to take that hand."
A crack appeared in Sharmia's expression.
Even after Jern closed the door and left, Sharmia did not lower her hand for a long time. Her smiling expression was frozen in place.
"... Your Highness."
As Sharmia's gaze slowly turned to the dagger on the left side of her desk, Karos, who had been watching from behind, quickly stopped her.
"It seems things won't change no matter how many times you try."
"Indeed. If he refuses even after I've gone this far, there's nothing I can do. Hmph, it's his own loss."
The slightly dangerous atmosphere vanished in an instant, and Sharmia puffed out her cheeks as she tore the contract to shreds. -Rip!
Rip!
"He's a fool. It seems he doesn't understand that no matter how he struggles, being with me would put him on a different level. Why doesn't he get it? Is it because he's young? Haaah..."
"Perhaps it is because he understands."
"What do you mean by that?"
Karos swallowed her words. Her encounter with the boy named Jern was brief. But if she had learned anything, it was that he was almost a perfect counter to the princess.
He trusts only the judgments he has reached through his own deliberation. To the extent that even if a prophecy were true, he would act in a different way if it conflicted with his judgment.
"It was a slip of the tongue. I apologize."
There was no need to say it. As Karos bowed her head, Sharmia muttered while slumped over her desk.
"I need to start acquiring a fallen one as a card soon. But after seeing him... I don't think I'll be satisfied with anyone else..."
In truth, Sharmia seemed to really, truly like Jern. Karos could not understand Sharmia at all, so knowing she shouldn't, she cautiously asked.
"Your Highness."
"Hmm? What is it?"
"It is hard for me to believe how foolish my own words are, but I do not understand Your Highness's judgment. Were you truly thinking of employing such a person?"
Because of what she had heard, she couldn't believe it. But Sharmia asked back with a bewildered expression.
"Why? Is there a problem?"
"... Of course there is."
This situation is not a disaster. At most, at the very most, it would end with the capital burning and a few nobles dying— A small matter. A tiny, tiny matter.
Compared to the world.
"—When you first saw him, did you not say that he would become an executive of the Red Lotus?"
"Yes, I did."
An affirmation as if it were nothing special. Karos gripped the hilt of her sword.
"Then why don't you kill him?"
"Hmm..."
After a moment of thought, Sharmia shrugged and answered.
"That's all the more reason to make him my ally."
Karos once again gave up on understanding. It was the most correct judgment she had ever made.
At that moment. In a certain mansion, the scratching sound of a pen stopped. A conclusion had been reached. '... Hmm.' Because that conclusion was something she really didn't want to admit, something unpleasant. Dersia let out a sigh. A very deep one.