“I saw it when I was a child, and I still dream about it,” she explained. “So it’s not completely fictional...”
“A dream, huh? Then we’ll proceed from the idea that you saw it in a dream! So, what’s your story about, Orihara?” Yuichi asked, forcefully dragging the conversation forward.
“Um, put simply, the male hero falls in love with the female Demon Lord, and he’s forced to choose between her and the world. The protagonist is the Hero of Scales, Astoria Kruger, and the Demon Lord is Lasagna von Jusphoria. The fundamental question of the story is whether they’ll get together or not.”
“That much I could more or less make out from the title,” he said. “So, how is the world in danger?”
“Sakaki! You can’t ask that!” Aiko exclaimed.
“Why not? It’s the natural question to ask, isn’t it?” he asked.
Aiko seemed strangely angry about the question he had asked offhandedly.
“Sorry, but that’s still a secret,” Kanako said. “What matters is that at the end of the story, it has to be one or the other. Will he kill the Demon Lord and save the world, or destroy the world to save the Demon Lord? There can be no ending where he saves the world and lives in it with her.”
“That’s heavier than I was expecting,” he mused. The title had made it sound like a comedy.
“But let’s leave the plot stuff aside!” Mutsuko declared. “The question is, what would you do if you were sent to that world? First, you’d have to pick a faction!”
“Then I’ll explain in brief about that,” Kanako said. “Glowsphere contains two main forces that are waging war. One is the faction of the Demon Lord described in the title. The other is the Hero Army. Humans come from several different countries, but the Hero Army is a united force, so it’s okay to think of the humans as a single faction. The people have crossed borders to join forces against the Demon Lord’s threat.”
Yuichi felt relieved that there were only two factions to remember. If there were warring human groups on top of everything, there would be no way he’d be able to keep it straight.
“The Demon Lord is invading human territory,” Kanako went on. “The Demon Lord Army is very powerful, too powerful for normal people to stand against. Within it are the Demon Lord’s lieutenants, the Twelve Hell Kings. Her army is a three-tiered system, with the Demon Lord standing at the head, and below her the Twelve Hell Kings, who lead an army of fiends. The Demon Lord’s true power is still unknown, and the fiends are foot soldiers, so the Twelve Hell Kings are the foundation of the Demon Lord Army.
“The Twelve Hell Kings have sworn fealty to the Demon Lord, but they’re far from a monolith; they all have different ideas about things. Broadly speaking, there are three factions among them. The absolute obedience faction is Chance Meeting Meredith, Battle Dust Sevrine, and Decisive Judgment Glenda. The neutral faction is Blue Sky Rochefort, Brutal Gertrude, and Lamenting Alexandra. The idealist faction is Raging Geshtenks, Mediator Christophes, and Southern Lights Sylvester. The absolute obedience faction acts in complete accordance with what the Demon Lord says. The neutral faction acts in the Demon Lord’s best interest and sometimes offers counsel. The idealist faction wants Lasagna to be held to a higher standard as Demon Lord.”
A lengthy explanation. Kanako had always been long-winded, but Yuichi couldn’t understand even half of it this time.
“Excuse me, you said there were twelve Hell Kings. That was only nine,” Natsuki pointed out, raising her hand.
“I can’t believe you picked that out...” Yuichi was impressed. He’d been so lost, he hadn’t even tried counting names.
“I’m sorry, but the last three are connected to the Demon Lord’s secret, so I can’t tell you who they are just yet,” Kanako explained. “Next, the Hero Army. Heroes are people who one day suddenly acquired a supernatural power. When you awaken as a hero, a symbol appears on the back of your hand. That symbol reveals your power. For instance, the protagonist, Astoria, has the scales mark. His power lets him weigh two options and identify which one is better. Other examples include the flower mark, which indicates control of plants; the mountain mark, which lets you makes yourself heavier; the cat mark, which gives you great agility; and so on.
“The Hero Army are humanity’s trump card against the Demon Lord Army, but the protagonist Astoria is considered to be the weakest and most cowardly hero in the whole army. Once every one hundred days, the Demon Lord Army rests, leaving only the bare minimum of forces behind. The heroes want to use this as an opportunity to attack and take out one of the Twelve Hell Kings, or possibly the Demon Lord herself. This is all prelude to the story. Now, I’ll list the main heroes of the hero army. First, the Flower Circle Hero, Flammy...”
She went on and on talking about the heroes from her story, and Yuichi barely remembered any of it.
Club came to an end while they were still in the morning hours, and Yuichi headed to the roof.
“You are late!” a voice exclaimed.
The minute he got there, he found Yuri was waiting for him. Her pose was imperious, her complicated hairstyle blowing in the wind. Her hands were on her hips, and she was staring straight at Yuichi.
“Sorry, but ‘after class’ was pretty vague, time-wise,” he said. He had remembered the promise, but Makina’s little game, and Mutsuko’s dragging him to the club meeting against his will, had delayed him.
“If I tell you to come, of course, I mean immediately!” She had all the haughtiness one would expect from a born heiress.
“So, what did you want?” he asked. “To pick up where we left off?”
Yuri had attacked Yuichi during their summer camp, but Mutsuko had interrupted them, and she had run off.
“First things first,” she said. “Who is that?”
“Ahaha. Hello there...” Aiko, who had come along, answered awkwardly.
“I am aware of who you are, Noro! I meant the other one! The one clinging to Yuichi Sakaki!”
“You’re using my full name?” Yuichi asked. His reaction had been to the least noteworthy part of what she’d said, but he understood why Yuri was so surprised. It was because Kanako was clinging to Yuichi’s arm, pressing her substantial breasts against it. “This is Kanako Orihara. She’s in my club. She had a book published recently. Maybe you’ve heard of it?”
“I have heard rumors of it. So?” Yuri asked, urging him to continue. Apparently, the name was not what she’d wanted to hear.
“I said I was going to the roof, and she asked if I would take her with me,” he said. “But she’s afraid of heights, apparently, so...”
She hadn’t said why she’d wanted to come to the roof despite being afraid of heights. As a result, Yuichi was just as baffled as Yuri.
“...This is ridiculous!” In an instant, Yuri unleashed a torrent of pent-up emotion. “Yuichi Sakaki! When I called you here, it should have been clear that I intended to ask you out! Yet you bring a woman along! And one who is ostentatiously hanging off of you, at that! What exactly are you trying to tell me?!”
“How was I supposed to know you wanted to ask me out?!” he shouted.
“If she’s afraid of heights, she could cling to Noro! Why must she cling to you, Yuichi Sakaki?!” Yuri exclaimed.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t, um, mean to get in the way... but it has to be Sakaki the Younger, or I might be in trouble if I fall...” Kanako said hesitantly in response to Yuri’s outpouring of rage.
“You can’t fall; there’s a fence! And you’re acting as if he could even do something to help you if you did!” Yuri cried.
“Oh, well... I think maybe he could,” Aiko interrupted, having had some experience with that herself.
“This is none of your business, so would you kindly shut your mouth?!” Yuri snapped.
“Um, right.” Yuri’s glare forced Aiko back into dejected silence.
“Now, what is wrong with you? If you’re so afraid you can barely stand upright, you just shouldn’t be here!” Yuri continue
d, addressing Kanako again.
Kanako’s knees had been knocking the entire time they had been on the roof. Yuichi hadn’t realized she would be this frightened, but now that they were there, it was hard to ask her to lay off.
“Well... Well, fine. To complain about the situation would be beneath my dignity,” Yuri eventually said, breathlessly, perhaps realizing she wasn’t getting anywhere.
“I feel like you’ve had plenty of complaints already, but okay. Seriously, what do you want?” Yuichi asked.
She had mentioned something about asking him out, but just to be safe, he’d decided to make sure.
“I want you to date me!” she screamed.
“Sorry, I can’t.”
It might have seemed like an overly flip response, but Yuichi had actually given it quite a bit of consideration in that split-second. Maybe the polite thing to do would have been to offer a more roundabout refusal, or to make more of a show of thinking about it. But it seemed to him that it would be more rude to try to buy time, or add more words for their own sake, when the answer was so obvious. Thus, he came right out with it.
“Why not?” she asked. If it had been an earnest confession of her feelings, she might have been hurt. But Yuri was just being stubborn.
“I hardly know you, and I don’t want to accept an offer just because you asked,” he said. “What about you, anyway? You barely know me, too.”
“Wh-What else can I do? I have my anthromorph instincts! After the display that you showed me...”
“Display? Did she... see you naked?!” Aiko gasped.
“No! And how dare you propose something so outrageous?!” Yuri shouted.
She’d been referring to him killing The Head of All. To an anthromorph, that meant he was now the strongest among them; the leader of the pack. Their instincts would be to follow the leader. In other words, to anthromorphs, Yuichi was now on par with The Head.
“Hang on. So those anthromorph women were, um...” Aiko asked haltingly, as if she had just come upon an upsetting realization.
“Yes. All the female anthromorphs there would have been in Yuichi Sakaki’s thrall,” Yuri said. “Of course, I believe most of them died in the disaster, but... anyway! You don’t particularly dislike me, then? If you don’t really know me, then you cannot dislike me! Very well. You shall get to know me henceforth! And at such time as you do, I will ask you out again!”
“You’re awfully determined... honestly, after everything you did, it’s more surprising that you think I don’t hate you...” Yuichi said. She had seemed to be plotting a lot of awful things. Still, Yuichi was willing to put that behind him.
“Hey, should we really be talking about the anthromorph stuff? Orihara’s right here,” Aiko said, approaching and speaking in a low voice.
“What’s the big deal?” Yuichi said. “She always zones out when we talk about that stuff, and—”
Crash!
Yuichi was interrupted by a sudden loud noise that rang out over the roof.
He turned towards the source of the sound, and Yuri turned to look, as well.
There was Western-style armor on the ground. It was dull, without luster, and squashed completely flat. If there was a person inside, they must have been badly deformed by the fall.
“Huh?” Yuichi and Aiko both asked in surprise, while Yuri and Kanako just stared dumbly at it.
It was so sudden, their brains couldn’t quite process what had happened, at first.
It took them some time just to reason out that — judging from the sound and the state it was in — it must have come from the sky, and quite high up in it, at that.
Yuichi looked up. The sky was blue and clear, without a single cloud. He couldn’t see any sign of where it might have come from.
“17th century heavy cavalry plate mail...” Kanako murmured. “The development of firearms would begin rendering armor obsolete, causing them to make it lighter and lighter. This was the last period during which heavy armor was used. Lancer cavalry was getting phased out, too, so there’s no lance rest.”
“Orihara?” Yuichi asked, concerned.
Kanako was looking straight at the armor as she explained it. She was usually the type to try to escape from reality, but this time, she seemed surprisingly composed.
“Yuichi Sakaki! What is the meaning of this? Is it your doing? Is it some kind of game you’re playing in order to give me the brush-off?” Yuri shouted.
“Why would I go to all this trouble?!” he exclaimed.
“Is... Is there someone... inside?” Aiko asked, fearfully.
“No, I don’t think so,” Yuichi said. “If there were, we would see blood.”
Just as they were vacillating over the idea of getting closer to check, Aiko and Kanako turned their eyes silently towards the sky above.
“Laputa?” Aiko breathed in shock.
“No, what fell was armor, not a girl...” Yuichi said.
“Huh?” Aiko looked at Yuichi, confused.
Yuichi looked up at the sky again. There was definitely nothing there.
“There is something floating there, though...” Aiko, though, seemed to see something in the sky.
“No, I don’t see anything... Konishi, do you see anything in the sky?” Yuichi asked.
“Nothing in particular.” Yuri also began craning her neck to look up, but it appeared she didn’t see anything.
“What is it?” Yuichi couldn’t see anything, either, but that was no reason for him not to believe Aiko. After all, there were strange things out there that only Yuichi could see; he wouldn’t be surprised if there were things visible to others that were not visible to him.
“Straight above... It looks like an upside-down castle. I couldn’t say how big. There’s something like... a dragon? Flying around it...” Aiko spoke haltingly, as if she didn’t quite believe what she was saying herself.
“Zalegrande Castle...” Kanako looked up at the sky and whispered, as if in a trance.
“If we’re not being attacked, and there’s just something weird going on, then I’m not entirely sure how to deal with it...” Yuichi said while looking at the crumpled armor. The armor made no show of attacking; there was no sign of anything alive inside of it. There didn’t seem to be any parts below the knee, and there were lots of gaps in it, so if someone had been wearing it, that would have been immediately obvious.
“I sure hope we’re not being attacked...” Aiko murmured, dumbfounded, from his side.
Yuri strode up next to them, wearing her anger openly. “I have never been treated in such a fashion! For my once-in-a-lifetime love confession to be defused in such a ridiculous manner... it’s extremely upsetting!”
“Orihara... do you know something about this?” She had been murmuring something about it before, so Yuichi decided to ask.
“Ah?” Kanako, who had been clinging to him ever since they got to the roof, now fixed her eyes on him. “Well, let me see... this model was from the age where armor-makers were making their last gasps against the progress of firearms. It was a fruitless task, but they made the armor thicker and even tempered it to try to make it resistant to bullets. The total weight is over 30 kg, and they generally wore it on horseback—”
Her stock of knowledge didn’t seem like it would be exhausted for a while, and Yuichi was about to cut her off, when something else came falling.
This time, it happened right before Yuichi’s eyes. It had definitely fallen from the sky.
It looked like another part of the armor — a silver plate that struck the roof hard, bounced, and landed next to the armor already there.
He looked up and saw a few other pieces falling. They appeared to have come from much higher up, so it was hard to know when exactly they had appeared. The next thing he knew, they were there, and that was that.
Planks and clumps of metal of different shapes and sizes bounced off the roof and gathered near the original suit of armor.
“What is it?” he asked Kanako, who seemed like she
might know about this, too.
“It’s horse armor,” she said. “In the 16th century, they began experimenting with using steel plates to protect horses, too. But it turned out that having to carry armor, as well as a fully-armored knight, was too much for any less than the sturdiest horses to handle. It also slowed them down, which made it hard to use it effectively.”
“...I thought I’d try and ask, but that’s not very useful in the current situation...” Yuichi commented. Metal plates were falling from the sky. Knowing that they were horse armor wasn’t really helping.
Yuichi waited a little bit, but saw no sign of anything else falling.
“What do you think we should do?” Aiko asked, completely at a loss. “You think we can just leave it? I mean, it can’t have anything to do with us, right?”
“Yeah, I guess it’s none of our business, huh?” Yuichi said.
A mysterious incident had taken place right before their eyes, so it felt like maybe they should do something. But it probably was none of Yuichi’s business right now.
“I am not amused, and I’m going home right now!” Yuri declared. “Yuichi Sakaki! I’ll visit you another time, so be ready when I do!”
Yuri left the roof ahead of the others. Yuichi really did feel like he was being challenged to a duel.
“We should go, too. We can get something to eat on the way,” Yuichi said. He’d suddenly remembered he hadn’t had lunch yet.
It was late at night. Yuichi was in Mutsuko’s room, conferring with her about what had happened earlier that day.
There was a reason he always had these discussions with her late at night: Mutsuko was always busy with something. She often left her door open, but even if she was in her room, if she was concentrating on something, it was forbidden to interrupt her. When she was getting ready for bed was the main time she usually seemed to be free.
The middle of the night was also most convenient for Yuichi, who tended to spend his free time training when there wasn’t something else going on.
The Melancholy of the High School Girl Light Novel Author?! Page 5