by Yuu Kamiya
“And squeeze her booob!”
“…Whaa?”
Sora and the Shrine Maiden raised their voices at the same time.
“Upon this ‘command’—the rite…will be compleeete!”
Plum showed no awareness of the reactions around her and only brimmed with confidence at her announcement. Sora exchanged a brief glance with Shiro, and once he’d confirmed her nod of approval—
“Uhh, okay. Shrine Maiden, you cool with this?”
“…Well, I suppose I was the one who said I’d do it…though I can’t say it sits well that she didn’t explain aforehand.” The Shrine Maiden sighed and fanned her chest.
“…This is really tough somehow… ’Kay, here I gooo…”
With these words, sheepishly extending his hand to the Shrine Maiden’s breast, Sora, his face a mask of resolve—squeezed tension into his hand.
He almost let slip a cry at the elasticity that let him sink in yet pushed back. Sora was deeply moved at this sensation—still different from that of Steph. But his wonder at the sensation was ignored.
“Hmng…?”
The Shrine Maiden, furrowing her brow in apparent displeasure, felt something go off inside her, and her expression…changed. And then, turning her gaze languidly toward Sora—in a daze—mumbled:
“Wha-what is this? This skin-crawling feeling…it transcends mere disgust at your loathsome smile, incorporating irritation as well—I-I see… Is this—is this what they call love?!”
“Hell noooooo! And hey, that hurts, damn it!”
—The Shrine Maiden whispered her feelings with a look in her eye as if viewing something horrible, at which Sora promptly shouted his dismay. But as if she had no ears for his cries, the Shrine Maiden continued.
“Eh, this is love. What is it? I’d never have imagined it, yet now I can say with certainty that I am in love with King Sora. Indeed…so this stomach-churning feeling that makes me want to vomit is love… The world is a surely a vast place.”
“—Hey, Plum. You failed, right?”
Any way you looked at it, it appeared the Dhampir had blown it. Sora’s expression strained the corners of his mouth, but Plum just stuck out her chest with pride and answered.
“Hee-hee-hee, oh, just listeeen… This is where the key lieees.”
—And now her troubled face sparkled, having pulled off a feat that only a Dhampir could.
“The love spell is one whispered of since ages of old in distant realms, yet never actually achieeeved—”
“…Is that so, Jibril?”
Love potions, love spells—such things were to be expected in fantasy, but…
“—Indeed. Though I am loath to admit it, the principle escapes us all entirely,” Jibril conceded, unable to conceal her wonder. Grudgingly admitting Plum’s triumph, she nodded.
“As far as I know, a spell to intervene in such a vague, uncertain element as romantic love, which even those in the arts are unable to define, has never been accomplished even by Elf…”
However outstanding their aptitude may have been for illusion, Dhampir’s rank was Twelve. While magical aptitude was practically synonymous with Rank Seven, the very image of weavers of complex magic, having accomplished what even Elf couldn’t, Plum merely nodded as if to say, What else would you expect?
“Yeeesss, the tricky part was how the definition of romantic love is indeterminate—it’s different from person to person, you seee.”
Beating her little wings merrily, Plum explained. Raising her chest so high one thought one would hear the sound of the air filling her lungs, she continued:
“No rite can have any meaning over an indeterminate element defying definition. This is why all the stuff that was vulgarly called ‘love magic’ was nothing more than lust magic—however!”
“Hey, wait there, Miss Plum. I’m actually more interested in lust—”
Disregarding Sora’s interest, Plum raised her chest as if bending over backward.
“We Dhampirs have finally brought it to fruition!”
“……”
And then the magic that even Elf had been unable to reach, that had astonished even a Flügel, was explained once and for all:
“If it’s indeterminate, all we have to do is determine iiit! If romantic love is a feeling that differs for every person, then all we have to do is arbitrarily impose our own definitiooon!”
What was it with this absurd logic? Love magic, so common in games, had never felt as wrong as it did today. With a glance over to the Shrine Maiden—who looked back at him as if regarding a pile of garbage—
“…Uh, but this obviously isn’t love.”
Sora mumbled with rolling eyes.
“No! If the Shrine Maiden perceives herself as being in love, that is looove! For love—is an illusion to begin with!”
Whaaaaam. The race excelling most in stealth and illusion—in the manipulation of mind and perception—laid it out without any qualification.
“…Shiro. I have never been as disillusioned with love as I am today.”
“…What…is, love…indeed…”
Ignoring the siblings as they contemplated their philosophy, Plum allowed herself to be carried by her momentum.
“Come, King Sora. The Shrine Maiden must now recognize all things creepy as love! The time has come for you to let out a decisive, overwhelming, just all-out creepy line to make sure! Do it!”
At hearing creepy chanted over and over, a desire to say something welled up inside Sora—but he swallowed it for now.
“Uhh…‘Shrine Maiden, I wanna get all hot and bothered and lick you all over…’”
At these first words that popped into Sora’s head, the Holy Shrine Maiden reacted—with a step back. “Ohh… No, Sora, you mustn’t say such things—it makes me more and more in love with you! ”
“Yo, Plum! You think these lines and that expression match?! You notice she’s looking at me with utter contempt?! Dude, she’s clearly telling me with her eyes to fuck off and die, you know?!”
Tears in his eyes, Sora grabbed Plum by the collar and shouted, but the Dhampir puffed herself up with pride all the more as she shook her head.
“That is the form of the Holy Shrine Maiden’s love. That’s how it is now, you seee? Isn’t it magnificent?”
“Sure, it’s magnificent. Now hurry up and stop it! My sanity is getting shaved away at Mach speed!”
—Nay, I say. This can be no love spell, no cheat code…
……
“Myyy, that was an experience… ’Tis worth living long indeed.”
The rite dispelled, the Shrine Maiden’s laughter jingled gleefully. Relegating that sight to the corner of his eye—so the Werebeast would not catch on to his wounds—Sora addressed Plum.
“Okay, I get your sure thing or whatever. But why don’t you do it yourselves?”
If they had the means to make someone fall in love so unconditionally, the Dhampir might as well have done it themselves. But Plum dropped her shoulders as she answered.
“You see, the last male Dhampir is still youung… What the queen desires is a ‘prince’—”
Spinning her hands around and making some magic circles or something float in the air, Plum continued:
“It’s a spell to disguise perception… It may be quite the spell, but even so, it can’t, say, make the Shrine Maiden fall in love with some rock over theere… It has to be at least a man with the ability to reproduuuce.”
—Then, wordlessly tugging the hem of Sora’s clothes, Shiro showed him her phone. Glancing at the words typed there, Sora replied:
“Hmm… ‘Then it doesn’t have to be Brother,’ huh. Most true.”
—At Sora’s words, the Shrine Maiden’s and Izuna’s ears twitched.
“Hey, Plum, can multiple people go into the queen’s game?”
“Huh? Uh, yes. I think so…though it’ll take some doing since the rite to meddle in the queen’s dreams is already such a big deaaal… May I ask why you can’t do it by yourself, Sirrr?
”
“Sorry, but cheats are a last resort. If we’re gonna do this, I want to check our ability to do it fair and square.”
“The trickster has a mouth…”
“Hey there, Shrine Maiden, don’t you go talking shit—a cheat is an unbeatable con that breaks the rules; a trick is a method encompassed by the rules that means you lose if you get caught. They’re fundamentally different, right?”
—Though the Shrine Maiden and the rest didn’t know it, Sora and Shiro—even in their old world, though they may have used mind games and tricks—had a policy of never using cheats.
“A game should be played out for all it’s worth within the scope of the set rules. If you ignore the fundamental rules, you can’t call it a game. We’ll use bugs, we’ll use broken characters, we’ll use whatever helps us win as long as it’s official—but we don’t break the specs. That’s out of the question.”
He punctuated this with a single nod.
Then Sora realized something—and with a look toward the Shrine Maiden and another nod, he asked:
“—Hey, Shrine Maiden—can you swim?”
The Shrine Maiden responded with a shake of her head. “—Even if I cannot, ’tis more than enough for me to simply walk in the water. What of it?”
“I was thinking if it’s okay with you, we’ll take her up on her offer—and go to Oceand.”
“…Hmm, well, I suppose. The reward’s quite a nice one, and it looks like you have a chance of winning.”
“Y-you willl?!”
“—Shrine Maiden, is there anyone you know who’d be cut out for this?”
At this question, the Shrine Maiden paused briefly to consider. Then—her hand placed strategically over her mouth to obscure the smile rising unbidden to her lips as she imagined the imminent change in Sora’s expression—the Shrine Maiden announced:
“—Ino Hatsuse. I understand that man has taken thirty wives.”
Elkia Royal Castle: the royal bedchamber. Steph, having surrendered herself to the bliss of sleep for the first time in a long time, now drifted through the land of dreams—
“We heard the story, you old fart! Now your fate is sealed!!”
She tumbled out of bed at the explosive noise that rocked the castle and the roar of rage that eclipsed even that.
“Wh-what’s going ooon?!”
Steph, screaming and writhing from having struck her head, nevertheless grasped whose voice—correction: howl—she’d heard and immediately headed in that direction. That is, she made for the Great Conference Chamber, even forgetting that she was still in her bedclothes as she grabbed her sheets and flew out of the room.
Practically kicking down the door to the Great Conference Chamber, Steph saw what was most likely—no, unquestionably—the source of the boom: Jibril. And perhaps because of it—
“Wh-what is going on here…?”
Ino Hatsuse’s cards—he had been playing on Steph’s behalf—along with those of his opponents (nobles, presumably) and reams of papers all floated through the air in the wreckage of the Great Conference Chamber. The smoke had yet to settle. And the origin of this calamity, now noticing Steph, finally spoke:
“Oh, little Dora, good day. My masters instructed me to shift us to Elkia at once, and as we have a fair number of people, I opened a rather large hole in space. Is everything all right?”
—So had there been a chance of everything not being all right? Steph ignored that concern and peered through the smoke. Whereupon she saw Sora, bounding as if to smash the floor—bellowing as he stomped toward Ino with enough force that it seemed he might smash right through the floor.
“Defendant Ino Hatsuse! Charged with the grave crime of having so much of a damn life you took a double-digits’ worth of wives! In the court of summary jurisdiction in my head, all members of me, upon my arbitrary and biased judgment, unanimously pronounce you guilty and sentence you to the penalty of death! According to the laws of the galaxy, you—here and now—should become space duuust!!”
“…Ahh…King Sora, Sir, the things I would like to say to you number like unto the stars in the heavens.”
Faced with the return of the King of Hooky—and let us also add, the Mad King—after half a month, Ino twitched as he held something back—and yet. A single line from Izuna, who popped up behind Sora, made Ino freeze.
“…Grampy…are you a ‘secks monster,’ please?”
“Huh—?! Izuna, where did you learn that—?!”
Perhaps not knowing its meaning, Izuna tilted her head.
“…That’s what that asshole Sora called you, please.”
“Hey, you hairless monkey jackass!! After dumping this mountain of work on me, what did you teach my granddaughter, you bastard?!”
Unable to maintain his exterior, Ino smashed a table apart, bellowing. But seeing this, Sora looked to the heavens dramatically and waved his hands about, pointing.
“Ho! Behold, Izuna! This is the face of a criminal whose grave sin has been thrust before him. Is it not a horrible sight?!”
Izuna, looking disillusioned, mumbled further:
“…Grampy, you’re a damn playboy.”
“Whan-no, Izuna! Your gramps gave each of them the love—”
“Aah, aah! Silence, silence, you slave of your groin! Cease your excuses and take with honor—gkhh!!”
“…Brother…shut up…”
Riding on Sora’s back, Shiro’s whisper was as soft as the force she applied with her arms round the vexed Sora’s throat to shut him up.
—By the time the smoke was finally beginning to clear:
“Eh-heh-heh, you folks are always so lively, every time…”
With a sound of small bells and the noise of clogs knocking against the floor—the golden fox revealed herself.
“Wha—H-Holy Shrine Maiden?!”
To Ino, who prostrated himself the moment he caught sight of her, the Shrine Maiden commanded:
“Ino Hatsuse—we henceforth wend to Oceand, in full force.”
She continued in her amused and pleasant tone:
“We’ll explain on the way, but it happens this is the time I would like you to display the full force of your predilection for philandering. Have you no objections?”
“H-Holy Shrine Maiden… O Holy Shrine Maiden, to think that even you see me in such a—”
Despite the fact that Ino seemed moments away from wetting the floor with tears, the Shrine Maiden lowered her voice slightly and put the question to him again—
“—Have you no objections?”
—Ino raised his face and looked around. Looking at the faces assembled there, who knows what conclusions he drew in the end—but his reply was succinct:
“…As you wish. It shall be done.”
“—…”
Confused, Steph lurked by the door, unable to follow the situation.
“Yo, Steph. You look great. It’s been two weeks, has it?” asked Sora nonchalantly, as if only just noticing her. Seeing him, countless emotions whirled in Steph’s heart. Rage, rebuke, volubility, curiosity—. But before any of that, Sora’s face, one she hadn’t seen in so long, made her vision blur. The many lines she’d prepared for when she finally saw him again all flew away. Steph decided to let alone the drops that formed as she clenched her eyelids. She decided not to think about what emotion inspired them, and simply following her feelings, she opened her—
“Aye, policy’s been progressing right quick in Elkia, too, I see—under Ino Hatsuse’s direction, was it?”
“Dude, it was Steph. We just put Ino there to keep her under control and advise her.”
“…Muh?”
—So it was that following this exchange between the Shrine Maiden and Sora, only a foolish noise dropped out of Steph’s gaping mouth. Her eyes widened at this explanation, a not-so-subtle change ignored by the Shrine Maiden, who smiled as if grasping the situation.
“—I see, I see. That’s why you put up the banner of building a bloody Commonwealth and then
, as the would-be presiding monarch, the two of you dallied freely in the Eastern Union… You’re as wretched a man as ever, I see.”
At the Shrine Maiden’s smug words, Sora replied with a similar smile. “They say leave things to the experts—we can always count on Steph when it comes to politics.”
“…And when you consider you weren’t present, all the more, eh?”
“Yeah. What we were more worried about was that some other country might take the chance to mess with us.”
—Ino and Steph gasped. But also looking at the papers, Shiro calmly carried on her brother’s thought.
“…‘Brother and, I, aren’t home’…No matter, how you look at it…it’s a trap…” She continued:
“…To jump, into…that trap…you gotta be, stupid.”
“Those morons don’t have a chance in a million against Steph, who plays us all the time—and learns every time she loses. Which is why we could relax and focus on the Eastern Union!”
Steph and Ino could only gape, flabbergasted. But Sora hardened his expression a bit and added, “But playing that often is overdoing it. Steph, why’d you take all the matches?”
—At this reproach, Steph’s thoughts froze. Come to think of it…he was right—why had she accepted all the matches? It was she, the one challenged, who held the right to decide the game or whether to play at all. Why had she exerted herself so? Steph’s eyes widened once more as she asked herself this, yet Sora continued:
“Steph—I’m counting on you, but don’t push it. Also—like, what…” He scratched his head as if slightly embarrassed, then muttered, “…Thanks, Steph.”
—Those were the words she’d wanted to hear. That’s all she’d wanted as she’d been pushing herself so hard. Her welling tears, the understanding permeating her brain, feeling her body heat rising, her cheeks flushing—all of this accosting her at once, she still managed to reply:
“N-no… It is only because you two are so unfathomable that I assumed I had to hurry—that is all!”
Sora approached the stammering Steph. Her heartbeat accelerated.
“So, Steph. Hate to spring it on you when you’re tired, but like the Shrine Maiden said, we’re heading to the city of Siren.”