Mahouka Koukou no Rettousei - Volume 11 - Visitor Chapter (III)

by Sato Tsutomu

  Tatsuya was reexamining the predetermined conclusion once again in the living room of his own home.

  At that time, the buzzer rang.

  A shocked cry from Miyuki, who had answered the door's intercom, reached Tatsuya’s ears.

  Miyuki’s face displayed surprise and impatience when she came to Tatsuya.

  "Um, Onii-sama, there’s a guest..."

  "Should I meet the guest?"

  Tatsuya had gotten up because he thought it was some kind of uninitiated guest, however—

  "No, I didn’t invite her, but... the guest is Sakurai Minami-chan who I met at the Yotsuba main house."

  "What...?"

  Tatsuya also remembered that maid girl.

  Sakurai Honami. The former Metropolitan Police SP who was his late mother’s Guardian. The woman who had poured love out to the two siblings as easily as if she was an elder sister or a relative. Three years before in the summer in that battle in Okinawa, the augmented magician had lost her life protecting Tatsuya. The girl's features were completely like the person the siblings could never forget.

  She was a visitor completely unexpected to even Tatsuya.

  In front of Tatsuya, with Miyuki at his side, was a girl in a spring-like pastel one piece dress.

  After Sakurai Minami politely bowed, she passed a single envelope to Tatsuya.

  Tatsuya invited Minami to sit and sat down on the sofa himself. As she watched, he cut the seal and sent his eyes to the letter inside prompted by her gaze.

  As he continued to read, Tatsuya felt as though an illusionary pain was spreading in his mouth.

  The sender was Yotsuba Maya.

  After the perfunctory seasonal greeting, the letter read thus:

  "This Spring, Minami-chan will be enrolled in First High school.

  In regards to this, please give Minami-chan accommodations in your home.

  She has become a good housekeeper; she already possesses enough skill.

  You must need help around the house; after all you purchased a maid robot, right? In any case, you and Miyuki-san both are going to be busy with various things now that you two are becoming second year high school students.

  She has been informed that she will work as a live-in maid so please do not have any scruples about ordering her about.

  Also, I intend to have Minami-chan learn the work of a Guardian.

  As her senpai, please teach her many things."

  He felt as though he could hear his Aunt's high-pitched laugh from the face of the page.

  Tatsuya folded up the letter and returned it to the envelope, then placed it on the table; perhaps she could tell something from his behaviour, thus Miyuki said "Onii-sama?" to him in an anxious voice.

  Tatsuya took one deep breath and passed the letter to Miyuki.

  After a small wait, the sound of air being gulped emitted from Miyuki’s throat.

  Minami stood next to the wall facing her as if she was waiting for Miyuki’s eyes to leave the letter.

  "I am a novice, but please accept me. As Oku-sama stated, please use me to the fullest."

  Minami deeply lowered her head.

  Even though they understood she was the linchpin of an invasion from Maya, neither Tatsuya nor Miyuki could reject a girl who had the same face as Honami.

  Armored behind his poker face, Tatsuya could do nothing more than nod at his Aunt’s bitterly ironic ‘present.’

  —In April, the new school year would begin and it would be even richer in mayhem than the previous one—

  That unwelcome premonition would not disappear from its resting place in Tatsuya’s chest.

  [The end of the first year volumes]

  The Ojou-sama's Magnificent(?) Day Off

  Common Era 2095, November 2. Throughout the nation, a triumphant mood was felt.

  The evening of the day before yesterday, the news had reported that the defense force had eliminated the Great Asian Alliance's forward base and armada with their secret weapon. The latest news flowing through the living room late yesterday evening was that North Tokyo had asked Washington to put out feelers as an intermediary of peace. This development had occurred way too quickly, so there were those who did not consider the report to be all that reliable, but only a small percentage of the population maintained the ability to make unruffled judgement.

  Much of the population had abruptly become commentators on military affairs — boys who would normally have no interest in politics talked about diplomacy and pragmatic power politics in loud voices at schools.

  To the girls' apparent shock, disapproving glares at a time like this had no power to restrain them.

  This was not limited to school. Sighing at the high spirited, irresponsible celebrity on the screen, Saegusa Mayumi switched the television off.

  The current time was 10am. Since today was a weekday, she would usually be at school at this time. However, students of every magic high school involved in the Yokohama incident had continued to be given a break from school since yesterday, and First High School was no exception.

  As someone preparing to take her exams at the beginning of the new year, taking a break from being drilled on the subjects she was studying certainly caused complicated feelings in her heart, but she wasn't someone who had been involved just because she was at the scene. Mayumi had been actually involved, so it was good for her to take a break. "Unfortunately, she could not relax.

  [11]

  She realized that she had turned off the TV, right?

  The extremely good timing of the housekeeper's voice that could be heard from the intercom was mere coincidence — Mayumi was fully aware of that even as she mused over the possibility.

  "I’ll open the door right now."

  She replied as she stood up from her chair. Actually, she could have unlocked it by giving a command to the voice recognition interface of the Home Automation Robot, but for no particular reason, Mayumi opened the door herself.

  In front of the door was the housekeeper in charge of looking after Mayumi. Even now, there is an extensively supported subculture of people who wear a uniform and are called a word starting with M and ending in D. ...Well, the skirt was calf length, the collar concealed the region below the neck, and there were no large uncovered parts in the back, so this was a functional uniform.

  Besides, in this house, the existence of a housekeeper wearing this kind of uniform is not strange in the least. After all this time, there was no way it should feel unusual at all.

  "What is it?"

  Mayumi asked the housekeeper, who was about halfway into her twenties.

  "Danna-sama[12] has summoned you."

  When she heard this, Mayumi grimaced slightly. 'Again?' she thought.

  Despite being questioned on what happened over and over just yesterday... while Mayumi grumbled in her mind, the next words made her tilt her head.

  "He is waiting in the reception room."

  Even though it was described as a head tilt, this was a private gesture made only in her mind.

  —The reception room? Not the study?

  That was a question that Mayumi had.

  "Is there a guest?"

  "It seems so."

  It could not be said that they had been together for a long time, but roughly speaking, it was her companion’s job to be extremely helpful to Mayumi. From the short exchange, Mayumi understood that the woman did not know the guest's name.

  "Please inform him that I will come after I change my clothes."

  "Shall I help you change your clothes?"

  After considering it for a moment, Mayumi immediately made an intuitive decision. Modern fashion did not present many opportunities to wear dresses that could not be put on by oneself.

  "It will be all right. I will present myself in properly formal attire."

  In short, the housekeeper had probably been ordered to make sure of that. As usual, the housekeeper respectfully bowed and withdrew when Mayumi g
ave her answer.

  ◊ ◊ ◊

  The tailored one piece dress she wore was in a light color, with an ankle length skirt that protruded slightly near the vicinity of the thigh. After she adjusted the lace on the hem, Mayumi knocked on the door of the reception room.

  "Enter."

  The voice that seemed to come from the room was her father’s recorded voice from a speaker installed within the decorated wood door. The recorded voice was almost indistinguishable from his living voice and told family members that they needed to be formal.

  Apparently, today’s guests were people they couldn't be very open with.

  "Pardon me."

  Wearing her usual two layer thick mask of a lady, Mayumi uttered the cliché phrase in a low tone and slowly entered the room.

  With her eyes cast down, she peeked at the guests' faces.

  The man and woman seated in front of her father both had faces she knew. Even so, they were not the type of acquaintances she particularly welcomed. Nonetheless, she did not particularly hate them either.

  However, she did not show any of her true feelings as she stood beside her father with a smiling face and made a graceful bow to their guests.

  "Welcome, Hirofumi-san. Mio-san, it has been a while since I last saw you."

  Before the girl replied, the young man stood up.

  Nevertheless, the woman with the appearance of a young girl remained seated. And no one raised their eyebrows at this.

  They were not maintaining poker faces; neither Mayumi nor her father, Koichi, considered this disrespectful.

  As for why the woman, Itsuwa Mio, wasn’t sitting on a sofa: she was sitting in a wheelchair.

  However her brother, Itsuwa Hirofumi, seemed to feel guilty about it; even though they didn’t consider it rude, his return greeting was slightly inarticulate.

  "I hope we haven’t called at a bad time, Mayumi-san."

  "Please have a seat. After all, Mio-san is already seated."

  "Thank you very much, Mayumi-san. I am sorry for waiting so long between visits."

  It felt like the person being discussed, Mio, had become defiant instead, when she answered Mayumi’s words with a laugh and a cherubic smile.

  While Hirofumi seated himself lightly on the sofa, as she asked him to, Mayumi was gripped with the same doubt, "Is this person really older than me?" that she always felt when she was face to face with Mio.

  It was an indisputable fact that Itsuwa Mio had turned twenty-six this year. However, whenever the actual person was in her field of vision, she couldn’t help wanting to doubt that truth.

  Her height was only an inch or two shorter than Mayumi’s own; however, their figures were completely different. Her body could be described in one word — undeveloped. There wasn’t much about her body that could be called ‘womanly.’

  To be truthful, she could still move her legs. But because of her extremely weak constitution, her body could not endure walking for a long period.

  She started using a wheelchair around the time she turned twenty, however, because her body had been too weak to exercise for a long enough period of time. Her appetite was small, which meant that she didn’t get enough nourishment, which made her body weak in a vicious circle. Her undeveloped figure was a result of that.

  There was very little bulge in her chest area that could be seen while she was clothed. Calling her completely flat wouldn’t be much of an exaggeration. Her hip area was also as thin as a young girl’s. Mio’s body looked like it belonged to someone around the age of thirteen.

  Her facial features matched the youthful appearance of her body. Her style of clothing completely fit her physical features, and somehow gave off no hint of ‘womanliness.’

  However her childish looks didn’t matter; Mio hadn’t made any outings after she had graduated from college and had made special arrangements to take most of her college classes online, so why on earth had she come here today? Secretly, in her mind, Mayumi was scratching her head in puzzlement with the thought of ‘I don’t think she is merely accompanying Hirofumi by any means, though.’

  "We came to say goodbye to you, today."

  When Mio broke that news, Mayumi’s gaze clouded with disbelief — or to be correct, she was mystified by the preceding statement.

  "Are you returning to your family’s main estate?"

  To conceal any obvious turmoil — but she had no need to feel upset — Mayumi replied with a question.

  The Itsuwa clan’s main seat was in the Ehime prefecture, but because Mio needed to commute to university, she had left and come to Tokyo to live her life in one of their other residences. Because her younger brother, Hirofumi, started college just after she graduated, the two lived together.

  "I will return to the main house; however, before that—"

  Mio cut off her words in a formal manner to hide her inner laughter; Hirofumi was purposely changing his expression, bringing his brows together sullenly.

  "We will be going to the front."

  "The front... you’re going into battle!?"

  When the meaning of the words 'the front' sank into her brain, Mayumi raised her voice without thinking.

  "—Please excuse my rudeness. But why..."

  Mayumi promptly apologized for her impropriety and looked at Mio and her father with confused eyes.

  "The public announcement will be made next week, but the official decision has been made."

  The answer came from her father.

  "Mio and her brother are going to stay for a while at the Sasebo Naval base; from there they will go west with the navy by sea. Their destination is something we don’t know; however, their purpose is to urge the Great Asian Alliance to conclude a peace treaty by making a show of force. ...It probably doesn’t need to be said, but until the official announcement is made, not a word to anyone."

  "Yes, I understand that."

  Mayumi readily agreed with her father’s admonishment. Naturally, she was only agreeing to the ‘not a word to anyone’ part.

  She understood the reason why the military would deploy Mio. The woman was one of only thirteen publicly acknowledged Strategic Magicians in the world, of which there were said to be probably fewer than fifty in total, the rest of whom were hidden. The Japanese government publicly admitted to having only one user of Strategic Class Magic.

  The woman’s Strategic Class Magic ‘Abyss’ was a specialized naval attack, but it could also be used effectively on land. Just by having her accompany them, they should be able to apply tremendous pressure on the enemy.

  However, even so, she felt that it wasn't a very rational move at this time. The forefront of the invasion had been launched against the Yokohama coastal region and the military's actions at the time had wreaked havoc on the Korean peninsula, which had actually brought an end to the October 31st stage of the conflict. As long as they weren't going to pursue territorial concessions, a counter invasion was already strategically unnecessary. There was no need to say that she felt the demerits of going as far as sending Mio out for several weeks in her condition, even with all the thorough preparation, were greater than the merits.

  It was not clear enough to put into words in her mind, but Mayumi felt a general uneasiness.

  "I will also be going with my elder sister."

  He was probably gripped with similar feelings of dissatisfaction. However, this was a government decision which the head of the Itsuwa clan accepted, and could not be overturned by Hirofumi. He was someone who could be chosen as the next head of the Itsuwa clan, but he was not yet the ‘next head’; at this stage, the situation could not be changed by any objections he raised. His decision to at least accompany his elder sister in order to help her showed in Hirofumi’s face.

  "The truth is..."

  Perhaps desiring to change the ambience brought about by her brother’s mood, Mio’s tone switched to a joking one.

  "I did want to see Mayumi-san become my brother’s bride however."

  This certainly
resulted in a change in the mood. —Nonetheless, it was in the opposite direction of what she intended.

  This remark, unfortunately, continued the previous topic and no one laughed at what was commonly called a ‘death omen’ type of joke.

  "Nee-san."

  "...I'm sorry."

  Within the increasingly serious atmosphere, Mio gave a mournful cry and become completely crestfallen.

  "Ah, well, we'll take up that conversation once again when Hirofumi-kun returns."

  Due to his feelings of responsibility as a host, Koichi promptly covered up the gaffe and returned the weak smile to Mio's face; as a result of the paucity of choices for their expressions, Mayumi and Hirofumi went expressionless.

  There was a reason Mayumi did not give a ‘it’s been a while’ to Hirofumi. This was the reason Mayumi's thoughts scattered when it turned out that Mio was not simply accompanying Hirofumi.

  Hirofumi was one of the candidates to become Mayumi’s betrothed. However, since Hirofumi was the eldest son of the Itsuwa Clan, it might be better to say Mayumi was one of the candidates to become Hirofumi’s betrothed. They were both direct descendants of the Ten Master Clans and close in age; one was an heir and one was the eldest daughter of the main family with an elder brother who was the principal heir — the conditions could be called quite favorable.

  To tell the truth, the conditions were the same with the Juumonji clan’s Katsuto, and Koichi was thinking about which one he wanted to marry Mayumi off to. (The Ichijou clan’s Masaki was excluded because he was younger than Mayumi.)

  Of course, the people in question had their own opinions on the matter and there were other arranged marriage talks that hadn't quite become engagements; however, Mayumi and Hirofumi often dined together and went to the theater together in a family setting with both the Saegusa and Itsuwa clans. —Despite the expectations of the adults, the pair themselves weren’t interested, hence the mutual poker faces.

  However, always ‘silently going along’ only made their moods worsen, which was something Mayumi knew quite well.

  "By the way, when do you leave?"