My Beloved Princess ~The Boy Called Incompetent Rises with Only a Sword and the Princess's Devotion~ - Chapter 108: The Eve of the Final Battle

Chapter 108: The Eve of the Final Battle

“Wait a second. Calm down, Kirin.”

“No, I will not wait. I’m taking that worthless commander’s head.”

The large strategy tent stood nearly empty after the order to disperse, with only a handful of mercenaries still inside.

Boots hammered across the boarded floor, and a fist came down on the massive planning table. The blow made one of the carved wooden army markers tip over with a clack.

The tent was thick with killing intent, all of it radiating from the girl at its centre, her lovely face twisted by hatred. The sheer ferocity of it, the kind that allowed no objections, sent uneasy murmurs through the mercenaries around her.

As if in answer to her rage, the air cracked and popped around her. When Kokuren tried to seize her by the shoulders, he yelped, “Hot!” and snatched his hand back.

“What brought this on so suddenly? Our opponent’s a noble, you know.”

“Do you think I would lose to the likes of Ryusei?”

“That’s not the point. If we lay a hand on the Noble Alliance, we’ll be rebels. And if that happens, Rakuyō and the others working the rear support line will be arrested as accomplices too.”

“That fool punished Shunka for disobeying orders. All she did was make graves for our comrades. I cannot forgive it. I will kill him.”

“What? Shunka? All right, I get it. Let’s kill him.”

Kokuren, who had been doing everything he could to stop her a moment ago, changed his tune the instant he heard Shunka’s name. He grabbed his beloved sword and headed for the tent entrance alongside Kirin. The mercenaries hurriedly got out of their way, as if instinct told them not to meddle with a wrathful god. As he strode through the path they opened, he asked,

“So what did they do to Shunka?”

“I do not know. Some mercenaries were gossiping about it just over there.”

That day, with the enemy capital right before them, a strategy meeting had been held ahead of the final battle. Gathered there were the worthless commander representing the nobles and the core of the mercenary forces.

The meeting had proceeded without issue and ended safely. Up to that point, everything had been fine.

Then they had happened to overhear a rumour from the mercenaries leaving the tent.

According to it, “a slave who had gone and built graves in camp without permission” had been hauled away for disobeying orders. But it was only a rumour, and it was not even clear whether the slave in question was really Shunka.

“Then first we confirm what’s going on. It’ll still be time to kill him after that.”

“There is nothing to confirm. Shunka is the only dragonkin eccentric enough to mourn slaves.”

“Even so, this punishment or whatever it was still isn’t clear. Maybe it was only a verbal warning.”

“…Understood. Then let us put it on hold for the moment.”

Kirin usually came across as a soft beauty with a calm air about her, but in truth she was passionate, impulsive, and at times disastrously short-sighted. At the same time, she was generous toward anyone she took a liking to. To those blessed with her affection, that dramatic shift could make her seem almost like she had two personalities.

Beside herself with rage over Shunka being hurt, Kirin calmed down somewhat after her beloved partner reined her in.

But her resolve had not wavered in the slightest, and she still looked ready for battle. She swept the tent flap aside with rough impatience and strode out. Catching a glimpse of her severe profile, Kokuren murmured, sounding oddly pleased,

“Still, when did you get so close to Shunka?”

Leaving the strategy tent behind, they made for the commanders’ tents.

The camp’s tents were divided into slave tents, mercenary tents, and commanders’ tents, with the commanders’ section set up in the safest central area. The supply depot where Shunka had been burying the dead was also close to the commanders’ tents.

As they moved along the broad road lined with tents, they spotted Shunka trudging toward them from ahead. From that distance, they could not make out the expression on her downcast face.

Kirin wanted to make sure Shunka was safe as quickly as possible. Before she knew it, she had broken into a run.

With her head lowered, Shunka failed to notice Kirin approaching. Only when Kirin came within arm’s reach, and the shadow falling over her must have entered her sight, did Shunka finally lift her face. Looking up at the unusually breathless Kirin, she tilted her head and asked,

“Why are you in such a hurry?”

She smiled as if nothing had happened.

For a moment, Kirin nearly relaxed in relief at the sight of Shunka looking unharmed. Then she frowned at once, struck by how badly that smile fit what she had heard.

Looking closer, Shunka’s smile was stiff. Together with the rumour from earlier, it looked wrong no matter how Kirin saw it.

Driven by the unease swelling in her chest, Kirin started checking Shunka all over with her hands. Not caring if she got dirty, she dropped to her knees and asked,

“Are you hurt? Did they do anything awful to you?”

When she rolled up Shunka’s sleeve, she exposed an arm covered in fresh wounds. But Kirin could not tell whether those injuries had come from the battlefield or from corporal punishment.

Shunka gave an awkward laugh at Kirin’s concern.

“I got scolded a little. But I’m fine. It’s the usual sort of thing.”

Then she added sadly,

“It looks like I’ll be able to get more sleep.”

She turned her face away and then, just like that, suddenly ran.

Kirin instinctively moved to chase after her, but someone caught her shoulder from behind.

“Let her be alone.”

“But…”

“It was only for an instant when she turned away. But that brave Shunka was crying, wasn’t she?”

“……..”

No matter how hard things got, Shunka had never stopped smiling. The simple fact that she had shown tears shook Kirin more deeply than words could express.

Shunka had carried out every one of her duties perfectly, and on top of that she had kept burying their comrades while sacrificing what little sleep she had. She had not disobeyed orders, nor had she neglected her work. Kirin could not understand why someone like that should be punished. Nor did she want to understand it.

“I cannot forgive this after all.”

The one who had made Shunka grieve had to be judged.

Driven by that single conviction, Kirin rose to her feet, but Kokuren stepped into her path.

“I’ve got an idea.”

“An idea? Whether to carve him up with a sword, crush him with my fist, or gouge him out with my breath… I think that is about all there is to consider.”

“No. It won’t save Shunka.“

Those words, aimed straight at the heart of the matter, brought Kirin up short where she stood.

“Shunka belongs to one of the thirteen packs under the Noble Alliance. It’d be convenient if that commander were her master, but if he isn’t, then Shunka will still remain a slave. They’ll just appoint a new commander, and that’ll be the end of it. Her treatment probably won’t change.”

“Then what should we do?”

“Let’s take Shunka into our pack.”

That option had always existed in Kirin’s mind as well.

Whenever she wondered what she could do for Shunka, it was one of the choices she had weighed again and again, only to leave pending every time without ever approving it.

She had wanted to help Shunka, and yet she loathed herself for the pettiness that kept her from making that choice. That feeling, unnatural by the standards of an ordinary dragonkin woman yet entirely natural by human ones, was called jealousy.

“Into our pack? Shunka…?”

“Yeah. We promised we wouldn’t make our pack any bigger, so I could never bring myself to say it. But now I know you feel the same way.”

Dragonkin society always thought in terms of the pack.

Within a pack, sharing one’s husband was normal, and a tolerant attitude toward the other consorts was expected. That was how they preserved harmony within the group. It was the same kind of feeling as friends happily sharing a single cake.

That was why Kirin, who felt revulsion toward harems, was an oddity among dragonkin. And because she imposed that oddness on her husband as well, she had earned the resentment of the other consorts, Rakuyō among them.

“Jealousy is an ugly emotion that throws a pack out of step.”

She did not need Rakuyō to tell her that.

Kirin herself knew it. And it was not as though she felt no guilt over her own behaviour.

She was always wavering. Always tormented by what she was.

For a long time, she had agonised over whether she might not be necessary to the pack at all.

Perhaps that was why a note of accusation slipped into her voice.

“The same way? That I want to make the pack bigger?”

She was supposed to want to help Shunka. And yet the words that spilled from her lips would, ironically, bring about the exact opposite result. What was she doing, rejecting it? Was she going to abandon Shunka? The conflict and guilt welling up inside her made her chest ache until she wanted to cry.

“I know. You hate what people call a harem, right? But put your hand over your heart and think about it. Why did you want to kill that commander?”

That was obvious. She did not even need to think.

“Because Shunka was treated horribly.”

“Treated horribly… Is that alone enough reason to make an enemy of the Noble Alliance? Is it worth putting Rakuyō and the others in danger too?”

Kirin’s expression clouded as he struck at the sore spot.

“Then can you forgive it? Can you stand there before Shunka being unjustly flogged and pretend not to see it?”

“No, I can’t.”

“Then you feel the same way too, don’t you, Kokuren? You truly do want to save Shunka, even if it means making an enemy of the Noble Alliance.”

“Yeah, I feel the same way. Just like you, I think of Shunka as one of us.”

At those words, spoken as though they were the most natural thing in the world, Kirin truly lost her voice.

“You said it yourself before, didn’t you? That you’re not gentle enough to smile after your family gets hurt. You’ve already acknowledged Shunka as one of us.”

◇◇◇◇◇

Evening.

In a plaza not far from the mercenaries’ tents, the mercenaries had gathered and were drinking around bonfires. The red-faced men chatted in high spirits, swigging black liquor from little barrels filled to the brim, their conversation lively and loud. Perhaps because of that, even the slave girls serving them seemed lighter on their feet than usual.

“Tomorrow’s the final battle, huh? At long last, we’ll be able to go home.”

“Damn right. Our employers this time are the Thirteen Nobles, so the reward money’s gonna be massive. Even if I moved the whole family to one of those pricey neutral cities, we could loaf around for years on that kind of pay.”

“Buying safety’s fine and all, but I don’t wanna abandon my turf. I want to expand my home base.”

“Yeah, that’s probably the safest bet. But the more money you pour into it, the easier it’ll be for people to target you, so watch yourself.”

“Speaking of that, what d’you think those two from the Black Kirin are gonna do? They probably make dozens of times more than we do. Though for them, I guess they don’t need to worry about bandits.”

Feeling the men’s gazes on her back, Kirin took one of the meat skewers roasting over the fire and bit into it. A nasty gritty crunch sounded in her mouth, followed by an equally unpleasant taste.

“Hm. Perhaps I overcooked it a little.”

“A little? Not even close. The heat’s way too high. This ain’t meat anymore. It’s charcoal.”

Perhaps still heartsick, Shunka was nowhere to be seen at supper despite being on serving duty.

That was why Kirin had tried cooking for herself for the first time in a while, but apparently the result had been disastrous. She moved her jaw with a sound less like chewing meat than crunching hard candy, forcing herself to fill her stomach anyway. Obliged to keep her company, Kokuren let out a heartfelt sigh.

“This is awful…”

“Endure it for one night.”

“On the eve of the final battle, no less. This is rough.”

“It certainly reminds one how much Shunka does for us.”

According to the information they had gathered from the slave soldiers they were friendly with, Shunka really had been punished in the central plaza.

The official reason was disobeying orders. According to the toothbrush-moustached commander’s argument, she had neglected her sleep and failed to make the effort required to keep herself in peak condition. And so, in full view of the crowd, Shunka had been sentenced to a flogging. The one who had given that order was Anraku, the Dragon King serving as supreme commander of the Noble Alliance.

That alone was an act worthy of death a thousand times over, but what Kirin could not forgive above all else was what had happened afterward.

“Building graves for lowly slaves right beside my quarters. It’s so gloomy I can hardly stand it.”

Having spat that out, the toothbrush-moustached commander ordered the slave soldiers to dig up the graves and throw the unearthed corpses out into the wasteland. The graves Shunka had painstakingly made to remember the dead were mercilessly torn open, and by leaving the bodies exposed to the elements, he had trampled even her wish that they rest in peace.

And not a single one of the Thirteen Nobles had stopped that outrage.

“Saying slaves have no need for graves. They have some nerve.”

Dark killing intent poured off Kirin thickly enough for anyone to imagine it, and even so, the only reason she had managed to hold herself back was because she had the just cause of freeing Shunka, but…

“So then. How shall we identify Shunka’s master and dispose of them?”

She closed her eyes and dabbed delicately at her mouth with a napkin as she spoke in a calm voice. The mismatch between her tone and her words made Kokuren sputter black liquor everywhere.

“What the hell are you saying all of a sudden?”

“Ownership of a slave lies with the master. If the master is removed from the picture, then Shunka becomes free, and after that we can welcome her into the pack if she so wishes. Is that not so?”

“That’s true, but that’s way too brute-force a way of doing it.”

“Is it? I think this is the shortest and fastest method.”

“Even if it is, the risk doesn’t match the reward. We’d turn the Noble Alliance into our enemy.”

“We need only make it look as though the enemy nation assassinated them.”

“That is not something to say in front of a crowd, you know!?”

Drawing attention from the people around them, Kokuren lowered his voice awkwardly.

“With your ability, you’d probably be able to assassinate a noble without attracting notice. But assassinations always come with the chance of failure. That method’s too risky.”

“Without risk, slave liberation cannot be done.”

“No, it can. Shunka will be eighteen very soon.”

Eighteen. Kirin understood perfectly what that number meant.

“The law of the dragonkin. Once one reaches the full age of eighteen, one may freely form a pack and become independent. So that is what you intend to use?”

“Exactly. Even without going out of our way to fight, it’s possible to add Shunka to our group.”

Kirin gave a small nod to show she understood Kokuren’s proposal, then voiced a concern.

“What if Shunka’s master does not approve of freeing her?”

“Then…”

Kokuren drained the black liquor from the small barrel in one go and grinned.

“We take her by force.”

Kirin was exasperated.

“Then shouldn’t we have just done that from the beginning?”

“I want to do this properly. If we lose a comrade because of a conflict that could’ve been avoided, we’d regret it forever.”

“I see. In that case, I will respect you as my husband and leave that side of things to your judgement. However, that aside, I will not be satisfied unless that worthless fool is dealt with.”

At the very rear of the battlefield. That place, from which he could run away at any moment if the battle turned against them, was the fixed position of the toothbrush-moustached commander placed in charge of directing the front lines.

Perhaps he thought he had drawn the short straw. Every time, he would yawn lazily and show no motivation at all. He issued no tactical orders whatsoever; the only two commands he ever gave were charge and retreat. From the perspective of the mercenaries who risked their lives and crossed swords on the field, his listless attitude was more than enough to breed resentment. In fact, plenty of mercenaries already resented the toothbrush-moustached commander.

Even if that man were to die, it would almost certainly have no effect on the larger picture. If anything, there was reason to worry that keeping him alive might damage the war effort from here on out.

Nothing but harm and not a single benefit. Faced with Kirin’s irritation, Kokuren remained utterly calm, and utterly cold, as he spoke.

“The final battle starts tomorrow. Within a few days, the royal capital will fall. Once the war ends, the Noble Alliance will dissolve. That’s when we’ll bring Shunka into the pack. After that, everything’s free. From there on, you can boil him, roast him, do whatever you want.”

Having been given permission, Kirin nodded silently in satisfaction.

Some time later, Shunka came pattering over.

She bowed her head over and over, apologising for being late.

Seeing that she had regained her usual smile, Kirin felt relief from the bottom of her heart and lightly jabbed Kokuren, as if urging him to comfort her.

The small girl settled in beside Kokuren, and their usual foolish chatter began. Shunka giggled softly. Kokuren was pointing at the meat skewer stuck in the bonfire and complaining about something, but Kirin barely heard him.

When Shunka hurriedly stood to make food, Kirin stopped her with one hand and said,

“Shunka, you have no role tonight. I have decided that today I will serve you my homemade cooking. So you are to rest and take it easy.”

Kokuren made a face like he absolutely hated the idea.

Ignoring that, Kirin headed for the cooking area.

On the eve of the final battle, their last quiet hours slipped away like that.