The Beastmen's Continent
Even after leafing through every adventurer’s guidebook I could find, there was not a single word about ships that sailed the skies. The cheap volumes sold in the markets were just as silent on the subject.
In that moment, a secret of this world known only to mages was laid bare before me.
“Hey!”
I was still staring up at the enormous vessel in open wonder when a woman on the deck looked down and waved.
“We’re about to cast off! Keep dawdling and you’ll have to catch the next one!”
She was right. Departure preparations were in their final stretch; mages bustled about the pier and streamed up the gangway onto the great ship. I gave her a quick answering wave and started toward it.
There was no boarding procedure to speak of. The mages stationed at the entrance merely counted heads as people filed past.
Of course, having reached the finals of the competition meant a fair number of them recognized me. Envy, jealousy, goodwill, and admiration—all of it tangled together and clung to my back as I walked.
Once Nightmare and I stepped onto the deck, a mage handed me a numbered ticket and a small key.
“Your cabin and ticket for the duration of the airship voyage.”
“Ah, thank you.”
“Have a pleasant journey.”
The mage bowed and moved on to the next passenger, handing out identical tickets and keys.
[315]
I checked the number, slipped the ticket into my pocket, and looked around.
The deck of the flying ship—the airship—was surprisingly spacious. Mages wandered freely across it.
I was doing the same, exploring here and there, when a cool breeze rose from the far end of the deck and a woman came flying toward me as if the wind itself carried her.
Her robe and cool sky-blue hair billowed as though they were one with the breeze. Moving like the wind given human form, she alighted lightly in front of me.
“Hello!”
Was she imitating the way elves moved? Mana flowed around her body, weaving the air so that she seemed to ride the wind exactly as the elves did. She was human, of course.
The blue of her robe marked her as a mage of the Blue Tower. I raised a hand in greeting.
“Hello.”
“You’re the Starlight of Dawn… right?”
Only mages could toss around such an embarrassing nickname right to someone’s face without the slightest hesitation. I gave a small nod.
“I knew it! You look different up close. I mean—cuter.”
“Thanks for the compliment.”
“Traveling alone?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, really? Then how about sticking with me? I’m by myself too.”
I considered the offer for a moment. A new encounter that had blown in on the wind. She didn’t seem to have any ill intent, so sharing the airship journey with her didn’t sound bad at all.
I slid down from Nightmare’s back and held out my hand.
“I’m Ceris, of the Tower of Dawn.”
“Wendy. Blue Tower, as you can see!”
Her smile was as refreshing as a breeze.
Wendy and I strolled the deck, talking about all sorts of things—most of the conversations started by her questions, admittedly.
Then a vast current of mana began to stir beneath our feet. Wendy, walking beside me, felt it too and glanced around.
“Looks like we’re taking off.”
“This airship?”
“Mm-hm.”
The moment she finished speaking, the sails that had seemed purely decorative unfurled, and the airship began to move. An enormous surge of mana was pushing the vessel forward.
“Whoa…”
Nightmare and I moved to the railing. The great airship sliced through pure white clouds and climbed into the blue sky.
It felt as though we were crossing a sea made of clouds. Cool wind brushed my face as I spotted the blue ocean and the tiny scraps of land spread out far below.
Puihihing—
Nightmare, equally thrilled by the unfamiliar sight, lashed his tail wildly, stirring little gusts of his own.
“Amazing, isn’t it?”
“You seem pretty used to riding airships, Wendy.”
“Yeah. This is the best place to feel the wind.”
She laughed softly and spread her arms wide. Her blue robe billowed like waves in the rushing air.
From the airship’s deck you could take in everything on the ground: the Karuma Empire, the savage lands of Greenfall, the Magic Towers, my homeland the Kingdom of Abel, and even the continent called Monster Island.
The solitary stretch of blackened earth standing apart from the rest had to be the world of the dead known as the Grimshade Kingdom.
The airship passed over all of it and flew on across the sky above the blue sea. The endless ocean met the blue heavens so seamlessly that it was hard to tell where sky ended and earth began.
Just as white clouds drifted across the blue sky, a hazy mist began to gather over the water. We had reached the place where the entire sea was blanketed in thick fog—the Blue Veil.
Soon the secrets of a world I had never known would unfold. I swallowed dryly and wrapped my arms around Nightmare’s neck.
Puihing—
The edge of the sea and the fog that covered it came into view. Like every other end of the world I had seen on my adventures, this place too looked as if something had simply severed it.
Through that broken edge, seawater poured downward—into the bottomless blue sky below.
“Wendy.”
“Hm?”
“What’s under that sky?”
“Who knows…? No one does.”
“Couldn’t an airship go down there?”
“You can go down. But no airship has ever come back up.”
“What happened?”
“Someone would have to return for us to ask… and so far, not a single person has. So nobody knows.”
At her words I gazed at the other sky stretching beneath the sea. The airship sailed past the sight with complete indifference.
The landmasses that had spread below the heavens were gone. The sea that had stretched like another sky had vanished as well. Only blue sky remained in every direction.
It felt as though we had been dropped into an empty blue void.
Still the airship pressed on without pause, heading ever toward the end of the sky.
“Shall we head inside soon?”
“I’d like to look a little longer.”
“You’ll be staring at nothing for quite a while. Better to go in, unpack, and settle.”
“Ah.”
I nodded. Caught up in the wonder of a sight I had never seen before, I had been standing there for hours with my bag still on my back.
Following Wendy’s advice, I headed inside. The airship had no dedicated stables, so Nightmare and I would have to share a cabin.
I pulled a thick blanket from the drawer and spread it on the floor—making a bed for him. He shot me a look that clearly said he wanted to sleep on my bed with me, but that was simply impossible.
If Nightmare climbed onto the bed it would collapse under him in an instant. He was that heavy.
“You stay here.”
Puihing—
Looking thoroughly dejected, Nightmare settled onto the blanket I had laid out. Setting down my heavy pack left me feeling much lighter. I had stuffed my full plate armor into the bag instead of wearing it, and the weight had been considerable.
In light clothes and carrying only my sword, I slipped back outside. Nightmare let out a mournful whinny behind me, but there was no way I could drag a horse that size around the airship.
If he had been the size of a small puppy, maybe.
Plenty of mages still wandered the deck, drawn by the open expanse and the pleasant wind that brought a sense of freedom.
Wendy was practicing magic alone. She wove the wind she summoned together with the natural breeze and tried to use the combined current to fly.
She wobbled unsteadily, yet she managed to lift herself into the air.
Surely she wasn’t doing all that just to float around for fun.
I walked over to her.
“Ah, you’re back. How was the room?”
She touched down lightly as I approached and asked the question. I nodded and returned one of my own.
“You were imitating the way elves move, weren’t you?”
“Huh…? How did you know?”
“It just looked similar.”
“Mmm, you’re right. I wanted to recreate the magic of the elves from the old stories…”
Her voice trailed off as she called up the wind once more and began to ride the gentle current she had created.
Mana poured from her entire body. That was how she kept her balance in midair—an extremely difficult method. There were far too many things to mind at once; the slightest misstep would send her spinning helplessly through the empty air.
Releasing mana from the whole body rather than a single part… a fascinating technique. I began calling up wind with mana the same way she did.
It started as a soft breeze at my feet.
The moment I stepped onto that faint current, the tiny wind spirit that had been circling me wrapped itself around my body.
Paaaaah—!
An unexpected storm erupted. The spirit, having absorbed the magically created wind, could not control its own power and unleashed a violent gale.
“W-wait—!”
“Huk…!”
Wendy and I were caught in the blast and hurled upward across the deck. Our bodies spun wildly; the world whirled into a dizzying blur. We crashed down onto the great sail stretched across the center of the ship.
“Hah…”
I pressed a hand to my racing heart. We had nearly been flung clean off the airship. Wendy seemed to realize it too; her face was pale as she let out a shaky breath.
“W-what was that just now…? The wind got so strong all of a sudden…”
She muttered, trailing off as her eyes settled on me. I was the only one nearby, so of course suspicion fell my way. I gave an awkward smile and looked away.
Once she climbed down from the sail, the fear of being launched into the sky again made her abandon further practice.
The sun sank and night arrived. The moment glittering stars appeared across the pitch-black sky, a new sea and a vast continent unfurled beneath the heavens.