Plague Winds (8)
A Calyx.
In the distant past, they were akin to familiars summoned from another world, serving masters across the Kempf-Litton Continent. Spell amplification, combat support, compensating for weaknesses, bestowing new capabilities—these entities, possessing talents tailored to their summoner's innate nature, were once regarded as vivid living reflections of mana's diverse manifestations.
Why, then, had their summoning been universally outlawed?
While their potential for constructive aid was undeniable, there were always those who weaponized them for heinous ends. One might argue that severe legal punishment would deter summoners from abusing them. But what if the Calyx itself was the perpetrator?
Non-humanoid familiars devoid of intellect or beastly summons driven purely by instinct were manageable. A humanoid Calyx, however, possessed distinct sentience and reasoning. Keeping a tight rein on sentient beings capable of robbery, murder, plunder, and wanton violence proved an impossible task.
As grim precedents piled up over the decades, the rulers of the Kempf-Litton Continent were left with only one viable recourse: an absolute ban. Rather than struggling to police the unpoliceable, forbidding the ritual altogether ensured that no calamity could ever take root.
It was for this very reason that Junon had been put through this trial—to ascertain whether he possessed the makings of a monster.
I assumed Senia had her reasons for vouching for him so fiercely, but still...
The Siren Elder had never envisioned an outcome like this. It was true that the suppression cuff had been discreetly tampered with, and true that the young man had possessed multiple paths forward. Even so, defying every expectation, he had navigated his way into the heart of their sanctuary without harming a single Siren.
He had arrived far too quickly, delivering a result that overturned every cynical assumption.
"W-Well, now we can finally get down to business. Ha... hahaha..." Nella stammered, glancing at Junon's face before hurriedly averting her eyes and changing the subject.
Ever since Chireu had ambushed him, Junon's face had been thoroughly glazed in thick, viscous saliva, gleaming wetly in the lamplight. The Elder, however, was so consumed by his own lingering apprehension that he failed to register the sheer absurdity of the sight.
"Haaah..."
A heavy, irritated sigh slipped past Junon's lips.
Is he about to make a move?
The Elder's thoughts raced. There were no defenses prepared inside this private chamber. If the man decided to take a hostage here and now...!
"Excuse me. Before we talk, I don't know if it's out of line to ask, but..."
"...What is it?"
He had to stay sharp. This human always seemed two steps ahead; there was no telling what he might unleash. Yet, for the sake of his kin, the Elder would gladly offer his aged bones to the slaughter. If he threw himself into the fray, he could at least keep the girl from being taken hostage.
And yet...
"I feel so disgusting right now I can barely stand it. Mind if I step out and wash my face first? Surely that's not too much to ask?"
"...What?"
Braced for violence, the Elder was left utterly dumbfounded by a plea for fresh water. A bewildered squeak escaped him, and the rigid suspicion coiling through his posture abruptly dissipated.
The hostility he thought he had sensed was nothing more than raw annoyance at having a sticky, saliva-drenched face. To say he had misread the situation was a massive understatement.
It seems I have grown far too jumpy in my old age.
To let his mind jump straight to hostage-taking over a soiled face was an embarrassing insult to his guest.
A few minutes later, having thoroughly scrubbed the lizard drool from his skin, Junon returned to the room. He eased the door open with painstaking caution, half-expecting another green projectile to launch itself at his skull.
The Elder and Senia both cleared their throats in quiet embarrassment, silently acknowledging his wariness. Given what had just transpired, no one could blame him.
"Pfft...! Ahahaha!"
"Nella... I told you it's rude to laugh."
"B-But... look at him...!"
Senia scolded her gently, but the sheer comedy of the preceding scene proved impossible for the child to suppress. Peals of bright, innocent laughter filled the chamber.
The two adults broke into a cold sweat, terrified that Nella's giggles might offend their dangerous guest, but Junon felt no irritation whatsoever.
I suppose it really was that hilarious to her.
When he had first stepped into this room, the air had been suffocating. Awkward glances, defensive coughs, and an impenetrable barrier of mistrust would have strangled any productive discussion in its cradle. No one would have dared to speak openly.
Instead, the frosty standoff had been thoroughly shattered by a child's unrestrained amusement.
Might as well let her laugh her fill.
Junon allowed a small smirk to touch his lips and waited patiently. The frantic scrambling, the desperate attempts to maintain an imposing veneer—it was undeniably comical, but he saw no need to pick a fight over it. Her laughter wasn't venomous or condescending; it was pure, unadulterated childish glee.
Unlike the scorn and ridicule he had grown accustomed to throughout his miserable past life, the sound brought an unexpected sense of lighthearted relief.
Behind him, soft whispers rustled between the two women before settling down.
"I'll step outside for now. I hope the two of you have a productive talk."
"Very well. Go on, Senia."
Nella's breathless giggles finally trailed off into quiet snickers. With Senia quietly pulling the heavy door shut behind her, the room settled into a sober quiet, signaling the true commencement of their dialogue. Both parties had a mountain of questions, but the conversational leverage rested heavily in one direction.
Even so, Junon took a step back.
"You go first. I'll ask mine once you're finished."
"...Are you certain? You are in a position to dictate the flow of this discussion."
"To be blunt, my thoughts are still a bit disorganized."
He had a great deal to address, but sorting out which thread to pull first was tricky. Determining the right subject to establish common ground required finesse, and Junon needed another moment to assemble his approach. Letting the other party take the lead was the cleanest way to find his footing.
"In that case, I will take advantage of your generosity. May I ask how you came to know Nella?"
"We ran into each other in the forest by chance. I had some business of my own in the area and was patrolling the perimeter."
"...And you simply let her go? A Siren?"
"I did."
Given the long-standing hostility between their races, it was only natural for a human to show immediate aggression toward a Siren. Centuries of human greed, subjugation, and brutality had carved that bitter reality into the demi-humans' very bones. Naturally, suspicion flared within the Elder's heart.
He could not shake the gnawing dread that this was yet another cunning ploy—a silver-tongued human orchestrating an elaborate deception to corner the remaining Sirens.
"He's telling the truth, Grandfather! I saw it with my own eyes!"
"Hush, Nella. I told you not to interrupt."
"No! He even hid me so the other humans wouldn't see me!"
The little girl, who had just been rolling on the floor in laughter, now planted her feet and clutched her small fists, adamantly defending her savior. Yet even after hearing the concrete details, the Elder refused to let his guard down.
"She is merely a child. I cannot take her words as objective truth."
Infuriated by his stubbornness, Nella tugged hard at the sleeve of the Elder's robe. "You don't need to doubt him! It's the absolute truth! Two other humans saw my shed skin, and he hid it from them to protect me! He hid me, too!"
Despite the girl's passionate plea to clear Junon's name, and despite the cohesive chain of cause and effect matching every report, the aged Siren's skepticism remained ironclad.
"I don't know the exact history between your people and mine," Junon said calmly, "but I understand the gist of it. You've been stabbed in the back by humans more times than you can count. Am I right?"
"You are. I regret the cold reception, but given our history, suspicion is our only shield."
"So you devised this test to see if I was the kind of man who would slaughter your kin?"
"Precisely. There is nothing more to add."
His analytical acumen was formidable. Senia's boast that Junon would decipher the trial with trivial ease had proven entirely accurate. Yet that insight did not erase the contradictions at play.
"Then something doesn't add up," Junon pressed. "Why save the stranded humans in the first place? And out of all of them, why did you single me out for this test?"
To Sirens nursing a generational feud against mankind, there was no earthly reason to rescue a cluster of isolated imperial soldiers. Yet they had deliberately intervened, guiding the exhausted troops beneath their protective barrier. They called it imprisonment, but in practice, they had granted exhausted, dying soldiers a safe haven. They had held all the cards, yet chose mercy.
The Elder, however, chose to play dumb.
"Who can say? I am not certain what you mean. What leads you to such conclusions?"
He was asking for concrete proof. That was fine by Junon.
Pointing out the loose guard rotations wouldn't be enough to shatter his facade. Instead, Junon raised his left wrist, displaying the metallic cuff clamped around it, and stared straight into the Elder's eyes.
"This bracelet was rigged from the start, wasn't it? Crafted specifically so I could slip free whenever I chose."
It was an undeniable truth. A mana-suppression cuff forged to neutralize dangerous human captives had failed to activate entirely. Such a glaring defect could not possibly be an accident.
Faced with the evidence, the Elder finally abandoned his feigned ignorance.
"Hah... You are just as perceptive as Senia."
"You strapped a completely defective restraint to my wrist. How could I not notice?"
"Hm? Wait. Defective, you say?"
"Even with this thing locked on, my mana circuits circulated without the slightest hitch. That was how I realized something strange was going on so quickly."
A look of utter bewilderment washed over the Elder's weathered face. Junon wondered for a second if the old man was genuinely shocked by the notion of a manufacturing error, but he chose not to pursue the trivial detail aloud.
"Regardless, I understand that you wanted to test my character. But before we go any further, I want to know: why me?"
The Elder offered no answer.
"My apologies. That is one matter I cannot speak of."
"You cannot even tell me the reason behind your silence?"
"...Indeed."
Just like that, Junon's opening inquiry hit a stone wall. In truth, the answer wasn't strictly necessary. Uncovering the motives behind their broader behavior was already enough for his immediate goals.
Now came the crux of the matter.
"Understood. Let me move on to the real question, then. Do you genuinely believe the Sirens can protect this territory on their own?"
"...!?"
The answer, of course, was an unequivocal no.
If the Sirens had the strength to hold their ground indefinitely, they would never have allowed themselves to cross paths with humans. As an aquatic race capable of thriving in the bitter extremes of the far north, there was no rational reason for them to settle around this particular lake unless forced. In other words, they had been driven south because they could not repel the Devourers on their own.
"If you release our people, we can help you," Junon said evenly. "We are an isolated unit severed from the main expedition force."
What the Sirens lacked was manpower. Maintaining a colossal barrier left them with virtually no frontline fighters capable of open combat—a fatal vulnerability that the trapped human soldiers were primed to compensate for.
"You claim you captured and detained exhausted soldiers, but in reality, you provided them with a sanctuary. Had you left them out there, they would have been annihilated on the spot."
Because the Sirens had effectively saved their lives, convincing the soldiers to fight alongside them for mutual survival wouldn't be difficult. All Junon had to do was ask them: Why do you think the Sirens sheltered us instead of leaving us to die?
"Why not take this opportunity to tear down the wall between us once and for all?"
Junon finally laid his cards on the table.
If the rift between their kinds could be bridged, their collective strength would multiply. The human soldiers could reinforce the perimeter and shore up the unstable barrier, securing the safety of the entire settlement.
If the soldiers could shed their prejudice against the Sirens, every last human trapped here could survive until reinforcements arrived. More importantly, escaping this valley was an absolute prerequisite for Junon to return to the Grand Duchy, accelerate the research on the Lemterte Plague, and develop a cure before the continent burned.
"..."
Junon assumed this proposal would be immensely tempting to the aged demi-human. If the two factions joined forces, if ancient misunderstandings could be resolved, perhaps a future where humans and Sirens coexisted within the Principality once more was not a hollow dream.
"That will not happen."
"...Pardon?"
The Elder's flat, unyielding refusal caught Junon completely off guard.
"You alone may be an exception. But the rest of your kind cannot be trusted."
Indeed.
What festered within the hearts of these demi-humans was far heavier than simple hatred. An abyss of unyielding distrust cloaked their souls, weaponizing a deep-seated contempt against all of humanity. A generational trauma carved into their very marrow could not be dissolved by a handful of pragmatic arguments.
"It is best we conclude our conversation here."
The Sirens had not merely suffered a bitter betrayal at the hands of mankind.
They had fled through rivers of their own blood, desperate to escape human greed.
Simply to stay alive.