A Prayer to the Merciful Goddess
"This peach…… it's remarkable. How can something be so sweet and yet so refreshing at once? Madam was right—it truly is a rare treasure."
Having lavished his praise, the Crown Prince devoured the enormous peach in a matter of moments.
He's at the age when he should be eating plenty and growing fast.
Seeing the boy who had sat so primly in his black dragon robe, face hidden in shadow, now munching away in plain clothes with peach juice dribbling down his chin, he somehow looked a little more his age.
I held out the peach still in my own hand.
"Your Highness, have this one too."
"You should eat it, Madam."
"I've already had plenty. I brought these for you to eat, Your Highness."
When I pressed it into his hands as if swept along, the Crown Prince tilted his head, then used his silver knife to slice off the top of the peach.
"Madam."
"Yes?"
Into my open mouth—parted mid-question—he slipped a small piece of the heavenly peach. A sweet fragrance bloomed across my tongue.
The boy smiled beautifully, the corners of his eyes crinkling.
"What kind of companion would I be, if I were the only one eating?"
Beyond his tender smile, I could see the painted eaves, the brilliant blue sky, the scent of peaches.
Somehow, I felt soft and warm all over.
If you asked me what exactly that feeling was, I couldn't have explained it well.
I chewed the peach in a daze.
……It's incredibly sweet.
Clearly something had been wrong with my original body's tongue. The heavenly peach tasted far richer and denser in this healthy body than it ever had in my memories.
It's delicious.
I used to love it because every bite seemed to ease the pain and the exhaustion weighing down my whole body—but I didn't feel any of that now.
Well, of course. I wasn't tired or in pain anymore.
Even without that feeling…… it's this sweet.
That was enough.
The slice was rather large, so I chewed it for a long while before swallowing, and the Crown Prince popped another piece into my mouth, cut even smaller than before.
"Your hands and feet are tiny, Madam, and it seems your mouth is too. You will grow bigger eventually, won't you?"
That kid just stabbed right at a sore spot.
The years in Heaven, when I'd remained a child and grown not a single bit, flashed through my mind, and I welled up reflexively.
"I'm going to grow up big and tall, tho you see!"
"You should say that after you've finished chewing."
The Crown Prince wiped the corners of my mouth with his handkerchief.
……Being treated like a child by an actual child. My pride was taking a real beating.
Is it because he's young that I keep acting like a child too? Pull yourself together—you're 209 years old!
I quickly chewed and swallowed my peach, then declared with all the gravitas I could muster.
"Your Highness, teach me archery too."
"You are still too young, Madam……"
"Didn't you start learning when you were four?"
"That was a toy bow. If it's a toy you want, I still have mine—you're welcome to it—"
"I don't want a toy. I want to learn with a real bow."
"That is still too early for you. Wait until you've grown a little more."
"You received a real bow when you were eight, Your Highness. I'm nine. I'm a whole year older than you were when you got yours!"
At my bold argument, the corner of the Crown Prince's mouth lifted.
"And yet you are far smaller than I was at eight, Madam."
"How could you possibly vouch for that? It was when you were little!"
"Then, shall we stand up for a moment and see?"
I scrambled to my feet and stretched myself as tall as I could go.
The Crown Prince picked up the black-horned bow resting beside him and stood it upright next to me.
Ah, he's comparing our heights using the bow.
I stole a glance sideways. The tip of the black-horned bow nearly rose above my head. I quietly rose onto my tiptoes.
My skirt is long—surely he can't see.
"Pfft……"
The Crown Prince made a strange sound, then covered his mouth with his hand and shook with laughter.
He was holding back laughter, wasn't he?
"Why are you laughing all of a sudden?"
"It's—it's nothing."
The Crown Prince quickly lowered his hand, compared my height against the bow, then shook his head.
"You are at least a handspan shorter than I was at eight. With your frame, handling a horned bow would be difficult, so let us begin with a toy bow."
"Aaah……"
I wanted to learn now. This was the whole reason I'd come down to the mortal world—to try things like this!
I pulled my most pitiful face and gazed up at the Crown Prince with desperate, pleading eyes.
"You really won't……?"
Parents and the fairies alike had always crumbled the instant I made this face, but the Crown Prince only flinched and averted his gaze.
"……Looking at me like that will not change my answer. A bow is a weapon—what if you were to hurt yourself?"
"……"
"Please don't look at me that way. If you grow just one more handspan, then……"
He seemed to be floundering, yet he remained firm.
He wasn't going to cave. I gave up and heaved a sigh.
"I want to grow up fast."
"So do I."
"Then, even a toy bow…… I'd like to practice with that at least. You can teach me with that, can't you, Your Highness?"
"Of course. I shall have to find where my childhood bow is kept."
The Crown Prince smiled brightly.
From that day on, archery practice was added to both the Crown Prince's schedule and mine.
The days slipped past in a blink, and at last the promised night of the new moon arrived.
I took Seol Deunghwa's hand and made my way toward the Queen's Palace.
The moment the great front gate came into view—bearing the official name of the palace, Unsojeon, Hall of the Clouded Heavens, carved in bold, sweeping strokes—the hand clasped in mine began to tremble.
"Nervous?"
I whispered the question. She looked down at me and answered in a low voice.
"Yes. Even though there's hardly anything for me to actually do…… I can't stop shaking."
"If you're that nervous, then pray that everything goes smoothly."
"I'm sorry—pray to whom?"
"To Princess Cheonmyeong. She's a merciful goddess, but a very great one. If you pray to her, she'll grant it without fail. Go on, try it."
Seol Deunghwa blinked, then smiled faintly. I feigned perfect innocence and urged her on.
"I'm telling you, try it. It definitely works."
"Didn't you say I mustn't invoke her sacred title carelessly?"
"That's for everyday. When you're praying, it's fine."
"Hmm. Then……"
Crossing the threshold of the Queen's Palace, she began a prayer under her breath.
"We beseech you, we beseech you, O Princess Cheonmyeong."
The front courtyard of the Queen's Palace blazed bright as high noon, filled to bursting with Inner Guard officers bearing fire pits and torches.
Taut with nerves, Seol Deunghwa kept praying as she picked her way between them.
"……Though it appears as though I have deceived others, I harbored no wicked intent—it was to save a life, only to preserve my own and that of my poor daughter. Princess Cheonmyeong knows the full story of it already, so surely she will……"
The King, who had been pacing anxiously before the raised terrace, fixed us with a bloodshot glare.
Seol Deunghwa gripped my hand tightly, swallowed dryly, and bowed low.
"If the Queen does not wake, I will not let either of you off lightly."
Having snarled his threat, the King jerked his chin.
"Inside."
We removed our shoes and stepped into the Queen's Palace.
Every court lady had been ordered away on the pretext that others would interfere with my abilities, so the vast hall was steeped in utter silence.
As we walked toward the sleeping chamber, Seol Deunghwa brought her prayer to a close.
"……Grant that Her Majesty the Queen be rescued safely, and protect us so that nothing wicked befalls us. We beseech you, we beseech you, O Princess Cheonmyeong."
"Granted. I shall watch over you just as you ask."
At my prompt reply, Seol Deunghwa burst into a short laugh.
Her nerves have definitely loosened up. I rounded on her with my most solemn voice.
"How dare you laugh, when a goddess has deigned to answer your prayer! Where is your gratitude!"
Clapping a hand over her mouth to smother her laughter, Seol Deunghwa whispered to me, her voice still tinged with mirth.
"Thank you most sincerely, Your Highness."
"Hmph. Very well. Do not forget this grace you owe me."
Her complexion much improved, she opened the door to the sleeping chamber.
At my request—dressed up as one of Seol Deunghwa's own—the interior had been arranged with screen after screen layered around the Queen's bed.
Passing between the screens, we saw the Queen lying upon the bed in her sleeping garments.
So this is the first time I'm actually seeing her face.
For someone who had supposedly slept for two straight years—despite the King having summoned physicians, Taoist masters, even shamans—the Queen was in remarkably good condition.
Her complexion was pale and she was a little thin, but there seemed to be no bedsores, and her breathing was even and steady.
When I checked the Queen's breath with my finger and rose to my feet, Seol Deunghwa tensed up again and asked, slightly faltering.
"Sh-shall we begin?"
"Yes. Do you remember what I explained before?"
"Yes."
What I was about to do was the very thing my father had done every time he came to save me.
No—actually, this will be far easier than that. I had been all but dead, but the Queen is unquestionably still breathing.
Ordinarily, the dead cross the River of Three Crossings in the company of their assigned Reaper of the Underworld and enter the Netherworld that way.
There, if it is determined for any reason that the soul has not died a natural, proper death, the Netherworld refuses entry and sends it back.
If the soul's lifespan cord still remains, it can seize that cord with its own hands and return to the land of the living. And in other cases—a mistake on the Underworld's part, some blunder or mishap—the assigned Reaper personally escorts the soul back.
The problem lies with souls that wander into the Underworld on their own, without a Reaper.
Because…… aside from the Netherworld's interior proper, the realm of the dead has almost nothing that could properly be called a road.
Why else would I have waited motionless on the bank of the River of Three Crossings for my father to come?
Without a Reaper's guidance, you can't even find the entrance to the Netherworld in the first place.
The riverbank is somewhat better off, at least, since the river itself serves as a landmark. But stray even a little from the River of Three Crossings, and in an instant you are hopelessly lost.
You can't find the road back to the living—no, you can't even find your way back to the river itself.
And if your luck runs out, you may be devoured by the monsters and ghosts that drift through the realm of the dead.
For the Underworld beyond the Netherworld is, in the truest sense of the word, a demon realm.
There are, broadly speaking, three kinds of souls that enter the Underworld without a guide and end up lost.
First, those who died but whose souls came to the Underworld under their own power, without waiting for a Reaper.
Second, living humans who entered the Underworld still carrying their physical bodies.
And the third and final kind is—
Those who have not died, but whose souls have simply slipped out of their bodies and fallen into the Underworld.
That's exactly the Queen's condition. It's the same thing that happened to me every single time.
When a person suffers devastating shock, or comes to believe they have died, or when the body is in too much agony and torment, the soul can tear itself away from the flesh without any actual death having occurred.
They call this "lost soul"—silhon.
A living soul—one that has popped clean out of a body still alive—instinctively seeks out and tries to return to its own body.
That's why, in most cases, fainting doesn't progress all the way into a coma.
But if the shock or the agony is great enough, there are rare occasions when the soul uses the dark energy it has vented to force open the gates of the Underworld and tumble all the way down into the land of the dead.
When that happens, the soul wakes to find itself with no idea where it is, with no way to return to its own body.
And that is precisely what a coma is.