With the Sand of the Wasteland
The royal capital of Sperita.
In place of the aging king, Melchior had shouldered the bulk of the kingdom's administrative duties — but with him gone, the work had piled up without mercy.
Naturally, that burden fell to his younger siblings.
Adelaide sat in the office, clutching her head in both hands. Her black hair was a tangled mess, the gold streaks that jutted through it trembling with every frustrated shake.
When was the last time she'd had a moment to herself?
Melchior had even taken the secretary who usually helped with the paperwork, and the headache was becoming unbearable.
"He did this on purpose. I just know it…."
From the mountain of work itself to every last detail of it, nothing sat right with her.
Adelaide clicked her tongue and went back to the documents. Most of them were petitions from the common folk.
This place needs repairs. That district feels a little unsafe. The monsters have been keeping us up at night….
As if Adelaide herself had been getting any sleep.
She was drowning under the sheer volume of it all — buried so deep she could barely breathe.
The only thing keeping her afloat was the youngest sibling working beside her.
Diego, the baby of the three, bore a faint resemblance to Melchior, but where Melchior was all sharp edges, Diego had a gentle, easygoing face.
Having finished sorting a stack of papers to the side, Diego let out a short sigh and looked over at Adelaide.
"Sister."
Adelaide didn't even turn her head, eyes still fixed on the documents.
"What is it? Something wrong?"
"Ah… when is Brother coming back?"
At the mention of Melchior, Adelaide finally lifted her gaze from the papers. She looked at Diego and gave a soft, amused laugh.
"Diego. That man is not your brother."
"Sister?"
Diego blinked.
Adelaide pressed her thumb and middle finger hard against her temples.
"Someone who runs off without doing a single thing he's supposed to — you call that a brother? That bastard is just some stranger who happens to share our blood."
"Well… he has been awfully mean about it."
Diego nodded along with her assessment.
Melchior had lost the Ampianura Elder Species subjugation to Adelaide, and so he'd left to earn glory elsewhere.
It had been the old king's command.
Leave the capital's affairs to the princess, and send the First Prince to the outpost to resolve this entire situation once and for all.
What no one had expected was that the moment the order was given, Melchior would stop looking at a single document.
Adelaide pictured Melchior's face, cackling away somewhere. Her fist ached for it.
She hung her head, exhaled a long sigh, and muttered to Diego,
"Maybe we should just call him 'that guy.'"
That guy, of all things.
Diego laughed quietly, trying to soothe his sister's irritation.
"…Even so, he's still our brother, isn't he?"
"Then how about 'that pathetic brat'?"
"Brother may be a bit of a failure, and pathetic, and a total lunatic, and a raving piece of trash — but he's still our brother, isn't he?"
Diego delivered the vicious string of insults in the softest, most polite tone imaginable.
Adelaide blinked several times, then slowly rose from her seat.
"…I didn't say it that harshly."
"Ah, didn't you?"
Diego tilted his head with shameless innocence, letting the matter slide.
Adelaide eyed his bright, smiling face and shrugged. He was a terrifying little brother sometimes.
"Oh, by the way — among the letters that came up for us, there were a few from the outpost."
"…Right. Have you been organizing those properly?"
"Yes. And one of them is from Brother."
Adelaide's brow furrowed.
"What did he send? If it's another request for candy, one reply telling him to shut up will do just fine."
"Ah, it's not that — though I suspect you won't be too pleased when you hear it."
"…What has he done this time."
"Would you like to read it?"
Adelaide stood and crossed over to Diego. He handed her Melchior's letter.
She took the crumpled paper and began to read carefully.
My dear younger siblings, I trust you are well.
I told the secretary to write this, but I found I wanted to send my regards myself. First of all — this letter is not written to provoke you. I ask that you read it through to the end.
Adelaide, my sister, are you well? You must think I simply couldn't be bothered with the paperwork. That is a misunderstanding. I wanted to teach you that the path to the throne is not an easy one. This is the path of kingship you chose for yourself. Grit your teeth and endure it. And that hunter you hired to spite me — Alice — is here, as it turns out. She is doing well.
Alice was there….
Adelaide let out a short laugh at the welcome name. Of course, that laugh also carried a healthy dose of fury directed at a certain prince.
Melchior. That man had absolutely neglected his work on purpose.
Diego, I trust you are helping your sister diligently. Learn as much of the administrative work from her as you can. That said, do not entertain thoughts of becoming king yourself. And if you do, keep them buried deep. Should your sister find out, she might stab you in the back — or banish you to some far-flung exile. Much like what has happened to me. Ah, and is Father in good health? Tell him that thanks to him, I am having a wonderful experience.
And….
There was still a great deal left to read, but Adelaide's hand was already crumpling the letter tighter and tighter.
Diego, who had been watching her carefully, spoke up.
"I had no idea you thought of me that way, Sister."
"You're actually believing what this man wrote? Father was the one who sent him out there in the first place. How exactly am I supposed to exile my own brother?"
"Isn't this just the kind of paranoia people like us tend to carry?"
Adelaide nodded at that.
"Fair enough. But even so — would I really turn on my own blood? Now, the people around me, on the other hand…."
"That's even more terrifying."
"I'm joking."
Adelaide dismissed it as barbaric nonsense and returned to the letter.
And there is a matter of note.
An ancient calamity has appeared in this wasteland. Disastro. The mad predator that devours the world itself. I will gather sufficient information and materials — wait for them. Adelaide, I am beginning to understand, if only a little, why you place such faith in hunters. I intend to trust them as well. Do not send support yet. Simply ensure that the kingdom's soldiers are thoroughly trained to face monsters at any time. Leaving that to the knights should suffice. Should I judge our strength insufficient, I will request reinforcements without hesitation.
With the sand of the wasteland,
— Melchior
Disastro.
Adelaide's brow furrowed at the unexpected name.
A monster that had died in ages past, risen and walking again.
She had known the Anomalies were no ordinary affair — but she had never imagined a trial of this magnitude would come knocking.
"So it crossed through time."
If even Disastro — classified as a supreme-grade monster — could come through, then something far worse was surely waiting at the end of all this.
The thought of such a creature sent a chill down her spine, but the immediate concern was Disastro itself.
"Disastro really is a serious problem."
"It seems Brother intends to make use of the hunters. Will that truly be all right? I'm a little uneasy about it."
"Who can say. But it's not impossible. You should try trusting the hunters yourself, just once."
"Hmm."
Adelaide gave Diego a wry little smile.
Thinking that might be the end of it, she scanned the letter once more — and noticed a postscript scrawled at the bottom of what she'd assumed was finished.
P.S. On the day you receive this letter, could you draw a map of Sperita's night sky constellations and send it as quickly as possible? Make sure Mesarak, Piccolac, and Achere are visible.
Adelaide tilted her head at the sudden request.
"Constellations? What kind of nonsense is that?"
"I have no idea either. Perhaps he misses the capital's night sky?"
P.P.S. And if you could send some candy as well, that would be wonderful! — From the Secretary
"He wants the candy for himself and made the secretary ask for it."
"Almost certainly."
There was nothing more below that.
Adelaide folded the letter neatly and set it aside in its own pile. She returned to her seat, slumped forward over the desk, and let out a heavy sigh.
A supreme-grade monster.
Adelaide had never seen one herself, but she knew well enough that when creatures of that class moved, entire cities — entire nations — could fall with ease.
There had been kingdoms that met exactly that fate in the past.
No matter how much faith one placed in hunters, facing a supreme-grade monster was another matter entirely. It was a problem on the scale of the entire kingdom.
And yet Melchior had said he would trust in the hunters' strength.
Coming from a man whose goal was building the kingdom's military might, those words were almost unthinkable.
"If he has something to lean on…."
Adelaide thought of Alice.
The hunter who had flawlessly completed both the king's mission and Adelaide's own personal commission.
Perhaps Alice had left a good impression on Melchior.
She'd only recently heard the news that Alice had taken down an ancient Alberoelva — and already she was at the outpost.
If Adelaide had known it would turn out like this, she would have gone to the outpost herself instead of the prince.
"She's fast."
When the time came to hunt Disastro, there was no chance Alice would sit it out.
If they gathered every Master Hunter who could fight, and everyone else capable of standing on a battlefield besides — maybe, just maybe, it could work.
Adelaide stretched her arms high overhead.
She envied Melchior, who got to watch all of that up close.
Slumping back against her chair, she spoke.
"Diego."
"Yes, Sister."
"When Brother comes back, I really should hit him."
"That doesn't sound half bad."
The fact that he alone got to see all of it — the more she thought about it, the more infuriating it was.
Adelaide leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes for a moment.
"Sister, you can't sleep. Then I'll be the only one working."
"I'm not sleeping. Just resting my eyes."
"Sister…."
Even Diego's pitiful voice couldn't make her open them.
To hell with it.
Diego, equally resentful of working alone, simply laid his head down and closed his eyes as well.
And the work kept piling up.
"Hah… huff…."
A body battered beyond recognition. Blood dried hard along the creases of my palm.
I set my weapon down for a moment and flexed my fingers; the clotted blood flaked off and fell in dark crumbs.
Blisters had burst open all across my hands — not a pretty sight.
All of it was the wreckage of the hunt.
I'd abandoned exploration for a while and simply killed every monster that crossed my path.
My body groaned under the accumulated fatigue. My muscles screamed from the relentless schedule.
One by one, small wounds had carved themselves into my flesh — the price of a body too worn down to fully turn aside a monster's attacks.
It was hard, but there was no time to take it slow. There was no telling when Disastro might move.
I needed to broaden my physical senses and experience even further, and gather materials while I was at it.
But even this had its limits.
Supplies were running low. What little stamina I had left was running lower.
Surviving day to day on nothing but meat had grown old. I didn't care how plain it was — I just wanted a real meal.
I hadn't been able to wash properly either. The grime was driving me insane.
My entire body was worn to the bone, and yet somehow my mind remained razor-sharp.
Splash—!
I crushed a Waterburst Fruit, wet my mouth with it, and dumped the rest over my head.
Through the soaked strands of hair, my eyes flashed open.
————!!
Dualeratos, the Spearhorn Beast.
A desert spearman that charged with the single horn growing from its skull.
That hardened cranium came at me like a shield, and the horn jutting from its center like a lance.
Just you. Then I'm heading back.
I raised my shield.
And thrust my sword forward to meet it.