While She Sleeps (1)
Marin was waiting for me on the shore.
She looked at me with those expressionless eyes, the dying twilight at her back.
"How's the body? I heard you couldn't even move when you got the call."
"I'm fine. Used a lot of mana, though."
At those words, Marin gathered mana into her hand.
A blue light tinged with the sparkle of stars.
The starlight that should have shone brighter than ever was dimmed, as if eclipsed by sunlight.
"Monsters came to the Max Republic. So I stopped them."
"So that's how it was."
Even for Vital, seizing a Divine Artifact while making an entire nation his enemy was no small feat.
While he was dealing with Eva, he must have wanted to divert the Republic's attention elsewhere.
That was also something Diana had hinted at during the battle, right after Vital's declaration of victory.
Though I got brutally rejected, but still.
"Quite a lot of them, apparently. Enough to make you burn through all your mana."
"Yeah, tons. Took ages to take them all down."
It would have taken a staggering force to pull the eyes of the capital's defensive garrison outward.
After his defeat in the battle against the Archmage, Vital had gone silent, hiding in a dungeon and devoting himself to recovery by absorbing the life force and mana of the monsters.
His people called themselves the Celestial Clan, boasting that they were greater than humans, beings close to gods — but in truth, they were nothing more than humans capable of wielding Divine Artifacts.
Humans and monsters differed fundamentally, from body structure down to mana itself, so his original plan of healing had come to nothing.
Instead, through numerous experiments, he came to understand the structure of monsters, and using the Divine Artifact First Heartbeat, he mass-produced and controlled them — an army, so to speak.
That was also why the Hardliners, always ready to stab him in the back at a moment's notice, had never bothered to eliminate Vital, the weakest among them.
He was useful in all sorts of ways, after all.
Well, what do we have here?
Vital is dead, the Divine Artifact recovered by the Academy side.
And his pride and joy — that army — seems to have been wiped out by Marin.
"Anyway, I took down all of them. Like this, and like this. I threw a punch and they died."
Fwoosh!
The wind split with a sharp crack.
Every time her fist cut through the air, a gust strong enough to sting the skin came howling.
Good to see she looks healthy.
Her mana was nearly drained, but her body was still clearly in working order.
It was her answer to my worried question, shown through action rather than words — though.
She likes white, huh.
Somehow my gaze kept drifting downward instead of staying on the punches.
With every gust, the hem of her skirt whipped up, and through the gap flashed pure, pristine white.
Was it because of that spotless white underwear?
"So, in other words, you're telling me you captured every single monster that tried to attack the Republic?"
"Captured every—?"
"It means you swept them all up."
"Oh."
Her airheaded charm was intact too, apparently.
In any case, it seemed the whole affair had wrapped up nicely.
"I missed one."
"You? Missed one?"
The Marin I knew was a specialist in catching monsters.
She'd spent half her life since birth beating them down — and she missed one?
"You didn't let it go on purpose, did you?"
"No. It was really strong."
"...What kind of thing was it?"
"It was really, really big. It crawled on four legs..."
Marin spread both arms wide, explaining the monster's features with dramatic gestures.
Isn't that basically the description of every monster out there?
That much wasn't going to narrow anything down.
"Can you describe it in more detail?"
"And also... yeah, it was carrying a city on its back."
A city.
I swallowed hard at those words.
A bloated bulk, four legs like pillars, crossing the Otherworld on foot.
If it carried a city on its back, there was only one thing it could be.
The Great Monster Ascelon.
One of three fragments shed from the primordial King of Monsters Corachia, long ago felled by the Guardian — the one symbolizing its flesh.
Legend said a single stride of its massive gait could cross a continent, and that since creation it had endlessly devoured other monsters, swelling its body ever larger.
I'd read all of that in the Writer's setting notes — I just never expected to fight the thing.
"How was it?"
"If you mean fighting the monster... it was whatever."
Slaying the Otherworld's monsters was Marin's true calling, so she spoke of it like it was nothing.
One glance at her uniform — not a single drop of monster blood on it — and you could tell just how one-sided the fight had been.
"That's not what I'm asking about. Something else."
"Something else?"
"You saw a familiar face after so long, didn't you? Didn't you?"
The city built atop the Great Monster Ascelon had been founded on an altar raised by the Celestial Clan long ago for their rituals.
It was also the stronghold of the Hardliner remnants defeated by the Archmages — including Vital.
There was no way they'd stayed hidden while Ascelon came under attack.
"How did you know?"
Marin looked up at me.
She stared at me intently, with a strange expression brimming with curiosity.
Was I imagining things?
For a moment, her face seemed to hold some odd flicker of life, of emotion...?
"If it's about the Celestial Clan, I have my ways of finding out."
"Are those people connected to you?"
"I won't deny it. But we're not exactly allies or anything like that."
If I had to sum it up — a contract killer?
Commissioned by the Writer, their role was to slaughter anyone who stood in the way of the happy ending, so it wasn't far off the mark.
In this roundabout way, I was unintentionally confessing that I was on friendly terms with them.
"Solis."
"What?"
"What do you think of me?"
But the words that followed caught me off guard.
"What am I to you?"
As always, Marin spoke with no change in expression.
But there was a tremor in her voice.
As if she were afraid of what I might say, and yet desperately wanted to hear the answer.
I see, then.
She had been worshipped as a god, and at other times treated as a monster — an object of fear and vigilance.
She had lived long ages and met countless people, yet her hollow heart was never filled.
Like the Tin Woodman's empty chest in The Wizard of Oz.
An unquenchable thirst.
And the one time that hunger had been sated was a memory with an old man.
Days spent alongside an ordinary person — that was what filled it.
Her intent in asking was simple.
Was I any different from all those others?
Or was I someone who could cherish her the way her grandfather had?
She was trying to find out.
The hope bleeding through her voice — she'd probably let it slip without meaning to, wanting so badly for it to be the latter.
What's with all this worrying, kid?
"The wind's cold."
I buttoned up the sweater of her uniform.
One button at a time, by hand, with all the care I had.
"Dress properly. People will think you're a slob."
"I don't feel cold."
"Don't lie. I know everything, remember."
Marin was clumsy with emotions.
Even on battlefields where people died around her, her face never changed, and people pointed fingers at her for it, calling her heartless.
"You're just a little odd compared to everyone else — but you're no different at all."
"How do you know that?"
We went to the Academy together. How could I not?
Even without having read the novel, any of the others would have given the same answer.
"Whenever they serve you americano, you whine about how bitter it is. And you cling to me like a puppy every day because you like me."
"That's it? Just that?"
"What else would you need?"
Answering a question with a question is just common sense.
I placed my hand on her head and stroked it.
As always, like always.
"I'll walk you home. Let's go."
I held out my hand and offered to go together.
Marin stared at me for a moment.
Whoosh!
"Oof!"
"Yeah, let's go."
She'd plunged straight into my chest without warning.
That startled me.
...
From the beach to the dormitory was no distance at all.
By the time I'd finished carrying her on my back, we'd arrived at the mansion.
"How's your body?"
"Won't move. Stiff."
Her body was stiffening in real time.
Unlike the others, who recovered after a good night's sleep, Marin's depleted state came with a long recovery period.
Once she ran dry, I remembered reading in the setting notes, she needed at least a week of rest before she could move again.
"Get some good rest. Wake me up when you come to."
Having delivered her home, my business here was done.
I was about to take my leave when —
"Solis."
"What is i—?"
Marin called out to stop me from behind.
The moment I turned my head at her voice.
Slick.
"Why are you taking your clothes off?"
Her uniform loosened, her snow-white skin bared down to just her underwear, she flopped back onto the bed.
"I'm going to be asleep for a while now."
"So?"
"I won't wake up even if you touch me. Totally defenseless."
"..."
"Do whatever you want, Solis."
With those words, the drowsy-eyed Marin closed her eyes.
Her face, lit beneath the lamp, was as peaceful as a sleeping princess in the woods.
She wore the kind of unguarded expression that made it seem she wouldn't wake even if the world collapsed around her.
Looks like this calls for some education.
A beautifully laid table, if I do say so myself.
If a grown man turned this down, he deserved to have his dick taken away, plain and simple.
I stood beside the bed.
And gently laid my hand on the cheek of the soundly sleeping Marin.
"Phew."
Her faint, delicate breathing was driving me insane.