The Heir of the Sun
Following the voice led to…
Blue-tinged hair.
A hunter’s outfit wrapped around her frame.
She resembled Hilken, the gamekeeper who lately had little to do but wander the woods on leisurely hunts.
A man with a deep, low voice sat perched on a tree branch, looking down at her.
It was Hawk.
He had come to scout Vincent near the capital at Yohan’s request.
Hawk, blinking at the absurd scene before him, spoke sharply.
“I asked what you’re doing.”
“Ah, this is— I mean, well, uh— Honestly, how much did you hear…?”
“You’re the strongest. The terrifying knight wielding the sword the Lord of Steel gave you.”
“Kyaah, y-you heard everything—!! —! —. —!!”
Whoosh—!!
“…What? You crazy—!”
As she spoke, Eclipse flung flames wildly with whatever she could grab.
It was nothing more than an embarrassed outburst born from the intoxicating act she had been lost in moments before.
Hawk was not the sort to be caught by such aimless fire.
With the nimble movements of a hunter, he leapt from the branch where sparks might reach and landed before the flustered girl.
‘…?!’
But.
In the instant he descended,
Hawk’s face hardened as he traced the path of the flames she released.
The reason was simple.
That magic was…
not ordinary fire magic,
but a form of celestial magic.
He sensed it was the power of the sun.
Though the name contained the word “magic,” celestial magic worked differently from ordinary spells.
Common magic activated the caster’s innate mana circuits to project power outside the body.
Celestial magic, however, drew the power of constellations from the sky and manifested it upon the earth.
Those who wielded it were less mages than mediums.
The power they released was never their own.
It belonged to distant beings floating in the night sky.
Thus, one who had long studied celestial magic could identify which constellation’s power was being used simply by the flow and aura of the mana released.
How many generations had Hawk’s Transivist family served the Sagittarius constellation?
He was one of the last two remaining heirs to that seat, alongside Hilken.
He took the duty more seriously than anyone, training relentlessly to preserve the tradition.
In other words, it would have been stranger if he did not recognize it.
And recognizing the one who wielded the sun’s power was no difficult matter for those versed in celestial magic.
The constellation symbolizing the sun was the Goddess of Evil.
Only those born from her could wield her power.
‘Or her descendants…’
Unconsciously, Hawk muttered, layering certainty upon certainty.
“…You’re Solart’s—”
“………Eh?”
She looked completely lost, but that did not matter.
‘The Sun Clan… I thought they were all dead. So the rumor that some escaped Vincent and survived was true…!’
If her ancestor or she herself had known this truth and proclaimed herself a descendant of the sun, she would surely have walked the same path as Hawk, a celestial-magic hunter.
The fact that she did not know only confirmed she was a descendant of that family which had deliberately erased its existence.
There was nothing more to consider.
Hawk recalled the faintly remembered words his father had spoken when he received the tattoo on his chest acknowledging him as the current heir to the Sagittarius seat.
“…When the day brightens over this land, the moon will cover the sun, and what cannot be broken will meet its end.”
At Hawk’s words,
Eclipse’s expression also hardened.
“I don’t care about anything else. Do you know about the ‘Alignment of the Heavens’?”
“Y-you are—?!”
“I am the one who can draw out the true nature of your power. The one who sent me to you is fate and prophecy. If you have never met another family head who spoke as I do, then I suppose I am the first Aligner.”
“………G-good heavens— It really existed…?! The one no one had ever met. H-how am I…!”
“I, too, had assumed it would be impossible to find a descendant of the sun in my generation. I’m simply astonished.”
“Wait, none of this makes sense. The sun’s existence or whatever— What exactly is that…?!”
“That is…”
Learning the past tied to her blood was, for Eclipse, both an easy and difficult story.
The girl who had been so innocently delighted simply to hold Solaris
had, today, come face to face with the truth of the world.
***
The classroom for Class 4, to which I, Yohan Kim, belonged, was at the very end of the third floor in Sigmund’s main building.
Well, since most classes would be held elsewhere anyway, we probably would not use it much…
“Oh, there’s a window seat. That’s mine.”
Wearing a uniform that resembled a military outfit, I sat by the window, enjoying the summer breeze, feeling as though I had returned to middle or high school.
Back then I had nothing to worry about except studying,
and even that had felt difficult.
Looking back after everything I had been through in this life, those days might have been the most peaceful time of all.
While I was thinking this,
I saw my classmates— if that was the right word— for Class 4 filing in one after another.
But.
As expected…
The students of Class 4 I had not seen yesterday
were all people I already knew.
Creak—.
“Yohan. Good morning. We’re in the same class.”
“……Whoa, Cryan.”
He greeted me and casually pulled a chair up beside mine.
Then, studying my expression, he asked,
“Is something wrong? You look like you ate something strange this morning.”
“No. It’s the class assignments. How can everything go exactly as I expected? Well, if you’re here like this, then naturally behind you…”
“Yes, there’s that troublemaker waiting for you. As you guessed, he’s in our class too, but he skipped today because a traveling gambling troupe arrived outside the city.”
The moment I heard that, I doubted my ears.
“…Is he insane? He’s a student now.”
“It’s an infamous troupe that parades elf slaves dressed as rabbits. When I mentioned it casually, he got excited and ran off.”
As expected…
People do not change.
Lumein had even given him an important keepsake from childhood, telling him not to cause trouble while he was locked in the tower.
Yet he had cast aside that pure affection and gone running after whatever caught his fancy.
Well, he probably would not lay hands on the rabbit girls himself.
Still, he apparently wanted to see such a rare spectacle.
Then Cryan spoke with that peculiar, unreadable expression of his.
“Honestly, I’m a little curious too.”
“………You caught it from him?”
“Not exactly. The context is different. I simply want to see with my own eyes the dark side of Karlank that rounds up elves en masse through the Western Massacre and puts them to use.”
“You can justify anything if you try hard enough, huh?”
While we were chatting like that,
the next to enter were people connected to the forest practical training.
Creak—!
“Oh, Lord of Steel! So we really are in the same class…! I thought I must have misread the names for a second.”
“Hello, Lumein. And Bisa beside you.”
Correcting the name could wait.
“…You remembered. Bisa, say hello.”
At that, the girl twitched her long ears
and, like a mother, pulled the small blind girl beside her forward so she would know who I was.
“Waa, it really is Yohan! Hello. Please take care of me!”
It was Bisa, the blind girl whose eyes could not see.
She was the one I had saved when the Steel Hawk was chasing me.
She turned her head toward the sound and bowed in greeting, even though she had no idea where I was.
Watching them,
I could only think,
‘…Nonedon, you really saw everything I did during the forest training, didn’t you? Everyone gathering around me ends up like this…’
But.
That thought did not last long once the next person entered.
Creak—.
“Yohaan…”
“—My lady!!”
“Good morning? You’re full of energy this early. Sorry. I overslept, so I guess I sent you ahead…”
She looked delighted to be back at school, her face bright with a smile,
yet for some reason the sight made me deeply uncomfortable.
Why?
Because if you had eyes, you would look at her skirt.
Good grief, no matter how strange this country was, this was too much.
How could a skirt be that short?
Every nameless male student who had nothing to do with my lady would be staring.
Heat rushed to my head. I whispered to Cryan sitting beside me.
“Cryan, move. That seat’s mine now.”
“…How tyrannical. Why? You’re the very picture of a bad man.”
“—Shut up. If I don’t put my lady in the back row, everyone will stare at her like that. At this rate I might end up killing my classmates.”
“Poor me. Pitiful Cryan.”
After driving him away, I offered my seat to Karalin, who was smiling without a care in the world, and pulled out the silk blanket I kept in my bag for just such occasions, draping it over her thighs.
“My, how thoughtful.”
She laughed, pleased,
but I could only speak while swallowing my anger.
She might not understand why I was so sensitive,
but this was far from ordinary.
“My lady, your skirt—”
“Hm?”
“You never wear anything that short. What on earth…”
“Ah, this…”
She said.