The Princess (3)
A protagonist shines all the brighter the mightier the villain they face.
The same holds true for bombardment. The grander the target you smash to pieces, the more magnificent it appears.
A mere high-powered blast looks far less impressive than one capable of driving off the Four Heavenly Kings and obliterating entire mountains.
Yes—that’s why a shooting range built from Memory Mud works fine for training, but it’s utterly useless for a demonstration.
If the range remains unscathed no matter how hard you fire, how is anyone supposed to feel the true awe of the bombardment?
So I made a request. Bring me a target that’s incredibly tough and enormous. Just make sure it’s something I can destroy without issue, since I plan to pulverize it with everything I’ve got.
“……Uh.”
But I had forgotten something.
That the Church would never fulfill my request in a normal fashion. That whenever I asked for something, they always went overboard trying to grant it.
“Are you truly planning to destroy this with your bombardment?”
The princess gazed at me with clear concern. And she had every right to.
I had expected them to haul over some oversized chunk of marble—leftovers from carving goddess statues, maybe.
Never in my wildest dreams did I think they would bring rare metal.
Rare metal. The essential material for crafting the highest-grade armaments. Lightweight yet extraordinarily hard.
And rare, which meant one thing: ridiculously expensive.
They had gone and procured it just to use as a bombardment target. ……Does the Church really have that much money to burn? Between this and the Memory Mud last time, their spending is way too extravagant.
I should have just pointed and said “marble” from the start. I curse my past self for vaguely requesting “something hard.”
First things first—answer the princess.
“Of course. Something of this caliber is needed if it’s going to leave a lasting impression on Your Highness, don’t you think?”
I spoke with full confidence, while desperately suppressing the anxiety churning inside.
……I’m screwed. Regular bombardment isn’t going to cut it for the visuals here.
But I couldn’t back down after coming this far.
This was a matter of a man’s—no, a saintess’s pride. Besides, if I retreated now, I couldn’t even begin to imagine how disappointed the princess would be.
I have to do this. Even if it means enduring the Bombardment Fairy’s nagging!
“Then would you mind stepping back a little?”
At my words, the princess nodded and immediately took several steps backward.
The Bombardment Fairy suggests you might as well just admit you can’t do it even now, while you still can.
“……No. A true man never goes back on his word.”
The Bombardment Fairy asks what kind of nonsense a woman is spouting about being a man.
Ignoring the Bombardment Fairy’s words, I uttered the keyword to increase firepower.
“Limit Release.”
Limit Release
The shackles binding the Holy Relic came undone. At the same time, tremendous power began concentrating at the muzzle.
And the burden of that immense power was something my body alone had to endure.
How much output would I need to raise to blow away a rare metal chunk that size? I had no idea.
For now, I would have to increase it just enough that I wouldn’t collapse—enough to at least keep up the act of normalcy in front of the princess.
Still, if I failed to destroy the rare metal…… that would be a total humiliation.
But I believe in my bombardment. I believe in the Goddess who bestowed the Grace of Bombardment upon me.
The Bombardment Fairy is horrified, asking if you’ve really gone insane.
I ignore the local broadcast. I focus solely on the massive target before me.
Please, just blow it away cleanly. I don’t even need the firepower that once obliterated a mountain!
Pouring all that desperate hope into it, I endured the pain and pulled the trigger.
And as if answering my plea, the bombardment swelled in size in an instant—large enough to casually swallow the enormous rare metal mass whole.
……Wait a second. Isn’t this a bit too big?
Unfortunately, once the trigger was pulled, the firepower of a bombardment never decreased.
Having engulfed the rare metal, the blast showed no sign of losing momentum and continued to stretch onward.
It had long since surpassed the usual range of my bombardments. Of course, the thought that the range might increase never even crossed my mind.
In the end, the unstoppable bombardment reached the shooting range itself.
Then a roar several times louder than usual slammed into my ears. It was so deafening that even my ears, long accustomed to post-bombardment thunder, rang with tinnitus.
I’ll have to find a tight-lipped priest later and get treatment first. The load on my body seems far from negligible.
As for the rare metal…… good, cleanly obliterated. I sneaked a glance at the princess’s reaction.
Her eyes looked about twice their usual size. Her mouth? Naturally hanging open. Anyone could see she was utterly stunned.
Great. At least I’ve covered the principal. The moment I tried to breathe a sigh of relief inwardly—
The Bombardment Fairy laments that we’re doomed.
The Bombardment Fairy says now’s not the time to look over there.
No, I should be looking over there, where are you looking… hey……
“Ah.”
Only then did the catastrophe that had befallen the shooting range enter my vision.
A massive hole had been punched clean through the range—which, being made of Memory Mud, should have retained its original form even under heavy impact.
The cause? Obviously my bombardment. The shot I just fired had casually exceeded the shock threshold that Memory Mud could withstand.
After causing an accident on the very first day I received the Grace of Bombardment, I had sworn never to repeat such a thing.
I close my eyes. The deed is already done. No amount of regret will turn back time.
Then at the very least, I should achieve the original goal, shouldn’t I?
I feign nonchalance. Then I slowly approach the princess and flash a bright smile.
“How was that? I put a little extra power into it. Was it a bombardment you’ll remember for the rest of your life?”
The princess answered my question by nodding her head vigorously in silence.
It wasn’t exactly the reaction I had hoped for, but since she seemed thoroughly shocked, I could consider the first bombardment demonstration a success.
Of course, that was just me looking away from the brutal reality brought on by a single demonstration and escaping into denial for a moment.
……By the way, how the hell am I supposed to explain that, seriously.
After the bombardment, she returned to her room. The Saintess had said she had some business to attend to and would be back shortly, leaving only Princess Chartier in the room for now.
She calmed her racing heart.
The sight of the Saintess unleashing that bombardment still flickered before her eyes.
For a moment, she had thought heaven and earth were flipping upside down. That was how magnificent the spectacle had been.
Any grand magic would look pathetic next to the Saintess’s bombardment.
“……Incredible.”
The Saintess spoke of it as power received from the Goddess and downplayed herself, yet the princess still found the Saintess extraordinary.
A weapon never seen before, a power never handled before. How much effort must she have poured in to wield it with enough skill to take to the battlefield?
Moreover, considering she had gone to the front lines not long after becoming a Saintess, the effort supporting her must have been beyond imagination.
“I have to work hard too.”
She had received the Emperor’s encouragement to learn much and grow.
There had been the Empress’s words of support as well, saying she would do well.
As for the Crown Prince…… she decided to just ignore him. To the princess, there was no greater bastard of an enemy than the Crown Prince.
Just because he was born a year earlier, he strutted around putting on airs. As if being one year older made him all that.
Compared to the Saintess, the Crown Prince wasn’t even worth the dirt under her toenails.
Anyway, hadn’t she received her family’s warm encouragement and support? Right now, the princess’s motivation was overflowing to the point of being a problem.
She would seize this opportunity granted by the Goddess, learn a great deal, and grow strong like the Saintess. Then she planned to keep the promise she had made while praying to the Goddess.
More precisely, she intended to use that as an excuse to gain a little freedom.
Of course, her status as princess and the importance of being a direct descendant of the Emperor would hold her back. But she felt it would be all right.
If the princess’s small desire were wrong, the Goddess wouldn’t have granted her divine power in the first place.
“And with this chance, I’ll get closer to the Saintess.”
This was a goal pure with the princess’s personal feelings. Getting close to the person she admired? How sweet those words were.
Yes, good. The current situation was far too favorable for the princess.
If her life until now, with almost no chance to leave the imperial palace, had been the epitome of boredom, now it was filled with novelty.
Honestly, she almost wondered if she was dreaming right now.
Yes, this very moment was the first peak ever to arrive in the life of Chartier Ecclesia.
She could do this. With the her of now!
Who could have known?
That the princess who learned divine power would transform so drastically.
If she had known the future, would something have changed even a little?
Since the past cannot be rewound, this hypothesis was ultimately a meaningless one.
Yet one could not help but speak of what-ifs.
That was how shocking the princess’s changed appearance had been.