When the Hounds Lose Their Prey, They Die (1)
Regina had been born to a maidservant, an imperial princess in name only and a bastard in every way that mattered.
To everyone else, she was no more than a bug not worth the trouble of noticing. And yet on the day the imperial children were gathered, as tradition demanded, to measure their magical aptitude, her fate changed.
“My word……”
Regina’s small hand vanished beneath the red light that burst forth around it.
From the altar erected at the very top of the imperial palace, a flower of light bloomed extravagantly, as lush and brilliant as a rose in full bloom.
Gasps rippled through the crowd watching the ceremony.
“Princess Regina has tremendous mana!”
The fierce radiance was like a blazing fire. Anyone could see at a glance that the light contained an immense reserve of power.
The painfully thin girl, her rose-colored hair streaming about her shoulders, stared at the miracle she had unleashed as though she could hardly believe it was real.
All the while, the murmur among the mages overseeing the rite grew louder. In particular, the face of the one who led the Magic Tower was filled with astonishment.
“At last, does the blood of an Archmage return to the imperial house……!”
The imperial family of the Ferman Empire, descendants of a great Archmage, had been steadily losing its magical power for centuries. By now, even the emperor himself could barely conjure a flame the size of his palm.
In such circumstances, the appearance of a descendant who seemed unmistakably to have inherited the blood of an Archmage in full was nothing short of a blessing for the empire.
“With mana this strong, she’ll be able to wield all sorts of magic!”
“If it’s Princess Regina, she may be capable of multi-element magic, even healing magic.”
When the ceremony finally ended, after a stream of reverent praise from the elder mages, Regina’s mother, the maidservant, was granted the title of imperial concubine, and Regina was moved to a detached palace within the imperial grounds.
Raised thereafter under the empress’s hand, Regina believed her life might finally change, even if only a little.
But then again, that was the problem.
Regina had been a genius, and one who far surpassed the imperial family’s expectations.
“How dare a bastard have that much mana!”
“Filthy little maggot!”
The legitimate princes and princesses writhed in fury and jealousy.
In particular, Herais, the rightful heir of the Ferman imperial family, loathed her beyond all imagination. His own gifted mana was so meager that people even whispered doubts about his bloodline.
“That worm dares to parade her filthy feet before the heir of the Ferman Empire? I’ll be sure to put that girl back where she belongs.”
At some point, Regina’s mother fell ill. To cure her, they needed a rare medicinal herb that even the imperial palace struggled to procure.
Only the trading company owned by Herais’s maternal family could obtain it.
That was the moment Herais got a leash around Regina’s throat.
“From now on, you’re my dog.”
Herais needed a “dog” to go out and exterminate monsters in his place.
After a massive monster wave had struck fifty years earlier, taking part of the empire’s territory with it, public anger toward the powerless imperial family had only grown. As a likely crown prince, he should have led the offensive himself to win back the people’s favor—but Herais had no intention of throwing his precious body into some monster nest.
And so, in the year Regina turned thirteen—
“Any imperial blood must take the lead in protecting the empire. Regina, you will restore the dignity of the imperial house!”
The emperor sent her to the Mage Corps for monster extermination.
The Mage Corps was made up of those who had been cast out of the Magic Tower, the center of power, for one reason or another.
Anyone assigned there was condemned to wander those frontiers for the rest of their lives until the borders tainted by the monster wave were reclaimed.
Even the young Regina was sent into the Mage Corps, where she roamed the borderlands.
She endured countless injustices and was driven into more and more battles every year, every month, every week.
And she survived. Her genius would not let her die.
At sixteen, she reached a level in Ferman that no one dared compare to.
At eighteen, when the commander leading the Mage Corps was killed by a monster, Regina inherited his position.
That was how far she went before there was scarcely a place on her body left without a scar.
And so she became the crown prince’s dog—and the imperial family’s.
***
Under Regina’s leadership, the Mage Corps became something rather unusual: a group that obeyed only her orders.
Whenever they went out to hunt monsters, Regina saved those who had manifested mana. They were commoners or even lowborns, or at best the children of obscure noble houses.
A mage who could not properly control mana after a sudden awakening was a dangerous thing. For that reason, they were often shunned even by their own families.
Regina was the one who gathered them up, brought them into the Mage Corps, and taught them how to control their power.
“If you learn how to handle your strength, you can become a proper mage. Will you follow me?”
“If you can free me from this awful mana rampage, I’ll do anything.”
The mages who would otherwise have been left to die at the mercy of monsters, unprotected by their lords, also came to follow Regina.
Cast aside yet capable, they remained loyal to Regina and gradually widened the range of their activities.
Not only in the cold country of Ferman, but even in Fredericks, the long-standing enemy land of knights.
As they hunted monsters that crossed the imperial borders, Regina and the Mage Corps survived more than one near-annihilation.
Every time they returned alive only to be ordered out again, their reputation climbed higher and higher.
“I heard the Mage Corps drove off another monster again?”
“Ah, they say it would’ve been a disaster without the princess.”
“Is it true she’s the strongest among the imperial family?”
“Probably. Otherwise they wouldn’t keep coming back with victories every time.”
As Regina’s name grew more and more formidable, so too did the jealousy and suspicion of the other imperial children. Before long, they began taking matters into their own hands.
Money meant for the Mage Corps was embezzled.
“You say you never received payment? But I already sent it to your commander. Shouldn’t you be taking it up with the commander’s office instead of coming to me?”
Supplies they were entitled to were withheld.
They tried every possible way to kill Regina, and each time, she survived.
But the sacrifices kept mounting.
Regina’s subordinates, who died defending the border, vanished without even leaving their names behind.
They had given their loyalty to the empire as members of the Mage Corps, yet in death they were still nothing but the children of slaves, commoners, traitors, and fallen nobles.
Then, one day, after half her unit was pointlessly wiped out because no reinforcements ever arrived, Regina—who had always bowed before the imperial family’s authority—finally raised her voice in front of the emperor for the first time.
“Please accept my Mage Corps as official members of the imperial knight order. Acknowledge their military achievements. Even if it’s only a barony, grant them the status they deserve.”
The emperor, confronted by Regina’s bloodied and exhausted appearance, frowned in disgust.
Meanwhile, Herais, standing beside him, ground his teeth at Regina’s behavior, which had strayed beyond his control.
Regina continued speaking, her face rigid despite the gaze that seemed to pierce straight through her chest.
“If you will only promise that much, the Mage Corps will continue to fulfill its duty as citizens of the empire.”
Then she dropped to one knee with a heavy thud, lowering herself further. It was as though she would not move again unless they gave their word.
The emperor, who had only meant to cast out a bastard daughter in the first place, turned over his greedy thoughts.
Regina’s Mage Corps had once been nothing more than a trash heap collecting troublesome lowborns, but by now it had become a fairly useful tool.
It produced results beyond expectation with only modest support. If it disappeared, it would be something of a loss.
After weighing the matter, the emperor finally nodded.
“If you continue to cleanse the border of monsters and reclaim imperial land as you have been doing, I will free your lowborn soldiers from their caste and grant titles according to their accomplishments. I promise it.”
“I thank Your Majesty for your mercy. The Mage Corps will remain forever loyal before you.”
Seeing Regina’s face loosen just a little, he bowed once more.
But not everyone was satisfied.
Herais was barely suppressing his boiling rage.
His dog developing a will of her own and speaking as she pleased. Swearing loyalty to the emperor instead of to him.
Those were things that should never have happened.
One week before their next deployment, Herais summoned Regina for a spar.
When she arrived at the training grounds, Herais forced her to her knees, smiling as he pulled something from behind his back.
It was a restraint forged of thick metal.
“Your mana is so strong that you’ll need this level of control gear for a fair sparring match, won’t you?”
It was the imperial magic sealing device passed down through the royal family for generations, a magical restraint used on traitors and high criminals: the Shackles of Restraint.