Don't Die, Sir Kareha
"General!"
The adjutant and knights rushed forward to save him, but the monster, having completely lost its reason, roared and barred their path. They could not reach Adolf; all that entered their sight was the image of him collapsing in a pool of his own blood.
From behind, Aisia watched the scene and felt a shock that dropped her heart into her stomach.
"Sir... Sir Kareha?"
She knew it instinctively—his wounds were of an entirely different order from anything before. The thought even struck her that it might already be beyond saving.
"Princess, it's dangerous! If you go any farther, the monster will—"
The guards tried to hold her back, yet Aisia advanced on trembling legs. In her mind the question circled—Why am I moving? I'll only get in the way—but her body moved first.
In that instant the monster reared its heavy forepaw to deliver the finishing blow.
"You must not go!"
Aisia drew in the faint mana that shimmered beyond the darkened passage and forced her mind to focus. The power was unstable, yet if she did not save him now, the chance would be gone forever.
"Out of the way!"
At her sharp command the guards flinched and fell back. Aisia charged forward and poured every scrap of magical energy she possessed. The crude but powerful shockwave slightly deflected the monster's strike; its paw failed to crush Adolf's body completely.
"Uwaaagh!"
The beast's foreleg slammed past him into the floor, sending stone shards flying and splitting the earth. Adolf, spared by a hair's breadth, dragged in a ragged breath and clung to consciousness.
While Aisia gasped for air, the knights at last closed in and drove their blades into the monster's flanks as one.
"Now!"
The adjutant barked the final order. Momentum broken, the creature could not withstand the barrage and toppled with a thunderous crash that echoed through the ruins.
Victory was theirs, yet Adolf had been grievously wounded. When he tried to rise, strength fled his limbs and he sank back to the ground.
Ah... so this is how it ends.
Blood seeped steadily beneath his armor and began to spread; his vision blurred. Adolf Kareha knew the wounds were worse than those that had claimed men on any battlefield—no simple matter. He felt the bitter regret of it: one more step and he might still have averted the world's ruin. Guilt toward the parents and family he would leave behind pressed on him; the knowledge that he himself had altered the past and thereby doomed the future made his breath come feverish as he looked, one by one, at the faces around him.
"Treat him at once!"
Soldiers scrambled forward with bandages, but the wounds would not clot even under hard pressure. In three or four places shards of shattered metal had bitten deep into flesh.
"The injuries are critical!"
The medical mage ran up shouting; the adjutant only shook his head.
"At this rate his life itself is in danger..."
Then Aisia stepped close. Her body already felt leaden from the mana she had spent bringing the monster down, yet the sight of Adolf bleeding on the edge of unconsciousness weighed far heavier on her heart.
"Healing magic will take hold, but... the damage is so extensive..."
The medical mage prepared the spell with obvious reluctance, hands trembling. The situation was sliding steadily toward the worst. Whether from the peculiar mana distortion that filled the ruins, healing magic refused to flow as smoothly as it should.
Aisia steadied her breathing and whispered,
"I'll do it."
"Princess, your own condition is far from good."
The mage tried to dissuade her, but her eyes flashed as she answered again.
"There is no other way. With my mana I may at least ease the wound a little."
She knew perfectly well that her unstable power had not yet fully recovered. Even so, her control surpassed that of the medical mage before her; better that she, who could still shape a little magic, should be the one to cast it. More than any calculation, however, she simply could not leave him lying there.
Aisia Lil Shuhain had decided to heal the man who was her homeland's enemy. She herself could not understand why she fought so hard to keep him alive, yet there was no time left for answers.
"Hang on a little longer..."
"...Aisia Lil Shuhain."
She knelt and unfastened his armor. Blood welled without pause from the gashes laid bare. Placing trembling hands above the wounds, she gathered every last shred of magic she possessed.
In his fading vision Adolf Kareha wanted to stay her magic with a hand that would no longer move. He was going to die anyway; never on any battlefield had he seen even a master healer save someone more broken than he now was. And she could not even cast proper spells after her mana rampage, could she?
Yet he did not know the crucial truth. Would Aisia Lil Shuhain—who had lived through the same wars as Adolf Kareha—truly have been ignorant of the facts he knew?
"Don't die, Sir Kareha."
With a deep breath a bluish light bloomed at her fingertips. Since the earlier light-emitting magic she had regained the ability to cast simple spells, yet the moment she began the healing, cold sweat beaded on her skin. Mana activation tore open the battered channels inside her body; blood began to trickle from her lips.
"Princess! This is beyond your limit!"
"Beyond my limit? When it comes to saving a life, 'beyond my limit' is something I can do!"
As though she had heard a fool's question, Aisia Lil Shuhain snapped at the healing mage who tried to stop her. The longer she held the spell, the more the cold sweat poured; hemoptysis continued until her own vision began to swim. At this rate she would die as well.
Even on the hazy border of unconsciousness she kept the healing flowing—and dreamed.
"Sia, aren't you overdoing the training these days? A lady must know how to spare her body."
"Mm... Mother...?"
Aisia blinked, then realized she was seated at the royal family's table. Ah... we were just having a meal. But training too hard...?
She gave a small laugh at her mother's worried words. Across the continent the two empires that each claimed the title of true empire swept the land like a pair of chariots; as a child Aisia had already chosen the one she would face on the battlefield as her rival.
"I've decided to take the new rising star of the Wurt Empire as my rival."
"A rival? He must be someone fine, then."
"He's the same age as me—fifteen—and they say he'll be the next war hero! I can't lose to him!"
Even as she spoke the words, a strange thought flickered: Yes, that was how it was... Why had she thought of it that way?
In any case, she had felt both admiration and competitive fire toward Adolf Kareha, the peer who already possessed such outstanding tactical skill. To fifteen-year-old Aisia he was the destined rival she would one day meet on the field of war.
Time in the dream raced forward.
"...Damn it."
By the time she turned nineteen, the rival she had chosen had become a madman. The Liberia Empire filled with the black reputation of Adolf Kareha, the war genius of Wurt. These were no mere rumors. Liberia fielded many female knights; evidence began to surface that Wurt soldiers had committed atrocities upon their corpses, and witnesses of public executions appeared one after another.
"Damn it... damn it!"
How could a nation that harbored such a blood-crazed warmonger call itself a great power? She would never forgive him. Aisia Lil Shuhain resolved to judge him with her own hands.
"I will never forgive you, Adolf Kareha."
Carrying that hatred for the man who slaughtered her people so cruelly, she took the field and, within a year, faced him at last. And she was utterly defeated. Afterward she expected to die as those others had died.
Yet what had he done?
He had killed his own subordinate for her sake so that the same crime would never be repeated; he had never laid a hand on her in torture. He had even rescued a Liberia-born maid for her.
Deep down Aisia Lil Shuhain had known the truth all along.
But... why am I still here?
She understood it was a dream. Understanding did not wake her; she gave a hollow laugh, thinking this must be the lantern of a life flashing before death. So she had overreached and died after all.
"What? Mother?"
Suddenly a resonant voice filled the empty air around her.
"..."
She murmured agreement. Judged by what she herself had seen, Adolf Kareha was a proud knight who had made great sacrifices for her, who kept faith with his men and earned their trust.
"Yet in the end I have only received from Sir Kareha. Honor demanded that I give something in return as well."
It had never been the treatment of a hostage; every one of his subordinates had shown her the full courtesy due a princess.
"Even if I wished to, I no longer can. I have neither the authority I once held as a princess nor the strength to protect anyone."
Perhaps because she believed herself already dead, she spoke the wretched words lightly.
"Favor...?"
Aisia Lil Shuhain found her mother's words strange. Simply granting favor—was that not a fraud? Even barter required the exchange of goods for goods. Compared with all he had given, her favor seemed worthless.
"Given up? I have?"
She who had never known the meaning of surrender—why was she being told she had given up? The slight to her pride, spoken so lightly, ignited a sudden flash of anger.