Love Letters Carry Catastrophe
“…….”
Instead of answering Nemesia’s question, Seraine casually lifted the cream-colored letter envelope in her hand.
Then she broke into a vile, triumphant smile—one no one would ever have imagined an emperor wearing—and spoke.
“Calling them the same would be a stretch. My letter felt rather… sincere. Just looking at the thickness alone, mine seems to have about two more pages, wouldn’t you say?”
“Hmm?”
Nemesia’s eyebrow twitched at Seraine’s completely unexpected boldness.
Arsiena carefully raised her own envelope in agreement.
“Mine was much the same. A rather reckless declaration of love for a life that would vanish like dust. But isn’t that precisely what makes the emotion of love so magnificent?”
“…….”
A brief silence followed.
Nemesia clicked her tongue once.
“Tsk. Fine, so you’re saying it’s true? That you all received letters from the same man.”
Her crimson eyes darkened like the Black Moon, then brightened again.
“The letter that came to me was similar. Asking if I didn’t want to be called not the ‘Demon King of the Black Moon,’ but simply ‘Nemesia.’ Some worthless human daring to call me by name.”
Seraine snorted a laugh.
“Worthless? If you’d read my letter, you wouldn’t be saying that.”
“Hah? You little fledgling Transcendent. You’ve gotten quite a bit more insolent while I wasn’t looking, haven’t you?”
“Insolent? Even now I’m offering the utmost courtesy to the two eld— …Transcendents who have protected the continent’s balance for thou. sands. of. years.”
Seraine parried the Demon King’s murderous threat with perfect calm.
“Anyway, returning to the point—this man was the first to worry about the nights and the exhaustion of ‘Seraine’ the person, rather than the great emperor of Roelina.”
Arsiena inclined her head slightly and answered in turn.
“Then what of me? For thousands of years I have only looked down upon the rise and fall of this world from above.”
She traced the edge of the envelope with a fingertip as she continued.
“I received a letter saying that even knowing he would vanish first, he wished to become a warm speck within my eternity for that brief span of time. To think there still exists a being who can utter such foolish words.”
“…I see. So that’s why the two of you came flying all the way down here.”
Nemesia burst into hearty laughter.
“The conclusion is the same. Insolent, reckless, and therefore adorable. And more than anything—he looked like he had a delicious heart… that’s what you’re saying, isn’t it?”
Seraine shrugged.
“Thinking of cutting out and eating the heart first is very much like a Demon King.”
“And you can still say that while driving a blade into the heart, fledgling.”
Arsiena looked between the two of them, then lightly clapped her hands and brought the situation back under control.
“That will be enough. Drawing out pointless talk only harms us all in the end. However, I will ask one more thing, Nemesia.”
“What.”
“Was the sender’s name written at the end of the letter the initials KJH?”
“Yes. A student currently enrolled at the Academy, KJH.”
“I see.”
The three Transcendents floating in the air spoke the same word at the same moment.
KJH.
Watching from below, I genuinely felt every drop of blood in my body run cold at once.
Ah, fuck… I should’ve just done it anonymously. I must’ve been out of my goddamn mind.
All that remained now was for them to find the life connected to those three letters among the hundreds or thousands of students inside the Academy.
And honestly… if those three put their minds to it, it probably wouldn’t even take a week.
Compare writing styles, lean on the headmaster a little, then match the mana wavelength that spread when the coordinates were set against the mana wavelengths of every student stored at the Academy…
Fuck a week—it’d be done in a day.
“Anyway, to sum up—”
Nemesia’s voice dropped lower.
“Since none of you look like you’re planning to back down, how about we settle the rumor that’s been circulating all across Rahelon, while the chance is here?”
“…Rumor?”
Seraine narrowed her eyes and asked.
“Oh, come on. What’s with the act? You’ve all been hearing it for years.”
Nemesia lifted her gaze to the sky.
There, countless lights were breaking, reconnecting, and breaking again in a swirling chaos.
“Which of Rahelon’s Transcendents is the strongest. Which continent’s sun burns hottest, which forest runs deepest, which Black Moon hangs thickest.”
At those words Arsiena slowly wrapped her hand around the hilt of her greatsword.
The roots of the World Tree writhed beneath the blade.
“Humans always grow curious about such useless things.”
“So what exactly do you intend to do, Nemesia.”
Sensing that the atmosphere had turned dangerous, Seraine raised her golden bow as well.
The string of the Heavenly Bow already quivered of its own accord, as though ready to loose an arrow without being drawn.
The corner of Nemesia’s mouth curled upward.
“I thought we might settle it here, today. Since I’m already out collecting the price for a letter, I might as well kill two birds with one stone.”
The Demon King of the Black Moon whispered.
“Showing them the strongest that Rahelon has been so noisy about… wouldn’t be so bad, would it?”
KWA-GAGAK—!
The instant her words ended, the heat of the Demon Realm, the emperor’s pressure, and the life of the forest slammed into one another like beasts baring their fangs.
Over the ruins of Argentina, multicolored mana began to tangle and spread.
“…Insane.”
I reflexively ducked.
A noise that felt like it would rupture my eardrums rolled out, and several buildings far away shook to their foundations.
Hey, you crazy Transcendents, there are still perfectly fine humans left down here…!
I already knew that Transcendents paid zero attention to any life that wasn’t another Transcendent.
But… I hadn’t expected them to go this completely off the rails…
Seraine hadn’t even drawn her bowstring, yet dozens, then hundreds of golden arrows rose into the air around her fingertips.
Each one felt as though it could erase an entire city; just looking at them pressed down on the lungs.
Arsiena matched the mood and slowly raised the greatsword of the World Tree.
KWA-DEUDEUK—!
Heaven and earth creaked at the same time.
It felt as though invisible roots planted across the whole of Rahelon had all turned in a single direction at once.
Beneath the Black Moon, Nemesia drew up blood-red mana.
Crimson moonlight flowed along her hair and the leather straps of her attire.
“Good.”
The Demon King said.
“Today, with this Academy as the starting point, a new record will be written in the skies of Rahelon—”
“…Wait a moment.”
But Arsiena cut her off, her expression turning grave.
“…Huh?”
Seraine frowned.
Nemesia tilted her head slightly as well.
“A rather ominous thought has just occurred to me.”
“What.”
“Can we truly be certain that the unknown man sent letters only to…”
Arsiena lifted her gaze and slowly swept it across Nemesia and Seraine.
“…the three of us?”
“…….”
“Don’t tell me…”
Seraine closed her eyes as if something had clicked, then murmured under her breath.
“You think he might have sent one to the Dragon Lord as well?”
Dragon Lord Serapagnia.
Ruler of the skies and the highlands.
The being who watched over the world’s balance, and a catastrophe of a different breed from the Outer Gods.
“That crazy dragon bitch?”
Nemesia smiled as though the idea were absurd.
“No chance. Not if the man has even a scrap of sense.”
“He seems more than capable of it to me.”
Arsiena once more gave her envelope a light lift.
“Think back to the sentences in the letter. He never once used the word ‘Transcendent,’ yet every line showed he knew our positions far too precisely.”
Seraine closed her eyes very slowly, then opened them again and spoke in a low voice.
“The four beings who protect Rahelon. Empire, forest, Demon Realm, and—sky.”
Nemesia clicked her tongue.
“If we’re going that route, there’s one more, isn’t there? The Transcendent of this Academy.”
Seraine’s and Arsiena’s gazes dropped simultaneously.
Toward the half-collapsed main building, the shattered towers, the cracked platform.
Toward someone who was surely watching the current situation from somewhere down there in shabby clothes, secretly and slyly.
“…….”
“This could get more complicated than expected if we’re not careful.”
“In the worst case, not three but four, even five…”
That was the moment.
—
The sky that had been a chaotic vortex from the clashing auras of the three Transcendents suddenly fell unnaturally silent.
A silence so complete it felt as though the very concept of sound had vanished.
And as if they had planned it, the three Transcendents all jerked their heads upward at once.
I too raised my head by pure instinct… and saw it.
“…Oh for real. Oh my god.”
Holes had opened in the sky.
More precisely, seven things that looked like holes had appeared.
Seven black points in the dark sky, as though someone had pressed their finger into the fabric of the heavens again and again.
And those points swelled in an instant.
“Those are… meteors…?”
They were far too large to call ordinary chunks of rock.
Masses the size of entire mountain ranges flipping over and falling.
Each one big enough to pulverize a city and still have room left over.
Those brutally huge boulders were free-falling straight toward the ruined ground of the Academy.
There was no fire.
No crimson tails born of burning atmosphere.
Instead, even light and sound itself were being sucked into those masses.
Which made it all the clearer.
This was no natural phenomenon.
The Transcendents looking up and assessing the situation soon seemed to realize what they were looking at as well, and muttered under their breaths.
“No way.”
Seraine.
“That crazy dragon.”
Nemesia.
“Oh my. It seems the arrogant Dragon Lord has finally gone completely around the bend.”
Arsiena.
And in almost perfect unison, the same words burst from the mouths of all three Transcendents.
“That crazy bitch the Dragon Lord is dropping meteors!!”
The three beings who had been glaring at one another as if ready to devour each other moments earlier simultaneously doused the auras they had been unleashing, as though they had made a pact.
The flesh-cutting killing intent was swept away, and mana with an entirely different purpose began to fill the space.
Mana and demonic energy meant not for destruction, but for protection.
“Honestly, when does that insolent Dragon Lord plan on coming to her senses.”
Seraine raised her bow.
From the tip, golden arrows shot skyward.
One, two, three—dozens, hundreds.
Instead of flying at the meteors, the arrows rose into a vast circular orbit high above the Academy.
A golden circle drawn by the Heavenly Bow.
The instant the circle closed, a barrier of mana invisible to ordinary eyes blanketed the entire Academy.
“World Tree, wrap your protection over the heads of these pitiful beings.”
Arsiena drove her greatsword into the earth.
At once, roots erupted from between shattered stones and the cracks in the ground, wrapping one by one around the humans who were scattering in panic and trying to flee.
“Everyone’s so quick on the draw. Let’s see—my job’s simple enough.”
Nemesia smiled and spread her hands.
“Weaken the force of the pebbles that crazy dragon bitch dropped.”
The Black Moon high above shuddered and poured a crimson waterfall earthward; the red mana that poured from it took the form of a reaper’s scythe in her hands.
Paaat—!
A jet-black blade shot into the sky.
Along the descent paths of the seven meteors, seven enormous blades of the Black Moon were carved into the heavens with perfect precision.
KWAAANG!!
The first impact.
The golden barrier rippled, the roots of the World Tree screamed as they held, and the blades of the Black Moon continued to butcher the meteors.
The meteors shattered into pieces, yet every single fragment was still large enough to erase a village.
In the end, though, every last shard slammed into the emperor’s barrier and lost its force, was cradled by the forest’s roots and had its speed broken, and was whittled down by the Demon King’s mana until its size shrank away.
I watched the scene almost in a daze.
…So those meteors exist because of the letters I sent…?
Dragon Lord, Platinum Dragon Emperor Serapagnia.
The one who, under the excuse of balancing the world, summoned catastrophes whenever she felt like it.
Perhaps an even bigger villain than the Outer Gods themselves.
Dozens of rock fragments were still raining down overhead.
Yet not a single scratch landed on my body.
I saw a tree root brush past my ear.
A piece of the World Tree’s root rode above me, catching every falling shard of stone.
“…Ha. What the hell am I supposed to do about this.”
The breath I had held while frozen by the overwhelming spectacle finally burst out of me late.
Dirt and dust showered down through my hair, but thankfully my bones were still intact.
My heart was hammering like mad, and in the sky the three Transcendents were simultaneously catching seven meteors while shielding the humans each in their own way.
And finally, when the last meteor shattered and the rock masses that had filled the Academy’s sky completely vanished—
In the empty space they left behind, something in the form of a woman unfurled a pair of enormous platinum wings to either side and revealed herself.
