First Love
I still dream of my past life from time to time.
Back in my school days, the moment I opened my mouth the atmosphere would freeze solid, and every friend’s face would curdle like spoiled milk.
College was no different. I barely finished the first semester before I fled into the military like a man running from a burning building.
They say there’s no paradise waiting for the ones who run.
Even in the unit I earned a legendary reputation as an atmosphere destroyer.
The silver lining was that I never quite crossed the line into “problem soldier” territory… but maybe that was the universe’s idea of a joke, because three days before my discharge I died.
I was up on the range as a control officer for the division marksmanship competition when some lunatic decided to shoot me and open fire on everyone else.
Ever been shot?
I don’t recommend it.
Especially not two rounds in non-lethal spots that refuse to finish the job quickly.
I closed my eyes. When I opened them again I was lying on cold stone.
Tiny hands. Low eye level.
I had become a five-year-old boy.
An orphaned beggar boy, no less.
Even among the street-kid packs I was the outcast.
That part wasn’t my fault. I’d been the outcast from the start.
Begging and pickpocketing were skills I’d never practiced, so of course I was terrible at them. Extreme hunger finally dropped me flat on the roadside with the world spinning.
So this is how I die, I thought.
That was when a clear, slender woman’s voice cut through the haze.
“You’ve got talent, don’t you?”
My body lifted into the air.
When I opened my eyes again it wasn’t another filthy alley. It was a luxurious chamber—soft bed, high ceiling, antique furnishings everywhere.
The room of the Third Imperial Princess, Seriel, the woman who had picked me up off the street.
“From this day forward your name is Ricarton.”
“…….”
I simply nodded.
Past-life experience told me that opening my mouth would probably get my head removed. Ninety-eight percent chance, give or take.
She claimed she saw talent in me. In exchange for food, clothing, and shelter she taught me swordsmanship and magic.
Why “in exchange for” instead of “in addition to”? Because…
Thwack!!
“Ghk—!!”
Broken ribs were the baseline.
KRA-KOOM… CRACKLE-ZZZT!!
“Gyaaaaaah!!”
“Heh. Still alive even after being roasted black.”
She dropped lightning on me until I was thoroughly cooked.
“Blub-blub-blub… gurgle…”
“……Are you dead?”
She repeatedly dunked the non-swimmer me underwater and hauled me back up.
The days were indistinguishable from torture…
“…Why the hell is this getting bigger?”
…yet watching my dantian and muscles swell day by day still filled me with a strange sense of accomplishment.
I really did grow stronger. In a single year I passed the knight examination and became the Empire’s youngest apprentice knight.
“You’ve finally become worth the food you eat.”
“It is all thanks to Your Highness’s grace.”
I answered on one knee. Seriel went silent for a long moment.
“……?”
I lifted my head and found her staring at me with eyes wide and mouth opening and closing like she’d just seen a monster.
I’d never seen that expression on her before. It was unsettling.
“…You can speak?”
“…Yes, Your Highness.”
“Ha. Then why have you been hiding it all this time?”
“I-I have no gift for words, and I feared I might offend Your Highness’s mood…”
“Ha. Hahaha. Come here and take a beating first.”
That day I got thoroughly dusted by Seriel for reasons I still don’t fully understand.
My knighting celebration turned into her personal stress-relief session.
Another year passed.
I shed the apprentice tag and became Seriel’s personal escort knight.
“Ricarton.”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
“Raise your head.”
I looked up. Seriel stood over me with the tip of her sword resting against my shoulder, gazing down with a face utterly free of playfulness—every inch the imperial princess, her dignity hanging around her like perfume.
“From this moment you are my escort knight. An escort knight must never bow his head.”
“Yes.”
“If you understand, stand. You need not kneel before me either.”
“But…”
“I already know the depth of your loyalty. Or do you intend to cling to pointless custom and hand your enemies the chance to strike me?”
“No, Your Highness.”
I rose at once and met her eyes.
Seriel, a full head taller than me, smiled as she looked at me.
Sunlight pouring through the window shattered above her in dazzling fragments.
A pure smile without a single speck of mischief was etched onto my retinas like a painting.
In that instant I understood.
Ah. I will never forget this moment for the rest of my life.
I will spend eternity remembering this day, staring only at her back, and suffering for it.
I will close my eyes carrying feelings that can never be returned.
Another year slipped by.
“…Your Highness.”
“What is it?”
“…….”
“Oh, just speak already!”
“I thought you might dislike it…”
“Say it first!”
“…When I woke up this morning, my second Core and second Class opened at the same time.”
“What?!”
Seriel shot to her feet as if she couldn’t believe her ears and stared at me.
She poured mana into her eyes, peered inside my body, and then—
Thud! Thud!
—started beating me.
“You talent-stuffed little monster!”
“Ow! Ow! I told you you’d hate it!”
“No, I don’t hate it! I’m delighted! When my escort grows stronger, I grow stronger!!”
Thud! Thud! Thud!
“Then why are you hitting me?! Ow! My bones! You’re breaking my bones!”
…
“Haa. For this body of mine to feel envy toward the likes of you… that simply won’t do, will it?”
She said it while wiping sweat with a refreshed face. Zero persuasive power.
Every time I achieved remarkable growth, I got hit.
The day she finally stopped hitting me came later.
The Emperor’s sudden death.
Then the family tragedy that followed. The War of Brothers.
Blades drawn for the crown.
Compared to her siblings, Seriel had no powerful backers. She was forced to flee the capital to escape the succession struggle.
“…I’m so tired.”
A full year of hopping from one protective house to another while on the run.
Seriel was exhausted.
Sometimes when she looked out the window her eyes were completely empty.
Those pink irises could stare at the vast sky and hold nothing at all.
“Even my eldest brother was slaughtered without mercy. That little brother of mine will finally wear the crown. My own life won’t last much longer either.”
“…Your Highness.”
“Leave now if you wish. With your talent, even if your loyalty is questioned, you’ll still have chances to prove your usefulness.”
“Why would you say such a thing?”
It hurt.
That easygoing cheerfulness that clashed so charmingly with her cute face had always been her greatest strength.
The tragedy of people drunk on power felt like it had stolen her away.
“Do you not wish to live?”
“The moment you saved me as I was dying on the roadside, my life became Yours, Your Highness. If you order me to go and die, I will die. But if you order me to live alone, I will refuse. I will choose to die by Your Highness’s own hand for the crime of disobeying an order.”
Seriel’s eyes went round for a second as if startled. Then she schooled her expression and spoke coldly.
“Ha. The boy who barely spoke except when he was being beaten is suddenly eloquent. Don’t come crying to me later.”
I saw it.
The ear she turned away from me was bright red.
A single droplet clinging to her long lashes trembled on a precarious curve before sliding down.
A few days later.
Shaaaaa—.
Rain poured down in sheets that day.
Even though it was midday the world was dark as midnight, and the wind-driven rain made it hard to keep my eyes open.
“Your Highness! Your Highness—!!”
Seriel had gone for a short walk with the maids when the downpour hit.
The butler said she’d headed for the rear mountain. She still hadn’t returned.
Ugly thoughts flashed through my mind.
“Damn it!”
If only I hadn’t forced open my fourth Core the day before.
If only the backlash hadn’t left me unconscious until now.
I vaulted onto a horse.
The riding skills Seriel had beaten into me during my apprentice days finally paid off.
Thududududu—.
A roar that could have been rain or hoofbeats hammered my eardrums.
I poured mana into my ears and amplified my hearing.
Hundreds of hoofbeats.
Dozens of horses were galloping in one direction.
“Fuck!”
I spat a curse from my homeland and drove the horse harder.
The count’s prized steed charged through the storm without hesitation.
“You’ve hidden well until now, Third Princess.”
A voice several kilometers ahead slammed into my ears with perfect clarity.
“…Are my younger sisters still alive?”
“Is that concern, or a desperate bid to offer them up in your place and survive?”
“Hmph. As expected of that dog’s dog—not a scrap of dignity in your words.”
“That arrogance ends here. The one who will be reduced to a dog before His Majesty is you, woman.”
“First I should shut that foul mouth of yours.”
Kuoohhh—.
Mana swirled violently up ahead.
The mana of Seriel, a 4th-Class mage.
The driving rain turned into hail. The mud became ice.
Every horse surrounding her froze solid, yet the knights atop them remained unharmed.
They had raised their own mana to defend.
“Still struggling, Princess. We’ve prepared thoroughly against your magi—”
Before the man could finish, I severed the napes of the two knights at the rear of the formation.
“Kraaagh—!!”
“…Hm?”
“What the hell is this brat?!”
“A kid?”
Trained knights that they were, they drew steel instantly.
All of them were 2-Core or 3-Core openers.
Even hanging on the edge of three Cores, they were still too many for a lone child like me…
Kuooh—!
But I don’t only have Cores.
The magic I had internalized by taking Seriel’s spells with my own body.
I poured out every drop of mana that answered my boiling rage.
“Rain down.”
Hail compressed into arrow shapes and hammered into them.
“Ghak!”
“Magic! Wrap yourselves in mana!”
Even in the chaos my ears stayed locked on the conversation between that man and Seriel.
The moment any of them looked ready to lay a hand on her, I was prepared to trade an arm and a leg just to reach her side.
Mana-honed blades carved in from both flanks at once.
I kicked off the mud, spun my body, and slipped between the two trajectories.
“Wha…!”
“Crazy…!!”
Acrobatics only possible because this body was still a child’s.
Adult muscle would have been sliced into six neat pieces; mine, thankfully, stayed intact.
Still, holding off this many opponents of similar rank alone was impossible.
“Core Open.”
The activated Cores poured out mana.
One, two, three… and four.
The mana circuit leading to the fourth Core unlocked, and the power sleeping there flooded through the pathways.
Fatigue vanished as if I’d been doped. My vision sharpened.
Enemy movements looked like they were running at half speed.
“So this is how it feels. A 4-Core knight.”
It had been half a gamble, but it paid off. Their mana had stimulated my Core.
With the new Core open, my magic was affected as well.
KRA-KOOM—! CRACKLE-ZZZT—!
Lightning crashed down on the knight who had raised his sword.
Mana that commanded the atmosphere itself. Proof I had stepped into 4th Class.
The flood from the fourth Core also stimulated my dantian, pushing me across the threshold of 4th Class.
“L-Lightning…?”
“What the hell is that bastard?”
Seeing their comrades turned into grilled squid, the enemies froze for a heartbeat.
I didn’t waste it. I severed their joints.
Seok! Seuk!
“A brat…? Ah. That one. The youngest knight, your little escort.”
Sreung—. The leader drew his sword.
Mana and killing intent poured out of him.
A 4-Core knight.
“Tch. Useless fools. Even exhausted from the forced march, to lose your heads over one green brat…”
He waved the others back and faced me alone.
Mana wrapped around his eyes as he examined my condition. The smile drained from his face.
“Four Cores…? You’re telling me a whelp like you has reached the same Sword Master realm as me?”
“F-Four Cores…!!”
The Sword Master’s personal certification made the small fry edge away from me.
The blade that had been pointed at me slowly lowered toward the ground.
The instant its tip was about to touch the frozen mud—
KWAJAK!!
—he launched himself at me like a projectile.
I slipped past the silver trajectory and drove for his vitals.
When he deflected the counter I’d thought unavoidable with a gauntlet reinforced by mana, I almost let out a sound of admiration.
Kakakakang—!
The life-or-death duel with a 4-Core knight stretched past ten minutes.
I had 4th-Class magic, but worry for Seriel kept fracturing my focus.
Every time I caught sight of her fighting the other knights, red lines were carved into my body.
The gap between a freshly opened 4-Core and a veteran was widening, slowly but surely.
Splash.
Before I knew it the ground around us had turned red.
“It’s over! Give up, Princess!”
“Kh…!”
Through ringing ears I heard Seriel’s ragged breathing and the footsteps of knights closing in on her.
“You dare take your eyes off me for a woman in front of this Cursed, you brat?!”
Taking your eyes off the fight.
His words stabbed into my mind.
‘You’re looking away during a fight? Do you want to die?’
‘Uh, over there!’
‘Hm?’
‘Your Highness just looked away too.’
‘…Come here and take a beating.’
Old memories and the most effective move surfaced together.
I grinned while staring past his shoulder.
“Finally here. You’re late.”
“What?”
At the same instant I manifested a magic arrow behind him and fired it at his back.
The sudden mana signature forced him to spin and defend.
Of course no one was there.
“You cowardly—!”
Seok—!
Thud.
His head tumbled limply to the ground.
“Says the man who brought dozens to torment one woman.”
As for the remaining small fry—
BZZZZZT—!
I turned them into lightning-grilled squid.
“Your Highness, are you all right?”
After confirming no one was left breathing, I checked Seriel’s condition.
Mud and blood had ruined her appearance, but thankfully none of the blood was hers.
“…Why did you only come now?!”
When she lifted her head, her eyes were full of something that wasn’t rainwater.
Thud.
“Aren’t you my escort knight?!”
“I’m sorry.”
A hand caked in mud struck my chest.
Thud.
“Hic! Where were you all this time?!”
“I’m sorry.”
Thud.
“Why did it take you so long to deal with one man?!”
“I’m sorry.”
Thud.
“I thought I was going to die! What am I supposed to do if you die?!”
“…….”
Thud.
“Waaah, I was so scared! Waaaaah!”
I simply stood still.
She leaned against my chest and cried for a long time.
Until the rain stopped and the dark clouds cleared.
For a very long time.