Dranus (03) 051: The Heir of Eckelhart
"It's fine," Kalen said. Flap, flap. A dark mass led the way, beating its wings. The thing with that truly hard-to-pronounce name spoke in a gruff voice.
It was just like when the spirit had appeared and Blamia froze—as if time itself had stopped. All because it had heard Kalen's question about whether that phenomenon was okay.
"It's because I forced my way in here. It's only temporary, so don't worry."
"...Got it."
"Ugh, really..."
For Kalen, though, it felt like question marks were popping up over his head. The spirit's manner of speech had changed dramatically.
No—ever since that something claiming to speak human words had started sounding like actual 'speech,' it had been that way.
At Kalen's instruction to guide him, the spirit soon led him into the Spirit Realm. His body stayed put, but his mind floated in a strange, hazy sensation. As they drifted through that vaguely dreamlike place, the spirit's words shifted like that.
"Do you have any idea how difficult this is?"
What had merely resembled something spirit-like soon took on a clear form, gradually aligning with the refined tone of a noble lady.
"No clue."
"Of course not. I'm contracted to her, not you."
A familiar noble lady vibe emanated from this unfamiliar spirit. If he closed his eyes and just listened, he might have believed it was Sinat. A slightly more mature and gentle Sinat, that is.
Dignity from a spirit? Ridiculous. But it was too hard to deny—Kalen could clearly sense the spirit resembled a noble lady.
As Kalen fell silent, the spirit expressed its deep dissatisfaction, as if venting a grievance.
"What do you think made me break the rules and ask you for help? Even after doing that to my back!"
"No,"
"You have no idea how much trouble I got in with Mother... I mean, Her Majesty because of it!"
It was definitely different. Words that had sounded curt and clipped in their spirit-human dynamic now came alive with color and nuance.
"What does she see in a guy like you to fall so hard...?"
"..."
"Anyway, you're the only one who can save Sinat, so we need to hurry."
"Why'd you choose me over my master?"
"Your master?"
"The old man who was with me."
"Ah."
The noble lady aura radiating from the spirit. Kalen shuddered at the dissonance but asked calmly,
"You call it magic, right? In your words."
The "you" the spirit referred to surely meant humans. Kalen nodded along, taking the spirit's words at face value.
"You must be asking because you're advanced in that field, but it's utterly useless on our side."
"You mean spirit magic?"
"Well, if it helps to think of it that way. Precisely speaking, if you have mana, we can't do a thing from this side."
"But spirit magic uses mana too."
"Pfft."
A laugh like a fresh spring breeze—pure and devoid of malice, enough to make Kalen mistake it for one in that instant.
"To manifest spirit magic in the human world, you naturally have to adapt it to that realm's framework. Even when we manifest ourselves, we use mana to fit that framework."
"So you don't use mana in the Spirit Realm."
"Exactly. That's why it had to be you. Get it now?"
Honestly, no. No matter how calm Kalen was or how well he assessed situations, that only applied within the bounds of common sense.
People struggle to grasp what they've never experienced. These words strayed so far from everything Kalen's environment had encompassed that they were hard to comprehend at once.
"...That's not the only reason, though."
The spirit abruptly turned its head away, as if done discussing it.
"Anyway, we need to hurry. Once the ritual finishes, it can't be undone."
Before Kalen could respond, the spirit continued, knowing he was struggling to follow and adding clarification.
"What you call spirits live far longer than humans."
"I know a little."
"Even for us, it was so long ago it's called 'ancient history.' Do you remember me mentioning the betrayers'Tomb?"
"Yeah."
The spirit faced forward again, as if its head ached.
"The Spirit Realm is divided into three kingdoms, and each has beings called betrayers."
Kalen somehow sensed these betrayers were linked to the monsters from Sinat and Selasier's incidents—and the spirit's words confirmed it closely enough.
"What happened is too long a story, so just know it was a horrific incident. The three betrayers had their manifestations shattered by the kings of those kingdoms at the time and were imprisoned in the void."
"The void is the Tomb?"
"Quick on the uptake. Yes, exactly. A spirit trapped in the void can never see light again. It's no different from a tomb."
So that was the meaning of the betrayers' Tomb. Three monsters in the Spirit Realm, called betrayers for sparking some horrific event, had been sealed away by the kingdom kings in an inescapable place—the Tomb.
The reason they were called betrayers was presumably tied to that atrocity, though Kalen could only guess.
"Manifestation means the form you take in the human world, right?"
"Yes. Taking an animal form puts the least strain on us. In the Spirit Realm itself, we appear as humans."
"Human forms?"
"Spirits have interacted with humans since ancient times, so from our perspective, humans are mysterious, fascinating beings. A bit cute, too..."
Like a higher being gazing upon lowly creatures. That was how spirits, these incomprehensible entities, viewed humans—mysterious, intriguing, and appealing enough in form to mimic.
According to the spirit, before mingling with humans, they had existed as drifting orbs of light.
"Destroy a manifestation, and we can't even escape through the human world. That's how vast ages passed."
To the spirit, "vast ages" defied human measurement. At least as far back as magic's emergence—likely even earlier.
"And then you showed up."
As those thoughts crossed Kalen's mind, an irritated, scolding voice rang in his ears.
Kalen realized it was directed at him and parted his lips.
"How do you have a world like our clan's?"
"...That world, you mean."
"What you call..."
As Kalen listened and something clicked, the spirit declared firmly.
"A mental image world."
"What a joke. Worlds aren't meant to be ornamental art pieces. You humans are mysterious, fascinating, even a little cute... but sometimes hopelessly dense."
Mental images must be beautiful. Serving as a representation of the self, the more stunning the mental image, the greater the acclaim. That was why people obsessed over beautiful ones—it was common sense.
Yet here was a spirit outright denying that truism. As Kalen recalled old tales of mental images used in battle,
the spirit accelerated toward a brightening space.
"I thought mental images had long lost their purpose in the human world, but then you appeared with one identical to ours."
Kalen remembered that moment. The spirit's words inevitably evoked it.
The time he'd thrown himself in front of Sinat. When the Spirit Realm monster had bared its fangs at them.
"It was a mistake on its part. It saw your world resembling ours, mistook you for one of us, and exploited the gap."
"Ah."
Suddenly, the pieces fell into place.
For some reason, Kalen's mental image matched the one from Sinat's contracted spirit's clan. The monster that attacked Kalen and Sinat that day had mistaken Kalen's mental image for a spirit's—and seized the opportunity.
In short, revenge. The monster, its manifestation shattered and sealed in the Tomb, had used that breach for vengeance, appearing in a grotesque form for the same reason.
"...You're royalty, aren't you?"
Kalen pieced together the comprehensible bits and asked. For the spirit's words to hold, her clan had to be direct descendants of the ancient king who sealed the monster. Otherwise, there'd be no reason for it to mistake a similar mental image.
The spirit paused briefly before replying softly.
"Yes. It's a bit embarrassing to say it myself, but I'm the heir to the Eckelhart line."
Spirit clans, royal houses, betrayers. The Spirit Realm suddenly felt far deeper than humans could imagine.
"The Eckelhart line has a name too, then?"
Perhaps because of the stories he'd heard, Kalen began seeing the spirit before him not as a mere spirit, but as a person.
"Person" wasn't quite right—she was a spirit, not human. But as an entity bearing a whole world, with a history that could be told as a story.
"Felisierus von Eckelhart."
They passed through the brightest spot. As the overwhelming light filling his vision subsided, the world took shape.
"You're the first human to come here."
By now fully transformed into a girl's form, the spirit greeted Kalen with a radiant smile.