Who Is the Owner of This Body?
If they meant to kill me, they should have just killed me. Why did it have to be like this? I don't know who did it, but I will make them regret dragging me back to life in this shape.
"There's still a fair bit of strength left. No. This woman's body itself is exceptional."
Experience and knowledge only go so far. This flesh hasn't been trained, and there's a limit to how many of those pigs I can put down with it. Holy power, though, is another matter. I'm no mage, but I can manage the basic spells those frail wizards lean on—wrapping the body to make up for what it lacks. Body reinforcement, they call it. Hopeless mages use it as their mainstay, and it grows stronger the more mana you feed it. I simply run mine on holy power.
"Or did the mana cross over intact from that other body?"
Either way, the flesh was a wreck, but the holy power seemed to have come through whole. A prison of this caliber wouldn't hold me.
The iron door tore open with ridiculous ease, and beyond it waited a whole crowd of those swine.
"Hah. The hell? How'd that noble bitch get out? Hey, did you even lock the door?"
"I locked it properly! What is she even—"
There were quite a lot of them. I couldn't afford to get careless. This was my first fight in this body, so I would end it in one stroke, with everything I could bring to bear. Normally this was something I did with the Holy Sword, but I hardly needed a blade to handle bandits.
"Let's just get this over with."
I packed holy power into my hand and drove it straight into the floor.
Explosive Sword
Light erupted from the earth with a deafening roar and swallowed the bandits whole.
"Holy power, mana—both about right. Keep this up and there's no calling me anything but a brawler."
The ground was a disaster. It had caved in completely, and every last bandit was dead on the spot. With power like this, I could still work as an active adventurer.
"Fatigue hasn't worn off yet?"
Or was it from detonating all that mana at once? No. I wasn't going to deny reality. It was this female body. This flesh was going to need a certain degree of proficiency after all. I listened for any sign of life nearby. The bandits seemed to be dead, all of them. Maybe I'd sleep a little.
This fate of mine really is something. Having my body swapped was already enough to choke me with the unfairness of it, and when I opened my eyes I'd been kidnapped somewhere else again. Judging by the place, at least, it didn't seem I'd been brought here for anything unsavory.
"And where am I this time?"
Even granting that someone had carried me here, the room was exactly like a noble young lady's chambers. The wallpaper, the vanity, the enormous bed—it was just like the room I'd seen when a noble of the kingdom invited me into his manor.
"Mm."
I'd hoped otherwise, and of course I was wrong. The chest was still full, the waist still narrow, and between the legs, conspicuously empty. My head was a mess, but I'm no fool. I didn't carry the entire party's load for nothing. In a situation like this, I was more confident than anyone that I could keep my head cold.
Right. And yet the conclusion that forced its way forward was that I had possessed some noble young lady. Honestly, it was strange enough that I wondered if this was a dream. No. When a Hero passes the Holy Sword to someone else, do they receive a new life instead of dying? Even for that, this wasn't being born again. It meant possessing another's body with my memories intact.
I pushed myself up. It felt different from before, but the body was unmistakably light.
"Ha. Is this actually real?"
What the mirror showed was, plainly, a different person. Not Hero Tati. Not the former Hero Tati—a woman. The glass held a lady of elegant noble bearing who could not have been less suited to the Hero party's great struggle, and the confused face looked as if it had no idea why it had ended up like this. Setting the better-than-expected looks aside, I decided to look a little more carefully.
"What is this. What."
A bizarre scene: the bewildered woman kept talking to the mirror. Something was off. I tilted my head left, and the woman in the mirror tilted left with me. Right was the same. So that was it. Hero Tati's life had ended, and I had been born anew. Fine. I'd take it. Even so, I didn't know cause from consequence.
"Whose body is this?"
The hair was a color you rarely saw in the kingdom. She had to be from the empire upheld by the Four Grand Dukes, and beyond that I couldn't infer a thing. I'd done nothing but fight, so I'd barely met any nobles. If I had a connection worth naming, it was the Clyde family of the Norwell Empire.
A latch clicked. The door opened, and a man with dark blue hair stepped in.
Ah. I think I know that face. Turn it over for a moment and it might come to me.
"You're awake."
"...?"
"Hah. The break with the imperial prince went through cleanly enough. Never thought you'd actually get yourself kidnapped."
A broken engagement with an imperial prince? Kidnapped? What was he talking about? And where was this, that he spoke as if he knew me? I decided to hear him out.
"Looks like you were snatched on the way here. Someone else is probably behind it. Anyone come to mind?"
What was I supposed to say to that? I didn't know a thing. Acting like he knew me out of nowhere—he didn't seem to be speaking as if he knew what was actually inside. Who was this man? Family of the body's owner, most likely. I felt I'd seen him somewhere, but the memory wouldn't surface.
"There's a limit to how far you can slight our Clyde family."
The Clyde family. One of the four grand ducal houses that made up the empire, the house that ruled the north. Their duty was to drive back the barbarians pouring down from the north and hold the line against the monster armies pressing in. Because of that, their forces were rumored to be the strongest among the Four Grand Dukes. Don't tell me it was that house.
"It only got smoothed over this far because of that Hero bastard's suicide."
The dark-blue-haired man went on. So the world had written it off as the Hero's suicide. Still, that bastard Carn had enough of a conscience not to pass it off as me running away.
"So what are you going to do now? The Clydes never had the cleanest name to begin with. Even so."
I was going to have to answer. How? Coldly speaking, the man in front of me knew this body. Family, most likely. And the woman of that family had her engagement to an imperial prince broken and had been kidnapped. He'd probably stormed the bandit camp to save her. This body had been rescued by the Clyde family. Anyone of Clyde's caliber would have a mind tuned for battle. Pretending to be this body's owner was dangerous. I'd only look suspicious, so wasn't it better to act as if I had no memory? If I was going to be watched either way, that was the better play. A broken engagement with an imperial prince, then a kidnapping. Perfect shock to fake a loss of memory over.
"Who are you? Clyde? Is this the Clyde household?"
No—I think I do know who he is. If it's the Clyde family, I've taken a few commissions from them.
"Ha. Lost your memory, have you."
All right. I'd cast the bait. Now what? The Clydes were a noble house, and looking closer, this man seemed to be someone I knew. So I'd take a shot.
"Mm. I'll ask, then. Are you Evan von Clyde?"
I knew him as the young Grand Duke of the North. Or had he still been a lesser lord? Either way, back when I was the Hero I'd settled a few matters on this side.
"Casual with your 'you' a moment ago, and now you address me by name."
"Was I some insolent brat who never learned any manners? Your daughter, perhaps? Or your younger sister?"
Right now, getting information mattered most. He hadn't expected this, had he. Evan von Clyde stared at me for a long moment, then sighed.
"You truly remember nothing."
"Astonishingly, not a single thing comes to mind."
"Mm. Fine. I'm your older brother. Evan von Clyde. Father died a few months ago, and I succeeded him. You're that Clyde's daughter, so you may call yourself the Grand Duke's daughter."
Hm. So both lesser lord and Grand Duke had been the right thing to say.
"To put it in order, then—this body had its engagement broken by an imperial prince?"
"It's a stretch to say it was done to you. No. Well, if we have to define it, yes."
He heaved another heavy sigh. Just as I'd thought. Of course. What a pitiful mess. Sorting it through, I hadn't transformed. I might truly have possessed this body. What had become of my original one? I could use holy power even now, so it seemed to have crossed over into this flesh. Then whoever took my old body—whether they made a dullahan of it or did something else—it would be nothing but an ordinary human corpse. I just didn't know where this woman's self had gone.
There were possession spells among the dark arts, but those only worked on dead bodies. If I had possessed her for some reason, that meant I'd entered an empty shell with no soul. The body itself, at least, was a good one. I'd been granted a new life. What did it matter if the body was a woman's? I am me. The problem was the broken engagement this woman had on her record.
"A broken engagement. For a noble lady, that's the worst of it. It drags the family's honor through the mud."
I decided to sound him out.
"You talk as if it were someone else's affair."
Because it is someone else's affair. I truly didn't know who owned this body, or why I was in it. What I did know was that I'd been given a new life. So I had to use this situation well.
"Then you're the Grand Duke, and I'm a young lady with nothing left."
"That's right."
"Are you casting me out? A lady with a broken engagement has nothing she can do but be thrown out of the house."
That might be better. A woman's body would make things harder, but instinct told me something. The body itself was remarkably good. So this was what they meant, that the Clydes are born with exceptional physical ability.
"We were already planning to part ways with the Second Imperial Prince. It's not to that extent. But it's plain enough that the family's honor was damaged because of you."
Hm. He doesn't like it, but he won't throw me out? Is that actually better? And if it's the Clydes, there are plenty of means I can put to use.
"Then what should I do now?"
"First, graduate from the academy. Felione. Getting through it safely is the task set before you. However."
"However?"
"From here on, a lot of people will be aiming for you. Dying would lower the Clyde family's standing too. Take an attendant with you if you need one. Mm. For now, you'd better rest."
With that, Evan von Clyde walked out. He said his piece and left. Should I have asked what people were saying about the Hero? No. That would only draw suspicion.
Maybe I ought to get this straight.