20th day, 10th month, 1,546th year, Continental Calendar — Van Castle
"Now then... Here I come, sire!" Aisha cried.
"Bring it on, Aisha!" I called back.
We were in the training grounds inside Van Castle. In this space, which was open
to the sky like an archery range in Japan, I stood facing a fully armed Aisha. In her
usual light armor, Aisha took up a stance with her greatsword pointed towards me. I
had medium-sized Little Musashibo dolls (the ones that were toy-sized were small,
while the ones large enough to fit a person were large), five of those medium-sized
dolls (hereafter referred to as A-E) protecting me.
In the corner of my vision, I saw the referee, Liscia, raise her right hand.
The next moment, Aisha made a big downwards swing with her greatsword. A
visible shockwave flew towards me and the Little Musashibos.
I put Little Musashibo A (equipped with shields in both hands) up front, having it
ready its shields. The moment the shockwave hit, there was an incredible clang, but
somehow Little Musashibo A managed to hold its ground.
"It's not done yet!" Aisha called.
There was no time for relief. Aisha turned to the side, keeping the blade of her
greatsword pointed in my direction, and then thrust with all her might. Little
Musashibo A tried to overlap its shield to defend, but Aisha's blow hit with the force
of a battering ram, punching through both of the shields and Little Musashibo A.
Uwah... She can punch through two thick shields...? I was nearly struck dumb by
the absurd amount of power she had, but then Aisha stopped moving momentarily.
Thinking this was my chance, I sent Little Musashibo B (equipped with two
swords) and Little Musashibo C (equipped with a spear) around to attack her from
both sides.
Aisha stabbed her greatsword, which was still impaling Little Musashibo A, into
the ground, using it to fling herself into the air, like she was doing a cartwheel.
Aisha was standing on her hands atop the hilt of her greatsword.
"There!" I cried.
With the remaining two Little Musashibos, D and E (both equipped with
crossbows), I took a shot at Aisha, who presumably couldn't maneuver with her feet
off the ground. The two bolts fired straight towards Aisha.
"Not good enough!" Aisha called.
On top of the greatsword thrust into the ground, Aisha did something similar to
one of those capoeira kicks where you stand on your hands (I don't know the proper
name for them), spinning her feet and kicking the incoming bolts out of the air.
"Ow!" I called.
With a splat sound, a light impact on my forehead that knocked my head
backwards.
In the middle of my forehead there was a smushed ball of clay about the size of a
10 yen coin. If it had instead been a throwing knife, or a stone, I'd have died
instantly.
Well, this being a practice match, the bolts didn't have arrowheads, and we were
using clay instead of stones, so neither of us could possibly have died, but still, losing
this badly was depressing...
I sat down dejectedly.
"Aw, geez... I'm not even a match for you, huh," I said.
"Th-That's not true..." Aisha stuttered, hastily trying to reassure me.
"Aisha, an accurate analysis of his fighting strength is important, so you should be
honest with him," said Liscia.
She was right. I was searching for a fighting style that suited me. As king, I was in
a position to be protected, but it wouldn't hurt to be able to protect myself, if it ever
came to it. I'd had a narrow miss with Gaius in the battle a little while ago, after all.
"Liscia's right," I said. "Give it to me straight."
"W-Well, then... it may seem harsh to say this, but even though you set up your
dolls like an adventuring party, they didn't feel all that strong," Aisha said. "I feel as
though giving them each two swords and having them rush me would have been
more difficult to deal with."
I considered that. "Pi*min tactics, huh... but you still blew them all away when I
did that, didn't you?"
"Which means what you did was even worse than that, I suppose?" said Liscia.
"Urgh..."
When Liscia pointed that out, I slumped my shoulders. Since Pik*in tactics
wouldn't work, I'd tried using a composition based on an adventuring party, like
Juno's, the one I'd gone adventuring with using Little Musashibo, but... the result had
been a miserable defeat.
"In an adventuring party, they'd have a mage, after all," Aisha said without
seeming to care too much. "If those shields had been reinforced with magic, I
would've had difficulty punching through them, and if I'd had spells flung at me
instead of arrows, it would have been more difficult to respond to."
That she said it would have been "difficult" for her, rather than that she "couldn't"
do either of those things, only served to show how ridiculously powerful Aisha was.
"We can talk about mages all you want, but I can't use elemental magic or
reinforcement magic..." I said. I couldn't use any magic whatsoever, so there was no
way I could use it to give the weapons carried by the dolls I controlled with Living
Poltergeists an elemental alignment and make them shoot fire or ice.
"If I went to a magic school, or some place like that, to train, could I learn how,
maybe?" I said.
"No, not possible." Liscia quickly shot down the idea. "I mean, I've never heard of
someone with dark-type magic being able to use another element."
She proceeded to explain.
"The four major elements, fire, water, earth, and wind, manipulate magicium
found in the atmosphere to produce various phenomena, and the light element
interferes with magicium inside the body to do things like speed up the natural
healing process, or strengthen the body. The dark element doesn't have any sort of
ability like that. So... just give up."
It looked like I could train all I wanted, but I'd never become a mage.
This, after I had the good luck to be summoned to a world with magic, too...
somehow, I'm disappointed. I slumped my shoulders dejectedly.
"What're you moping about?" Liscia asked, with an exasperated look. "The dark
alignment isn't that common, you know? I've only ever seen three people with it."
"Three?" I asked. "Assuming two of the three are Tomoe and me... who's the
third?"
"Mother, or so I hear. She's been never willing to tell me what her power is,
though."
Hmm... Lady Elisha can use dark magic, huh, I thought. Lady Elisha is Liscia's
mother. If I recall, Lady Elisha was the one who actually inherited the throne, but she
left managing the country to her husband, Sir Albert, right? We haven't had much
occasion to talk, but she's always smiling and seems like an amiable sort.
"But with the abilities I have, I can't see any way to defend myself..." I said.
"Rest at ease, sire! I will always be there to defend you!" declared Aisha,
thumping her chest with pride. While she seemed reliable, I was starting to feel
pathetic myself.
"It's pretty lame for a hero to need girls defending him..." I said.
"What are you saying after all this time?" Liscia said bluntly. "You were never
much of a hero to begin with."
I mean, she was right... but couldn't she have sugar-coated it just a wee bit more?
I was thinking she could have, but then she said, "Besides, isn't delegating the tasks
that you can't handle yourself one of your strengths, Souma? You're protecting all of
us in ways that only you can." She smiled tenderly.
Aisha nodded in agreement. "The princess is right! You protect the country we all
live in, sire, so let us protect you in turn!"
When they said it like that, I still felt pathetic, but I was a little happy. I might be
an unreliable king, and a hero in name only, but I just need to protect them in my own
way... no, I want to protect them. I felt that way from the bottom of my heart.
"Your Majesty!" a voice called out, and I turned to see Juna in her marine uniform
bowing to me with one hand at her chest.
"Sire Hakuya has been looking for you," said Juna. "He wishes to discuss the
districting of the city, he says."
"Okay," I said. "I'll be right there."
I stood up and brushed the dirt off of myself. Leaving the clean-up to the soldiers,
I brought Liscia and Aisha with me to the governmental affairs office. It was time for
me to do what I was able to do now.
◇ ◇ ◇
When I reached the governmental affairs office, Hakuya and the Captain of the
Royal Guard, Ludwin, were waiting for me.
I sat at my desk, while Liscia, who had been acting as my secretary for a while,
and Juna, who had been doing the same because we had a shortage of people lately,
stood behind me, on either side. Aisha stood by the door, acting as a guard. Lately, it
had become the norm for us to work in this formation.
Once I confirmed everyone was ready, a somewhat sleepy-eyed Hakuya laid out a
map of the divisions of Van that he had prepared. "I have completed my proposal for
the redistricting of Van, so I will have you take a look."
At Hakuya's behest, I looked at the map. The square walls of city were vertical,
while lines representing the main roads were running towards the princely palace in
the center. Each of these main roads had side roads running off of them at a right
angle in regular intervals, giving it a grid of squares, like a Go board. It was like a
map of one of the ancient capitals of Japan, Heijo-kyo or Heian-kyo, that you might
see in a history textbook.
The nobles' residences were clustered in the northeast, while the workshops
were clustered in the southwest. Garrisons for the guards were distributed evenly
throughout, and it looked super efficient.
I was silent. I leaned back in my chair, looking up to the ceiling, and sighed.
"...Hakuya."
"Yes, sire," he said.
"This goes too far," I said.
What's with this efficiency-focused layout? I thought.
Ane san rokkaku tako nishiki... I felt like I needed to chant the Kyoto road song, or
I was going to get lost.
Actually, if we're going to change so much, it'd be faster burning the entire castle
town to the ground and starting from scratch, I thought. Are you trying to turn me into
Emperor Nero?
"I'm sorry," Hakuya said. "When I saw what a chaotic mess the town layout was, I
was impelled to make it more efficient..."
Hakuya seemed to understand that what I'd meant. He smiled wryly and pointed
to the main streets. "However, as a measure against fires, the city must be split into
districts. Laying down these main roads is a necessity, I would think."
"I agree, but... for everything else, I'd like the changes to reflect the will of the
people who live here," I said. "What sort of city they want to make this, how they
want to make it more livable for them. I want the people who live here to think
about that. I mean, if we just decide everything ourselves, they'll probably resist it."
"I have already reached out to some of the architects who live here, but... you
want to make the locals think?" Hakuya asked skeptically. "With the atmosphere in
the city now, they're likely to turn it into a piece of avant-garde art..."
"An artful city, huh... that could be interesting in its own way," I said. It might be
good to try building art galleries and museums, too.
...Wait, huh? The marketplace already looks like it's going to turn into something
like Ameyoko. If I build a bunch of galleries and museums on top of that, I feel like Van
is going to end up more and more like Ueno. Maybe I ought to build a zoo and call it a
day.