Chapter 510

“…Me~?”

Elias tapped himself on the chest and asked. Luka nodded.

“Yeah.”

I only just figured out that we need Leo? Is that what he means? Elias smiled, but he was utterly confused.

To Elias, the reason he had needed to bring Leonard Wittelsbach here—and why he had to—was crystal clear. He couldn’t convince Luka of it, nor could he give him an answer. Because… Luka was someone who was very much like him.

It wasn’t enough for a person to simply look ahead and keep running. Someone who blindly charged forward for beliefs and values both distant and close was someone prepared to be crushed to death beneath the enormous, heavy rock they had chosen to carry on their back. The things that had made them look toward the end of the world were what had kept them alive until this day, but they were also prepared to give themselves over to Thanatos¹ whenever he intervened between them and that distant end.

The struggle for dignity could make death a noble means of resistance. Or sometimes, the unjust oppression of an age would only change if a person was willing to burn themselves away, exhausting every last atom of themselves with the resolve to die. That was the rebellion of someone who had been crushed beneath an oppressor yet insisted that they would no longer remain there.

Or someone might be driven to die and, with the resolve to die, disobey the command. Until he could entrust himself to the Thanatos that came from nature, he would remain here, breathing on this earth, proudly slipping past the Thanatos summoned by humanity itself. The age of the divine right of kings had ended long ago, so surely that was possible, wasn’t it? It was the sort of joke that wasn’t even funny.

This was Elias’s struggle for dignity.

And so Elias was the kind of person who might run toward the end of the world and be crushed beneath a rock—and, as he had said, that would be an honorable death. Luka was the same. They were alike, and because they were alike, there were things they could use each other to rise from. But there were clear limits, too. They were people who could willingly fall together into the land of Hades, with a shared emptiness beneath them, because they were hollow in the same places.

So what they needed was…

Someone who could make them put down, at any moment, the enormous rock they had been carrying on their backs without even realizing they were being crushed beneath its weight.

Elias slowly raised both hands to cover his mouth. He felt a strange sensation drive down his spine and slowly rubbed his cheek.

Put it down? He had never once thought of that. It was impossible.

The vengeance that had been half-transfigured into an exaltation, the one-sided solidarity he felt toward tens of millions of the powerless dying beneath the same oppressor, the determination that he absolutely had to tear apart and correct the varied, multilayered injustices emanating from his oppressor, the warped patina that had begun with vengeance but, once recognized, made it impossible to return to the time before he knew…

Had he ever looked away from them? Had he ever put them down, even for a moment? He had never thought of giving up survival through defiance and instead surviving for a life spent with the friends he loved. As long as he remained conscious of it, he had no intention of doing so in the future, either.

But what if, without realizing it, that was already what had happened, little by little, like clothes getting soaked in a light drizzle? The fact that he had sought out Leo based on that paradoxical clarity he couldn’t yet put into words made him wonder if, without even realizing it, he had already become unable to turn away from the peace, stability, and abundance of love that Leonard Wittelsbach represented simply by being who he was.

That was why, when a friend who was really like him was suffering, he had brought here the love that would keep their feet on the ground. He wanted his friend to remain on this earth the way he did.

When the thoughts buried deep within him, thoughts he had never been conscious of, suddenly took shape as words and images clearer than anything else, Elias was struck by a shock accompanied by a fear so intense it was easy to mistake for exhilaration.

Then how had Luka been so certain that Elias would realize this? As if he had already seen the future…

When Elias came to his senses, Leo was looking directly into his eyes. Eugène Lamour, Luka, and even the senior who hardly felt like a senior were all looking at him too. Leo blinked down at him from slightly above before turning his head and speaking. The light from the chandelier streamed in from where his head had been.

“You seem to be all right.”

“…….”

What was the point of having a childhood friend if not for this? Leo could tell whether Elias was all right just by looking into his eyes, then put everyone else at ease. Of course, Elias could do the same.

Elias grinned to himself at the thought, then remembered the look in Leo’s eyes on those occasions. Whenever Leo returned from the Imperial Palace, or whenever the Imperial Palace came up in conversation and Leo furrowed his brow, he would unfold a world of his own, right there in the middle of the commotion or the silence, breaking through the rules that governed time and setting up a barrier that belonged only to him.

At first, Elias had been nothing but bewildered by it, unable to understand what Leo was doing or why. But once he had grown accustomed to Leo’s way of doing things, he found that he could always regain his composure within that barrier.

Luka nudged him in the side. When Elias turned, Luka had cast a soundproofing spell and was simply looking at him. Elias blinked rapidly, and only then did Luka speak.

“Thank you, Eli.”

“Hm?”

“I know you brought him here because you thought it was what I needed. I owe you another one.”

Elias grinned and draped an arm around his friend’s shoulder. Then he leaned close and whispered into his ear.

“If you keep calling every little thing a debt, what are you going to do from now on?”

“Hahaha…”

Behind Luka’s laughter, Elias could hear Eugène Lamour and Leo talking. He pulled himself together and caught up with their conversation.

“…I still want Bavarian citizenship. I can’t go back to France like this.”

“Why do you say you can’t go back?”

“Too many interests are involved.”

Does that mean he could be convinced to reconsider his retirement? Just as Elias was thinking that, Leo voiced his concern about Lamour obtaining citizenship.

“From France’s perspective, they won’t be pleased about you moving to Bavaria, even if you have retired. They won’t want your symbolic stature to pass over to Bavaria.”

“Let them dislike it. I can’t stay there anymore. I want to spend my remaining time somewhere peaceful and bring my life to a close.”

At those words, the senior’s eyes twitched. Leo nodded slowly before asking, “I’d like to know why you chose Bavaria instead of another country. Bavaria is close to France, and Germany is watching you just as closely as France is. The Saxony Daily is even waiting for a chance to publish a scoop about you. You also said your mother was from Darmstadt. If so, you could go to the Grand Duchy of Hesse instead. Why do you want Bavaria?”

“As for why I didn’t choose Hesse first, even if it is my mother’s homeland, I grew up in France, so anywhere that speaks German is foreign to me. If I’m going to settle somewhere, I would rather be in the strongest among them.”

Elias cut into their conversation.

“You aren’t even considering Prussia.”

“I didn’t think it was right for me. An artist…”

Eugène Lamour answered immediately, then trailed off. Elias waited patiently, and Lamour soon continued, seemingly conscious of the people present.

“Some people may not appreciate me bringing up the word ‘artist’ so often, but I cannot ignore ethics. Spreading the world as seen through a complacent perspective in the name of art is a reproduction of violence. That is why, after striving to live my entire life as an artist, I cannot go to Prussia now. The Prussian imperial prince is sitting right here, so I may be being rude, but wrong is wrong.”

Elias smiled, finding it somewhat amusing that Eugène Lamour had recognized him.

“No, I like that. Please, continue.”

“Very well. I suppose I should explain why I didn’t choose the other countries.”

He took a sip of the tea that had been prepared and continued.

“First, the reason I decided to retire was because I no longer had the strength to endure their vulgarity. The dignity they cast aside when they shamelessly mistreat others will eventually return to them and pierce their own hearts. I want to ask why they cannot see that.”

Everyone exchanged glances. At first, it didn’t seem to have much to do with choosing a country. Eugène Lamour murmured to himself.

“Society seems to be… gradually moving in a direction where it is governed by ideology, forgetting how to think in concrete and multifaceted ways. At first, I also considered going to America.”

“Oh, America.”

“In America, they administer intelligence tests as part of the immigration screening process. I took one myself under an assumed name, and the immigration authorities gave me a very high rating and informed me that I had received it. ‘You are qualified to become a proud citizen of the United States of America.’ I gave up on going to America that very day. It was only recently.”

Elias nodded. Eugène Lamour continued slowly, his eyes fixed on the ground.

“They refuse entry to foreigners who receive low scores on these tests, and even among Americans, those who perform poorly are given the designation of ‘feeble-minded’ and placed under special supervision. I hardly need to explain how dangerous this way of thinking is. By ‘feeble-minded,’ they mean people who cannot generate much economic value, people incapable of intellectual labor, and sometimes people with mental disabilities who struggle to live on their own without someone else’s care. Some Americans consider this right because they believe that only a select few with at least average, or even high, intelligence can guarantee America’s standing and strength as a nation. And that national strength means technological advancement, as well as prosperity under a capitalist economic system. They believe the best thing for everyone is to confine the feeble-minded in buildings like livestock barns and make them perform simple labor over and over. The reason they think this way is that the logic of the strong preying upon the weak and survival of the fittest is ingrained in them. And, astonishingly, they claim that they isolate these people from society to prevent the worst possible outcome—the weak being devoured by the strong.”

Everyone waited silently for him to continue. Eugène Lamour closed his eyes, almost as if he were falling asleep, and went on.

“Classifying people into three groups through intelligence tests and having the state intervene based on the results… or even if the state does not intervene, creating a social climate in which private citizens actively classify those three groups… does not end with merely stripping people of low intelligence or those with mental disabilities of their dignity. It sends a powerful signal that the state or the public is permitted to place different values on the dignity of those who produce little economic value under a capitalist economic system. The blade is not pointed only at other people’s throats. Even an ordinary person of average intelligence, once they becomes unemployed, or once they becomes a low-income earner or a beggar, becomes an inanimate object with no dignity worth preserving. Most violent of all is the fact that those who have created and perpetuated this invisible caste system can fall to the bottom of it for some reason and come to believe that they themselves deserve to be treated this way. We have finally arrived at an age where the destruction of human dignity has become the spirit of the times.”

Elias exchanged a glance with Leo. Eugène Lamour opened his eyes and took a sip of tea. After moistening his throat, he continued.

“Usually, when people insult others, they don’t think this far, and that is precisely why they don’t realize what they are giving up in the process. But none of these things are unrelated or independent of one another. They merely perpetuate a mutually reinforcing kind of decadence. I do not know what kind of ruin the absence of such long-term reflection will bring tomorrow. I am too afraid to even look. That is why, for the same reason I decided to retire, I decided not to go to America. I wonder if that answers your question.”

Eugène Lamour’s long explanation came to an end, but no one spoke. Elias looked at Leo and Luka and muttered, “He’s perfect.”

“Exactly.”

Luka answered at once. After exchanging a glance with Leo, he spoke.

“I’d like to offer you a role.”

“Now? I was planning to rest.”

“Of course. Rest for as long as you wish. We’re talking about what comes after that. We would like Sir Eugène Lamour, who has already left his mark on the history of art, to contribute to history in another way as well. If you’re willing, we’d like to make you a concrete proposal. Whether you accept or refuse is entirely up to you.”

Luka looked down at the gloves he was wearing, then raised his head.

“Would you be willing to hear us out?”

Sir Eugène Lamour was silent for a long while as he looked at Luka, then nodded.

Eugène Lamour’s safety was not completely secured by this. If anything, this was only the beginning. We told Mecklenburg to wait until a mage from the Bavarian Royal Army could come to protect Eugène Lamour, then left the room. Elias, apparently excited, was already running off into the distance.

As we were leaving the estate, Leo asked me quietly, “Are you all right?”

What exactly was he asking if I was all right about? I could make a rough guess. I regretted not taking out my earrings sooner. Instead of meeting his eyes, I nodded first.

“You already beat it out of me. I’m fine now.”

“Beat it out of you? I was trying to help.”

Leo answered with a smile and didn’t ask anything else. While I was in the conference hall, and throughout the carriage ride afterward, he moved the mana around my heart. He had probably been trying to suppress the irregular resistance of my core, which would not move according to my will, with healing mana. But since the disturbance had begun in my mind rather than from a problem with my core, he must have known that he could not control the fluctuations in my core that way.

Even so, he asked no further questions. When it came to my safety, he usually wanted to know every move and the reasoning behind it. But when it came to problems within me, he often remained silent. The fact that neither Elias nor Leo demanded an explanation from me when they saw that strange glimpse of the 21st century in the Catacombs was proof enough.

When we returned to the Crown Prince’s Palace, Elias looked up at the sky and shot a hand upward as if pointing straight at it. Then he said, “There.” A pigeon was flying in the distance, and at a glance, it was obviously a messenger pigeon.

“This pigeon was here earlier too…”

“How do you know it’s the same pigeon?”

Leo said it to Elias in a bored tone. I watched them, wondering what they were talking about. What did they mean by whether it was the same pigeon or not?

“Just a gut feeling. These things can cross the barrier, right? Why have they kept hesitating all this time? The fact that it hesitates in the first place means it’s just some completely unfamiliar pigeon whose mana isn’t registered with this building.”

“Hm… That makes sense.”

As they talked, they suddenly turned toward me. Seeing my face, they realized there was still something they hadn’t told me and patted me on the back. I entered the room with a look that said I had no idea what they were doing.

I stood silently, leaning against the desk as I looked at the note they had handed me. Einsiedel had contacted us. About an hour ago, at that. When the note was wrapped around the scytale tube Narke had brought before, letters that made sense appeared at one point.

“The city hall on the bridge. Third floor, last room. Third shelf of the bookcase.”

I read the message written on the scytale. The last room on the third floor of the city hall, the third shelf of the bookcase. What could it mean? The answer was obvious.

“It’s the place where we can enter Pleroma’s world.”

I set down the scytale and took a seat. Even Einsiedel was telling us to strike Pleroma. Perfect. Wasn’t that exactly what we wanted? I had been planning to dig through the Extra Chapter to find an entrance, and thankfully, he had given us one first.

Leo picked up the unwrapped note by the edge with his fingertips and said, “If it says the city hall on the bridge, it means Bamberg City Hall. Looks like that’s our way into the Archdiocese of Bamberg. Lukas, one more thing. There’s writing on the back too.”

I nodded and wrapped the note the other way.

“Easter. As many as possible.”

“As many as possible?”

Elias frowned. Easter was tomorrow, and ‘as many as possible’ could only mean one thing… I rubbed my chin and said, “There’s a time limit. Does it mean we’re supposed to deal with as many dioceses as possible tomorrow?”

If the note were simply telling us to deal with one diocese, there would be no reason to add ‘as many as possible.’ Once we entered, there were only two possibilities: wipe them all out or fail. The extreme restraint in this cipher told us that it conveyed only what was absolutely necessary. I glanced out the window and continued.

“Judging by the fact that he had a carrier pigeon waiting nearby without any message attached, he must have meant for us to deal with as many dioceses as possible. Einsiedel made sure we could use that pigeon to send him a letter if we needed to. He didn’t want there to be any miscommunication between us.”

Leo agreed.

“I think so too. Once we enter the Archdiocese of Bamberg, we should be able to reach the other Pleroma dioceses as well. So we need to gather as many people as possible. Let’s work out a strategy, with me included.”

I opened my notebook and picked up a pen. Then I pointed the tip at Leo’s arm, which was still wrapped in bandages.

“Your arm.”

“What about it?”

“Shouldn’t you keep taking the medicine for another day? It doesn’t look completely healed.”

“I’ll take it three more times when we get back.”

Leo said it calmly, his eyes unwavering. Had he always been this reckless? I braced a hand against the desk and warned him, “If you push yourself before it’s properly healed, you might not be able to use that arm freely for a long time.”

“If that’s the problem, I can fight with the other one.”

Leo’s resolve didn’t waver despite my warning. I understood. For one thing, he had the skill to back up that confidence. For another, he was someone who knew when to strike. He leaned back against the chair and said, “The timing couldn’t be worse. The Papal See’s demand is perfectly reasonable. The real crisis will come when the entire world turns its back on Germany because of Pleroma. I have a duty to make sure Bavaria isn’t swept up in that current.”

“The world isn’t turning its back on us yet. There have always been people saying Germany should take responsibility for compensating for the damage caused by Pleroma. Nothing has happened so far.”

“Easter. As many as possible.”

Leo repeated the words on the note. I silently looked into his calm eyes.

“You’ve figured it out by now too, haven’t you? Einsiedel must have sensed that something was wrong, whether at Terminus Eukairia or within Pleroma. He only has one day to buy himself some time, and before that, there must be something we need to obtain first. Whether it’s honor or safety.”

Of course. There was no way I hadn’t figured it out.

Then he delivered the decisive blow.

“It makes a huge difference whether one more person goes in or not.”

I was silent for a moment before writing Leo’s name in my notebook. Then I began recalling the names of the mages in the Bavarian Royal Army that I knew.

“There are a lot of mages who were injured in the Stadelheim Prison collapse. We need to round up every single one of them without leaving anyone out. Leave the students alone… Let’s mobilize every mage in the Bavarian Royal Army and move out. It wasn’t part of the plan, but we’ll have to call Julia in. As for Luise, there won’t be any excuse for him to avoid it if Headquarters calls him in, so I’ll think about that a little more. What about Narke?”

Elias snapped his fingers.

“He said he’s going to catch a sheep.”

“What? When?”

“He said it has to be caught now.”

“Why is he catching sheep the moment he gets back to the country?”

“I don’t know. He might be back by tomorrow morning.”

I rubbed my lips in disbelief and twirled my pen. The pen tapped against the desk in a steady rhythm. Meanwhile, Elias shrugged. I stopped twirling the pen, held it properly, and drew a line across the notebook.

“If we move the Bavarian Royal Army all at once like this… Prussia will notice the movement and find it suspicious. But we have no choice. Whether they call us in or not, we need to eliminate as many Pleroma dioceses as possible before Easter ends. We’ll worry about the aftermath later.”

“It’s Easter. That’s a problem… There’ll be far too many people out and about. Fortunately, the Christians should all be holed up in their dioceses. The Pleroma ones, I mean.”

“To wipe out as many dioceses as possible with minimal casualties…”

We needed to investigate. Yuri Alekseyev’s Extra Chapter was out of the question because I was still in my child form and couldn’t fight, and more importantly, it was in Russia. Mecklenburg’s Extra Chapter had also moved from Mecklenburg-Strelitz to Russia, so it would take time to return to Bavaria. When even ten minutes of real time was precious, we couldn’t afford to waste time traveling. Raising my Time Difference level with points would make things easier, but…. What if we started right here in Bavaria?

I put a hand to my head. Looking out the window, I muttered, “We have too little information. If we’re going to hit the other dioceses all at once, we need more information.”

“Then~?”

“Let’s try contacting Einsiedel. Tell him we want to meet and talk.”

Elias nodded and wrote our demands on the string used for carrier-pigeon communication that was sitting on my desk. Five minutes later, he returned to the Crown Prince’s Palace with a reply. He wrapped the note around the scytale cylinder and deciphered it.

“Only Lord Kleist.”

We stared at each other in silence. Both Leo and Elias furrowed their brows, as though wondering if they had heard correctly. Leo spoke first.

“Sounds like he’s saying he’ll only tell Luise.”

“Ridiculous.”

The moment he finished speaking, I rested a hand on my hip and let one arm hang loosely at my side. No matter how I thought about it, that couldn’t be right. I shook my head and continued.

“Forget it. I’ll investigate it myself. Even if we get more information from Einsiedel, we’ll still have to go to northern Bavaria and investigate in person if we want to come up with a strategy.”

“You’re worried Einsiedel might attack Luise?”

Elias asked, resting his chin on his hand. There was nothing for Einsiedel to gain from attacking Ulrike. If anything, it would be a loss by any calculation, since it would destroy our alliance. But I couldn’t simply assume that meant Luise was safe, either. I picked up the note and shook it, speaking more sharply than I realized.

“‘Only Lord Kleist.’ What exactly is Einsiedel trying to do by telling us to send only Luise to him? By insisting that Luise come alone?”

“So that’s why you’re saying we can’t send him alone? What would you do if you were him?”

I fell silent, looking into Elias’s eyes. After thinking it over, I set down the pen in my hand and said calmly, “Right. We should hear what he wants. Let’s ask Luise directly.”

Elias clapped his hands and shouted, “I’ll go get him~!”

“Wait, if you go—!”

Elias didn’t even listen. He kicked open the door and left the room. Leo let out a short sigh without changing his expression. I wanted to do the same. I could already imagine what kind of face Ulrike would walk into the room with.

Less than five minutes later, the sound of someone running madly down the hallway reached us. Ulrike came stumbling into the room, dragged along by Elias, who had a fistful of his shirt collar. As expected, he was as stiff as Pie when faced with Elias. Judging by how quickly they had returned, he clearly hadn’t even been given a proper explanation before being dragged here. Leo called out to him in a concerned voice.

“Luise.”

“Happy Easter… What is this?”

Ulrike sat down in the empty seat with a frown. He interlaced his fingers and looked eyes around for no particular reason.

“Why are you all gathered like this? The vibe is kind of scary.”

“Luise.”

“Hmm?”

Ulrike answered with his brows drawn tight. I sat down and wondered how to even begin.

“We need to attack Pleroma in Bavaria. We found an entry point.”

Ulrike’s eyes widened. He leaned toward us in disbelief and asked, “…! Is this a Headquarters operation? They’re ordering another Pleroma extermination operation when you’re not even fully recovered yet?!”

“No. We’ll be doing it ourselves with the help of the Kingdom of Bavaria. For diplomatic reasons, we need to attack Pleroma in Bavaria as soon as possible. You know from our experience with Munich-Freising that once we strike, the other dioceses will change their entry patterns. So our best option is to take out as many as possible in one go.”

“Then, finding an entry point this time means…”

“Einsiedel gave us the information.”

Ulrike’s expression hardened. At first glance, his face looked cold. I quietly watched that chilling change in his expression and continued.

“He wants us to take down Pleroma. This is clearly cooperation, not a one-sided debt we owe him. We have our own reason to attack Pleroma, and so does Einsiedel. That’s why I asked him to give us more information, but…”

“But?”

“He replied that he would only speak with you.”

Ulrike tilted his head without even blinking. I continued.

“We called you here because we thought we should respect your wishes. We’ll follow whatever you decide, but I don’t think you should go. I can’t guarantee your safety. And I’m sure everyone here is worried about you too.”

Leo gave a slight nod. We waited for Ulrike’s answer, but no one spoke, and silence settled over the room. I clasped my hands and asked quietly, “What do you want to do? I’d recommend finding another way.”

Ulrike looked at us as if he couldn’t believe we were seriously asking. He spread his hands, shrugged, and looked around at his friends.

“I’m going. Of course!”

Translator Note

1. Thanatos is the personification of death in Greek mythology. ↩︎