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Tate no Yuusha no Nariagari (LN) - Volume 14 - Chapter 9




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Chapter Nine: The Miko Priestess of Carnage 

“Phew.” 
I entered the bath area at our lodgings and let out a sigh. The room was full of steam. I’d just wash myself and then get into the bath. 
“Oh my!” I certainly didn’t like the sound of that voice. I looked in its direction, and for some inexplicable reason, Zodia was already there, in the bath, looking over at me. 
She still had her clothes on, even! This was all a new one to me. 
“Good evening, sweet Naofumi. What a coincidence, meeting you here.” 
“Coincidence? In the men’s bath? And I told you, drop the ‘sweet.’” 
“The men’s bath? I admit, I got totally lost and just ended up here.” Amazing. I’d known she had a terrible sense of direction, but coming into the men’s bath? By mistake? 
Even more amazing, after what I saw yesterday, I could almost believe it was possible. 
“This is hot water too. I thought it was cold.” 
“Are you still drunk?” 
“No, I’m not.” 
“If you say so.” Zodia came out of the bathtub and closed in with me. 
“I could wash your back, if you like?” 
“This is the men’s bath. Out!” 
“Oh dear. You don’t like me? But I’m so clean!” What was she talking about now? If any of those others saw me like this, the uproar would be unprecedented. Just having wandered in here because of her sense of direction clearly wasn’t going to cut it as an explanation. 
 
I had to get Zodia out of here, right away. 
“Not interested.” 
“You’re so stiff! And not in a fun way. Can’t you be a bit softer?” 
“No.” 
“Come on. After a bath is a great time to play.” 
“You’re talking about the promise from yesterday?” I said. Zodia nodded to my question. Maybe I should call in security and set a trap for her? 
“If you lose, you have to strip,” she stated. 
“Keep your clothes on! It’s a card game. Stop taking things in a weird direction!” 
“Then we’ll just play cards,” she conceded. “But I want to play more types of games.” She really had believed in my promise and come to play with me. If she was Sadeena’s sister, this could end up getting pretty messy. 
I really wanted to be wrong about this. If I wasn’t, well, we’d just pile on and capture her alive. 
“Anyway, just go and sit in a chair in the changing room.” 
“Sure thing!” 
“Just to confirm, why did you come here today?” 
“To take a look at the Heavenly Emperor.” 
“And you haven’t seen her yet?” Just how bad was her sense of direction, seriously! If I wasn’t reading this wrong, anyway, then after my bath I’d introduce her to Raphtalia and the others along with playing the game. As I considered all this, Zodia walked off toward the changing room. What a hassle . . . Then a breeze blew past me. She’d gone out, then? 
 
Growing more concerned, I hurried through my bath. 
“Phew. Here, I’m done. I’ll play with you now—” Zodia wasn’t there though. “Hey! Hello?” I called, but she didn’t appear. Maybe she’d wandered off into the women’s bath. We had the entire lodgings to ourselves, however, so I definitely would have heard a commotion if an unknown individual had been spotted wandering around. 
“Ah, Master! You finished in the bath?” Filo chirped up. 
“Rafu!” It was Filo and Raph-chan. I could still hear some background noise, suggesting the struggle with Atla was ongoing. 
“Yeah, all done. One thing, Filo, Raph-chan, would you go and have a look in the women’s bath for me? There might be a woman called Zodia in there.” 
“Really? Sure, okay.” 
“Rafu.” The pair of them went to do as I asked and then came right back. 
“No one there.” 
“Rafu?” 
“Hmmm. So where’s she gone?” That gust of wind wasn’t her wandering off again, was it? She must be lost again. We’d have words, if we met again. Of course, combining her random comings and goings with her sense of direction, who knew when that might be. I didn’t want her turning up in my bedroom. 
 
“Master Naofumi!” Atla was yelling. 
“They’re still going at it? Can’t they pipe down a little!” I shouted. 
“She’s using the things S’yne taught to her to play with big sis and her brother,” Filo told me. Hmmm. Atla was definitely getting stronger. At least Raphtalia and Fohl were keeping up. “Sadeena is siding with Atla, saying that looks like more fuuuun. She wants to enjoy bathing with Masteeer toooo!” 
“That drunkard, stirring up trouble again.” The final battle was close. This wasn’t what they should be wasting their time on. “I’d better go and stop them, anyway.” 
“Yeah. If they want to get in the bath with Master, they just have to jump over the fence,” Filo chirped. 
“Rafu.” Filo hadn’t done that this time, but she’d clearly been getting some ideas. I’d have to be careful going forward. With that, I headed back to Atla, and that calmed everything down. 
“Today was fun too, little Naofumi,” Sadeena remarked. 
“That’s easy for you to say.” I looked over at Sadeena, who was fanning herself in the garden after her bath. Raphtalia and the others were tired and so they’d already gone to bed. Atla had been trussed up again and rolled out and was now sleeping under the watch of Fohl. She’d been on a real rampage recently. Hopefully this would help her cool off.
 
Sadeena had transitioned from bathing to drinking. With our forced march and all the training, Raphtalia and the rest of the gang were pretty worn out. It was strange, to be honest, that Sadeena still had any energy. 

Me? I wasn’t as exhausted as I thought. 
Maybe it was because I’d got a good handle on using life force, and being focused on defense, I didn’t have to move around too much. I should probably give out some nutritional supplements. 
“So, little Naofumi, what do you need from me?” Sadeena went on. 
“Well, there’s some stuff going on.” 
“I’ll strip down and standby, then.” 
“Where the hell did that come from!” Dammit. Why was I having so much trouble with people like this recently? I wasn’t looking to settle down in this world! 
“Thinking about it, I’ve heard a fair bit about Raphtalia’s history, but there’s lots of other stuff I don’t know. I need to ask some additional questions, or problems may come up,” I explained. 
“Oh, that’s all this is? Can’t you just ask the other revolutionaries about it?” 
“That’s only going to get me fragments. Sadeena, this is about you too. There are too many holes in my knowledge of your past. Not to mention, it seems you have a sister now?” 
“Little Naofumi. A woman needs to maintain some mystery if she is to allure men.” 
“Enough games. I launched this whole attack on Q’ten Lo in order to deal with Raphtalia’s problems.” At my demand, Sadeena took a drink, looked and me, and then slammed the cup down. Huh? There was a cup on the opposite side from me? 
 
“Very well. Having come this far, it may be worth explaining things a little more.” Her voice was different from her normal mocking tone. She sounded just like she had when she drank Raphtalia under the table prior to the Q’ten Lo attack. So she was finally ready to discuss this seriously. “What do you want to know first? You already know some details about Raphtalia’s parents already, correct?” They were the bloodline of the Heavenly Emperor and left the nation due to the fighting over succession. I knew that much. 
“I would like to hear that from you too, but first things first. I need to ask about you, Sadeena.” Lots of people knew Sadeena, and she was often called by various names, including the water dragon’s miko priestess and the miko priestess of carnage. I knew she’d worked in lots of different professions, but I had so much more that I needed to ask, especially in regard to how she never held back, even slightly, when fighting her own kind. We’d recently been able to capture them alive more often, but until entering Q’ten Lo, many of them had chosen to kill themselves rather than be captured. 
I continued to inquire. “You’re incredibly strong for one of your race, and I’ve never seen anyone use magic like you.” We’d fought members of Sadeena’s race numerous times, but I was yet to see anyone use the same lightning magic as Sadeena. I’d expected to face a horde of Sadeenas, but that hadn’t happened. Not yet. Still, those battles hadn’t been easy, with the nullification of our hero weapons forcing a reliance on pure technique. 
“Oh my, you might be right. You’ve been doing so well, little Naofumi, so I guess I can share more of myself with you.” With all her mocking stripped away, for once Sadeena actually started speaking honestly. “The village, settlement, whatever you want to call it, that I come from. We have some serious issues, even among our own race.” 
 
“Differences between your people, you mean?” I wondered. There were numerous different types of killer whale, after all. Quite different when compared to each other. A total of four types had been observed, if I recalled correctly, including resident fish eaters, transient marine mammal eaters, and offshores, or something like that. So they were a race like that, similar but not the same. 
“You’re careful with use of your demi-human and therianthrope forms, aren’t you? Any reasons for that?” I pondered. 
“I stay in my therianthrope form as much as possible, it’s true, in order to appear my most capable. I only use my demi-human form when I want to avoid attention, things like that. It was like that in Siltvelt, right?” I remembered Werner and those guys paying attention to that. The demi¬human form was used as a way of showing no intent to attack. Sadeena likely created the impression of her therianthrope form being her normal state and then used the demi-human form for infiltration and the like. 
“Although in Q’ten Lo the orca whales are probably treated as a related species and the same race,” I ventured. This linked back to my previous discussion on killer whales. Those without the ability to turn into demi¬humans were just called orcas. They were a closely related but different race and also treated differently from the “orcinus.” Yes, this could all get confusing. 
 
“Maybe my family was a little more involved with our bloodlines. Humans do that too, sometimes, don’t they?” she contemplated. 
“Yeah, sometimes. It was pretty clear in Melromarc, places like that.” The queen, and Melty, probably had good families and were definitely invested in bloodlines. The queen said something about the bloodline of the Shield Hero when Witch framed me. 
“My family is the house that serves the water dragon and the house who carries out the punishments of the Heavenly Emperor. In other words, his executioners. The house that does all the dirty jobs, basically,” she explained. 
“Hold it there.” Man, having a sister to replace Sadeena? A pretty twisted family. 
“Yes?” 
“So you serve the water dragon but act on behalf of Raphtalia’s family? Isn’t that a bit strange?” 
“Well, like I said, it’s our role to do the dirty jobs for those of noble standing, although it’s treated as delivering the punishment of the gods,” she went on. Hmmm. A complicated position, then. 
“So you basically do the stuff the water dragon and Heavenly Emperor don’t want to?” 
“Oh my, well, if you put it like that, yes. The miko are positioned as the miko in service of the two gods.” 
“Okay, so moving on. Sadeena, you can use that lightning magic because of what? You’ve received some kind of special blessing?” I asked. 
 
Sadeena was a melee fighter and could use magic, and even cooperative magic, making her an incredibly versatile, all-round fighter. Even if her innate abilities weren’t considered, her specs were just too high. 
“Oh, you’re making me blush! All of these probing questions.” 
“Stop joking around.” Sadeena had a talent for diverting the topic with those kinds of comments. I wasn’t going to let her escape this time though. 
“I was born with this lightning magic. It’s rare too, so I’m told. There have been others with this power in my family, apparently, so maybe it’s a family thing?” 
“Hmmm. So you were born with it?” 
“The orca whale and orca are generally based in water magic, but my family tends to have quite different properties.” 
“So it’s an aspect of your family?” 
“Maybe. But I’m an especially rare example. Just like how you don’t get drunk, little Naofumi.” How could I respond to that? Eating the rucolu fruit was considered disgusting. People even considered it sacrilegious. “By the time I was self-aware, I was aware of my lightning magic and could already use it.” Being able to control lightning freely underwater, that had to be powerful. To be honest, the only time I’d even seen her close to being in trouble was when she fought us—and even then, I wasn’t sure she was being serious during that battle. 
So the fight with the Demon Dragon? Maybe that was the only time she really couldn’t do anything. 

“My house has long served the water dragon, you see. I started my work as the miko at a pretty young age and underwent rapid maturation since I was small.” Demi-humans and therianthropes could be rapidly matured by leveling them up. Raphtalia had a big gap between her appearance and actual age too. Did this mean Sadeena had received a special education since she was small? 

“After that, I started doing work for the village and nation. That’s why I don’t have many friends my own age,” she said. 
“It all makes sense now.” 
“Oh, little Naofumi, you’re so mean!” 
“Yeah, yeah. How did that environment turn you into this person, then?” 
“Who knows? I’m not sure about that myself.” Was this really just her natural personality? 
“Also, I guess being able to train as much as I liked at the castle of the Heavenly Emperor in the old city is a part of it. I had the chance to learn whatever martial arts I wanted, from all sorts of people.” 
“You make it sound simple.” 
“You think it’s okay for me to be a bit conceited here? Like, maybe I’m just an Atla-level combat genius?” 
“Asking if it’s okay to be conceited is a bit odd, you know,” I quipped. It was true though. In all aspects, combat sense, everything, she was a bit of a high-spec monster. In fact, I almost felt like asking what she was bad at. In terms of being able to learn anything by watching it, just like Atla, Sadeena could indeed be said to have the same combat sensibilities. 

“You do have an excellent sense for combat. I’ll admit that,” I maintained. 

“You praised me! Yay!” 
“This isn’t a ‘yay’ situation!” 
“My real reason was the drinking after the training, of course.” 
“I should have known. So you’ve been drinking since way back when?” 
“Yeah, come to think of it. I guess I was avoiding reality. I had a lot of pressure from my family, stuff like that.” 
“I bet I could have had an honest conversation with you back then too.” I said. Sadeena gave a wry smile at my comment. 
“If I’d met you back then, little Naofumi, maybe I would have turned out like Atla.” I didn’t think they were so different even now, but I managed to hold that in. Still, if Sadeena came at us full strength, I didn’t think Raphtalia or Fohl would be able to stop her. 
She continued. “We’re getting off topic, anyway. I did three jobs. First, my work as the water dragon’s miko priestess. This involved listening to the voice of the water dragon, receiving his blessings, and conducting divine ceremonies. Well, my parents did the ceremonies, so I really just listened to the voice of the water dragon.” Sadeena was the miko priestess. A bit of a delinquent one, perhaps. I could easily picture her stealing holy wine and getting wasted on it. “I can still say all the prayers,” she said. 
“Okay.” 
“You’re not interested in what I did as miko?” 
“I just need an overview, not a play-by-play.” 
“You really don’t cling to the past, do you, little Naofumi. I love that about you.” 
 
“I don’t see why,” I said. It didn’t sound like much of a compliment. 
“Next job, the miko for the Heavenly Emperor. Here there were also a variety of priestesses serving other things. And priests as well. If you must know, I was the representative of my species. When it came to the crunch, I had to fight a variety of foes as the symbol of authority.” 
“So more a general than a miko?” 
“You’re not wrong. These jobs are treated as priestesses and priests because they serve a god. The old guy’s master, the one who gives you so much trouble? Technically, he’s also a priest.” Man. That pickup artist, a priest? 
Anyway, this meant it was like a noble rank, a title given to the best of the nation’s generals and artisans. Hmmm. This really was quite a unique culture. 
“Then, as an extension of that, the one responsible for handling the dark side of the country was the representative of the orca whale race, the water dragon’s miko priestess,” she continued to explain. 
“You were an executioner? One who puts criminals to death?” 
“That’s right. My role was that of executioner. That’s why I was called the priestess of carnage.” 
“I see.” From what I was learning of the nation when Sadeena was here, it was clear she had occupied a pretty twisted position. It seemed there was still a lot I wasn’t being told too. 

“I had to perform all sorts of different executions. Shocking with lightning magic, chopping off heads with a katana, running them through with a harpoon. All sorts.” 

“Whew.” 
“There are all sorts of detailed stipulations about how to conduct the execution, depending on the crime. We might be a small country, but you’d be surprised. It also fed back into the issues we were having as a nation.” In regard to executions, my limited experience was just violent comics and games and materials from long ago that I’d seen online. So I was completely unable to imagine the suffering of Raphtalia and the others, those who had undergone real torture. 
“At my own discretion, I also sometimes fought the condemned. Like, if they could beat me, they could go free. That made it easier for them to accept their fate. A fight to the death rather than just being put to it.” Sadeena had been forced to perform executions, just because it was her job. So she’d alleviated her guilt by giving the other side the illusion of a chance. I wasn’t affirming her decision, necessarily, but someone had needed to do it. The dirty jobs, in the right way. 
To put it one way, Sadeena was somehow broken as a human. But with an awareness of that, she’d also managed to overcome it. Somehow, even though she was older than me, I felt a weakness in Sadeena I hadn’t seen before. 
“I see.” It would be easy to provide some cheap sympathy and pretend to understand, but that wasn’t going to console Sadeena. That said, about the only thing I could do was sit at her side and silently listen to what she had to say. 
 
So silence it was. 
Sadeena gave her wine bottle a shake, gave me a cup, and then poured. She didn’t want sympathy. Just listening was enough. 
I took the cup, which brimmed with wine, and drank it down. 
Sadeena laughed, and it didn’t look like bravado to me; she really was enjoying this moment. Even if Sadeena suffered everything that I’d personally been through, the same litany of pain, she might still be sitting there laughing. 
In fact, I was starting to feel a bit stupid, dragging so much baggage along with me. Just thinking that, though, certainly wasn’t enough for me to be able to cut it all free. 
“Sounds like a workplace with a lot of problems.” 
“Do you think so?” 
“Yeah.” 
“My only real concern was not being an oracle.” 
“Ah, that suspicious power again,” I said. That comment got Sadeena laughing. It didn’t feel like she was drunk, but something else. Something a bit different. 
“I was a terrible actor back then, so my worries were pretty obvious,” she lamented. She never showed anything of her true self nowadays! “The blessings of the Heavenly Emperor would have allowed me to do some incredible things, so I was told. They must have been talking about the sakura stones of destiny. They weren’t strewn about like they are today back when I lived here.” Did this mean that only being blessed a little by the Heavenly Emperor had formed something of a complex for Sadeena? “My parents were pretty hard on me because of that. Always expecting so much. They weren’t much like real parents to me at all.” 

“They just threw you into the work, from the sound of it.” 
“Yes. As early as I can remember, I was likely a match for them in raw strength.” 
“And I’m guessing your parents weren’t weak. You were just too strong. The only reason you aren’t an oracle is because you can handle your drink, meaning you didn’t lose yourself and spout spiritual nonsense like those other lightweights.” 
“Oh my.” Sadeena laughed at that too. “You might be right. I never made any serious mistakes, and if only I’d also been an oracle, it was said I would have been the greatest miko in history.” 
“Hey. Don’t downplay the one power I’ve got—not getting drunk!” 
“I know. It all seems very silly now. It was just a bunch of people getting drunk and proclaiming that their ancestors were visiting them and other impossible stuff,” she lamented. What a crazy situation. These were the kind of abnormalities that only came into view with a wider perspective. I was almost starting to feel sorry for them. 
My own parents, too, had been pretty hands-off. All parties had already been aware of that fact. Reaching my age, and coming to know something of the world at large, I understood now that there was such a thing as compatibility between parents and children. It wasn’t that either side was at fault, but I did believe I had some experience with a case of incompatibility. 
 
All of that said, Sadeena’s family was really twisted. 
Sadeena had been forced into becoming an adult without knowing the joy of being a child. I started to wonder if maybe I’d been doing the same thing to Raphtalia. Maybe she needed more time to blow off steam and act her age a little? 
“The Heavenly Emperor at that time was Raphtalia’s grandfather. He was sick all the time. He and Makina would abuse me all the time, saying I was a corrupted miko without any oracle powers,” Sadeena continued. 
“I hate them both already.” 
“Can’t be helped. In either case, just as I was coming to feel these days would continue until I died, I met Raphtalia’s father.” Sadeena looked up at the sky as though enjoying the memory. 
“The next Heavenly Emperor?” I said. 
“Yeah. He had a real sense of responsibility, such credibility, and always had people around him.” Even as she said it, Sadeena looked at me. 
“Yes?” 
“When you were looking after the kids in the village, little Naofumi, you reminded me of him. Maybe a bit softer. That kindness was the same.” 
“I’m not sure what to say to that.” I mean, I was acting like a parent to Raphtalia, so I could maybe see some overlap there, but I wasn’t kind. I was a dictator. 
“After all the punishment I’d taken, he consoled me and asked me if there was anything wrong. Then we talked about all sorts of things,” she went on. A key meeting in her life, huh. Hard to imagine a time when the robustly competent Sadeena had struggled with anything. “He could also hold his liquor. Boy, the man could drink. He could even hold his own against me, pretty much.” She was obviously enjoying reminiscing and gave me a smile. “He was the greatest person I’d ever met, until you.” 
 
“So you liked him because he could drink? Or as, you know, a man?” I asked. 
“Hmmm. We didn’t really have that kind of relationship. Of course, I felt love for him, but he never looked at me like that. I mean, I wasn’t exactly going around proclaiming my feelings,” she explained. She wasn’t? Then something had changed, because she was always trying it with me. She never did that with Raphtalia’s father? She continued. “Among all the children of the Heavenly Emperor, he was the closest in the line of succession. But he had some younger half-siblings, I think.” There had been some assassinations or something, right? Raluva had mentioned them. 
“Carry on. Just what you remember,” I said. 
“Raphtalia’s father also showed me around the old city. Took me to lots of interesting places.” 
“Sounds promising.” 
“He was a considerate person, but—perhaps due to that—it also felt like he’d experienced his fair share of bad stuff. He started talking to me because he wanted to know what kind of things an executioner really did.” 

“Curiosity killed the cat. He sounds like the type to get caught up in all sorts of trouble.” 
 
“You might be right, but I also have that to thank him for his saving me. Back then, I really was having a very hard time of it.” She had been very unlucky with the life she was born into. That was a fact. It probably couldn’t be helped if her personality was a little twisted as a result. She went on. “It really made an impression on me when, after hearing about my work, he apologized for asking so casually about such a painful topic.” 
“That was the first time anyone had said something like that to you?” I inquired. Sadeena looked up at the sky without any of her normal joking around. “You really did love him, didn’t you?” 
“Hmmm. Not in the way you are thinking, perhaps. Not after meeting you, little Naofumi, and comparing the two experiences,” she reckoned. Seriously! But still, she knew her own mind. “And anyway, he already had someone he liked.” 
“Raphtalia’s mother?” I ventured. Sadeena gave a quiet nod. Was there something there too? She divulged more. “She was a raccoon type, I believe, far from the Heavenly Emperor by blood. Of course, that didn’t make any difference to Raphtalia’s father. He chose her anyway.” 
“How did the two of them meet?” 
“She was a maid in the castle. A great cook, and she could handle other housework too. Smart, and kind. A real homemaker mom, you know? Raphtalia’s father was totally smitten, and she made him work to win her over.” From Sadeena’s response, the whole chain of events sounded quite pleasant to behold. “Time passed like that, anyway, with the health of the Heavenly Emperor gradually getting worse, and so the discussion turned to who would take the position next. That was when the attacks started on Raphtalia’s father, who was next in line. They called him unworthy to hold the post due to his general demeanor.” Yeah, I heard about things like this in Japan’s history. In the Edo period, all that infighting among the harem. I hated those bitter power struggles among women—or perhaps more accurately, those who infested a world that was finally at peace after a long period of conflict. 
 
In any case, I could see why Raphtalia’s father would run away from that power. 
She went on. “He’d never done anything publicly wrong, but the rumors stuck. The condition of the Heavenly Emperor only worsened after he met with Raphtalia’s father too.” That definitely sounded like some kind of plot. “He told me that if things carried on like this, the struggle to become the next Heavenly Emperor was going to get him killed. If the only other choice was to get embroiled in an unwanted conflict, he decided to flee and asked me to join them.” 
“He dragged you into something nasty.” 
“Not really. Raphtalia’s parents were the only ones who were nice to me, and I was completely out in the cold when it came to the struggle to become emperor.” Without that suspicious oracle ability, it seemed her standing had been pretty low. 
Hah! Imagine believing that Sadeena had no natural abilities. Did they even have eyes? 

“He was looking for people to aid him. I talked with the water dragon about what I should do, and he told me that I should go along to protect them.” 

“So you chose to leave.” 
“Yes. From the water dragon, some other collaborators, and Raluva and the current resistance, I was given the ostensible punishment of having my level reset, and then I was assigned to protect Raphtalia’s parents.” So she had played the role of protector back then too. She continued. “During our time on the road, Raphtalia’s parents became like my own and taught me all sorts of things. Gave me a taste of what a normal household was like. From my point of view, they are like my real parents. Those memories are more precious to me than anything.” That explained why Sadeena treasured Raphtalia’s parents, and Raphtalia, so much. “After that, we drifted through many countries, just letting the flow take us, until we ended up in Melromarc, with their exclusion of demi-humans. And that was when we met the governor who wanted consolidation with the demi-human nations.” 
“It sounds like a difficult time. The way Raphtalia talks to you, though, it seems she keeps her distance a bit,” I wondered. They didn’t feel like sisters who had been raised together. Sadeena was more like an older girl from the same neighborhood. 
“That’s because once little Raphtalia’s mother got pregnant I kept a little more distance, of course. Raphtalia’s father didn’t seem to mind, but I didn’t want their daughter turning out like me!” 

“I don’t think they could have made that happen, even if they’d wanted to.” 
 
“Oh my!” 
So these two people so precious to her had died in the first wave. Of course she would care for Raphtalia. Receiving no love from her own parents, Raphtalia’s parents had instead provided so much love and caring. 
Thinking of it like that, Sadeena really was like Raphtalia’s big sister. 
“That’s given me some background on your origins, Sadeena, and about Raphtalia’s parents. Finally, I need to hear about the bloodline of the current Heavenly Emperor,” I declared. 
“In regard to that, I don’t know any more than the reports.” 
“I guess not.” The information provided by Raluva was that the battle for succession had seen many assassinations and other skullduggery, and now there was only one person left in Q’ten Lo who was the bloodline of the Heavenly Emperor. 
Furthermore, that person was a child. 
A child who loved filolials, had given the order to protect life, and placed sakura stone of destiny blessings on his underlings like he was giving out candy. 
The real power lay behind the throne, then, with the Heavenly Emperor simply acting as a figurehead. Makina was the real one pulling the strings. 
Then she stated, “Still, I never believed I’d be back here in Q’ten Lo, trying to take the nation. Never even dreamed it.” With that, Sadeena took a drink. There was a cup across from her, even if no one was there. Maybe she was making an offering to Raphtalia’s parents. 

“Like we have a choice. If you’ve got a complaint, share it with the people here who let this mess happen,” I sneered. 

“I’m not complaining. It does feel strange, though, once having been so fixated on a pointless position.” 
“Hmmm.” In a rare moment for me, I moved close to the eloquent Sadeena, gave her a hug, and patted her on the back. 
“I think Raphtalia’s parents would be proud of you too. Maybe they’d tell you that you’re pushing yourself too hard. That you need to relax a little,” I consoled. She was always so bubbly but was already clearly trying so hard. The reason she was stirring up trouble with Atla was surely because she wanted to confirm Raphtalia’s real strength. 
“But I’ve failed to protect so many people. Those in the village, and even Raphtalia’s parents themselves,” she lamented. 
“I know this isn’t going to be much help, coming from me. But I’m still going to say it. What do you think you are, an all-powerful god? It would have been incredible if you could have saved them, of course, but unfortunately, none of us are gods.” At least when I had Raph-chan on my head, I hadn’t seen any ghosts in the village. Raphtalia also seemed to have been suffering from nightmares, but she’d gotten over it. “I’m only capable of making irresponsible comments, perhaps, but if anyone said things like ‘Sadeena, you should have saved us! You liar!’ I’d say we just cut them loose. If there’s someone who relies on others that much, we don’t need them.” Wasn’t that the case? Wasn’t that relying completely on someone else? I was the Shield Hero. How many times had I been left wondering why I had to defend those so reliant on me? 
 
Of course, defending people was my only way forward. So I defended them. 
I asked her, “Would Raphtalia’s parents have said something like that?” 
“No, never. They were more the type to run ahead and try to distract the enemy, if it meant saving their allies.” 
“Exactly. Sadeena, you searched for the Lurolona slaves in Zeltoble in order to save Raphtalia. I think that’s more than enough.” Even if the slave hunters had been tracked, it would have been difficult for Sadeena, a demi-human therianthrope, to rescue Raphtalia and the others from the village if they reached thoroughly corrupt Melromarc. So she had saved them indirectly in Zeltoble. She’d done everything possible for them. 
Indeed, her only piece of bad luck was that I had purchased Raphtalia. It could be that I was the one Raphtalia didn’t need. 
I consoled, “Anyway, now I’m the one acting as a parent for Raphtalia. I’ll be careful to do my best without applying too much pressure so that you don’t have to worry.” I stopped hugging Sadeena and looked at her. 
“So I should be aiming to become your wife and Raphtalia’s step-mom, then?” she probed. I could only sigh in exasperation. There was no reasoning with Sadeena on this point. She then announced, “Well then, little Naofumi. I’m going to do my best too.” Sadeena tried to stand up as though she was ready to jump right on me. I kept her down with gentle pressure on her shoulders and stood up first. 
I had to get out of here. She was ready to pounce. 
“No need to try too hard! Don’t lose yourself in drink. Try getting some sleep instead!” I asserted. 
 
“Oh, little Naofumi! Don’t you dare run from me!” 
“What’s all this noise—Sadeena! What are you doing?” Raphtalia turned up, coming to see what all the noise was about, and that only exasperated the situation. Business as usual, then. 
In the end, there wasn’t time to talk about Zodia or whether she was actually Sadeena’s sister. 
 





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