Eliza

Chapter 1: Poisoned Soup

Rather than whiting out, it felt like the inside of my head was being filled with darkness.

Without hesitation, I sunk the hemlock into the pot of soup. I didn’t know what kind of face I was making, nor where I was looking at. With leather gloves too large for me on my hands, I felt like laughing at how silly it looked.

Although I cried when I first decided to poison my family, I no longer had any tears left to cry.

As I looked at the finely ground poison, while being extremely careful not to touch it, my head had been completely filled with blankness, leaving no space whatsoever for emotions to seep in.

Luckily, on the dinner table was a large quantity of seafood and other delicacies that my vile mother had probably obtained from unscrupulous merchants. The irony was, this was all supposed to be in celebration of my birthday today. I just happened to recognize a poisonous plant from my previous world. Perhaps the merchants that had sold this food had tried to assassinate us, is what I thought people would think. No matter what, I probably wouldn’t be suspected due to my age.

Viscount Kaldia and his family that were infamous for being villainous, all died, leaving their daughter Eliza who had just turned two as the only survivor. For the crime of poisoning the viscount’s entire family, a merchant who was once again infamous for being villainous was executed.

…And that is the story of how I, Eliza Kaldia, succeeded the position of a Junior Viscount.

Since hemlock is a poisonous plant that doesn’t take effect immediately, I thought that perhaps someone would survive, but it seemed my fears were unfounded. They either died due to lack of oxygen caused by paralysis, or choked to death on vomit caught in their throats, or hit their heads and died as they lost consciousness. My family members died in a rich variety of ways, but the scene caused by my crime wasn’t even able to traumatize me.

In my previous life, hemlock had caused my younger sister to become hospitalized, causing quite a commotion. Because it almost killed her, it had remained as a frightening memory up until now, so it was ironic that I had now used that memory to poison and kill others.

It would be no lie to say that my vile, base mother was interested in nothing but money, and my father’s favorite interest was to see blood and pain along with contorted facial expressions, so this was their punishment. And since all of my relatives were wiped out, as the only survivor of the Kaldia family, I’ve inherited everything.

Of course, taking my age into consideration, it was impossible for me to actually run the Kaldia family, so this seemed to have sown the seeds of a pointless power struggle among the conservative nobles in this country. Well, if they all crushed each other, it might even turn out to be a good thing for me.

Obviously, as I was only a two year old infant, I wasn’t even considered a suspect in my family’s assassination, even though I was the one who benefitted the most by inheriting everything. But of course, I wouldn’t be able to immediately take up the duties that came with being a Viscount. For the time being, the royal capital sent someone to become my guardian. All I wished was for the person who came to be more humane than my father. After all, if he were just like my father, then I wouldn’t know what I even killed my family for. It wasn’t even funny to think about how rotten this country must be if that were to be the case.

Although I didn’t know if the heavens responded to my dearest wish, the vigorous elderly aristocrat that the royal capital sent to me let out a terrible wail at seeing the terrible state of my family’s lands and economic situation.

From haphazardly stacked bills and debts, to the countless numbers of idiotic, despotic laws and higher taxes than permitted that had been enacted illegally despite the country’s national laws. The people in this domain had been under such a tyrannical regime that they were too exhausted to even complain. Meaning, the people in my domain were all tattered to the point of breaking down. I could safely say that hell would be akin to this.

Of course, I was powerless to do anything about this.

Therefore, no matter how elderly my guardian was, until I became an adult, or at least until I matured and was able to provisionally take power, it was imperative that I rebuild my domain no matter how difficult it was. After all, that was why I killed all six of my family members, my parents and all my siblings.

Well… I guess, there was also an additional reason. And that reason is related to why I was able to carry out this assassination. Long story short, it was because I was someone who reincarnated into this world.

Cutting to the chase, I was able to recall that this world appeared to be that of an otome game that I played in my previous world. Of course, I didn’t know this the second I was born. I figured it out when I heard a maid singing one of this country’s lullabies to me.

The supreme power in the northwest of the continent, the Arxia Kingdom. That’s the country I was born into, the country where Viscount Kaldia’s lands were located. From the lullaby, and from day to day life here, I thought that life here was similar to medieval Europe… probably. Well, I only had a rough idea of what that would be like. After all, I wasn’t that interested in history in my previous life, nor was I all that interested in foreign countries. But, I was certain that there was no such country called the Arxia Kingdom in my previous world.

However, the reason why I was certain this was a different world, was that this country’s name just happened to be that of one in a game I played in my previous world. What made me certain of it, was myself. Or more accurately speaking, it was the name given to me, and the way my family behaved.

Eliza Kaldia. Combined with the Arxia Kingdom, it was no longer a mere coincidence of European naming. The unfortunate thing was, my name matched exactly with the name of one of the game characters.

I hate this name, was my first thought when I recognized my name.

After all, it was easy to associate this name with the Eliza Kaldia that had appeared in the game, a truly repulsive, villainous game character. The youngest daughter of the Kaldia family, the family whose misdeeds piled up so much that they were eventually executed by the country. Even though she was born as an aristocrat, without even thinking about why she was allowed to hold a higher position than commoners, she appeared to misunderstand commoners as nothing more than garbage to be stepped upon. That was the type of character that she was written to be.

At first I thought it was a mere coincidence, but after witnessing my family’s characteristics, and finding out that the name of the country I lived in matched the Arxia Kingdom in the game, I had to admit it, even if I hated the idea. Meaning, this must be the same Arxia Kingdom as from the game.

Then, my thoughts immediately turned to what would eventually happen in the game.

The story was that the heroine would come over from the neighboring country to the Arxia Kingdom’s school where many nobles gathered, in order to find a marriage partner.

Obstructing the heroine, I suppose you could call her the rival, as someone meant only to give the heroine difficulties, that was the viscount’s daughter, Eliza Kaldia. And, no matter which ending you ended up on, her entire family would be executed.

After all, even if you took away Eliza’s actions at school, as her family’s crimes within their own lands wouldn’t change, the only change that I recalled between the different paths in the game were how fast they would all be executed.

Originally, I had borrowed this game from my younger sister in order to kill time, but now that I’ve reincarnated into this world, I needed to carefully think things through.

No matter what, I definitely wouldn’t face a future like that in the game. With the current situation, I figured that I would eventually be executed.

With that taken into consideration, it also helped me decide to poison my entire family. Something like a destruction flag, I would destroy it to the roots as early as possible.

…As a result, I felt like I had done something even worse than the Eliza in the game. After all, I assassinated my entire family. I didn’t know the specifics of the laws in this country, but, from what I recalled hearing about laws in medieval Europe, the crime of killing your family was said to be punished by quartering. Well, since I used poison, I might also be called a witch and burned at the stake.

Since I had no intention of suffering through such painful executions, I would take the secret of my family’s deaths with me to the grave.

From then onwards, since I couldn’t do anything right now, I would just leave the rebuilding of my domain to my guardian, and it probably wouldn’t be a problem for me to live quietly for now. Fortunately, it seemed that he was even able to calculate how much money would be required to rebuild my domain. My guardian, the Senior Earl Terejia, seemed to be quite a capable person. My father couldn’t even compare. ……Once I become the family head I wish I could change my name back to Maria. As for why, it was probably because my personality in the previous world had greatly affected my life in this one. Oh well, countries like Austria and France didn’t exist here.

Chapter 2: Golden Sea

Two years had passed. In just two years, my domain had changed greatly. Outside my window, all I could see beyond the fence, were rippling waves of wheat. He had done quite well in only two years, is what I was thinking, Earl Terejia could be proud of what he had accomplished.

Due to the despotism of the Kaldia family, the people’s resources had been stretched to the limits. Since my shallow father’s biggest problem was his fear of rebellion, he had repressed the people overzealously. If they didn’t work in the fields, then there would be less income. Even an idiot could see that this would only eventually lead to self-destruction.

But, saying that my father did not completely understand the famine issues within my domain, might have been an exaggeration. He knew that repressing the people as much as he did would reduce income. Then, how did he maintain such a luxurious lifestyle in bad taste?

……When I learned about my family’s incredibly evil “source of income,” I was unable to stop myself from throwing up at the boundless depths of human greed and evil, even if he were my own father.

Among the punishments for the people in this domain, there was something called forced labor. Basically, putting someone to work. With my common sense from the previous world, there wasn’t really anything like this in my country, so at first I was a bit confused.

When my father started the forced labor system nineteen years ago, he would take girls from twelve to eighteen years old, and boys from ten to fifteen years old, and force them into sex service. Without sugarcoating it, he was basically treating the domain’s people as slaves.

In the Arxia Kingdom, “slavery” is considered illegal.

It is clearly stated in national law that slavery is illegal, but, it is only there in the first place because the state church, the Ar Xia church, protested against slavery on a large scale. The reality is that most commoners were under a system similar to slavery, called serfdom, in this country.

Father, with his despicable cleverness, came up with this trick to get around the label of “slavery.” First, saying that this wasn’t a demotion or a lifetime thing like slavery. Also, sending the gathered laborers to other domains to work as well. Calling this only as “labor” to the very end.

In this country, no, on this entire continent, people were merely considered to be the property of their domain’s lord. This was considered to be common sense here, but I disagreed with it. Meaning, a rental fee could be earned by loaning out the “property.” It had to be concealed in this flashy manner, and nobody would blame my father.

Since anti-slavery laws were strong in the Arxia Kingdom, openly practicing slavery would mean getting exiled. Although Earl Terejia seemed to have a strong sense of ethics, there were probably corrupt nobles in other parts of Arxia.

Because this country had enjoyed a long period of peace, I wonder if that caused Arxia to stagnate and begin to rot from inside. Unfortunately, I found out that “laborers” were dispatched to countless houses. And even now, there were still many of them.

These laborers were an example of the numerous despotic laws that my father enacted like vomit. It was horrifying. “Laborers” that returned due to pregnancy would be abused even more, increasing even further the amount of psychological damage dealt to them.

Since they were under an unbearably high tax, countless commoners were in the harsh situation of facing starvation, and there were so many famished people that improving the quality of life within my domain was progressing slowly.

That’s why I was saying, things were better already. Earl Terejia had put the safety of my domain’s people as his first priority.

He started with the hunger issue. He sold off all the excessively expensive stuff in the house. That’s good. I wouldn’t even know where to sell all these things. That money was used to provide free meals to the people.

At the same time as distributing food to the villages, he also promised forgiveness to the villagers that had been forced into banditry by the terrible conditions. At this time, I didn’t know it yet but, Earl Terejia seemed to have purchased food and supplies from out of his own pocket as well. But, he calculated it as a loan to Viscountess Kaldia in my name, is what I found out much later.

Next, he captured all the wrongdoers that benefitted from working with my father. Since most of the Kaldia family had been assassinated in a single day, they had all fled. I learned this after I started associating with other nobles. The reason being, they had taken what valuables they could with them when they had fled. After executing the primary conspirators responsible and distributing their wealth, along with addressing the hunger issue, the people’s resentment towards Earl Terejia and me was able to make a 180 degree turn, and they viewed us in a much better light.

After that, it was just a matter of improving our popularity with the people in my domain. It was a good thing that the people were so weak that they weren’t even able to consider revolt. Their bodies and minds had been completely broken, after all.

And so, for the past two years Earl Terejia has worked tirelessly day and night for the sake of my domain. Looking at the brilliant sight outside my window, I cried a little at the knowledge.

Earl Terejia was rather elderly. Rather, it could be said that he was quite a bit older than the life expectancy in this country. It was due to the standard of living. It wasn’t strange at all for anyone seven and older to die of something, and reaching seventy was about the limit. I could only watch such an elderly noble become more and more haggard with his work, while I was being taken care of by the nanny he prepared for me, Mrs. Galton.

In fact, I had still never even spoken with him. At first, it was simply because Earl Terejia was very busy. The situation was that the people in my domain had to be managed and helped as quickly as possible. There was no time for stopping, his work arrived for him like angry waves crashing down. Earl Terejia himself had no time to spare to take care of children. And I was fine with that. I had no reason to complain.

It happened that night.

I was leaning out the window, looking at the clear, bright night sky and its sparkling stars without a single cloud in sight. I didn’t really mean anything by it. It was just that when I was looking outside earlier, I happened to want to see the stars later for some reason.

“Do you want to go out, Eliza?”

A low, hoarse voice that still had a bit of power to it came from beside me. I think I could compare it to rumbling thunder. Before I realized it, he had put his hand on my back and I felt a nervous feeling in my stomach, and my body stiffened with tension. I didn’t know what the reason could be for him to suddenly speak to me, since he’d never even said “hello” to me in the two years since he’d been here.

“……Why did you think something like that?”

Although I knew it was rude to answer a question with a question, but the earl didn’t seem to mind, and looked at the stars that I had just been looking at.

“Earlier during the day, I heard that you had been crying to go out.”

“Eh?”

“I had been wondering if you were lamenting your misfortune at being unable to go out, but it seems that I was mistaken. Yet, child, why is it that when you have never even cried before today, that you would cry over something trivial that happened, when you have such a lovely personality?”

Mrs. Galton must have reported it to him, I see. While looking at the wheat shining brilliantly in the sun earlier today, I was indeed crying. My nanny must have seen me earlier today since she had been taking care of me for the last two years, and I was like a daughter to her now. Oh, and, I suppose three and four year olds should have been crying more, eh. Since I was able to speak, I also didn’t have anything to cry over or complain about. Recently, I had finally realized that it may have seemed a little strange.

“Indeed, as far as I can remember, I’ve never left this house. However, I understand already that it’s out of necessity. I don’t have any special interest in going outside or anything of the sort.”

“……”

“Today…… I was just looking at the wheat fields outside. It wasn’t that I wanted to go out.”

The earl who had been silently looking at the stars without speaking, suddenly returned his gaze to me. He was looking me straight in the eye, but I didn’t know what he was thinking.

“The wheat is finally ripe, now. When I thought about that, I involuntarily started crying for some reason.”

And with that, the earl and I stared at each other in silence. His black pupils were still filled with a strong light in them, but I was still unable to tell what he was thinking at all. The eyes are supposed to be windows to the soul is what I suddenly recalled, so I started thinking about phrases from the previous world. If you gaze into an abyss…

“The abyss will gaze back into you.”

“Eh?”

I was shocked at hearing something so unexpected, it happened in an instant. By then, Earl Terejia had already turned around and started leaving. Without saying anything else, the earl disappeared from my sight in the hallway.

Chapter 3: A morning of eavesdropping

It’s been a few days since I turned five.

It’s morning during what’s left of early spring. It wasn’t time for Mrs. Galton to come wake me up yet; I might have woken up because I sensed something. Something seemed to be abuzz in the mansion, I could hear the adults discussing something in low voices. I hurriedly changed from my pajamas into casual wear, and left my room as softly as possible. The hallway was still a bit dim and chilly.

In this country…… or rather, this area, the most common casual wear is tunics and dalmatics, they’re a bit too needlessly heavy for me. It’s such a pain to carry the hems so that they don’t make a sound against the ground.

Originally, I’m supposed to stay in my room obediently until Mrs. Galton comes to get me, but today it seems like something is happening. It should be fine if I just see what’s going on without being a bother to anyone.

This mansion is called the Mansion of Golden Hills, but given the Kaldia family’s former tendency towards wild extravagance, it actually seems a little small in comparison. The name comes from the wheat fields surrounding the mansion that were under direct control of the family. In this domain, the areas under direct control primarily harvest high-priced wheat, while commoners mainly have to raise rye for themselves. But three years ago, these wheat fields had been a ruined wasteland due to a plague.

It seems that in Arxia, the residence of a lord of the domain is usually on the scale of a small castle, but since the Kaldia family’s domain has been small and poor for several generations, they couldn’t afford to build something like a castle. And as for why my father never even maintained the place at all… He was afraid of attracting attention with flashy reconstruction. His hobby instead was to expand the dungeons as much as possible – truly, he was the lowest of the low. He didn’t even consider that his own actions caused the people to resent him, leading to a loop where he would imprison more and more people. Because of this, the Mansion of Golden Hills was considered to be one of the smallest noble residences, split up so that the second and third floors had various bedrooms and empty rooms, and the first floor had rooms such as the drawing room and kitchen. My bedroom was located in basically the innermost part of the second floor, and even though the floor was decently thick, I could still hear a commotion from downstairs all the way from the second floor, so in order not to be caught, I quietly moved until the sounds grew louder and I reached the staircase. After all, it’s been the first time ever since I killed my family that there’s been such a large commotion.

Hiding myself in the shadows of the pillars, I peeked from the staircase railings towards the entrance. Both entrance doors were wide open, and several busy-seeming adults were bustling about constantly. They seemed to mostly consist of fully armed men, and the ones that were all wearing leather with no sense of uniformity, they were probably Viscount Kaldia’s personal troops. The soldiers that were wearing metal armor, were probably prepared by Earl Terejia for some reason, or maybe even sent here by the House of Lords for some purpose…

Given that soldiers from other territories generally wore chainmail, it feels like the technological level of my domain might be almost one hundred years behind the other domains. Because of the House of Lords, the nobles aren’t entirely isolated from each other, so a certain level of standard has been achieved across Arxia, making my domain’s soldiers stand out as rather unusual. Once again, this is just appalling.

Currently, this mansion is inhabited by eleven people, including me and Earl Terejia. My nanny, Mrs. Galton, my governess, Mrs. Marshan, the earl’s secretary, Bellway, the cook Nathan and the baker Olga, the maids Isadora and Phoebe, the gardener Boriswaf, and the maidservant Mary.

The people that were usually still sleeping at this time were only me, Mrs. Galton, and Mrs. Marshan, while everyone else would have started working already. In any case, I could hear someone’s angry voice without any hesitation to it coming from the drawing room. Even though I wanted to know what was going on and even sneaked out of my room to here, no matter how much I concentrated I couldn’t make out what was being said.

I wonder if it’s better to give up and go back to my room. It’s probably almost time for Mrs. Galton to come to my room in order to wake me up. The thin clouds outside the window were beginning to let a few rays of sunshine through the dimness.

Thinking while running my hand through my hair, I slowly began to return. Just at this moment, someone ran to the drawing room.

Maybe he didn’t close the door because he was in such a hurry, or maybe he just felt it wasn’t necessary. Now that the door to the drawing room was no longer closed, I could suddenly hear a booming voice loud and clearly from where I was.

“Here’s my report. Agil Irishettsu, stationed at Cyril village, is reporting that the wolf dragon – draconis – has been discovered.”

– Draconis? At the term that sounded out of place, I involuntarily stepped forward a bit. It’s a name I’ve only heard in fairy tales here, so I was rather tense about this. The strange name caught my full attention and piqued my curiosity, and I completely forgot about returning to my room.

In one of my bedtime stories that Mrs. Galton had read to me, there were a few of them that could be counted as heroic epics. Something that didn’t change from world to world, was the fact that morality plays where monsters were exterminated were always popular. For example, the tale where the Ar Xia church’s shrine maiden, Xia Fema’s servant Wetzlar defeated the giant evil wolf dragon and rescued his wife and daughter is famous throughout all of Arxia. Really, this is closer to a myth than a fairy tale, but…

There’s also other stories like how the monkey sage and the ancient wolf dragon have lived for thousands of years, but this is just another commonly told fairy tale.

According to it, draconis is a gigantic wolf with scales, with a snake’s tail, and wings on its back like a bat’s that allow it to fly.

I had thought it was only a fusion of several beasts made from imagination, but it seems that wasn’t the case.

The draconis actually exists. Come to think of it, this world isn’t only a separate world entirely, I finally remembered that this is also a fantasy world. If I think back really hard on the game’s information, the word “monster” did seem to appear several times in it.

Of course, in the ordinary Amon Nor Mountains, it was said that in the farthest, innermost portion of the Bandishia Plateau, they lived and ate the snow snakes there, but since I’ve never seen such a thing for myself, I didn’t believe it up until now.

“Whatever the case, something like the draconis suddenly appearing. Exactly what is going on?”

“…Somehow it happened.”

Since I slipped out from my room and heard about the draconis, Mrs. Galton had a strange look on her face but I somehow came up with a good excuse, although I was rather ambiguous and vague. After all, surely I couldn’t tell her the truth about slipping out and what I just heard.

Even in the afternoon, the commotion in the mansion still hadn’t died down. It didn’t seem like Earl Terejia was trying to hide the information on the draconis from me. He did seem to tell Mrs. Galton to not let me loiter around too close to the drawing room, but I stayed in the dining hall next to the drawing room and could still hear everything being said just fine.

The discovered draconis was quite large. According to the stories I heard before, draconis were supposed to be rather similar to wolves, preferring to live in herds. That’s why the draconis from this village was being called a lone wolf.

I wondered what exactly the draconis had come down exclusively for, from the Amon Nor Mountains, to the place where humans lived. Since the mountains weren’t a fitting location for a domain there, there really should be no reason. Since they’re saying it’s such a large individual, I doubt it would have lost in some territory war amongst its own kind up there either.

“Eliza-sama, it’s time for your meal now!”

“…Pardon me.”

There was too much to think about so I had lost sight of my surroundings while I concentrated. After a sharp rebuke from Mrs. Galton at neglecting my meal, I hurriedly stopped thinking about the draconis for the time being.

Chapter 4: Memories from dreams within dreams

I was alone in a vivid, hollow, dismal, yet beautiful world. I vaguely wondered if I was dreaming. While floating up and down, I merely looked at something that seemed like bubbles.

Is it alright to call these my memories, I wonder? No, these don’t exist in my current life.

Is it alright to call these recordings, I wonder? No, I can’t touch or feel anything.

The colorless bubbles became smells, sounds, images, I could feel something against my skin, and could taste things at times too. Although it was nostalgic, I also felt a sense of emptiness inside as well. It was as if I was forced to pick up a book I’ve already finished before, and forced into reading it again.

This isn’t me. While I was confident of this, the knowledge contained within were things only I knew. Meaning, at the same time, this is undoubtedly also me.

How should I call this? – I think its term is my ordinary, boring previous life.

I was born and raised as a regular girl with regular parents and a younger sister in a much different world where civilization was highly developed. Other than the fact that I died rather young, there was nothing special about me at all. I didn’t have any hobbies or passions like my younger sister, I was moderately cool about everything, a person lacking in personality.

And the thing is, the girl that I used to be gave off the impression that she had no interest in anyone or anything around her.

Among that girl’s colorless memory bubbles, only vivid images appeared. Meaning, recent memories from right before she died. As I looked at her life, I felt like I was treading water. It was distant and dull to me, as I was forced to relive these memories I’d already gone through.

Of course, since that girl is now a different existence from me, although I understand her way of thinking, I’m no longer the exact same wavelength as her. Another way of saying it, is that I feel like she’s my sister or mother instead of “me”.

“Lately, I’ve been getting so tired from everything…”

The girl’s voice sounded muddy and weak. Before she died, she had kept thinking that. Running would make her instantly tired, I wonder if it’s because she never participated in any school activities. Also, even climbing the stairs would leave her gasping for air. I think it’s because she really lacked physical strength.

Come to think of it, I remembered about that girl at this point in time. Lately, she would only use elevators and escalators, to decrease the amount of walking she would have to do. Whenever she left her house, she would ride a car or take a train, she never even walked one kilometer from her house.

As this memory bubble disappeared, another one replaced it.

“Something seems off. I’m this lacking in physical fitness?”

Before she realized it, the girl had begun burning out. She had difficulties getting to sleep every night due to her breathing problems, and she would often get dizzy.

There was also terrible swelling on her hands, feet, and face, I wonder if it’s because of lack of sleep?

As her physical condition got worse and worse, and after she fainted more than five times, she was withdrawn from school for medical reasons and simply rested at home, and thoroughly managed her own lifestyle. Like a machine, she would get up every day at a predetermined time, take a calculated diet, and get a moderate amount of exercise.

However, her situation didn’t improve. On the contrary, she even began feeling pains in her chest.

Then one night, she convulsed in her death throes, and died.

The memory bubbles felt like they were distorting my body. The girl’s experience and suffering dully wrapped around my body, and felt like it was trying to crush me, but I somehow managed to withstand it and moved on to the next memory bubble.

The girl had very few clear opinions on anything. It wasn’t limited to only difficult subjects, for example she couldn’t even say what her favorite foods were, or give an opinion on whether it was right or wrong to eat the more intelligent animals.

In contrast, the girl’s younger sister was a person that clearly expressed her opinions on everything, and made it clear what she likes or dislikes, rather than being ambiguous about it.

Her younger sister was disappointed with the older sister’s weak will, and conversely the girl wasn’t able to understand how her younger sister had the ability to speak her mind on everything.

As if to show everything more clearly, the bubble had mostly disappeared and become a blur. The next memory bubble appeared.

“Your physical condition doesn’t seem to be so great lately. Are you alright?”

After she fainted during class for the third time, the teacher finally had a one-on-one discussion with her. The teacher was shocked at the girl’s badly swollen face, and encouraged her to get a checkup at the hospital. As suggested, the girl got tested at the internal medicine department, but there was no clear result, and the only conclusion was that she should review and revise her lifestyle.

Although she tried to do what she could for her irregular school life, the changes in the girl’s body continued.

The colorless memory bubble faded. As I watched the memories, it felt like my heart was gradually drying up. Without paying any attention to that, the next memory appeared, and I was reluctantly forced to accept it.

After the girl began staying home from school and was planning out her daily life, her parents suggested that she should take up a hobby for fun. Indeed, the girl’s original plans had been a bit too mechanical.

However, she couldn’t think of anything she wanted to do for fun at all. She had basically no interests at all. Normally she just watched TV or surfed the internet, or read manga that she would borrow from friends, or flip through magazines; she would just pass the time meaninglessly.

“Hey, why don’t you try this game that’s being featured right now?”

Maybe she couldn’t bear to see the state the girl was in, one day the girl’s younger sister made a suggestion.

At this memory, I got goosebumps all over my body. For some reason, this is the only memory I didn’t want to see. I got a really bad feeling.

The moment I thought so, I escaped with all of my strength. The colorless bubbles, the vivid colors, everything was rapidly fading.

But even so, I didn’t wake up from my dream. While still sleeping lightly and feeling like everything was so far away from me, I looked back at my previous world again.

TN:

This side chapter about Eliza’s past and her previous life actually takes place right after chapter 3, so it’s chapter 3.5, and there’s another part to it that’s coming up next that will go into more detail about the original game setting in question. None of the game characters appear until much, much later into the story, though…

Chapter 5: Memories from dreams within dreams (2)

I fell down into the muddy world of sleep. In the darkness, beautiful yet lurid colors were overlapping. If this is a visualization of my own spirit, even I feel that it’s quite bleak. I’m not quite able to describe it accurately with words, but it was a twisted sight, that seemed terribly hollow to me.

Even though I was so immersed in my dream world, oddly my mind still retained quite a sharp sense for emotion. It feels like while I’m asleep, my heart is shriveling.

Memory bubbles appeared again out of somewhere, they were wriggling. What will I see this time, I wonder. At any rate, I had no way of resisting, so I’ll just quietly watch them obediently.

They were some pretty old memories. It happened when I had been just a little older than I am now.

In front of the young girl that used to be me, was her younger sister that was scratching in pain at herself due to the effect of some plant. The girl was watching the sight in horror.

The girl’s younger sister had been playing in a shallow river. Her whole family was out that day on a picnic. Her parents noticed that her younger sister was violently thrashing about in the river, and came running over. My father forced my younger sister to throw up by sticking a finger down her mouth, while my mother called an ambulance.

Her younger sister had accidentally swallowed some hemlock’s leaves growing by the riverside. It seems that some of the leaves had fallen into the water, so she swallowed them along with the river water.

It’s an extremely clear memory. Even though my memories had begun fading after I reincarnated, this is one of the clearest memories that I can recall. I had used this memory to kill my entire family.

Even just a few tiny leaves had almost killed my younger sister. When I had shredded maybe hundreds of the leaves into the soup, it was a memory that remained carved into my mind even until now.

Without paying attention to my feelings, the memories kept changing on me to new scenes.

“Oh? ……So there was this type of game as well.”

The girl was holding a video game controller pointed at a TV screen. The 3D CG character looked pretty good on the screen, and places that seemed like western palaces were beautifully displayed on the screen as well. In front of all this scenery, was the girl that was the heroine of this game.

“- If you take this path and turn right, the crown prince should be there.”

Next to the girl, her younger sister was giving her information on the game’s capture targets. Even though the girl really didn’t care for spoilers about characters and story that she hadn’t seen yet, her younger sister kept blabbing on.

Maybe it was that she sensed that her older sister was not long for this world, and that she wanted to have more conversation time together.

“If you listen to the crown prince, you’ll also learn about the military commander-in-chief’s grandson. But, you won’t be able to go down the crown prince path then.”

On the screen was a young boy with blonde hair. It seems that he’s the crown prince.

The screen darkened as some conversation choices popped up, while an image of the crown prince remained on the left side. It seems that there’s different screens for when the characters are conversing with each other.

“Hey, Emilia Rindarl. What’s up?”

Although the lines had voice acting, the voice actor acting the part sounded a bit unnatural. The girl furrowed her eyebrows as she went to the options menu, and turned the voice acting to the OFF option.

“Ah, wait.”

The girl ignored her younger sister’s objection. The tone of the male voice had sounded a bit too flirtatious, and the girl felt uncomfortable at that.

This is quite a long memory. Even though I didn’t want to see it, the memory continued on. Still, I couldn’t avert my gaze. Even if I tried to pay no attention to it, I wouldn’t be able to erase this from my memory immediately. My heart was pounding.

Even though I refused to watch and tried to resist, I couldn’t budge at all. Even though I’m feeling distressed, this time I wasn’t able to escape.

The game’s BGM suddenly changed, to a much more aggressive soundtrack. A girl in a gaudy dress with black hair and sharp eyes appeared. She had a much different type of design from any character that had appeared so far.

“Ah, it’s Eliza.”

The girl’s younger sister suddenly muttered that, and the girl learned that Eliza was the heroine’s rival and enemy.

There was a noise ringing in my head. The fog was already fading from my head, and I just kept staring at the remnants of this piece of memory in my mind.

I can’t say that the person on the screen merely looked like me. After all, the person on the screen really had been “me.”

The moment she appeared, it was made clear that she was the heroine Emilia’s enemy. She’s always dressed in vulgar and gaudy clothing, and has a twisted, evil personality. She would feign politeness while getting in the way of the relationship between the crown prince and the daughter of the archduke from the neighboring country.

That was the type of character that Eliza Kaldia was.

---

TN: This side chapter about Eliza’s past and her previous life actually takes place right after chapter 3.5, so it’s chapter 3.5 part 2.

Chapter 6: The baby draconis

My days where I still couldn’t go beyond the mansion or the garden continued as always with my schedule remaining the same each day.

In the mornings, Mrs. Galton would come wake me up, help me get dressed then perform morning worship, then head to breakfast together in the dining hall. Mrs. Marshan would then teach me various subjects until noon, have a snack, then exercise in the garden if it’s sunny, or read if the weather is bad, then wash myself with hot water before having dinner, and then finally perform an evening prayer as well before sleeping.

Because as a noble girl, my life was controlled and scheduled very tightly by my nanny, I basically had no free time.

After the commotion caused by the draconis, the mansion eventually returned to life as usual. Mrs. Galton and I went on with our lives as usual while all the adults hurriedly bustled around, that is to say the event wasn’t able to change our daily routine. Earl Terejia was also directly passing me educational materials on culture and moral sense.

One day, early in the second month of the year, the mansion returned to being silent for once again. The adults that had made the mansion noisy every day might have captured the draconis, or maybe they’ve left for the extermination now.

I received Mrs. Marshan’s lessons as if nothing had ever happened, and just like usual the three of us were eating together. Suddenly, there was a disturbance at the entrance, and the door to the dining hall opened. Unexpectedly, Earl Terejia went out of his way to tell me personally to come to the garden to talk to him after I was finished eating.

At first, I was wondering exactly what it could be.

While I’m surprised that the earl had something to say to me, even more surprising was that the earl informed me in person rather than having someone else do it for him.

Ever since our first conversation that one night last year, I’ve had several chances to speak with him directly, but he would always wave me off with one hand. Because of that, I wondered if an emergency had occurred and packed a snack in a hurry.

Even though I knew it was a breach of etiquette, I ran towards the garden.

The thing in question he wanted to talk to me about, was about raising a baby draconis. It turned out to be something I couldn’t even begin to imagine.

It seems that the draconis that appeared in my domain earlier had been a female individual looking for a place to give birth. The male was nowhere to be found, and judging from the fact that the female’s body was full of injuries, it seems that the conclusion was it had indeed lost in a territorial war and been chased down the mountain. The earl and his party had discovered the draconis’s nesting spot when they headed out to protect the village in question, but the draconis in question seems to have passed away while giving birth, leaving behind four baby draconi.

Since the draconis is an extremely intelligent monster, if they are trained before they mature and get used to people, it seems that they can be tamed.

There’s been no actual examples of this for the past two hundred years, but since it seems to have occurred once before, the story has been passed down. Because of my father, my domain used to have the worst public order in the land, in order to keep the peace, Earl Terejia had moved his personal forces here as well, and it seems that even if people did poorly in training the punishment would be light. From the kingdom east of the Kaldia domain, there was a forest filled with monsters, and snow snakes would often come down from the nearby Amon Nor Mountains as well, so it wasn’t uncommon that there would sometimes be losses to some livestock. Since the draconis’s main prey was snow snakes, Earl Terejia decided to see if a draconis could be successfully raised to be used for the sake of my domain. I had no objections.

Out of the four baby draconi, three had been sent over to Fort Jugfena, which also borders the neighboring eastern country like us. The last one was being held in Earl Terejia’s waist, and it was sucking on dog milk that had been soaked in a cotton cloth. Seeing the earl and his rugged face taking care of the draconis as if it were a puppy was quite a surreal sight to behold, I was completely lost for words when I had ran out to and arrived at the garden.

Without minding the fact that I had a blank look on my face with my mouth wide agape, the earl simply explained what had happened, and he told me quite frankly why he had called me over.

“Eliza, you’re going to be this draconis’s master. Take care of it properly every day, in order to get it used to you.”

“I understand.”

During my conversation with the earl, I only had about two seconds of time to be confused about it all. Since he had just explained the situation to me, my reply was immediate. My head which wasn’t working quite yet decided on its own to agree for me, it’s probably better evidence than anything of the training I’ve received as a noble girl.

With the aid of Mrs. Marshan who had quite extensive common sense and knowledge, I decided to give my astonishingly rare pet the name of Rashiok. It’s the name of the ancient sun god that was worshiped here in the Jugfena region. It’s now just an obscure fairy tale, in which the sun in the story claimed this name as its own. Once, a mouse took a bite out of Rashiok’s cheese sun, but the weakened sun will still help people in their time of need, is what I remembered Mrs. Galton saying before.

Mrs. Galton had been born somewhere in the south southwest of Arxia, I figured it would have been around the Greenfield region, but she really knows the Jugfena region’s fairy tales quite splendidly… Well, because Mrs. Galton has quite a serious personality, she might have specially looked into the fairy tales here in order to adapt better to this region and show her commitment.

Rashiok was a baby draconis that had just been born.

Three months later after all the commotion from his arrival, Rashiok finally became able to open his thin eyelids. He would nudge me with his tiny nose whenever he wanted milk, and press against the cotton wool filled with milk with small, awkward movements, and whenever he saw something he would first point his adorable nose towards it, it seems that the soldier in training Kamil who shared some of the responsibilities for raising him with me felt some regret towards this last part.

“Even though he seems so cute…”

“Will he still be like that even after he grows up?”

“Everything is cute when they’re small, Charlie. Even though Charlie is a shortie, you don’t understand the cuteness of small things, you must have lacked something while you were growing up…”

For some reason that I don’t understand, Kamil would always call me Charlie. I am a respectable noble with the title of viscount after all, so I tried to get the reason out of him, but he still wouldn’t tell me. Really, what a rude fellow. I’ll forgive any irreverence wherever there’s nobody else around, but it might have been a mistake to say that to him in the first place. Since he was to be my partner in this and I would be seeing his face every day, I thought it would be too bothersome if he was always respectful towards me and obeyed orders, but this…

“Because young ones are able to obtain the love of those around them while they’re still small, it means that it’s just a type of defense mechanism.”

“Charlie’s not cute at all when you say things like that.”

And so Kamil shook his head and sighed, seeming to lament something, when I heard the whistling sound of the maidservant Mary from the corridor to the garden. Since she was interested in our conversations, she would often listen in from time to time and laugh in amusement. I wonder if I should wish for a change of pace or some rest from this daily work I do. I don’t really mind being listened in on that much, but from time to time I’d like to listen in on something interesting as well.

“If it’s just like that children’s song, I think that Rashiok might be able to move around by himself by the next full moon.”

“A draconis that was just born, will open its eyes during the night, and will run about and play during the evening, and will leave its nest during the night after three months. Counting the moons since Rashiok’s been born, and the way he’s been opening his eyes, it seems that everything in the song was correct after all.”

“There’s always been a legend around here of a draconis being a loyal guardian once, it unexpectedly turned out to be true.”

As Kamil got lost in his interest towards the draconis, I looked straight into Rashiok’s golden pupils. In another ten days, this tiny creature will be able to move around on its own…

To me, who had just been a baby, feeling like a pet to other humans while my destiny remained far away from me. Due to his lack of sight while he’s still young, watching over him was amusing. He seemed cute yet lonely at the same time. I definitely won’t mistreat him, and my feelings just happened to match up with Kamil’s on this matter.

Chapter 7: This is basic training

“Don’t leave your side open!”

In tandem with the unforgiving angry voice, my wooden sword was knocked out of my hands. My sparring partner Gunther, would not go easy on me at all. While holding my wrist which was numb from the shock still, I thanked him politely.

Rashiok has grown to the point where it’s fine even if I’m not watching him at all times anymore, it’s now late summer. The barracks being built for the domain’s troops next to the Mansion of Golden Hills has been completed, Earl Terejia had organized the troops he had hired along with the original soldiers from my domain here. It’s quite some building they’ve finished here… It feels like just not long ago I was still watching its construction from my window.

Right after the troops moved into the barracks, for some reason the earl had me start learning martial arts. In order to drill the foundations of how to use the sword and spear into me, a three month soldier in training course (for a noble) has been prepared especially for me.

But really, I’m supposed to be a girl. I’m wondering if Earl Terejia has perhaps happened to forget my gender.

It’s probably a standard part of noble education so there’s nothing strange about this. There’s no problem with this, but… A different problem is that I feel like my life may be in danger now.

After I thought about it for a bit, I decided to do it.

This barracks was decided upon in order to allow the Kaldia domain’s troops to stay here at all times. Since it’s the Kaldia domain’s troops, of course they were mostly my domain’s people. Meaning, among them were still people that hated my father’s blood to the point of wanting to boil him alive. Of course, they would include me in their targets to hate as well. They hate me simply because of my heritage… Those kinds of uncivilized fellows.

I went out from the mansion for the first time. For grave crimes, the place where you would get quartered became my first memory of a place I visited outside the mansion, so I wondered if there was such a thing as karma, just how bad my karma would be currently.

Something even worse, is that more than half of my domain’s troops were originally bandits. I wonder if I’ll really make it to the end of my three month training alive.

At least Kamil and Rashiok are with me as my caretaker and pet but, if I’m spoiled too much by Kamil it’ll probably cause my head to be separated from my body soon down the road, so I hurriedly dragged out my skills for self-sufficiency from my previous life that I had almost forgotten by now after reincarnating.

“March ten laps around here, and don’t you dare slack off!”

“Yes!”

“Do you remember how many times I’ve said it already, use your voice from the stomach when you reply!”

“Yes! I’m sorry!”

The jeers finally stopped after a while, well it could be worse.

I had always been confined to a gilded cage and raised delicately until now, but this training to me caused me to throw up every night and become completely covered in sweat, sand and mud;

it’s difficult to describe completely with just words.

Although my breakfast and light meal for lunch were properly prepared for me by the troops, at night I was supposed to provide for myself. It seems to be common training for improving survival ability while on the battleground.

Night in the Kaldia domain is long for lower-ranked soldiers that don’t even get candles. Since I’m also throwing up my food during training, at night my hunger would never, ever end, but because my own weakness is the cause, I desperately searched for anything edible at all that I could gather. In my previous life I never wanted for food, and in this life I was born and raised in a noble family that didn’t lack resources either, so I’ve never known until now just how painful an empty stomach could be.

It was good that Rashiok was allowed to help me, since searching for edible food with a five year old’s abilities was a bit beyond me. Rashiok was beginning to grow scales, and was the size of a small dog, and would roll around and enjoy our hunt for food. After I returned to the barracks, the “food” I collected would be checked for edibility, an actual soldier in training would have to check for poisons themselves, so it seems I was given preferential treatment in this.

Of course, I was at least properly taught about the poisons that could cause immediate death.

Although my stomach feels like it’s breaking every night, and even blowing bubbles at me could topple me over, at least it’s still been calm and quiet every time I visit the barracks.

For a powerful country with no wars, it feels like they have an almost abnormal level of importance attached to the training about food. I wonder if it’s a relic from the time when they became bandits because of scarcity of food… How dare them, something must be wrong with their heads. Is it that people’s spirits have become soft after developing civilization, or that they made this training for me because something’s wrong with them, I wonder which it is.

Because there were many types of poisonous mushrooms, that was the first lesson hammered into my brain.

Birds and rabbits are commonly eaten by the people in my domain, but no matter how many times I tried to hunt them with Rashiok, we were unable to catch even one.

There were only frogs with very little to eat on them, I learned that the bigger ones would be under the mud. Their eggs are supposed to be edible, but unfortunately it’s not the season for that right now.

The snakes that I could find were all rather large, and I was treated to a snow snake recently. Since they’re the main prey for the draconis, its nutritional value must be high.

Most spiders, even the venomous ones, can be edible when cooked.

Since many herbs are very poisonous and harmful for digestion, eating them will be only a last, last resort.

I collected a lot of fruits from various trees, but most were inedible. Since they would come up again when I threw up exactly the same as when they went in my stomach, I quickly gave up eating these.

What was easiest for me to capture was lizards. The drawback is that lizards must be cooked very well done over a fire in order to prevent parasites, but well, I’m learning now with my own body that humans are truly omnivorous.

Since my hunting results haven’t been very good the past few days, the day before yesterday I tried boiling grass in salt water, and yesterday I found an out of season cicada, also tried some of the weeds growing all over the place. It turns out that young pampas grass is actually edible, who would have thought…

“Charlie hasn’t been to the river yet, eh. There’s always lots of insects, snakes, and plants there, and if you give it your best shot you might even be able to catch a fish.”

“That this grubby brat is actually supposed to be a refined noble, ten out of ten people probably wouldn’t believe it.”

All the soldiers in training are calling me Charlie. Kamil must have spread it without me knowing, or maybe it’s an old name for something in this region. I have no idea whatsoever if it’s supposed to be derogatory or affectionate. I wonder if they’re taking it out on me because I’m a noble girl and they hate the aristocracy, or if they’re getting along well with me since we’re all comrades that are in this together, sharing similar meals.

Some days their attitudes would be as cold as ice, and some days they would be warm towards me as if I were their own child. Human emotions and feelings are so complicated that I don’t understand them even now.

“The river, huh… Charlie, I think you know this already, but if you go there take Kamil with you.”

“That’s right. Otherwise you might get lost, and can’t find your way back, you’ll be crying!”

The men were all treating me as a child with their language, and the soldiers in training were getting each other riled up with their playful banter. Well, it’s a fact that I’m technically still a child, so I just nodded without minding what they said, and just like always, the charm of a lovable child, which these fellows completely lacked, was able to cause most of these guys to fall silent in amazement.

I don’t mean to blame anyone but, even though I’ve adapted to life in the barracks, I still haven’t gone out from the land under direct control even once. The land under direct control also included a small patch of woods and a pond. I haven’t gone out far enough to the point where the barracks and mansion would no longer be visible, since I had felt that it would be better to stay within vision of adults I could reach just in case some sort of trouble happened.

“Oh, isn’t it about time for the kid to go to sleep? You’re going to be beaten up by Gunther again early in the morning, you know?”

The oldest soldier in training among the lot, who usually didn’t speak up too often, raised his voice, and caused a bout of laughter. Every day after breakfast, was the time for everyone to help out in the fields belonging to the area under direct control, other than me who would be useless even if I went to the fields, so I would receive swordsmanship instruction from Gunther instead. My sword would be knocked out of my hands dozens of times, and after that I would be receiving training in martial arts and getting beaten up, however not to a terrible extent. This was my usual daily routine.

Since I was getting worn out and pushed to the limits by Gunther every day, I could feel the other soldiers becoming slightly less reserved with me. After seeing their enemy’s daughter getting beaten up and rolled around in the dirt so much, it’s probably a load off their chests.

“That’s right. I’ll go to sleep now, good night everyone.”

I bid them good night politely, then slipped into my bed of straw. The instant I laid down, I could feel my consciousness slipping away from me and I fell asleep immediately.

Chapter 8: Concern about the neighboring country

The stunningly golden wheat, and all the rye as well has been harvested, a silent winter was about to take over from late autumn here in the Kaldia domain. My three month soldier in training course was almost over, and I’m also throwing up much less often than before. Every day, I would walk around with a hoe for plowing that was taller than I was, but for now, it was too big for me to even swing. It’s some sort of strange training that’s supposed to improve my physical strength and endurance.

It happened one day right before I would return to my life in the mansion from the barracks. In the office of the domain’s lord in the Mansion of Golden Hills that I wasn’t allowed to step into until I completed my training course, right now I was receiving a personal lesson from Earl Terejia in front of four maps on the national situation.

Earl Terejia has reformed the domain’s laws quite a bit, and in particular he wrote all of the laws pertaining to the domain’s troops himself. Before he came, it was like we almost didn’t even have a standing army. It’s because in my father’s entourage, as long as about ten people had weapons, that was enough for him to swagger about.

After all, it’s stipulated that all the nobles in Arxia are supposed to have their own forces. Of course, basically no countries would want to invade us, the largest country on the continent, and inside the country it’s been peaceful as well ever since the kingdom was founded, many lords’ armies were there in name only. It’s no exaggeration to say that the only ones with decent armies are the earls stationed on the remote borders.

In the time of the Arxia Kingdom’s previous incarnation, the Ar Xia Holy Kingdom, we had already abandoned all policies of military aggression towards other countries. Currently, the borders with other countries were closed, and only those with a passport issued by the king were allowed to enter or leave.

We have non-interference peace treaties with other countries, and there are friendly trade agreements to allow merchants with permission from the state to do business and international trade. Our country basically practices isolationism.

As for the overall situation in the continent, the rise and fall of nations occurs very often with high intensity. The countries apart from the Arxia Kingdom are basically always on alert and vigilant for war.

Arxia Kingdom is able to remain at peace largely in part because the other countries haven’t been able to develop beyond anything more than small countries. The power struggles between countries of similar strengths is keeping them busy, so none of them have the time to even do anything about the major power Arxia.

Among all this, as for why Earl Terejia has been gathering an army in the Kaldia domain, of course there’s a reason for it. It’s to guard against the countries in the east.

“The Rindarl Union Dukedom, is it?”

“They might be changing their name to Rindarl Empire soon.”

To the east of the Arxia Kingdom, four countries have been expanding their territory for the past hundred years. It’s an alliance between the countries of Densel, Planates, Giograd, and Parmigran.

Originally, there had been a country called the Rindarl Kingdom that ruled over the northeastern part of this continent, but it split into north, south, east, and west, each ruled over by a duke, and each dukedom ended up attracting many people similar to the duke of each country, thus becoming their own separate countries with individualistic traits.

At some point recently, there had been a movement to reunify the four dukedoms and to nominate an archduke as the leader of the four dukedoms. With that many people under their rule combined, it wouldn’t be strange if they changed their name to the Rindarl Empire.

Right now, the four dukedoms are small countries compared with Arxia, but if they combine and become one country then they will become a great power comparable to Arxia. If another country with similar power is born, then the predominant position that Arxia has held onto for so long might be no more. Depending on the actions from the Rindarl side, a war between the two countries may be an actual, alarming possibility.

“Between the Kaldia domain and the country of Densel, there’s only the Jugfena royal domain. If a battle with Rindarl begins, not only would you be ordered to the front lines, it wouldn’t matter even if you had no combat skills.”

Earl Terejia explained everything clearly and in extreme detail to me, while he marked places for me on the maps showing the northern part of the continent and the Arxia Kingdom.

With Rindarl uniting together, that would completely change the power balance in the north. Arxia would be affected the most directly, which is why secretly, the Kaldia domain would have to take heed and be on guard as we were located in the east of Arxia and close to the border.

Because I still hadn’t learned much yet from Mrs. Marshan on Arxia’s politics, Earl Terejia had to explain everything to me meticulously. Even though I had arrived at the office during the morning, it was already time to have a light lunch after the earl finally arrived at the main topic.

“What I just told you about Rindarl, you should think on it a bit yourself as well. At least, right after your upcoming sixth birthday celebrations are over. It’s good to be prepared early.”

Earl Terejia moved onto the main issue. First, he picked up a detailed map of the north, pointing out the borders of the Jugfena royal domain and the Densel Dukedom.

“Do you know about Fort Jugfena that’s been built along our national border?”

“Yes.”

It’s the fort where Rashiok’s siblings are being raised. To the east, there’s a forest known as the Monster Forest, and it’s also a major export location for the grain produced by the Kaldia domain. Since it’s not open ground and we have to go around the Monster Forest to get there, I’ve heard it would take about four days to get there on horseback.

The earl pointed his finger at the northeastern part of the royal domain. He drew a circle close to the southern tip of the Bandishia Plateau, and kept tapping it.

“Do you know about the nomads?”

“They’re tribes of people that raise livestock and periodically roam. Is that correct?”

“That’s mostly correct. South of the Bandishia Plateau, is a nomad tribe called the Shiru tribe. They should technically belong to the kingdom of Artolas, but because Densel has conquered Artolas, they’re resisting against Densel together with some of the farmers from the border.”

The earl pulled out the oldest map out of the four maps he had prepared, and showed me the area that used to be the former empire of Artolas. It’s a country that used to contain the eastern half of the Amon Nor Mountains, as well as the Bandishia Plateau. Its capital Remeshu had been located in the northern plateaus, but after it fell to Densel, now it’s become part of Densel’s territory.

Artolas had originally been founded as a country for the Artolas people, and this included the Shiru tribe, and the farmers around the region had been accepted into the former country of Artolas as well, is what the earl explained to me.

“Since Densel now controls the farmland to the east, the Shiru tribe has been gradually moving westward. Right underneath the plateau, in the royal domain is where battle between the Shiru tribe and Densel will most likely begin. It’s because that entire area is wide open plains. Actually, it’s been reported to the House of Lords that the Shiru tribe and the farmers together with them would like to be accepted as refugees by Fort Jugfena.”

Given that the Shiru tribe has less than one in ten thousand odds of winning, if Rindarl unites together successfully then it’s extremely unlikely that Densel will stand for leaving them alone. It’s been five years since the name Artolas has been erased from the maps. Because the Shiru tribe has resisted Densel unsuccessfully for all this time, it’s very unlikely that they’ll now be accepted as citizens of Densel.

“Densel intends to wipe out the Shiru tribe, and the Shiru tribe knows that they can’t resist them… is that what’s going on?”

“That’s right. At this late hour, surrender is no longer an option open to them. However, although the Shiru tribe aren’t numerous, they are excellent equestrians. It’s difficult to imagine that they will be completely wiped out before they reach Arxia.”

With the fort so close to them, the Shiru tribe would definitely fight their very hardest – if that’s the case, Arxia might not be able to say it’s unrelated. The leaders in the Jugfena royal domain should think really hard about whether to intervene.

“The leader of a domain’s armies is the lord of a domain. That means you, Eliza.”

Because I’ve inherited the title of Viscountess as a member of the Kaldia family, that also means taking on the responsibilities that come with it. The Arxian royalty and nobility that had gotten complacent in an era of peace, didn’t treat the talk of Rindarl uniting together seriously four years ago, when I had just inherited my title.

“It’s fine to leave command decisions on the battlefield to General Calvin, but at a very minimum you will have to be present in the fort. If defense of the fort becomes necessary for whatever reason, know that you yourself may also be required to take up arms for self-defense. After you end your time in the barracks tomorrow, I will begin teaching you how to ride a horse.”

There was no room for me to agree or disagree with anything. I’ve always thought that the concept known as war was very far from me, but in actuality it was so close already. I looked silently into Earl Terejia’s eyes, and could only respond by nodding.