Chapter 27

Every trainee stood at attention on the parade ground.

“66th Class. Starting today, you’re on leave.”

The Chief Instructor spoke.

“The reason is simple: anyone who plans to desert, go ahead and desert. This leave has no set length. It’s indefinite.”

He tapped the ground with the butt of his wooden rod.

“But any idiots who decide to cut their own vacation short, be back a week early.”

Then his final words.

“Well done. Dismissed.”

“Thank you, sir!”

For the first time in eight months, the 66th Class stepped outside the Training Center.

“Mago, what in the world did you do in the capital? Why would Captain Shimena come looking for you...?” Kinjo asked.

“Human cannon?”

“What exactly did you do...?” he repeated.

“I’ll probably be kicked out even if I do come back,” I said.

Amon muttered at my side.

“I don’t even know what I did. It was outright insubordination; for a second my brain just... flipped.”

Thinking of the Second Invasion, he sank into gloom.

“We survived because of you, Amon. The guy everyone hated for being a jinx is suddenly the most popular, so what’s the problem?”

“I don’t need that. Unless it’s Louise! And now I can’t join the Special Task Force...!”

“Pretty sure that’s not true.”

“Mago, how can you be sure? They’ve got it in for me. My evaluation sheet is going to be a wreck...!”

“I’ll tell you later.”

“Fine. Everything later. First, let’s rest!”

Belle draped an arm each around Amon and me.

“Come on! To my place!”

* * *

We were invited to the Red Family mansion.

The second daughter, Elizabeth Red, had promised us her thanks.

Everyone accepted except Louise, who politely declined.

Kinjo, Amon, Oscar, and I attended.

I had lived inside a noble mansion for thirteen years.

Not as family, but as a consumable.

Before Kinjo gave me the Mark of a Free Person.

Before the war, the Shua mansion had been my well and my cage.

Had it been the Red mansion instead, the well I lived in would have been rather nice.

It was that enormous.

No wonder they were called one of the Three Great Noble Families.

“The instructors must’ve had it rough too. They ignored all this and rolled the dice just like us,” Oscar muttered, craning his neck at the house.

Servants swung the main gate open.

It took three of them.

The moment it parted, El came to greet us.

“G-good to see you again.”

She curtsied with refined grace.

“Eat all you like. Rest all you like.”

She welcomed us with a bright smile.

As we stepped inside, she drifted to my side.

“Mago.”

A whisper.

“The f-family prepared a special gift for you.”

“Thank you.”

“Ask for anything. We’ll d-do our best.”

An unexpected reward.

I answered at once.

I needed plenty, but one thing urgently.

“A weapon. Not something off the shelf—custom-forged.”

* * *

Navy uniforms.

Imperial soldiers killed in action.

They rose, still dead.

Undead.

One soldier’s limbs bent at impossible angles.

Another had holes punched through his torso.

How they had died, how much it had hurt—none of it mattered.

They were back.

They opened their eyes as beings that felt no pain.

A curse.

In this absurd, brutal world, magic was inborn.

Among its bearers, the special—like Marcello Arnes.

And the silver-haired woman before me.

“What are you, really?”

“Hm?”

She tilted her head; a strand of silver brushed her shoulder.

It was almost blinding.

So beautiful it almost blinded me.

Her looks were utterly out of place on a battlefield.

“A Necromancer—the only one in the world!”

You could tell at a glance.

“Or, to put it another way, the Ghost King.”

She was the Demon King’s Army’s new weapon: a handgun with a revolving chamber. She called herself a revolver. In her other hand she gripped a greatsword.

“Who decided you get to be a king?”

“Every Undead is my subject, and sovereignty is mine. No one can stop me, so wherever I set foot becomes my territory.”

She even smiled, stretching the corners of her mouth.

“So how could anyone call me anything but a king?”

Theatrical, like an actor on stage.

“If you’re a king, why are you under the Demon King?”

“Me? No, that’s not it. Two kings have simply joined hands. I’m not some officer in the Demon King’s Army.”

“Are humans so disgusting you’ll shake hands with anyone? Why not invite our Emperor to the party while you’re at it?”

Silver Hair burst out laughing.

“Sorry. That one might be a bit much.”

She leveled the greatsword, pointing straight at me.

Every member of the 63rd Platoon locked eyes on me.

Just moments ago we’d stood together, trying to kill this silver-haired woman.

Now they meant to kill me.

My role had been to honor them with a hasty funeral, but they’d gone and resurrected themselves.

There was nothing more I could do.

I’d just have to kill them again.

Kill them a second time.

Then I’d have something left to do.

“If that fails, too...”

I might as well give up.

What more could I possibly do?

My comrades of the 66th Class had been wiped out long ago.

Captain Shimena Extein—Captain of the Empire’s elite Special Mission Unit 1—was dead.

Humanity’s hope, Marcello Arnes, was dead.

The Imperial Knights Commander, the Warrior Division of the Sea—all gone.

Thousands of comrades who’d passed through my hands had met the same end.

I was sick of it.

Sick to death of the endless cycle of defeat and despair.

The Silver Tomb had no room left; I’d suffered enough.

When I was half-ready to quit, what descended was both blessing and curse:

a single drop of strength to keep fighting.

It rippled outward with a wave.

* * *

“Huff...”

In the Red Family mansion, the wide, soft bed made it easy to fall asleep.

But the dream was a nightmare.

“Feels like I’m being rushed. Damn it. I know.”

It was about to begin.

Roughly three years from now.

I would reclaim my weapon, my enchanted gear.

“This time, it won’t break.”

I pictured their ominous faces next.

Seven officers of the Demon King’s Army.

For the moment none of them had joined the Demon King’s forces yet, so I’d cut their throats before they banded together.

“Of the seven, the vampire is first. That’s why the custom-made weapon...”

After those seven, the very top, the head—the Demon King.

And the one who haunted even my dreams:

“That damn Ghost King. I know.”

I switched on the bedside lantern.

Light flared.

A sheet of paper on the desk caught my eye.

Blueprints El and I had drawn.

El had taken one look at my artistic skills and, startled, insisted on drawing them herself.

Apparently traumatized, she’d rolled up her sleeves and dived in.

The nightmare had driven sleep away.

I went to the lake.

The Red mansion came with an artificial lake.

The most comforting place I knew.

By now, the lake felt even more comfortable than the bed.

“Mago.”

I didn’t need to turn; I knew it was Kinjo.

He sat beside me.

“Why aren’t you asleep?”

“Just woke up suddenly. You?”

“The bed’s too soft... My back hurts; I can’t sleep.”

“All trace of noble breeding gone. What happens when you get used to a training-center cot?”

“Bet Amon and Belle can’t sleep either. Noble blood doesn’t help. We’re creatures of adaptation.”

It came out of nowhere.

“Someday we’ll adapt to peace again, too.”

“Here’s hoping.”

“And here we are, at the end of the road.”

“What’s with the closure-line, Mago?”

“It’s not an ending—it’s the start.”

“I know. Feels like yesterday my house was smashed to splinters.”

Kinjo would never forget that day.

“Thanks, Ms. El. Inviting us here just because we’re your little brother’s batch. I used to be close to my siblings, same as you and Belle.”

He hadn’t changed since the day he swore revenge.

He thought of his family every single day.

“Yeah... I know.”

“Mago, we’re going to Aquaella—no matter what. We’ll kill every last one of them and drive the rest out.”

“Count on it.”

“Still no traitor, huh.”

“Traitor? Oh—you mean the orc model.”

“Right. Whoever hid that blade inside it. I poked around, but nothing.”

“If they’re sloppy enough to be found already, they’re amateur. Could be a supplier’s screw-up, not treason.”

“Mago, how could a shop mess up that bad?”

“Fair point.”

“I’ll keep digging.”

“Actually, I...”

“Hm?”

“Truth is, I’m embarrassed I’ve got nothing. No answer worth giving.”

“With zero clues, it’s tough... Oh, and speaking of endings—Amon and Belle are done here. Their scores bar them from the Special Task Force. We won’t see them for a while. The 66th is splitting up. Kind of a bummer.”

“I pulled a few strings. That’s why they’re heading to the capital with us.”

“You asked the Task Force for that...? So what happened—do they know?”

“Only Ms. El knows.”

“Then it’s as good as settled. When will you tell them?”

* * *

Breakfast was over; the table still cluttered.

“Mago, say it again—slower.”

Amon looked stunned.

Half-chewed bread hung from his mouth—decidedly un-noble.

“You and Belle. Captain Shimena’s pulling you into the Task Force by special waiver.”

“C-come on... quit joking.”

“Don’t like the sound of it?”

“I’m ranked fourteen, for crying out loud—fourteenth!”

“That’s why it’s a waiver. She’s ignoring the numbers.”

“But the Chief Instructor will glare me to death...”

“Shut it, Amon.” Belle shoved his shoulder. “Mago, the captain really promised?”

“She gave her word. Said shoving 41st place into the unit felt absurd, but she’d do it.”

“So it’s real...!”

“Belle, you’ve already avenged your family. You killed the boss. Yet you still want in?”

“I can’t lie around with my feet up.”

“Th-thanks, Mago... Next time, come to my house...”

Amon murmured, cheeks pink.

“We hate wasting talent—Captain Shimena and me.”

“Talent, huh... ha!”

They beamed like lanterns.

“Congrats, you two. Not sure dying sooner qualifies as celebration, but anyway—everyone except me is Task Force now. Even Louise...”

Oscar cut in.

“Oh, Oscar—you’re applying too.”

“Huh? No way! I enlisted for the knights!”

“The captain earmarked you for the Technical Division. She asked for you by name—think it over.”

“Nope. Front-line duty? Forget it.”

“Didn’t you run your hometown smithy solo?”

“Solo?”

Every head snapped toward him.

Eyes bored holes in Oscar’s face.

“War ends, you reopen that forge and you’ll mint coin. Right?”

“Don’t—just don’t, Mago. No hypotheticals. Don’t bait me with hope.”

Oscar flapped both hands in panic.

In his past life he’d crafted muskets for the knights.

We need him—badly.

The Demon King’s army debuted revolvers in year eight.

With my intel, Oscar could leapfrog their design.

Drag their tech into the present—before they even fire a shot.