CHAPTER~17
During the three years she was gone, he
Airi remained silent for a long time, as if lost in thought.
Seeing her face grow pale with guilt felt strangely heavy, so Magician N hurried to speak.
“You are not the only one who has been waiting for you, Princess.”
“Everyone has been waiting.”
“His Majesty the King, and the princes as well.”
“They have lived on, praying endlessly for the moment you would open your eyes.”
“So to us, these past three years were not pain, but hope.”
Even at his attempt to comfort her, Airi did not respond for a long while.
Overwhelmed by the sudden flood of circumstances, she merely closed her mouth and remained silent.
Watching her carefully, Magician N cautiously continued.
“In truth, there was something His Majesty the King promised in exchange for saving you.”
“Not only forgiving the matter of sending you to the surface,”
“but also granting pardon for the sins my mother committed.”
For the first time, a faint sense of relief crossed Airi’s face.
Not missing the moment, Magician N reached out his hand.
“You do not need to worry about anything, Princess.”
“Let us return to the kingdom together.”
Airi looked at the outstretched hand, her lips parting as if to speak several times, yet no words came.
Leaving his hand where it was, Magician N waited quietly for her to gather her thoughts.
Only after a long while did Airi finally manage to speak.
“Before we return to the palace,”
“may I ask just one thing?”
After hesitating for some time, she lowered her head the moment their eyes met, as though she were a sinner.
In a barely audible voice, she asked:
“Ramiel…”
“……”
“My Ramiel,”
“is he healthy?”
Magician N fell silent.
He could omit details, but he could not lie to his master.
“His Highness…”
After pausing once, he added carefully.
“Regrettably, he is confined to his sickbed.”
Airi’s lowered head snapped up.
“Ramiel is sick?”
“……”
“Where?”
The subdued look from before was gone without a trace.
Her face looked as though she had been driven to the edge of a cliff.
“Is it bad?”
“Is he very, very sick?”
She tried not to show it, but her voice and eyes trembled violently.
Magician N vaguely understood what answer she wished to hear.
“I only heard it through rumor, so I cannot be certain…”
Even so, he could not bring himself to lie.
The moment he finished speaking, Airi’s face drained of color.
A stillness as if time itself had stopped stretched between them.
Her head, which had not even blinked, drooped down.
“I see.”
“……”
“I see.”
Though she answered, her expression suggested she could not grasp the meaning of her own words.
“Ramiel…”
Murmuring while staring only at the dark stone floor, she looked almost absentminded.
“Ramiel, this year…”
She could not finish the sentence, her lips parting and freezing in place.
Airi remained motionless like a shattered statue for a long while.
Only her hair drifting with the current showed the passage of time.
Magician N quietly looked down at the Princess, whose face seemed to have lost all meaning in life.
Even after returning to the sea where her father and brothers awaited her,
she could not abandon thoughts of the son she had left on land.
A small child with whom she shared no memories, who might not even remember his mother’s face.
Even if she returned to the palace, she would never forget the blood she left behind on land.
For a month, watching the King of Triton wither away before the unconscious Airi,
Magician N learned that a parent’s love for a child could never weigh the same in reverse.
The Airi before him now wore the same expression the King of Triton had worn then.
“Princess,”
“do you wish to see His Highness?”
Airi met his gaze but could not answer.
Countless emotions flickered through her dimmed eyes.
How heavy and unfathomable the burden on her shoulders must be,
Magician N, now with only one heart left, could not possibly know.
“Every time I attempted magic to save you, Princess,”
“there was something I firmly asked of the kingdom.”
And so, as always, he chose to follow inertia.
“That any interruption might cause the magic to fail,”
“and that no one was to come here until I completed the ritual and returned to the kingdom.”
“……”
“Sometimes it took only a single night,”
“but other times it took months.”
“Some spells lost their effect at dawn, so I had to wait for nightfall to resume them.”
“No matter how long it took, the kingdom waited in silence until I returned.”
“……”
“And last night,”
“I told them that the ritual had just begun.”
At last understanding his meaning, hesitation appeared on Airi’s previously despairing face.
Magician N did not miss the faint glimmer of hope trembling in her shadowed eyes.
“If I do not return to the palace,”
“then for a while, no one will know that you have awakened.”
The strength left Airi’s hand that had been gripping her collar.
Glancing sideways at her pale ankle revealed between the parted coat, Magician N spoke calmly.
“So, Princess,”
“why don’t we use this time to go see His Highness together?”
Carefully wrapping her coat tighter, hiding even her feet, he continued.
“Besides,”
“I’ve been stuck underwater for three years myself, and I was growing restless.”
At that single remark, Airi looked as though she might burst into tears.
Magician N vaguely recalled the last command she had given him.
How could anyone ask him to leave her like this?
Why was a life without her paler than one without blood, darker than death itself?
Though he had never learned it, Magician N felt he now understood a little.
“It’s all right, Princess.”
“This time, we are not leaving for good.”
“We’re only going to see His Highness’ face for a moment.”
He gently wiped away the pearl-like tears gathered at her eyes and whispered.
“Once we explain the situation later,”
“His Majesty the King will understand as well.”
Though knowing full well that the King of Triton would never permit it if he learned the truth,
Magician N lied to his master.
He knew how uncomfortable it would be for her, having lost her tail and gained two legs, to live underwater.
After all, he himself had spent three years beneath the sea in human form.
Magician N’s gaze shifted from Airi’s toes peeking from beneath her coat to his own two feet planted on the ground.
He too would not be able to return to his former form for some time.
In a way, it was for the best.
Though he prayed for all sins to be washed away,
Airi naturally felt shame upon awakening naked.
Like Adam and Eve, who were exiled forever after disobeying God and stepping into the land of light,
the Princess who walked on human legs had no path back to her former life.
“Let us go outside, Princess.”
And so, Magician N chose once more to become a sinner, following his sinful master.
* * *
The Emperor’s office was as quiet as ever.
Standing by the door, Diego Garcia silently watched Michael’s hand as he reviewed the documents piled on his desk.
“Your Majesty,”
“the banquet is close at hand.”
“Would it not be wise to get at least a little rest?”
Despite the concern in his voice, the Emperor did not reply, nor even glance at the Admiral.
Flip.
Only the sound of turning pages cut sharply through the silence.
Michael’s face glimpsed between the documents looked less like that of a living man with desires,
and more like a candle that had burned out long ago.
Seeing his gaunt cheeks and bloodless complexion, Diego Garcia’s eyes filled with unease.
Since the Empress disappeared three years ago,
Michael had remained in this state.
The Emperor was never one to show his emotions openly,
but he had at least been someone who voiced displeasure when things went awry.
Lately, however, it had gone too far.
As though trying to forget something, he deprived himself of sleep and immersed himself in work,
until at some point, he stopped reacting to anything at all.
Even the advice of his closest aide, the Admiral, no longer seemed to reach him.
The only time the Emperor reacted now was when reports regarding the search for the Empress arrived.
