DYTDWSY - Chapter 1

 A World Where Humans and Fairies Coexist

◆A World Where Humans and Fairies Coexist

—This is a tale from before fairies hid themselves from humans and vanished from their sights.

In this world, humans and fairies coexisted and lived together. Anyone could see a fairy's form as naturally as seeing their own reflection. Those with high magical power, like wizards; devout priests; innocent children; and races like elves and beastmen—who were naturally attuned to nature and possessed ancient blessings from time immemorial—could hear their voices and, though capriciously, even engage in chatter and conversation.

 

Furthermore, if a fairy was in a good mood toward someone they could converse with, they might even listen to that person's request and offer assistance.

Well, even with those they couldn't converse with properly, fairies might lend a hand or help out on a whim—especially to children with pure hearts or humans they took a liking to.

Fairies aren't just little people with wings, either.

And when we say wings, it wasn't just butterflies, dragonflies, or other insect-like wings. There were wings like those of birds. Wings like leaves or petals. Fairies sometimes look like dwarves as they do not have wings or feathers, and yet could fly. Fairies in animal forms with wings. Occasionally, there were fairies who looked ominous and wicked, yet somehow had the mischievous charm of a little imp or devil. There were all kinds of fairies.

Their forms and appearances seemed to differ based on their race, the magic they wielded, and attributes like the mysterious power called mana that flooded this world.

For example, earth-element fairies were often described as having the classic dwarf-like form without wings or feathers. Wind or plant-element fairies frequently possessed insect-like or plant-based wings. Fish or mermaid fairies were water-element. Animal-form fairies were often fire or light-element. Mischievous-looking fairies were mostly dark-element.

These fairies wielded mana—one of the natural life forces abundant in this world—more skillfully than wizards. They occasionally bestowed benefits upon humans, sometimes capriciously, other times with genuine care, granting the magic necessary for daily life.

Even in a world blessed by such fairy favors, humans would ignite the foolish act of war over the smallest, most trivial misunderstanding.

The Lionhead Kingdom and the Silvermartin Empire had also gone to war, sparked by a minor dispute.

But trivial, petty reasons end for the same reason. The upper echelons of both nations, seeing the war as nothing but a wasteful drain on soldiers, food, and supplies that only exhausted them, decided to end it. To declare a peace alliance to the surrounding nations, they sacrificed my grandmother—the emperor's sister at the time—as a hostage-like offering to end the war.

When my grandmother married into the Lionhead Kingdom as a pledge of peace to neighboring nations during the war sparked by the feud between the Lionhead Kingdom and her homeland, the Silvermartin Empire, the Lionhead Kingdom was a nation surrounded by high mountains to the east. Beyond the mountain range lay a vast sea, separated only by the Beastmen Kingdom. It relied on imports from neighboring countries, its only assets being skilled craftsmen and mineral resources.

The surrounding nations were: to the north, a snowbound land whose main products were furs and cloth; to the east, separated by high mountains, the Beastmen Kingdom with its developed fishing industry and culinary culture; to the west, the Elf Kingdom rich in nature, with thriving forestry, herbalism, and a large population of mages; and to the south, the mighty Silvermartin Empire—my grandmother, Satin Polish's homeland—a fertile land facing the sea, renowned for its advanced magic and culture. The Lionhead Kingdom was surrounded by these nations.

It was in the Polish Marquisate, one of the marquis families of this Lionhead Kingdom, that I, named Lilac, was born.

Originally, my grandmother's marriage was arranged to form a peace alliance between the Silver Martin Imperial family and the Lionhead royal family. However, since the royal family of the time already had a primary wife, it was deemed unsightly for a noble imperial family member to be a concubine, even if they were a former enemy nation. Thus, the arrow of selection fell upon my grandfather's marquis house, which at least saved face as a token of the alliance.

But that was not the promise. The Imperial side complained that they had agreed to marry into the royal house, but the Marquis family, whose status was declining, had reneged on the deal, making it unacceptable. Consequently, the matter was carried over to my mother's generation.

However, even in my mother's generation, when the meeting between my mother and the Crown Prince took place, the Crown Prince ostensibly disliked my mother's appearance. This was because she carried the blood of Satin Polish (previously Satin Silvermartin), an outsider from the Empire. Compounded by baseless rumors of malice and jealousy circulating only within certain hostile factions, he complained he'd been forced to accept an unwanted person suspected of being illegitimate.

So, the Crown Prince claimed he fell instantly in love with a duchess's daughter present at a party where other noble children met to decide fiancés and attendants. He quickly engaged her, thus ending the engagement talks with my mother. However, his mother's engagements were all rejected by both high nobility and even the Earls, due to the vicious rumors and the Crown Prince's handling of the situation.

Therefore, a political marriage by royal decree was decreed, justified as being for a treaty of alliance spanning generations, personally issued by His Majesty the Jersey Wooly Lionhead King, renowned for his royal lineage's distinctive blond hair and ever-alert blue eyes. Thus, a baron without lands and known to have mistresses was assigned as her husband, and my mother was relegated to live in a detached wing of the marquis's mansion.

“Even if it's a royal decree or a political ploy, how could we possibly accept an outsider, a lowly bastard of lowly blood?! This annex should be more than sufficient for you!”

My mother was told it was a royal command without even time to prepare a dress, let alone plan a wedding. She was made to sign the marriage documents alone, in the presence of His Majesty the King, who glared down at her, a plump Baron Checcard Papillon with red hair and orange eyes that burned with anger, and a Rex priest with yellow hair and amber eyes that looked down on her from the start. After that lonely wedding, with no reception held of course, I was grabbed by the arm and practically dragged to a small detached villa that had been prepared, where I was dumped.

Around this time, my grandfather, the previous marquis, had been frequently unwell since losing his beloved wife, my grandmother. He had been secluded in the estate, partly for recuperation and partly because he felt secure with my mother, an excellent marquis, taking over the duties.

The only silver lining was that the malicious rumors about my mother's birth had ceased to reach my ears. Or rather, even if she had heard them, those who knew of her close relationship with my grandmother in life, or the acquaintances who still maintained contact, would have had no reason to doubt.

The rumor in question stemmed from the fact that while my mother should have been the legitimate heir of the Polish Marquis, she was actually born earlier than expected when my grandmother—the imperial princess who had married the previous marquis from a neighboring country—gave birth to her. This led relatives and other nobles to suspect she was an illegitimate child.

Yet no matter what circumstances or rumors beset her, Mother's brilliant platinum hair was unmistakably the imperial family's signature color, identical to my grandmother's when she was young, while her sky-blue eyes undeniably spoke of the bloodline of the late marquis, my grandfather.

Despite this, my father—the younger brother of the Silver Fox Duke family who had married into the Papillon Baron family—was merely a pawn to a political marriage, sanctioned by His Majesty the King. He despised my mother, a bastard child bearing the blood of an unknown father and possessing imperial blood, viewing her as nothing more than a nominal Duchess. My father, with his flashy pink hair and pink eyes, and his self-proclaimed cousin mistress, drove my mother away and seized control of the marquisate.

To make matters worse, he insisted that a woman claiming to be his childhood friend—though her story changed every time they met—and her daughter, who resembled her mother with pink hair and orange eyes, were pitiful and deserving of sympathy. He claimed their merchant family had fallen into debt and ruin when their business failed, leaving them nowhere to go. He then had them move into the main residence as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

Truthfully, it was probably a story leaked by a loose-lipped servant my father had secretly replaced, made all the more amusing by the fairies' gossip. According to them, the woman was a former prostitute who had been my father's mistress even before he married my mother, and the girl was likely her daughter. Seizing the opportunity presented by my father's marriage to my mother, who was merely a figurehead, he brazenly brought his mistress into the marquis household.

Servants working for a marquis house are typically discreet, drawn from families with at least basic etiquette and common sense—counts, lower nobility, or younger sons and daughters who didn't inherit titles. Yet despite this, the servants my mother hired wouldn't obey orders. My father and his mistresses found it intolerable that these servants—mere servants!—were inflexible and even made suggestions, so they arbitrarily dismissed them.

Yet maintaining the vast marquisate required more than the small staff typical of a baron's household. Father and his mistresses began hiring only smooth-talking acquaintances, ill-mannered quasi-nobles, and commoners, filling the household with people who looked down on Mother, the rightful head of the marquisate.

Though my mother was thus disliked by my father, the marquisate's actual power lay with the previous marquis, who lived a life of leisure on the estate. Consequently, my mother managed and ran all necessary duties within the marquisate's domain. Even at the country house, there was Trianta, the trustworthy, honest butler with black hair and black eyes who had served since the previous marquis. There was also Havana, the long-serving maid with brown hair and brown eyes, who was like a doting landlady. Then there was Tan, the stubborn orange-haired, chestnut-eyed cook who would never forgive anyone for wasting food. Only Palomino, the gray-haired, gray-eyed gardener employed by my father's older brother, the Duke, for surveillance, was allowed to come and go. Thus, I never had to run into my father's mistress and her daughter.

Despite this situation, according to what my mother told me, when I was born, an unusually large number—hundreds, thousands?—of fairies gathered at the Polish Marquis's residence with my mother and me. No, it seems the number of fairies surrounding my mother had been increasing since she discovered her pregnancy a month after my father happened to get drunk and assaulted her.

“This child is a salvation and a hope, but also a special child destined to become fate itself.”

The fairies, gently stroking my mother's belly, bestowed blessings one after another.

Fortunately, my nominal father and his mistress—mother and daughter—were away on business in the domain, though it was likely a honeymoon or something similar, so they still seem unaware to this day. Yet, even in the middle of the night, the room was bathed in light so bright it could have been daytime, startling the attending physician, wet nurse, butler, maidservant, and even my mother herself.

Perhaps because of this, having been close to fairies since birth, the first words I learned came from them.

“Hello, Lilac-chan. Nice to meet you.”

“Finally, we meet. I'm a fire fairy. How about it? I'll warm you up.”

“I'm a wind fairy. See? Feels cool, doesn't it?”

“I'm the Water Fairy. If you get thirsty, just say the word.”

“You lot are noisy. She's still an infant; it'll be a while before she understands words. Myself? I'm Sable. The guardian of Lilac.”

Especially Sable—that fairy?—who was the same size as an adult, with wings, sky-blue long hair, and beautiful eyes like amethyst or purple crystal. He took care of us instead of the main house servants, who often neglected my mother and me when our absent father was away, or when the butler and senior maids weren't around, taking advantage of his absence to cut corners.

And then, a few months after birth.

“Look, you're almost rolling over. You need to get your arms out.”

“Oh! You did it! Good job!”

A few more months passed.

“Sable-sama! Lilac-sama is about to fall into the water!”

“Waaahhh...”

“Oh my! Lilac!”

While Mother was consulting with the butler and maids about duties and budgets, Lilac had crawled quite far. She wanted to see the watering hole where the maid Havana often went to wash clothes, so she had wandered in.

“Whoa, Lilac! ...Phew, that was close.”

Mother and Sable had to team up for the rescue.

Several more months passed.

《Hang in there. Almost standing... Yes! Good girl, good girl》

《Oh. Just like that. Hmm. Your walking is looking more polished now》

And, perhaps because she gave birth to me, or because Mother tended to be unwell, she taught me words, manners, and even studies. That Mother and I managed to survive at all was thanks to the fairies, Sable, and our trustworthy servants.

“Lilac, this is how you use a spoon.”

“Mmm. Aah?”

《Ah, look, you spilled so much again. Lilac is such a handful. Hahaha》

“Kya-ha-ha. Seb-yu-ko-e-na-ni?”

《Ah, that's called a comb. See, it's a tool you place on your head to brush your hair.》

“Chaa, ko-e-ha?”

《This is a pen. It's a tool used to write letters or draw pictures, or to write in diaries and letters.》

“Sey-bu-yo, hold me, hold me.”

“Alright, alright. Lilac loves being held, doesn't she? My sweet, beloved Lilac...”

Back when I was little, I never questioned being able to talk normally with Sable and the other fairies. I truly believed it wasn't any kind of special ‘power’ I possessed.

But I think it was around age five, when I was just becoming aware of things? For some reason, my mother said to me with a frighteningly serious expression:

“Do you understand? You must keep it a secret from everyone else—except when you're alone with me like this—that you can talk to fairies, even though you're neither a wizard nor a priest.”

“Why? Why can I talk to Sable and the others? Why can't anyone else know?”

When I looked at her with a troubled, sad face and protested,

"Being able to talk to fairies is a privilege reserved only for little children.

It might be too difficult for you now, Lilac, but if anyone finds out you can still talk to them after you grow up, they might separate you from me. Worst case, they could lock you away in a temple or the royal palace.

So please, promise me? You must never let anyone else know you can talk to the fairies, okay?

If you absolutely must talk to them, never speak aloud. Just talk to them in your head.

Right, fairies? Is that alright?"

Mother wasn't as skilled as I am at communicating with the fairies, but she was completely accustomed to the little fairies who shuttled back and forth between us. Even without understanding fairy speech, she knew they could understand human words perfectly well.

So, Sable and the fairies listening nearby, and of course Mother herself, were all looking at me with such pained concern. I decided to do as I was told.

(Sable, can you hear me?)

“Yes, I can hear you clearly through telepathy. But your lips are still moving a bit, and your gaze is directed at us, so let's be mindful of correcting that habit too.”

(Okay, got it.)

So instead, I came to believe that having even the slightest ‘power’ different from humans was evil and shameful. I decided to keep hiding my ability to talk with the fairies.──

Author's Note

I made a minor correction to the description of the eastern geography of the kingdom because it was a bit off. My apologies.

< Prologue - ToC - Chapter 2 >