DYTDWSY - Chapter 3
If I Die, Will Everyone Be Saved? If I Die, Will Everyone Be Happy?
— Because my mother had once been a candidate for the Crown Princess, Her Majesty the Queen took a dislike to me, and I was increasingly burdened with state business — even being made to handle documents I should not have had to deal with.
When I was confined to the tower, my half-sister Flemish began, as if in substitution, to be seen meeting with the Crown Prince in the palace gardens through the tower’s little window.
She was shrewd and two-faced, and perhaps because of that Her Majesty the Queen took a liking to her; one could also see her enjoying tea with Her Majesty the Queen.
While I was made to live inside that tower, every time the Crown Prince visited it seemed half for my instruction and half as a way for him to vent; he slashed my back, legs, and arms.
“If only you weren’t here, I would be with the woman I love, Flemish!”
At first, from the overwhelming pain, humiliation, fever, and misery, I relied on the healing power of the fairies who gathered at the tower; later, when the visiting prince found that my wounds had miraculously healed through the doctors and maids, it was discovered.
“If she’s a Saintess, she should easily be able to heal such wounds! Stop that pathetic show and cast the ward! Do your duty!!”
But I couldn’t endure it anymore. I couldn’t bear it. I wanted to die. I wanted to be killed quickly. When I had lost all hope and had given up on living, even when the fairies offered to heal my wounds, I refused — because once healed, I would only be slashed again. I would only be used to produce wards and healing for others’ benefit.
So I told the doctors, magicians, and priests that I didn’t need treatment or potions; I asked the fairies to take and dispose of everything they gave me, refusing to heal my wounds. I let the stench of necrosis spread around me, lay awake in pain and fever, stopped restoring my holy power, and began longing for a quick death.
Yet, even without medicine, apprentice and low-ranking priests used my treatment as practice for their healing spells. Even when the pain and scars remained severe, they forced treatment on me, and in that way they kept me alive in the tower for almost three years.
From about when my stepmother and half-sisters began to abuse me at age seven, droughts continued in one region while massive floods hit another — natural disasters began to occur across the country.
However, excellent mages and priests simply fixed these weather and earth abnormalities, and because such events — rare though they were — could be resolved, nobody raised any alarm.
Then, when I was ten and the fuss over me being a Saintess had started and I had begun appearing at the royal castle for strict Crown Princess training as the Crown Prince’s fiancée, plagues spread and small uprisings among the populace occurred frequently as I was bullied by my teachers, the Crown Princess, and palace attendants chosen deliberately harsh by the Queen’s slander.
In truth, these things happened because the Spirit King and the Creator Gods had become enraged at a country and its people that brutally abused their beloved child — me — and had withdrawn the blessings they had been giving to the land, the country, and the weather. The beloved child of the spirits — if she had been allowed to live a happy, peaceful life — would have received the Spirit King’s and Creator Gods’ beneficence, but nobody noticed.
Three more years passed while I continued to suffer locked in the tower, until one day, on the advice and oracle of some so-called diviner or priest, it was announced that if a noble, pure sixteen-year-old maiden were offered as a sacrifice to the gods — that is, if her life were taken as an offering — the country’s unnatural calamities and unrest would cease. They declared that the noble sixteen-year-old maiden who would be sixteen this year — namely, the Crown Prince’s fiancée, me — had been chosen.
The catalyst was an enigmatic fortune-teller who had appeared as if from nowhere: silver-haired and violet-eyed, with an androgynous beauty that could be read as male or female. This so-called fortune-teller, famed in the streets for being uncannily accurate, was summoned to the royal castle by the temple and the royal family to divine the cause of recent disasters and plagues, and to advise how to stop them, in front of His Majesty the King and the priests.
“...Well then. To quell these calamities... one must truly make happy a noble, pure sixteen-year-old maiden.
“That is all the advice I can offer. Please deliberate carefully and do not mistake this...”
After saying this, the fortune-teller vanished as suddenly as when he had appeared.
“Hmm... so then, a noble sixteen-year-old maiden... that narrows it down... it would be the daughters of high nobility...” the King pondered. Priest Rekkis — eager to take credit — put forth a suggestion.
“Your Majesty. With due respect, may I speak?”
“In a recent oracle from the Creator Gods there were peculiar words: to make truly happy a noble maiden of sixteen. That might imply a bride offered to the gods as their supreme joy. If one were to offer a maiden as a sacrificial bride to the gods, one would hardly expect a mere ordinary girl to satisfy them. If the maiden were of the Saintess rank — the Crown Prince’s fiancée, for example — I believe the country’s disasters and unrest would be quelled.”
“Oh! Priest Rekkis, that must surely be the case.” The Queen brightened at this and was delighted.
“Mother! But surely you can’t mean taking a life! If you kill the Saintess, who will maintain wards and healings?” cried the Crown Prince.
“Please wait. Think it over. Do not make mistakes,” someone cautioned.
“What are you saying, Your Majesty? Precisely because she is the most noble and fit to be presented as a bride to the gods, would it not be only a Saintess of imperial blood who could be offered?” the Queen insisted.
“Indeed. Recent Saintesses have been losing the ability to heal and their wards have weakened. There is no reason to keep feeding and keeping an unhelpful burden.”
“...Come to think of it, Flemish, that girl’s half-sister, is said to have been the one whose power was taken from her...” someone whispered.
“Prince! Is that true? If so, then this Rekkis was the one who leapt to a false conclusion. How could we have overlooked the true Saintess and let her be insulted? We must reconsider immediately for the sake of the nation!”
“So, Marquis Polish. The Saintess, Miss Lilac, has been given an honorable role,” the Crown Prince brought the decision made by the temple and royal house to report to my family’s marquisate.
“I see... even if she’s an unpleasant girl, she’s good for something. My lord, thank you for informing us and for the troublesome duty you’ve foisted on us,” my father said.
“Now, what are you hesitating about? Our Polish marquisate, though we painfully present our daughter as a sacrifice, will be praised as having performed an honorable deed. We will not be scorned; indeed we will be lauded,” my stepmother said.
“Yes. Father, even if she’s hideous, she becomes a sacrifice for the family.”
“Oh! Then I should claim that I, Flemish, awakened Saintess power and so became the Crown Prince’s fiancée, clearing away that bad rumor!” Flemish said, showing a little flame magic she could muster in her palm.
“Well! Flemish becoming a Saintess? How wonderful! Of course, you should be the one to be engaged to His Highness.”
“Indeed. Since his fiancée has been taken by the gods, our family’s sister becoming the new fiancée will be welcome.”
“Your Highness, I am overjoyed!” Flemish exclaimed.
And so, before I knew it, my engagement was annulled and it was decided I would be sacrificed for the sake of the country and its people.
I was seized by royal soldiers and palace knights to be brought out of the tower. Half-dead when they found me, I gladly chose to die as an offering — thinking that at last I would be freed from days of suffering, anguish, and abuse — and thus the events at the beginning came to pass...
If my death would save everyone... if me dying would make everyone happier...
So I was brought to the holy place within the Lionhead Kingdom — or rather, a place that had once been holy — to perform the ritual.
Although it was midsummer, the thick canopy made the place somewhat cool thanks to scattered sunlight through the leaves, yet recent abnormal weather had so corrupted the spot that what should have been a pure, solemn sanctuary was now a foul, nauseating spring — in truth, a swamp that had become eerie.
At the very center of the small forest said to mark the foundation of this country, there was a single clearing barely large enough for ten people. A huge rock that looked like the gaping head of a dragon was the landmark; originally it must have been the solemn place for rites.
From the dragon’s mouth — whether since ancient times, since spirits and fairies took up residence, or since the nation’s founding — water had poured like a waterfall and formed a small spring at its foot.
But now that spring, which should have been clear, had become a pitch-black, toxic marsh wafting miasma.
They laid me on the stone stage in front of that marsh and bound my wrists and ankles with coarse rope so I could not escape.
My dress was yellowed, thin, dirty, plain, and in tatters; I hadn’t changed or washed for days and had no way to mend the tears.
My hair, once a point of pride as a hint of platinum blonde, had been depleted of almost all its strength by casting wards and receiving treatments; I hadn’t had wash magic or cleaning magic used on me for days, and even my comb had been taken. My hair was tangled, split, broken, dusty, greasy, and brownish with filth — nothing like the hair I once boasted about.
Cuts and abrasions all over my body — since I had refused treatment — had become suppurating in places and some parts were close to necrosis.
Food had dwindled to a single daily bowl of watery gruel or salty broth. In fact, in the days before being made a sacrifice I had so lost will to eat or to live that I barely ate. Although I was sixteen, I remained short and stunted; I’d wasted away to skin and bone, my cheeks hollow, dark circles around my eyes pronounced, and my skin harsh and rough.
The girl I had been with my mother was nowhere to be found; she had vanished without a trace.
To get me to the stone stage they had cut my tendons so I could not run away; I could not walk on my own and breathing was agony as men — soldiers or executioners — dragged me there.
Perhaps they were men conscientious in their duties. I had no strength to move; I was simply tied to the stone stage. Did someone approach me? I could hardly see, so it didn't matter.
I barely made out that hair color... could it be Priest Rekkis? The man who had declared me a Saintess, who — although he himself had been exhausted from blood magic and from treating the sick and wounded brought to the tower — nevertheless ordered apprentices and low priests to treat my wounds badly, the man who had caused much of my suffering. Is this his doing... because of him I am now in this state?
A sound — perhaps my throat was slit? ...It felt hot and painful... I hate pain... my strength is fading...
Lilac
Lady Lilac — really, won’t you do anything? If we ask, we could crush every one of them here.
No. I don’t care anymore. This is fine, you know? If everyone will be saved. I will finally be of use to someone, won’t I?
When I turned my blurred eyes up toward the treetops, all I could clearly see was the grieving figure of Sable-sama.
...So... I don't have do anything anymore... Thank you... fairies... Sable-sama...
I scraped together my last strength and faintly shook my head in refusal.
In my fogged mind, I thought I heard the thoughts of those standing around me...
“If only you weren’t here, I could be the legitimate heir of the Marquisate!”
Father? ...You only noticed me now, when it’s like this?
“If you hadn’t been born, my daughter would have been Saintess and the Crown Prince’s fiancée!”
Angora... why did you hurt me? After Mother died you were free to do as you pleased?
“If only that sister weren’t here, all the marquisate’s property, my parents, my family, the fiancée’s status — everything would be mine!”
Flemish... you took everything that belonged to me and Mother and still you are not satisfied? We never did understand each other.
“If only you weren’t here, I could be with my beloved Flemish!”
Your Highness... I don’t know if that’s first love or what, but if there is reincarnation I will never love you again.
“If this one becomes a sacrifice, I can become the next high priest!”
Priest... I hope your god does not abandon you.
“If this creature is gone and we stop wasting money, the lives of us villagers will improve!”
Ah, I see... Was it because I didn't try hard enough that no one understood me? Was it really my fault that I was so excited about being a saint? Who's to blame?
"Lilac... my sweet, dear child..."
"Lilac-sama. Don't go. Don't give up."
I'm sorry... I was stupid and foolish...
I'm really sorry...
And so, all the blood that flowed from Lilac's neck, far from purifying the water in the swamp, stained it even darker...
However, despite sacrificing the Saintess to the pool, the disasters and unrest did not cease; instead, the Spirit King and the Creator Gods turned their fury on the country that had cruelly murdered their beloved child, and the realm was driven to ruin and destruction.
In fact, the fortune-teller had been the Spirit King in disguise — he had taken that form and, knowing the dire plight of his beloved child, deceived them to hasten her liberation.
Unaware of this, the priests, the Crown Prince, and Her Majesty the Queen seized upon the fortune-teller’s words to entrap Lilac. They publicly announced the false proclamation as if it were a brilliant plan.
“Had this creature been offered as a sacrifice, I could have become the next high priest!” someone cried.
Because Lilac was gone, her half-sister Flemish took the Crown Prince’s fiancée position, and even usurped the Saintess seat that she had thought a mere figurehead, all because of ignorance. They had not known that it was Lilac herself who had been maintaining the nation’s wards from her confinement in the tower.
And yet, Lilac remained as the rightful head of the marquisate. It was because of her that three generations’ worth of promises toward the Empire and the support from the King’s uncle, the Duke’s family, had been upheld for the marquisate, and because Lilac had been there, the Crown Prince had accepted the household’s requests for luxury goods beyond the dowry.
The marquisate managed to scramble funds to quietly pay those bills with the butler and household steward who had been forced to act under orders.
The management of the domain and estate affairs had been carried out not only by butler and steward but at times with the help of six high spirits of earth, water, fire, wind, darkness, and light.
The administrative duties imposed by the Crown Prince and the Queen were likewise managed only by borrowing the aid of those six high spirits.
But once she was killed as a human offering, the promises to support the marquisate from the duke’s family, who had pledged to support the beloved niece Lilac, vanished. The marquisate’s estate management and administration, compounded by my half-sisters’ extravagant spending and my father’s gambling and brothel debts, could no longer be covered. The Crown Prince, the priests, and even the new Saintess Flemish plundered funds for lavishness.
“If not that sacrificed girl, then these are the real culprits! We thought that if she were gone and the waste stopped, our lives would be easier!” cried the people.
“Taxes got worse! There’s no food!”
“We lost our children!”
“You liars claimed to be Saintesses! Because you killed the true Saintess, we suffered!”
“Stop! Stop it! Don’t pull my hair!”
"O-Of course! My stepdaughter must have cast a curse on us before she died! It's not our fault!"
"I'm a noble! Ah, I've worked so hard to collect all my wealth, so please don't destroy it!"
"Laying a hand on a priest is an act of blasphemy! Aaaah, please don't kill me!"
"Are you going to defy the royal family? Stop it!"
"It's not my fault, you traitors! I'm the queen, the highest-ranking woman in the country!"
"I was deceived too! The ones to blame are the Marquis' family and the temple who lied! Help me!"
Because of this country and these people, neighboring countries were attacked within just one month, and the Lionhead Kingdom met a tragic end that could never be undone...
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