07-05 Isolated
In the town of Delead, they stayed overnight at a farily high-class inn . It was a sturdy stone-built three-storey building with a flat rooftop .
During the night, Jin for some reason or another couldn’t sleep and left his room, then tried going up the stairs to the rooftop . Small lights gave off enough light to let him somehow see where he was walking .
Stars were twinkling in the spring night sky .
“Ooh, what a pretty night sky . Even though I don’t know the constellations here . ”
Jin who was looking up at the starry sky began to feel unusally sentimental . Then,
“Reiko, you’re here, right?”
“Yes, Father . ”
Reiko, the faithful Automata always protecting Jin, undid her [Stealth] magic and appeared .
“Come over here . ”
“Yes . ”
Jin who had become somewhat lonely called Reiko to his side, and gently stroked her head .
“Father?”
Reiko raised a puzzled voice due to Jin’s slightly unusual state .
“Mh, yeah . You’re always by my side, so . ”
“Yes, that’s because it’s my reason for being . ”
“Hehe, you always say that, don’t you . Well, it’s fine, just stay by my side always . ”
“Yes, of course . ”
It was dark so Jin couldn’t see well, but at that moment Reiko had an extraordinary smile on her face .
Suddenly a song flowed out of Jin’s lips . A song he had for some reason forgotten about until now .
The ending theme of a story about a group headed west in search of a sutra . This was also from the orphanage director’s collection, but he had heard the tune from a video tape, not a cassette tape .
“Father…”
Reiko held Jin’s hand . She hoped that would remove at least a bit of Jin’s loneliness .
Jin stopped singing, and then .
From behind he could hear the sound of footsteps . Reiko quickly turned around and prepared for combat…, but .
“Jin, kun?”
It was Elsa . Apparently as her room was on the third floor, she had heard Jin’s voice and had come up .
“Elsa? What’s wrong?”
Jin asked .
“That’s my line . What’s wrong, Jin-kun?”
“Do you even need to ask . Somehow I couldn’t sleep”
Getting such an answer, Elsa gave Jin a searching look and then,
“Huh . ”
Her reaction was that of more or less accepting the answer .
“So, that song just now was?”
“Something or the other . ”
As if she wasn’t satisfied with that answer, Elsa showed a deeply pondering attitude then,
“Jin-kun, lonely?”
She guessed exactly right at Jin’s feelings, didn’t she .
“Eh?”
As it was dark she couldn’t see Jin’s flustered and troubled face, but he was still clearly confused . By no means did he expect Elsa to say what she just said .
“W-why?”
With a slightly nervous voice he answered with a question, and,
“Because I’ve been like that . ”
Elsa spoke .
“Father is military personnel so he’s seldom home . Mother has a weak constitution so she doesn’t leave her room much . My brothers are so much older than me that we don’t really see eye to eye . ”
He had previously heard of Elsa’s family structure, but hearing it again either way made him feel for her .
“There’s no way Rai-nii either could always play with me . Especially after he became a diplomat we’ve not been able to meet often . ”
No doubt she didn’t have many friends of her own age . The cause of her not being very good at conversing must’ve been that too, Jin thought .
“When I was lonely, I wanted to get all the more solitary . Then I would the time I had fun . ”
“By times you had fun, you mean…”
“When I was little . When I played with, or no, when my brothers and Rai-nii played with me . ”
As expected, childhood memories seem to be special for everyone, Jin once again thought . The childish days when you knew nothing and only spent time playing .
In Jin’s case it had been an extremely short time, but certainly it had been like that .
“Jin-kun is a great Magi Craftsman . Even so, for that reason you’re isolated . ”
Tonight, Elsa was frightfully sharp .
“…Is what Rai-nii said . ”
But in fact it seems it was Reinhardt’s opinion told second-hand .
“Rai-nii said . The only people who can make up for isolation are the ones who share the same feeling . ”
“…Elsa . ”
Jin was surprised that such a speech came out of Elsa’s mouth . However,
“…But, what did he mean?”
In any case, Elsa was Elsa .
Jin’s vaguely serious feelings had left somewhere . He once again looked at the night sky, then at Elsa .
“Aren’t you cold?”
Looking closely, in the middle of the darkness, Elsa was wearing only her nightwear .
“Mm . I’m fine . ”
Even so, Jin removed his coat and put it on Elsa .
“Thanks . Jin-kun is always kind . ”
Elsa thanked Jin and closed the front of the coat . Jin then said to her,
“Hey, during the day, we talked about the common people’s faction and chosen people’s factions, but are they in a bad conflict?”
“Nothing like that . Our country is mostly of the common people’s faction . Only a part of the nobles are of the chosen people’s faction . ”
According to Elsa’s explanation, part of the nobles who employ Magi Engineers = Magi Craftsmen try to monopolize technology .
“They’re just immersed in their superiority complex . ”
Elsa cut them down to size .
“But, Jin-kun hates something like that, right?”
“Yeah . Just building things that are liked is enough, but when people accept them gladly it makes you happy . That’s the time when you’re likely to be rewarded for your work . ”
“Rai-nii also said something like that . ”
Elsa then stopped talking and cast her eyes down as if hesitating to say something, but eventually like she had readied herself she raised her head and,
“Although Rai-nii told me not to talk about this . ”
With that preface,
“I want Jin-kun to come to Shouro Empire . Then I want you to build many things that are liked, and things that are helpful . ”
She then blushed just a bit,
“…Jin-kun, the look on your face when you build things, I like it . ”
Elsa said, turned around and,
“Good night . ”
She left the rooftop with those parting words .
“Things that are liked, and things that are helpful, huh . ”
Jin who was left by himself muttered to himself . For some reason Reiko wasn’t in sight .
“To get rid of isolation, to settle down, is what it means, right . ”
Right now Jin was alone . He didn’t belong to any country .
“Well, I did plan to sooner or later live in some country, but . ”
His original intention behind touring countries during this trip came out .
“Shouro Empire, huh . ”
Speaking of Reiko, at that time .
“Elder Sister, there was a man like this . ”
She received a report from the ‘Hourai Island SP’ alias ‘Ninja unit’ .
“A nuisance night by night, aren’t they . It would surely be a bother to expressly report this to Father, so please handle the disposal by yourselves . ”
“Yes, understood . ”
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