Volume 1 Chapter 2 Part3 (1/2)
Diana raised her head and smiled at Yasuo, as though she had sensed his distress.
”I will respect whatever decision Hideo makes… Just as I have family that I want to protect, Hideo also has all of you that he must protect. Please don't worry, believing my words and agreeing to send Hideo to our world are two separate matters. ”
Diana kneeled in front of Yasuo and said that.
”Ah…”
There was not a hint of guile in Diana's upturned face, and Yasuo found himself unable to look away from her.
”Resteria wishes for Hideo to return. However, both my mother and the King have strictly instructed me to not be forceful. In short, Yasuo and Nodoka, they were telling me to not ignore your opinions under any circ.u.mstances, and after coming here, I understand.”
Diana talked while looking at Yasuo and Nodoka in turn.
”I wish we had the opportunity to talk more. Even if that leads to Hideo deciding not to return to Ante Lande, Resteria will definitely protect all of you, and will not do something like taking Hideo away by force. By the name of my father, Alexei, I give you my most solemn vow.”
”Uhh… Ah.”
”Onii-chan, you're being seriously disgusting.”
Having Diana hold his hand and look him in the eye sincerely, Yasuo, who didn’t have much opportunity for close contact with girls, began to get fl.u.s.tered, and this caused Nodoka to deliver some acidic comments.
”Fufufu. Actually, Madoka, I have a message from my mother to you.”
Maybe because she noticed that it was placing strain on the relations.h.i.+p between the siblings, Diana finally let go off Yasuo's hand.
”From Erize?”
”Yes. a.s.suming Hideo had children, she made me promise to reveal the message only once I was able to convince them that what I said was true.”
”You only had to convince the children? Did she say what you were supposed to do if I hadn't married that person?”
”Yes. My mother insisted that, ”There's no way Hideo would marry anyone other than Madoka.””
”Oh, Erize, saying things like that…”
”I'm sorry, Onii-chan. Compared to Mom, you're still better.”
”Stop that. They can hear you.”
Yasuo and Nodoka had no option but to wait with a stony look on their faces while their mother giggled at Diana's words.
”Ahem. So what's the message from Erize?”
After noticing the cold looks from her son and daughter, Madoka stopped giggling and returned to the topic.
”Yes, it's a video letter. Just like that mechanism called a TV, it will allow you to see my mother's appearance and hear her voice.”
”Video letter?”
”It's probably something like taking a video on your Slimphone and burning it onto a disc.”
”Eh? Have the two of you not heard of a video letter before? You've never sent or received one?”
While Madoka was fl.u.s.tered over the generation gap with her children, Diana brought out something that looked like a heavy cylindrical can from the room where she had been staying.
Yasuo and Nodoka looked at the can, a.s.suming it had some sort of removable media inside, but for some reason, Madoka looked at the can and made a sharp expression.
”I've heard that this is based on new technology that Hideo had brought over as well. Their making is a national secret, and only Resteria's Techno Weapon engineers are capable of making these.”
”Just a minute, Diana-chan, is that the message from Erize…?”
”Yes. My mother especially had the video recorded onto this to ensure that the video could be played back in j.a.pan. With this, it would not arouse any suspicion, even if I were to lose it.”
Diana opened the can by twisting the lid off, not paying attention to Madoka who looked worried.
Looking inside, Yasuo and Nodoka saw something that looked like a black tape that was rolled around two circular disks.
Nodoka tilted her head after seeing the unfamiliar object, Yasuo furrowed his brow trying to remember where he had seen something like it before, and Madoka put her hand on her forehead and sighed while looking down.
”Just how are we supposed to playback a 8mm tape in this day and age?”
It was a nostalgic-looking 8mm video ca.s.sette that had long since disappeared from the homes of ordinary people. Looking at the newly made, yet ancient media storage device that apparently held a video of her old friend, Madoka silently cursed the high rate of development of video playback technology.
Diana had a perfect look of shock upon her face once she was told that regular people didn’t have a device capable of playing 8mm tapes anymore.
After a quick internet search on his Slimphone, Yasuo found that there were several services that transferred the contents of 8mm tapes onto a DVD or a BD, and they would be able to see the video letter from the other world after a few days.
Although that would mean that the person doing the data transfer would end up seeing the video, since the source was an 8mm tape, they would probably conclude that it was just some weird person wearing strange clothes and talking something unintelligible, so that was not a problem.
”Umm, my mother seemed to want to talk about some important matters from the past that only she, Hideo, and Madoka know about, and, well, she wanted you to see this video whether Hideo decided to come back to our world or not… She made it clear that the contents of the video were vital to your safety, and we didn’t expect that the technology used to record the video would be on the verge of disappearing from this world, so, umm…”
After seeing Diana who was fl.u.s.tered, Nodoka picked up the media storage device that was based on outdated technology and looked over it curiously.
”Can you record sound onto this as well? It's black and white, and looks clunky, don't tell me the quality is like watching those old videos from during the war time?”
”Nodoka, you're going to be taking exams soon, so use your brain a little. Just how old do you think I am? Although they were just coming into the market when I was in school, these tapes record video in full-color, along with sound.”
”Oh? Then can't we just use the VCR at Grandpa's house to play it? That one is a tape player, right?”
”VHS and 8mm are fundamentally different. You sound so arrogant when you point out the differences between DVD and Blu-Ray to me, but you don't even know that?”
”I don't care about such ancient things. It's not like it'll appear in my exams either.”
”Ancient… Nodoka, that expression is going to come back to hit you in about thirty years. Things like Slimphones and HDD's will be relics of the past by then. Your kids are going to say stuff like, ”Eh, a Slimphone? What's that, pottery from the Jomon Period?” okay?”
”Ehh? That's impossible! And Mom, you're poking fun at me too much!”
”Umm, both of you, please don't fight!”
Diana was panicking while seeing the mother and daughter who were arguing over incredibly stupid things, but Yasuo had something he had to confirm because they couldn't watch the 8mm tape right away.
”So what happened to the s.h.i.+ that attacked our house earlier? Did you destroy it?”
”Eh? Ah, no. Unfortunately, it managed to get away. To tell you the truth, there is a very good chance that all of you might be attacked again.”
”So, the target of the s.h.i.+ is Hideo, the Hero, right? In other words, it's after my Dad.”
Diana replied in a tone lacking confidence,
”That seems likely, but we're still not sure exactly how intelligent the s.h.i.+ are. People have postulated that the behaviour of the s.h.i.+ is greatly influenced by their actions during the time when they were still alive, so the s.h.i.+ might…”
After hesitating, Diana continued to speak.
”I don’t know if the s.h.i.+ was after Hideo, or if it waited for Hideo to be away so that it could attack his family. That's why I would like to act as a guard for you and Nodoka as much as possible.”