story 3 (1/2)

For some reason, the files I had saved had spelling errors...I could swear they were more presentable than this when I posted them in the VO forums...I changed a couple lines as well.

Also, I guess I need a Teto tag.

Fate. A word I hate.

A gaudy ornament for a heart that understands truth. A permission to stop thought.  A justification for the weak to give in to irrationality. A notion that brings a sweet and ugly escape in order to accept a reality you cannot change.

So please, when you tell my story, don’t soil me with that word.

This is a fragment of my memories of a resolute choice.

A song of truth, entrusted to you.

“Could you please stop rus.h.i.+ng me so much? I don’t intend to offer any resistance.”

I slightly raised my voice in protest, attempting to coerce them with a small frown while adopting a nonchalant air.

Naturally, that sort of protest was just ignored. Several men escorting a helpless girl must have been a sight to unsettle as soon as you looked, but there was neither a critical voice nor a sympathetic look in my surroundings.

Mainly it was due to being early in the morning, when few people were around. But even if it was, for example, the middle of the day, on a main street packed with people, I probably wouldn’t have got the reaction I wanted from the crowd surrounding me.

The simplified equipment used by the men was formal to the point of exaggeration, and completely confined them. The outfit told eloquently to everyone that saw them that they were soldiers of a prosperous empire.

In contrast, I didn’t feel like playing the role of a pitiful lamb forced to march. My back was straight; I stared to the front, and went forward in an intentionally slow pace giving sidelong glances to the soldiers that were urging me to hurry.

“Pay due respect to the Diva! And here I thought that was the first and foremost thing written in the scriptures of the draconic faith.”

Even when confronted with such sarcasm, the soldiers at my sides showed no signs of being perturbed. Those men resembled one another closely in physique and age, wore the same issue uniform, and even reacted in the same manner. I’ve come to suspect that there must be stated in the requirements for military personnel that the recruits should be devoid of personality.

Nevertheless...I couldn’t yet shake off the indefinable strange feeling I had towards a part of what I had just said.

(I am the Diva. I know that in my head, but it just doesn’t ring true.)

The t.i.tle of “Diva” holds an absurdly important significance in this world. At times, the singers that captivate large audiences in the opera houses, or the female poets that show off their singing voices in bars and crossroads are praised using the term as a colloquialism. But that never goes beyond a whisper behind closed doors, because if that reaches the ears of the zealous believers or the priests of the draconic faith, there’s the chance that the person may be captured and severely punished for “recklessly scorning the saint”; moreover, such zealous people are found everywhere.

A “Diva” is a special being to that extent. She is a holy being that bears the role of offering songs of prayer and serving the enshrined deity of the draconic faith, the “dragon” that brings eternal abundance to this world. You can never see more than one standing together; there is only one “unreturning holy woman” chosen at a time.

With believers that can easily reach a hundred million, the draconic faith places this person in a central role. Due to offering herself and her singing voice to the enormous “dragon”, the living G.o.d that supports this land.

That is the “Diva”; no matter what I do, I can’t equate such a being to myself. Because that was a being that belongs in those stories repeated more times than I care to count in children’s books and the scriptures of the faith.

But, no matter how much I don’t want to believe it, I was chosen. I don’t understand the details, but it seems I carry the special ability of the “Diva” that manifests only in the females of a special lineage.

But naturally, I can’t give easily guarantees on that subject. My father died young in an accident, and mother, who kept working as a laborer to support my younger siblings and myself, perished some years later as well, due to an illness.

As blessed as this country is by abundance, if you live in it but have no workers, there is no choice but to starve. We lived in such poverty.

“As a matter of fact, you are a person that carries the lineage of the “Diva”; you have such ability. If you consent to become the “Diva” of the next era, I promise you in the name of the Emperor that from now on, you will never live in want again.”

I would have to be a big idiot to meekly believe someone waltzing in with such a story. However, the messenger that conveyed that to me was dressed only with the fineries high ranking government officials use, and furthermore carried a letter signed by the Emperor and the patriarch of the draconic faith; if I were able to harbor suspicions after those two names were brought into the picture, it would be like calling them foolish.

Though forced into it, I was quite unable to believe such a story; and yet I had in front of my eyes a big decision.

Two simple alternatives: To become the “Diva”, or not.

If I agreed, my family would be saved from poverty and lack of prospects, and would from now be guaranteed financial stability. However, as the other name of “unreturning holy woman” reflected, I would never be able to leave the “dragon”.

If I refused, my family would remain, as it was, in a state of distress, and would continue on struggling with hards.h.i.+p. However, I would be able to be there and share in those hards.h.i.+ps with them.

A wise person might loudly say I had no choice. But, I doubted.

I would soon reach the age to legally earn my living. If I argued only from the perspective of my family’s happiness, it’s not like there was no chance of fulfilling it with my own hands if we waited just a bit more.

A happiness granted by others, and a happiness grasped by myself. When I compared the two, my preferences were clearly slanted towards the latter.

But it wasn’t an easy matter, since the “Diva” of the next era was regarded as indispensable.

-If I don’t become the Diva, the world might be destroyed-

Yes, certainly this problem carried that implication. And, when I thought about that point, I couldn’t avoid feeling slightly perturbed.

Why, why, without demonstrating any semblance of hurry, the highest political authorities on the world were even giving me room to deliberate?

Forcing me would be easy. If there was a reason not to do it, then that must mean the authorities themselves had alternatives.

Then, was there other choice? If I a.s.sumed their calmness was real and not faked, then...

“If I refuse, can someone else be chosen for Diva?”

There is another “candidate”. Moreover, perhaps is someone more appropriate for becoming Diva than me.

For someone else, that was not a desirable thing, but if someone could shoulder that burden for me, nothing could be better, I thought.

“I see. Your intelligence surpa.s.ses my expectations. I like you, child.”

My question, when revealed, was met with a pleasant nod from the head of the Emperor. Instantly, I began to see red, suddenly filled with rage, but I chewed on my lower lip and squashed that feeling.

Losing my head there was likely to turn into the third and worst alternative. My future and the future of my family, was bound to be destroyed and scattered away, leaving no trace.

No one would save me from that. So blowing up was the last thing I should do.

“Just for reference, may I enquire the name of the other candidate? It might actually be someone I know.”

I swear it; I had no second intentions saying that. I was trying to calm down, cracking a lame joke; it was said half-consciously.

I don’t know the exact numbers but, to begin with, just the imperial capital is said to have one million inhabitants. Contrary to what I had said, the possibility that the name would belong to someone I knew was bound to be almost equal to zero.

But, in the end, the answer to my words would become a huge reason for my final choice.

“I wasn’t in the mood for needless talk, but I’ll make an exception for your wits and tell you. The other candidate is...”

Because, he told me, with a pure smile that made me think of an infant tormenting a bug, that the name was...

“Teto!”

Suddenly someone called my name, and my reminiscing was instantly cut short.

It seemed like I indulged myself in a reverie. The scenery surrounding me had completely changed from the residential district, with its jumble of roofs big and small, into the dreary governmental administration district, closer to the center of the imperial capital.

Since many officials were moving over to live in the government office buildings themselves, this section of town wasn’t all that popular, even in the middle of the day. It was an area that commoners pretty much had no reason to approach; I also wasn’t at all familiar with it.

It was likely a consensus among the inhabitants of the imperial capital that this district was a place mainly frequented by aristocrats and their sons and daughters. Yes, a fitting place for people such as the young lady that had just called me.

“You’ve come, Meiko.”

In a sense, she was the person I wanted to see the most. In other sense, the one I wanted the least to see.

When she appeared, I smiled wryly at her without thinking, but I struggled desperately to hold back the joy and confusion boiling in my heart.

I had planned to go without saying goodbye to the younger girl with the fluttering chestnut hair.

Excluding my family, no, perhaps including them, she was the most important person for me, my closest friend.

Even though she was the granddaughter of the current Chancellor of the Empire, and was born into one of the most prestigious families, for some curious reason, gentle Meiko had become my best friend.

---And the one to decide my choice, “the other candidate for Diva”.

“What is going on? Why...you, the Diva! No one told about that.”

In front of Meiko, with her big eyes full of tears and her shoulders shaking as she bitterly complained, I completely lost track of what to reply.

As an aristocrat, she had received an advanced education; also, she was considerably smarter than me. If I gave a half- baked reply, she was sure to see through it and grasp my real intentions. So while I kept silent, I searched desperately for the words I should tell her.