Wandering Witch: The Journey of Elaina, Vol. 2

by Jougi Shiraishi

  “……” I let out a sigh at Saya’s carelessness and lack of foresight. “What would you have done if that reward had been a lie?”

  “But this is the Country of Truth Tellers, right? They shouldn’t be able to lie.”

  “That doesn’t seem to be the case.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Saya, do you have a piece of scrap paper?”

  “I do, but…”

  “Let me borrow it, please.”

  “…?” Tilting her head in confusion, she pulled a single sheet of paper from her pocket and held it out to me. “Okay, here you go!”

  The thick paper was covered in neat, closely packed writing. By all appearances, she had handed me the formal request that the country had issued in sending for a witch.

  “…It should be obvious that I can’t scribble on this.”

  Incidentally, the request Saya received was as follows:

  Dear United Magic Association,

  I would like to extend a request. Currently, due to the power granted to our king by a magical sword, no one in our country is able to tell a lie. Telling the truth is not inherently bad; however, it is a tremendous inconvenience to us citizens. Can you please send a representative to our country to help us solve this problem once and for all? We will pay a reward in accordance with the following—

  Sitting next to me as I took a long, hard look at the request form, Saya puffed up her cheeks.

  “It’s nice that the reward for this commission is high, but it doesn’t have the client’s name or address or anything else written on it. So I have to start by searching for the sender. Basically, I can’t get any information from that letter. What I’m saying is that that paper may look important, but the truth is I don’t need it. Do whatever you want with it. Eat it for all I care.”

  “I think you’re mistaking me for a goat, Saya.”

  As Saya fumed, I sighed and took another look at the paper in my hand.

  Somehow, I had the feeling I had seen it somewhere before. The thick paper looked just like the paper used in a sketchbook, and the beautiful handwriting looked familiar as well.

  ……

  Oh.

  “I think I might know who sent this request.”

  “Ah! Really?!”

  “Do you know what country we’re in right now?” I said as I returned the thick paper to her hand.

  We went back to the palace. In contrast to the previous day, there was nothing you could call a crowd, just people coming and going through the square.

  “……”

  “……”

  In no time at all, we found the witch we were looking for.

  She was running around in a panic, thrusting her sketchbook at various people passing by. On it was written Is there anyone here who knows about the witch dispatched from the United Magic Association? She’s wearing a moon-shaped brooch.

  It was extremely suspicious behavior. She stuck out like a sore thumb.

  “Hey! You again! You can’t hang around in this area after being banned from the palace, you incompetent witch!”

  Eek! I’m sorry! I’m sorry!

  She was chased off by a soldier.

  “…That weirdo?” asked Saya.

  “That weirdo.”

  I nodded at Saya, who looked doubtful.

  Then we chased after the runaway witch.

  What a terrible experience…

  The witch who had been running around was now huddled up in the back of an alleyway, clutching her sketchbook. She was crying.

  I stuck my face out from the alleyway to check the road and confirmed that the soldier was nowhere nearby.

  “Hello there. Haven’t seen you since yesterday.”

  She was surprised.

  You’re the witch from yesterday! What’s up?

  “If I remember correctly, you’re searching for the witch who was dispatched from the United Magic Association, right?”

  Ah, yes, but…

  “Allow me to introduce you. This is my friend Saya. Apparently, she’s the one who the United Magic Association sent.”

  I put a hand on Saya’s shoulder and pointed to her chest with my other hand as I spoke.

  “Ah, hi there!” Saya chirped very casually.

  The girl was surprised again.

  That brooch! So you’re the witch I’m looking for! I see… I am the Quicksand Witch, Eihemia. I’m the one who sent the request to the United Magic Association.

  Saya took out the thick piece of paper. “Is this your form?”

  Nodding several times, Eihemia turned over a new page in her sketchbook, and after holding up the word YES, she turned the page again and wrote on the new page: Sorry. I was in a hurry. I carelessly forgot to write my name or a place to meet. Oopsie, she explained.

  It seemed she had prepared some simple answers in advance.

  And so—

  “Um, you can’t talk?”

  YES.

  “Why?”

  Out of the mouth comes evil.

  “Would you be serious, please?”

  …There’s some backstory to it, she wrote. But it is deeply connected to the current state of the country. Since you’ve taken the commission, please allow me to tell you my story.

  “Hmm.”

  “Ah, wait a minute, please; I’ll take notes.”

  I nodded, and Saya got a pen and paper ready. She certainly looked like an overly attentive new hire, trying to leave a good impression on her first day.

  And then, after Eihemia had looked the two of us over, she began to write.

  The truth is, I was the one who crafted the king’s sword.

  For some reason, she looked a bit proud.

  It all happened a little over half a year ago.

  Eihemia, who was working in the palace at the time, received a request from the king.

  “Rid this country of liars. I only want honest people around me.”

  She had listened to the situation. Apparently, the king believed all his retainers were lying to him. He could no longer bear this treachery, so he decided he had to eliminate all liars.

  Eihemia respected the king deeply—and might have even harbored an unrequited love for him—so she immediately accepted the task and brainstormed ways to bring the lying to an end.

  Then she had a flash of inspiration.

  “That’s it! I can set up a barrier that will prevent people from lying as long as they’re within its boundaries!”

  But creating this barrier would require a ton of magical energy. And so Eihemia sacrificed her own voice, greatly empowering the spell. However, it still wasn’t enough. With no other option, she resorted to pouring every last bit of her magical energy into the spell.

  As a result, she lost the ability to use magic entirely and her voice, but she completed the sword.

  You might ask why she had decided to sacrifice her voice. I asked her in the middle of her story, and she blushed and wrote Because I was worried that if I lost the ability to lie, I might accidentally confess my feelings to the king…

  She was that shy.

  Afterward, she had taken the finished sword to the king immediately.

  My king. If you grip this sword with your dominant hand, the whole country will immediately lose the ability to lie. If you let go, or hold it in your nondominant hand, the effect will vanish. Please accept it.

  This way, the king would always have to carry around her gift. She was quite the schemer.

  “…Why does it have to be my dominant hand?”

  The spell is stronger this way.

  That had been a lie. The truth was that Eihemia hoped to remain by the king’s side, helping him whenever he had trouble because he couldn’t use his dominant hand.

  “Hmm… By the way, why can’t you speak?” The king thought it was strange. She revealed everything about the situation to him, and he lamented, “You went that far to obey my orders… If everyone was as devoted as you, I wouldn’t have had to resort to this kind o
f action…”

  Your kind words are wasted on me.

  Then the king took the sword in his dominant hand and said, “But wow, what’s with this tacky sword? You sure have bad taste. I guess I’m stuck carrying this piece of junk around, huh?”

  …Huh?

  “…Oops.”

  That day ended on a somewhat awkward note, after the king accidentally spilled what he really thought.

  The following day, the king used the sword to bring sweeping reform to the entire country. First, he banished retainers who refused his orders. Next, he used military might against the citizens who complained about being unable to lie.

  Thus, the Country of Truth Tellers—or rather, the Country of Hostage Loyalists—was founded.

  And now the only people left were those who agreed with the king, no matter what.

  By the way, after losing her magic, Eihemia was deemed incompetent and expelled from the palace.

  I had no value to him other than my magic powers…, Eihemia wrote, finishing her story.

  I had never heard anything so absurd.

  “Of course your magic was all he cared about. You were employed as a witch.”

  I thought I would still be able to stay by his side, even after I lost my magic.

  Indifferent to Eihemia’s suffering, Saya added, “But knowing you’re the reason someone gave up their voice and used up all their magic just to follow your orders is a lot of emotional baggage, isn’t it? Didn’t you consider that the king might feel uncomfortable?”

  Those are choice words coming from someone who talked about fate and marriage the moment we were reunited!

  Ignoring my exasperation, Saya stared at the request form.

  “The request you submitted was for me to return this country to normal, right, Eihemia? What’s the best way to go about doing that?”

  Take the sword out of the king’s hand.

  “I see.” Saya nodded.

  “What would happen if we destroyed the sword?” I asked.

  The magic energy that I poured into the sword would dissipate, and both my voice and my powers would be restored.

  “Oh-ho.”

  “In that case, the easiest way would be to destroy the sword while the king is making a speech like he did yesterday, right?”

  The next speech is in one month.

  “Elaina, the two of us could share a room for a month—”

  “Let’s come up with another plan, shall we?”

  To steal the king’s sword, you can’t go wrong by entering the palace.

  “…But won’t it be difficult to get in if we can’t lie? If anyone asks us what we’re doing there, our cover will be blown,” argued Saya.

  True.

  “This is the Country of Truth Tellers, right? So it must be impossible to lie your way in.” I continued, “But if we use that thing Eihemia is holding, we can make it work somehow. The magic here prevents lying, but there’s more than one way to deceive a person.”

  Even if we couldn’t lie out loud, we could get by with writing.

  Eihemia nodded and held up her sketchbook with the word YES written on it. She seemed to realize the loophole in her spell—the fact of the tacit understanding already established here. She may have even arranged it that way on purpose.

  “…? What are you talking about, Elaina?”

  Allow me to explain.

  I borrowed the sketchbook from Eihemia.

  “Ready? We can do it like this—”

  And then I wrote out our strategy for her.

  ……

  Before I knew it, I was lending a hand with Saya’s operation, but I didn’t want to touch on that until the very end. After all, in a country where you couldn’t lie, it would be impossible to hide your embarrassment.

  “Pardon me. What is your business here? You can’t go any farther in without prior approval from the king.” As we had expected, a guard stopped us at the entrance to the palace. Then the guard noticed that Eihemia was with us. “Ah! You! What are you doing here?! You’ve been banned!”

  Eek! I’m sorry! Sorry!

  “Hey, now.” I grabbed Eihemia—who had turned tail and prepared to flee—by the scruff of the neck and pushed Saya forward with a slap on the back. “Saya, hurry up and explain the situation, please.”

  Standing in front of the guard, Saya confidently held up a single sheet of paper.

  “Ahem. Mr. Guard, do you understand what is on this piece of paper?”

  On that slightly dirty paper was the following:

  I repeal the banishment of the Quicksand Witch, Eihemia. I grant permission for her, along with the Ashen Witch, Elaina, and the Charcoal Witch, Saya, to enter the castle.

  It was written quite clearly and even included the king’s signature.

  “It says your banishment was revoked…? This is suspicious. Is this real?”

  Playing hardball, huh?

  “What are you saying? Isn’t this the Country of Truth Tellers? It couldn’t possibly be false, could it? Or are you saying the king is lying to us?”

  “…Hmm, that is a good point.”

  “Well, step aside, please.”

  “……” The guard begrudgingly stepped aside, allowing us to boldly pass through the gate.

  Phony letter in hand.

  In this country, no one could tell a lie. Verbally. However, the situation was different in writing. Letters were different than words, as they could be erased. If one was to erase a letter after writing it properly in the first place, one could very easily craft a lie.

  Since revisions didn’t work for whole words, it was impossible to write a lie, no matter what you tried. But if you only edited the letters… Well, there were a number of ways to tamper with them.

  The previous day, when I was testing the limits of the spell in my hotel room, I had realized this fact. The ragged signboards everywhere in this country seemed to have been made in the same way. I understood why I had gotten a dirty room at a place that advertised its cleanliness. The people of this country had realized they could lie in writing and were keeping quiet about it.

  “Yay! That went really well, didn’t it? Just as I expected of one of Elaina’s ideas.”

  “Thanks for saying so.”

  As we walked through the castle, Saya stared at the letter I had forged. By the way, I had copied the king’s signature. After properly writing that This is an imitation of the king’s signature, I had erased everything except for his name, completing the forgery.

  No doubt about it! The pen is mightier than the sword!

  There was someone next to me writing strange things and wearing a triumphant expression, but I pretended not to see.

  “And, Eihemia? Where should we go from here?” Saya asked.

  Probably the throne room? The king is always there, killing time.

  “Oh-ho. So where is the throne room?”

  Pretty far from here.

  “Got it. All right, you two, follow me, please! I’ll protect you.”

  “You’re awfully enthusiastic, Saya.”

  Welp, I can’t fight anyway, so I’ll hide in the back.

  “All right, leave it to me. In my capable hands, it’ll only take a second to get the sword away from the king.”

  Where is all this confidence coming from?

  “Do you have some sort of plan?”

  “First, I’ll go right through the main door. Then I just have to say ‘Hello, I am a witch from the United Magic Association, and right now we’re conducting research on magical artifacts. If you don’t mind, would you please let me see that amazing sword?’ And then the king should hand it over, right? I mean, it’s a perfect plan, hee-hee-hee!”

  “It’s obviously full of holes.”

  There’s no way he would part with my sword for such a stupid reason!

  We have two witches, so one could distract the king while the other steals the sword. That would be a more reliable method, I think. Well, we could do that even without two of us, though
.

  Anyway, we’d better touch base before we confront the king—I thought as we progressed through the middle of the palace.

  “What’s with all the noise?”

  The king emerged from a door directly ahead of us.

  But why? Isn’t it supposed to be a ways off? I turned around with a virtual question mark hovering over my head.

  Sorry. The throne room is here. It was actually quite close.

  Eihemia had written these words.

  It was a very flimsy apology. In every sense.

  “There’s no way around it, now that we’ve been discovered. Your highness, please let go of that sword right now.”

  I realized it would be impossible to proceed safely, so I quickly pulled out my wand, pointed it at the king, and stepped forward, pushing him back into the throne room.

  However, as he retreated, the king shouted “Intruderrrrrrrrrrrrrrrs!” and summoned his guardsmen.

  A huge crowd of soldiers came thundering down the hall, shouting things like:

  “What was that?”

  “That was the king’s voice!”

  “Is something wrong?”

  They surged through the open doors, and in an instant, our path of retreat had been cut off.

  Mm-hmm.

  “Saya. I’ll deal with the king. You do something about the soldiers, please.”

  “Leave it to me!” Saya readied her wand.

  As for Eihemia, she shrank into my side and held up the words I am a noncombatant.

  She was totally unwilling to participate.

  Well, I guess that’s better than getting in the way.

  “Your highness. Hand me the sword, please.” Slowly and steadily, I closed the distance to the king.

  “Eh, shut up! Be quiet! Eihemia…what the hell are you doing?!”

  My king. That sword is dangerous. I should know. I made it. Eihemia was holding up her sketchbook behind me. So please give it back.

  “What are you saying?! This sword is the best weapon I have to lead this country. As long as I have this, I can guide the country in the right direction.”

  And then the king said, “Even if villains come after my sword, I can deal with them myself—like this!” He swung the sword in a horizontal slash.