Princess of the Empire (JNC Edition)

by Hiroyuki Morioka

  However, it is only through commerce with other star systems that those bio-resources can be our wealth. What do you think would happen if we left that exchange of goods to the Empire? There’s no doubt they’d take a big bite out of it. They’d give the people nothing but their scraps, wouldn’t you agree?

  As such, it was necessary for someone of the Hyde Star System to become its lord and take part in its trade.

  “Well, I’m convinced,” said Durin.

  “Yeah, it’s reasonable enough. That’s why I’m staying a noble. Although, I’ve been having my doubts lately...”

  “Doubts? About?”

  “Think about it — it’s impossible to be a citizen of Hyde and an Abh noble at the same time. I don’t have any of the rights of a citizen of Hyde anymore. Sure, it’ll be fine with my father at the helm for the time being, though he doesn’t have citizen rights in Hyde either. But he’s convinced that he’s working for the benefit of the star system. I intend to work for the system, too. But what about the generation after me? My son or daughter would have their genes altered; they’ll be born as a beauteous blue-haired Abh. That’s the rule, and there’s no getting around it. They’ll also likely be Abh culturally. Would they be capable of putting themselves in the shoes of a Hyde citizen?”

  “Dude, you’re so damn stiff. Stop overthinking!” Durin looked at him dumbfounded. “That bunch of idiots hates you anyway, so forget about them! Point is, you’re part of a family business, and you get to decide whether you take it up or not. Though if I were you, I wouldn’t even think about handing over such a big business to someone else.”

  A “family business,” huh. Never thought about it that way. Jinto felt as though he’d been thrown a life vest. Jinto was an only child, so if he didn’t become the next count, then the Lin family line would terminate without ever accumulating much by way of tradition. But so what? Who exactly would cry over that? “You’re right. You’re absolutely right.”

  “I’m always right.” Durin suddenly pointed toward his toes. “Look right here. This is my first time at a spaceport. From up here, I think our planet looks really pretty, too.”

  It was then that Jinto realized the floor was projecting Delktu’s surface. A screen right around the same size as their round table was displaying video footage of the clouds drifting over the planet. The arnaigh (ARNEZH, geosynchronous orbital tower) bridging the surface and the spaceport tapered so thin it seemed a thread before getting sucked into the clouds, which gleamed with the light of their star, Vorlash.

  “Yeah. It is pretty.” It dawned on him that he’d never looked down upon the surface of his true home planet, Martinh. The realization surprised him a little.

  “By the way, how long’ve you been here? Five years?”

  “Nah, been here for seven.” Jinto looked back up at him. “The invasion of Hyde happened in I.H. 945 (Imperial History, Rüé-Coth ROOEH KOHTH).”

  “So you came here right after they invaded? Am I remembering that right?”

  “Yeah. I had no idea what was going on, they just shoved me on a frach (FRAHSH, traffic ship), and then whisked me away on a cargo passenger ship that was standing by in orbit. Let’s just say I learned what it felt like to be an animal dragged to a zoo.”

  “But you had a retinue, right?” Durin bought some surguc (SOORGOO, coffee) from a passing vending machine and handed Jinto a can. “Take it, on me.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Don’t worry about it. It feels good to treat a young master prince to a little something.”

  Jinto smiled. “So yeah, about my ‘retinue’ — there was nobody there for me. Or at least, nobody from Martinh.”

  “Whaaat? But that must’ve been a super raw deal. You were what, 10, back then?”

  “Yeah, I was 10.”

  “Whose bright idea was it to send a 10-year-old kid alone to a star system dozens of light-years away?”

  “Yep. So one of the stewardesses on the cargo passenger ship became a full-time attendant for me. I think she must’ve been asked to do so by my father. She took care of me in lots of ways, including bringing food to my cabin.”

  “Wow, sounds swanky.” Durin looked a tad envious. “Must’ve been some high-class space travel.”

  “It wasn’t.” He grimaced at the memories of that time. “Not least ‘cause I couldn’t talk to anybody. There weren’t any translation devices that could speak my home language then. She somehow managed by using a translation device for Ancient English...”

  “Wait a sec. What’s ‘Ancient English’?”

  “My home language is descended from Ancient English. But it’s not like I ever learned Ancient English, and now I’m way out of practice with my Martinese. It’s unintelligible to me.”

  “So it’s just like Baronh.” The majority of Delktunians couldn’t understand Baronh, and Durin was no exception.

  “Yeah, for the most part. Not that I really felt like chatting anyway. Aboard that ship, I kept quiet. I didn’t even take a single step outside my cabin.”

  “Was that stewardess Abh?”

  “No, I think she was a rüé-laimh (ROOEH LEF, citizen of the Empire), since she had black hair. Must’ve been from a nahainec (NAH’HEN, terrestrial world) somewhere. But that didn’t matter to me then. They were a crew of invaders to me.”

  “Heh heh, if she’d been Abh, I’ve got a feeling you might’ve gotten attached to her.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “C’mon, you know how they say Abhs are all lookers. Guys and ladies alike! I don’t care how young you are, you’d be all about playing nice when a gorgeous young woman comes along.”

  “Come on, dude.” Jinto became somewhat huffy. “When I look back, I can’t help thinking I did wrong by her. I mean, she even went so far as getting off the ship to do my paperwork so I could enroll in school. And despite that, I don’t even know her name. She probably did introduce herself, but her name was buried in heaps of either Baronh or Ancient English, both of which were babble to me.”

  “Huh. Well, whatever. By now, that stewardess has gotta be middle-aged anyhow. Unlike Abhs, us Landers are just gonna keep aging.”

  “For god’s sake, is that the only way you can think about people? I’m trying to express my earnest gratitude to her as a person...”

  “Yeah-huh,” said Durin, trying to pacify him. “No matter what, I only ever think about pulling in the chicks.”

  “Good grief,” Jinto readily agreed. “You’re the type that honestly believes that any old person in the crowd that passes you by is the love of your life. It doesn’t matter how tenuous the connection is, you never lose time trying to get in super-cozy with her.”

  “Okay, first of all, I don’t just fall for ‘any old person.’ She’s gotta be cute, obviously. Second of all, I never think of her as the ‘love of my life.’ I just want her to be with me for a single night, in fact.”

  “Hah!” Jinto clapped. “So what’s your success rate?”

  “A lot higher than you think, pal.”

  “Oh really? I’ve only ever seen you take out a girl once. Plus, according to what I heard when I asked about it afterwards, that girl was your little sister.”

  “Fine, then what do you think my success rate is?”

  “Zero.”

  “Look. Compared to zero times, one time is infinitely huge.”

  “What?” Jinto looked taken aback. “Don’t tell me you’re into... you know...”

  “Quit it. I’m trying to tell you I’ve won the heart of a maiden that’s not my sister.”

  “But just the once, huh?”

  “More than once!” Durin fumed. “You just happened to never be around.”

  “That so? Hey, I’m willing to chalk it up to that for the time being.”

  “Oh man, you can’t face reality, can you? Talk about averting your eyes from the truth. If I score with the ladies, what’s it to you?” Then, Durin looked as though something had suddenly occurred to him. “Ah, could it be!? Are you
actually into... you know...”

  “That’ll be enough of that.” Jinto knew Durin was just firing back, so he took it lightly. “I’ll have you know I’m a devout follower of the Hetero way. And no matter how thirsty I become, my faith shall hold strong. I will neither woo nor romance you.”

  “I’m fine with it, honestly.” Durin’s eyes clung to him.

  “If you liked me, you should’ve confessed to me sooner. Oh yeah, we’ve still got time. Let’s take a moment, before we part ways, to verify our romantic feelings...”

  “In full view of all these people?”

  “You think public view is any obstacle so long as you’ve got love?”

  “You are surprisingly unrelenting, you know that. It makes me wonder whether you might secretly be a ‘pagan’ yourself.”

  “Don’t be silly.” Durin dropped the gag. “‘Cause if you’re a devout Hetero, then I’m a crazed Hetero fundamentalist extremist.”

  “Oh, I know.” Jinto drank the rest of his coffee and tossed the paper cup into the receptacle in the middle of the table. “Thanks again for the drink.”

  “You don’t need to thank me for a coffee, young master noble.” Durin laid down the sick burn and, upon casting a fleeting glance to his right, gave the back of Jinto’s hand a little poke.

  “What is it?”

  “Have a look.”

  Jinto followed Durin’s line of sight. Sitting by an adjacent table was a middle-aged woman with brown skin. She was taking an interest in his strange combination of brown hair and noble attire so visibly that she was practically boring a hole in him.

  If I were a real Bar simh (BAR SEEF, Abh noble), thought Jinto, how would I react in this moment? Would he have shouted at her, called her “insolent”? Would he have steadfastly ignored her? Or would he have shot her dead without a word?

  But what Jinto ended up doing instead was flash her an ingratiating smile.

  The middle-aged lady looked away slightly, as though she’d seen something she shouldn’t have.

  Jinto breathed a sigh.

  “That old lady’s hot for you, man. I’m jealous. You’re an old-ladykiller. I’ve got half a mind to stick your face over my own...”

  “That’s not it. She was staring ‘cause a Lander wearing the garb of an imperial noble is as rare as a dog using gréc (GREH, chopsticks).

  “But you’re really getting somewhere, buddy boy. For a Lander, that is.”

  “I guess,” Jinto admitted.

  Durin had a question for him. “Hey, I’ve only ever seen them on holovision — are Abhs really that attractive?”

  Jinto cocked his head. “Couldn’t tell ya.” “I myself haven’t ever seen an Abh in the flesh.”

  “But didn’t you attend an Abh school?”

  “Wha—?” Jinto realized that his friend had been under a misconception. “Wow, I barely ever talked about my school life, did I? So get this: There isn’t a single Abh at the Abh Linguistic and Cultural Institute I went to. It’s all about educating candidates for naturalization as imperial citizens, and there are a lot of former imperial citizens among the faculty. The founders and principal went out there, and then came back. In other words, they’re soss (SOHS, territorial citizens) of the Countdom of Vorlash that were formerly imperial citizens. Mind you, it’s not as though the Empire and the Countdom of Vorlash are linked in some special way; in the end, it’s a private school under the jurisdiction of the Vorlash territorial government’s Ministry of Education.”

  “I see. I took it for granted that it was an imperial academy.”

  “You think Abhs would throw any of their coin at a surface school?”

  “When you put it that way, I guess not.” Durin angled his head to the side in puzzlement. “But then, why did you come to Delktu? Shouldn’t they have you taken you to an Abh school right off the bat? It’s not like learning Delktunian’s gonna do you much good, right?”

  “Abhs don’t go to elementary school. I’d have had to enroll in an institute of higher education, as a kid who was neither a prodigy nor understood any Baronh.”

  “For real? Then how do Abhs learn to read and write?”

  “Their parents teach them.”

  Jinto recounted secondhand the info he’d learned in school. Abh society was aristocratic in nature, and so much weight was placed on each family’s ghédairh (JEDERR, family traditions). In order to pass on those family traditions, parents needed to personally provide their children with an education. Apparently, the Abh thought it outrageous to allow children, whose personalities were not yet sufficiently concrete, to spend a significant amount of time under a stranger.

  During their children’s infancies, Abhs gave the task of educating them their undivided attention. Nobles with territories hired tosairh (TOHSEHRR , local magistrates), and even gentry took leaves of absence from their work duties, all in the effort to make their heirs more fit for the task.

  Moreover, to transmit knowledge that the parent themselves had forgotten, they had onoüaréïréc (OHNOWAHRE’EEREH, mechanical teachers), as well as trips to camp for imparting group-living experiences.

  “If you think about it the way they do, I’ve received a really warped education,” said Jinto. “My father is the Count of Hyde, but there’s no way he can be there to teach me the Abh way, so he thought at the very least he could have me learn Baronh and all the common knowledge stuff. That’s why he dropped me at the nearest school for imperial citizenship aspirants.”

  “And so it’s been seven years since then,” Durin chuckled. “I thought you were smart, but it turns out you’re not that brainy.”

  “I had to study and pick up material that was age-appropriate, so it took me all of that first half-year or so and a ton of sweat to learn Delktunian. For one, most of the students there were Delktunians.”

  “‘Course they were. The only folks who’d study abroad on a territory-country out on the outskirts like Vorlash are country yokels.”

  “You oughta say stuff like that only after I’ve returned home. Not even Delktu’s most amazing architecture can hold a candle to Martinh’s hybrid-functionality structures,” said Jinto in defense of his home.

  “Not even this orbital tower?” asked Durin. He was so unfazed it was obnoxious.

  Durin had hit a sore spot. As the latest news had it, there still weren’t even any prospects for the construction of an orbital tower on Martinh due to anti-Abh sentiment, despite the fact that every other inhabited planet within the Empire had one. To ride a spaceship there, one still had to rely on dangerous and costly traffic vessels. Even so, it seemed there were almost no candidates for space travel.

  “C’mon, it’s not impressive, it’s just stupidly huge,” said Jinto, straining to come up with a comeback.

  “Sure.” Durin didn’t rebut. He leaned his right elbow against the back of his seat. “Hey, that old lady’s staring at you again.”

  “Must be this dumb hair.” Jinto combed up his hair. He was fed up.

  Abhs kept their hair within tones of blue. However, “tones of blue” was an oversimplification; in reality, the colors they deemed appropriate for hair varied within the range of green to purple, to say nothing of all the different shades thereof. That said, brown hair was out of the question.

  “You should’ve gotten it dyed. Should be easy enough.”

  “Nah, though I did think about it...”

  “Why not, then?”

  “For starters, I was afraid I’d sort of delude myself into thinking I was a real Abh. I technically am legally, but genetically I’m a Lander.”

  “‘For starters’? So, there’s more where that came from,” pressed Durin.

  “Yeah, though I guess the only other reason is I’m stubborn. I may’ve stumbled into being an imperial noble by some cosmic mistake, but I don’t want people thinking I’m pleased about it.”

  “Gotcha.” Durin leaned over the table, his expression unusually serious. “You know, about what you were saying before... if you wann
a call it quits on the noble thing, then I’d stand by you, no problem. This is your last chance, isn’t it?”

  “It’s not my last chance,” said Jinto. “I can withdraw from the aristocracy at any time.”

  “Why not do it now, then? Is it ‘cause they’ll stop sending you your allowance?”

  “That’s one reason.”

  “I can look after you; just gotta get you a job, that’s all.”

  Jinto was shocked. “But you’re still in school!”

  “Yeah, but even kids in school’ve got their contacts. I know a manager who appreciates the position of low-income students. I won’t beat around the bush; he’s my uncle. Besides, you’re smart — you could get a government scholarship.”

  “It’s all right. Thank you,” said Jinto. “I want to see the world of the Abh with my own eyes. I want to see how the people who invade and reign over us live their lives.”

  “Guess that could be fine, too.” Durin shook his head, as if to call him eccentric in his curiosity.

  “Besides,” Jinto continued, “You’re the only one who came to see me off.”

  “That’s... uhh...” His friend had suddenly turned rather inarticulate.

  “All the kids who hung out with me, were chums with me, back when I was just ‘Lin Jinto’... they all flew off the minute they found out that I’d omitted the bit between my family name and my given name.” You’re the only one who forgave me for misrepresenting my identity. If I’m to ever live as a territorial citizen, I’d want to live right here on Delktu. But that requires giving things time to cool down.”

  “It was a great opportunity to find out who your real friends are.” He smiled a weak smile. A smile that didn’t suit his typical self.

  “It really was,” Jinto agreed gratefully. “If and when I come back, I might come to you for guidance.”

  “You got it. Leave it all to me.” Durin puffed his chest out in pride. “When I’m out of school, I plan to form a business. And I’m gonna work you to the bone when you’re back here as a low-grade employee of mine. I’ll even use you in an ad while I’m at it. I can see it now: ‘Our company is staffing a former imperial noble!’”