Prologue 0-1: Shirley Madagascarwel Blood
Shirley, a researcher for planet Estashion’s governmental research agency, was heading back to her room after finishing her day’s work.
“Whew... I’m so tired.”
She collapsed on the bed and stretched herself out to relieve the exhaustion that had built up over the course of the day. Thanks to complicated circumstances, she’d been working with the highest levels of government ever since she was a child, but this latest project was especially taxing.
“The director said that once this was done, our ideal world would become a reality, so I have to do my best. But still...”
She tried to get herself fired up again, but gave up halfway through.
She thought about going somewhere to refresh herself, and instantly a list of entertainment facilities and hangouts in the city popped up on one lens of her glasses. Of course, the information wasn’t actually displaying on the lens itself. The chip that was embedded in her brain was just receiving video information from the Estashionian government’s advertising department. It appeared to be displaying on her glasses because she’d set that as the default location, figuring it would be easier to see.
After silently browsing through several potential leisure spots, Shirley shut off the broadcast. She’d thought about it, but in the end, she just didn’t feel like going out.
And if she wasn’t going to go out, she had no choice but to do something at home. It was a tall order considering there was nothing except for furniture in her room. Maybe she didn’t really have any hobbies, but given that that was just the peculiar way she’d been brought up, it was hard not to feel sorry for her. Not that there was anyone around to sympathize.
“Hahh... Hm?”
She reached under her bed unconsciously, and her fingers touched something soft. Curious, she pulled it out to see that it was an old doll of hers.
“Wow... this brings back memories.”
It was the one toy she’d been allowed as a child. Long ago in a white room just like this one, it was her only playing companion.
“Okay, Garnet, let’s trade rings,” a younger Shirley had said.
“Okay... Shirley,” the doll, Garnet, had answered in a faltering voice.
Shirley had taken the ring in the doll’s palm and exchanged it for the one she’d been holding.
“Heehee! Okay, now let’s seal the promise with a kiss.”
“Okay... Shirley.”
“...Mua.”
Shirley had kissed the doll’s cheek and sworn to love it forever. That was the memory that replayed in her head as she toyed with the doll’s hands now.
“Garnet never learned to be good at talking, did she?”
The doll’s brain was loaded with a memory accumulation AI that Shirley had developed. It was an artificial intelligence that learned different types of thought patterns via experience, and Shirley played with it to help it learn. At least, that’s the excuse she’d given. In fact, she’d just wanted a doll back then, and she’d created the AI to justify owning one. Of course, a quickly maturing child like Shirley soon graduated from playing house.
I was so lonely by myself back then, wasn’t I?
That was why she’d made Garnet. She’d wanted a friend.
But now that Shirley had grown up—though she was still only 16—and she wasn’t shorter than the adults anymore, she could talk to them normally. She had a lot of coworkers at the lab. She interacted with them almost every day, arguing with them about the current project or doing research with them...
“Hahh...”
I guess I still don’t have any friends...
“...Oh?”
As she was playing with the doll, she realized its pocket was bulging a little. She slipped her finger inside to find a pair of toy rings.
“Eternal love, huh?”
She still had no idea if such a thing even existed, much less for someone like her. Someone who wasn’t normal. But even so, at least...
“If the ideal world becomes real... maybe I can make a friend...”
She pressed her face against the pillow as she whispered those words. Nobody heard them. They simply echoed off the walls of the sterile, white room.
Prologue 0-2: Fam
An apprentice crewmember of the space pirates called the Seageists was cleaning the decks of their ship. This girl—Fam—was doing it the old-fashioned way, plunging a mop into a bucket filled with soapy water and swabbing the floor manually. These days, even pirates could get their hands on the cleaning robots that were everywhere in the Galactic Federation. Robots could clean the ceilings and walls just as easily as they could the floors, and they could keep the ship cleaner than any human could. It was actually inefficient to have Fam do it. This was simply her punishment for doing something stupid.
“Damn it!”
Fam panted heavily for a moment as she leaned on her mop. She’d only been tasked with cleaning the living quarters, but even after an hour’s work, she felt like she was no closer to being done.
“Why! Do! I! Have! To...!”
With each over-emphasized word, she jerked the mop back and forth as rage and resentment flared in her eyes.
The hell’s gotten into the boss, anyway?
Fam was thinking of the face of the captain of the Seageists, Squallow Low. She didn’t know exactly what his face looked like, however, because he always covered it with a huge mask. After a grievous injury a long time ago, he’d become a full-body cyborg. The process had given him the ability to fight for dozens of hours at a time, but it also meant he couldn’t go about his daily life without the help of machines. He needed the mask to help him see and hear, which was why Fam had never seen his real face.
But despite his gruff, scary looks, Fam could always sense the strength and kindness in his eyes. Maybe that was how she’d been able to tell that something wasn’t quite right with Squallow lately.
She silently contemplated the matter.
Fam was once a homeless girl on a planet in an isolated corner of the universe. Theft, violence, starvation, discrimination... Those awful things were her daily life. There was never a hero to save her, until one day, she was indeed saved. It just wasn’t a hero. In fact, it was the opposite. A pirate.
He told her his name was Captain Squallow, and then he said to her, “From now on, you’re family.” For the first time, there was light in her life.
I’d do anything for the boss. But why attack a planet like that? And why for some silly “treasure”?
Several hours ago, Squallow had gathered his crew together like he always did and told them all about their next attack. They were going to raid a certain planet and steal a treasure that slept there—something normal space pirates did all the time. Pirates took lives and treasures for their own pleasure. That was the life of a pirate. Lawless roguery.
But the Seageists were different. At least, that’s what Fam had thought. This new plan wasn’t how they used to do things. That’s why she’d made it clear she was against it.
And the result of her dissent was that she was now stuck swabbing the decks. Given that the captain had absolute power aboard the ship, as far as punishments went, she’d gotten off easy. But she was still upset on a very deep level.
Barely any of the other leaders tried to stop the boss.
Fam recalled the almost unnatural silence after the captain had given his orders. Something was wrong with the Seageists. And Fam was scared of it.
“Fam.”
“Wah!”
A sudden voice snapped her out of her moody thoughts, startling her enou
gh that she accidentally kicked her bucket over in surprise. The dirty water sloshed over the floor. Now she’d have to clean it all over again.
“Who the hell...? Uh-oh.”
She turned around angrily, only to be met with a woman in a suit. The sight seemed very out of place on a pirate ship. This was the “secretary” that Squallow had hired about a year ago... or something like that. It was odd for a pirate to hire a secretary, but Squallow was more than just a pirate. He also provided an education for the orphans he picked up, distributed the Seageists’ booty, took care of the complaints and arguments that were always coming up from the crew’s families, and plenty of other things. He had a full plate. That’s why he’d found this woman—or more precisely, female android—to help him out. But for some reason, Fam didn’t like her.
“...Do you need something?” Fam asked.
“I have a message from the captain: Enough cleaning. Get ready for the job.”
The job, of course, was piracy. And by “get ready,” he meant getting the weapons cleaned and prepped, among other things.
“Understood.”
“That’s all I have for you,” the secretary said. She then left as quickly as she’d come.
Fam watched her go with a glare, then started to pick up her cleaning tools once she was sure the secretary was gone.
Even looking in those damn eyes of hers, I can never figure out what she’s thinking.
Since she was an android, there was no probably no helping that part, but Fam knew there had to be some reason she felt this way.
I don’t like her!
Fam frustratedly kicked the empty bucket as hard as she could. Droplets of dirty water flew everywhere, but since the bucket was mostly empty now, it didn’t make things much worse than they already were.
Prologue 0-3: Rain Waterchild
It was a mere 50 years ago that planet Berano was registered to the Galactic Federation. Ninety percent of Berano’s surface was covered in water. It was a peaceful, oceanic planet of perpetual summer. That is, it was until the arrival of space invaders changed everything.
As beautiful as it was, humble Berano was not a particularly developed planet, and the aliens with their vast technological superiority almost drove its inhabitants to extinction. Berano lacked resources, but just being a planet full of beautiful merfolk made it a target. And so, survival on Berano meant that there was a cruel decision to be made...
Ryugu Palace. The ocean floor of Berano.
Rain Waterchild, the merfolk princess, was at the top of the palace’s tallest tower, flipping through an old, well-worn picture book.
“...The red fish and the blue fish, who were best friends, were thus separated.”
It was a book her mother, Queen Muse, used to read to her all the time when she was little.
“The red fish prince and the blue fish princess swore they would meet again someday. The prince kept their promise in his heart as he took his people to another place. The princess also kept their promise in her heart as she watched him go. They both longed for the day when they would see each other once more.”
And that was the end of the story. It was a sad ending.
“...Is this really how a story’s supposed to end?”
Rain slammed the book shut. Her long, elegant eyebrows drooped as she then looked down at the town below the castle.
It was called Ryugu Palace City. It was now a developed resort destination, but the town she’d loved for so long had only become that way after Berano had registered with the Galactic Federation. The merfolk had originally just lived in the sea, but now they inhabited an undersea city surrounded by a pressurized dome. It was a popular tourist spot that offered all kinds of services and entertainment for visitors. The merfolk dance in particular was the most popular draw in the city.
Even Rain’s home, Ryugu Palace, had been turned into a high-class inn befitting such a resort. Only the highest floor of the palace where the royal family lived had been spared. Rain herself wasn’t old enough to work yet, but eventually she would have to help her mother run things.
That was how much Berano had changed. Rain didn’t think that change was a bad thing, but the decision that Berano... the decision that her mother had made to bring about that change was a cruel one. That’s how it seemed to her, especially looking over the city now.
“There you are, Rain.”
“Mother...”
Her mother appeared at the entrance of her room almost as if Rain’s thoughts had summoned her.
Muse was the queen of the merfolk, and she was the most beautiful of them all. Of course, Rain had inherited that beauty. But in her current mood, that beauty seemed terribly tainted to her.
“What’s wrong...?” Muse began to say, but she pursed her lips when she saw the book in Rain’s hands. “Never mind. I won’t ask.”
Today was a study day. Rain was supposed to be learning history. Today was the day she would learn what happened to planet Berano before she was born. Her mother knew all that.
“Mother, why... why did you make such an awful decision?”
“There was no other way for this planet to survive,” Muse answered. Her voice was resolute.
But Rain still couldn’t accept it.
“But... But wasn’t there anything else you could do?”
“Perhaps there was.”
“Then...!”
“There’s always some small possibility there’s another way, but that doesn’t affect the choices you have to make.” Muse walked over to Rain and looked her dead in the eye. “We chose what we thought was the best decision at the time. But if you think that what was the best choice for us wasn’t the best choice for you, then find another answer.”
“Another answer?”
“Our choice was to protect. Even if we couldn’t protect everything, we chose to protect as much as we could. And even now, we’re following the path we chose with all the strength we have.”
“...”
In her mind, Rain took several steps back, overwhelmed by her mother’s unwavering expression. But in reality, her feet were as unmoving as if they’d been sewn to the floor. All she could do was look back at her mother.
“Rain, you are my daughter. Your decisions will have a great effect on this planet and on the people who live here. If you remember nothing else, remember that. Only then will you be able to choose the path you walk, whether that’s following in my footsteps or looking for another way.”
“...”
Even as her mother left, Rain stood frozen in place.
Think...
She repeated what her mother had said back to herself.
That’s right... Even if it was cruel, Mother chose to protect this planet. It’s easy to criticize her, but criticism alone isn’t a resolution.
Berano had a sad past, and its history had been carved by the hands of her mother. So what was she, her mother’s daughter, supposed to do? What was important was to think, choose, and then act.
Rain silently looked back down at the picture book in her hands. What was it that she’d said to her mother when she’d read it to her as a child?
“Don’t worry, Mommy.”
“Hm?”
“Even if the prince and the princess never see each other again... If that happens, then I’ll just find the prince and bring him to the princess.”
“...I see. Then if that day comes, I’ll ask for your help, okay?”
“Okay!”
Prologue 1
“A planet of eternal summer?”
“That’s right. It’s called Berano, and the sea there is really pretty.”
It was the week after the school pool opened when Iris suggested we go swimming.
“But why swimming? We just went swimming in the school pool today.”
“That pool’s so small, though.”
“Is it?”
The school pool was 25 meters long and had seven swimming lanes. It didn’t seem small to me at all.
; “I can swim from end to end in three seconds.”
“Oh, so that’s it.”
Iris was from Finerita, a planet where everyone was super strong. A normal Earth pool wasn’t good enough for her, it seemed.
“So let’s go swimming in the sea this weekend!” she said.
“The sea, huh?”
It was only halfway through June, but the weather had definitely been muggy over the past few days. I couldn’t deny swimming would feel great. Iris said it was always summer on this planet she was talking about, and I certainly didn’t hate the idea of getting an early taste of the season for myself.
“Hm, okay. Yeah. Take me with you to the sea.”
“Yay!”
Iris began to hop up and down happily. She then whipped around towards the seat next to mine.
“So, Satsuki, are you coming?”
“You’re inviting me? Really?” Satsuki looked up at Iris, a little surprised.
“You’d come whether I asked you to or not, right? You’ve been slowly leaning in towards us ever since I brought it up.”
Satsuki suddenly turned red, adjusted her posture (she had indeed been leaning towards us), and coughed.
Iris shrugged. “Well, if you want to come, you can. Of course, that’s only if you think you can beat me at the beach.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“Heh heh,” Iris chuckled a bit as she smiled provokingly. “Speaking of, Satsuki, how confident are you about your beach body?”
Satsuki gasped. Her eyes instantly widened and fixated on a certain part of Iris’s uniform... I won’t say where. And I definitely won’t say that I did the same thing. I mean it. Really.
“Tch! So that’s it... Fine. I accept your challenge!” Satsuki yelled.
“Just what I wanted to hear. I’ll show you once and for all which of us is number one,” Iris replied.
“So it’s finally time for the swimsuit episode, huh? I need to go defrag and free up some memory in my brain,” R added.
All of the girls, including R, were getting really worked up about this for some reason.
“Um, so... you’re inviting everybody?”
I Saved Too Many Girls and Caused the Apocalypse: Volume 5 Page 1
