The lamp's flame flickered, and shadows crawled across the wall. The Prime Minister's office—a stone chamber with only a single lamp burning, casting orange light across the parchment. Mizuno Misaki had arranged the tenth volume of the Gais documents alongside three maps, but her pen now rested on the desk. The calculations weren't finished. She wasn't trying to finish them. Her hand had simply stopped moving. (The same numbers again.) Imperial scouts scattered across the Portos road. Supply line calculations. Encirclement in the valley. Remaining provisions from what Reon brought. No matter how she combined the figures, everything Misaki could do from the royal capital's office converged into a single point. Organize. Analyze. Wait for messengers. That was all. Was that really enough? Beyond the window overlooking Felthain's castle town, one lamp went dark. Then another. As the night deepened, the city's lights slowly dimmed. Misaki stared at the column of numbers written on the parchment. The line "Left to Valner" rose and fell in her mind. Gais—the Prime Minister's former advisor, the old man who had managed this nation's intelligence network for years—had left that name behind. But what did it mean? What had he entrusted? To whom? The only certainty was that no one named Valner existed anywhere in the current Prime Minister's office roster. She picked up the pen again. She tried to resume the calculations. She couldn't. (Why am I just staring at maps here?) The words escaped her lips. She hadn't even noticed. The stone walls absorbed her words like a whisper into the void. Misaki remained still for a moment. Then she stood, pulling the leather bag that sat beside her desk closer. She would go to Portos. She would move to a position where she could understand Reon's supply routes from the outside—the ones trapped in the valley. She would gather information directly from the field. She had exhausted what could be calculated from a desk in the royal capital. The next step was to get closer to the front. ...At least, that was the logic that made her feel capable of moving. She chose not to think about the other something deep in her chest. She opened the leather bag and began packing. First, a pen. Then a spare pen. An ink bottle. Then five sheets of parchment, six, seven. She folded the maps and added three more emergency sheets. The memory of the night before the death march in her previous life—stuffing a notebook and three pens into her bag—had transferred into her hands. A PM's instinct prioritized recording tools in a crisis. Food. Right, food. She searched for a bag of dried fruit, checked the shelf, and confirmed there were two hard loaves of bread. A water skin. As she tried to push them into the leather bag, it was already nearly full with pens and parchment. Misaki checked inside the bag. Parchment made up well over ninety percent of the contents. "...Preparations complete," she murmured, and felt her eyes clear slightly. She could carry the food in her hand. That would do. She extinguished the lamp and opened the door. Cold air from the corridor touched her cheek. She walked with quiet footsteps. The castle at night had minimal lighting, with only lamps placed at regular intervals along the corridor to illuminate the floor. Aira's room was at the end of the west wing. She knocked. Twice, a bit forcefully. Nothing happened for a while. She knocked again, this time with a slightly quicker rhythm. There was a sound—a clatter—and the door opened. Silver hair tumbled in disarray. The braid had come half undone, flowing over her shoulder to the front. Water-blue eyes blinked sleepily, saw Misaki's face, and blinked again. She wore only a jacket over her nightclothes, and her short sword was naturally left behind. "...Misaki-san?" Aira's voice was hoarse. She had definitely been asleep. "I'm going to Portos. I need your help borrowing a horse," Misaki said. Aira's eyes snapped awake instantly. The drowsy water-blue eyes widened, and she forgot to hold back her loosened silver hair, grabbing Misaki's shoulders with both hands. "What? Are you serious!?!?" Aira's voice rose. "Perfectly sane," Misaki replied. "Do you know what time it is? It's the middle of the night! The Portos road has imperial scouts——" "I'm aware. That's why I need to gather information." Aira froze, still gripping her shoulders. Her face showed the internal collision between her instincts as a guard and the reality before her. Misaki understood. This girl was now facing a situation that shook the very foundation of her guard duty: her charge was trying to head toward danger of her own volition. "If you lend me a horse, I'll go alone," Misaki said. "That's even worse!" "If you don't lend me one, I'll walk. Calculate which is safer in five seconds." Aira's mouth opened and closed. She was searching for a counterargument but couldn't find the words. Misaki took the opportunity to start walking. "Which way is the stable?" "Wait——please!" Aira called out behind her. There was a sound of hurried movement. --- On the north side of the castle, in the stable adjacent to the north barracks, there was one night attendant. A man in his thirties with an honest face, he blinked at the two figures who suddenly appeared. Misaki spoke in a calm tone, the leather bag tucked under her arm. "I am Mizuno, assistant to the Prime Minister. I need to borrow a horse for urgent intelligence gathering. If I cannot receive permission here and now, the situation could become significantly more problematic. Is that acceptable?" The stable hand looked at Misaki, then at Aira with her disheveled silver hair, then back at Misaki. "...I'll prepare two," he said quietly, and stood up. Aira came to stand beside Misaki. "That was underhanded," she whispered, her voice tinged with laughter. "If it's effective, there's no problem," Misaki replied. Two horses were brought out. Chestnut and black. Aira adjusted the saddles with practiced movements, glancing at Misaki. "Misaki-san, have you ever ridden a horse before——" "I haven't ridden one, but I understand the principle," Misaki said. "The principle...," Aira murmured. Aira started to say something, then stopped. After finishing with the saddles, there was a brief pause before she handed the reins to Misaki. "...Don't give up, even if you fall," Aira said quietly. Her voice wasn't a command as a guard, nor polite encouragement. It was simply what she wanted to say. Misaki looked at the black horse. The horse looked back at her. Its large eyes glowed faintly in the dim stable. (It has a friendly face.) That's what she thought. She would realize that judgment was wrong thirty minutes later. --- Aira mounted with grace. In one fluid motion, she was in the saddle, gently pulling the reins to calm the horse. Her silver hair flowed in the night breeze, and her sharp eyes as a guard scanned the surroundings. She sat on the horse as naturally as if it were her place to be. Misaki managed to mount on her third attempt. The first try, her left foot didn't reach the stirrup. The second time it did, but her body tilted dangerously to the other side. On the third attempt, Aira instructed, "Hold on a bit further forward," and Misaki finally settled into the saddle. They passed through Felthain's castle gates and onto the Portos road. The night air was cold, and the stone pavement gleamed in the moonlight. The first ten minutes weren't bad. Misaki focused on matching her body to the horse's walking rhythm, holding the reins neither too loose nor too tight. Aira rode slightly ahead, occasionally glancing back to check their pace. Portos harbor was about seventy kilometers northeast of Felthain; if they rode through the night, they could get close before dawn. (This might work. It's actually working.) The moment she thought that, the horse turned left. "...I wanted to go right," Misaki said. The horse continued left. She pulled the reins to the right. The horse ignored her and headed toward the grassy field on the left. "Why are you going left?" There was no answer. Of course not. Aira came back and corrected the way she held the reins. The horse finally returned to the road. After another ten minutes of progress, the horse slowed and began grazing on grass at the roadside. "This isn't feeding time," Misaki said. "You can't really tell a horse that...," Aira replied. "As a project member, it's showing minimal autonomy," Misaki said. Aira murmured "Project...member...?" with a confused expression. She adjusted the reins and started to say something, then stopped. About thirty minutes after they'd set out, they approached a thicket of low brush beside the road. The horse suddenly turned right. "Wait, now it's going right——" It charged straight into the brush. Thud. Misaki fell headfirst into the undergrowth. Dried leaves hit her face. The smell of earth filled her nostrils. As she stood up, brushing dirt from her arms, leaves fell one by one, two by two, three by three. Her hair was full of them. Her right cheek was covered in mud. The leather bag—she'd managed to keep hold of that. "Worse than the night before release," she muttered. The horse had returned to the road and was contentedly grazing. When Misaki approached, it lifted its head and began chewing the last dried leaf that had stuck to her hair. "Are you alright!?" Aira came running, having dismounted. She looked at Misaki's face, saw the mud, saw the horse eating the dried leaf. Her mouth trembled slightly. She was clearly holding back laughter. "You can laugh," Misaki said. Aira laughed while saying "I'm sorry," her shoulders shaking. After a moment, she said "Let me wipe that off," and produced a cloth. She gently wiped the mud from Misaki's cheek, her water-blue eyes serious as she checked for any remaining dirt. "I'll remount," Misaki said. "...I'll help," Aira replied. This time, she mounted on the first try. --- The night road continued. Felthain's lights faded into the distance, and dark forest pressed in on both sides of the road. Each time the moon hid behind clouds, visibility narrowed, and only the rhythmic sound of hoofbeats echoed. Misaki was gradually growing accustomed to the horse's movements. The trick of settling her weight into the saddle was beginning to sink into her body. A memory from her previous life surfaced. A late-night office. Progress reports piled high. A room lit only by the white glow of a display screen. Nights when she'd stayed alone to continue calculating. She hadn't been able to escape—or rather, she hadn't seen the option to escape. She'd simply remained there, stacking numbers. (Back then, I couldn't stop. I just didn't know how.) Tonight was different. She'd fallen, gotten covered in mud, had her hair eaten by a horse. Her appearance was terrible. But she was here by her own choice. She had decided to stand up from that chair in the royal capital. When she realized that, warmth bloomed in her chest. Within that warmth, Reon's voice mixed in. "I'll be back in three days." Those short words. The moment before leaving the castle gate, when he'd turned back. His golden eyes. The color of his gaze when he'd started to say something but didn't. Her hand unconsciously touched her mud-covered cheek. There was still a spot Aira hadn't quite wiped clean. (This is a work-related judgment. To confirm the supply lines——) That excuse felt thin tonight. Every time his golden eyes surfaced in her mind, her chest tightened. The voice saying "I'll be back in three days" echoed somewhere distant. She already knew this wasn't "work-related trust." She'd simply refused to acknowledge it. Her face grew even warmer. The mud was no excuse for that. Beside her, Aira quietly watched Misaki's profile in the darkness. Aira said nothing. She simply faced forward and urged the horse onward. Her back seemed to be smiling slig