4
The deepest point of the Empire, the Planet’s Navel.
Before he knew it, Crossweil had been working four thousand meters underground—a distance great enough to make him feel faint—for eleven whole days. As he’d gotten used to the work, everything around him had started to change, too.
He’d made friends with his coworkers.
“Morning, Crow! You look dead tired even though we’re just getting started for today!”
“I’ve had my hands full since morning dealing with my sisters…”
A brown-haired girl named Musha sprinted past him. She rivaled Eve as the smallest girl in the mining shaft and was just fourteen. She also happened to be the youngest out of all of them. According to her, she’d come to work in the Empire and strike out on her own after having a fight with her parents.
She was cheerful and talked about her story like none of the events had happened to her, keeping a positive perspective.
But then Eve came by next.
“Watch it, Crow. She’s nice to all the guys around here, regardless of who they are,” Eve warned.
“Hunh? I’m kind to everyone, not just the guys,” Musha shot back. “You’re the only one I don’t get along with, runt!”
“What?! You call me the runt?! You’re way smaller than me!”
Crossweil watched the exchange, feeling entertained.
“Aren’t they the best of friends?” Alicerose laughed under her breath. “All the kids working here are like that. It’s easy to talk to everyone since we’re all the same age, and we eat together, so it’s almost like we’re family. And that includes you now too, Crow.”
“…Alice, you’re not going to stop them?”
“Drake will stop them,” Alicerose said, and almost as though she had timed it, a loud clap echoed through the place as someone clapped their hands together.
“Time for the morning meeting. I have a special announcement for you all today,” said Drake, a brown-haired boy. He’d been working at the mines for three years. He was also their leader and was turning nineteen that year.
“You may see a guest in the afternoon. They will be observing the mines.”
“A guest?” Eve opened her eyes wide and looked puzzled. “What are they coming for? Who are they?”
“A special observation team. All I’ve heard is that it’s someone very high up in the Empire, so even Lavitch has been nervous since morning. I think they must be very important.”
“Heh… The kind of person I hate the most, then.”
“We received an order for this afternoon,” Drake continued. “Once we’re called, everyone present should stop working and gather here.”
Then they split up. A dozen or so of the miners returned to their posts. Crossweil, of course, was tasked with the job of carrying parts back and forth.
“…”
He looked up at the staggering drill that was separated by an imposing barricade. He had started to get a full picture of the machine over the last two weeks he had been working as a miner. And so…
“There’s definitely something off,” he said to himself.
“Hey, Crow, what’re you standing around doing nothing for?” Eve elbowed him from behind. “The leader’s nice, but if that yappy foreman sees you, you’ll be in for it. He’s already on edge from the inspection in the afternoon.”
“So, Eve, I was thinking…”
“Nobody wants to know what you think,” she said. “But I guess I’ll listen. What is it?”
“Is this really a mining facility?”
They were mining for iron ore. At least, that was the pretense for why they had gathered here, in the depths of the earth.
“I’ve never seen any ore being excavated. I asked Musha and Drake, and they haven’t seen it, either. Plus, Drake’s been here three years now.”
“…”
“Has anyone seen the ore at all?” Crossweil continued.
They were in the deepest part of the Imperial capital, the Planet’s Navel. Wasn’t the whole point of that to mine for ore?
“I’ve been wondering if we’ve really been digging for something else,” Crossweil said.
“Oh? Thinking like a little investigator, huh, Crow?” Eve gave a snort of laughter. “What good is it going wondering about such philosophical questions when we’re just the underlings?”
“You’ve never been curious, Eve?”
“Not really. I don’t care what we’re mining for. It could be oil or dinosaur bones, for all I know. We just dig down. Then we earn money. That’s all—” Eve cut herself off.
Just then, there was a commotion at the lift.
“Everyone gather round! Get into a line!” Lavitch’s voice rang out through the mining site.
“Oh, crap…it’s already time. This is such a chore,” Eve said, clucking her tongue as she ran off. The miners lined up, surrounding the lift. Once Crossweil arrived, everyone had already taken their positions.
“Wait right here and clap when you see the Crown Prince!”
“…The Crown Prince?”
“No way! As in the Lord’s son?”
Eve and Alicerose glanced at each other. Next to them, Musha and Drake looked bewildered, as they could have never imagined such an important guest would come.
Ting-a-ling.
A lift descended from above their heads.
“The Crown Prince has arrived!”
“His Highness, Yunmelngen, is here to conduct a personal inspection. Everyone, applaud now!”
First, the escorts disembarked. Ten very burly men, each wearing suits, filed out. Behind them, the Crown Prince followed, his hair a bright blue and wearing a pristine white outfit.
“What the—?! Is he the real deal?!” Musha, who had shouted that out loud unintentionally, covered her mouth with her hands in a panic. It was unclear whether the Crown Prince had noticed.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” he said with a serene smile and clear voice.
He sounded like a boy soprano. There was an ambiguous note to his voice. It was almost as though it wasn’t quite clear whether he was a girl or a boy who had yet to reach puberty.
The same went for his features. His eyes were wide as a kitten’s, and his nose and lips were small. Though he had been presented as the Lord’s one and only son, here in front of them all today, the Crown Prince seemed like a delicate and sweet girl.
“There really is something elegant about him.”
“Hmph, I don’t know about that,” Eve huffed in response to Alicerose’s murmur. “Why does he look so dainty. He’s a guy. I can tell from his face he’s never done a lick of work in his life.”
“Do you think so?”
“Obviously,” Eve said. “He’s the Crown Prince. He’s not elegant—what you’re picking up on is the conceit written all over his face.”
“He might be cuter than you, Eve,” Alicerose commented.
“Really, Alice?”
Away from the two bickering twins, Crossweil was absentmindedly staring at the Crown Prince’s back as the foreman led him away.
…He’s inspecting this place?
…A single bit of ore hasn’t been dug up, though. What’s he coming to look at, then?
There were plenty of mines and excavation sites all around the Empire. From among all of them, why had he chosen this place?
“…”
One hour passed.
Even after the Crown Prince had finished his inspection and left for the surface, that question remained in Crossweil’s mind.
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