File 04- Our Last Crusade or the Undefeatable Big Sister
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The witch’s paradise—aka the Nebulis Sovereignty—was a nation of people who possessed supernatural energy called astral power.
One day in the royal palace…
“Yes, I’m enjoying this brush!” Alice yelled with vigor, a paintbrush in her hand.
Aliceliese Lou Nebulis IX.
Her brilliant golden hair and charming face were her most striking features. The enemy Imperial forces were terrified of her and had dubbed her the Ice Calamity Witch, but in her regular life, the moniker hardly suited her.
At the moment, Alice was…
“Oh! Aha!”
…passionately wielding a paintbrush.
However, she wasn’t painting so much as pummeling the canvas, as though the brush were her weapon.
“Sir, how is this?!” she exclaimed.
“Oh? You seem to be even more enthusiastic with your brushes today than normal, Princess Alice.”
A court painter stroked his beard as he approached her. He was her art instructor.
This was a painting lesson, which was fitting for a princess, as she needed to be cultured.
Yet a moment later, Alice stopped in her tracks. She was no longer flailing her brush around.
“How odd…”
She raised her head. Her eyes met a houseplant, which was presumably her subject.
“Sir, I have a question about something I don’t understand.”
“What is it, Princess Alice?”
“I’m motivated, and I have a zeal for using my paintbrush, and I’m even working under the instruction of a court painter. These should be the perfect conditions to paint.”
“Yes, you’re quite right.”
“But this piece of mine…”
Her canvas looked nothing like the plant she was trying to paint.
Instead, she had depicted something resembling an eldritch horror crawling over a table using its green tentacles. It was straight from a horror movie.
……Why does it look like this?
Alice was sure she had been painting a houseplant showered in radiant sunlight.
“Oh? Oh my!” However, her instructor seemed to be genuinely ecstatic when he glanced at her work. “Princess Alice, you’ve improved yet again! Look at this novel and unique use of color and brushstrokes. You’ve completely deconstructed the original shape of the houseplant so that it’s unrecognizable…now this is creative. No layperson could hope to express such artistic talent!”
Alice, however, remained silent.
“Oh, what is it, Lady Alice?”
“I feel so very conflicted…”
Though Alice appreciated the compliments for her creativity, she had wanted to create a more naturalistic painting.
“Sir, I was trying to…take a more photorealistic approach with this piece.”
“Hmm. I believe that the best path forward would be to nurture your creative tendencies, Lady Alice.”
The man cleared his throat. “All right. Well, if I am to provide some concrete advice, let us start with this grotesque tentacle here—”
“That’s the plant.”
“Oh, pardon me. Now, Lady Alice, the way to obtain photorealistic quality to your art is to focus on shadow. For example…the shadow of a houseplant would take dark green with a touch of blue blended in. Then the areas where the sun strikes the leaf would require a bit of yellow—”
The instructor launched into an impassioned lecture.
But was that all true? If she just gave it some shadows and adjusted the colors, would this tentacle monster really start to look like a houseplant? She felt like something was off about her piece on an even more fundamental level. It was like she was entirely missing some quality that was indispensable to painting.
“This really isn’t going well for me. Oh, right. How are you doing, Sisbell?”
She remembered that her little sister was with her and turned to face her.
A total of two students were attending the art lesson. Alice, the Sovereignty’s second princess, was one of them. The other was the third princess, Sisbell. Her little sister was also currently practicing. Unlike Alice, she was incredibly quiet and was only dabbing her paintbrush.
But how was her canvas looking?
Alice wanted to see.
“Sisbell, how is your painting? Is it progressing along?” she asked nonchalantly.
She would just take a tiny peek. The moment she stole a glance, however…
“What is this?!” She was absolutely shocked. Alice’s eyes went wide when she saw her little sister’s work. “S-Sisbell, this painting is…”
“Hmm. This really isn’t going well for me. I haven’t tried my hand at art in some time, and I’m afraid I’m out of practice. Oh? What is it, dear sister?”
Her sister turned to her.
Sisbell Lou Nebulis.
She had striking strawberry blond hair and charming features. Because her features still had a girlish quality, she looked adorable, almost doll-like.
“Oh, you were asking about my painting? I’m embarrassed to say that it’s been so long that I’ve become terrible at painting.”
“Terribly good, you mean…”
“What?”
“Oh, uh, nothing!” Alice quickly lost all nerve to look at her sister’s canvas and turned away.
……What is with that?!
……She’s way too good at this!
Sisbell had perfectly captured the vivacious green of the houseplant and the faintly warm sunlight filtering through the curtains. It was a perfectly traditional painting.
By comparison, Alice’s was a garish collection of tentacles.
“Hmm… You’re pretty good, Sisbell, I must say. Yes, quite passable. It looks like the instructor really helped you.”
“So how is your painting then, Alice?”
“What?”
She froze. When her little sister looked at her with curiosity, Alice backed away.
“You saw my painting, so I’d like to see yours as well.”
“What? I-I’m still working on it. It’s…a draft.”
“Then I’d like a peek.”
“N-no, Sisbell! It’s still—”
Before Alice could stop her, Sisbell picked up the canvas.
She stared hard enough to bore holes through the painting. And then…
“Pfft…”
“Did you just laugh?! You just laughed, didn’t you?!”
“Of course not. I was just so deeply moved… Hee-hee. Pfft!”
As she said that, Sisbell didn’t even bother to hide her pitying smile.
“Good gracious…it’s quite a piece of work, though. Now, what are these green tentacles here? They’re quite grotesque and eerie to look at. In fact, they look slightly obscene.”
“Obscene?!”
“You don’t mean to tell me these are meant to be the plant’s leaves? I’m so very jealous of your originality.”
“Grrrr?!”
She had made a big miscalculation. Alice hadn’t thought her sister would be so good at traditional painting.
“Uh, um, if I may, Princess Alice and Princess Sisbell? I think it’s wonderful you each have your own styles—” As the instructor tried to mediate, Alice cut him off and pointed at her sister.
“I challenge you to a battle, Sisbell! If you think you can look down on me just because of a single canvas, you’ve made a huge mistake!”
“So what would you like to do?”
“I haven’t shown you what I’m truly capable of. And it seems that you still need an education in culture and art befitting a true princess.”
“A true princess? Ha-ha! Are you saying that you are a true princess, Alice?” Sisbell was confident. The slight girl proudly thrust out her chest. “Yes, you do have something amazing, Alice. I don’t have the strong astral powers you do, so I can’t fight on a battlefield, and I am somewhat jealous of your shamelessly well-developed bust, but—”
“What about my bust is shameless?!”
“However! When it comes to being a princess, you cannot beat me in anything. I, the Third Princess Sisbell, have the true qualities befitting a princess!”
“Well, now you’ve said it.”
As she hid her canvas behind her, Alice faced her sister head-on.
Her little sister was actually cute. She was as sweet as a kitten. Even her mischievous smile had its charms.
But none of that mattered now that she had challenged her.
“It’s a duel, Sisbell! With our pride as princesses at stake!”
“A battle to show who is the true princess! That’s exactly what I needed.”
“I’ll show you that no little sister can surpass her big sister!” Alice declared.
“Hee-hee. But there’s one right here who has.”
Sparks flew between the two siblings.
But just as the battle between the second and the third daughters began, there was a light knock at the door.
“Alice, Sisbell, are you in here?” A clear voice was followed by a woman of incomparable beauty. The most striking aspects about her were her lustrous emerald hair and her bosom, which was even larger than Alice’s.
“Elletear?!”
“Sister, what are you doing here?!”
Alice and Sisbell both shouted in surprise simultaneously.
“It’s been quite some time. I’m glad to see you’re doing well.” The woman smiled.
Elletear Lou Nebulis. She was the first princess—in other words, the oldest daughter making up the trio of sisters.
“S-Sister…!” Sisbell faltered. After the big show she had put on for Alice, she looked intimidated. “Sister, I thought that you were campaigning overseas…”
“I’m finished with that, so I’ve come home. I heard you were here in the art room, so I thought I would visit you.”
She smiled, then she shifted her attention to the instructor behind them.
“Well, if it isn’t Michelandaro the painter.”
“Y-you know my name?!”
“Of course I do.”
“It is an honor. You look ever more beautiful, Lady Elletear!”
“Ha-ha, you’re too kind.”
Charmed by Elletear’s looks, the painter turned into a fawning mess. Yes, this was their older sister, Elletear. Within the Sovereignty, she had looks that were rumored to rival a goddess’s, and it was said she could easily make any man fall for her. Alice and Sisbell simply couldn’t compare.
“So, Alice, Sisbell.” Elletear turned to face them. “You were shouting earlier. It doesn’t do well to fight.”
“We weren’t fighting,” Sisbell replied instantly. “We’re staking our pride on a duel. It’s a very noble venture.”
“And how will you go about doing that?”
“We will be competing to see who is the better princess.”
“Hee-hee…” In that moment, there was something ominous about Elletear’s graceful laugh. “Well, that sounds fun.”
“Elletear?”
“All right then.” She clapped her hands and beamed as she declared, “Then how about I participate?”
“What?!”
“W-wait, sister!”
Neither Alice nor Sisbell could believe her ears. Hold on. This wasn’t good. A formidable opponent had just entered the arena.
“Please wait, Elletear! This was a personal duel between Alice and me… So, um…”
“Sisbell? You really should share the fun,” Elletear smoothly dismissed her. “Oh, I know. We can ask the ministers to be the judges and have the queen and our people spectate.”
“B-but, Elletear!”
“Sisbell.” A glint flashed in Elletear’s eyes. “Didn’t you just say that you have the qualities of a true princess? I believe that’s what I heard.”
“You were listening to us?!”
They had touched on her pride as the eldest. Forget letting sleeping dogs lie—they’d prodded a dragon awake. By the time they realized it, it was already too late.
“I—I was just saying it because of what Alice said first…”
“Sisbell! Don’t put the blame on me!”
“Well, I’m looking forward to this,” Elletear cheerfully continued as Alice and Sisbell panicked.
And thus started the very first True Princess Competition between the three sisters.
The night before the competition, Alice prepared for the battle in which her pride as a princess was on the line.
“It’s time for a strategy session!” Alice called Rin into her room. “Ever since we decided to do the competition, I’ve been working on being more dignified as a princess, but I’m far from prepared…”
Alice also needed to stay on top of her duties as a candidate for queen. In other words, she was incredibly busy. She had to attend important meetings and greet special guests from overseas.
“I didn’t have much time…”
She had worked as hard as she could to cultivate herself and refine her dignity as a princess in the spare moments she’d had.
Her sisters must have done the same, though. She’d received reports that both Elletear and Sisbell had been hard at work as well.
“Rin, please be honest.” She stared into her attendant’s eyes and nodded. “How likely is it that you think I’ll win tomorrow?”
“That you’ll win?”
“Yes. And don’t spare my feelings. I want to know what you truly think.”
“I would say 0.02 percent,” Rin replied.
“That’s a bit too honest, don’t you think?!” She slapped her desk and stood up. “It’s the night before the competition. The person you serve is nervous, so you could have at least said 40 percent or 50!”
“You said not to spare your feelings, Lady Alice.”
“I—I suppose I did…”
The competition was between three people, which meant they each had a one-in-three shot of winning in a vacuum, so Alice had been hoping Rin would say that at least.
“So, Rin, how did you arrive at that number?”
“Sisbell has a 40 percent chance of winning. Based on the themes covered tomorrow, I think it could even be 50-50.”
“Then why…”
“Because of Lady Elletear,” Rin declared. “Yes, you’re a wonderful princess, Lady Alice, but her incredible beauty and noble dignity make her incomparable to any other person in the Sovereignty’s history.”
“Urgh?!”
“Now we just wait for the day of. We can only hope that Elletear withdraws due to a stomachache.”
“Then you think it’s hopeless?!”
“Yes. That’s why I put your odds at 0.02 percent.”
“Rin, you dummy!”
And so their strategy session wasn’t very useful.
……No, actually…
……I already knew.
No little sister could surpass her big sister. Elletear was basically a living testament to that. She was more prim and proper than anyone in the Sovereignty, and more beautiful, too, not to mention cultured.
Alice knew she was up against frightful competition. If they had been duking it out on the battlefield, Alice would have won as the strongest princess in the Sovereignty, but she had few prospects of that being one of the themes for the next day’s competition.
“What should I do…?”
Ding ding. Right at that moment in the middle of the night, the bell to Alice’s room rang.
“Excuse me…,” came a voice.
“Sisbell?!”
Alice doubted her eyes when her little sister entered the room. They would be enemies the next day, so she could only wonder why Sisbell was visiting her room so late into the night.
“What’s wrong, Sisbell?”
“I wanted to talk to you about something, Alice…” Sisbell closed the door. Then she looked at Rin as well. “I see. So you were having a strategy session together to prepare for tomorrow’s competition.”
“Huh?! Th-that’s top secret!”
“You don’t need to hide it from me. In fact, that’s what I wanted to talk to you about.”
“And what’s that?”
“I’ll get straight to the point.” Sisbell took in a deep breath. “Let’s join forces.”
“……Huh?”
“You already sense it, too, don’t you? We have no chance of winning against Elletear in tomorrow’s fight.”
“Huh?!”
“We miscalculated. I can’t believe she came home earlier than we anticipated…” Sisbell balled her hands into fists. She sounded like a real tactician, what with the way she was speaking as though her sister were the enemy. “I hate to admit it, but Elletear is the most beautiful person in the Sovereignty. She has looks and brains, and she’s also graceful and charming. We might as well call her the most perfect big sister in the world… Unlike my second sister.”
“What did you just say?”
“Never mind. Anyway, if we take on this challenge separately, we have no chance.”
“…Yes, you’re right.” Alice reluctantly nodded. “But wait, Sisbell, we’re supposed to fight each other tomorrow. If the two of us team up, wouldn’t that be against the rules?”
“Rest assured that I have no intention of breaking the rules. We’ll pick off Elletear first. That’s all I’m proposing.”
They would make Elletear drop out of the competition first. After that, the two of them could have their face-off. Then only a single victor would emerge.
“It was originally a match between the two of us. Elletear just forced her way into it.”
“You have a point…”
They had no time to hesitate. The day of the competition was already approaching.
“Sisbell.” Alice held out her right hand. “Let’s fight our invincible sister together!”
“Yes!”
And so the second and the third sisters gave each other a firm handshake during their clandestine meeting in the middle of the night.
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