Chapter 15: Mirrored

COMBAT TRAINING EVALUATION

26 March Sorean 10

Evaluator: Keldon, James

PERSONAL INFORMATION

Name: Antiqua, Melia

Gender: F

Race: High Entia father, Homs mother

D.o.B: 22 February Entirmina 232 (age 78)

Height: 156cm

Weight: 47.6kg

Specialisation: Ether staff

STATISTICS

Note: Each value is scored on the related Eryth Combat Scale.

Physical Strength: 32 While still below average in terms of magnitude, this category is seeing a relatively average amount of improvement.

Ether Attenuation: 93 It is now effectively a given for Melia to achieve a score of 100 here before the age of 80, which is simply unheard of on the modern scale.

Agility: 22 There is nothing of interest to note here.

Resilience: 441 While her resilience is still projected to remain well below average, Melia is firmly no longer in the "unnaturally frail" category, and should be able to take a few hits from opponents in her combat level range.

Overall Combat Level: ~3.8 Statistical progress continues to accelerate.

ARTS

Elemental Discharge: A+ Burst aura now activates in either 14 or 13 discharges, which seems to be dependent on frequency of discharges. This behaviour has little historical precedent, and needs further research.

Summon Bolt: A+ Summoning time is a constant 1 second.

Summon Flare: A Summoning time varies between 1 and 2 seconds.

Summon Aqua: A Summoning time varies between 2 and 3 seconds.

Summon Wind: A- Summoning time varies between 6 and 7 seconds.

Summon Earth: D+ Summoning time varies between 1.5 minutes and 2 minutes, which is quite the range, but still very ahead of the curve, and behaves as perfectly as her other elementals upon completion.

Burst End: B- The defensive drop of this art now measures approximately 7% and leaves about 4 discharges worth of burst aura left over.

Hypnotise: B+ Casting time varies between 4 to 7 seconds, and is always successful.

Shadow Stitch: B+ Casting time ranges between 2 and 5 seconds and ensnares targets for a total of 15 seconds.

Healing Gift: B+ Casting time is a constant 7 seconds, with a perfectly consistent amount of vitality extraction.

Spear Break: F No further comment.

Overall Arts Grade: B Melia continues to be a model student of elementals with strong affinity for other ether arts. Her single weakness however is obvious and glaring, with no solution in sight.

MOCK BATTLE ANALYSIS

Melia has now experienced six mock battles, and shows improvement in strategy, execution, and confidence in each one. However, while she understands the strengths and weaknesses of her teammates and correctly accounts for them, she appears to still think in terms of individuals doing individual things, not grasping the full extent or potential of teamwork. Until this happens, she will remain unfit to learn the nature of chain attacks.

It was a clear morning in May. With the instructor of her Monday morning classes sick, Melia wandered through the library, aimlessly looking for something to read. Normally she would have a clear goal in mind, but the unexpectedness of the opportunity resulted in uncertainty.

I've read a lot of technical, technological stuff recently. I feel like finding something more...something...more "natural". If only I knew what that meant.

Looking up at the shelves, Melia realised that she had wandered into a part of the library she had never really ventured into before: the section on High Entia biology, a topic she was never really that interested in due to how often she had been figuratively beaten over the head by it across the years.

Something from here would certainly be new and different. She scanned the shelves. Nothing really stood out at first - textbooks on neurology, journals on specific diseases, the history and uses of DNA sequencing before it was outlawed. She was about to shrug and move on before she noticed something peculiar.

...There's a disproportional amount of books on sexual reproduction here. She scratched her head in confusion. For a subject she had only been taught for less than two weeks out of her whole life - much of which was fear-mongering more than informational - the library section on it was unusually large. She had always suspected it was a topic that had been skirted around a bit, given that preparing her to produce heirs was a total waste of time with Kallian's existence, but didn't think the disparity could be this major.

Let's see what's hiding in here. Melia selected one of the larger books from the shelf and sat down at the nearby table.

"Ah, there you are, Melia." Kallian seemed to have materialised from nowhere. "Come, we need your help."

Melia dropped the book on the table and stood up from the chair as if they were white-hot. You have simultaneously the best and the worst timing in the world.

Kallian lead her to one of the smaller advisor's rooms. Hogard was already present, along with Gurt Huaj, a high-ranking mechanical engineer.

"Greetings, Your Highnesses." Huaj was pouring over a complex blueprint laid out on the table.

"Greetings, Huaj." Kallian sat down and motioned Melia to do the same. "Melia, I will get straight to the point. We would like you to go to Sword Valley and collect a Quality Shaft."

Melia expected a few different things that this could be about, but travelling to the Mechonis was most certainly not on the list. She responded with the second thing that came to mind, keeping the first for later. "And how am I expected to accomplish that?"

"It's quite simple: Trade with the Mechon."

"...what?"

Kallian knew the nature of her confusion and cut it off. "The Mechon are not naturally the ruthless killing machines they are characterised as. We only see them as such because in the rare cases when we do meet them, they are here on the Bionis, actively attacking Homs settlements. When in their homeland, they are much more docile, actively ignoring anything they do not perceive as a threat. We have successfully traded with them in the past - as long as they are treated carefully, they are no more a threat than any other wild creature."

Melia had trouble believing the explanation, but decided to accept it at face value for now. "How would one trade with a mindless automaton?"

Huaj answered. "The procedure is simple. You take several ether crystals to be used as payment. Once you identify what you're looking for, you ensure that a Mechon is present, replace the target item with the crystals, and very slowly depart. Once the Mechon realises you are making an exchange, it will evaluate the crystals, and you should remain still. If it deems the payment sufficient, it will begin collecting the crystals, at which point you may simply leave."

"And what if the payment is not sufficient?"

"Well...truth be told, we don't know. We have always paid much more than we expect the item to be worth, in case the Mechon decides you are attempting theft."

That's not exactly reassuring. "Why would we pay in valuable crystals? Is gold not a currency to them?"

"We don't think it is, no. Experiments have been conducted that reveal the average Mechon will completely ignore gold, whereas it will go out of its way to collect ether crystals."

Out of questions about the nature of the job, Melia moved on to the one that had originally first come to mind. "Why am I being selected to carry this out?"

Huaj started fidgeting a bit. "We have not attempted to trade with the Mechon for quite some time, and the person we would normally entrust to do so has since died. With our method set, we didn't think we would need to train a replacement, and could simply send anyone trustworthy."

"Yes, but why me?"

Kallian responded. "You are short and thin with small wings and smooth features, and the Mechon do not recognise ether staves as a weapon. You are the perfect example of someone who they will see as a non-threat, who can still defend themselves if something does go wrong."

It made sense; there was nothing about the logic she could refute. This is going to be like the Colony 7 rescue mission, isn't it? Me as the only person in the city that can undertake some task? Or is this more like the Bunnit event, and this is some hidden test of skill somehow?

"This is what the typical Quality Shaft looks like." Kallian placed a photograph in front of Melia, which depicted a reinforced metal pole about a metre long. "It may be of a few different colours, which for our purposes does not matter."

"Here are the crystals." Huaj produced a bag full of a dozen high-quality ether crystals of varying elements. "We estimate this to be about 1.7 times the worth of a Quality Shaft."

Resigned to her fate, Melia emotionlessly placed the photo into the bag and slung it over her shoulder.

"Let's get you going," Kallian prodded. "I think this is the perfect time to take the Illustrious Alighting for its maiden voyage, don't you think?"

There's the ulterior motive. "It is a sensible proposition."

"I'm glad you agree. Hogard will take you to Sword Valley. Good luck."

From ground level, Sword Valley was honestly not all that impressive. Sure, it was a little weird for the landscape to be composed of metal instead of rock, but to someone used to artificial environments, it didn't feel all that strange. To be honest, it was far more strange to arrive with such speed - the Illustrious Alighting's engineers certainly pulled no punches when it came to performance. If she succeeded quickly, she could be back before lunch.

Hogard deployed the landing gear and sat the vehicle down on the ground, not very far at all from the bridge to the Bionis' thumb. "This is as far into the valley as I am allowed to pilot into. I will await your return here. Good luck, Lady Melia."

Melia wordlessly and carefully stepped down off the craft. Walking on the metal ground was quite a bit more surreal than simply observing it. She could see several Mechon in the distance, probably about a ten minute walk away.

She started moving towards the Mechonis at slightly slower than normal walking speed, trying to look simultaneously determined and non-threatening. She knew that Hogard would quickly swoop in if any trouble started, no matter what he was told to do, and put himself in danger to let her escape. It was probably the worst thing that could happen, honestly - Melia's ether arts could do passable damage to Mechon, whereas Hogard's physical attacks would have little if any effect, and the Illustrious Alighting had no combat tools to her knowledge.

Approaching the Mechon, Melia couldn't help slowing down even further. It was very unnerving to watch the black-armoured constructs wander around with no apparent purpose, especially as they continued to take no notice of her. There were times in her life where she'd wished for invisibility, but this was not at all how she'd imagined it.

Five minutes after passing the first Mechon, she spotted a large pile of what looked to be scrap material off to the side of the valley. This should be as good a place as any to start looking.

She approached the pile before realising that there was a very curious setup surrounding it. A bipedal Mechon was stationed in front of the pile. Two other Mechon were currently rummaging around in the pile, apparently looking for something in particular. A third Mechon approached holding a part and showed it to the one in front, before adding it to the pile and walking away again. The two searching Mechon finally found what they were looking for, showed four identical-looking parts to the one in front, and walked off.

This...this looks oddly like a trading post. Melia could see a Quality Shaft sticking out the back end of the scrap heap. If that is the case, then this should be easier than expected, as this overseeing Mechon should be prepared for various kinds of exchange of goods. If I act correctly, I may even be able to provide more accurate payment, instead of simply giving them all the crystals I have brought.

Trying to move casually, she walked around the pile and slowly extracted the Quality Shaft from it, before coming back to the front. The overseeing Mechon eerily stared at her the entire time.

Melia placed the shaft on the ground and started removing crystals from her bag one by one, laying them out in front of the overseeing Mechon, which fixed its gaze on each one as she put them down. Once she had laid out seven of the crystals - the value she calculated to be close to the part's believed value, given that she had twelve crystals that were estimated at 1.7 times its value - she remained crouched and waiting.

The overseeing Mechon continued to inspect the crystals, turning its head jerkily as its attention jumped from one to another in no apparent pattern. After about a minute, it looked back at Melia and remained unmoving.

...Is that not sufficient? Melia carefully dipped back into her bag and put down three more crystals, leaving just two. The Mechon looked over the new offerings but still seemed unsatisfied.

This had better be enough. She pulled out the last two crystals and added them to the lineup. Perhaps our previous overpayments have primed them to underestimate the true worth of our crystals.

The Mechon looked over the two new crystals for over a minute before glancing back over the rest of the set. After a full three minutes of further deliberation, it finally did something different: it looked into the sky, towards one of the airborne Mechon passing overhead, which turned off its previous course and swooped down to ground level. After five seconds of what looked like empty staring, the flying machine picked up as many crystals as it could carry and flew off elsewhere.

Melia let out a sigh of relief. I will take that as success. She took the Quality Shaft, stood up, and backed away as two more flying Mechon descended and collected the remainder of the crystals. They must be capable of communicating in some way that we cannot perceive. They are almost like insects, acting as specialised parts of a whole instead of individuals. They would actually be quite interesting to study if they were not bent on destroying every sentient on the Bionis.

She turned back to where she came from and started walking away at normal speed. It's quite curious how they completely ignore me until I attempt a trade, and then immediately begin ignoring me again, as if acknowledging me is a waste of time. They must be designed for efficiency over anything else - if it could be said that someone designed them, which I suppose could be the Mechonis itself, in the same vein that the spirit of the Bionis gave birth to our species.

Lost in thought, she reached her ship unexpectedly quickly, and almost ran into it before realising it was there.

Hogard nodded her way. "Your success is swift, Lady Melia."

"Indeed. There was no trouble to be had." Melia hopped on board and plopped herself down in the seat at the back, clutching the Quality Shaft tightly.

"Very good. Let us away." Hogard lifted the craft off the ground and slid the speed multiplier up to maximum, blasting off towards Alcamoth at unparalleled speed. In what seemed like no time at all, they were pulling into an imperial hangar, with Sorean, Kallian, and a dozen eager material engineers waiting to greet them.

Er, is this one part really that big a deal? Melia gave the shaft a more thorough look-over. It didn't look any kind of special: just a black metal axle with riveted, reinforced sections at either end. It looked decidedly ordinary.

Sorean was the first to speak. "Well done, Melia. You braved an intimidating landscape and toed the line with our enemy in order to retrieve a crucial element of our exotic materials research."

Melia tried to keep a straight face, but couldn't help showing a bit of confusion. That seems overblown. What's one rod going to do for research? And there was no difficulty involved, just some careful posturing really. Stepping down from the ship, she carefully handed the shaft to one of the engineers, who was taken somewhat by surprise and hastily shuffled off somewhere with the rest of the nerd mob following.

"I know it seems a bit overdone," Kallian said, "but materials from the Mechonis are highly valuable for many different reasons, and it is folly to give the Mechon too many crystals to help their attacks against the Bionis. It is almost like throwing a steak into a starved crowd."

The metaphor awakened Melia's hunger; it was pretty much lunchtime after all.

It was a chilly Saturday in late February. Melia was sauntering aimlessly around the Filicoh District, a lesser-density commercial area. She'd put up a large amount of resistance against monthly excursions recently, but was getting nowhere towards being allowed to go back to sitting in the palace indefinitely. She still had no idea what more she was supposed to learn at this point.

Wandering around with no real goal in mind, something caught her eye that wasn't there the last time she was: a lavender roadside sign reading "Annual MAC Meeting Today, Room 4, 2pm: All Welcome".

What is MAC? I am intrigued. She'd never heard the abbreviation before, and was interested in learning more. She was a bit worried about its potential length, as she didn't even know what would happen if she didn't arrive back to the palace in time for dinner, but it seemed rather unlikely for that to happen.

The sign sat in front of a small convention centre. Melia stepped inside and turned towards room 4. It was one of the larger rooms, filled with several round tables that could seat six or so each, for a total seating space of sixty or seventy. About forty people were already present and seated, and one of the tables was full of various snacks.

Taking a seat at an empty table near the exit, she quickly recognised something odd about the crowd: there was a very high proportion of half-bloods, with over half of the attendees having small wings, plus a few full-winged people with rounded ears. Aside from that, there was no real demographic pattern.

This might be some sort of support group for half-bloods. But it doesn't make sense for such to advertise itself as "all welcome", nor to meet only annually.

A middle-aged red-robed small-winged woman arrived and took a seat at the closest table to Melia's. "Hello there. Are you new to us?"

"...Yes." Uh-oh, I didn't want this to be a commitment, I just wanted to attend a single meeting out of casual interest.

"Good, good. What's your name?"

"Mel."

The woman nodded approvingly. "Perfect. I'd say it suits you. Enjoy the meeting."

Melia didn't know what to make of the comment, but nodded politely.

People continued to file in. Once the hour struck, there looked to be fifty-five present. Someone stood up from what looked to be the lead table, judging by how it was littered with the most stuff that its occupants had brought.

"Welcome, fellow members and interested guests, to the 16th annual meeting of the Melia Appreciation Club!"

There was applause. Melia clapped lightly; she hadn't yet quite parsed what exactly the club's name implied.

"This year's theme is speculation. We're going to have some fun taking wild guesses about the princess's life. Maybe serious if you feel like it, but mostly humorous and light-hearted." Several people nodded; the theme was probably distributed in advance.

The realisation slowly started to come together in Melia's mind: she had just anonymously walked into her own fanclub, and it would be incredibly rude to just leave. She could already feel her face reddening, and started worrying like mad while the head table continued to speak.

I can't believe such an organisation truly exists. Does Brother know about this? How many people would notice if I simply went to the washroom and never returned? Is this whole setup an elaborate joke at my expense? How can I possibly remain anonymous in a crowd of people obsessed with me?

She was torn from her internal rambling by a sheet of paper and pencil being placed in front of her. Looking up, she saw that writing instruments were being distributed to everyone else.

"You've got ten minutes to draw what you think Princess Melia looks like," said the leader. "We'll vote on the results and give out some coupons to the three most realistic and most outlandish. Have fun!"

Everyone quickly got to work. Melia stared down at her paper. Well I can't just sit here and do nothing; I've got to at least make an effort, to avoid standing out. But to do that, I have to do something neither realistic nor "outlandish", something that fits in between the two extremes.

So. If I didn't know what I looked like, what would I think it could be?

She started to sketch. She didn't consider herself all that good at drawing, even though it was the go-to activity that she was pushed towards as a toddler whenever she was being a nuisance, and as a result had a large amount of self-taught experience with it. She hated drawing herself more than anything, but managed to convince herself that she was instead drawing some kind of long-lost sister: a longer and thinner face, narrower eyes, ears at a midway point between rounded and pointed (an uncommon but not surprising feature), and short hair tied in a bun.

With about a minute left, she looked over the finished product. It kind of looked like what she felt her masked voice sounded like: more sour and stricter, and perhaps a healthy thirty years older. This is a club of fanatics, they should not take well to a dreary interpretation. Just what I need to avoid winning anything.

Once the time was up, the entries were collected to the head table, before being displayed to the room one at a time and voted on by a show of hands. Melia added her vote to the ones that amused her more than anything - mostly the ones with unusual hairstyles, such as a massive beehive swirl, or twin locks that wrapped around the neck and down the arms. She was relieved yet somewhat surprised to find that no one was all that close to being correct - the top three "realistic" entries were all thin-faced, and the winner had extremely curly feathers.

I suppose it's nice to know that my identity is clouded enough that a room full of admirers are oblivious to my true appearance.

"Now," the leader announced, "it's time to hear some of your weirdest, wildest, and most outrageous theories on just what Princess Melia does in her day-to-day life. We'll start at this end of the room and work our way down, and once we've heard from everyone, maybe we'll discuss some of the better ones. Just keep it clean and give us a laugh!"

This is going to be either amusing or deplorable. Perhaps both. Melia was prepared for the kinds of things she'd read of in the sensationalist tabloids, the conspiracy theories and negative press. Luckily, she was wrong.

"Melia is scared to death of butterflies."

"Our taxes are so high because she spends all day eating candy."

"Melia is so desperate to learn how to cook, but they won't let her, so she sneaks into the kitchen during the night and burns things."

"She's super hyper all the time. Whenever we see her outside the palace, she's heavily sedated."

"Melia sneaks outside at night and just rolls around in the grass."

"She can't stop herself from throwing food, it's just so fun to her."

Almost every single anecdote was accompanied by hearty laughter. Melia couldn't stop herself from joining in; the disconnect between the guesses and reality was so total and hilarious that it was impossible to not laugh. She could feel the onset of a giggle fit.

"She wastes all the money guzzling fine wines."

"Melia sits in her room all day playing Call to Duty."

"The first time she tried to use elementals, she set the palace on fire."

"Melia has the loudest burps in the family, and she can't control them."

"She can fly, but her wings sound like a buzzsaw doing it."

It just seemed to get funnier and funnier. A few other people seemed to have lost control of their chuckling, so Melia didn't feel so bad about being unable to stop.

"Melia actually secretly has the leg strength to kick you across the room."

"She rides around the palace on a Nopon servant."

"Melia can't see a thing without her glasses."

"She hides her face because her eyes are different colours."

"Her wings are actually full size, they're just rolled up tight."

Seated the furthest away from the head table, Melia was the last to have her turn, having had a bit of time to compose herself and think of some zany factoid. She decided that this was a perfect opportunity to throw everyone off the scent - to propose something simultaneously crazy yet realistic that would get lodged in peoples' minds and make it even harder for anyone to recognise her in public.

"She has golden hair."

The crowd still laughed, but there was also a notable amount of oohs and aahs at the suggestion that the princess was a chromothrixiac - one who never had their hair change from gold to silver between the ages of eight and ten, one of the rarest half-blood traits. It would be the perfect explanation for why she kept her whole head under wraps at all times.

I'd say that was pretty successful. Melia watched as pretty much every table delved into speculation over her baseless guess. I have no doubt this rumour will spread from here and infect the entire gossiping populace, which will further obscure my true identity.

After a few more minutes of discussion, the leader stepped up again. "This is all incredibly interesting, but we do have to get on to the third event."

The chatter died down as the leader produced more papers, which were passed around.

"This meeting's third and final event will be a repeat of one of our most popular segments from a few years ago."

A murmur of anticipation rose up; some people seemed to already know what this meant.

If it was popular enough to be repeated in a later year, it must be highly entertaining.

"Okay, everyone. You've got ten minutes to describe Princess Melia's perfect husband. Don't hold back, now!"

Everyone excitedly got straight to work.

Melia was left in a mild shock; it took her about ten seconds to realise her mouth was open, and closed it quickly. She didn't understand at all how pretty much everyone could be so fascinated by the subject of her love life - especially the part where no one seemed to be aware that she didn't have one, had no interest in having one, and would probably be overruled by her father if she were to ever try having one.

After a minute of absolutely nothing, she again realised that she had to put at least something down; she couldn't be the only one to have a blank page by the end. But she had absolutely no idea where to start - she figured she could be honest and no one would be any the wiser, but to tell the truth she'd first have to figure out herself what it was. "Top qualities of a husband" was something she had literally never considered before.

A total of four minutes after the start of the challenge, she decided to just stop thinking and start scribbling a list of good personality traits, and see if anything useful appears.

- Intelligent
- Average size (not tall)
- Prefers solace alone (no big circles of twenty friends)
- Has learned many life lessons (as opposed to having a sheltered life)
- Knows when to remain quiet/admit defeat

Melia looked over her spur-of-the-moment list, somewhat surprised at herself for pumping it out. I must say, if I could magically create a friend, this would indeed be a blueprint for success. Whether that would turn to romance, we shall never know. This is a throwaway spur-of-the-moment exercise after all.

Once the time expired, the results were collected to the front and read aloud by the leader. The majority of them were trite and cheesy traditional white knight characters with some random personality quirk to make them superficially unique, with a minority of celebrities and intellectuals. Melia was not much impressed, but she knew from the start there was unlikely to be anything of the sort. Her own submission was comparatively short and simple, and was subsequently glossed over, to her satisfaction.

With everything accounted for, the leader made one last announcement. "All right, well, that concludes this year's meeting. If anyone has anything for the care package or wants to sign up for the quarterly newsletter, step to the front now. Otherwise, I hope to see you all on the last Saturday of February next year!"

There was a smattering of applause. Some people got up to leave immediately, while others approached the front table.

Melia sat still for a moment, processing the last announcement. There's a newsletter every three months? How could they possibly have enough to talk about for that frequent a publication? She had half a mind to subscribe just to see what it could contain, but of course her address was the palace, so there was no way it could be done without giving herself away. Come to think of it, she didn't even know if it was possible for her to receive mail.

With the crowd starting to thin, she started moving slightly towards the front, to catch a glimpse of what the supposed "care package" was. Apparently, it was a medium-sized cardboard box that was loaded with all the papers people had written and drawn during the meeting, and several people were adding their own letters and small boxes to it. "Melia Antiqua, Imperial Palace" was inked on the side.

A mix of competing thoughts started to swell up in Melia's mind; she shook her head firmly to try and hold them at bay. I'm getting out of here. Only then will I start to consider what this means. She left the building as fast as possible without looking suspicious and immediately headed back for the palace.

Having managed to return to her chambers without interruption, she started pacing restlessly.

This fanclub intends to mail me a package, and evidence suggests this is not the first time. I have never gotten mail before, nor the slightest hint that someone has attempted it. Therefore, something is obstructing the delivery that neither side knows about. The most obvious candidate is that some other member of the family is intercepting it, with the second likely possibility being that it is not addressed properly and being held in a post office somewhere.

I want to receive this mail; it may provide a clue as to the mindset of these strangers who are borderline worshipping me. Therefore, I need to take a guess as to what the issue is, and intercept the interception.

The clock chimed eleven, signalling Melia to find a nearby balcony and peer down towards the palace's main entrance, waiting for the mailman to arrive. Her plan was simple: get down to the palace's mailroom before anyone there could do anything to the day's deliveries. As a Sunday, there was likely going to be less mail than most days, meaning her timing would have to be quite precise.

She still wasn't really sure what to make of the Melia Appreciation Club. As a child, it did not take long for her to assume that everyone disliked her by default, simply for being child of the Second Consort, and aside from temporary positive reputation boosts, she saw no reason to ever change this mindset. It was pretty much the first time she had found evidence of people in the general public that seemed to hold a positive opinion of her, without needing the impetus of a recent event. As a result, learning that there existed a group of people who effectively revered her was difficult to believe, and subsequently lead to a mix of unidentifiable emotions. She hoped that finally getting one of their "care package"s would help her understand their mindset.

Looking down towards the courtyard, she saw a uniformed man arrive with a package in his hands.

That's got to be it. She started scrambling down the palace's interiors towards the mailroom, a place she'd only ever been once or twice out of curiosity, while trying to not make it appear as if she had somewhere to be.

The mailroom wasn't all that large; it only needed enough capacity to house about three dozen letters a day, plus the occasional package. Melia saw that the imperial postmaster, a younger man she didn't recognise, already had her package in his hands and seemed to have already decided what to do with it.

This man must be the missing link. "Hello there, postmaster."

The man had a minor freakout, half-juggling the package. "E-e-excuse me L-Lady Melia, I-I didn't realise you were here."

"That is all right." A short pause. "I see you have a package addressed to me."

"W-w-well, no...well, yes, yes I do. But it's illegitimate."

Melia put on a careful arched eyebrow. She normally didn't have much confidence in her people skills, but the postmaster seemed to be vulnerable. "Is that so? What evidence do you have?"

"...Wwwwelllll...um..." He put the package on the counter behind him and propped himself up against it, clearly a bit mentally overwhelmed. "I-If you'll give me a moment, Y-Your Highness, I-I'll explain."

"By all means."

The postmaster took a few deep breaths before continuing. "This is only my fifth month here. My predecessor told me that, every year at about this time, a fraudulent and dangerous package addressed to you arrives from an unknown source. He said he was under orders to dispose of it immediately, every time it appears, and told me to continue to do so after his retirement."

"Really? Fascinating. So what does it contain, then?"

"Um...well, I don't know, to be honest. I was told to get rid of it immediately, I haven't bothered to discover whatever's inside. I mean, if it's dangerous, it would probably-"

Melia took hold of the bottom of her staff and extended it, reaching across the room to jab the package with one of the head's sharper bits, snapping the tape. She then pulled back to open the flap, revealing the papers and boxes within.

"I'm not an expert, but this looks rather legitimate to me."

"...er...um..." The postmaster nervously checked below the surface layer of the box's contents to find nothing of a dangerous nature. "...well, I suppose you are right."

"It appears so." Melia stepped forward to take hold of the box. "I hope we've learned a lesson about blind acceptance of claims here today. Thank you for your time."

"Y-y-yes, Your Highness." The postmaster withered back behind the counter.

Melia started walking back to her room. So the current postmaster is gullible enough that the blame does not reside with him. Given his story, which I have no reason to doubt, I strongly suspect his predecessor was under orders from someone to dispose of the package, and therefore he is also not the primary source of the issue. The question is, who gave that order? It may not matter at this point, if I have successfully convinced the new postmaster to do otherwise, but I hate leaving such a plot unresolved.

She sat down on her bed and popped the box open. Let's see what kind of stuff my admirers think I like, and what someone doesn't want me to have. The first thing to be extracted was a message from the club's leader.

Hello, Princess Melia! Here are the spoils from the Melia Appreciation Club's sixteenth meeting. We had a theme of "speculation" this year, so people had a lot of fun making up what they thought you look like, and what kind of person you're looking for in romance - please don't be offended, it's all in good fun! Also included is the typical assortment of gifts some of our more generous members have donated. Have a good year!

Melia couldn't stop herself from feeling upset at the realisation that the previous fifteen of these packages had been destroyed to no one's knowledge - probably thrown into an incinerator, with no chance of retrieval. But as she started looking through the rest of the box, her mood lifted significantly. She had already seen all of the drawings at the meeting, so she skipped them for now. There was a total of twelve letters from various people, mostly talking about their lives in the past year. They were all boring, layman's stuff, like fretting over whether a crush had reciprocal feelings, or lamenting over a dead pet, or trying to figure out how to stop a sibling from being bullied. Yet Melia found herself fascinated by them: slices of normal people's lives that they wanted to share with her, with no expectation of reply. It was as if they wanted to give her a glimpse of what friendship was like.

The five small boxes were even more intriguing than the letters: each one filled with homemade sweets. The concept of having candy hidden in her bedroom made her downright giddy; she had to exercise a lot of self-control to not simply eat them all right then and there, which would certainly spoil lunch.

Having absorbed everything in the package, Melia was left feeling a mix of emotions. She remained confused that people would be so entranced by her, considering that she didn't know what she did to deserve it, but also felt something alien that she could only guess was some form of pride - that even with her lack of accomplishments in life, she had devoted fans. Fans that continued their support despite a total lack of acknowledgement from her.

I'm not really any closer to comprehending their motivations. But these people deserve some sort of response.

She started bouncing ideas around in her mind. It would be a year before the club's next meeting, but that was okay - she might need that long to ensure the plan's success.

It was the last Wednesday of June. Halfway through Melia's previous training session, Reddel had determined that it had been long enough since she had begun work on the earth elemental that she needed to try something else, even though it was not quite on the same level as her other elementals yet. Therefore, Melia entered the training room ready to do something new.

"Before we begin today, I would like to ask you a question."

Er, this is unusual. "By all means."

Reddel gave off the impression that he was reluctant to bring up the subject, but had no choice. "Would you be interested in dropping Spear Break for a topple art?"

The immediate thought that entered Melia's mind was "yes", but she knew this was a terrible knee-jerk reaction to a question for which serious thinking was needed.

"I ask because I believe you may have more success with a topple art. History has shown many times that not even the mightiest heroes can have full comprehension of both staggering a foe and exploiting it afterwards. Perhaps you are someone who has the topple mindset as opposed to the break mindset, in which case switching to Down Kick or Ankle Cut would be most beneficial. Do you agree?"

Melia stood and considered the question for a few minutes, iterating over both memories and thoughts.

"I originally selected Spear Break because it did not need to immediately follow another art to be effective. Were I to learn a topple art, in order to use it at the right time, I would have to rush into melee range from my ideal position at a distance. Both then and now, it seems like a dangerous and risky proposition."

"But surely no riskier than being close enough to use Spear Break to start with?"

"If I am at such close range, I am already in an unfavourable position, and would prefer an art that I can immediately use to push enemies away rather than have to wait for an ally's successful attack."

"If that is your decision, very well. But keep the option in your mind."

Though she believed she made the right decision, Melia still felt a lump of uncertainty. It's no fun to struggle with Spear Break, but at this point wouldn't learning some new physical art be just as bad, even if I somehow magically display some hidden mindset for it in the future?

"So, let us move on to today's new art."

Yes, that would be much better than dwelling on physical arts.

"This art is called Reflection." Reddel demonstrated by twirling his staff around, forming a ring of what looked like hexagonal mirrors around himself. "It uses light ether to redirect an opponent's attacks back upon them." The barrier vanished as fast as it came. "However, it cannot be sustained for very long, and thus timing is critical."

Melia instantly saw much potential in the new art, the obvious one being to bait enemies into attacking her and eating the damage themselves, with another being to protect herself from wide-area attacks and help out those who did get hit.

"Like Shadow Stitch, you will be learning Reflection in two parts. The first half involves the creation and control of a single reflective panel, which behaves much like an elemental but differs in several key ways. The second half is the production of enough simultaneous panels to protect yourself from all sides."

Reddel spun his staff again, creating a single reflective panel, which sat in front of him for several seconds before fading away. "The mindset for this art is primarily defensive. You must have intent to erect a glassy barrier in front of yourself, shining with more lustre than any manmade substance."

Melia took her staff and started spinning it around, imagining that she was spinning some sort of glistening spiderweb. After about two minutes, she could sense an unusual warmth on her staff's handle - not the scorching heat of summoning a flare, but the kind of heat that one feels laying in the sunshine on a cool day. Focusing harder, she could see her staff beginning to trace out the outline of a large hexagon in the air, creating a slowly-widening border of silver. However, as it started to thicken inside, it started to vanish outside. By the time she had filled the entire shape, it was about the same size as one of Reddel's panels. Fully formed, it continued to shrink until it disappeared.

"Not bad," Reddel mused. "It is typical for the first-timer to attempt a panel the size of their staff, as it is the most natural way of doing things, but it is terribly inefficient, as you can see from it fading away at the same rate you were building it up. Your main goal at this point is to get a feel for how to start at the correct size. Once there, you can concentrate on accelerating the creation process."

Melia nodded and started from the beginning again. It seems strange that, after many years of knowing an art of dark ether, I am only now learning one of light ether. I'm sure there is a reason for it, but I can't imagine what it could be.