SALP Chapter 4

"Oh, really? What would be good about the kingdom being revived?"

"I don't know either?"

"Anyway, it must be good, right? Since it's our homeland."

"But our homeland is Roas?"

So Lanthe didn't know much either. She only learned from the adults that she was a troublemaker who resembled her mother, whose face she couldn't even remember.

"Fool! What would be good about our kingdom being revived? It means we wouldn't have to hide and live in a small land. We could live freely in a wider and more prosperous world."

The smart daughter of the village chief had said such things, but Lanthe couldn't understand her words either.

"I like things as they are now?"

Right now she was free and the world was wide and prosperous enough. Even if she ran around all day, she couldn't see all of the village and forest. The livestock kept having babies, and the fruits that ripened in the forest grew back immediately even after the villagers picked and ate them all.

Lanthe couldn't understand the hearts of people who loved a kingdom they had never seen. She couldn't understand at all why they should be interested in a destroyed kingdom.

Lanthe liked Roas. It was the hometown that bore and raised her. The world where Aunt Louise who loved her lived, where there was a warm home, where memories of playing with Vigo existed.

"Lanthe, let's play! Let's go sledding!"

"Vigo! Did you already finish lunch?"

Yes, most of all because cute Vigo was there...

"Yeah. I brought berry pie for a snack too. My mom made it this morning."

Because that lovely little one, that angelic child was there.

Vigo was a boy of the same age who lived next door to Lanthe. He was short with slightly upturned eyes that looked like a kitten's, which was very cute. His black curly hair that showed chocolate tints in sunlight was also pretty.

His eyes were the same purple color as other Raphlishians, but the black curly hair was his alone. She only learned much later that he was a child someone had secretly abandoned at the village entrance.

"Vigo's family's pie is really delicious! I want to eat it every day!"

"I'll bring it to you every day. Let's eat together."

"Great! Hehe!"

Lanthe and Vigo were together every day.

She thought they would be together forever.

"Let's go! Whoosh!"

"L-Lanthe. It's dangerous if we go down the hill too fast."

"My sled is faster than a reindeer! Whoooosh!"

"No, these kids climbed the mountain again? Auntie told you little ones not to climb the mountain! What if wolves bite you!"

"Big trouble! An ugly witch appeared!"

"A-Aunt Louise, I'm sorry."

"Bleh! Try to catch me!"

"That little brat will get caught by the ugly witch and get her bottom spanked!"

"S-sorry, Auntie. I asked her to play, so don't scold Lanthe."

"No tasty cookies for you today, you rascals!"

"Nooo! Defeat the evil witch! Whoooosh!"

Lanthe was a disobedient troublemaker, but Vigo was a kind and gentle child. He was smaller than her and slower at running, so he was often caught by Aunt Louise and scolded as their representative.

Still, Vigo would climb over the fence the next day to play together again.

"Lanthe, let's play!"

"Come here for a moment. I have a present."

"A present?"

One day, Lanthe taught Vigo her long-hidden secret.

"The snow angel is moving!"

"Isn't it cute?"

It was a somewhat special snowman that Lanthe had created.

"It's a sparkling dancing angel. How is it?"

A cute snow angel that shone with light like snow reflecting sunlight while flapping its two wings on its own, spinning round and round.

"H-how did you do it? How did you control it?"

It was no wonder that Vigo's eyes grew wide with surprise. She had been the same at first.

At first, Lanthe also made ordinary snow angels like others. Winged snowmen that Raphlishians made every winter when snow piled up, thinking of their homeland. She didn't particularly like the angel that people believed in, but snow angels were so pretty that she would make tiny snow angels by herself and play with them when snow accumulated.

The strange thing happened when she turned seven. When Lanthe made a fist-sized snow angel and hummed a tune because she felt good, the snow angel started flapping its wings and dancing shakily as if it were alive.

"When I sing, the little snow angel dances. But when it melts in sunlight, it returns to heaven just like other snow angels."

"Is Lanthe a witch?"

"I'm not a witch! The angel just dances because it likes me!"

Lanthe raised her voice and vehemently denied it.

She was not a witch who cast magic. Having greed for and studying mysterious spells was something only people of the outside world did, absolutely not Raphlishians. Aunt Louise feared that the magic studied by Penmark people was used to harm humans. She taught that there were infinite possibilities with just the ordinary talents God granted to humans, that wonderful things could be accomplished just by living earnestly with a kind heart.

So Lanthe was secretly worried. Worried this might be bad magic. Worried that perhaps she was a demon's child who cast evil magic. Worried that her birth parents, whose faces she couldn't remember, might actually have been demons.

"This is a secret, okay? I only showed it to you. Got it?"

"R-really?"

"You absolutely can't tell anyone."

"Okay. I'll keep it secret."

"It's definitely a secret?"

"But... it's really pretty and cute. The little snow angel."

"Right? Hehe!"

Good Vigo kept his promise well.

Their secret was kept safe until they turned ten.

But after that... after that, she couldn't know. Whether Vigo continued to keep his promise, or whether he spilled all of Lanthe's secrets to someone.

Because Lanthe and Vigo being together had ended on that winter day when they both turned ten.

"Kids! Vigo was taken by a witch from the outside world!"

"What?"

"A witch from the outside world came across the river last night! A scary-looking witch with lips red as blood took Vigo and carried him across the river!"

"I saw it too! Vigo took the witch's hand and followed her!"

The village was turned upside down.

Vigo had disappeared. Children who claimed to have witnessed the incident all said that humans from outside the village had taken him away.

"Wahhh! I'll go bring Vigo back!"

For Lanthe, it felt like the world had collapsed. When she lost her parents, she was a baby who didn't even know what separation meant, but now at ten years old, it was different.

So separation is something that tears your heart apart.

The demons from the outside world took away her precious friend.

But Raphlishians were not allowed to go outside Roas. Because the demons and witches of the outside world, the terrifying Penmark people who hunted and devoured foreigners, would enslave or kill them.

"You must never go near the riverside."

"You must return home before sunset. You must!"

The adults controlled the children even more strictly.

Lanthe had other friends, but sometimes she was suffocated by loneliness as if she were left alone in the world.

She missed Vigo. Why had he followed the witch? He had promised they would play together forever, just the two of them...

Still, Lanthe loved Roas. It was the hometown that bore and raised her. The world where Aunt Louise who loved her lived, where there was a warm home, where memories of playing with Vigo existed.

She waited for the day when Vigo would return to their hometown.

"Please return Vigo. I'll be a good child. Please."

Praying earnestly every time she woke up and every time she went to sleep.

For ten fleeting years.

"Roas will soon be destroyed. Those who can leave should evacuate."

The season of fire that Lanthe faced for the nineteenth time.

The elder grandfather, who was a prophet, warned that the village would be destroyed.

But at that time, the number of people who decided to escape the village was less than half of half the total population. For those who had difficulty moving around, or whose children were too young to make a dangerous journey, there were no choices. Whether to leave or stay. Either way was a life-or-death gamble.

Lanthe remained in the village. She wanted to protect Aunt Louise, and also to wait for Vigo.

But in the end, Roas burned brightly and became ashes.

The hometown where Vigo would return disappeared.

The village chief and Aunt Louise and the village elders, who had bravely blocked them saying 'We have no princess!' were the first to lose their lives cruelly. Black and crimson death swept through Roas. The demons who had invaded from the outside world were more horrific than anything they had heard.

"Aunt Louise...!"

Our ancient kingdom Raphlang was also destroyed overnight, wasn't it?

Now Roas is about to be destroyed too.

Ranthe, who couldn't even cry, staggered in a daze, was slapped across the cheek and collapsed.

"It's dangerous here, so please get in the carriage quickly, Your Highness."

Then she briefly came to her senses at some woman's voice dragging her away.

"His Majesty Derek will protect you."

Is she crazy...?

"You will live safely protected as a precious woman."

Is she crazy...?

Killing us and then saying she'll protect me. Now I see that she's the same human as me. Not a demon or witch, but crazy people. If they were sane people in the first place, they wouldn't even think of harming others so carelessly.

Ranthe, dragged to Newbella, was confined in a place called a palace that was only glossy on the outside.

Every night she had nightmares and woke up. Each time, she recited prayers thinking of Aunt Louise. Wanting to obtain the peace she had taught her.

But praying and singing had never once shown her the light in her heart. Her heart never became at peace, not at all.

The gray clouds hanging over Lanthe's head only grew thicker day by day. It seemed like gray clouds made of ashes left from burning a small village were just waiting for the moment to descend and bury her.