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What kind of person is the Princess?

Well… to put it simply, she’s a good person.

Born as the king’s daughter, she carries countless responsibilities on her shoulders but does not shirk them or indulge in luxuries like some nobles do.

When the kingdom was in danger, she never complained while selling off royal palace goods to gather funds, believing that the royals and nobles should lead the way for the people. She’s like a living embodiment of the term “noblesse oblige.”

That said…

Honestly, sometimes her feelings were a bit over the top.

“I’m sorry!”

“N-no, Your Highness, you shouldn’t be doing this here!”

That’s right.

To be honest, I felt a little anxious about meeting the Princess even while here. I just had a feeling reactions like this would happen.

The Princess was currently kneeling before me, her head bowed in the dirt, begging for forgiveness.

…The person who could be considered the most noble in this country, aside from His Majesty the King, was kneeling and prostrating herself before me.

“Your Highness, there’s no need for this. Everyone is just staring blankly at this side…”

I quickly whispered to the Princess while kneeling beside her, but she seemed completely unfazed by that.

“No! If anything, it’s better if there are more eyes on me! I have failed in my duty as the one who should be the owner of the kingdom and made others suffer! That is not something that can be hidden!”

Well, even if it’s called suffering…

It’s true that I sacrificed myself. There was no other way in that situation.

Dana’s theory came too late to be completed in time, and even if Pia poured all her divine power into it, the Demon King’s immense strength in that moment wouldn’t have been stopped. Kalia’s shield wouldn’t have done much either.

If it had been Arna, she might have somehow managed it instead of me. Since Arna was acting with the power of the World Tree and all the Elves, if she had sacrificed herself with that power, she might have been able to stop the Demon King.

But if that had happened, the World Tree’s recovery speed after the war would have drastically slowed down. Not only the World Tree but the entire Elf society could have been thrown into turmoil. The power to recover would have vanished, and for a while, they wouldn’t have been living in abundance.

…Well, to be honest, the reason I chose sacrifice back then wasn’t really because I was worried about Elf society, but rather because I didn’t want to see my companions sacrificing themselves right before my eyes.

Regardless of the reason, I was the one who ultimately ‘chose’ that sacrifice. No one pressured me beside me, and there wasn’t even time for that.

“It was my choice at that time. So, Your Highness, there’s no need for you to feel so guilty.”

“Though it was a choice, it was a situation where there was no other option but that! In the end, it was us who drove a visitor from another world to a battlefield where he could only die. It was due to our lack of strength…!”

“….”

I lifted my head to look up at His Majesty the King.

His Majesty was silent, hand resting on his forehead.

I heard the Princess arrived last night.

And it seems that while she was visiting a local city, she was never told I had come. If she had known, she would have flown to the capital without a second thought.

Upon hearing I had arrived last night, she shed tears and was about to rush to my room when she heard that “It would be rude to come at this hour” and stopped.

By the way, last night… well, I had been spending time in various ways with my older sister, and it must have turned into a very embarrassing situation when the Princess popped in.

Also, it was thanks to His Majesty’s prior visit that I was less flustered before meeting the Princess.

The Princess always had a tendency to… express her feelings easily, but seeing her react so fiercely was a rare sight.

“Your Highness, I wasn’t the only one who sacrificed on the battlefield. Countless others lost their lives—”

“—350,000, Hero.”

“Huh?”

“At least 350,000 young lives were lost on the battlefield. That’s the number of officially registered military deaths, so there were likely many more who died. Those who had been living peacefully in cities and suddenly fell victim to the Demon King’s forces, or those who formed resistance armies to fight in a place turned into a battlefield, would have seen even more fatalities.”

“….”

When the Princess said that, I was left speechless.

I didn’t even know the proper numbers myself. To be fair, it’s only natural. The moment I died was still before the war went completely over, so proper tallies hadn’t been made yet. More than that, they probably wouldn’t have announced such casualty figures in the kingdom.

Unlike Earth, where the population numbers in the hundreds of millions exist, the population in this world is not that large. There’s no professional statistics, but even at most, it’s likely fewer than the population of South Korea.

I’ve seen somewhere that South Korea’s standing army is just over 500,000, so if you think about it like that, it means over half of the standing army in peacetime has perished. That’s just the number of deaths of those officially enlisted, and since it’s only been a few months since the war ended, one would assume that that number would only increase, not decrease.

Taking into account the many soldiers conscripted from various regions, as well as the numbers she mentioned of those who worked as militias and the yet unaccounted civilian deaths, that number would likely rise significantly more.

“I understand. No matter how many times I kneel, I won’t be able to soothe the sorrow of those who have lost a child or a sibling. But if seeing me like this can provide even a little consolation to someone, then I can kneel like this as many times as it takes.”

“Ah….”

So then, it was indeed a ‘visit’ to local cities.

That probably wasn’t something ordered by the royal family but rather a choice made by the Princess herself.

And most likely, the Princess acted just like this in those local cities too.

Kneeling at mass graves without proper funerals, without being able to recognize who was who, she must have apologized for being a useless royal who couldn’t protect the people.

That image came to mind too easily. Because that’s just the kind of person the Princess was.

In fact, I heard that at the start of the war, she wanted to take a sword and go to the battlefield herself.

But… while thinking this in front of the actual person feels a bit off, the Princess wasn’t particularly talented in swordsmanship. She was smart and had a good memory, but her physical abilities were quite weak. No matter how hard she tried to learn, she ended up wielding a sword worse than an average girl her age.

Moreover, even if she could wield a sword properly, serving on the front lines would have been impossible. Unless she had other siblings, if the only heir to the royal family was to die on the battlefield, another power struggle would arise within the kingdom.

Due to various reasons overlapping, the Princess ultimately could not go into battle. Whether that left a grudge or not, she had spent the entire war giving speeches encouraging soldiers at the rear. I heard she personally handed out combat rations and assisted in supplying military goods.

Her close ones likely knew that she never thought about political matters, but being near the battlefield, her support among the nobility and soldiers who participated in the war was remarkably strong.

“Then even more so, there’s no need for you to kneel in front of me. After all, I simply did what I wanted to do. I was greatly rewarded by the Goddess, too.”

“But….”

Hearing what I said, the Princess hesitated to get up. It seemed that the burden on her heart was heavy.

“If you keep doing this, we won’t be able to share the conversation ahead. …Alright, fine. I will accept your apology, Your Highness.”

After hearing my words, the Princess’s expression brightened just a little.

Seeing that, I smiled back at her.

“Then… shall we think about which delegation to bring to the Elf capital city, Ririle?”

At my words, it seemed the Princess finally recalled why we had gathered here and exclaimed, “Ah…!” while turning red.

 

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