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He was a man he had thought of as calm even after a sporting event, yet the temperature transmitted through their briefly touching hands was hot.
Feeling that body heat, Rose realized that, contrary to what she had always suspected, Ray Crawford was indeed a living human being.
“My, newlywed bliss is truly something.”
Along with the King's words, the loud laughter of the cadets spread, carried by the refreshing breeze.
* * *
Inside the tent, Ray changed back into his uniform and stared blankly at the handkerchief before tucking it into his jacket pocket.
“I was truly surprised to hear the news of your marriage. I thought you would marry a woman from a prestigious Orturan family...”
Tony, the captain of the opposing team, spoke as he stepped out of the tent.
He was the person who had shared the most time and hardships with Ray during the war three years ago, and now, in recognition of his military achievements, he had become a young professor at the Naval Academy.
Since it was an extraordinary rise for the son of a tenant farmer, Orturan had been abuzz with talk for a while.
“I didn't realize the Lieutenant Colonel was someone so weak for beauty. Now I see why you stayed so late.”
Ray chuckled at Tony's sly joke.
Tony, who still called him Lieutenant Colonel, was perhaps the person who best knew that Ray was not a man who would marry simply because of a woman's face.
It was a shocking marriage that was bound to cause gossip, but people tended not to speculate too much about the reason for the marriage.
The Orturan people who had seen Rose in person believed, quite naturally, that Ray must have decided to marry because of that face. In a way, it could be considered an advantage.
Instead, an absurd rumor was circulating that Ray was a man more susceptible to beauty than expected.
“Mrs. Crawford is kind and beautiful. Not that I believed the stories in the newspapers to begin with.”
“Yes, I wish other Orturan people would think as you do.”
“Not everyone believes the Daily Oakley, so do not worry too much. Besides, cannot you simply stay by your wife's side?”
Tony, watching Ray who didn't give a particular answer, gave a cryptic smile and asked.
“Do you still consider me a friend?”
“Of course, Tony.”
Ray answered without a moment's hesitation.
Tony was the person whose rhythm matched his best on the battlefield and with whom he could communicate most easily.
“Then please think of your wife in the same way.”
Ray knew exactly what Tony meant. He meant that Ray should view her, a Boltonian, as a person just like him. Just as Ray had become friends with Tony, whose status was something Ray would normally never associate with.
Even while political philosophies speaking of equality and freedom swept across the continent, Orturan stubbornly taught the fact that not all people are equal.
However, Ray had long since realized that coming from a historic ducal house did not solve everything.
Taking out a cigarette and placing it in his mouth, he thought of the war. The place where all his doubts began.
In a place where everyone died equally from a single gunshot, soldiers became merely human beings, regardless of status or region.
A title did not provide an extra life.
Ray thought about how everyone was this identical before the muzzle of a gun, and how long the authority of this ridiculous title would last, and how long the brainwashing that they were different could possibly work.
The war was won, but the King of Planto was hanged on the scaffold, and Antaka became a republic. Ray could not understand what meaning there was to that war where countless people had perished.
“I feel as though I have moved a century back in time.”
Words his wife had once said drifted back into his mind. Her words were not easily forgotten. They tended to stimulate the skepticism Ray had tried so hard to bury.
Every now and then, she sent him back to that battlefield of the past. To that battlefield filled with doubt.
“Well, Tony. My thoughts aren't what's important.”
With a sigh, white smoke flowed out and scattered into the blue sky.
Yet, contrary to his doubts, the system had not yet collapsed, and Ray still had to live within it. He was also one of the most powerful symbols of that system.
If so, the only thing he could do—however ridiculous—was to prove that he was qualified, to prove why he was different. Even if it meant risking his life in war.
“Do not underestimate your influence, Lieutenant Colonel. You are the person who can exert the greatest influence in Orturan right now.”
Ray, brushing off the ash, merely gave a light smile.
“...Do you really think war will break out again?”
Deep fear was etched on Tony's face as he asked hesitantly.
“It seems Minister of the Interior Avery has been advocating for it strongly lately. Even the progressive party, the opposition, is staying silent because they don't want to be branded as a country without loyalty.”
The Kingdom of Radan, the party actually involved, had been barely calmed down through the Radan ambassador, but the problem was inside Orturan.
If Avery continued to act out like this, the probability of Radan changing its mind increased.
Madman.
Ray muttered a dry curse inwardly while inhaling the cigarette smoke.
A man who hadn't even participated in the war.
In the neighboring country, the King's head was placed on the guillotine; he wondered what Avery was relying on to act this way.
While Ray risked his life to prove this farcical system, people like Avery were proving on the other side just how useless such things were.
“There are quite a few people within the Academy talking about participating in the war, Lieutenant Colonel.”
“It can't be helped if that's the education they receive. You teach them—that the reason for a soldier's existence is not only to attack.”
“They are still young. They are overflowing with ambition. And the newspapers speak as if starting a war is the only form of courage.”
Tony muttered with a sigh.
Having reached the top of the stairs, they arrived at the entrance of the rear garden where the King, the Prince, and Rose were.
After paying his respects to the royals, Tony gave a final greeting to Ray before departing.
“Right, let's have a meal sometime.”
After parting with Tony, Ray put the ash into a portable ashtray and walked toward the King. They looked serious, as if discussing something grave.
“They say there is no improvement at all. He was found wandering with a knife a few days ago, so he is currently in isolation.”
“Who would have known Olson would break down like that, of all people. He's completely gone. How terrible, truly terrible. To show such a disgraceful side in his final years...”
At the Prince's words, King Catherine clicked her tongue with a look of pity.
They seemed to be talking about the former principal of the Naval Academy. He had been a brilliant general, but after participating in the war, he suffered from mental derangement and had to retire from the principalship.
“He probably wasn't as strong a person as we thought. Don't great events like war reveal who the truly strong people are?”
The Prince, who had a pessimistic and caustic nature, muttered in a gloomy tone.
A truly strong person.
Ray repeated those words and thought of his father.
His father had said he had to execute a beloved subordinate for the crime of espionage. It was clear that the memory had tormented him.
That was an experience Ray had also gone through.
On the battlefield, someone he believed to be a friend had abandoned him and fled, and someone he had thought of as merely a colleague or subordinate had risked their life to save him.
There were times when the enemy, of all people, showed mercy.
The realization he learned in that way still coexisted paradoxically within Ray's inner self.
He had learned the coldness that he must kill before anyone else kills him, and the cruel, inhuman lesson that killing a person is an excessively easy and convenient task.
Even now, if he were told to pick anyone and kill them, he could easily do so.
However, he also learned that all humans are ultimately the same when facing the crossroads of life and death, and that humanity does not distinguish between status or friend and foe.
That a King and the son of a tenant farmer are simply the same. No, that sometimes the son of a tenant farmer is more human.
Ray thought that this contradiction might be what had driven his father mad.
But unlike his father, he had overcome it and accepted the contradiction-filled reality as it was.
Why did his father go mad while he remained sane?
When he thought about it endlessly, the only conclusion that remained was that his father was weak, simply frail.
“In that sense, your wife's husband might be the strongest person in Orturan.”
The Prince smiled upon seeing Ray approach.
“I wonder. Perhaps things like war do not determine strength or weakness.”
Rose spoke up with a hesitant and cautious attitude.
“I just feel that such things teach us that we are merely human.”
Her voice was so quiet that it actually drew more focus.
“My, Mrs. Crawford. People like us must not be 'merely' human.”
King Catherine shook her head with a subtle smile. Her gaze was as if she were looking at a small child.
“Is that so?”
Rose smiled awkwardly at that gaze. She looked like someone who, by any standard, was not included in the 'us' the King referred to.
“Still... he was also just a human. I don't think that can be called a mistake.”
The woman, speaking while gauging the atmosphere, looked at Ray. As if she knew something.
The conclusion that no one in Orturan had ever denied was denied by his wife, quite casually and far too easily.
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