The Holy Grail of Eris prologue

Ding-dong, the bell rang.

Today, Connie was a bad girl. She broke her father's command and went to see the "execution". She snuck out from the mansion even though she was told that it was forbidden and came to the St. Mark Square. She even dragged Kate with her.

This lush and vast site was usually the perfect playground for Connie and Kate. They would play tag or hide-and-seek―――and sometimes even sneak into town hall to play pranks on people, but they had never been reprimanded by friendly officials. This place was like Connie's backyard.

That's why she thought that it would be fine. Since this place had never made Connie feel scared.

――― However, today, St. Mark Square was different.

First of all, a lot of people, so many that you would have thought that people from the whole capital were here, had gathered! The only events Connie knew where so many people would gather at once were Holy Birthday (Christmas) and Star Reading Festival. However, the only difference from the usual festivals was that everybody's eyes were blazing. They were glaring, tinged with a very disgusting fever, similar to the eyes of Jon, the gardener's son, when he was bullying Connie.

Connie had never seen a thing called "execution" before. It was because her father hated it. Each time the subject of an "execution" came up, he would frown, saying that it was something inhumane. Connie, who had just turned 6 years old, didn't quite understand the meaning of his words.

Ding-dong, the bell rang.

Connie was swept away by the advancing crowd and unknowingly separated from Kate. The moment she noticed, she turned pale. Today, there was something wrong with the Square. There was an unpleasant atmosphere drifting around. Becoming anxious, Connie parted the wave of people and shouted Kate's name, but it was drown out by the enthusiastic calls that were louder than her voice. Panicking, Connie kept shouting Kate's name while advancing through the waves of people.

When she realized, she had come to the front row of people.

There was a pedestal she had never seen before in front of her, in the center of the Square. For a second, Connie thought about whether this was also built for the sake of the "execution", but she immediately discarded that thought. Kate was of a bigger priority. Just where was Kate? Other than the unfamiliar pedestal, the scenery before her was the same old Square. There was a statue of Amadeus, the founding hero of this country, to her left and the statue of Saint Anastasia to her right. And a little far away from here, the bell tower of St. Mark was standing tall, as if looking down on the whole Square.
Just as Connie turned her head to look for Kate, the surroundings suddenly got excited. The gate leading to the Moldavite Palace was unlocked and a carriage arrived at the Square.

Appearing from the inside were a girl wearing black hood and several men.

There were young and old men in the bunch, but they all were dressed primly in formal clothes. However, the girl's outfit consisted of a mouse-colored, frugal one-piece dress, which had even become frayed at places.

The moment they showed up, the cheers of the crowd became more excited and eventually changed into angry roars and jeers. Vulgar words, the likes of which Connie had never heard before, flew forth. Connie became so afraid that couldn't move from her spot, however, the girl who was supposed to be on the receiving end of those words didn't seem to care. Without even glancing at the crowd, she was led by the formally-dressed men and taken to the specially installed pedestal in the center of the Square. In other words, right in front of Connie. As the girl approached, Connie saw the wooden handcuffs on her wrists.

The excitement of the crowd was unstoppable. Pointing at the girl, some would scream, while some would clap and roar with laughter.

Ding-dong, the bell rang.

When she noticed, thick, dark clouds had gathered in the sky. Drip-dropping rain painted dots on the ground.

When one of the men whispered something, the girl took off her hood. Glossy black hair spilled over as she listlessly shook her head. And finally, she looked towards the people.

At that moment, Connie gasped.

There stood the most beautiful being Connie had ever seen in her life. Snow-like white skin, lips as red as ripe fruit and Amethyst-colored eyes, glittering like stars.

The word 'divine' was created exactly for this person. Connie was probably not the only one who thought so. As a proof, jeering that was extremely noisy a moment ago, suddenly stopped.

Everybody was staring at the girl entranced. The girl wasn't a bit disturbed even after being exposed to the scrutiny. On the contrary, she looked around the Square as if to check each person's face. This time, the people who were looked at, shrank back.

The girl slightly narrowed her eyes and harrumphed. Then, she slowly opened her mouth.

"Be cursed."

Even though she didn't raise her voice, her cold voice reverberated through the whole Square.

"All of you bastards should be cursed!"

For a second, the surroundings turned quiet. Immediately, the sound of swallowing came from the crowd. There was no way curses existed, but her attitude was so brazen and confident that agitation spread through the people.

"Y-you bitch!" someone shouted with a trembling voice. However, that became a catalyst, and crowd, which finally returned to itself, started hurling abuse one after another. "Whore!", "Devil!", "Murderer!"

Connie could only tremble in fear. Being merely 6 years old, she still didn't have immunity towards the human malice. Just as she was looking around, not knowing what to do, her eyes met with those of the girl. Perhaps she found the presence of a young child like Connie rare. At first, she looked stupefied at Connie, but then suddenly broke into a smile. That's right――― she smiled!

Connie opened her eyes wide. Her heart almost leapt to her throat. What…was…that just now? What…was…this? Hadn't she just seen something outrageous? This was…This was―――

Probably something extraordinarily beautiful and gentle enough to make her want to cry.

The girl whispered something. However, fortunately, or perhaps unfortunately, it didn't reach Connie's ears.

Ding-dong, the bell rang.

Before she knew, the rain gained momentum and came stabbing down. The wind roared and the sky whirled into a black color. The executioner made the girl kneel and raised his sword. At that moment, something shone along with the earth-splitting sound of explosion. Its flash painted Connie's field of vision into white. She couldn't see anything. As she held her hands over her head and narrowed her eyes, something warm flew to her cheek, followed by a nauseating rusty, irony smell.

―――By the time her vision returned, everything had already ended. The man with the sword was holding up something round and dripping red. A splitting sound of cheers came from the crowd. "Look, the hammer of justice has been dealt!", "Serves you right!", "She died!, "She's died!", "She's dead―――!"

Connie couldn't move. She couldn't even scream. She couldn't believe just what had happened in front of her a moment ago.

Somebody whistled and the surroundings heated up. As if following each other, cheerful voices bust forth one after another. The circle of joy gradually grew bigger―――however, it didn't last long.

Suddenly, somebody raised a voice.

"――― Hey, look, fire!"

At the end of their finger was the burning town hall. "It was struck by lightning! The lightning just fell!" somebody else shouted. The flames groaned. After a single moment of silence, somebody screamed. The escaping people pushed each other away, bumped into one another and bellowed angrily.
"Move!" Connie was shoved by somebody and fell on the ground. It hurt. It was painful and scary. Somebody.

Somebody, save me.

At the end of her line of sight, she noticed somebody who had fallen just like her. It was a black-haired woman. Just as Connie stretched her hands towards her, she felt that something was out of place. ―――Nothing.

There was nothing below her head.

The moment Connie realized the identity of the thing that was carelessly rolling on the ground, she finally screamed. 'That is an inhumane act'. Her father's words crossed her mind. Ah―――

Overhead of Connie, who had tightly closed her eyes, the bell of St. Mark rang crazily, ravaged by the storm.

—
Notes:
Something new again, so sorry (a teaser for now) ;_;
I just saw the first chapter of manga and thought that it looked interesting.
New chapter for main novels will come soon, I swear! I'm like 60% done with all of them!! (:”<)

Notify me about any typos, mistranslations or weird/awkward grammar you notice so I could fix it afap

Chapter end