Chapter Text
Part One: Hope Emerges
Prologue:
The scene opens at House Karsten where the Emilia, Crusch, Anastasia and Felt camps are gathered.
Emilia: “I greatly appreciate you inviting us all over to your estate, Crusch-sama.”
Reinhard: “Indeed, Lady Felt and I humbly thank you for the hospitality you have shown even though we are your royal candidate rivals.”
Crusch: “It’s no problem, while my camp and Emilia-sama’s camp are in an alliance I have no issues being hospitable to the others on matters not pertaining to the royal selection, and after the last battle we all had against one of the sin archbishops I believe it may be necessary to take a well earned break.”
Subaru: “You can say that again, I still don’t know how we managed to get out of that one by the skin of our teeth. But, I guess we did have the Sword Saint himself to help even the odds near the end and it sure saved my behind. I guess that’s three I owe you now huh, Reinhard?”
Reinhard: “Don’t worry about it Subaru, you don’t owe me a thing. It’s my sworn duty to fight against evil, helping out a friend in the process was just a bonus.”
Subaru: “Heh, can’t stop being noble can you?”
Reinhard: “It comes with the territory of becoming a knight, Subaru. You’ll have that trait honed along with the rest of your abilities soon enough yourself.”
Julius: “Hmm, that remains to be seen” Julius joked as he and Anastasia entered the room.
Subaru: “Very funny, Julius…” responded Subaru sarcastically at his friend’s joke, but he couldn’t help but feel his pride be hurt somewhat.
Even though they were on much better terms now, Subaru still has some minor resentment for what happened at their first meeting back at the Royal Castle and the humiliation he had to endure at the hands of this same purple haired knight.
Emilia sensed his hurt feelings and tried to comfort him.
Emilia: “He didn’t mean anything serious by that. You’re my knight, Subaru and I have the utmost confidence in you and your training.”
Subaru: “Thanks Emilia-tan, I appreciate it."
With that, his spirits started to improve.
Suddenly, Subaru had an idea. All this talk about knights and training reminded him of something near and dear to him from his home world. And he thinks that maybe his friends would like to learn about something from his culture that they can all partake in during this rare moment of free time.
Subaru: “Hey, I’ve got an idea for something fun we can all do.”
Emilia: “Oh, what is it Subaru?”
Subaru: “I’d like to show you all something from my homeland. It’s a story, well sort of a fairy tale, from my culture that’s actually kind of like the things that happen here. It’s a very popular and well known story where I come from and I want to share it with you guys.”
Crusch: “Hmm, that’s right. You are from a different land than anywhere on the map here, aren’t you? I suppose seeing a glimpse of where you come from would be interesting.”
Emilia: “I agree, it sounds really fascinating. I’d love to.”
Reinhard: “I think I’ll take you up on that offer as well. I’m sure Lady Felt would also enjoy it. How about you Julius and Anastasia-sama?”
Anastasia: “I don’t see why not, I am curious about what this story is. Maybe I’ll learn something valuable to help me with business negotiations, I’ve already gained some nice stuff from this kid before.”
She was alluding to the alliance between the Crusch, Anastasia, and Emilia Camps when they partook in the subjugation of the White Whale, and the rewards that were reaped because of it.
Julius: “If you wish to hear it my lady, then by all means, and I’ll like to accompany you as well.”
Subaru: “Great! I’ll need some time to get things set up. Hopefully Beako can help me out with some of the technical aspects. After Rem, Ram, Frederica and Petra finish up helping around the mansion and making dinner we can gather back here. I’ll be sure to also get Otto, Garfiel and Ricardo when they finish their upkeep with the earth dragons.”
A short while later, Subaru is messing around on his laptop trying to get the files he needs setup while Beatrice is standing nearby.
Subaru: “I’m glad I was able to bring this thing with me when I got summoned here. The battery doesn’t last as long as my old phone did, but still pretty long and luckily it had a full charge when I came here and I haven’t had a real good reason to use it until now.”
Beatrice: “Is that one of those pieces of technology from your world you told Betty about, I suppose?”
Subaru: “That’s right. Basically it’s a much bigger metia than the other one I used to have. It can store all sorts of digital things for later use, and access many different areas filled with information. It’s almost like an entire library all stored in one place. Granted, much of its features are rendered useless seeing as there’s no internet in this world.”
Beatrice: “I don’t fully understand what you mean about this ‘internet’, but if there’s something on there you need I may be able to help you retrieve it I suppose.”
Subaru: “I was just going to ask that. I really just need help projecting the images to a large screen so all of us can view it. Think you can manage that?”
Beatrice: “It shouldn’t be much of a problem to use some mana to project what’s on your screen in fact.”
Subaru: “Thanks, Beako. You’re the best loli spirit I could ever ask for!”
After some more time passes and a dinner prepared for by Lord Roswaal’s maids, all the mansion’s occupants gather in the main hall where multiple chairs are set up.
Ram: “So, what sort of idiotic game do you have planned for us this time, Barusu?”
Rem: “Sister, that’s not very nice. Subaru-kun simply wants to tell us a story from his homeland. He told me it was like the fairy tales we have here and some of the things that happen are similar to what happens in our land.”
Ram: “I’m just saying, I know how he usually is. But, everyone else seems interested in it, even Roswaal-sama. So I guess I’ll give Barusu a chance, just this once.”
Otto: “I gotta say I’m really excited to hear more about things from Subaru’s culture. I wonder if anything in this story could help me out with being a merchant haha.”
Garfiel: “Man, Cap’n always has cool stuff planned out for us, he’s the best!”
Felt: “Of course, Big Bro never lets us down!”
Petra: “Definitely, Subaru told us some stories back in the village, but never anything like this before. I can’t wait!”
Ricardo: “I’m just curious if there’s anything I can use for planning better battle strategies, if this story is anything like ours it surely must have plenty of fights.”
Roswaal: “Yeees, it certainly would be quite intriguing to learn mooore about this boy and what shapes his personaaality.”
Everyone is gathered in their seats while Subaru gets his computer files ready. When it’s all set up he turns to the crowd.
Subaru: “Okay everyone, thank you all for coming to see what I have to show you. As you may have heard me say earlier, this is a story from my homeland that has been popular among my people for generations. While it is not a true story, it still has had a major impact on me and my people and offers some good moral lessons and is overall very entertaining. There are things written in a different language so I’ll be sure to read them out loud so everyone understands. And lastly, this story is going to be presented in a way you’ve likely never seen before. Where I come from, storytelling like this is a visual medium similar to stage plays so you will actually see the events play out along with accompanying musical scores.”
Emilia: “Ooh that sounds really fun!”
Rem: “I agree, this all sounds so exciting Subaru-kun!”
Ram: “Yes yes, can we just get on with it though, please?”
Subaru: “Alright alright. Beako, do your thing!”
Beatrice uses her magic to project Subaru’s computer screen on a giant blank wall in front of the audience.
Subaru: “And here we go” he says as he presses play.
