Chapter 9
Morning in Hokurin wasn’t merely warm—it was already sweltering.
The sun had only just risen, yet it burned with a fierce, unrelenting heat.
Hasu and the others came to see them off, but there was no weight to the farewell—only the same easy, familiar exchanges as ever.
“Thanks. See you tomorrow.”
“Got it. Catch you later.”
That was all.
Yuki gave a casual wave and took the reins as if nothing more needed saying.
—Tomorrow? Later?
Might Her Majesty have cause to return here?
The thought gave Ando pause—but before he could speak, the Raptors leapt into the air and turned south.
The plains slipped away beneath them. The air grew heavier, thick with moisture, clinging to him in the wind.
They passed over a line of low hills—
—and the world opened wide.
A vast stretch of water spread to the very edge of sight, blazing under the sun.
He had never seen anything like it.
“My Lady… is that...... the sea?”
“Mm-hmm. Pretty, isn’t it? Our capital’s right by the coast—we’ll go down to the shore once we get there.”
Ando could only stare.
No mountains. No valleys. No walls. Nothing but water—endless, shimmering, breaking the sunlight into glitter.
Waves rolled and broke, each crest dissolving into white.
Beyond that—more blue.
Farther still—deeper blue.
The line between sky and sea faded, until it was hard to tell where one ended and the other began.
Along the shore, tall, slender trees swayed, their fan-like leaves catching the wind.
A faint, unfamiliar scent drifted up to him.
“The smell of the sea,” Yuki said.
He hadn’t even realized his mouth had opened slightly. Something in his chest tightened, stretching wide.
“…It’s enormous.”
—So this was the sea.
So this was the world.
Imresia, too, touched the northern sea. He had never seen it, only read of it—water heavy with salt, a horizon too distant to make out the far shore.
But the brilliance, the scent, the sound of the waves—none of that had ever been captured on a page.
If he hadn’t been astride the Raptor—he would have run for it like a child, racing across the sand to the water’s edge.
He would have forgotten the chill, let the surf soak his feet, the spray strike his face, chasing the feeling without restraint.
The impulse surged so strongly it took all his will to hold it back. He tightened his grip on the saddle.
Five steedraptors skimmed along the coastline, gliding on the wind. Before long, clusters of buildings came into view.
Below, the dragonfolk looked up.
“Hey—that’s Yuki!”
“They’re back!”
More Raptors rose to meet them, circling in easy arcs, their wings flashing in the sun.
The capital spread wide—far beyond anything Ando had seen in Hokurin.
With the sea at its back, the land climbed gently into low hills. Broad, low-roofed houses stood in peaceful order, their deep eaves casting shade, their pillars lifting the structures lightly off the ground. Gardens flowed into one another without walls, and wind and light moved freely through the open spaces.
Along the shoreline, where the waves curled in, larger buildings gathered close, their roofs layered toward the sea.
Yuki gave the signal to descend.
“That’s my place,” she said. “Our bath’s the biggest in the country. You can swim in it.”
Ando could hardly look away as the imperial palace of Tatsuno drew nearer, his chest tight with a rising thrill.
The raptors swept down in a wide arc and settled into a vast garden, their wings beating once, sending ripples through the grass.
Yuki slipped lightly to the ground.
Like the rest of the city, the palace was built low and entirely of wood—yet it spread with a serene grandeur that set it apart at once
At its heart stood the main residence, its sweeping roof rising in a deep curve, like a mountain lifted gently from the garden.
It was the foundation that caught Ando’s eye.
The residence extended out over the water, raised high on thick pillars driven straight below. Beneath it, the surface shimmered, scattering light upward in wavering reflections. A stone bridge arched toward the entrance, and soft ripples passed beneath, casting shifting patterns against the underside of the floor.
Around it, smaller residences opened onto the garden, linked by covered walkways that ran in all directions.
Walls were few. Pillars defined the spaces, and open corridors lay bare to the air. Beyond them, paper screens slid in place of solid walls, filtering light rather than shutting it out.
The garden stretched wide—broader than the grazing grounds of the royal palace in Imresnople—lush and meticulously kept.
A clear pond reached toward the sea, crossed by a vermilion bridge in a clean, elegant arc. Its red burned bright against sky and green, like a single stroke laid upon a painting.
Flowers gathered along the water’s edge in bursts of red, gold, white, and violet. Tall southern trees swayed in the breeze, and birds with vivid, jewel-bright plumage rested among their branches, their feathers catching the light as they stirred.
A crowd of Dracoserpens had gathered along the corridor of the main hall overlooking the garden.
Male and female alike bore proud, imposing frames—if anything, the females seemed larger still.
Come to think of it, among the Empress’s retinue, only Yuki stood taller than Tien. And back in Hokurin, Hasu had been the biggest as well.
Some smiled. Some raised a hand in greeting. Others swayed their tails in an easy, wordless welcome.
At the center of it all, Yuki waved with a bright, unguarded grin.
“We're back—how’ve you been, guys?”
At once, they spilled out into the garden.
As Ando carefully slipped down from the Raptor’s back, he found himself surrounded—just as he had been the day before in Hokurin—by looming figures on all sides.
“Glad you made it all this way.”
“You must be thirsty after that flight—want some water?”
“Or are you hungry? Food’ll be ready soon.”
“It must’ve been cold. We can get you into the bath right away.”
Once again, Kiba stepped in, settling them with ease. He parted the crowd and guided Ando toward the entrance of the main residence.
They crossed the stone bridge laid over the water and stepped up to the building’s edge. By the entrance stood a low stone bench and a shallow stone basin, steam rising gently from its surface. A large bathmat lay spread.
It closely resembled the bathhouse they had seen in Hokurin the day before—only the basin here was much shallower.
“At our place, every residence has a foot bath at the entrance,” Yuki said. “Wash your feet, then step on the bathmat before coming in.”
It was meant solely for cleansing the feet.
Following what he had learned the day before, Ando washed carefully, then dried them on the mat before stepping up onto the corridor.
The corridor was laid with the same fiber-woven floor mats he had seen in Hokurin, yielding softly underfoot. Paper screens stood in place of walls. The boundary between inside and out blurred, allowing light and air to pass freely through—just as in Hokurin.
And yet, each element here carried a far greater refinement.
As he moved along the corridor, flashes of the red arched bridge and the shimmering surface of the pond slipped into view again and again.
