The vast plain stretched endlessly beneath the sky, crisscrossed with farmland. Cutting through it, a railway train streaked under the sunlight, its body drawn long like a massive white phosphorescent serpent. From afar, the white metal exterior gleamed with dazzling brilliance.
But on the hillside before the tracks — where the train was about to pass, under the shadow baked by the sun — pairs of crimson eyes slowly opened along the backlit slope.
"An isolated carriage… no annoying signs of too many living presences…"
"The direction is toward Kyoto Prefecture."
"Perfect — just right to serve as the 'Her Highness the Princess's' carriage for her millennium-long appointment."
Cold voices rose one after another, accompanied by the violent beating of membranous bat wings and sharp screeches.
And at the very instant the train was about to reach the base of the hill—
A figure dropped down. With a resounding thud, it landed squarely in the middle of the tracks, directly facing the oncoming iron beast hurtling forward at over 250 kilometers per hour.
Ding-ling!
Though still at some distance, too far to make out the details of the figure within the shadows, the driver responsible for the train's safe operation swiftly pulled the alarm lever, letting out a shrill, drawn-out warning to alert the person ahead.
At such speed, at such distance, there was no time to slow down. To rouse that figure, the driver also switched on the train's headlights.
But in the next second, he froze.
Bathed in the blinding beam of the headlights, there stood a towering figure, its crimson eyes glowing. From its back stretched a pair of pitch-black, abyssal wings — bat-like, blending into the darkness until illuminated.
What—what was that?
The driver did not even have time to react.
The train roared as it slammed forward.
And the figure lifted its hand—meeting the engine's front head-on in a brutal collision!
It should have been like a mantis trying to stop a cart, like a mayfly shaking a tree. Yet bizarrely, the figure was neither flung aside nor crushed instantly. His legs dug deep into the gaps between the rails, tearing up countless tracks as he was forced back—yet still standing firm upon the shadowed ground.
He staggered, but he did not yield.
What's more—his retreat grew slower and slower.
And the train's speed… also decreased.
Until finally, within the shadows of Mount Kitayama, it came to a complete halt.
Its momentum utterly extinguished.
Stopped — by the strength of a single man!
By now, the driver was so close he could see the figure clearly through the glass window.
He saw those terrifying crimson eyes.
And between bared lips, the gleam of sharp, beastly fangs!
"Begin the operation—"
The figure spoke, his voice a low, buzzing resonance, high and commanding:
"Legion of the 'Dark Princess'!"
Thud-thud-thud!
The entire train shook violently.
One after another, figures dropped from the mountain above, landing upon the roofs of the carriages.
One after another—
Dead Apostles!
[450 years after the death of the Holy Son Christ]
[This was the year when the once-mighty Roman Empire had already split into East and West. From the east, the blades of the Huns swept across the Eastern Roman Byzantine kingdom, founding the vast Hun Empire, and aimed their forces toward the Western Roman Empire and the lands of Gaul.]
[This was the year when the Hunnic armies, under their king Attila, clashed upon the Catalaunian Plains near Châlons on the Marne River against the allied armies led by Flavius Aetius of the Western Roman Empire.]
[The battle ended in mutual devastation. The Western Roman Empire paid a terrible price, but succeeded in halting Attila's advance beyond Gaul. Forced to retreat, Attila withdrew his forces, yet the man called the "Scourge of God" by the people of Europa did not cease swinging his sword. Instead, he turned his sights upon the very heart of the Western Roman Empire—Italia.]
[This was the year the Hunnic Empire, with its conquered vast territories, stood tall over the western lands.]
[And this was the year you were born upon the soil of the Hunnic Empire. Your birth was noble, for you carried the royal bloodline of the Huns, kin of King Attila himself. Your name—Subotai Ughur.]
["Ughur" was the surname of the Hunnic royal family, the symbol of the most exalted lineage among the Huns. Though its history was not long — less than two centuries — it represented the qualification to inherit the Empire's highest authority.]
[And "Subotai" meant "swift" and "brave."]
[Your father was Octar, Attila's uncle, a prince past sixty years of age, ruling over the eastern tribes of the Hunnic Empire as a "king." For the Hun Empire had long followed a system of dual kingship. Though Attila now held the true power of the crown, there still existed a nominal second "king," even if that king had long since bowed his head to Attila.]
[You were both the only child born in Octar's later years, and the sole newborn heir of the dwindling royal bloodline of the Hunnic Empire.]
[When you were born, even Attila, campaigning far away in Italia, sent a personal letter, choosing for you the emblem of the eagle.]
[One could say the entire empire placed great hopes upon you.]
[And you did not disappoint them.]
[From the moment of your birth, you displayed extraordinary intelligence. Among the Huns, a people famed for their martial prowess, you were one of the rare few blessed with a remarkable gift for language. Before your first month, you could already babble words; by two months, you had mastered all the common scripts of the Hunnic Empire. By three months, you revealed an astonishing talent as a "medium," able to commune with the supreme deity the Huns called the "Eternal Heaven."]
[Before you were half a year old, you were already hailed as the future high priest, the great shaman of the empire.]
[But only you knew—the being you touched was not some supreme deity. It was a colossal, pallid woman, still exuding terrifying power even in her slumbering state.]
[You did not know what she was.]
[You only knew that the energy within her was unimaginably dreadful.]
[Yet this was a truth you alone could not speak aloud. Even if you told it, few would believe. Instead, they believed more in the miracles you displayed in the name of the Eternal Heaven, and in the gifts you exhibited beyond human measure.]
[Your father too invested deeply in your upbringing. He hired the most enigmatic great shamans of the kingdom to teach you the ancient arts of sorcery and curses.]
[Hunnic sorcery and curses were ancient, yet simple. They relied upon channeling the faint energies naturally overflowing from the slumber of the "Eternal Heaven." Though faint, for ordinary people these energies were still vast, nearly impossible to perceive, let alone manipulate.]
[But for you, they posed no obstacle.]
[You mastered them with ease.]
[With your tender body that had only just learned to walk—]
[You even learned to draw "one" and infer "three."]
[Within two months, guided by divine inspiration, you created the ability known as the "Triple Cycle." Since your miracles were born from within yourself, the great shamans who taught you regarded you as the incarnation of a god.]
[That winter was bitterly cold.]
[In winters past, many of the elderly of the Hunnic tribes could not endure such chill.]
[But with a medicinal system utterly unlike the Hunnic shamans', using extremely special herbs, you raised the survival rate of the elderly greatly.]
[You received commendation from your father.]
[Even Attila, at the front lines in Italia where the winter chill was less harsh, resolved that once spring came, he would return to the capital, Buda, to personally meet you.]