v2 prologue

RETURN OF THE DRAGOON CAVALIER

At first, she could not discern its nature.

The diminutive stone pillar, scarcely reaching her knees… appeared far too crude to merit the name of gravestone.

A mere heap of roadside stones, it bore no trace of artistry. No inscription adorned it. It resembled a child’s stack of blocks, carelessly assembled—utterly devoid of condolence or reverence for the departed. Had she not been informed, Dominica Skoda would have passed it by, unheeding.

“This… this is…?” she gasped, her voice a trembling whisper.

Beneath a canopy of oppressive gray clouds, the landscape lay shrouded in mournful hues, ill-suited to midday’s light. The gravestone before her seemed all the more wretched in its stark simplicity.

“L-Lady… Lady Lucye’s…” The village elder who had led her here nodded, his voice quavering.

His deeply lined face tilted downward… fear thick in his faltering words.

Certainly, standing before a lord who had returned triumphant from a protracted and brutal war was cause enough for trepidation—but what truly unnerved the aged villager was the colossal, otherworldly presence looming behind Dominica.

Silver and jet black—a towering form clad in contrasting hues.

Even with its vast, shadowy wings folded and its elongated neck bowed, it dwarfed any ox or horse like a predator that might seize such beasts as prey.

Not wholly a beast but its limbs and head bore a configuration akin to humanity’s.

Yet to call it “humanoid” was inadequate. Its neck stretched too long, its arms and legs proportioned unlike any man’s. The equine, elongated head sported a pair of horns and above all, the sinuous tail, nearly half its length, was an organ no human could claim.

Human-like, yet not human.

Winged, yet not a bird.

Tailed, yet not a beast.

What name could suit such an anomaly, if not otherworldly?

Yet… its form was not the sole source of its singularity.

No fur cloaked its surface, nor smooth skin. Some named its covering “scales,” but these were unlike those of serpent or lizard, interlocking planes that evoked the plate armor of knights.

Thus, it was known among the people:

A dragon clad in armor, the Armored Dragoon—so it was called.

No matter how fervently one proclaimed it “safe,” the creature’s imposing presence would stir fear in any heart. That the elder did not flee screaming testified to his resilience. Even Dominica, when first confronted by this Armored Dragoon, had nearly collapsed in terror.

“Lucye…” she murmured, dazed as if in delirium, invoking the name of the one interred beneath the stone.

Her sister Lucye was the sole remnant of her family.

“Onee-sama. Onee-sama—”

Her cherished sister. Her only kin by blood.

When she closed her eyes, Lucye’s smile lingered vivid on the inner lids.

In the embrace of silence, her sister’s voice echoed within her mind.

“Look at this flower. I think it would suit Onee-sama’s hair.”

“Yes, we must offer some to Father and Mother’s graves as well—”

The Skoda lineage was a knightly house fallen into decline.

Their holdings were meager—a modest fief, sufficient only to uphold the barest veneer of knightly dignity while living frugally as rural nobility.

The father, destined to restore the Skoda name… had ventured to the battlefield before Lucye’s earliest memories, never to return. Though of knightly stock, not all are born for war. Dominica suspected her father lacked the warrior’s mettle.

Her mother… succumbed to illness mere years after her father’s departure.

Just like him, she was earnest to a fault. Raising two daughters and preserving the Skoda family’s honor on scant tax revenue exacted a toll beyond measure. A curable ailment turned fatal under such strain.

“Onee-sama, today we were gifted some duck meat.”

“Wait, I’ll prepare Onee-sama’s favorite mustard sauce—”

Thereafter, Dominica and Lucye clung to one another, two sisters sustaining each other in solitude.

A fief, however small, should have provided enough revenue for two girls to live modestly—had all gone as intended. Yet in the villages of the Skoda domain, tax arrears and evasion grew ever more brazen. As minor nobility, bereft of their patriarch, left with two girls not yet twenty and no retainers—the villagers scorned their lord.

The Skoda family lacked the strength to censure such insolence.

This could not endure… Dominica resolved.

The war stretched on, its end ever elusive.

Far from abating, the frontlines shifted ceaselessly where none could predict when their homeland might become a battlefield. A minor noble’s fief could be forsaken by the crown at any moment, perpetually at risk of war’s ravages.

“Onee-sama, why…?”

Lucye’s face was etched with sorrow when Dominica declared her intent to join the war.

It tore at her heart to leave—yet Dominica’s resolve to march to the battlefield held firm.

Valor in war could expand their fief or secure its exchange for safer lands, far from the frontlines. The villagers might then recall their reverence for the Skoda name.

In this age of chaos… with no allies to shield her, Dominica could conceive no other means to protect her sister.

“Onee-sama, when will you return…?”

Of course… despite her knightly heritage, Dominica possessed scant martial training.

Her father, who should have instructed her, was gone. To study under a renowned master demanded coin and time—resources she lacked.

Thus, even in the army, her paths to distinction were few.

Nay, there was but one.

From the outset, she had no other choice.

As commanded, she surrendered her body.

In other words…

“Lucye…” Dominica sank to her knees before the humble gravestone.

“At last—the war has ended…”

She had won renown, claimed a new fief as her reward, and returned home in triumph.

“Why… like this…”

“L-Lady…” The villager, head bowed, muttered something of Lucye’s demise—but his words scarcely reached her.

To accept her sister’s death was all she could bear. No space remained for other thoughts.

All had been for Lucye.

She had no other cause to defend.

To safeguard Lucye, whatever the cost—Dominica had offered her body, embraced a fearsome path that even stalwart warriors and true knights recoiled from, and stood resolute on the battlefield.

She fought with desperate fervor, securing boundless rewards.

Yet…

“Was I…”

Was it a mistake?

Had she remained at Lucye’s side even if death were inevitable, she might have comforted her final moments or perished alongside her.

Surely Lucye had awaited her sister’s return, each day an eternity.

Surely Lucye had departed this world in profound solitude and despair.

The thought within her, shattered her restraint.

“Oh… oh… ooooh……!” Collapsing before the gravestone, Dominica wept.

Heedless of the silver armor now stained with earth, she struck her fists against the ground, again and again, her sobs spilling forth. She knew not how to quell the boundless grief swelling within. Unable to remain still, she poured her anguish into her blows, hammering the earth relentlessly.

And—

Ooooh… OOOOOOH……!

A roar resounded through the leaden skies above Dominica and her companions.

As if in communion with her sorrow… the dragoon, clad in silver armor, reared its head heavenward, its colossal frame quaking, unleashing a cry of torment into the dark, turbid firmament.