The Traveling Girl and the Scorching Country

Stories

## Illustrations

## Prologue

Taiwan edition. Transcribed from Sakuraba (makeinu.weclub.info).

Beneath a sun fierce enough to scorch the hair and a tropical air that choked the breath, fields stretched on and on—fields no one had the heart to till anymore, gone to weed.

Everywhere stood unmanned huts, half fallen, scorched by the fighting.

There was almost no sign of people. No matter how far one walked, there was only ruined countryside and the marks the war had left behind.

This place was the tropical kingdom of Gessasonica.

Gessasonica had once been a wealthy country, dense forest and ample water across its whole territory, harvests rich in every season.

But the civil war between the government forces loyal to King Koslan IV and the rebel army, the Quecha, had dragged on for more than ten years. Industry could not grow. Fertile fields went to waste. And day after day, people lived under fire in fear.

Even this road, cutting across the Gessasonican countryside, had been chewed into pits and holes by shells. A girl walked along the broken shoulder, pulling a suitcase with rollers fitted to its base.

She looked about fifteen. A beautiful girl, with striking, intelligent eyes and finely drawn features.

From head to foot she wore a proper maid’s uniform, clothing her slender frame.

A short capelet lay over her shoulders, and beneath it a white apron edged with a wavy trim.

White socks and black slip-on shoes.

At her chest, a bow, and a brooch set with a green stone.

The girl’s pale skin and sharply defined face were plainly unlike those of the Gessasonican people, who belonged to the Asian races…

## Chapter One

A pure-looking girl in a maid’s uniform walked a battlefield that did not match her appearance at all.

She was about fifteen, with snow-white skin that did not belong in this tropical country, and deep-cut features that gave an impression of quick wit.

What covered her slender body was a short capelet and a white apron edged with a wavy trim, together with white socks and black slip-on shoes.

At her chest were a bow and a brooch set with a green stone. Her clothes were plain, yet they were a proper maid’s uniform, the kind that shows a person’s bearing.

Dragging a rolling suitcase, the girl walked through a town. It was a town built back when this country had still been a colony.

At the center stood a small church in the European style and a square paved with flagstones; beyond them, a neatly planned town spread outward.

The fighting had nearly destroyed every house of stone or brick, and the elegant foreign streetscape had vanished without a trace. The square and the church at the town’s heart might once have taken a direct bombardment; half of them had turned to rubble. Only the tough tropical plants still pushed leaves and branches up from beneath the debris.

The shopping street in one corner of the town had prospered once, but now almost every shop was closed. The storefronts were nothing but broken glass, and past noon there was not a single figure in sight.

Among them, only one shop still sent up cooking smoke.

It looked like an ordinary tavern on the edge of a city, yet dust lay over everything—the interior, and the neon sign above the entrance that read “Diu’s Shop”…

## Chapter Two

Daman, capital of the Kingdom of Gessasonica-Koslan—

The city had been famed since ancient times for its fine scenery, and even while the country was at civil war, Daman alone need not fear the fighting. In secret, the government forces and the rebel organization, the Quecha, had made a pact not to open battle here.

High-end resort hotels run on foreign capital stood in rows, and tourists from abroad were many. Set against the rest of Gessasonica, withered by years of civil war, the difference could hardly have been greater.

In one corner of Daman’s busy district was a small restaurant that still kept the style of the old Nafis colonial era.

The three-story stone building was faced with Latin-style tiles in red, green, and blue. Elegant arched windows looked onto the street, and above them retractable colored awnings were spread.

Beside the door, carved with wooden ornament, was written “Nafis Cuisine — Ban Dong.”

On this morning of fierce tropical sun, a man crossed the packed streets of the district and stopped in front of the shop.

He wore sunglasses and a straw hat, a Hawaiian shirt and cropped trousers. Dressed for leisure like that, he looked every bit a foreign tourist on holiday in Asia.

The man stood at the entrance, glancing about, then lifted the corner of his mouth, like a young man home from far away to visit family.

“Hey, Tad Ban Dong.”

He opened the restaurant door and called out in an easy voice, pointing at the owner, a man of fifty or sixty, slumped over the bar.

“You still alive?”

The man blinked and took off his sunglasses. What appeared behind the lenses…

## Chapter Three

Daman, the capital of Gessasonica, was a well-known resort paradise.

Along the white-sand coast stood world-class chain hotels, and there were fine restaurants, casinos, water sports, and every other amusement for tourists from all over the world.

That morning, in Daman’s busy district, Ainoa was waiting for a bus in front of a sightseeing-bus stop.

She had pale skin that, at a glance, was nothing like a Gessasonican’s, and intelligent eyes.

Ainoa wore a black dress and an apron edged with trim—a traditional maid’s uniform. A plain capelet lay over her slender shoulders, and from the middle of the capelet a brooch set with a green stone could be seen.

After a while the sightseeing bus stopped in front of Ainoa and opened its door.

“Excuse me—does this bus pass the casino on the way to the long-distance bus station?”

Ainoa showed the driver her free ticket and confirmed the bus’s destination.

“Yes. That’s right.”

The driver answered her. His shirt was open at the chest, and he looked a little slovenly. “You can put your luggage in the compartment underneath.”

“Thank you. That won’t be necessary.”

Ainoa smiled and declined the driver’s offer with courtesy. With both hands she lifted the suitcase, which looked heavy, up the steps, and boarded the bus.

Two men in uniforms like those of guards sat in the rearmost seats, their manner overbearing. Holsters with pistols hung at both their waists.

Aside from them, there were no other passengers.

“Ah… you wouldn’t happen to be Nafi…”

## Afterword

“Mr. Fujiwara, would you try writing a novel like this?”

Editor S of the NOVEL JAPAN editorial department asked me that, and three years have passed since then.

“I started working at HJ Bunko because I wanted to publish this novel,” Editor S said. From that time on, it seems Editor S had already imagined Ainoa’s basic setting and personality in full.

According to Editor S, the maid is a profession with a long history, originating in Britain’s Victorian era. To take up that work, one must possess a cultivation that could be called “the way of the maid.” And the maid manga, anime, and light novels flooding Japan now almost never meet that standard. Works one can acknowledge as “depicting the maid correctly” amount to only one manga and one anime… That is what Editor S said.

“Oh. Is that so.”

I remembered something a young anime-critic friend had said when we talked before.

“There’s a maid-café boom right now, but unfortunately very few shops truly qualify as maid cafés. Most of them just grab some girl, put her in clothes that look like a maid’s, and have her talk in a coy voice. Counterfeits, nothing more,” he said.

“If the goal is a real maid café, the first thing should be a strict interview to select women who already know honorific speech and etiquette, and then to hire them. But even after hiring, you cannot put her to work in the shop at once. She must be taught the correct manners and language of a Victorian maid…