"Grandma Shamash, read us that book again!"
"Hey, you have to call her Principal! And it's not fair that Kyouka always goes first! Me too, me too!"
"Me, me! I want to hear stories about Grandpa!"
When the chime rings for recess, the children swarm around me, their Principal.
Kyouka, Yuri, Ako.
All three are my precious, adorable grandchildren.
To be precise, most of the students in this school are my grandchildren. Or, even more accurately, they are our grandchildren.
At their pleading, I read the children's book written about him. Reading it makes me miss him so much, though in truth, there hasn't been a single day I've forgotten him.
...It has been over ten years since he passed away—the man who gave me, a woman who had intended to live her whole life alone, happiness beyond measure.
Even now, I remember it all as if it were yesterday.
How we sought him out in turns throughout that first winter, barely leaving him a moment of rest. I look back on those days with such nostalgia now. We were all so foolishly young back then.
For our honeymoon, we all went to Lake Helipa. He ate Helipa-eel (he used to call it "unagi", didn't he?), which was supposed to boost vitality, and we were so insatiable that we stayed holed up in our inn the entire time. I remember the Spirit getting angry at him because he couldn't fulfill his Guidance.
The time we passed through the mirror to his world. I remember being so surprised when his parents, seeing us for the first time, frothed at the mouth and fainted.
Driving around in a car for sightseeing—seeing landscapes I'd never seen before, surrounded by new things, I felt an excitement that belied my age.
Marina-san used drop items from the Hitotsuzuki monsters to transform from a simple knight into a special Vocation: "Sacred Cross". His knight brigade, bolstered by a Dragoon, a Paladin, a General, and a Sacred Cross, gradually gained the power to move the world.
The brigade renamed themselves the Artemis Knights and backed Efta Solo, the third son of the Solo family. Efta, having started a railway business, outmaneuvered his siblings and successfully became the head of the Solo family.
Because of that connection, we ended up fighting the Empire, which I never expected, but thanks to his wit and ideas, we managed to pull off a revolution with almost no bloodshed. He claimed it was for the sake of the people, but it was really for Ion's sake. He was hopelessly kind, right down to the very end.
The new nation became a wonderful place.
It was the strongest in battle, yet it never fought and harbored no territorial ambitions. He called it "just a cheat," but the world really did become a better place.
Women were finally allowed to become knights, and persecution based on race vanished.
He didn't like to stand out, but all of us—the women involved with him—knew the truth. We knew that he, and he alone, was the hero.
The countless inventions. The nation-building. The moral standards. Especially the value that "a Hitotsuzuki isn't everything; people should be able to do what they love"—a concept that is taken for granted now, though it was hard for people to accept at first. Even his strategies for the Hitotsuzuki, he put so many new ideas into practice that casualties became almost nonexistent.
The shops he started have grown into chains, so common now that you can find them in every town. It's spoken of like a legend now that it all started from a tiny street stall in Erishe.
He truly left behind so many things—more than words could ever tell.
"Shamash. Are you in? Let's have a drink tonight, it's been a while."
While I was reading to the children, there was a knock on the door, and another visitor came into the Headmistress's office.
"Ah, Priestess-chan. With pleasure."
"Don't call me that... It reminds me of him, you know."
Priestess and I have become literal soulmates over the past hundred years. Or perhaps, since we were both his wives, it's more accurate to call us family.
"Ara? Reading that again?"
"The children insisted."
What I am reading to them is the story of him and Diana. It is a beautiful tale of two people who meet, overcome numerous hardships, and finally join together after the battles of the Hitotsuzuki.
Though, he used to laugh when he saw it, saying, "I didn't have any hardships like this!" Incidentally, since it is a children's book, the "harem" part is glossed over.
"Come on, keep reading! Grandma Shamash!"
"What happened at the very, very end?"
I shrug my shoulders. How did it end? That is something that goes without saying.
"Yes, yes. 'And so, Jirou and Diana were joined. They loved each other, had many children, and lived happily ever after.' ...You children are the descendants of those two, you know? Walk with your heads held high and keep sharing that love, okay?"
"""Okaaaaay!"""
The children reply energetically and run out of the office.
I am certain they will pass that love on to the next generation in the right way. They, too, will love others, give birth to children, and raise them. Just like we, who loved him, did.
Because love is something that lasts forever, through all eternity.
