1

Yuliana awoke to small waves slapping her back. She was clinging onto what appeared to be a cabin door, removed from its rightful place together with a sizable segment of the wall, adrift somewhere at sea.

She raised her head and saw a great galleon flow by her.

It was completely unlike Captain Greystrode’s haggard, menacing mountain of boards; an elegant vessel, regal even when battle-worn, with sides painted pearly white, stripes of dark blue running across. Yuliana heard voices, people crying on the deck high above, waving at her. She waved back. A boat was hastily lowered and they rowed to pick her up and lifted her aboard the galleon, with as much respect and grace as could be afforded under the circumstances.

Yuliana assured her rescuers she was quite fine, which was mostly true, save some mild scrapes and bruises that weren't worth mentioning. Only, she had no memory of anything that had transpired following the out-of-nowhere hurricane. She could vaguely recall having seen Izumi, but had that actually happened, or had it been only a wishful dream?

Quite a crowd gathered on the deck of the Crucifico to receive her majesty. Dozens upon dozens of knights and sailors, their faces painted with wonder and awe. The ship was in a sorry state, the broken foremast but a grotesque stump. The damaged rigging and sails were being stripped and replaced, with great coils of rope and debris all over the main deck. The dead had been gathered in a line for burial, covered with sheets, while the injured were being treated. But once word spread of the unexpected miracle, maintaining military discipline became impossible. The Empress of Tratovia had been found, hale and whole, against all expectations; everyone wanted to catch a glimpse of her majesty, to see what they had fought and suffered for. Shortly, the Imperial officers restored order and the quarterdeck was cleared of needless personnel, although they still lingered as close as they dared, so as to not miss a word of what was to be said.

With most of the commotion dispersed like this, Yuliana wound up standing face-to-face with a collection of familiar faces, as well as a handful of new ones. They had all seen their better days. There was Captain Belfraum of the Crucifico, his broken arm in a cast. There was Major Uleison, his head wrapped up in bandages, his staff replaced with a crutch, weak but smiling. And in the middle of the group stood one very glum-looking redhead lady in uniform, who could not be ignored any longer.

Miragrave spoke not a word, made no smiles, but only stared grim and unflinching at her majesty, and it was—as usual—quite difficult to tell what she was thinking.

Was she perhaps angry?

“Ah, Master…?” Yuliana greeted her mentor with an apologetic smile, not knowing what to say. “It’s been a while. H-have you been well…?”

Miragrave came forward without a word. She went over to Yuliana while maintaining every bit the dignity and grace befitting an Imperial commander. However, when she was but one step away, the Marshal could hold back no more, but cast her arms around the young woman and took her into a tight embrace, as though still unsure if the vision was real and desperate for confirmation. Of course, Yuliana wasn’t going to disappear, better than aware of her own authenticity. But even after the Imperial had surely made certain of the fact, she wouldn’t let go. Hiding her face in Yuliana’s hair, she continued to squeeze her, not making a sound.

“Eh, Master!?” Yuliana asked, astonished. “A-are you crying!?”

“—I’M NOT CRYING!” Miragrave immediately denied, but her shoulders were quite clearly trembling, and her broken voice left no question of the matter.

Hit at last by the reality of these harrowing two weeks, Yuliana felt her own tears begin to spill in kind. She reached her hands around Miragrave's shoulders, squeezing her tighter, and they both cried with no more restraint, and no one had the heart to interrupt them.

In a while, the Marshal distanced herself, regained her composure with a deep breath while wiping her eyes, and was her usual self again—or, close enough.

“Welcome back, Yuliana,” she said in a soft tone, a heartfelt smile on her lips.

“I’m back,” Yuliana answered, meekly smiling in kind.

Here, Admiral Wittingam deemed the time fit to make his appearance. With a dry cough, he took a step forward and started with a bow,

“Your majesty. It is my pleasure to see you safely returned to us. On behalf of the Royal Navy of Luctretz, allow me to…to…”

Despite his firm start, the Admiral soon trailed off, lifting his face and taking his first good look at Yuliana’s visage.

“...My, uh...Aa…Oh...My,” the man stammered, having suddenly lost the thread of his speech.

“Why, is there something wrong with my face?” Yuliana asked him with a frown, tilting her head, and wiped her cheeks.

“No, no. No,” Wittingam denied and shook his head, his pale face turning quickly red. “Not at all. I simply...Er, wished to congratulate you. On, eh, your...recovery...”

“Recovery? Was I sick?” she asked.

“No. No, that was not what I meant to say. I…I...”

“Yes…?”

Waramoti stepped forward in support of the struggling officer.

“Of course,” the bard said to Yuliana with a bow, “what the good Admiral here means to say is that the sight of your majesty’s tearful, flushed face is simply too fair for words—with which I fully agree. Alas, his unaccustomed tongue found no way to express it in the Common Speech, for which he should have our pity.”

“—A-a-absolutely not!” the Admiral swiftly denied, growing even more flustered.

“No?” Yuliana asked him. “Then you think I’m hideous?”

“THAT’S—!”

So flabbergasted was Wittingam’s expression at that moment that Yuliana couldn’t hold her laughter anymore. She laughed brightly and long, feeling a little sorry for the Admiral—and yet, thanks to this slight dent on his pride, she felt as if a great weight had been lifted off her shoulders.

“But what happened?” Yuliana asked, recovering. “I may have a rough idea on the reasons and the belligerents, but I must admit, the course of the battle itself is a little hazy to me. Was the Navy victorious? What became of the pirates then? Where is Eryn—the dragon, I mean? And where’s…”

Unsure of how much was safe to say, Yuliana ended up letting her words drift off into questioning silence.

“Your majesty,” Wittingam attempted to repair his damaged image with a proper report, correcting his posture alongside. “We engaged the Confederate fleet, who were holding you hostage, though greatly inconvenienced by the presence of the aforementioned dragon. Nevertheless, everything proceeded according to plan, until an unnatural typhoon suddenly fell on us out of nowhere. The winds turned into something fierce, and a water devil unlike anything I have ever beheld forced us to swiftly withdraw our ships to a distance. Right as the situation began to seem slightly disconcerting to us, the storm stopped, every bit as abruptly as it had appeared, and there was...eh, a light...? Ah, yes, a flash of light. Flashes. Bright, it went high—Loud noises were also heard and it was...It was highly confusing. Unsettling, even. Very much so...Ahem.”

The summary fell to a fumbling finish, as Wittingam realized he had no idea how to describe the final stages of the conflict. Not that any of the others could offer a more eloquent edition. The show had been exceedingly mysterious indeed.

“Well, it is what it is,” Waramoti said with a shrug and a wink. “I suppose we are going to have to be patient and wait for the accounts of those who had a better view, before we may grasp the full picture.”

“By those, you mean…”

“—Ah, yes! I almost forgot!” Wittingam suddenly cried out.

“Really, what is it, Admiral?” Miragrave turned to the officer, and her previous serenity was gone, replaced by the scowl of a possessive mother hen. “You drone on and on, and here I’m beginning to wonder if you aren’t being a pain on purpose!”

“Not at all!” The edge in the Marshal’s words allowed Wittingam to restore his composure. “I had a real report to make, before this pleasant turn of events. We’ve defeated the key pirate aggressors and the rest have peacefully surrendered. The dragon is gone, the battle is won—with one noteworthy exception: the Jade Tempest. She is escaping us, ma’am. We have every reason to believe Captain Cartognam still has command of her. What should be done?”

Everyone turned to gaze ahead, past the main mast and the bowsprit, to the distant sea, where the legendary pirate vessel was well on its way northeast, the green canvases once again set to the wind. The Crucifico had no means to catch the lighter brig at this point, and neither were there other ships close at hand. But the ship remained yet within the Gilded Bow’s range.

Miragrave gave Yuliana a knowing look, to which the latter responded with a slightly guilty smile.

“Rest assured, good Admiral,” her majesty said. “The Pirate King is not one to run from his responsibility. I am certain we will be seeing our friends soon again. All of them.”

“I...see,” Wittingam replied with a pause, not understanding her meaning at all.

“Then,” Miragrave said to Yuliana, “were my eyes deceiving me, or was the one fighting the dragon…”

“—Yes, that was Izumi, no doubt about it.”

Instead of Yuliana, it was Aurlemeyr standing in the back, who answered the question.

““How do you know Izumi too!?”” Yuliana and Miragrave turned to question the Imperial in tandem, astonished—and rather vexed.

“She is a woman after my own heart,” Aurlemeyr answered them with a dreamy smile, her hand on her chest in a fond gesture.

“And what is that supposed to mean!?” Yuliana moved to question the Imperial champion closer, growling like a dragon. “Moreover, who are you!?”

Before receiving an answer, or waiting for one, Yuliana’s gaze was captured by the pair standing further back, and she forgot all else. Those two stood out in their beige uniforms among all the dark-clad crew of the ship, and she had to wonder how she hadn’t noticed them sooner.

“Hila!? Tilfa!?” Yuliana called the two maids, hurrying over to them. “How come you two are here…?”

Ever since the wreck of the Thefasos, the fate of her maids had troubled Yuliana’s heart like a chafing shard of glass, hovering ever on the threshold of consciousness. In the lack of better knowledge, she had stubbornly held onto the frail hope of their survival, as unrealistic as it had seemed. Seeing the two now alive and safe seemed to Yuliana the most unbelievable of all the wonders today.

“Your majesty,” the maids greeted her with simultaneous curtsies.

“Eh... ?” Yuliana was a bit taken aback by their abnormally subdued behavior.

“We’re at the tail end of a long line, it seems,” Hila said, “but perhaps it is finally time to rejoice? Is it fine to celebrate and be happy now? No one will come to steal this moment from us, will they? Nothing terrible is going to happen again, yes?”

“I shall sing praises to the Divines for the rest of my life,” Tilfa said, “as soon as I dare believe what I see is true, and not only another quirk of a failing mind! I’d pinch myself to check, but that might not be enough. Could someone please cut me with a sword, so that the ferryman can tell me, ‘yes, it really happened’, as he takes me beyond? For it is said that in death are the only truths found.”

“You two…” Yuliana answered them with a pitying smile and felt her lip quiver. “This is real. This is real, and no one can convince me otherwise!”

“Then, your majesty,” Hila said, “would it be all right if I momentarily forget my lowly standing completely, and throw myself at you? Because I don’t think I can hold back much longer, even if it costs me my wretched life.”

“Your majesty,” Tilfa said, “even though my greedy colleague always steals the spotlight, and speaks my heart’s earnest desires as if they were her own, would it still be all right for me to do the same and squeeze you, just to be sure?”

Before either of them could make a move, it was Yuliana who caught the maids in her arms, and squeezed them close and tight against her bosom, with no intention to let go.

“Your majesty,” Tilfa cried, “I’m so glad you’re already bathed in salt water and I don’t have to feel bad about staining your clothes with my tears!”

“UHUUUHUUHUUHHUUUUUAAAA!” Hila wailed, no longer capable of understandable speech.

A short distance behind, the Grand Marshal of the Imperial Army turned to starboard to face the sunset, a faint smile of contentment on her lips.

“Admiral,” she said to Wittingam. “Signal the fleet. The Crucifico withdraws. The Henessy will escort us back to Efastopol. The rest stay for cleanup.”

“Very well, ma’am,” the Admiral nodded and left to pass word to his officers.

Turning then to the Captain of the galleon, Miragrave spoke the words she had delayed saying for so long that their meaning itself had begun to seem foreign to her.

“Let’s go home.”

2

So it came to be that Her Imperial Majesty’s intended two-week state visit to the Principality of Luctretz ended up taking well over a month, becoming the subject of numerous songs and books in the process.

In terms of historical writing, it should make sense that the end of the pirates’ long reign on the shores of the Numénn was an event of great significance, perhaps more so than anything else that occurred in this age, as far as the human realms are considered.

However, due to the chaotic nature of the conflict, there exist wildly varying accounts regarding the precise course of it. Some writers saw it fit to emit the unbelievable existence of the dragon altogether from their narrative, feeling that it tested the audience’s faith a tad too much. Some did mention the wyrm, but tried to spin it as a symbolic vehicle, a lyrical expression representing the corsairs’ endless greed and ferocity. Only a few writers included the creature as is, but then struggled greatly to explain its role and what became of it since.

Some say the beast simply flew away, back to whence it came from, disillusioned with humans and their senseless disputes. Others say the beast died of its wounds and the Numénn became its watery grave. Some say it survived. It grew and matured, and eventually mastered its gifts. And perhaps even on this very day, you might unwittingly come across a rare beauty of a woman out there in the world, who is, in fact, a wise beast and immortal inside.

Half a week after the Battle of the Edrian Bay, the young Empress was reunited with her childhood friend, the Prince of Luctretz, in Efastopol’s Royal Castle.

The Prince had sustained grave injuries in what he explained away as an innocent sailing incident. Indeed, it is well-known that a sailor’s life is ever full of perils, and no one thought to question his tale, as extensively mauled though he was.

In spite of his wounds, his highness went on to mediate the talks between the Tratovians and the Luctretzian Senate. It was in no small part thanks to his efforts that old grudges were buried, and lasting agreements signed. Trade was to resume between the Empire and Luctretz again, the border opened, all notions of war set aside. Regardless of his contributions towards peace and the many thanks his people showered him with, the Prince remained a modest man to the end. He assured all who would ask that the true glory belonged to the sailors and soldiers, who had risked and lost much for the greater good of the many.

In what became since known as the White Sails Act, cooperation between the two lands’ armies and authorities was to be reinforced, to weed out any lingering villainy at sea. Pirates who wished to give up their trade were pardoned in exchange for a full confession and surrender of all property, free to seek honest life again with a clean slate.

The surviving Confederate captains were imprisoned with varied sentences, but most of them cooperated willingly, and were spared from the hangman—with a few exceptions. One being Mr Hyarsvall Fijord, who remained unrepentant to the end, and was hanged for his crimes; and Mr Danh Ibin Samalda, who was a wanted man in the Sultanate of Oferion, and there deported. Mr Aprophiste, whose real name no one knew, had peacefully turned in himself and his ship. Yet, when guards went to retrieve him for questioning, his cell was found empty and none could tell what had become of him.

Nevertheless, there was little reason to enforce the new laws.

The Confederacy was finished, their leadership gone, their operation on both land and sea dealt a mortal blow. The Royal Navy set up a fort on the island of Harm’s Haven to secure the settlers, and the town grew in time into a reputable trade hub between the realms of north and south.

The Pirate King himself was never again seen on worldly waters, his legendary ship drifting from physical seas into the realm of myths.

Almost all sources agree that Captain Cartognam was never caught or arrested, but what then became of him and his crew? Some say the villain's brig was too badly damaged and sank before reaching home port again. Some say he sank it himself, to own up for his failure. Other versions of the tale tell how he escaped the final battle, and that somewhere out there, on uncharted waters, the Jade Tempest sails on, a pioneer of human progress.

But there is one particular anecdote researchers often dismiss regarding the ship’s fate, which suggests the battle was not its end. A few fishermen and woodcutters reported to have seen the Tempest’s iconic sails close to the shores of Arcadia a few days after the great battle, there to deliver a certain lady passenger to land. Not many were the witnesses of this event, and the credibility of those few is habitually disputed by later historians.

Only one poet connected this entire chain of events to the legend of the summoned champion, yet even in the later editions of Sir Waramoti’s famous epic, this particular chapter has often been omitted as non-canon, for one reason or another.

Yet, she was there, this much is a fact. And, as what followed later proved, Izumi did return alive from the sea. True to her word, she journeyed back to the Empire, there to accept the heavy fate that the stars had divined for her, and embarked onto the fateful journey through the shadow of death, to the edge of the world.

But let us not speak of such grim affairs now.

In this particular story, our champion played only an accidental support role, whilst the central stage belonged to another.

Yes, let us instead conclude our journey tonight in the sun-dressed royal harbor of Efastopol, where her Imperial majesty delivered her farewell-speech to the people gathered from near and far, before boarding the Thule for the voyage back home, on now safe waters.

A smile rivaling the sun on her lips, Yuliana spoke to the masses thus:

“Someone wise once told me that we are all born into this world as equals, crying, kicking, and screaming. But from that moment on, we are no longer the same; we go on each to become individuals unique and precious, shaped by the choices we make, the loved ones we meet, and the battles we win.”

Finest Hour | END