Anagin Chronicles

Chapter 072. Familiar (1)

In the midst of Anagin’s standoff with the Argonaut Expedition Team.

Sanchonius mustered his courage and threw out the bait called “familiar.”

Anagin didn’t know exactly what a familiar was, but he picked it up on instinct.

At the very least, he could tell that in this situation, it was a third path—one that allowed both sides to avoid fighting without embarrassment.

And astonishingly, that third path actually worked.

They truly believed the claim that Sphinx was Anagin’s familiar.

It was surprising. Practitioners affiliated with organizations always seemed hard-headed, yet here they were, compromising.

However, when examined closely, it wasn’t all that strange.

It was because Tramachus and Irida, the younger siblings of Meleager the Immortal and the Great Warrior Atalanta, members of the ‘real’ Argonaut Expedition Team, had agreed that Sphinx was indeed Anagin’s familiar.

Why those two agreed was unclear. After all, no one had asked.

Still, it was possible to speculate.

First, they were grateful that Sphinx had fought in their place.

Second, they were embarrassed by the fact that they had received help from a monster.

Third, their perspective on the monster had changed while fighting together.

A few other reasons came to mind as well, but Anagin didn’t bother prying.

Not only did he have no interest in asking about such trivial matters, but Atalanta and Meleager also chose not to pursue the issue any further.

If the result was good, wasn’t everything fine?

Oh, and for reference, everyone else nearby also accepted the fact that Sphinx was Anagin’s familiar.

Bounty hunters affiliated with the Anti–Forest Brotherhood, vigilantes, and even the Western Alliance—all of them.

As if they didn’t want to fall out of favor with the highly renowned Argonaut Expedition Team.

It was a bit unsightly, but it was still a rather entertaining sight in its own way.

In any case, for those reasons, all the misunderstandings surrounding Anagin, being a Practitioner Killer, walking around with a monster, and the like, were cleared up.

So then, what was happening now?

Surprisingly, Anagin was currently on his way to Chiron Tower, having received an invitation from both the New Argonaut Expedition Team and the Real Argonaut Expedition Team.

And not just any way, he was riding a flying ship, an airship.

* * *

“It’s a spectacular sight.”

Anagin stepped out onto the deck, honestly admiring the view outside.

Even for someone like Anagin, he had never truly flown through the sky before, so the scenery from above inevitably drew his awe.

“Ah, damn it, wait. This isn’t my first time, is it?”

Anagin recalled the memory of being thrown by his master on the very first day he decided to become a practitioner.

That lunatic had said he’d help him leave the village quickly, then promptly hurled him into the air, sending Anagin flying through the sky for days on end.

As a bonus, he’d been forced to see more unwanted aerial scenery than he ever cared to.

“…No, let’s say this is different. I’m safely and comfortably looking down from a ship this time.”

Anagin rationalized it to himself.

Back then, he’d been flying through the sky with nothing but his own body, dangerous and utterly unsafe, but now he was safely viewing it from atop a ‘flying ship,’ a magical tool, so it was completely different.

Thus, Anagin concluded that this sky-gazing was his ‘real first time’ seeing the sky.

“Um, um….”

As he erased the dark, dreadful memories and tried to build new, bright ones, someone spoke to him.

It was Kori and Pais.

The two kids looked somewhat withdrawn and cautious, just like when they had first joined Anagin.

It wasn’t because Anagin had given them any pressure. To begin with, he hadn’t cared enough to do so.

The reason they were being cautious was guilt.

And that guilt stemmed from…….

“Do you think we can meet the big sister?

“Y-yeah, big sis.”

It was about Sphinx.

More precisely, about their own reaction, being startled and wary upon hearing that Sphinx was a monster.

“Why are you asking me that?”

After boarding the flying ship that the instructor had taken out from his robe, Anagin had eaten, slept, and only just woken up.

So he didn’t really know how things were going now. Nor did he particularly care.

Still, he could roughly guess the situation.

“Don’t tell me Pinku-Pinku got upset and said she’ll never see you guys again?”

“N-no! That’s not it!”

Kori flinched at Anagin’s sharper-than-expected tongue.

Anagin’s mouth had the talent of creating problems where none existed, shining brightly even after getting beaten senseless.

Of course, Anagin himself didn’t care!

“She didn’t say she wouldn’t see us….”

“Then?”

“We weren’t sure if it was okay for us to go see her first. S-since normally, she would come to us first…….”

Ah, he understood roughly what they meant.

Of course, even kids wouldn’t be unaware. They knew they had hurt Sphinx.

She had cared for them and looked after them so much, yet the moment they heard the word ‘monster,’ they looked at her with accusing eyes…….

And now, Sphinx, who had risked her life to protect them, wasn’t coming to see them first?

It wasn’t unreasonable for them to wonder whether they could approach her, or even meet her at all.

“Wh-where are you going?”

Kori asked as she saw Anagin suddenly start walking.

If you ask, you get an answer—it was only proper.

“I’m going to ask. Whether she wants to meet you. Pinku-Pinku’s in her own cabin, right?”

Without even waiting for Kori’s reply, Anagin headed toward the cabin where Sphinx was staying, and Kori and Pais stared blankly before hurriedly following after him.

Worried that they might have made some kind of mistake.

* * *

“Whew, good thing you opened the door.”

Bang! Bang!

After pounding on the door and entering the cabin where Sphinx was staying, Anagin spoke.

If she’d sulked and refused to open it, he would’ve had to break the door down, and that would’ve been too much of a nuisance.

It seemed Sphinx had thought the same.

“If I didn’t open it, you’d have broken the door.”

“Well, yeah.”

“Lunatic”

“Judging by how you’re talking back, your tongue’s working just fine. So tell me.”

“...Tell you what?”

“Why you’re cooped up in this corner with the door locked. This gloomy look doesn't suit you—you, who enjoys doing laundry under the sun.”

Sphinx had no idea where to start arguing.

It was true she’d done a lot of laundry under the sun, but she’d never enjoyed it.

......Or maybe she had.

This was bad. The more she talked with Anagin, the more it felt like she might really start liking laundry, as if hypnotized. Could it be magic? Mind-controlling hypnosis magic?

She hated that idea. She hated it a lot.

“Or are you embarrassed to show your new appearance?”

“.......”

Sphinx flinched and looked down at Anagin.

She hadn’t misspoken. She was looking down at him.

After her vow was broken during the fight with Erysichthon, Sphinx had grown slightly larger than a horse.

Add to that the eagle wings sprouting from her back, the fur-covered body, arms transformed into something like a beast’s forelimbs, and a posture closer to a four-legged animal—her usual appearance was nowhere to be seen.

To an ordinary person, she would look more like a monster than a human.

But Anagin wasn’t an ordinary person—he was Anagin—so it didn’t really matter.

To Anagin, Sphinx was just Sphinx.

“You really are something, Brother. How can you be this rude as naturally as breathing….”

“Want me to apologize?”

He wasn’t asking lightly.

If Sphinx even nodded her head, Anagin was fully willing to apologize for real.

To Sphinx, who had saved people even at the cost of revealing her true form, he was willing to show at least that much respect.

After a brief moment of thought, Sphinx shook her head.

“......Forget it. I don't want a forced apology.”

“Oh, don’t worry about that. I’d apologize sincerely.”

Sphinx froze. She could feel it. This wasn’t just talk.

“...Still, it’s fine. Hearing an apology from you would feel awkward.”

“Alright, then let’s move on to the next topic.”

At the abrupt turn worthy of a professional charioteer, Sphinx unconsciously rubbed between her eyes. Truly, a man you couldn’t let your guard down around.

“So what do you want?”

“Is there no way for you to turn back into a human?”

“...Why?”

“Because you’re worrying about it like crazy. I don’t really care, but since you do, it’s clearly bothering you. So we should find a way for you to transform back.”

“You know it’s difficult, right?”

“It’s obvious if you think about it for even a bit.”

Anagin was right.

In the past, Anagin had heard from Sphinx that her transformation into a human wasn’t a simple spell, but a special kind of magic—a vow.

A sort of bargain-like magic, where one imposed fitting restrictions on oneself in exchange for a desired result.

Sphinx had sworn a vow not to harm humans in order to maintain a human form semi-permanently, but by fighting Erysichthon, she broke that vow, and the transformation was undone.

Naturally, it could be inferred that transforming back into a human would be difficult, and that inference was correct.

“It’s not easy.”

“Can’t you make another vow?”

“If that were possible, I’d have done it long ago. You can’t break a vow and then make another one. That wouldn’t be a vow anymore.”

“That’s insanely strict.”

At Anagin’s offhand comment, Sphinx let out a small laugh.

That way he saw everything so lightly—it was sometimes enviable.

“What about a normal transformation spell?”

“Impossible.”

“You don’t know how to use it?”

“No, I did know how.”

A story from the past.

That’s right—Sphinx knew how to use transformation magic.

However, for a monster as large as Sphinx to transform into a human required far more Yeom, and it had to be continuously consumed while maintaining the transformation.

In short, it wasn’t cost-effective.

The fact that she chose to make a vow despite knowing transformation magic made it easy to guess why.

But now, even that was no longer possible. As the price of breaking her vow, not only was the magic undone, but she had become unable to use transformation magic at all.

“That’s a shitty situation. Why’d you make such an unfair deal?”

“At the time, it seemed the most rational. I could have built up enough skill through training to transform into a human eventually, but I felt that time was too precious to waste.”

“Why was it precious?”

“......”

Sphinx couldn’t answer right away. Like a child afraid of being treated like a fool if she spoke carelessly.

“If you don’t want to say, then don’t.”

“......I wanted to know.”

“What?”

“Why monsters and humans keep fighting. Since when did monsters start eating humans, and why do humans hunt monsters to offer them to the gods? I wanted to know when and why it became that way.”

“......”

This time, Anagin fell silent. It wasn’t because he was pondering—it was simply that he had nothing to say.

It wasn’t a subject he cared about, and he wondered if there really needed to be some special reason or point in time for beasts that ruined fields and humans who protected them to fight.

......That said, he didn’t think her curiosity itself was foolish. He was simply curious why Sphinx cared about such things.

Sphinx didn’t answer this time either. She just laughed weakly.

“Who knows, right?”

“Well, maybe some things just can't be known.”

With Anagin’s characteristically indifferent attitude added in, Sphinx laughed even more.

And then, after a short while.

“There is one way. A way for me to transform into a human.”

“Oh? Really? What is it?”

“But I need your help, Brother.”

“So what is it, then?”

As if making a heavy request, Sphinx slowly moved her lips with a hardened expression, but Anagin urged her on quickly and lightly.

He had already come prepared. If Sphinx needed help, he was willing to give it. If she asked him to find magical tools or materials, he was even prepared to pause his training to get them.

That might count as training itself, after all.

Sphinx wasn’t unaware of Anagin’s thoughts, but this time, she believed it wouldn’t be so simple.

He’d be flustered the moment he heard it. With the fear of being rejected and the contradictory desire to see Anagin’s flustered expression, Sphinx finally spoke.

“Make me your real familiar, Brother.”

“Alright, let’s do that.”

Contrary to Sphinx’s expectations, Anagin answered immediately.

Anagin was, indeed, Anagin.