On the road leaving Garlot behind and heading for Orkney, the northernmost edge of Britain.
As evening fell, Arthur’s army, which had been crossing the rugged mountains and plains of Pictland, set up camp in the middle of a vast field.
While the Pict soldiers moved in perfect order to raise tents and light bonfires, the Servants and close retainers were also resting in their own ways.
But before one blazing bonfire, Penthesilea’s expression was twisted far more fiercely and turbulently than the flames themselves.
"......"
Using the branch in her hand, she aimlessly gouged at the dirt, trying to suppress the dissatisfaction boiling up inside her.
The past year.
During the countless battlefields she had crossed at Arthur’s side after being summoned to him, Penthesilea had become keenly conscious of the overwhelming male called Arthur Pendragon.
When he had first summoned them, Arthur had clearly declared, with audacious confidence, that he intended to make even his Servants into his women.
As the proud and high-spirited queen of the Amazons, she had inwardly looked forward to seeing how that arrogant king would court her and approach her, and had already decided she would willingly play along.
But what was the reality?
Arthur trusted her deeply as a source of strength and kept her close, yet not once had he shown any sign of desiring her or aiming for her as a woman.
Instead, hadn’t he taken the queen of the Moidart straight into his bedchamber?
Even Nobunaga, who was practically a roughneck, had ended up in his arms, and yet with her, there had not been even the slightest sexual contact.
That fact was leaving scratches on both her towering pride as a warrior and her self-respect as a woman.
"Ah, damn it! Why the hell is he only so bland with me?!"
At last unable to hold it in, Penthesilea hurled away the branch and grumbled, and beside her, Caenis, who had been tearing into a huge piece of meat, glanced over.
"What are you so dissatisfied about?"
Caenis asked, wiping the grease from around her mouth.
"Caenis, can you understand this? That bastard! At first he bragged about conquering all of us, but with me, he hasn’t laid a single finger on me for over a year! Even though he scooped up the Pict queen and Nobu without hesitation!"
At Penthesilea’s resentful complaint, Caenis let out a disbelieving snort.
"Ha! If it pisses you off that much, then you go at him first. Aren’t Amazons supposed to pounce on their prey first?"
"Why should I be the one to bow my head first? I should make him want me first...!"
Still bristling with pride, Penthesilea suddenly lowered her voice as far as it would go and leaned toward Caenis in secret.
"Hey, Caenis. You’ve... already slept with him, haven’t you? That Arthur bastard, is he really that... incredible in bed?"
"Pffft!!"
At that blunt question, Caenis, who had been about to drink some water, choked and spectacularly sprayed it out.
Her bronze skin instantly flushed as red as a ripe tomato.
"A-Are you insane?! Why the hell are you suddenly asking me that?!"
"Come on, everyone talks like they’re worried he’ll die of overwork, so I got curious! I need to confirm whether he’s a male good enough to satisfy the queen of the Amazons!"
"I don’t know, so don’t ask! And don’t even bring up that beast of a man!!"
Trembling all over with embarrassment, Caenis ducked her reddened face and fled the spot as if escaping.
Seeing even the strong-willed Caenis turn red and run away like that only made Penthesilea’s stubbornness and curiosity burn even hotter.
She sprang to her feet and strode straight toward the command tent where Arthur was.
"Arthur!!"
Throwing aside the tent flap roughly, Penthesilea stormed in.
Inside, Arthur had been checking the next marching route over a spread-out map, and even at her sudden intrusion, he merely looked up without any sign of surprise.
"What is it, Penthesilea? Something wrong?"
"Something wrong?"
Penthesilea strode up, planted a hand on the table, and glared sharply at Arthur.
"When you first summoned us, didn’t you boast that you’d make all of us your women? You even took Nobunaga into your arms, so why do you not give me even the slightest glance? Are you saying the queen of the Amazons isn’t even worth taking?"
It was a cry pouring out the pride and grievance she had kept suppressed.
But Arthur simply listened to her fierce protest in silence. He slowly folded the map on the table, then calmly swept his gaze up and down over Penthesilea’s flushed face and her rigid, upright figure.
Then he spoke in a very low, gentle voice.
"Why didn’t I look at you? Well. Seeing you this close... Penthesilea, you look especially beautiful today."
In that instant.
The air inside the tent froze.
Beautiful.
For Penthesilea, that word was a forbidden trigger that should never be uttered, the cursed spark that shattered her sanity.
Long ago, it had been the humiliating word Achilles spoke as she lay dying, looking down on her not as a warrior, but as a woman.
"......!!"
Bloodshot veins instantly rose in Penthesilea’s eyes. A beastlike killing intent burst from between her lips.
"You dare... you dare put that word in your mouth to me?!"
Just as she lost her reason and raised her fist to lunge at Arthur—
"This is exactly why I didn’t touch you."
Arthur’s cool, weighty voice crushed down on her madness.
Arthur had slightly released the pressure of the red dragon, and his eyes were no longer playful as usual, but those of a ruler sunk into cold stillness. Faced with that overwhelming presence, Penthesilea’s fist halted in midair.
"A moment ago, you were angry that I didn’t treat you as a woman. But the instant I praised your appearance as a woman, you lost your mind and tried to kill me."
"That’s...! That word is an insult to me...!"
"Yes, it is an insult. Because of that damned trauma Achilles left behind."
Arthur leaned against the table and folded his arms.
"You want to be treated as a queen and as a warrior, while also wanting to be treated as a woman. But the moment someone looks at you as a woman and praises you, you get possessed by the ghost of the past and go mad. With that contradiction of a complex weighing on you, how exactly am I supposed to treat you as a woman?"
Penthesilea bit her lip and could offer no rebuttal. Her halted fist was trembling faintly.
"I waited for you to break that wall yourself."
Arthur’s voice softened, growing more serious.
"You’ve been watching at my side for the past year. Caenis had a vicious trauma of her own too, after Poseidon raped her and forced her to become a man. But in my arms, she acknowledged her own femininity, overcame her past, and moved forward. I hoped that by watching her, you too would free yourself from Achilles’ curse."
"......"
"But even after a year, you haven’t changed at all. You’re still bound to the past, just walking in place."
Arthur rose from his seat and walked over to Penthesilea. In his eyes were reproach, but also apology.
"Of course, I’m at fault too. Maybe I should have stayed beside you more, coaxing you along and clinging to you until you overcame that wound. But Penthesilea, I am the king of Britain, the leader who must guide my people. And above all... I am the head of a household and a father who must care for his wives and raise his children."
"Arthur......"
"The children who depend on me, and my women, had to come first. What I mean is, I didn’t have the spare time to pour endless time and devotion into soothing and untangling your complicated trauma one piece at a time."
Arthur gave a bitter smile and shook his head.
"Honestly, I even thought it might be easier to conquer that haughty, infuriating Stheno than you, who desperately denies your own femininity. At least Stheno doesn’t deny that she wants to be loved."
That sharp truth made Penthesilea’s heart drop.
Only then did she fully realize that the gaze of the man she had wanted so badly had been repelled by the very defense mechanisms and complex she herself had built.
"Even if you were summoned in the Spirit Origin of a Berserker, you are still the great queen of the Amazons and a warrior with a mature mind."
Arthur reached out and firmly gripped Penthesilea’s trembling shoulders.
"If you truly want me. And if you want to know what love is, not as a warrior shackled to the past, but as a woman... then understand yourself, struggle to change, and move forward. Stop hiding behind Achilles’ shadow and clinging to hatred."
Arthur’s words stung like a whip, yet at the same time they were the clearest signpost, piercing straight through her inner self.
"If you break out of that shell yourself and come to me as your true self, then I’ll embrace you properly as my woman too. From now on, when I have time, I’ll even counsel you. Let’s try changing little by little."
Even after Arthur patted her shoulder and stepped out of the tent, Penthesilea remained standing there as if nailed in place.
The rage and madness that had surged up in her had long since cooled without a trace.
In their place, shame over her own weakness, which she had never once tried to face until now, and a fierce, desperate desire to somehow live up to that man’s expectations and break out of her shell began to swirl together inside her chest.
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