Queen's Blade Unlimited Story: Chapter 1-1(e)

First of all, in our ongoing quest to translate everything QB under the sun (as if that was something only a couple guys could pull off?), we got a twitter now: https://twitter.com/QBTranslations! We might translate there stuff like the funky tweets from the official Unlimited account, so check it out if you wanna!

Also, some news about Unlimited's upcoming OVA! Considering how the author of our novel is cowriting the script and the announced chars match the story so far, it's quite likely that the OVA is intending to follow the official story, for a change! Plus, more to come late February.

Now, for the previous poll about "soft" or "fit", "balanced!" took it with 49v-59%, and after that "soft!" with 18v-21%, followed closely by "fit!" with 15v-18%.
Guess balance is where it's at, huh? Can't complain myself, my Menace was the representative there :3

Next poll --let me preface it by saying I wasn't the one suggesting it :3--, one more about my Irma-chwan!

Storywise though, it's time for the new heroine and hero (?) to meet?

Enjoy!




Chapter 1: Elina's Journey (Part 1)

Encounter

“Phew...”
Passing through the gates to the walled city, Michel heaved a sigh of relief.

His ghostly pursuers had stopped in their tracks the moment he’d escaped from the confines of the forest. Following that short reprieve, he hopped onto a carriage that happened to be passing by before ending up here. The wraith would be no doubt wary of entering such a densely populated city.

“I should be fine now that I’m here, right?”

He muttered to himself, reaching for the whistle around its hip to reconfirm its presence. His one possession, he’d had it for as long as he could remember. Both he and the whistle shared a common sense of touch, so the boy couldn’t even fathom handing the item over to someone else.

And yet, Airi was dead set on obtaining it. For what purpose, though? As a member of the undead, just touching the whistle would be fatal to her, wouldn’t it? As far as he could tell, there should be no reason for her wanting it.

“C’mon, we got a match! It’s gonna start soon!”
“Really? Sweet, time to bet!”

A group of adults passed Michel by just as he was lost in thought, excitedly chatting to one another. It was about that time again, so a city this big was bound to have official Queen’s Blade matches going on in it.

Chance encounters turned official matches between fellow beautiful fighters were often considered a must-see and had a tendency to attract a crowd. Fights were apparently judged by angels too. No wraith in their right mind would want to hang around a place with angels running around, now would they?

“Here’s hoping I can at least get a little rest…”

He’d only just started to walk through the busy street, looking around as the people surrounding him went about their business when he suddenly froze. He noticed someone staring at him from the other side of the crowd.

“I don’t… believe it…”

There, straight ahead of him, he saw a girl in a maid uniform, the wraith known as Airi.

“I’ve been waiting for you.”

The boy had turned his back to the maid before she could even complete her respectful curtsy in his direction, breaking into a run at full speed; if she caught him now, he knew he was done for. Michel’s body screamed that it hadn’t even begun to recover from the last chase yet, but then, what other choice did he have? A series of groans escaped the boy as he forced his body beyond its limits yet again.

“Oh dear, are you really that afraid of me? I must admit that hurts.”

Airi elegantly weaved through the crowd, making her approach.

However, this was one chase that was not meant to last. Struggling to push back his mounting mental and physical fatigue again, Michel’s feet soon caught onto one another and he fell.

But by some miracle, the boy never hit the ground. Expecting the cold and unyielding feel of cobblestone rush against his face, he was instead greeted by something quite warm and pleasant-smelling instead.

“W-Wha-!? The hell are you-!?”

He heard a voice protest from above him.

“Who do you think you are, get your face out of there!”

The boy swiftly raised his face and found himself greeted with a very close view of what seemed to be someone’s cleavage.

“Hy-Hyaa! I-I’m sorry!”

And in his hurry to stand back up, his outstretched fingers found something soft. Something soft, and elastic, enough to jiggle.

“Ah!”

Still not thinking straight, Michel actually took a moment to reconfirm what that cushiony feeling in his hand might be.

*Jiggle, jiggle*

“H-Hey!”

An angry, maybe slightly embarrassed sounding, voice suddenly pulled Michel out from his reverie. It belonged to the girl whose breasts he was currently getting acquainted with. His face turned beet red the moment he realized what he had done.

“Wha-... no... I didn't mean to...”

***

“You have some nerve, coping a feel from a ruler’s breast like that!”

Elina icily berated, scowling at the boy for making her fall. True, she’d been lost in thought at the time, but still, getting knocked down? In the middle of a busy street like that…? Such disgrace! She figured she may as well give the boy a piece of her mind before she beat him up for it.

“I-I’m sorry.”
“Yeah, I bet, do you mind taking your hand off already?”

The blonde’s sharp stare pierced through the boy, who hadn’t let go of her breast yet.

“Hyah, I-I’m sorry! I’m so sorry!”
The child jumped back, apologizing profusely.
“Honestly…”
A pout crossed Elina’s lips as she gave the boy a once-over.

(Huh, he’s pretty cute, for a boy.)
If you ignored the clear signs of exhaustions on his features, like the sweat soaked hair or the blood shot eyes, he looked like he’d clean up pretty nicely in fact. There was an air of intelligence to him, something that Leina also had back when she was younger.

(Might have been nice to have a little brother like him.)

Far as Elina was concerned, that gave the boy a passing grade.
Meaning he qualified for somewhere within her strike zone.

“Good grief.”

She slowly sat herself upright and decided to give the boy another, more careful, look this time. Although a little messy right now, the clothes he wore seemed rather high-quality. Was he some well-known aristocrat’s child? Maybe just some rich kid?

The whistle hanging from his waist caught her eye. A layer of silver lines had been carefully etched into its body, which looked to be carved out of some kind of slightly transparent, white material that Elina could only guess at being either carefully polished porcelain or some kind of stone, animal bone maybe? Whatever it was, she could tell it was the work of a master craftsman just by looking at it.

“Hey, give me a hand.”
Still sitting, the Vance girl extended an arm to the boy.
“Huh?”
“Don’t you ‘huh’ me.”
Elina gently scolded the confused child.
“You’re not so rude as to forget to help the girl you knocked over back up again, are you?”
“M-My apologies. I… was kind of in a hurry.”
“That’s no excuse, now is it?”

The boy held out his hand and Elina carefully got back to her feet with a light and graceful motion, as to not burden the child more than she thought necessary.

“But if you want to make it up to me, you could do it with this.”
She went straight for the whistle hanging from the boy’s hips.
“Ah!”
“Lovely thing you’ve got here.”
She swiftly took the whistle and began stroking it between her supply fingertips.
“Uuugh-, s-stop thaaat!”
The boy’s entire body shivered, but the blonde’s attention was too fixated elsewhere to notice.
“Brings back memories. I used to play one of these myself back home.”

Elina brought her red lips to the whistle. However, no matter how hard she tried to blow, the whistle failed to make a single sound.

“Oh?”
“G-Give that… back… M-Miss…”
With flushed cheeks and a still quivering body, he reached for Elina’s hand.
“A-Are you feeling alright? Are you sick or something?”
Not thinking much of it, Elina tightly clasped the whistle with her grip.
“Auh!”
With a jolt, the boy’s entire body was taken aback.

Unfortunately for him, it seemed that was more than enough for Elina to finally catch on. She put her lips back to the whistle and breathed in once more, rougher this time. The boy groaned, his knees buckled and he collapsed back to the ground.

That certainly left her with little doubt now. Whatever she did to the whistle would transfer back over to the boy.
For some reason, despite having her day ruined by that elf outplaying her earlier, this actually brightened Elina’s mood considerably.

“H-Hurry… and give it back! She’ll be here any moment…!”
“There’s someone after you?”

Still twitching, the boy nodded to her.
A cool chill drifted in from the other side of the road and Elina spotted someone that stood out to her, a real nasty piece of work dressed in a maid outfit.

“Is she the one?”

The girl in the maid uniform slowly approached, cold wave in tow.

“I’ve finally caught up to you.”

Perhaps overwhelmed by the menacing tinge lurking behind that maid’s polite words, the boy tried hiding himself in Elina’s shadow.

“That whistle belongs with its rightful owner, it is not yours to take.”