Chapter 8 - The Girl behind the Curtain (1/2)

The next day, Kuro accompanied Syltina, who dragged along Alhart, to the castle. All along the way, Alhart whined, saying that he was tired, sluggish, didn’t want to do such a troublesome thing, didn’t want to go, and wanted to roll around on the bed.

“Ahh, what a pain. For the members, just me and Sylti and Kuro – the 3 of us alone are fine. The rest of them will just get in the way.”

“Even if you say that, this country still at least has to put up some kind of appearance. It can’t be helped if there are one or two extra people accompanying us.”

“Those one or two people are what will be a pain. It’s gonna be that Prince who spent a pointless amount of time glaring at you, and that willy-nilly second son that stinks of incompetence, right? And that one Saintess that somehow seems like she has the most bothersome personality of them all……say, it’s not a problem if we lose one of them during the journey by accident, right?”

“That’s right. It shouldn’t be a problem.”

“The second son that stinks of incompetence, you say……well, the request was to be the ‘Saintess’ guard’ after all. Isn’t it fine if we just have our fellow travellers work hard with regards to their own self-defense? However, it’s forbidden for us to make a move on them, alright?”

“ “…………………” ”

“You can’t, alright?”

“……fine.”

“……understood.”

Seeing Alhart and Kuroitsu reluctantly nod, Syltina made a wry smile as she opened the door to the room they were guided to. Within the room, there were already two people who had arrived before them.

“Hmph, you finally came. You have some guts to make me wait.”

“……who?”

“Wha-!?”

The one who immediately called out to them as the three entered the room, was a beautiful young man with blond hair and attractive blue eyes, sitting in the middle of a two-seater sofa alone. With but a single word from Kuroitsu, the beautiful young man’s jaw dropped in shock.

“Kuro……pff, Kuroitsu, that’s rude. Haha. He is, at the very least, this country’s, hehe, Prince, you know.”

“Sylti, saying that while your shoulders are shaking and adding on ‘at the very least’ as a follow-up is pretty ‘rude’ in itself, isn’t it?”

“Hehe. But look, Kuro. That face. He was arbitrarily convinced that he was famous. I’m sure he’s never had anyone ask him ‘who are you’ before. What a stupid face. Hehe.”

“You bastard!! Are you mocking me!?”

Seeing him stand up while simultaneously drawing out his sword, Syltina suddenly stopped laughing.

“Do excuse me. I didn’t think that a country’s prince would suddenly throw out those kind of words from before without even giving a proper greeting. I was rather confused.”

“Confused, you say……? Shameless!!”

“Prince Fract!!”

At Syltina, who spoke without a single hint of hesitation, Fract raised his voice and attempted to draw closer. However, cutting in front of him was the other person who had been in the room, Tedla.

“Please restrain yourself, Prince Fract. Without their cooperation, this country will perish.”

“Tedla……are you going to side with this woman? You know what she did 2 years ago, right!?

“……you do not understand anything.”

“What?”

“Prince, please properly look at this country’s present state. The country is in chaos, the citizens are impoverished, the politics have stagnated, and the knights, nobles, and those who would be supporting the country have even abandoned their duties – please, look at the country right now. The country’s current state right now, is due to the mistake we made 2 years ago.”