Chapter 12

TMBRFNL Chapter 12: On the Boat

The flapping of wings could be heard from the distance as a single falcon crossed through the morning fog .

“Hey, Tiel . Good work . ”

Coming out to greet that falcon was a young girl with black hair and eyes . She was “Clarina Hamillee”, who was known as the “Witch of Foresight” .

After making three revolutions above Clarina, who had come to meet it on the deck of a ship sailing across the ocean, the falcon transformed into a palm-sized girl .

“I was entrusted with a message from master . ”

A cute voice reverberated as the girl that landed in front of Clarina presented a single letter .

She, whose name was “Tieltinkle”, was Alhart’s familiar and a spirit that governed the wind .

“Thanks . I’ll read through it and write a reply immediately, so could you wait for a bit?”

“Of course . ”

Only a few moments after she started looking through the letter she had received from Tieltinkle, Clarina’s shoulders began to shake as she laughed out loud .

“Aha . . ahahahaha!!! Wow, what a masterpiece . To think that it really was ‘her’!! Ahahahaha!”

“What happened for you to laugh in such a loud voice, Clara-san?”

Rain, who had come out from the cabin, doubtfully asked .

“Ahh, Rain-kun . Look . A letter came from Sylti and Al-kun and, you know, it was just as I thought . ”

“Heeh . Then the Saintess knows that this is an ‘Otome game’ world?”

“Yup, she just ‘knows’ . By no means does that mean ‘she’ is the ‘protagonist (heroine)’ . ‘She’ doesn’t understand that fact . Even though there is no way that everything will go as the game (scenario) did, regardless of the fact that she’s come to a world that is similar to the game’s . To begin with, no matter how hard ‘she’ tries, she can’t become the ‘protagonist (heroine)’ . ”

As she laughed joyfully, Clarina passed her reply to Tieltinkle .

“What’re you gonna do?”

“What we need to do hasn’t changed . Until Sylti and co . have purified the taint, we need to prevent its expansion . It’s only that how things will ‘end’ has been decided . We have to tell that to everyone else, since we’ll need to arrange things so that they lead to ‘the ending’ . ”

Seeing Clarina smile brightly, Rain gave her a cramped smile .

“How scary . I wouldn’t want Clara-san to become my enemy . ”

“Uwah, how rude . I’m still quite preferable as an enemy compared to some other people . Take Sylti, for example . Even though she knew things would turn out ‘this way’, she still said she wanted to ‘believe in them’ . Despite saying that, she still continued to make arrangements behind the scenes so it would be fine no matter how it turned out . In the end, after being betrayed, she made use of everything she had prepared in order to complete her ‘revenge’ . How very scary . The number one person you don’t want to make your enemy would be a person like Sylti . If it’s for the sake of her important people of ‘now’, she can even cut off those who were once her important people . She has that kind of strength . ”

“Ahh, that’s true . But I also wouldn’t want to make Jin-sama my enemy either . ”

“Jin-sama is…yeah . I wouldn’t want to make him my enemy either . He’s dangerous . To protect the people important to him, let alone choosing his means, he’s the sort of person who would consign the rest of the world to oblivion . ”

“How he became the ‘Second Prince’ despite being like that is one of the mysteries of the world . ”

“If you say that to Jin-sama, then it’ll become impossible to work for a while, Rain-kun . ”

“I can’t say something like that! If I were to say it, it’d be to Syl-san at most!!”

“No doubt~ . But the fact that Sylti was the ‘former daughter of a ducal house’ despite being like that is truly a world wonder as well . ”

“Yeah, Syl-san is seriously strong after all . I’ve never won in a sparring match against her without using magic . ”

“That’s, well, truly what you’d call talent . The phrase ‘perseverance is a gift’ would be most suitable in describing her . When Sylti was a ‘duke’s daughter’, she was educated in the basics of fighting, to a certain extent . But that was ‘a duke’s daughter’s experience’ at most . She only started to earnestly practice 2 years ago . Back when she was still just a ‘duke’s daughter’, if I were to give my impression, she was just ‘coming along’ on our requests . ”

“Now that you mention it, Clara-san and everyone knew Syl-san back when she was still the daughter of the ducal house, right?”

“That’s right . She’s been with me, Jin-sama, and Al-kun for the longest period of time . Ah, and Master too . ”

“Just why would a person from another country – and a duke’s daughter at that – come to know people from this mercenary guild?”

“Ahh, about that……”

At Rain’s question, Clarina made a wry smile and narrowed her eyes in nostalgia .

“Before Jin-sama became Luran Kingdom’s second Prince; Jin-sama, Al-kun and I went to play in Rideiran Kingdom . Um, I think it was probably around 13 years ago?”

“Went to play, you say……rather, 13 years ago…Clara-san and Al-san were still 6 or 7 years old!! Even Jin-sama was still 10……I’m surprised you were able to go to Rideiran Kingdom . ”

“About that; if you used my familiar’s, Maira’s, power then it’s literally one flight away . ”

“Ahh, Maira-san was a ‘phoenix’, right? Rather, if you can ride Maira-san, then wouldn’t it have been faster to travel using that method instead this time!?”

“Ehh, but Maira is of the fire attribute . Since it’s incompatible with Rain-kun’s lightning and water attributes, she said she didn’t want to . Isn’t travelling by boat fine? Let’s just take our time and travel with leisure!!”

“It’ll be bad if we travel leisurely!!”

At Rain’s retort, Clarina laughed as if she had found it funny .

“Well, going back to the original topic . After going to Rideiran Kingdom like that, we merrily went sightseeing around the capital . And then, we happened to meet with Sylti, who lived there . ”

“So that’s how you guys met!”

“……not quite . ”

“Eh?”

Though Rain exclaimed with an ‘I got it!’ kind of feeling, Clarina refuted his words using a tone one octave lower than his .

Hearing her respond like that, Rain looked back at her blankly .

“The moment Jin-sama saw Sylti, he murmured ‘this is a fated meeting’ or something along those lines . He then kicked Sylti’s family and guards towards us while kidnapping her . ”

“……kidnapped?”

“That’s right . Kidnapped . He’s legitimately a criminal who kidnaps young girls . My goodness . Since we were with him, we (naturally) almost got caught, but we somehow managed to get away . When we found Jin-sama afterwards, and saw that he was honestly trying to win over the heart of a little girl who was more than 5 years younger than him, I seriously thought that pervert should just go die . ”

“Ahahahaha……”

“In the end, the people of the Knight’s Order stationed in the town came after us, so we had to run . But when we made our way back, Jin-sama ordered around the intelligence network to gather information on Sylti . The moment he knew Sylti was the daughter of a ducal house, that stupidly positive bastard said: ‘I see, what I was lacking in was status . That being the case, if I become a prince, this time I’ll be able to make her my wife’ . Then he began gathering information on the royalty of Luran Kingdom……”

“And then he became one!? A ‘Prince’!?”

“Yup . ”

“Haah!? Is it really that easy to become royalty!?”

Seeing Rain’s bare astonishment, Clarina made a wry smile while shaking her head .

“There’s no way he could become one . No matter how distant the relation is, in order to call yourself ‘royalty’, you need to have a blood relation with the ‘king’…… . . but you know, Rain-kun… . . every country, every era, and every king has some sort of ‘darkness’ that absolutely cannot be brought to light . Amazingly, the information that Jin-sama obtained included such a thing . The reputation of the ‘Dipterous Sword (our guild)’ was also greatly involved in the matter . ”

“The guild, is it?”

“Yup . The mercenary guild ‘Dipterous Sword’ was already famous around that time . Al-kun and I were still newbies that didn’t have nicknames yet, but Jin-sama was different . It’s true that guy was strong in combat, but his head also worked fast . Furthermore, his ability to gather information, as well as his charisma that allowed him to stand above others, distinguished him from the rest around that time . ”

“As expected of Jin-sama……”

“‘A fine article with a high potential of becoming a future central figure of a stateless guild that possesses the power to take down a country’ – that was what the Luran King saw as Jin-sama’s ‘worth’ . Plus, Jin-sama was someone who knew about the ‘darkness’ that he didn’t want publicized . ”

“If he erased Jin-sama, then he’d turn the major power, the ‘Dipterous Sword’, into his enemy; but if he left it alone, there was the possibility of that information being spread around, is it?”

“Indeed . That person sees death in the line of duty as the result of a lack of ability, but they don’t forgive ‘murder of their comrades’ . No matter who the killer is, that person would chase them to the ends of the earth to kill them . That is the ‘Dipterous Sword’ . That’s why, even though Jin-sama doesn’t have any blood relation with Luran Kingdom’s royalty, he became the ‘Second Prince’ . In addition, when their ‘darkness’ is exposed, they could ‘involve’ Jin-sama in it; all while conveniently making it so that we can’t easily point our blades towards them . ”

“Their way of thinking is quite nasty . ”

“Well, the one who actually proposed what I just said to the King was Jin-sama . ”

“Excuse me?”

“If the King made him a ‘Prince’, then at the time when their country’s ‘darkness’ were to be found out, they could involve him . On top of that, the ‘Dipterous Sword’ that possesses such enormous power can’t turn their blades towards a comrade . Furthermore, if he settled himself down in their country, then talks of the guild making a base there will likely come about . That would, in turn, substantially increase the number of visitors to their country due to the presence of the truly capable, internationally famous guild, the ‘Dipterous Sword’ . With Jin-sama as the middleman, it would also be possible to have them prioritize requests from their country too . He really has a silver tongue . Well, in reality, it was decided to just make a base in ‘ a country that we visited often’, which was why other countries became unable to easily meddle with Luran Kingdom . And since we were already in the country, no matter how cheap the requests were, everyone would proactively take them on . I seriously felt that Jin-sama’s foresight was scary . ”

“Somehow, I hate that just saying ‘because it’s Jin-sama’ is enough to convince me about everything……”

“……………well, that’s how Jin-sama managed to safely gain the status of ‘Prince’ and how Luran Kingdom re-established its title of the ‘Intermediary between Foreign Countries’…… . . All of this while, as one would expect, involving all of us . ”

Rain pat Clarina’s shoulder as she made distant eyes while recalling those times .

“And so, at that time, Sylti’s house started caring for us . We spent about a year at the ‘Balratona Duke House’ together and became good friends with her . After that, Sylti would come over here, or we would go to visit her; and that exchange continued . When Sylti became 10 years old, she also registered in the guild and took on requests every now and then . And then, as I said before, she only seriously started to learn the sword and magic 2 years ago . Since she already had the basics down, she rapidly became stronger; which meant that Sylti didn’t have to suffer through ‘having to make strenuous efforts’ . It was only natural that she would become stronger . ”

“I see…… . as expected, Jin-sama is frightening . ”

“After telling you such a long story, that’s what you think!? Aren’t there better things to say!!?”

“No, but that would be the biggest thing after all!! He said that ‘he wanted status, so he’ll become a prince’ you know!? Is he an idiot!?”

“He is an idiot!! An idiot for Sylti!! He’s such an idiot for Sylti that everyone thinks that if she tried to play around with Jin-sama, one or two countries could disappear!!”

“Uwah, that seriously doesn’t sound like a joke………… . rather, didn’t Syl-san like the Prince of Rideiran Kingdom?”

“You should remember, Rain-kun . There are many different kinds of the same ‘emotion’ . What Sylti held towards the Prince of Rideiran Kingdom was the kind of ‘affection’ that one would direct towards family or friends, but it was definitely not the kind of ‘affection’ you’d direct towards someone of the opposite sex . Well, it couldn’t be helped that Jin-sama lost his temper when Sylti became that Prince’s fianceé . So, even if things hadn’t become like ‘this’, Jin-sama probably would have stolen Sylti away through some illegal method made to appear legal . It was for that reason that he became a ‘Prince’ after all . ”

“I see………rather, huh? In this time’s ‘operation’…”

Seeing Rain had stopped, seemingly realizing something, Clarina laughed . It was a laugh that was teasing and gave the impression that she was having a lot of fun .

“Because it was a status that he obtained for Sylti, who was once ‘the daughter of a ducal house (in the past)’ . For ‘just (the current)’ Sylti, Jin-sama’s status is, conversely, too heavy . Also, there’s no way an ‘exiled person’ could become the wife of another country’s ‘royalty’ . Jin-sama is someone who thinks that he doesn’t need the title if it doesn’t benefit Sylti . ”

“Eh? Then, by the time this ‘operation’ is completed, Jin-sama will already be……”

“If things hadn’t gone ‘according to the scenario’ and Sylti was still the daughter of the Duke, then this ‘operation’ would have remained on paper . But, well, it’s about time to knock those arrogant guys, who’ve been strutting around like they own the place, down a peg, right?”

“Your smile’s scary, Clara-san . ”

“Fufu . The reason why Jin-sama got caught up in becoming a ‘Prince’ was Sylti . Now that the reason has disappeared, he has no need to be a ‘Prince’ . We are the ones holding onto their weakness . We are the ones that are stronger in battle . A ‘mercenary guild’ was a gathering of hooligans from the start . Even if it becomes a ‘stateless guild’, it won’t be dealt with easily . Up until now we’ve been obedient, but only because we were waiting for this time . Rather than picking up the remnants of a fallen country, it’s faster to take a ‘country that is on the verge of falling’ . When everyone said that ‘it might become like this’, Jin-sama immediately came up with this ‘operation’ . Sooner or later, Jin-sama would have cast away the things he didn’t need . The only difference is whether the ‘target’ to be disposed of is one or two countries . ”

“Although what we’re taking is different, it’s still a ‘Battle to take a Country’ regardless . ”

“Fufufu . Though ‘what’s being taken’ is quite important . ”

“What a scary guild . ”

“Uwah, it’s not convincing at all when you say that with a full-blown smile……”

“I’m just one of those hooligans after all . ”

A continent came in sight just past the horizon . Those who would sweep away the “problems” plaguing the country were, by no means, working to save the people there .

The moment the two possessing the smiles of “those who take from others” descended upon that land, Rideiran Kingdom’s “future” was decided .