🐎 🐎 🐎
HAKU and Gratia leapt off me and scurried ahead to stand directly in front of the emperor.
“We’ll protect Mama!”
“Yeah, mistress will be safe with us!”
They were trying to convince the emperor that there was nothing for him to worry about because they would protect Miss Neema, but, unfortunately, he couldn’t understand a word they said.
As usual, I translated for them, and in response, the emperor accused us of being too lenient on Miss Neema.
But it was impossible to reason with our mistress, who had a completely abnormal, borderline freakish obsession with interacting with animals and monsters. For their part, the animals also seemed to be drawn to her, so I didn’t think they would attack. All things considered, I felt that the best course of action was to just let her do as she liked and protect her if the need arose.
When I mentioned that, Celiunos asked if it was because she was a beloved child.
“No… Just because she’s her.”
I didn’t think it had anything to do with being a beloved child. I suspected that Miss Neema herself was the cause.
In the end, the emperor relented and let Miss Neema do as she wanted.
While holding the animal that had been making those strange noises, her expression was identical to the one she often wore while hugging Lars.
Before parting ways, the animal licked her cheek, leaving behind quite a mess.
I was frankly astounded by Paul’s level of preparedness because, foreseeing that something like this might occur, he’d handed me a cloth before we left and told me to bring it because I’d probably need it. Paul could use magic to instantly clean Miss Neema up, but I didn’t possess such powers.
I dampened the cloth with water just as Paul had instructed and used it to clean Miss Neema up.
We encountered so many animals along the way that it was becoming rather troublesome. Even the emperor seemed to find it strange.
When he mentioned it seemed as if all the animals of the forest were coming to meet with Miss Neema, the bugs laughed and said that was exactly what they were doing.
“Why, though?”
“Because she’s the beloved child, of course!”
“I don’t believe any of the other beloved children throughout history possessed that kind of power…”
“Well… This is special to the current beloved child.”
“Everyone can’t help but love her!”
Unless you asked a direct question, the bugs only gave vague answers. I thought this was due to their perspective being different from that of humans and monsters, but this didn’t negate the fact that it could be annoying at times.
The emperor, too, seemed to have a hard time understanding what they were saying because he asked Miss Neema about it. However, it was unclear how much she understood what they’d been talking about either. The emperor seemed to have his suspicions because he was quietly thinking it over. Meanwhile, Miss Neema was curiously looking around at our surroundings.
Suddenly, something dropped down from above, landing on Miss Neema’s face.
“Get it off! Get it off! What is this?!” she shrieked, flapping her arms wildly, vaguely resembling Gratia’s trademark bizarre dance.
It might be amusing to see what would happen if I didn’t intervene… But I’ll resist the impulse and do my duty to my mistress properly.
I held Miss Neema in place and peeled the strange animal off her face. It made an unexpected noise when I pulled it off, causing me to look closer at the animal and discover what appeared to be suction cups on its tentacles.
It really was an unusual creature because it happily moved on to suctioning onto my arm, totally unafraid.
Now that she’d been freed from the creature’s grasp, Miss Neema had transformed from panicked to curious and poked the creature and asked—a bit too late now, if you asked me—whether or not it contained poison.
I couldn’t communicate with animals, but thankfully, the elemental spirits answered for it.
“The elemental spirits say it’s not harmful to you as long as you don’t eat it.”
The topic shifted to focus on me after that, but I was more immediately concerned about what I should do with the creature attached to my arm. It seemed to have no intention of going anywhere; it had suctioned onto me and was staying perfectly still.
Gratia leapt over to the creature and, as if copying our mistress, began poking it with one of his forelegs. The creature attached to my arm responded by smacking Gratia with one of its tentacles. That sparked something in Gratia’s most primitive instincts because his four beady little eyes sparkled.
“Don’t try to eat it.”
Haku, as a slime, was beyond help, but Gratia and Kai were both beginning to show an almost fanatical love of eating. I supposed that could also be blamed on taking on the traits of their mistress.
“It’s finally come into sight.” The emperor pointed to something massive a short distance ahead.
The bugs were cheering, “Hurry up! Hurry up!” so it seemed that was our destination.
The thing stretched out its long neck towards us, and finally, I could get a picture of its entire body. The trees and bushes growing on its back proved that it was yet another strange and mysterious animal.
The animal’s face came right up to me, and then the tentacled animal on my arm finally released me of its own accord.
Was it tagging along because it knew we were heading this way?
…Oh well, no harm done, I guess. Hurry on home, little guy.
We ducked underneath the giant creature and emerged in a completely different setting.
Someone immediately grabbed Miss Neema, but based on their aura, they seemed to be an elemental spirit, so I wasn’t overly concerned.
So these are the elemental kings, huh?
The elemental kings introduced themselves, then launched right into a serious discussion.
There’s no need for us to join in on this discussion.
Inaho had awoken and was getting antsy.
“Seigo and Rikusei, can you entertain Inaho a bit so she doesn’t get into trouble?”
I was pretty sure they could be trusted not to let her do anything too reckless.
Saying, “Leave it to us!” Seigo poked Inaho with his nose and led her away from our mistress and the others.
Kai, who’d been behaving well enough up to then, staggered towards the pond. Considering Kai was a siren, it made sense that he would feel more at ease close to water.
Nox was trying to fly over here, but the bugs were crowding around him, making it difficult for him to fly. Based on how he attempted to avoid them, it seemed Nox could see the bugs, too.
“Hey, you guys are causing trouble for Nox. It looks like he can see you guys in here. It’s dangerous, so stop getting in his way.”
After I said that, all of the bugs began swarming. They stopped bothering Nox while he was flying, but now they were thronging around Inaho’s group and Kai.
I let out a sigh of exasperation and did my best to chase the bugs away.
“It’s fine to play, but be quiet about it, will you? You don’t want to make the elemental kings mad…”
My mistress was in the middle of learning important things from the elemental kings that we’d only had hazy notions of up to this point. If these guys were too rambunctious, it would be difficult for Miss Neema and the others to focus.
I wasn’t terribly confident that the elemental spirits would be able to restrain themselves on my say-so, though.
Tired of dealing with the elemental spirits, Nox landed on my shoulder. Then he began grooming his feathers, which looked mussed from the long and exhausting flight.
However, the bugs just couldn’t help themselves.
Taking advantage of the fact that Nox had stopped moving, they landed on his back and began playing. For his part, Nox didn’t seem to care as long as they weren’t impeding his flying because he ignored the bugs crawling around on his back and continued grooming himself.
While I was distracted by that, I suddenly heard the sound of a large SPLASH!
It seemed that Kai, who was lounging in the pond in his merman form, had smacked the surface of the water with the flat of his tailfins. The bugs danced around, playing happily in the shower of water droplets Kai had sprayed everywhere.
They really don’t listen, do they?
“Water bugs, make Kai behave himself, will you?”
“We’re not bugs!”
“Shinki called us bugs again!”
“If you don’t want to be called bugs, then stop being such pests.”
Right after I’d just finished setting the water bugs on Kai, Inaho and Seigo dashed past me. I wanted to pull out my hair by this point, but first, I grabbed Rikusei.