Uru paused for a moment. “Hmm. So you made sure your stories lined up before you came here, did you? Even if the gods really did attack you, though, I’d assume you had it coming. As much as the Faith’s insistence on sheltering faeries infuriates me, I find it hard to believe their gods would attack you out of nowhere.”
“I’m with you on the faerie bit at least, dude. I want to turn every last one of those little pricks into potion ingredients,” Ado growled.
While the average person saw the Four Gods as this world’s protectors, Uru—between his background as a mage and the harm faeries had done to the village—didn’t believe they existed at all.
He wasn’t sure what kind of relationship could possibly exist between those gods and Zelos’s party, but he was awfully jealous of the fact that everyone else here saw things the same way as Ado—not just Yui, but Shakti, Lisa, and Zelos as well.
He was an outsider in his own home, and that brought a furious look to his face.
“Let me make it clear,” Zelos said. “Metis had been summoning heroes on the order of the Four Gods—and it’s left the world on the brink of destruction. Those gods are real, and they’re evil. No doubt about it.”
“Y-You can’t be serious!”
“Well, yeah, it makes sense you don’t believe it,” Ado said. “But we’re different. They scattered us all across the world, and it hasn’t been easy for us to track down the people we know. I’m telling you, I didn’t abandon Yui, okay?”
“It’s a good thing you ran into Zelos, isn’t it, Toshi?” Yui said. “Thanks to him, we’re back together.”
“Aww... Thanks. But it was mostly right place at the right time, honestly,” Zelos said.
Uru had been under the impression that Ado had just dumped his pregnant wife outside Hasam one day. But now, it sounded like their separation had actually been the doing of the Four Gods—meaning Ado hadn’t abandoned her at all.
Uru had spent the past month living with Yui, and although it had sometimes hurt to see the adoring look she wore whenever she thought of her husband, that month had been absolute bliss.
But now that Zelos had found her husband, Uru’s happy days were at an end.
He saw Zelos now as a herald of misfortune.
“Bit of a shame, though. I’d hoped to personally give my thanks to the mayor who’s been protecting Yui,” Ado said.
“And I’m sure you would’ve gotten here a lot sooner if you’d known where she was from the start—or, heck, where you were. Right?” Zelos said.
“Oh—speaking of my grandfather, he went to get his back treated at a hot spring,” Uru said. “He left early one morning in a carriage. The driver was pretty intense...”
W-Wait... He took that guy’s carriage?! I... I hope the mayor’s still alive...
Zelos and Ado were very familiar with both the place and the carriage driver, who seemed to be up to his usual mischief, rampaging throughout the land.
“So Ado, what are you planning to do about Yui?” Shakti asked.
“Huh? Uh... What do you mean by ‘do’?”
“Well, we are state guests in Isalas—and they’ve given us quite the warm welcome, remember?” Shakti said. “But surely it’s not the kind of place you’d want to take Yui to, is it?”
“Yeah, especially when she’s got a baby in her belly, y’know?” Lisa agreed. “Not to mention, it’s a long trip there. There’s no way you can make her go all that way.”
“Ah.”
As Shakti and Lisa had just pointed out, Ado was in a precarious situation right now.
Isalas had been giving him some very special treatment because of how spectacular a mage he was. Plus, he was seen as a champion of the people for helping alleviate the country’s perpetual food shortage.
There was no way Isalas would be keen on letting a talent like him slip from its grasp. Yui would undoubtedly become an important bargaining tool to convince Ado to stay. In fact, the nation’s war hawk faction might even take her as a hostage.
“U-Uh...Zelos? Any ideas?” Ado stammered.
“I’m not sure I’m the guy to ask. Remember, I’ve been trying not to get mixed up in state politics in the first place.”
“Please, man, don’t blow me off here—I’m begging you! Help me out! I can’t leave Yui here forever either... I’ll do anything! At the very least, I want her to have someone I can trust by her side!”
“You really are desperate, aren’t you? In that case, how about I introduce you to a former duke I know? Isalas and Artom are both in Solistia’s debt, after all. Ah—I expect he’ll ask you for something in return, mind you.”
“Ngh...”
Ado was being forced to make a monumental choice.
After Isalas’s warm welcome, the thought of joining Team Solistia felt like a betrayal. But with Yui to consider, moving to Solistia did seem like the safer option.
It provided a much better environment for raising a child, after all, and if worse came to worst, Zelos would be in the same country to help him out. That was a big bonus.
“Still... Wouldn’t it be bad of me to just suddenly up and move from Isalas to Solistia?”
“Then how about you make sure Isalas gets something out of it?”
“Like what? Any ideas?”
“Like, say... Why don’t you start some kind of joint venture between Solistia and Isalas? Isalas doesn’t have much to see beyond mines and quarries, so tourism’s probably out... Hmm.”
“It’s gotta be cars, then, right? Isalas could do the bodywork while Solistia makes the engines...”
“You’d need to overhaul the infrastructure, though. If you’re not careful, you’d kick off a whole tech revolution.”
“It’s bound to happen sooner or later, right? And just to be clear, I’m talking about, like, sticking engines in carriages. Not fancy sports cars, just basic, low-speed family cars. And honestly, I’d start a revolution myself if that’s what it took to keep my wife safe.”
On Earth, adding engines to carriages had been one of the first steps of automotive development—but engine technology could be used for much more than cars. If Ado went through with his idea, things wouldn’t stop at automobiles. Once the genie was out of the bottle, there was no putting it back in. Ado had a lot on his plate, though, so he needed something to soften the blow for Isalas.
“Even if you’re not on board, Zelos, I’m still gonna go through with it. I need money so I can live with Yui too.”
Zelos sighed. “Doesn’t look like I’m going to change your mind...”
Decisiveness was normally one of Ado’s strengths, but in that moment, it seemed to be leading him down a risky path.
“Oh... Fine. You’ll want to use metal for the frame and wood for the body. For the engine, you could probably use a lower-grade mana motor. Magic stones should power a small one well enough.”
“Magic stones? Not a mana tank?”
“Mana tanks are made from a mithril-orichalcum alloy, remember? I doubt they’d be cost-effective. Plus, using magic stones would stimulate the economy. All in all, that’d probably get you about twenty years or so of breathing room.”
“Oh... And with magic stones, there’s no tank to worry about refilling. On the other hand, you’d need a lot of stones to actually run the car once you factor in travel time and distance...”
“As for speed... Well, their top end shouldn’t be much higher than a horse-drawn carriage. A little faster would probably be fine. That alone would increase demand among mercenaries, which would be huge for the economy. Still, I’m warning you: This is pretty much guaranteed to spark an industrial revolution.”
“Beggars can’t be choosers. I need to find common ground between a magic kingdom and a mining kingdom, and this fits the bill. Besides, I can’t imagine them putting together anything like my kei car or your motorbike.”
Zelos’s Harley-Sanders Model 13 and Ado’s kei car had been made using large amounts of rare minerals, which were expensive and only found in mines or dungeons. There just wouldn’t be enough miners, crafters, or materials to manufacture vehicles like that on an industrial scale.
Still, Zelos worried that their actions could cause technology to advance far faster than intended.
“The problem is this, I suppose: Would it be okay to take Yui with us to Santor right away?” Zelos mused. “After all this village has done to take care of her, it could be rude to simply drive off with her without giving proper thanks.”
“Have you talked about whether you might do something to repay them, Yui?” Ado asked.
“Huh? Well, the mayor said I was fine to leave without notice if you or Zelos ever came to get me. I do feel like I should at least give him a proper goodbye and thank him again, though.”
“Guess you leave him a letter or something, then? Wouldn’t want to disappear without a word.”
“H-Hold on a minute!” Uru shouted, clearly panicking. The way he saw it, a stranger had just shown up out of the blue to whisk away the woman he loved. Sure, that stranger happened to be her fiancé and the future father of her child, but Uru wasn’t mature enough to just stand by.
“Y-Yui’s pregnant, remember?!” Uru sputtered. “Are you really about to take her away from the village at such an important time?!”
“Don’t worry,” Ado said. “We have a special form of transport. We’ll be able to get her there faster and safer than in a carriage.”
“But just think about what could happen!”
“She’s in a stable phase of her pregnancy at the moment, so she should be fine,” Zelos said. “Plus, we can move her to my trailer when we get closer to the city.”
Zelos had a farm trailer he’d built himself, fitted with some decent suspension.
The kei car they’d be taking for most of the journey had cushioned seats and such too, so Yui would be fine to travel in that for the relatively short trip to Santor.
But reason wasn’t going to sway a young man that smitten. His first love was about to be taken away from him. He might never see her again.
And he refused to smile and let it happen.
“Fine. Then you leave me no choice,” he muttered. “Ado...I challenge you to a duel.”
“Huh?!”
Zelos and Ado were stunned by the turn of events. Their surprise made sense—they couldn’t have known what was going through the young man’s heart. Sometimes, youth and emotion drove people to reckless decisions.
And this was unmistakably reckless. Uru had no idea Ado was a Sage.
Perhaps ignorance was bliss. The gap between the two mages was enormous. Not only would Uru never be able to injure his opponent—it wouldn’t even be a fight.