That was way too long, and meant that he’d certainly be saying goodbye to Earth for good if he accepted. However, knowing that he could refuse and could return to his original world was a great help to Zenjirou’s current mental state. A person’s mind was a strange thing... If they were told it was impossible, they would want to go home more than anything, but if told they could return, they’d start to wonder if they really had to.
If everything she said is true, then it’s a pretty sweet deal. I mean, I’ve got no family, no girlfriend. Work’s... Well, it’s going, but I can’t say I’m that attached to the hundred and fifty hours of overtime every month.
Now that he actually thought about it, today was the first Saturday he’d had off in half a year. Weekdays frequently had him getting home after midnight, Saturdays were workdays as a matter of course, and about three Sundays per month were as well. The one saving grace was that the company did pay all the overtime worked, but he never had any chance to use that money. By the time he got home, he didn’t even have the energy to cook for himself, so his dinners on weekdays were either boxed meals from a convenience store or eaten while he was out.
Actually, it’s probably been just as long since I’ve talked to a woman outside of shopping or work, he thought. So, yeah, it’s not like I’m that attached to my life back home...
In his homeworld, he had no partner, and nothing but days full of work awaited him. In this world, an easy life and a marriage to a big-breasted beauty. When comparing the two options, his present situation could well be called “striking gold,” couldn’t it?
Those thoughts rushed through Zenjirou’s mind in an instant, but his inherent wariness put the brakes on just as quickly. Whoa, whoa, hold up. Even if everything she’s said so far is true, there must be a catch. She’s a queen, right? There have to be responsibilities that go along with marrying a queen.
Royalty were political families from birth. You often saw hedonistic princes in novels and manga, but they were a small exception, and he’d heard that most royals were busy enough that he, as a working man, could sympathize with them. If that’s what he’d be stuck with, he would probably be better off with the openly exploitative nature of his current office job.
Zenjirou took several discreet breaths and calmed his urge to decide immediately. “Umm, if I were to accept, what would my responsibilities be? A queen’s husband is still a type of royal, right?”
Aura smiled widely at the question, taking it as a good sign. “Nothing in particular,” she answered. “At any rate, I am the thirty-second ruler of the country, but in the history of the Capua Kingdom, I am only the third queen. My two predecessors both remained single for their entire lives, and the line of succession went through adoption to a child of a cadet branch with strong blood ties, and to a younger brother, who was still an infant when his sister took the throne, in those cases. In other words, Sir Zenjirou, you will be the first to marry a queen in this country’s history.”
Aura was speaking as if he had already accepted, but Zenjirou currently lacked the composure to notice it. There was something else that he needed to comment on even more.
“W-Wait a minute! Are you telling me that the rights and responsibilities of a prince consort aren’t defined at all here?” A prince consort was the queen’s spouse, though the word might not exist in this country, considering such a situation was unprecedented.
She nodded calmly in response to his flustered question. “Indeed, so the writings say. But rest assured, as you may infer from the fact that only three of the thirty-two rulers this country has had were female, we are generally a patriarchal society. Regardless of how things are in the workplace, the man is the head of the house, and it is a virtue of a woman to treat her husband with respect. Whatever form it may take, I pledge to make our marriage meet your desires to the best of my abilities.”
“R-Right...” Zenjirou stammered mindlessly at the sweet words that had just left her mouth. Her answer was far better than he’d expected, so that was the most coherent response he could manage at the moment.
If he took her words at face value, then not only would he have no further responsibilities, but Aura would do her utmost to accommodate him as well. This was way too good to be true. Even in his woolly-minded state, Zenjirou couldn’t accept it without question. It was far too convenient.
No, think it through. There’s got to be an ulterior motive here, he thought frantically in the face of those amazing conditions. They were so good that they made him want to leap into it feet-first. Besides, what does she get out of this? Continuing her bloodline? Is that really all?
Yes, if every other member of the royal family had died, Zenjirou’s strong ties would be awfully attractive. If that was the case, though, would she make it such a favorable opportunity? A family head that did nothing but procreate. Men like that were called “spongers.”
If she’s making her husband a sponger, maybe she’s got a thing for layabouts? No, no way...
If that wasn’t the case, there must be some other significant gain for her to be making this proposal. If not, she wouldn’t have immediately started with such an enticing offer, no matter how fitting Zenjirou was in regards to bloodlines.
No, I need more information. Zenjirou remembered one of the seniors at work giving him some bitter advice. “If you push a deal through without knowing it back-to-front, it’ll bite you in the ass.”
So he asked her another question. “Sorry to drag the topic back up again, but what will you do if I refuse? I can’t imagine you won’t marry, ma’am?”
“Well, in that case, I would probably invite a noble in the country with relatively strong blood ties to be my groom. Well, I say ‘strong,’ but they don’t amount to much. That’s why I went out of my way to summon you,” she said with a self-deprecating smile.
Right, so she has candidates in the country as well. I suppose that’s obvious. Hm... Wait a minute. Maybe... Let’s ask something a bit leading, he thought, another possibility coming to mind. He swallowed subtly so that Aura wouldn’t notice, and asked his next question in as calm a voice as he could manage.
“Would said candidates be those with grandparents in the royal family?”
Aura didn’t notice the leading nature of the question and simply gave a wry smile as she shook her head. “Hardly. There is no one with such strong ties to the family remaining. The closest are examples where their great-grandfather’s grandfather or, even better, their great-grandfather’s mother was in the royal family.”
Aha, bingo! he mentally yelled, hiding his surprise behind a winning poker face. His superior in the company had told him, “In business, it’s important that it’s conscious thought that controls your expressions, not your emotions.” That advice held true even in another world.
Her answer was clearly strange. To show it numerically, the case with the great-grandfather’s grandfather would mean they were five generations removed from the royal family, and four in the case with the great-grandfather’s mother.
On the other hand, there was Zenjirou’s ancestor, who was five generations removed from Aura. If, as she had said, there were survivors who were four generations removed, then there would be no reason to summon Zenjirou, who was five generations removed himself.
The village he had been raised in was insular, so he may have had very strong ties to the bloodline, but Aura couldn’t have known that before the summoning. She’d actually called it a “pleasant miscalculation.”