Even by carriage, it took around two days to get to the royal capital from Ishka. Naturally, that meant we had to spend the night somewhere, but since we were here at the request of the royal family, there was no need for us to camp out. Instead, we got to stay at a government-managed hotel on the main road. I figured I might as well take this opportunity to bond a bit with Suzume and the others, but it got dark far earlier than I expected, and Suzume, unable to withstand her sleepiness, ended up being carried to her room by Seele.
That left just me and Lunamaria. As though she’d been waiting for such an opportunity, the elf sage began speaking.
“Master, there’s something I need to discuss with you. It concerns the matter we talked about before.”
“Hm? What is it?”
She looked almost afraid to bring the topic up, so I urged her to continue. The topic in question was indeed something we’d discussed previously: namely, how my flesh and blood was currently equal to that of a dragon, and how I bestowed great power onto whoever I was intimate with. The incident with Suzume had happened soon after, so I hadn’t had time to hear the details, but judging from the fact that Suzume drinking my blood had actually saved her life, Lunamaria had probably hit the nail on the head. And what she had to say today supported her conclusion even more strongly: Ever since I’d left for Merte, Lunamaria and Seele had both noticed a significant decrease in their strength.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. Both Seele and I experienced the same thing.”
According to her, both their stamina and mana capacities had reverted to what they’d been before meeting me. In other words, my blood didn’t just have healing properties, it had strengthening properties as well. Just as when she’d brought this up before, Lunamaria seemed incredibly uncomfortable with discussing it. She was probably worried that she was getting too close to encroaching on one of my secrets.
The first time, she’d said she could “sense the dragon” in me. She was a spirit user and an elf, so what she sensed was probably my Anima. However, she hadn’t asked about it since. She was probably assuming that I wanted to keep the dragon’s existence under wraps. And in fact, she was right: I was trying my best to keep my power, my Shinsou, concealed. Whenever I’d used it thus far, I’d always made sure no one was around first. When there were other witnesses, like during my duel with Raz, for instance, I’d refrained from using it.
That wasn’t because I wanted people to think I was weak. In fact, I didn’t particularly mind if they knew I was strong. After all, there wouldn’t be any point to feigning weakness now that I’d already taken down griffins, scyllas, and the like. But details like how strong I was, the secret to my strength, and my fighting style, I wanted to keep secret.
The reason? To err on the side of caution. It wasn’t like the Illusory Blade, Shinsou, and vigor were completely unheard of outside the island. When it came to sharing information between adventurers, there were no national borders. There were probably some individuals in the empire who’d at least heard of the Illusory Blade style. If they saw my Shinsou or my vigor, they might immediately deduce that I was from Onigashima. And if that information spread, people could potentially find countermeasures to use against me. Take my vigor, for instance: It was a technique that sprang from one’s internal mana reserves, so if someone had an item that could seal one’s mana or could raise a barrier to defend against mana-based attacks, I would be at a serious disadvantage.
To keep that possibility as slim as I could, I wanted to reveal as little about my power as possible. Lunamaria surely knew that as well, meaning she must have had a good reason for bringing it up now.
“Since time immemorial, the easiest way to lure a skilled individual to one’s side has been to use the opposite sex,” she said.
“In other words, you’re worried that the nobles could try and use a woman to get me to leak information on my own power.”
“Precisely. Naturally Seele and I wouldn’t reveal anything, and even if we did, you could just silence us before we said anything important, using this collar.”
She gently touched the black collar around her slender neck. It was from the slave trader association itself, and it was enhanced with the spells Locate, Paralyze, and Choke—countermeasures against slaves who tried to escape, rebel, or say something they shouldn’t. The collar was made with the association’s unique technology, and it was impossible to mimic or reproduce. That was because if anyone so much as attempted it, the association would send their people to silence them for good, even if that someone happened to be a nation’s leader. That was how important an item like the slave collar was to the association.
That aside, I knew what Lunamaria was getting at. If my own slaves were about to talk, I could just keep them from talking. But I couldn’t do the same with a woman sent my way by the nobility, which was why she was warning me to be careful about accepting invitations and proposals from them in the future.
Truthfully, I appreciated her concern. I didn’t know whether there was a girl out there who’d actually attempt to woo me, and even if there was, I had no intention of canoodling around with a stuck-up rich girl whose face was all caked in makeup. It might sound surprising, but as the heir of the Mitsurugi family, I’d actually attended a bevy of formal banquets in the past. Or rather, I’d been forced to attend most of them. Anyway, out of all of the high-class women I’d met at those gatherings, not one of them had given me a good impression. Which was exactly why I wasn’t expecting much from this upcoming meeting with the royals either. Frankly, I wanted to finish my business here as soon as possible so I could head back to Merte. Or it might be nice to do some adventuring work with Lunamaria and Seele for once. I’d been sending them on separate quests up until now to hide my Shinsou from them, but from what Lunamaria was saying, it seemed that was no longer necessary.
As I was thinking that, I grabbed Lunamaria and pulled her close. She went wide-eyed with shock for a moment, but from the look on my face, she must have realized my intent. Her cheeks flushed slightly, but she didn’t resist.
The next morning...
“Wow!”
We were in the carriage once more. Passing through Horus’s gates as the sun had yet to fully rise, Suzume was open-mouthed in astonishment at the view before her eyes. The demonkin girl hadn’t shaken off her nervousness yet, it seemed, but even her heart was dancing at the capital’s gorgeous vista. For someone born and raised in the forest, it probably looked like something out of a fairy tale.