“Who haven’t we talked about yet?” Lord Endo asked after we finished covering all of the events leading to this day. “Just Artur, I guess?”
Art, huh?
“In the end, Artur Richter didn’t decide on a partner to bring to our wedding, did he?” Lieselotte scoffed.
For some reason, she didn’t seem to get along well with Art. Well, it was probably because his attitude was incompatible with House Riefenstahl’s devoted, single-minded nature.
“In Art’s case, I think he’s focusing more on work than romance right now,” I said.
As his best friend, I felt obligated to defend him. In fact, after graduation, he had been taking his work as a priest seriously, so it wasn’t a lie...probably.
Lady Kobayashi smiled and nodded. “Oh, yeah. Art’s the kind of guy who gets pretty absorbed in his work, and he achieves a lot of success at the Church. He’s a skilled priest, after all, and his family is influential. Now that the Goddess Lirenna has taken a liking to him too, he’s basically invincible, huh?”
“Yep,” Lord Endo said. “The way I see it, Artur’s only unlucky with girls because his job is too hectic. In this world, priests also serve as doctors, right? Dealing with emergencies and stuff sounds stressful.”
Even Lieselotte had to acknowledge this point. “I won’t deny that. It’s true there are patients only he can save, and in those situations, he will always go to save them. Also, whenever there’s a major disaster or disease outbreak, the Church immediately sends their best priests.”
“Art’ll be the first one called, since he’s exceptional at his job,” I said. “He also has a surprisingly strong sense of responsibility, so he’ll never turn down a request. His grades at school were good, but he wouldn’t have been able to graduate if the days he was performing his priest duties weren’t recognized as authorized absences.”
“Plus, he’s been watching over that useless goddess,” Lord Endo said. “He doesn’t have time for love. That guy’s gonna die from overwork.”
An awkward silence fell over the table. Art had been diligently protecting and taking care of the Goddess Lirenna from her revival until today’s announcement. That said, he was actually a proper, diligent priest, so he was happy to serve her. I seemed to recall him running around all over the place, acting in Lirenna’s stead as she couldn’t yet appear in public. Protecting her was hard enough already, but she was also the type to notice all sorts of problems in the world and demand Art fix them. This had gone on for the past few months straight.
Then, there was the crown prince’s suddenly scheduled wedding. It was a lot of work for the Church, especially Art.
Perhaps I’ll use my royal authority to make Art take a vacation sometime. Or would it be better to have the goddess do it, since it involves entreating the Church?
A chilly breeze blew through the air.
“The sun is beginning to set,” Lieselotte murmured.
The color of the sky indicated it was indeed close to evening. I nodded and looked at the clock tower to check the current time.
“Yes, it’s already this late,” I said. “Time flies when you’re having fun, huh? It’s a little early, but we can go inside now. It might become too cold outside.”
“Aw...” Lady Kobayashi looked sad.
I smiled at her. “Kobayashi, you’d like to see Lieselotte’s other wedding dress, wouldn’t you? Let’s prepare for the evening party early, and then we can chat some more.”
“Now that’s our considerate prince,” Lady Kobayashi said. “You aren’t Liese-tan’s beloved for no reason. That was the best suggestion ever!”
“Sieg, don’t charm Shihono too much,” Lord Endo said. “And Shihono, don’t praise Sieg too much. You’re gonna make me sulk. Well, jokes aside, thanks, Sieg.” He called it joking, but his expression said otherwise.
“Let us proceed with that plan, then,” Lieselotte said. “Lord Endo, Lady Shihono, I shall be taking my leave for a moment. Sieg too, yes?”
“Yes, I’ll get changed too,” I said. “You two can go to your rooms first. I’ll have the chamberlain take you there.”
Lady Kobayashi’s face turned pale. “Wait, Sieg, I have a bad feeling about this. These aren’t gonna be normal rooms, are they? There’ll be a couch I’m too scared to sit on because it looks like a work of art, expensive-looking vases I’m too scared to walk past... I bet I won’t even be able to step on the carpet without feeling bad.”
“Er, well, I did choose the smallest room possible so you wouldn’t be nervous. As for the quality of the furniture...I suppose you could say, this is the royal palace, so we can’t embarrass ourselves.”
“However, it’s just a room,” Lieselotte said. “You could utterly destroy it and everyone would accept it as the will of the gods.”
Well, she’s right. Not only were they gods from a foreign realm, we were greatly indebted to them. They had nothing to fear about the room.
“No, I wouldn’t break anything on purpose,” Lady Kobayashi said. “Ugh, I’m so nervous...”
“Calm down, Shihono,” Lord Endo said. “What they mean is, people will forgive you no matter what careless slipup you make. Just read that while you wait for them to get changed.” He patted Lady Kobayashi on the shoulder and pointed at Lieselotte’s diary.
“‘That’? Oh! I got permission to read Lieselotte’s Memoir, but I was so caught up in our conversation, I didn’t make any progress at all!”
Good, her attention shifted from the room to the diary.
“Okay, I’ll go to my room and read this while I wait!” Lady Kobayashi said, fidgeting.
Lord Endo looked at her with gentle eyes and smiled. “I’ll watch her read, because I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of seeing her changing expressions. Don’t worry about us. Take your time getting changed.”
“I don’t know how I feel about that... Do I really make that many faces? Then again, I do get the feeling this diary’s gonna be super mind-blowing. Well, I agree you don’t need to worry about us, Sieg. See you later!” Lady Kobayashi waved at us.
The two gods really were close. Lord Endo probably didn’t just think Lady Kobayashi’s changing faces were entertaining—he could look at the face of his beloved for hours without getting bored.
Lieselotte and I smiled at them and stood up to leave. I was very curious about the contents of Lieselotte’s Memoir, but for now, I had to focus on accompanying Lieselotte herself.
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