The negotiations with Priscilla Bariel ended in failure, and now every path had truly been cut off.
Rejected outright by both Crusch and Priscilla, and with
In other words— "So securing military strength for the time being is something I just… can't do?"
Crushed by despair and helplessness, Subaru touched his nose and muttered those words to himself.
The nose Priscilla had kicked in had more or less healed, and with no trace of the nosebleed remaining, it was more or less back to normal. Still,
The location had shifted from the aristocratic district to the commercial street in the lower ward of the royal capital.
The thoroughfare was teeming with people today just as much as ever, and Subaru sat inside a light-food restaurant, watching the crowds flow past as he chewed on a meal—a bread-like product filled with pork-like meat and lettuce-like vegetables, quietly filling his stomach in silence.
The entire morning had been wasted spectacularly at Priscilla's mansion, and it was probably around noon now. The time limit he had set for departing the royal capital was roughly seven or eight hours away, so whatever margin he had for scheduling was rapidly dwindling.
And yet the situation wasn't so much a stalemate as it was simply retreating on all fronts.
When you considered that his most straightforward solution had been demolished, you could argue that at least he had narrowed down his options—but even that much felt like a generous interpretation.
"Misleading myself into thinking I've made progress… give me a break. Damn that arrogant woman… she didn't even remember the favor I did her…"
Recalling how he had saved her from a gang of thugs when they first met, Subaru twisted his lips in contempt and spat out his frustration.
It was true that Priscilla had displayed an attitude that didn't contain so much as a shred of gratitude, but he hadn't expected that she would respond that way when he came crawling to her for help in desperation.
In the end, she had kicked him to the ground, launched into some incomprehensible lecture—similar to Crusch's—to berate him, and tossed him aside without a care. Al was Al, too. That heartless bastard, not saying a word against his mistress's outrageous behavior. What was the point of being fellow countrymen? Useless fool.
"To hell with all of them. Acting like they know everything when they don't know a damn thing… acting like they understand when they don't understand a damn thing… nobody can protect anyone, but they just keep getting in my way…!"
Grinding his teeth, he bit into the bread and meat with a viciousness born of frustration.
Inside his mouth, the food was chewed roughly, filled with rage and humiliation to the point where he couldn't taste anything at all.
He needed to think of a next-best solution, a next step forward, but Subaru's mind was entirely occupied with grievances and curses directed at every person he had encountered thus far.
All those fools who stood in his way, spouting objections as he tried to protect everyone, tried to save everyone—complicit in the evil deeds of that despicable Petelgeuse.
"If only everyone who gets in my way would just die—"
"I'm sorry to keep you waiting, Subaru-kun."
The one who cut off that ominous statement was a blue-haired girl, swaying the hem of her apron dress—Rem.
She sat down in the empty chair across from Subaru and said: "There's sauce on your face, Subaru-kun."
She reached over, and with the cloth in her hand, gently wiped the corner of Subaru's mouth.
While letting her do as she pleased, Subaru fixed Rem with a silent gaze, demanding a report. There had naturally been a reason the two of them had split up and gone separate ways.
That reason was— "I reported to the Knights' Headquarters that the
Her voice grew weaker as she continued, and Subaru bit his lip.
It wasn't Subaru—who would get no warm reception from the knights—that had gone. He had sent Rem to the Knights' Headquarters as Roswaal's emissary.
He had thought that if she hinted at the Witch Cult's existence, it might prompt the knights to take action— "That bad, huh?"
"…It seems they've already received numerous similar reports. The Witch Cult's background is unclear, so any suspicious activity gets reported upward almost immediately…"
"Ah, I see. So they're being treated like real witches from the era of actual witch trials. …If that's what's letting them use it as a cover, it's no laughing matter."
For as many people as there were who feared the Witch Cult on a latent level, that phantom of Witch Cult activity was being built up. That dread was being siphoned upward to the knights, and as a result, even the value of genuine intelligence was diluted and lost. What a tragically inverted state of affairs.
Rem's shoulders drooped, looking apologetic, but Subaru had no intention of blaming her.
This wasn't Rem's fault. The cause lay in the knights' negligence and the Witch Cult's inherent ugliness. The knights should be diligently verifying the authenticity of incoming intelligence, and the Witch Cult's members were nothing short of a blight on existence itself.
Gritting his teeth at these unfortunate realities, Subaru made his decision.
"If gathering combat strength is impossible… it pisses me off, but it can't be helped."
"What will you do?"
"It's obvious. We're going back to the mansion. I'm going back, and I'm taking
Petelgeuse's cackling laughter surfaced in his mind, and Subaru clenched his fist in frustration.
But even if he wanted to shatter that skeletal face of his, the most important thing—his reach—couldn't extend that far. He had a vague idea of where they were hiding. Even so, he didn't have enough manpower to launch a surprise attack, and even if he were to take them on with his current strength—it would mean putting Rem in the line of fire.
He couldn't stand that.
He absolutely couldn't endure that.
The thought of Rem being hurt, or worse, pushed to the brink of death—because of Subaru's actions, because of Subaru's decisions—was simply out of the question.
If he couldn't assemble a force to fight Petelgeuse without relying on Rem, then he shouldn't even consider confronting them.
His insides still churned with killing intent, and an inexhaustible litany of hatred's curses echoed endlessly inside his skull. Endlessly. But— "There's still a day and a half—if we can leave the royal capital now, we should be able to reach the mansion by the third day. That way, there should still be time to get Emilia and the others out."
Recalling the first loop, Subaru reviewed the time constraints over and over.
Three wasted days spent idly at Crusch's mansion. One day with Rem after hearing of unrest in Roswaal's domain, then another half day with Otto, picked up from a village along the way. After that, they traveled on foot to the location, where the morning of the fifth day greeted them with slaughter.
In other words, if he could arrive by the third day, there was still room to act.
"The second loop… damn it! How many days was I out of my mind!?"
On the other hand, the second loop was worthless when it came to sorting out the timeline.
Having returned, Subaru's mind had immediately deteriorated, and he couldn't remember a single thing about the journey back to the mansion with Rem. How many days Rem had spent at Crusch's mansion while carrying the mentally broken Subaru, and when they had fallen into Petelgeuse's hands— Anyway— "There's no time to waste thinking. Rem, let's arrange a dragon carriage. I can't ask Crusch or anyone else this time, but… in that case, how would we go about it?"
"Dragon carriages are normally arranged through specialty shops. However, demand for them is quite high right now, so I can't guarantee we'll be able to secure one quickly…"
Receiving Rem's uncertain answer, Subaru wolfed down what remained of his meal, stood up, and urged her onward. "Let's just go and see."
The ideal would be to rent a long-distance dragon carriage—one built for speed. At worst, he would have to consider the option of swapping out along the way, like in the first loop.
Grabbing his belongings and growing weary of a reality where nothing went his way, Subaru set off at a quickened pace, unwilling to waste even a single second.
Behind him, Rem hurried to match his stride, struggling to keep up with his pace. Subaru, without so much as a glance backward, never noticed.
※※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ "The commercial street feels really restless today."
Leaning his back against the familiar wall of the thoroughfare, Subaru commented on the difference in atmosphere among the passing crowds.
Even though his total experience with this landscape amounted to only a few days and a few hours, the sense of something foreign here today was so thick that even he could feel it on his skin.
That was because— "The news about the royal selection has spread, and people are finally flooding in from all over."
The response came with an accompanying sigh from the man who sat at the counter, resting his powerful arms and squinting in boredom—Scarface, the fruit shop owner who had become a familiar face: Kadomon.
He glanced sideways, as a matter of course, at Subaru stopping in front of his shop and said: "When the royal capital changes and different people come in, different things sell. If you keep standing there, you'll miss the busy season for our store, so scram."
"Even if the royal capital and the customer base change, your face doesn't, so this store's sales aren't changing either. More importantly—the crowd has really grown, hasn't it?"
Subaru shot back a sharp quip in response to Kadomon's complaints, then pressed further with his question. The shop owner made a particularly sour face, but touching the white scar on his cheek with a finger, he replied: "Traveling merchants from outside have been pouring in. Well, when it comes to business opportunities, the early bird gets the worm. If you show up late, there's less profit to be had. The ones with a nose for it have already set up shop and are laying out their goods to make their money."
"In front of such a big opportunity, what could a shop owner who still can't sell his apples and keeps them lined up out front possibly be thinking? Ah, I simply can't fathom it."
"You got something against my store? You gonna drop dead if you don't spit out insults every time you come by?"
Subaru tossed off his usual—and slightly less sharp—bit of banter, then surveyed the thoroughfare once more.
Sure enough, just as Kadomon had said, what had increased within sight was not so much the buyers running after merchandise as it was the sellers looking for space to set down their goods.
Their feet naturally led them toward the section of the commercial street where open-air stalls were being set up, and those who weren't headed there were pulling dragon carriages toward the aristocratic district.
"I get why traveling merchants would set up open-air stalls, but what's with the dragon carriages heading to the upper district?"
"They're going to sell directly to the big-shot aristocrats up there, right? If you pull it off, you make more profit than going through a trading house, and you get your face remembered by someone important. Screw it up though, and you'll attract the wrong kind of attention—and you might not come back down."
Kadomon spoke in a disinterested tone, as if he had no interest in other people's profit stories. Subaru offered a casual reply while his eyes remained fixed on the dragon carriages passing by.
At this point, wouldn't it be enough to get just one of them? At worst, if he couldn't arrange a dragon carriage, he would have to consider stealing one.
If it was a problem that could be settled with money, then money was the answer—because money couldn't replace a human life. But if someone had turned it into a problem that money couldn't solve, then he would have to commit a minor crime in the name of saving lives.
It was a far cry from stealing a bicycle from a parking rack, but Subaru decided to accept it as unavoidable. And as he watched the dragon carriages, Kadomon apparently noticed Subaru's interest in their cargo and said: "With all the people pouring in for the royal selection, both supply and demand are up. But the items that are especially in demand right now are iron goods, and weapons like swords and spears, and armor. Not just the stuff being brought in from outside—apparently, they're being bought up from shops that were already here in the capital too."
"Iron and weapons… that story sounds vaguely familiar."
He touched his chin, trying to recall where—and then remembered. It had been a scene from his conversation with Otto in the first loop.
In a situation where iron goods and such were fetching high prices in the royal capital, Otto—burdened with a massive stockpile of oil—had been pushed to the brink, drowning his sorrows in drink.
Combined with what Kadomon was saying, it seemed Otto's desperate situation had already been set in stone from this point onward.
Even so— "Swords and armor. If they're stockpiling iron, that means it's all in that category, right? Are the people hoarding it planning for a war or something?"
"Well, fortifying defenses… still, something's a bit off about it. If that were the reason, you'd normally do that in your own domain. Stockpiling too much in a temporary capital like this would just leave you unable to move—that's no good."
"From the way you're talking, you know who's doing the hoarding?"
When Subaru casually followed up on Kadomon's comment, the shop owner crossed his arms and gave a broad nod: "Duke
"Crusch…?"
The name that came up was unexpectedly close to home, and Subaru furrowed his brow with a look of suspicion. But when he thought about it, there were points that lined up.
Day after day, Crusch had been receiving numerous visitors. Subaru had assumed these were diplomatic meetings aimed at forging alliances with influential figures, but perhaps among them had been negotiations with merchants who had brought in goods like these.
In fact, the last person Subaru knew Crusch had met with was someone deeply involved in the royal capital's economy—a man named Russell.
For a moment, he considered asking for more details, but he hesitated, rebelling against the thought of splitting his focus on something so trivial.
And while he was deliberating— "Hey, isn't that your little lady waving at us over there?"
Following Kadomon's pointed finger across the street, Subaru turned his head to see Rem jogging toward them, waving her hand. She arrived in front of Subaru, catching her breath, and brightened her expression—just enough for someone who knew her to notice.
"I found one. We should be able to borrow a dragon carriage for long-distance travel."
"Really? That's great news. With how packed those rental shops were, I wasn't expecting much…"
The rental dragon carriage shops had been extremely busy, and the negotiations had gone as difficultly as Rem had feared. Subaru had judged that his presence wouldn't make much of a difference, so he had left the negotiations to Rem and visited Kadomon instead, using the conversation to organize his thoughts.
Now, Rem relaxed her cheeks with just a hint of pride, clearly having handled the follow-up negotiations well.
"Yes. The owner was quite stubborn, but I managed to reach an agreement by offering to pay a bit more. I'm sorry for making that decision on my own and spending from our travel funds."
"No, that was the right call. At this point, we shouldn't be skimping on money if it serves our goal."
Apparently, the system involved having the shop's people escort the dragon carriage all the way to the city gates.
She told him they had already arranged to meet immediately, so despite the rush, they would be departing right away.
"Well then, short as it's been, thanks for everything, old man."
"You're leaving the capital? You, I don't care about, but it's a shame about the young lady."
Kadomon said this with genuine regret—and that was because Rem had filled in at his shop several times, and each time, his sales had skyrocketed.
That Subaru treated him dismissively and yet Kadomon still didn't chase him off spoke to the shop owner's good nature, as well as Rem's contributions. In any case— "Thank you for everything, Master Kadomon. The next time I visit the royal capital, I'll be sure to stop by."
"My pleasure. …You know, the young lady here is clearly the retainer of someone quite important, but all I've been doing is being rude, and I'm sorry for that."
"Not at all. Right now, Rem is Subaru-kun's before she is Lord Roswaal's retainer. Please continue treating me as you always have."
"…You've only made me hate you even more, you know that?"
Kadomon scowled magnificently at Rem's response, crinkling the scar on his face, then held out a paper bag to her. Peering into the bag from beside Rem, Subaru saw it was filled with an assortment of colorful fruits.
"A token of gratitude for the sales contribution and for your patronage. Take care on the road."
"…Old man. This is exactly why you can't boost your sales. Your wife and daughter are going to lose patience with you."
"I didn't give those to you—they're for Rem-chan! Now get lost!"
Chased away by that rough brand of kindness, Subaru and Rem hurried off from the spot.
Right until the very end, there was no hidden meaning or agenda in his exchanges with Subaru—none whatsoever. And for that very reason, Subaru felt a sliver of his heart being soothed—and tightened the loosening of his cheeks.
Laughing, and having peace of mind—neither was something he needed right now.
Once everything was settled, he would laugh enough to make up for it all.
That was why, for now, these emotions were unnecessary.
They were unnecessary.
※※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ The earth dragon pulling the carriage Rem had rented was one of the largest Subaru had seen, boasting an enormous frame. It tore across the grassland, its powerful hind legs sending tremors through the earth.
Its leg strength kicked up so much dust that it lingered in the air for a long time after, raising speed but obscuring vision. Sitting beside Rem on the driver's seat, Subaru narrowed his eyes against the dust.
"It's fast… which is fine, but can't we do something about this?"
"This earth dragon is originally meant for transporting heavy cargo. So its riding style doesn't account for passengers, and it can't run quietly—it's built for speed."
"We were lucky enough to rent it and it can go nonstop, so I guess I shouldn't complain. …Still, this dust is rough. Is there anything we can use?"
Rooting through their luggage with teary eyes, he searched in vain.
With no other option, he wrapped a thin hand towel around his mouth as an improvised dust guard, then did the same for Rem.
"There. That should keep the grit out of our mouths. Feels a bit better, at least?"
"Yes. As for visibility… we'll just have to endure it."
With both their faces covered, they looked like some kind of gang from a bygone era, but Subaru had no bandwidth for jokes or wisecracks.
Once the reduced visibility made it harder to keep watch over their surroundings, Subaru's thoughts naturally turned inward. The grassland stretched as far as the eye could see, a world of unbroken green where even change was rare. The only things that shifted were the positions of the clouds and the slow but steady descent of the sun—which meant time was passing, and it was slowly scorching Subaru's heart.
His time allocation should have been significantly more favorable.
The day and a half spent in the royal capital could be accurately described as unproductive time yielding no results, but being able to depart on the second day with a secured dragon carriage was a major win.
Using the position of the descending sun as a starting point, if they galloped along the highway for half a day, they should reach the mansion by early morning the next day. If it was early morning of the third day, that was half a day earlier than when he had departed from Crusch's mansion in the first loop.
There should be plenty of time to get Emilia and the others out of the mansion and flee.
If there was a problem, it would be— "The possibility of running into the Witch Cult along the way, like last time…"
His memories of the second loop were hazy, but if the cave where he had woken up was their hideout, and it was located along the route to the mansion, then the encounter would have happened on the way back.
The two of them, racing back along the road in a dragon carriage or something similar, attacked by the Witch Cult—and as a result, Subaru captured, Rem who came to rescue him killed—that was the natural chain of events.
After that, Subaru had removed his shackles and escaped the cave, and although he couldn't feel the certainty of it, it should have taken roughly a day or so.
"In other words, they'd been lurking around the mansion for several days before that."
He didn't know the exact dates.
If the second loop's timeline was the same as the first, then the massacre at the mansion and the village occurred on the morning of the fifth day. And if Subaru's captivity lasted roughly a day and a half, then the encounter with the Witch Cult would fall somewhere between the third and fourth day. Meaning— "If we're scheduled to arrive early tomorrow morning, the possibility of an encounter hasn't been eliminated…!"
He gritted his teeth once more—he had lost count of how many times—and blood seeped from his gums.
If they had been able to leave yesterday, this concern would have been significantly reduced. But with their current travel time, they were cutting dangerously deep into the danger zone. Optimism was not an option.
"————"
From the corner of his eye, Subaru glanced at Rem, who gripped the reins with her attention focused on driving.
If it came to a skirmish with Witch Cult members, he would once again have no choice but to rely on Rem, as a matter of course. Or perhaps if he warned her in advance about the possibility of an encounter and urged her to be vigilant, they might avoid repeating the same tragedy.
But when he actually tried to form the words, he realized his voice wouldn't come.
The black miasma, the searing pain of having his heart crushed in that frozen world—no, it wasn't the fear of that. The fear of that pain was certainly there. Each time he recalled it, each time he relived it, the agony that tore through his entire body made him wonder if his hair would turn completely white. It was not something one could endure with sanity intact. He had only managed it when he had exploited that power, and even then, there had been some inexplicable explosion of emotion that had made it possible. If someone told him to do it again, he would shake his head.
But what was making Subaru hesitate to tell Rem about the Witch Cult wasn't that pain.
—Would Rem, truly, believe him?
"—!"
Just the thought sent a chill down his spine, and Subaru hugged his shoulders as if he couldn't bear it.
His heart was pounding ridiculously fast, and the sensation of nausea surged upward, compressing his organs. The stress of his extreme mental state and the fatigue of a body that hadn't slept for a single moment were eating away at his willpower and stamina as a deficit.
For the Subaru of right now, the single most trustworthy person in this world was none other than Rem.
Having been abandoned by even Emilia, having been treated coldly in succession by Crusch and Priscilla, Subaru's mind had descended into a world of suspicion and paranoia, unable to trust anything.
He couldn't imagine a scenario where his trust in Crusch and Priscilla would be restored, and with Emilia too, the image of them smiling openly at each other and having a real conversation—after he killed Petelgeuse and secured her safety—wouldn't even form in his mind.
That was why, for Subaru right now, there was only Rem.
Fully, completely, the one person he could place everything in and feel at ease with, the one he could call a companion—was her.
And what if, hypothetically, he confessed everything about the Witch Cult to her, and her expression clouded with suspicion? —Just imagining it was terrifying.
"Getting cold feet… seriously?"
He spoke aloud to chase away his cowardly feelings, but the sound was closer to a breath than a voice. A volume too quiet to echo, too soft even to whisper, drowned out by the rumble of the earth dragon—unable to even reach his own ears.
Even so, he had to tell her.
If there was a possibility of encountering the Witch Cult, then not knowing would mean nothing more than repeating the same fate as last time. The reason Subaru had lost his life and come back was to seize the best outcome.
Therefore— "R-Rem… so, about what I wanted to talk to you about—"
"Subaru-kun—there are people gathered up ahead."
But the voice he had squeezed out of his resolve was cut off by Rem's sharp call.
"Huh?" Subaru pursued her gaze and saw several foreign shapes rising up on the highway ahead of them.
—Could it be an ambush by the Witch Cult!?
The possibility came so quickly that Subaru nearly choked on his own heart, but as the shapes drew closer and their outlines sharpened, their identities became clear.
They were— "Hey! Could you stop your earth dragon for a sec? Let's exchange some information!"
Standing in the middle of the highway, waving both arms and shouting at the top of his lungs for them to stop—there stood the merchant Otto.
※※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ ※ "Oh, I'm so sorry. Thank you so much for stopping. These days, there are plenty of people heading toward the royal capital, but hardly anyone coming out of it. I've been hoping to talk to someone from that direction."
The young man who greeted the two who had halted their carriage—Otto—smiled as he spoke.
He was neither drunk nor wearing a disheveled air of resignation. And for the record, he was visibly uninjured, confirming that the merchant Otto was alive and well.
In the first loop, Subaru had left him behind despite his desperate attempts to stop them, and that had lingered as a small thorn in Subaru's heart. Still, given the carnage that had befallen the village afterward, leaving him might have been the fortunate choice for Otto.
In any case— "Everyone gathered here— are they all traveling merchants or something?"
"More than 'something,' they really are traveling merchants. Every last one of them is greedy and eager to hit it big in the royal capital, which is the talk of the town right now."
Otto gave a sheepish grin, rubbing his hands together as Subaru asked the question while surveying the crowd behind him.
Behind Otto, numerous dragon carriages were parked along the side of the highway, and men who appeared to be the owners of each carriage were gathered in a group. The number hovered around ten, with ages ranging from young like Otto to men in their forties. Among them was the thin man who had introduced Otto to Subaru in the first loop.
Once Otto and Subaru had finished their greetings, the group gradually surrounded the two, each introducing themselves and launching into topics of conversation.
The content was mainly about the current state of the royal capital, the changes that had occurred before and after the royal selection, and fluctuations in currency value—topics naturally of interest to merchants.
Honestly, even the time to stop and talk was precious, but once he had confirmed Otto's presence, the option of ignoring him and passing by had vanished.
Fortunately, he had confirmed Otto's safety (which was a given in the third loop), so he had intended to leave as soon as the conversation hit a natural pause.
"Are you about to set out? It's already nighttime—wouldn't that be dangerous? We're planning to camp here tonight… if you'd like, you're welcome to join us—"
And so, once the one-sided information exchange (dubbed as such) had concluded, Otto stopped Subaru and Rem as they were about to depart.
Just as he had said, even the last traces of the sun had faded from the sky, which was now tinged with orange, and night was beginning to descend upon the grassland from beyond.
In a short while, the Lugunica Highway would be completely consumed by night, and visibility would depend entirely on the light of crystal lamps.
The merchants who had gathered had already begun setting up their camp, and in the center of the area where the dragon carriages had congregated, preparations for a fire were already underway.
Their reasoning was likely that with so many people gathered, stray dogs or bandits who might appear on the highway would find it difficult to make trouble. Subaru admired the merchants' prudence, but even that safe period was something he couldn't afford to spare.
"That's rich, Otto. Isn't it more like you're just desperate to offload some of that oil inventory you're stuck with because you timed the market wrong? Don't play the good Samaritan!"
As soon as Subaru opened his mouth to decline, that voice rang out to heckle him. Laughter erupted from behind the man, and the target of his teasing—Otto—curled his lips.
"That's not my intention at all. It's pure goodwill. Well, it's not as though I wouldn't appreciate it if you happened to have even a small amount of oil to sell… for food supplies, lanterns, and the like."
"Oil… what about it?" Rem asked, her shoulders slightly lowered in sympathy.
Otto raised his eyebrows, shrugged in a deliberately nonchalant gesture, and said: "You see, it seems I made a miscalculation with this business opportunity. I'm sitting on a huge stockpile of oil that's only of marginal value as merchandise. It was supposed to fetch a fortune in
His helpless demeanor was probably his way of soliciting sympathy.
He might not have been the type to take advantage of that sympathy, and Subaru didn't think Otto was underestimating him either—but there was a transparent hope that, if even a little of the oil could be sold at a fair price, it would be a windfall.
Rem seemed to understand that as well. She offered sympathy, but nothing beyond that—merely a perfunctory "Is that so? That sounds difficult."
"Even if I go to the royal capital, I'm not sure I can sell all this oil. If I end up having to dump it at rock-bottom prices, I'll be bankrupt. —Bankrupt."
He repeated it twice because it was apparently important, but Subaru had neither the inclination nor the means to announce that he would buy all of it.
They had a connection from the first loop, but their involvement this time around was thin. He wanted to wish Otto a happy future, but his own future took priority.
Right now, what mattered was rushing through the night highway and entering the Meiliers domain as quickly as possible.
His thoughts were focused on the possibility of encountering the Witch Cult, and the strategy for safely evacuating Emilia and the others—and as he was about to weave words of farewell, Subaru noticed something.
If money could move things, wasn't that exactly what he should be doing?
"Otto, I have… no, a business proposal."
Otto's eyes widened as Subaru suddenly dropped his expression and whispered in a low voice. Reading the absence of any hint of humor in his tone, Otto straightened up immediately.
"If it's a business proposal, I'm all ears. What is it that you need, sir?"
"I'll buy all the oil loaded onto your dragon carriage. In exchange, lend me your strength."
Pointing at Otto's earth dragon—the same one Subaru recognized—and then spreading both hands wide, Subaru raised his voice so the merchants preparing their camps could hear: "Every merchant and every dragon carriage here—whoever is willing to sell me your services for money, buy me out! I'll take you all on!"