"Tenma, I'll be staying with you for a while!"
"Yeah... Jeanne, Aura, show Jin and the others to the guest rooms."
A few days after the party, the Dawn Sword arrived at the Royal Capital and took up residence at the Ootori family's estate. I had sent a letter ahead informing them of the political situation in the capital and left the decision to them, but a reply was swiftly brought by Ted, saying they'd be staying with us. However, something even more troublesome than Jin and the others had already happened to me. It was,
"Before that, there's something I'd like to ask... Tenma, is it true you got engaged to Primera?"
I had assumed the talk of the Royal Capital would be entirely about the Dawn Sword's dungeon conquest, but because Primera and I danced together at the party, a rumor had spread claiming the two of us were engaged.
An engagement between the daughter of a great duke and an S-rank adventurer who was in the process of setting an undefeated record at the tournament — and on top of that, we had known each other since I first began working as an adventurer, were close with her father and family, and were on such good terms with her eldest brother that calling us close friends wouldn't be an exaggeration. Combined with the fact that there had been previous rumors of us being romantically involved, everyone was now saying this time it had to be the real deal.
"As for that, it's nothing more than a rumor... but it's entirely due to my own ignorance. I feel terrible about what I've done to Primera and Duke Sanga."
My mistake... was choosing an unmarried woman as my dance partner. And of all dances, it had to be the very first one...
"Well, when you think about it, the first dance is for—"
t
h
a
t
kind of
partner,"
isn't it?"
The first dance at a ball is typically with your spouse, fiancé, or romantic partner, and this tendency is especially strong at noble gatherings. In other words, by inviting Primera to be my first dance partner in that situation, I had effectively signaled that I wanted that kind of relationship with her — and her acceptance was taken as agreement.
"Hm? But then why didn't anyone make a fuss when I danced with Amour?"
Until now, my first dance partners had been Lady Maria, Amour, and Hana, in that order. Lady Maria and Hana were both married, and the nature of my relationship with them was already well known, so everyone would have understood it wasn't that kind of relationship. But Amour was unmarried and technically a noble lady, so I had been wondering why that hadn't sparked any rumors, when—
"Perhaps they assumed you were just filling in for each other since neither of you had a partner? Being teammates and all?"
So when Lina said that, I thought about it for a bit...
"Now that you mention it, it might have looked like the same old scene. The dancing was pretty rough, too."
It was basically the same as how Amour always hangs around me, and since neither of us had any skill, we snuck off to a corner and danced as inconspicuously as possible — so the only thing anyone could say about it was that we were bad dancers.
For reference, when I partnered with Lady Maria, the gap in our skill levels was so enormous that I was doing everything I could just to avoid tripping. And with Hana, everyone else was dancing a waltz while she and I were essentially moving to a samba rhythm, so once again I was fully occupied just trying not to fall over.
"Just don't do anything that would make Primera cry, okay?"
When Lina delivered that closing remark, Aura judged the conversation to be over and moved to lead Jin and the others to their rooms, but—
"Being a ladies' man sure is tough, huh?"
"Surrounding yourself with beautiful women — we're jealous."
Jin and Garat started giving me a hard time. So I—
"Aura, take Jin and Garat over to Juubei and the others. If it's just a corner, Juubei and the crew will probably let it slide. Jeanne, as planned, show Menace and Lina to their guest rooms."
"Gooooot it!"
Aura answered with way too much enthusiasm, which made Jin and Garat start to panic. Menace and Lina walked past the two of them with faint smiles on their faces, following after Jeanne.
After that, I hung out with Jin and Garat for a while, and once I'd had my fill, I instructed Aura to show them to their rooms.
With Jin and the others settled in, I had nothing left to do, so I headed to the dining hall thinking about mass-producing some snacks. When I got there, Chris was already drinking in broad daylight. She had returned the day after the party, only to learn from a colleague that she'd been quite popular with the men — and on top of that, she'd been told it had only lasted a very short time. She was furious about it.
"Tenma... What exactly is my worth, I wonder..."
I'd gotten caught by a troublesome situation. I should have slipped away before she noticed me, but I'd been lost in thought for a moment, which made me too slow on the draw.
"Who knows? Everyone's worth is different, so it's not something I could say."
I gave a noncommittal answer and retreated into the kitchen to avoid getting further involved. While I was in there preparing to make snacks—
"Jeanne, move further back!"
"W-wait, don't push me, Aura... Huh?"
Jeanne and Aura came rushing over in a panic. They'd probably fled from Chris the same way I had.
"If you two have something to do, I can clear out."
If they had work to do, I was free to go anywhere so I wouldn't get in the way—but—
"No, um... we didn't come to the kitchen for work or anything..."
Seeing Jeanne struggle to get the words out, I understood right away that they'd come here not for work but to escape Chris.
"Then could you help me out?"
"We'd love to!"
Since they were free and it felt cruel to send them back to Chris, I decided to have them help me with my snack-making. The two of them had apparently found a legitimate reason not to go back to Chris's side, because they answered with almost indecent enthusiasm.
"The snacks in my Magic Bag aren't cutting it, so I want to prioritize quantity. That means Aura and Jeanne handle the baked goods, centering on cookies. I'll make pancakes. Any questions?"
"Leave the taste-testing to me!"
"I'll help with the baked goods too."
I'd directed my words at Jeanne and Aura, but at some point Amour and Lina had wandered over as well.
"Lina, thank you in advance. Amour, sorry, but I'm not recruiting taste-testers at the moment. Well, if you actually pitch in, that's a different story."
"...Understood."
Amour answered without much confidence, but it seemed he'd decided to help even if just for the sake of eating the snacks.
"Alright, let me lay it out again. Jeanne and Aura, handle everything except cookies. Amour and Lina, mass-produce the cookies. I'll take care of the pancakes. Now, let's get started."
I paired up Amour and Lina and stuck them with cookies, which were relatively straightforward, while the experienced Jeanne and Aura got the rest.
"Times like this really make me appreciate having a big kitchen."
The manor had been built by the King for Grandpa, but I wasn't sure whether the extra space was because they'd intended it for our own use or because they'd been thinking ahead to the people of Kukuri Village using it too. Either way, the dining hall and kitchen were spacious relative to the size of the building. That let us work on three kinds of snacks simultaneously.
"It's less like making pancakes and more like frying the batter for dorayaki skins, huh?"
When you lined up multiple small portions of batter on a large griddle and cooked them all at once, some of them inevitably came out with a darker golden-brown color. That deeper browning looked less like a pancake and more like the skin of a dorayaki.
"Should I set aside the darker ones for sandwiching with red bean paste or cream?"
Since we had adzuki beans from the south, if I made anko, we could whip up something close to dorayaki. Well, I'd never actually made anko before, but I had made zenzai, so if I simmered that down long enough, it should end up something close enough.
Once I had a decent number of skins made, I lowered the griddle's temperature and shifted into mass-producing pancakes. That was when—
"Tenma-kun… how do you see me…?"
Chris showed up like a ghost.
"You're Chris, Chris."
"That's not what I was asking!"
Just as I was getting exasperated with her uncharacteristically roundabout approach, I sensed someone enter the dining hall. Three people had come in. The one leading them looked like Albert, so it was probably those three idiots as usual.
"Hey~ Tenma-kun, are you even listening~? So anyway, between me and Primera, which one do you think would make a better wife~?"
While my attention had drifted for a moment, Chris's topic had veered off in a strange direction.
"That would be Primera. She doesn't get drunk and cling to me the way you do, Chris."
In Primera's case, she usually passed out from drinking before she even had the chance to cling to anyone, so it probably didn't match the standard criteria for a good wife—but for some people, that could be an important factor.
"Th-then, Mom! Which one would be a better wi—"
"Primera. I don't think a woman who frequently drinks herself into a stupor during the day would be a good influence on children."
"Guhh!"
Chris probably saw the truth in that one. Sure, just because someone got drunk often didn't necessarily mean they couldn't raise a child properly… but the optics certainly weren't great.
"Th-then…"
"Primera."
I had no idea what she was going to say next, but there was really no need to give a drunk person a serious response.
"Chris, you're in the way — go back to the dining hall."
"Okay…"
After sending Chris away, I used the remaining batter to keep making pancakes one after another.
"Out of batter now, but this should be plenty."
I'd made so much batter that I ended up with about a hundred pancakes roughly ten centimeters in diameter, plus fifty dorayaki shells of the same size. Unfortunately, about fifty of them came out misshapen or badly burnt, so I set those aside to be "tasting samples" — in other words, snacks.
A little while after I finished with the pancakes, Jeanne and the others seemed to have finished making their respective sweets as well. We decided to sample the failed ones first and save the rest in the Magic Bag.
"Now then, shall we all do a taste test… oh, wait, before that — Reni, what happened to Amour?"
With a huge batch of cookies right in front of him, Amour was sitting perfectly still. Not only that, he wouldn't respond no matter how many times I called out to him — he wouldn't even open his mouth.
"Well, you see… he stuffed several fresh-baked ones into his mouth and burned the inside."
"…Amour, turn this way and open up…'Aqua Heal'."
It was nothing dramatic — just the usual Amour. He'd gotten greedy because the cookies were fresh out of the oven, burned the inside of his mouth, and ended up unable to speak. That was all.
"I thought I was gonna die… fresh-baked cookies are deadly weapons!"
After healing him with Aqua Heal, the loud and boisterous Amour came right back, immediately launching into a passionate speech about the dangers of cookies.
"Sorry to keep you waiting, Albert. Cain and Lion want some too, right…?"
I offered a light apology to Albert, whom I'd been neglecting, and went to offer snacks to Cain and Lion as well — only to realize that sitting near Albert weren't Cain and Lion, but Duke Sanga and Primera.
"Tenma, which one of us did you mistake me for?"
Duke Sanga asked cheerfully, but I could hardly say I'd mixed up Cain, let alone Lion. I mean, I hadn't even been checking in the first place because Albert's group always came as a trio, so it wasn't really that I'd confused one for the other.
"No, it's not that I mixed anyone up. It's just that whenever Albert shows up with his usual two friends, the other two are almost always Cain and Lion — so I just assumed. Well, I suppose that confidence has dropped to about ninety-nine percent after this… I'll be more careful going forward."
"Oh, well, that's understandable. If anything, you could argue it's Albert's fault for visiting so often."
Duke Sanga laughed when he heard my reasoning, while Albert wore a wry smile, apparently thinking the duke was telling him he'd been coming over too much.
"So, Your Grace, what brings you here today... Actually, before that, what happened to Primera?"
Primera was slumped over the table, refusing to look my way. Her posture was, coincidentally, exactly the same as Chris's... though while I didn't know the cause for Primera, Chris was just dead drunk from overindulging, so the only thing they had in common was the pose... or so it should have been.
"You don't understand... do you really not understand?"
Duke Sanga pressed the question as if making sure, but I genuinely had no recollection.
"Tenma... the exchange you had with Senior Chris in the kitchen — even the dining hall could hear it."
"The dining hall... could hear it? ...Oh!"
Now that he mentioned it, Chris had asked me which of the two would make a better wife or mother, and I had answered Primera all the way through. Part of it was that I couldn't be bothered, but even if I'd thought about it seriously, my answer wouldn't have changed... or rather, with only two options and Chris in that state, there was no way I'd have given an answer other than Primera.
"Rumors are already going around that you're engaged to Tenma, you know. Even if you aren't bothered by the rumors themselves, hearing affectionate words come out of Tenma's mouth must have made you embarrassed. Go easy on her."
"Well, as far as the rumors go, it's partly Primera's own doing. There's no need to worry about it... no, actually, in this case, maybe it's better for Primera if she does worry about it..."
Duke Sanga had trailed off into muttering partway through... but since I was standing nearby, I caught every word. He probably did it on purpose.
"So, Duke Sanga, what is the actual business you have today?"
When I asked in a somewhat firmer tone, the duke cut off his muttering, straightened up, and put on a serious face.
"I actually came about the engagement rumors."
I figured as much, and then —
"That's not entirely a lie, but the real reason I came today is about the Dawn Sword. I brought Albert and Primera along as camouflage — if we came together, people would naturally assume it was about the engagement, and I can use that same excuse with the Reformist Faction nobles... So, would you mind summoning the members of the Dawn Sword?"
His real purpose was to meet with Jin and the others. He'd been teasing me for a while now, clearly enjoying himself.
"Aura, go bring Jin and the others here."
The ones who were brought over — Jin and the rest — were incredibly nervous. Well, they'd been relaxing when they suddenly got summoned by a duke. Even though they knew of Duke Sanga through me, aside from Lina, they'd hardly ever had the chance to speak with him directly, so their nervousness was completely understandable.
"First of all, congratulations on clearing the Seigen Dungeon."
"Oh, thank you very much."
When Jin expressed his thanks, Garat and the others followed with their own.
"Now then, I understand you wish to present the Dungeon Core to the Royal Family. What would you like in return?"
In exchange for presenting the Seigen Dungeon Core, the Royal Family had offered to grant each of them a formal noble title and territory. However, Jin and the others declined, citing that they lacked the ability to manage territory and, more fundamentally, had no intention of becoming nobles.
"That does put us in a difficult spot... If the compensation is money, it would be no different from simply purchasing the Core. And you'd prefer to avoid gemstones since they'd be too cumbersome, correct?"
The Royal Family wanted to give Jin and the others some manner of special reward, but as the Duke had said, money would be no different from a straight purchase, and aside from gemstones, they couldn't prepare anything valuable enough to match a Dungeon Core.
"So in the end, from the Royal Family's perspective, the quickest and most straightforward option is granting noble titles?"
"There are people who, like Tenma, have accumulated numerous achievements yet still refuse noble titles. I can understand where you from the Dawn Sword are coming from, but..."
"In my case, unlike Jin and the others, my achievements are the kind that can be settled with money."
The Dragon Zombie matter had been classified as unofficial, and the Earth Dragon and Running Dragon were achievements earned as an adventurer — I hadn't presented them to anyone, simply selling off the parts I didn't need. I had technically cleared a dungeon in the south as well, but it had been small-scale, and since the achievement fell within the Southern Autonomous Zone, Hana had already given me my reward. Incidentally, Hana had tried to hand over Amour as a reward, but since, for once, Robo the Honorary Viscount and I happened to agree, it had been settled with money and Southern specialty products.
"Perhaps we should have forced a noble title on you during the coup d'état turmoil."
"If the King tried to force the issue, you'd only go crying to Maria."
It was a cowardly tactic, but if you could get Maria on your side, just about anything could be managed when it came to matters involving the royal family.
"Well, let's set the matter of Tenma aside for now. What should we really do about this?"
Duke Sanga kept saying he was troubled while wearing an expression that didn't look the least bit troubled, so
"Why not just put it on hold? Jin and the others are currently active as adventurers and don't seem interested in noble titles, so why not agree to grant them titles when they retire from adventuring?"
In essence, I was suggesting they postpone the reward — but as long as the Royal Family made a binding promise, wouldn't that serve as a reward in itself?
"Indeed. That might be the best solution."
Duke Sanga adopted my proposal without a moment's hesitation. He had probably been waiting for me to suggest exactly that. Jin and the others seemed satisfied with the arrangement as well — they were fine with receiving noble titles, just not now, but perhaps decades from now.
"Could it be that you intended to place me between Jin and the Royal Family from the very start?"
"Well, that's exactly right. I had imagined that the members of the Dawn Sword would refuse noble titles. That's why a compromise proposed by Tenma — someone who has deep ties to both the Royal Family and the Dawn Sword, as well as influence among the nobility and society at large — would be something that could be pushed through even if objections arose."
I felt like I'd been used by the King and his people, but if I was the only one who could stand between them and Jin's group, then there was nothing I could do about it... Once my proposal got adopted, I'd try asking the King for a small favor.
"Lord Tenma, you have a visitor."
Just as I was wondering who would come at a time when Duke Sanga was here,
"I'll be intruding."
It was Grandpa's old friend.
Moreover, true to his royal status, he had entered the estate without waiting for permission.
"Get out! Jeanne, salt! Throw salt!"
At Ernest's sudden appearance, Grandpa bellowed and shouted at Jeanne to throw salt. Startled by his voice, Jeanne hurriedly grabbed the jar of salt — but not knowing what to do, she handed it to me.
"Grandpa, we can't just chase him away. We've finally got someone who seems like the real mastermind here... For now, just sit down somewhere. Jeanne, while you're putting that back, bring some water too."
"Jeanne, for the cup you give this fellow, use Shiromaru's old one that's by the sink... in fact, you must use that one!"
Shiromaru's old one... It was the one that had a crack in it and was already on the list to be thrown away. Offering someone water with that was bad enough on my part, but Grandpa was even worse.
"Jeanne, just bring regular tea after all."
I figured Grandpa might actually get serious if I let this go on any further, so I decided to put a stop to it here.
"So, is today's business about the Dawn Sword's rewards? If so, Jin and the others have already settled on what they want. Duke Sanga plans to report it to the King at a later date."
"That means your work here is done, right? Why don't you just leave already... no, just leave!"
Grandpa was doing his best to chase Ernest away, but if Ernest's business had been about the Dawn Sword rewards, his errand should have already been finished. So there shouldn't have been any problem with sending him away now... but Ernest apparently had something else to discuss, because he ignored Grandpa and sat down in a seat near Duke Sanga.
"Hmm, so that matter has been settled — how excellent. Now then, Duke Sanga, how is the main business coming along?"
"Yes! I was just about to get to that."
Tha
t
When I looked at Albert to see what he meant, he shook his head, clearly just as clueless. I glanced at Primera too, but the moment our eyes met, she immediately ducked her face down toward the table.
Jin and the others seemed to conclude that they'd finished discussing their own matters and were now moving on to my personal business. After excusing themselves to Lord Ernest and Duke Sanga, they headed back to their own rooms.
"So, what's this talk about a real offer?" I asked.
I had a bad feeling about this, but the two of them showed no signs of moving until I heard them out.
"To tell the truth, I had been thinking of bringing it up if there was time left over... but the discussion about rewards finished faster than expected, so we do have time for a personal matter."
Duke Sanga's presence seemed to shift into something entirely different from usual.
"I'll be direct... Tenma, would you become engaged to Primera?"
"Huh?"
"Wha—?!"
I was startled by Duke Sanga's words, but Primera was even more shocked than I was. On top of that, Grandpa, Jeanne, and Aura were so stunned they'd frozen in place, and Amour and Lina had their ears and tails bristling with shock, going rigid. Meanwhile, Albert seemed both surprised and confused at the same time, making strange movements as he hovered around Primera.
"If you have any resistance to a formal engagement, I'd be perfectly fine with simply having her stay by your side. To put it plainly, I suppose you could call it the role of a 'mistress.'"
There was quite a gap between a fiancée and a mistress, and I thought it was awfully strange for a father to offer to place his own daughter in that position, but—
"No, well... Normally, I wouldn't ask anyone to make Primera his mistress, even if it were you, Tenma. However, there are certain circumstances this time..."
When Duke Sanga seemed a bit reluctant to continue,
Lord Ernest interjected on his behalf. "The other day, when the nobles saw Primera dance with Tenma, some of them apparently came to believe that Primera intends to marry him. There were even fools who declared they'd offer their own sons as substitutes for Tenma. And there are those who say Tenma is being irresponsible by not marrying Primera. Those people don't say it out loud, of course, but they're hinting that the Duke is equally irresponsible for letting it slide, and His Majesty for staying silent despite knowing about it... They'd deny it if confronted, but at the very least, that's how it came across to me."
Certainly, some of them probably genuinely believed that, while others were just using it as an excuse to cause trouble. Regardless, it was true that in noble society, there were aspects of my and Primera's actions that drew criticism.
"We could silence those people by force, but doing so could trigger a massive upheaval that splits the kingdom into two or three pieces. I'm not saying they're right, but in the world of nobility, even behavior considered wrong can sometimes be considered understandable — so we can't categorically claim we're entirely in the right. However, if we declare that Primera is Tenma's fiancée, or his mistress, we can deflect the criticism."
It wasn't uncommon for nobles to offer their daughters as mistresses to powerful figures, and many of those currently criticizing us were doing the same thing themselves — so that would shut them up. On top of that, we could turn the tables and accuse them of trying to interfere with the relationship between Primera and me... Well, that part did feel a bit heavy-handed, but then again, they'd essentially been picking fights with royalty and the highest-ranking nobles, so whatever consequences came their way were their own problem.
"So with that in mind, would you be willing to take Primera as your mistress and keep her by your side?"
Duke Sanga delivered the whole thing as casually as idle chitchat, but I had a feeling this was about to become a very big deal.
Still, having Primera as my mistress… When I first met her, I never could have imagined something like this would happen… Just as I was thinking that,
"If you can see your way to accepting Duke Sanga's request, the royal family will take full responsibility for dealing with those pesky flies."
Lord Ernest, seeing me wrestling with the decision, apparently misunderstood and offered to rein in the clamoring nobles.
"No, it's not that—I'm fine with the betrothal. I was just reflecting on the fact that when we first met, I never dreamed it would come to something like this."
"I see. So you'll accept her as your mistress? Well, it can all be just for show, so don't worry too much about it… Though, if you end up wanting to marry for real while you're together, you could just forget about the charade and—Hm?"
Duke Sanga seemed to sense something off about my words and stopped midway, glancing around.
"Wait… You don't mean mistress—betrothed? Seriously? You're not joking?"
"Yes, that's what I said."
"Primera, come here for a moment. Albert, you too."
Duke Sanga still couldn't believe it, so he called Primera and Albert over. The two of them also seemed unable to take my words at face value; they approached without a sound of surprise, doing as Duke Sanga instructed. Then—
"Ugh!"
"Ow! Owwww!"
Duke Sanga gently pinched Primera's cheek, then twisted Albert's cheek with all his might.
"Hmm… Judging from Albert's reaction, it doesn't seem to be a auditory hallucination… Primera, congratulations."
With that, he tossed Albert aside like discarded trash—his cheek now bearing a bright red mark—and turned to offer Primera his blessings.