After spending that night camping outdoors, Edelred began finding a place to stay every time the day grew dark and suggesting - in the name of forcing - that we rest for the night.
Thanks to that, I could sit down at leisure and immerse myself in restoring the contaminated animals and plants. At a glance, that might sound like a good thing, but it was not. The only reason I had no choice but to immerse myself in restoration work was that troublesome situations kept occurring every time we camped outdoors, and I was merely trying to avoid them.
“By the way, Reu Rel, I know this is a terribly rude question....... but do you perhaps have an older brother or cousin with quite an age gap? Or perhaps one of your parents’ younger siblings who is much older or younger?”
“Huh?! Wh-Why are you asking that?!”
“Ah, I apologize if I offended you. The place where I woke up...... was called the Tristein Magic Tower, yes? Given its height and considerable scale, I wondered whether it might be a place where an entire extended family lived together.”
“Wh-What are you talking about?! The Magic Tower isn’t some family house.......”
“Ah...... it is not a house? Goodness, I apologize. I made a mistake because I do not know exactly what a ‘Magic Tower’ is. It must be a building for some other purpose. Since you are a mage...... perhaps it is a building related to magic. Am I correct?”
“Well...... yes.”
“Then there must be only mages there. In that case...... how many mages conduct research there? Are there perhaps any older siblings or relatives among them?”
“......There aren’t any. Besides me.”
“Hmm? What do you mean...... Do you mean there are no blood relatives among the mages of the Magic Tower?”
“No, um...... I’m the only one. The only mage in the Magic Tower.”
“Ah, I see....... That is what you meant. Then you were conducting magic research there alone? Alone in such an isolated place....... Did your family not worry?”
“......I don’t have family.”
“Hm? You do not?”
“They all died. Long ago.”
“Ah.......”
“.......”
“.......”
Yes. Situations like this, where Edelred took interest in me, chattered away asking about my personal circumstances, and ended in an awkward silence. I didn’t know what he was thinking, but he kept trying to meet my eyes somehow and striking up conversation about this and that. For me, who had no skill with words and had never had a long conversation with anyone except Master, it was truly nothing short of torture.
“If we’re camping, then either eat or sleep. Pick one. Don’t waste your energy talking to me for no reason.”
“Since we are, for once, sleeping under grass and dew together, would it not be good to at least make some idle conversation? If we build friendly relations, we can ease our tension and fatigue as well.”
Ease tension and fatigue, my ass. I was dying of exhaustion trying to somehow exercise what little sociability I did not have! I already had no experience interacting with others, so choosing words appropriate for friendly conversation was hard enough to kill me. On top of that, becoming aware that my conversational ability was disastrously terrible - though that was only natural, since I had spent hundreds of years alone - filled me with self-loathing so severe that I could not sleep all night and only kicked my blanket around!
And what tormented me most of all was...... the fact that Edelred had probably begun to notice that I was a fool who could not even naturally carry on an ordinary conversation. I did think, since he was someone I would merely pass by, what did it matter whether he noticed or not? But the problem was that it felt as if my dark past were being exposed to an unrelated third party, and that hurt. It also hurt to realize that even after so many years had passed, I was still bound by the past, and the thought that Edelred, an outsider, was seeing every bit of that made my chest feel as though a stone had been placed on it, leaving me breathless and in pain.
When would Edelred finally grow distant from me? For now, he showed interest in me and struck up conversations about this and that....... But soon, he would grow sick of my inadequacy and stop talking to me or showing interest in me at all.
And I was terribly afraid of the moment that would come. The moment when I would have no choice but to resign myself, thinking, Of course. There’s no way someone like me would ever make a friend.
I simply could not bear it, so several times I suggested to Edelred, “Let’s not camp tonight and just keep moving.” Since Edelred kept talking to me about all sorts of trivial things every time we camped, I thought that if we did not camp at all, the timing for conversation itself would disappear.
“You said you had to hurry to your younger sibling’s side and stay right beside them. You said that uncle would harass your younger sibling and try to kill them....... Then we shouldn’t be going this leisurely. We should hurry.”
“That is true, but...... are you all right with that? I would have no issue, but I do not think you should overexert yourself physically.”
As he said that, Edelred’s expression as he looked me over was full of worry. Unlike himself, who was tall and imposing like a swordsman, I must have looked so skinny that I might snap at any moment.
......Honestly, I was not that frail. I did not have a body that looked strong at a glance like a swordsman’s, but I was quite sturdy in my own way, to the point that I had never even had a nosebleed despite continuing all-night research for tens or hundreds of days. As for colds, except for one severe illness when I was young, I had never been seriously sick.
Above all, I had broken the limbs of magical beasts and other people - mostly bandits or criminals - but my own limbs had never once been broken. Except during my days as a student at the Royal Academy.
So I tried hard to explain that even if we moved through the night, there would be no problem at all....... but Edelred never abandoned his preconception that I was frail. Instead, he even drew his sword, showed me my face reflected in the blade, and began nagging me.
“Now, look. The area beneath your eyes is stained this dark. How can you say you are all right like this? Do you think that is all? During the journey here, your complexion has been growing paler and paler. As if you might collapse from fatigue at any moment. So how can you possibly be all right?”
“N-No...... That’s.......”
That was because you kept talking to me every night, and the stress was so extreme that it ended up like this.......
Of course, it was not as if I only disliked Edelred showing interest in me and talking to me. How could I only dislike someone who showed me goodwill rather than hostility? It was just that I was awkward because this kind of situation was so unfamiliar, and it pained me because I felt as if I could not answer properly. Even around the time I first entered the Magic Tower, I would flinch and hesitate at Master’s everyday conversations, and it felt like I had not developed at all since then.
Come to think of it...... Master said this back then.
-There is no need to blame yourself for having no way with words. Such things are merely a matter of familiarity. It is natural to be bad at something you have never done before. What matters is the attitude of continuing to try and improve. Then someday, you will be able to do it naturally. So do not avoid it. Try.
Yes, Master. Now that I think about it, I believe you were right. Therefore, your unworthy disciple will try not to avoid it, as you said.
Should I start by trying to speak first? Until now, Edelred had spoken first and I had responded, so if I tried the opposite, perhaps I might get a better result. But what would be a good topic to bring up?
While I thought for a moment, a decent topic of conversation crossed my mind. Yes, that was it!
“Um, you know....... Where are we going right now? Now that I think about it, I never heard the destination.......”
“Ah, come to think of it...... I did not tell you. Neuschrun. We will arrive if we go just a little farther.”
“Neuschrun......?”
Where was that? When I tilted my head at a place name I had never heard before, Edelred’s expression turned subtle.
“Surely you have heard of it? It is the kingdom’s capital.”
“Huh?”
Was the kingdom’s capital called that? I was sure it had another name.......
I thought that far and suddenly realized. The kingdom I knew had fallen hundreds of years ago, and now another kingdom ruled. If so, of course the kingdom’s capital would be different from the place I remembered, but I had not thought of that.
“No, wait. Then...... we were heading to the royal capital?!”
That meant we would be jumping into an enormous crowd. Naturally, since a royal capital was the capital of a country, it was bound to be packed with people.
Ah, no. That would be hard for me. I already avoided places with many people, and now I had to be swept up in a crowd outright. Just imagining it already made my heart drop and cold sweat break out all over my body.......
“Of course, we will not enter the royal capital itself. It would be troublesome if I walked among the crowds and unnecessary rumors spread.”
“Huh? Rumors? Do rumors spread in the royal capital just from walking around?”
“Ah...... no, it is nothing.”
What did he mean, nothing again? When I stared blankly at him, thinking something was suspicious, Edelred let out a short hum, hesitated, and then added in a troubled tone,
“Well, if that uncle finds out I am here, I doubt he will remain still. He might become needlessly impatient and harm that child.......”
“Ah...... hmm, I see.......”
As I nodded awkwardly, Edelred smiled faintly and showed a complicated expression. Just as an awkward silence was about to arrive, I snapped back to my senses and continued speaking.
“B-But! If you want to meet your younger sibling, don’t you have to enter the royal capital?”
“That is true, but for now, I intend to begin by grasping the current situation. Barging in without even knowing what year, month, and day it is would be reckless, you see.”
“Ah, hmm...... I-I see.......”
For some reason, I had nothing more to say, so I could only nod in a daze. At the same time, my head began growing complicated with the sense of crisis that the conversation was about to break off. Ah, no. I had finally been continuing a conversation, and now it was about to end. I had to say something, anything.
“A-Anyway! Since your younger sibling lives in the royal capital, they shouldn’t be in danger right away! I don’t know how much of an utter scumbag your uncle is, but in the royal capital, the kingdom’s army usually keeps strict public order, so your uncle won’t be able to do anything reckless enough for the kingdom’s army to crack down on him. Naturally, he’d at least watch himself, right?”
Thinking that I had barely managed to keep the conversation going, I held my pounding chest and looked at Edelred with a slightly uplifted feeling. For some reason, Edelred’s expression had darkened.
“I thought so as well. Because the kingdom’s army was guarding it...... I believed that child would be safe. Therefore, at one point, I thought it would be all right to distance myself. No, that I had to distance myself.”
“Uh......? Why, why would you think that.......?”
“Because if we were together...... I would put that child in a difficult position.......”
What was this now? Before, he had said that if he did not stay beside his younger sibling, they would be in danger. As I looked at him in confusion, unable to understand, Edelred’s expression darkened even further.
“But that was not the case. That child was a powerless child who needed someone by their side to protect them. And the only one who could protect that child was me. Realizing that too late was my mistake, and the beginning of the disaster.......”
“Wait, what do you mean.......”
Did that mean his younger sibling was originally going to die? So “I have to stay beside my younger sibling” did not mean he was worried there would be no one to take care of them if he disappeared. It meant he was going to save the younger sibling who was originally supposed to die and change the future? And the younger sibling’s death was even a decisive event that would affect the flow of the future?
That meant I was currently helping him do something that could violate the order of the world.......
“You fraud......!”
My vision went white, and I was about to grab Edelred by the collar.
“Is that true? The payment is that high?”
“It is. The request is simple too. All you need to do is take a little girl and abandon her in the forest. Do not worry about trouble afterward. They say she is an orphan with no kin, with no parents and no backing, so there should be no issue.”
At the suspicious conversation that came from beyond the undergrowth, Edelred and I both flinched at the same time.