Harben was bitter.
At the reality that he had to abandon his own countrymen and run away.
The blood and spirit of the North screamed at him to join the battlefield this very instant.
But Harben already possessed a rationality far removed from the North.
His years working as an Imperial coachman had gelded his Northern wildness.
That was why he could pursue what was reasonable.
His duty now was to protect Abel's safety above all else.
So he turned his eyes away.
"......Prince?"
But something was strange.
This was because Abel, who should have followed him, was standing still in the same spot.
Had his body frozen from the shock of witnessing the cruel carnage?
Harben turned back to drag him along, by force if need be.
It was right then.
Whoosh—!
Bright red flames flared up.
Flames so red they were nearly black.
They bore the same hue as Abel's dark red hair.
"This is...... I see."
Muttering to himself, Abel opened his palm.
The heat haze shimmered only for a moment.
BOOOOM—!!!
A ball of fire shot out.
The 1st-Tier spell, <Fireball>.
But something was strange.
Harben didn't know much about magic, but he could be certain of this.
"W-Why is it so......?"
Huge?
He remembered catching glimpses, over their shoulders, of the Imperial mages training.
The <Fireball> that the Empire's elites had produced while chanting their incantations.
It had been about the size of a man's fist.
He could say it with certainty.
KABOOOOM—!!!
It was absolutely not large enough to swallow a goblin whole.
"Gkh......!?"
Without even letting out a death cry.
The goblin was reduced to a heap of ashes, along with the spear it had been holding.
But Harben's astonishment was only just beginning.
Clench!
Abel abruptly squeezed his fist tight.
Then something astonishing happened.
The huge fireball stopped, fixed in place.
Soon, Abel pressed his index and middle fingers together.
He moved the two fingers.
The gesture, tracing curved arcs through the air, was like that of an orchestra's conductor.
If there was just one difference.
It was only that the performer on the stage was not a person, but fire.
Every time Abel's fingertips drew an arc, the fireball smoothly changed direction.
Boom!
Boom!
Boom!
One by one, the goblins burned.
By this point, Harben began to wonder what exactly he was looking at.
Magic that had already left his hand was changing its trajectory at his will?
It was this bizarre even to a coachman ignorant of magic.
If real mages had seen it, they might have gone beyond shock, coughed up blood, and dropped dead.
That was how utterly inexplicable the sight Abel was creating was.
"Skreeek—!!!"
Only after it had burned even the last goblin, which had been fleeing in terror, did the <Fireball> disappear.
"Phew, it's hot."
Abel took off the fur coat he had wrapped so tightly around himself.
Beads of sweat had formed on his forehead and cheeks.
And this in the North, where a fierce blizzard was raging.
"P-Prince......."
Harben let out a trembling voice.
Abel looked at him.
"Wh-What on earth, wh-wh-what did you just do......?"
"Hm."
Abel roughly swept back his dark red hair.
"I just felt like I could do it, somehow."
He gave a truly absurd answer.
'A genius......?'
No.
Harben was certain that such a flimsy word could never describe Abel.
But now was not the time to agonize over how to define Abel's caliber.
"Prince."
That Abel had saved his Northern countrymen.
After all, now was the time to be grateful for that.
"......Truly, truly, I thank you."
Harben bowed his head deeply.
Soon, Abel's hand touched his shoulder.
After a brief pat, Abel left the house.
On Harben's shoulder lingered a deep warmth that melted the chill of the North.
***
Outside, the fierce blizzard was still raging.
But it was no longer cold.
No, if anything, it was hot.
As for the reason, well.
===[First-Time Bonus Starter Set]===
- An item for guests who have just begun a new journey. Upon purchase, blooms the guest's innate aptitude.
======
It had to be thanks to this, naturally.
But...... it was a little different from the effect I'd imagined.
'I figured, of course, it'd be something like gaining the power to sweep away goblins.'
It blooms my aptitude?
I tried focusing my will on my fingertips once more.
Dark red flames bloomed as if they had been waiting.
"This is...... my innate power?"
It was strange.
After all, I had been judged to have no magical talent.
Members of the Imperial Household were tested for martial and magical aptitude in the year they turned five.
Personal martial might wasn't something that directly helped in running the Empire.
But the test was held because there was nothing quite like it for building the symbolism of the Emperor as 'the Empire's unshakable center.'
In fact, the successive emperors had been superhumans who boasted martial might that ranked, at the very least, among the top three on the continent in their day.
In that sense, I was not the right material for an emperor.
After all, I boasted the tremendous aptitude of being a dullard at martial arts and talentless at magic.
'It'd be a different story if it had been after my Aura Heart was shattered.'
At the time of the test, I hadn't yet been poisoned, so I didn't even have an excuse.
Besides, the test was conducted with the Imperial Household's heirloom, the 'Jewel of the White Dragon,' so there was no chance it had been rigged.
"There's no way the Jewel's test was wrong......."
Whoosh!
So why were flames dancing on my hand?
I didn't know.
'Well, will racking my brain alone give me an answer? I'll look into it slowly later.'
For now, I decided to focus on the matter in front of me.
Treading over the snowfield, I approached the old folks who were staring my way with blank eyes.
"Y-Your Highness, Deposed Crown Prince....... What on earth did you just......?"
The village chief let out a dazed voice.
Still, a far more dignified reaction than Harben's.
"Well, it just sort of turned out that way."
"......Do you think that can explain it?"
"Even if you asked me to explain, I couldn't go into detail. I don't know how it was possible either. I just knew instinctively."
"Those are words that would make mages clutch the backs of their necks and collapse."
"Let them, I guess."
"Hah."
The village chief let out a hollow laugh, as if flabbergasted, but only for a moment.
Soon, his deep-set eyes took on a solemn light and stared straight into mine.
"......Why did you save us?"
"What do you mean?"
"You know, do you not? That I do not harbor good feelings toward you, Your Highness, Deposed Crown Prince."
"Well, you didn't seem to have any intention of hiding it, so of course."
That was how I'd caught on that the village chief was the type who couldn't stand pointless pretense.
"To be precise, it seemed like you held a grudge against the Imperial Household itself rather than against me personally."
"......That is right. And following that grudge, I was rude to you, Deposed Crown Prince. Yet Your Highness talked with such an old man face to face, and finished every last drop of soup brewed from mere tree bark. And as if that were not enough—"
The village chief's gaze moved to my hand.
"—you even brought out the power you had been hiding and saved us."
I had never particularly hidden it, though.......
I'd only just awakened to magic, you know.
'Well, I get it.'
If I had shown off the power I'd displayed just now, at the very least the name 'incompetent deposed crown prince' wouldn't have followed me around.
But my public image was that of the 'incompetent deposed crown prince.'
So the village chief seemed to think I had deliberately been hiding my power.
"Why did you do it?"
It was obvious he wouldn't believe me even if I tried to clear up the misunderstanding.
So I just shrugged.
"Does there need to be a particular reason to save people?"
"Pardon?"
"I'm just saying it's only natural. Well, I'm not a fool either, so if I hadn't had the ability to save you all, I'd have run without looking back. But...... I have some power of my own, so I simply saved you, that's all."
"So...... you are saying you saved us not for any special reason, but just because?"
"Yes. Ah, there is one reason, actually. I haven't finished hearing it all yet."
"Hearing what......?"
"About what's happening in the North. I said I wanted to hear about it in detail."
I meant it.
I mean, we had only just started talking.
And then out of nowhere those goblin bastards came barging in, didn't they?
If this isn't rigged, I don't know what is.
"As it is, there's now one more thing I need to hear about. This place is far from the front line, so why on earth were monsters—"
"Ha, hahaha!!!"
The village chief suddenly burst into hearty laughter.
Perhaps the laughter was contagious.
Even the old folks around us, who had been listening blankly, started shaking with snickers.
......What?
"Is that so? Just because, huh."
He had laughed so hard that tears had even formed at the corners of the village chief's eyes.
"......I mean it, though."
"I know. No one could possibly take what you just said for a lie."
The village chief wiped away his tears and took a step back.
At the same time, the other old folks moved in perfect unison as well and began forming ranks and files behind the village chief.
Northerners standing tall, staring straight at me and me alone.
BANG—!
All at once, they slammed the weapons they each held into the ground.
Soon, they clenched their right hands into firm fists.
THUMP!
And with those fists, they struck their own left chests, the spot where the heart pounded.
Through it all, not a single one of them lowered their head or bent at the waist.
"Bar— Kasi—!!!"
20 throats became one perfect roar.
At that shout, which silenced even the noise of the blizzard, something deep in my chest pounded.
"Uh, um......."
Was I supposed to beat my chest the same way, or something?
The moment I was mulling it over.
"It is an old word of the North...... no, of the Barbarians."
Harben's voice came from behind me.
"'Beneath your feet, I lay down my shadow'...... It is the way Northerners express the highest respect."
"......Am I supposed to do it too, by any chance?"
"Ho ho ho, there is no need for that. Simply—"
Harben looked at the old folks with a smile.
"—showing them that you accept their sentiment is enough."
Swallowing my awkwardness, I turned my gaze.
They were still holding their stalwart stance.
Seeing it like this, the difference from the oath the Imperial Knights performed hit home.
When the Imperial knights expressed respect or loyalty, they knelt on one knee and bowed their heads.
But the Northerners were different.
To those who had inherited the blood and spirit of the Barbarians, lowering one's head only meant being a loser. A true warrior showed trust by meeting the other person's eyes as an equal.
They were citizens of the same Empire, yet their very way of thinking was this different, honestly.
I could understand why the Imperial Household and the North were on bad terms.
And as for me right now.
I was clearly closer to the North's side than the Imperial Household's.
After all, whatever else could be said, I was the Northern Grand Duke's husband-to-be, and the place I would be living from now on was the North, too.
"Hm."
I raised my hand.
And gave an awkward little wave.
That was because I had lived my whole life as the incompetent deposed crown prince, and this was the first time I had ever received the full weight of such sincere hearts.
It was embarrassing and awkward.
But I didn't feel bad.
After all, not a single one of the Northerners in front of me laughed at my clumsiness.
The moment the corners of my lips began to rise for no reason.
[Absolute loyalty of territory residents obtained for the first time!]
[Condition met: new 'Territory' category added!]
A golden message popped up.
***
I blinked.
A category added?
Does this thing even update in real time?
And on top of that...... 'Territory'?
'Anyone would think I was a lord.'
Well, if I became the Grand Duke's husband, I'd be something sort of like a lord.
But that was only if the Grand Duke acknowledged me as her life partner.
If she didn't welcome me.......
'Won't I just end up confined again?'
For a moment, unease flitted past.
After all, I'd finally escaped the Imperial Palace, and I didn't want another caged life where only the location had changed.
'......Should I check it out first?'
To wipe away my unease, I tried to look over the newly added category.
I also wanted to dig into the true nature of this [Shop] thing while I was at it.
......Thud.
But the ways of the world never went the way I wanted.
......Thud.
A heavy sound, drawing closer little by little.
THUD!!!
At last, the source of the sound revealed itself.
KRAKA-BOOM!!!
A giant body appeared, snapping thick conifers like sorghum stalks.
"An orc......!?"
Fuck.
It was one mountain after another.
"Hshhhk—!"
Acidic breath spewed out from between tusks that jutted out a good arm's length.
Judging by the veins bulging around its head, it looked to be thoroughly pissed off.
"It seems...... the goblins were a scouting party."
The village chief swallowed dryly and stood in front of me.
The other old folks also took their stances, as if to guard me.
"Yes....... And it looks like it's dying to kill me, since I burned that scouting party to a crisp."
Was it a monster's instinct?
The orc was glaring precisely at me.
'To take down an orc, you need at least a knight who can handle aura.......'
The old folks, including the village chief, didn't reach that level.
The bigger problem was that the orc wasn't an ordinary specimen.
Just like the goblin horde that had been reduced to ashes, it had deep blue skin and was blazing with a glow of deepest blue from its eyes.
In other words, it was a ferocious orc.
"Kuh......."
I quietly tried to conjure a flame.
Goddammit, since it was the first time in my life I'd cast magic, it seemed I'd failed to control my strength.
Even when I tried to wring out my magic power, it didn't work well.
"We will buy time."
Perhaps noticing my situation, the village chief endured his pain and adjusted his grip on the axe handle.
"In the meantime, Your Highness, please recover your magic power somehow."
"You're not telling me to run away."
"We do not want to die either."
Was it thanks to having offered the 'Barkasi'?
The village chief treated me with a much more relaxed attitude.
Of course, since he was facing a ferocious orc, he too was extremely tense.
"......I'll do my best, so don't any of you die."
With that heavy request.
The army of old folks charged forward all at once.
"Hm?"
No.
To be precise, it was the instant they set foot to charge forward.
SHWING—!
In that brief instant.
A flash of silver flared.
An afterimage that passed before my mind could even register it.
Crrrack......!
The orc's body was cleanly split in two.
The huge body separated left and right, nakedly exposing its blue cross-sections.
Apparently these bastards were steeped in blue all the way through their insides, too.
Thud, thud.......
The orc's carcass, cut in two, rolled across the snowfield.
It was while blue gunk was sullying the pure white snowfield.
That I became aware of what was around me.
"......!"
My field of vision had opened up wide.
The flash of silver just now hadn't cut only the orc.
It had cleanly split even the blizzard.
It had cut through a natural phenomenon......?
'No.'
It was more than just that.
"The moonlight......."
It wasn't tinged with blue.
Perfectly ordinary silver moonlight, the kind I had seen countless times, from my previous life to the night skies over the Imperial Palace after I was reincarnated.
Under the moonlight, clear and purified.
"I apologize."
A woman approached.
"I am late."
Silver hair streamed out with the woman's stride.
Silver even more resplendent than the moonlight in the sky.
It was flowing down along the woman's hair.
"I originally meant to send people, but an incident occurred within the territory, so I could not make it in time."
She sheathed her sword as she came toward me.
The closer she came, the more her delicate features, as if a god had set out to sculpt them, came into view.
Jewel-like red eyes, skin like white jade, and sharp yet graceful features.
A peerless beauty stood right here.
In other words.
"I apologize once again, my lord husband."
The master of the North had come to greet me in person.