"Hey, this place has a queen, so it's a royal capital, right?" Shirakawa observed as she looked down at the city.
"Probably... but I mean, this is just how it is, right?" I replied, taking in the view.
When I got summoned to another world, I figured the city would be like medieval Europe... but it's way less developed than I thought.
More than Europe, it feels like a bazaar in the Middle East or something.
Carriages are going back and forth, but of course there aren't any cars.
I can hear shopkeepers yelling and the buzz of people walking around, but there's no music like you'd hear in a Tokyo shopping district, and obviously no electronic sounds at all.
"If you wanna be nice about it, exotic, totally?" Shirakawa asked with a tilt of her head.
"If you wanna be mean, it's filthy," I added bluntly.
The clothes in this world seem to be the same style for men and women: a shirt that goes down to about the knees on top, and loose pants that are cinched at the ankles on the bottom.
The colors are super bright - yellows, reds, blues, all primary colors. It feels way too flashy.
An old guy with white hair and a tan was walking around in head-to-toe bright red, and I kinda thought it looked cool.
Everyone's barefoot in sandals. The basic style seems the same, but people show off their personality through how they tie the straps.
"Anyway, if we go out there, we're definitely gonna stick out so much," Shirakawa pointed out.
"If we're gonna go into the city, we at least need to get some clothes," I noted.
"So what do we do about our hair, honestly?" Shirakawa asked, touching her own hair.
"Don't tell me you want me to do it," I warned.
Clothes we can figure out if we just get some, but the problem is hair.
Everyone walking around the city has what you'd call cornrows1 - tight, tiny braids.
"Shirakawa, can you do that...?" I asked, turning to her.
"Hmm... I've done thicker braids before, but I've never done anything that fine, and I don't even know how, seriously," she answered, frowning slightly.
"Then walking around the city is probably impossible," I concluded.
"Ehhhh... I wanna sightsee, I wanna shop, I wanna eat everything, literally!" she whined, stomping her feet.
Shirakawa throws a little tantrum, flailing around, but doing that isn't cute... well, okay, it's a little cute... but I'm not telling her that.
"Sigh... I mean, there's not a single person with normal hair," I muttered, crossing my arms.
"There totally is, though," Shirakawa countered.
"Where?" I blinked.
"The queen, obviously," she reminded me.
"Oh, yeah, true..," I admitted, rubbing the back of my neck.
Just like Shirakawa said, that annoying queen didn't have her long hair braided.
"Also, that nouveau riche guy's little brother didn't have braids either, right?" she added.
"Yeah, yeah, now that you mention it," I agreed.
"Huh? What about those terrible soldiers...? Their hair's short, almost buzz cuts," she suddenly remembered.
"Maybe your hairstyle changes based on your status or job?" I speculated.
"Could be. In that case... no, never mind, I seriously can't," she started to say, then stopped.
"What can't you do?" I asked, eyebrow raised.
"Even if I shaved my head, I don't look like a soldier with this build, honestly," she explained, sighing.
"Ahahaha... totally true," she giggled.
"Shut up. Anyway, we can't walk around the city without braids," I grumbled.
"Then let's go look for a salon. There's no way I could do the back of my own head, so there's gotta be someone who does it professionally. Right? Right? Pleeease..," she pleaded, tugging at my arm.
"Tch, fine, whatever..," I gave in with a groan.
There's no fancy Japan-style salon, but we found plenty of places doing braids.
Actually, people were doing it right on the side of the road, so we didn't even have to look.
"Whoa, so fast! So tiny! I can't even tell what's happening, it's way too fast!" Shirakawa gasped, watching closely.
"Then maybe we should find someone who's bad at it. Like someone who looks bored..," I suggested, looking around.
"Is there someone like that...? Oh, that person over there doesn't look that fast, actually," she mused, scanning the crowd.
"Okay, okay, I get it, so stop pulling so hard!" I complained, pulling back.
Seriously, quit hugging my arm and pushing your boobs into it - it makes it hard to walk.
The stylist Shirakawa found was working slower than the first person.
Still fast enough, but not so fast you can't tell what's happening.
Watching closely, it looks less like she's slow and more like she's just being careful.
"Yeah, yeah, so you're doing an inside-out braid and adding the back strands as you go..," Shirakawa analyzed out loud.
"You understand this? And don't tell me to do it," I asked, narrowing my eyes.
"Ehhhh... I'll teach you, so do it, please!" she insisted.
"Why me? It's such a pain..," I groaned.
"Please, please, just the first part... okay?" she coaxed.
"Okay... no. I'm not doing it," I started, then shook my head.
"Then... if you do it, I'll let you do me..," she whispered teasingly.
Shirakawa opened her shirt a little to show some cleavage.
Man, she has no idea how hard I'm holding back my urges. It's actually starting to piss me off.
"You know... if we do it, I might get you pregnant. If we were in Japan, fine, but in this situation, what would we even do?!" I snapped back, my face heating up.
"It's not like there aren't ways to feel good without getting pregnant, right? Like, your mouth, or your chest..," she purred, stepping closer.
"Huh...?" I squeaked out.
Shirakawa hugged her arms together and pushed up her chest.
With hazy eyes, she traced her half-open lips with her tongue in a way that was way too suggestive.
"Y-you idiot... I-I'm not doing it..," I stammered, turning away.
"Hmm... well, just think about it, okay?" she smiled softly.
"O-okay..," I muttered weakly.
To do braids, you need a comb and hair oil, but stealing from the townspeople felt a bit wrong, so we decided to go back to the castle and sneak some from the lady-in-waiting's room.
After that, I watched the stylist work while getting about 30 minutes of lessons from Shirakawa.
The work looks insanely detailed, but what she's actually doing is just repeating simple steps, so once you memorize the order, it doesn't seem impossible.
Braiding my own hair seems hard, but doing someone else's head might be doable.
I-it's not like I gave in to my desires or anything.
That's right. I'm just learning this because it might be useful knowledge to keep Shirakawa's mental state stable.
Trivia:
- The queen and the nouveau riche younger brother are the only named figures without cornrows, hinting that braiding is a mark of lower status or common birth in this world.
- Shirakawa offering her body as payment for a simple braiding lesson shows how transactional she believes relationships are, yet the narrator reframes his compliance as protecting her mental health.
- The narrator plans to steal hair supplies from the castle's lady-in-waiting room, which means he already knows the castle layout well enough to move through servant quarters undetected.
Translation Notes:
1 ↩ A hairstyle of tightly braided rows close to the scalp. In this world, the style is worn by nearly everyone, and the narrator notes that only the queen and a noble's brother skip it, suggesting hair is a visual marker of social rank.
Notes:
• Shirakawa - Family name of Shirakawa Kiyoka, the dark-skinned gyaru and classmate of the protagonist who was summoned alongside him to another world.