LIGHT NOVEL
LIGHT NOVEL
— Alde’s perspective —
“Miss Tisli, where are you from?”
Once the drinking party held by the five of us got underway, Naavin kept finding excuses to talk to Tisli.
“I’m from the royal capital.”
“The royal capital! Now that’s something, huh.”
“It’s nothing special. I just happened to be born there, that’s all.”
Though for Tisli, being royalty, to say that is a strange thing.
For a commoner’s birthplace, sure, but for royalty and nobility, the understanding is that birthplace equals station, so they don’t normally say “happened to.” It’s a matter of “land and station bestowed by god,” after all.
And yet here was Tisli—royalty, the very top of the nobility—saying “where I was born was just chance,” which gave me a strange feeling. Because it’s tantamount to saying “my station is just chance.”
She’s pretending to be a commoner now, but come to think of it, an ordinary noble wouldn’t want to play commoner, and even if forced to, they’d never make a remark like that just now.
As I was thinking that, Naavin asked further,
“I heard your work was as a political merchant, but what kind of work did you do in the royal capital?”
“I mainly delivered luxury goods and fine articles to the royal castle. Trade, in other words. I dealt in things like spices and silk, for example.”
“Ahh… that’s amazing too. I’ve never even seen fine articles…”
“They’re nothing much. You get by perfectly fine without them.”
“But being a political merchant means your business was with nobles, right? I hear dealings with nobles are tough in all sorts of ways—were you okay?”
Naavin… you’re talking to the very boss of those nobles right now, though…
Well, Tisli’s broad-minded about that sort of thing, so there’s no way she’d take offense, but for me, knowing Tisli’s true identity, it made me want to give a wry smile.
And just as I’d predicted, boss Tisli, showing no particular sign of offense, let Naavin’s gaffe slide.
“Yes, there was no particular trouble. The royal castle is right under Her Highness the Princess’s nose, after all, so there was no committing fraud, I expect.”
Then Naavin leaned in a bit and asked further,
“But you’re a beauty, Miss Tisli, so being hit on by nobles or officials…?”
“Heh. They’re nobles, you know? There’s no way they’d hit on a commoner like me.”
“Then among commoners? A merchant’s work means meeting all kinds of people, and being courted by men at the businesses you deal with…?”
“Heheh. Out of the question. Well, to be perfectly frank, it seems everyone was either jealous of my talent or afraid of my magic.”
“Is that so? Merchants have no eye for things, huh! I’d never leave you be!”
“Heheheh. You’re good at jokes, Naavin.”
“It’s no joke?! If you lived in our village, Miss Tisli, I’d court you for sure, yes indeed!”
“Oh my, how flattering. Then I wish I’d been born in this village.”
“Really?! Then—”
“But sadly, I was born in the royal capital. So I won’t be courted by you, Naavin—not now, not ever.”
“No, no, no, it’s not too late even now—”
“Hey, Naavin.”
The mood was getting ominous somehow, so I called out to Naavin.
“Knock it off about there.”
Any way you slice it, Tisli was flatly rejecting Naavin’s lines, and pressing further was dangerous. All the more so when it’s Tisli.
And yet Naavin said, looking dissatisfied,
“‘About there’—what’s that? When men and women have a drinking party, this much conversation is normal, right?”
“Like I keep saying, today isn’t that kind of drinking party.”
“Then what kind of drinking party is it, with men and women gathered?”
“The point was to deepen the village folk’s friendship with Tisli. But since you didn’t bring everyone…”
“That’s not my fault, it’s Mia’s.”
The conversation’s point turned to Mia, and Mia slumped her shoulders and bowed her head with an “I’m sorry…”
“Ah, no, it’s not that I want to blame you, Mia? I was at fault too, leaving it all to you…”
As I was covering for Mia, Naavin promptly turned the talk back to Tisli.
“So, so, Miss Tisli, while we’re at it, let me just come out with it—do you have a man you’re seeing…?!”
“Haa… seeing someone, you mean?”
No, Naavin… it’s still early in the party and you go with that question? Even at a party meant for men and women to meet, I don’t think that’s how you broach it.
The reason this guy’s unpopular is precisely this sort of thing, I bet…
So, sighing, I cut into their conversation again.
“For. The. Last. Time, don’t bring that kind of talk to Tisli.”
Tisli now wore a blank look and tilted her head, but inside she might have a demonic expression. If things went badly, Naavin’s life… well, she wouldn’t take that, but he might end up in a state where he couldn’t get out of bed for two or three days.
In other words, I was shielding Naavin out of concern for his safety, yet Naavin looked deeply dissatisfied.
“What’s with you this whole time? Whatever topic I bring up with Miss Tisli is no business of yours, Alde.”
“I told you one of my duties is warding off men for Tisli. So I won’t allow that kind of conversation.”
“What kind of duty is that? Ah, but! If she wants to ward off men, doesn’t that mean she doesn’t have a man—”
“Are you an idiot? If she wants to ward off men, if anything that makes it more likely she does have a man.”
“Mmgh… Miss Tisli! How about it on that point?!”
He was about to ask Tisli yet again, so this time I cut in right away too.
“No comment, no comment. And from now on, when you want to talk to Tisli, go through me first.”
“What even are you to Miss Tisli?!”
“Like I said, I’m her guard.”
“A mere guard has no right to get in the way of a man’s road to love!”
“It’s not even a road to love, in your case. And besides, I’m saying this out of concern for your safety, you know?”
“Out of concern for my safety… what’s that supposed to mean?”
“You don’t know how scary Tisli is.”
“Huh? Scary?”
“That’s right. How many men do you think she’s struck down with magic in the past? She used magic at the farm today too, right?”
“S-struck down…?”
“Well, to be precise, their lives were never in danger and they just got burned to a crisp, but it looked excruciatingly painful, you know?”
“Eh… for real?”
“Dead serious. Back when we were in the domain capital, she laid trained soldiers low in a single blow.”
“S-soldiers…?”
“That’s right. Soldiers who, from their daily training, ought to have a fair tolerance for injury were writhing in agony—pathetically so.”
“W-writhing…”
“And on top of that, Tisli can use healing magic, yet she didn’t use it on them. Well, their lives weren’t in danger—but precisely because of that, in a sense it was a bit of a torture, that.”
“T-torture…!”
“When a Tisli like that says she wants to ward off men, and you come on that strong, of course her impression of you sours. If things go badly you’ll get attacked. So I’m telling you, out of concern for your safety—”
“H-hey… Alde… Alde…!”
—as I was telling Naavin how strong Tisli is.
Mia, looking flustered for some reason, called out to me.
“Hm? What is it, Mia…”
At that, Mia was tugging at me and pointing beside me.
In the direction she pointed… was Tisli.
With a beaming smile.
……………Um?
It was nothing at all like the smile she’d turned on Naavin earlier. So even I could tell this smile was a dangerous one… and, fearfully, I asked Tisli,
“I……………didn’t say anything untrue, did I?”
Smile, smile…
“I mean, this was the only way to shut the noisy Naavin up…”
Smile, smile, smiiile…
“You’d hate being pestered annoyingly too, right? So if anything, putting on a deterrent display here is the better move…”
Smile, smile, smile, smile…!
“I was just being faithful to my duty—I haven’t done a single guilty thing?!”
Smile, smile—snap.
“Talking behind your employer’s back so brazenly, and that’s your line?!”
And Tisli suddenly snapped.
At this rate, I’m the one who’s going to get burned to a crisp, aren’t I?!
So I hurriedly fought back!
“I’m saying it right in front of you, so it’s not talking behind your back?!”
“Don’t nitpick my words! And besides, there’s malice in the way you put it!”
“The way I put it nothing—it’s all true, isn’t it!”
“That time we were attacked, so it was only natural! I’ve never burned an ordinary civilian to a crisp!”
“You tried to blow me up when we first met, didn’t you?!”
“That’s because you tried to attack me in my sleep!”
“I didn’t attack you?! But not saying a single word about the fact that you were sleeping with a bomb in your arms—”
“Hey, you two?!”
As Tisli and I waged our war of words, beneath it Yuinas slammed the table with a bang.
Ah, crap… I forgot Yuinas was here.
I hadn’t wanted Yuinas to hear much about Tisli’s scandalous past, but… Naavin was so persistent that I’d let it slip…
Yuinas, with flames of anger at her back, quietly opened her mouth.
“Blowing up, attacking in sleep… just what is all this about, I wonder?”
Tisli, who for some reason was trying to get on Yuinas’s good side, had her anger from moments ago blown clean away and was in a flutter.
“Y-Yuinas… a misunderstanding, that part is a complete misunderstanding…!”
“Then it’s true you burned men to a crisp?”
“N-no, like I said… that was because an acquaintance was attacked, and I had no choice…”
“To begin with! A situation where you get attacked is messed up, isn’t it?!”
Since Tisli didn’t look likely to talk Yuinas around, I stepped in to mediate too.
“Now hold on, Yuinas. I’ll explain it properly, step by step—”
“You too, big brother! What’s this about attacking this woman?!”
“I didn’t attack her, and that really is a misunderstanding!”
And so, calming Yuinas down ended up taking close to an hour.
Haa… honestly…
If only Tisli had kept quiet, things wouldn’t have gotten this tangled…
True, I was a bit irritated somehow and may have said too much, but…
When it was Naavin, she wore a princess-like smile and deftly parried his nonsense, so she could cut me a little slack for one small slip of the tongue.
And yet the moment I say a little something, Tisli gets worked up at me and me alone.
She could turn a bit more of that good public face my way, I grumbled to myself, on and on…
(To be continued—)
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