To The Domain
“……it’s about time to cheer up, everybody”
“……”
It’s no use. Everybody is in a huff and facing the other way. We left the Runwalker March while being sent off by Sieg and the others before noon, but they’ve been in this state the whole time.
“You sure are an idiot, Lei. The thing do as a man at a time like this is to give each of them a kiss and apologise, you know?”
Fergus-aniue, who’s sitting beside me, says something like that. Saying something like that just because it doesn’t concern him. I can tell right away that he’s enjoying himself.
The ones currently riding in the carriage are me, Alexia, Ferris, Caro, Helen, Aerith, Priscilla, Chrona, Haku, Mei-chan, Roy, Eclat who’s sleeping on top of my lap, Krondine who’s sleeping on top of Mei-chan’s lap, Fergus-aniue, and Carome-aneue.
It’s the royalty-use carriage that Fergus-aniue went out of the way to bring over from Worvest for transporting us. It’s quite spacious.
Dargris and the others are riding in a different carriage. The ones riding over there are Dargris, Rene, Alma, Ely, Cait, Emma, Birdon, Shizuku, Rose-san, Rabi-san. Worvest soldiers are surrounding and protecting these two carriages. Well, we’ll fight as well if push comes to shove though.
More importantly, the current issue is the fact that everybody is ignoring me. An extremely awkward atmosphere is aloft because of the incident in the morning with Hikarin and Maririn sleeping naked in my blanket. The misunderstanding should’ve been resolved thoughh.
Mei-chan and the others as well, they’re being hit with such atmosphere and are being fidgety. I’m envious of Eclat and Krondine, who are sleeping carefreely in the middle of all that. As I was thinking of that, there’s a knock on the door from outside.
“What’s wrong?”
“It seems there are bandits, and they are attacking a village; what should we do”
“About how many of them are there?”
“Approximately 30 in total”
“In that case, apprehend them as far as possible”
“Hah!”
Fergus-aniue says, and the Worvest soldiers gallop towards the village that’s under attack. Still, bandits huh.
“Do bandits frequently appear?”
“Recently they do. They’re either those who were formerly Regalia soldiers or the residents of a village somewhere whose lives have gotten tough and degraded to being bandits. It seems Regalia had placed quite a high tax for the sake of the war this time around, and those who had it tough because of that became bandits.
Regalia soldiers, you know, right. They’ll just be executed even if they return to the Empire. The other countries can’t trust them. That’s why they’ve become bandits”
On top of that, there’s the insurrection of the former Regalia nobles as well after all. This sure looks like it’ll be quite a handful. Even if General Melia is suppressing them for us.
As we’re talking about such things
“Uwaa! This fellow is a Demon Soldier!”
A shout like that could be heard. When we open the window and look outside, a man whose body mutated into purple colour was rampaging. Is that a Demon Sword he’s holding in his hand?
“Why is there something like that around?”
“It’s a fellow that had been used in the war loitering around. We’ve been subjugating them as soon as we find them though”
Indeed, the Worvest soldiers seem accustomed, and they’re attacking while keeping their distance from the Demon Soldier. He’ll end up recovering from a half-baked attack, so they’re trying to finish him off in one attack.
“Does all the town and village feel like this?”
As expected, she’s concerned as the magistrate huh, Alexia is asking Fergus-aniue.
“No. It’s not something that happens that frequently. However, there’s the chance that the Empire is pulling the strings behind the scenes in the nobles’ case. We can’t blame them since there’s no evidence though”
That again is troublesome. Regalia Empire might use that as a reason to intervene again, so we have to get it under control quickly.
It seems the Worvest soldiers safely subdued the bandits, and they’ve apprehended and tied them up with a rope. It’s just that, when it comes to the guy who used the Demon Sword, they stopped him by killing him. It’s because there’s no saving once he becomes like that.
We spent about two days after that moving within the domain. It’s big enough to rival half of Nanor Kingdom size-wise after all. It’s quite spacious.
We stayed over in various villages and towns in the middle of all that and made progress, but perhaps because it’s after the war, all the villages and towns had no liveliness. Well, it’s inevitable if I have to say though. We’re invaders in the eyes of former Regalia citizens. I suppose there’s no way they can come to terms with it that easily.
After that, I somehow got everybody to forgive me during this trip. I was told to do various things like kissing them, hugging them, and whatnot, but I did it to everybody since I could get them to forgive me with that. I wonder how many times I thought of wanting to punch Fergus-aniue, who’s watching with a smirk beside me.
And then, the fifth day that we made progress within the domain. There’s a knock on the door from outside the carriage. When we open the window and look, the Worvest soldiers were galloping in files.
“What’s wrong?”
“We will arrive at the destinated town very soon”
“Is that so. Carry on advancing in that case”
“Hah”
After that, we were led all the way to the inside of the town. The town’s size is, roughly slightly smaller than the Royal Capital. Its population is about 40 thousand people, or so it seems but
“As expected, there’s no liveliness huh”
It seems like Helen thought the same thing as well. It has no liveliness like the other villages and towns. The main street that probably had quite a number of people walking on it previously was also deserted, and it had a lonely atmosphere aloft.
“As expected, I guess it’s because they’re occupied?”
“There’s that as well, but the Feudal Lord of this place left the residents behind and was the first to run away. The residents weren’t informed of anything, and before they know it, they’ve been occupied by another country. I suppose it’s inevitable to be anxious if they’re occupied without knowing what will be done to them”
I see. Something like that happened huh. It’s true that they’re probably anxious. Since they don’t know what kind of treatment they’ll receive. I guess the occasional gazes that I feel are also the residents looking from their houses.
Despite being bewildered by the undescribable atmosphere of the residents, we made our way inside the town.
