Otome Game no Heroine de Saikyou Survival [WN] - Chapter 50
Omen of Battle
“Grandfather, may I have a moment to discuss something with you?”
In the Royal Capital of the Kingdom of Cleydale, in the Prime Minister’s office in the Royal Castle, Bert Fa Melrose, the owner of the room, stared at his grandson who suddenly requested a visit with him.
The boy with faint reddish honey-blonde hair, who was not afraid of the intense gaze from his grandfather, who was the current Prime Minister, had a smile on his sweet face that matched the color of his hair.
Mikhail Melrose, the first child of the Melrose family’s legitimate son, had turned ten years old this year, and his physique had grown to the age of a commoner’s thirteen in the past few years because of his strong magical powers, and had become the talk of the young maids working at the royal castle with his grandmother’s sweet face and devious smile.
Bert’s son and Mikhail’s father, his legitimate heir, was ruling over the Melrose fiefdom in place of Bert, who could not leave the Royal Capital because of his vizier duties. Mikhail was in the Royal Capital because he was a friend candidate for the Crown Prince’s entourage.
Just like Clara, the daughter of the Countess of Dandol, was Elena’s playmate. Several children of good family backgrounds who would be the next king’s friends were gathered as the Crown Prince’s playmates. I was told that both of them had a good relationship with the Crown Prince.
“You really are an incredibly difficult child to grasp…”
“I’m used to Grandfather’s eye, you know. In the first place, people of the Melrose family are not likely to be excellent at looking people in the face.”
“…I suppose so.”
Bert’s mouth twisted as he understood his grandson was also the similar kind, and he quenched his dried mouth with the tea that Oz, the butler, had brewed for him.
As a former royal family of a country, the Melrose family had that side of them, for better or worse. That was why they could express their opinions to the royal family without fear, and it was also why they were sometimes favored by the royal family, like Bert and Mikhail were.
“Come to think of it, he was like that too…”
When I thought about it, was it because the Melrose family’s character was so strong that his daughter eloped without even thinking about her position?
“Was she the aunt you told me about? An old servant told me she was a beautiful woman. Rumor has it that the girl who is my cousin has been found?”
“…Where did you hear this story?”
Bert glared at Mikhail, who told him a fact that only a few people, including the royal family, knew, but he simply dismissed it with a smiling face.
He probably had his own information network at his age. Considering all that, he might be more suitable than his father, and Bert’s son, to be the Crown Prince’s Prime Minister after the Crown Prince would become the King, but Bert let out a small sigh at his grandson’s too precocious attitude.
“We’ll see how that thing goes in a few more years. So, what’s there to talk about?”
“Before we do that, I’d like to tell Grandfather alone about something.”
“I understand. Oz…”
“Yes, of course.”
Oz, who had been waiting in the room’s corner, bowed to Bert and Mikhail and left. What was it about this story that even Oz, a knight of the Dark Side, could not hear?
“Is that enough?”
“Yes, grandfather, this is about His Highness the Crown Prince.”
Mikhail told him that the Crown Prince had recently taken an interest in the life of commoners, which was not a bad thing in itself. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but the Crown Prince would like to take a tour of the Royal Capital, not in his role as “Crown Prince”, but as a [Hidden] guest.
There were guards posted throughout the Royal Capital to maintain security, and they were on patrol all the time, so there was no danger unless there was a major incident. The security was so great that even the daughters of counts were often seen shopping in the city with only two or three guards and attendants, although it was not necessary to do so alone.
However, the position of Crown Prince did not allow this. Even in the Royal Capital, it was necessary to rent out a high-class store for shopping with about 10 Royal Guards.
The fact that he wanted to look around on his own, perhaps inspired by the queen, a former free-spirited baroness who had gone out almost without an escort, was a real nuisance.
(…You really are a troublesome fellow, aren’t you?)
“As expected, I also made him agree to have a few guards. However, it seems that he heard from somewhere that we allowed the kidnapping of Her Highness the Princess, even though it was an attempt, and he refuses to have dark guards escort him outside the castle.”
“I see…”
It was indeed a blunder by the Dark Side of the organization. Even though they were understaffed, they only trusted people around the royal family, as confirmed by senior knights such as Sera, but upon investigation, it was discovered that Grave, who had worked for the royal family for nearly 30 years, had reassigned the personnel and intentionally spread the princess’ highness’s security to weaken it.
Although Grave had a fastidiously radical side in his youth, it was believed that it was all because of his loyalty to the royal family. In fact, over the last decade, the radical side had gone out the window, and as a royalist, he had no idea why he would do such a thing.
(No… it might be because… he was out of control because of his faithfulness.)
Grave disappeared without confirming Bert’s order of [a girl with peach-blonde hair], who was reportedly attacked by a monster and went missing.
He felt something strange about the Granddaughter who was found, and he also sent Sera to check on the situation with that other Girl because he wanted something to confirm, but there was no way to search for a child who could no longer be found.
Sera’s grandfather, Hoss, was also a competent man, but his eyes were probably blinded by the memento left behind by his friend.
“Mikhail…you could have admonished His Highness, right?”
“I don’t know about that. And I, for one, would not be comfortable with a greenhouse-bred naïveté as my potential future partner.”
“You are right. What do you want?”
“Well. All the capable dark knights know each other, even His Highness. So, would you be willing to lend him a few guards who are not from the Dark Side and who are familiar with the city as well?”
“Knowledgeable about the city…?”
There was a way to have competent knights escort him, but the Royal Guards, which had many senior knights, could not be said to be knowledgeable about the city, and even if ordinary knights were knowledgeable about the city, it might not be the city that the Crown Prince was seeking.
(Come to think of it, I heard those guys are coming back to Royal Capital soon.)
“Someone, send a messenger to the guild. I’ll send out a request to the Adventurers’ Party Rainbow Sword for a nomination.”
***
“That was earlier than planned. I thought it would take a long time to assassinate three thieves, even though they were at a lower rank.”
Dino, the head of the guild, gave me a surprised look as I returned to the headquarters of the Assassin’s Guild North Frontier Branch in a month, which was apparently earlier than planned.
He probably thought that even though he knew my fighting ability, I was only a child, and it would take a lot of time and effort to finish my job. In fact, I could have returned sooner if I had wanted to, since my work was finished about three days after my arrival, but I went hunting for some monsters in the dungeon while I was at it.
However, since I was alone and not in a party, I could not dive deep, nor did I intend to. The guild said that the highest floor that was currently reachable in the dungeon was the 15th floor, which was conquered 60 years ago by the lord of that time through persistent military force.
From around the fifth basement level, Rank 3 monsters appeared on their own.
It would have taken a long time if I had actually defeated them as I went along, but the guild had a map of the lower levels, and I forced my way underground using concealment and detection.
A dungeon was a monster, and inside it was a place where the laws of above ground did not apply.
It was filled with a magical element stronger than that of the earth, which allowed the monsters to work with a minimum amount of food, but because of this, they were always hungry, and the monsters that had gotten the taste of human flesh were very belligerent.
However, the strong magic element not only made it easier for monsters to live in, but also made it easier for humans to gain skills the deeper they dived.
Normally, I should proceed with caution, since this was my first time in a dungeon.
But I still lacked experience in fighting powerful enemies. It would seem that all I had done was to fight against enemies stronger than myself, but in reality I could only count on one hand the number of battles I had directly fought, so I dived into the dungeon alone to get stronger and hunted to the limit of my strength as well as my food supply.
I cut that off because I had to deal with multiple enemies when I descended to the later floors, and the lone Rank 3 monsters were no longer approaching me.
“Well, fine, I’ll pay you the promised reward. Also, this is just the right timing. I just received the information about the Mercenary of Dawn in the aforementioned matter from the liaison officer, so I will give you that as well.”
Dino handed me 10 gold coins for the reward and the information on the next target.
It was good as I had spent a lot of money recently. Since I had done a lot of reckless fighting, I needed to buy clothes and a cloak again, and I only had a few silver coins left.
But more importantly, I should probably read the target’s information now. I flipped through the stack of raw paper, skipped the personal information, and looked at the current situation…
“…the Royal Capital?”
“Since then, it seems that they have left the northern frontier area and headed for the Royal Capital. Perhaps they are planning to hide in a large dungeon near the Royal Capital until things cool down.”
“Another dungeon…”
“Hopefully, we can take them out while they are in the Royal Capital, but that may be difficult in the heavily guarded Royal Capital. We don’t have a liaison there, so should we send one or two people from here as well?”
“Is there an assassin’s guild in the Royal Capital?”
The Assassin’s Guild here was one of several branches in the country. I had assumed that by branch you meant that there was a headquarters, and that it was located in the Royal Capital, but I wondered if that was not the case.
When I raised such a question, Dino cowered his shoulders with a deliberate gesture.
“My dear fellow junior sister. It may be troublesome to talk about that, but we, the Assassins’ Guild, are not monolithic, even though we are the same organization. We are not enemies, but I would say that we are like-minded rivals with the same goal.”
“I see…”
So, you were not competing against each other to see who was best, but rather competing for the best results in each branch? Or perhaps it’s more like the feeling of a separate business that had been split off from a major trading company and was now estranged from the head office.
There were some aspects of this in the Adventurers’ Guild, but it seemed silly to not even share information, but it was easier for me to work with them this way.
Well, end of story. As I put the materials away inside my cloak and turned away, Dino called out one last time to see if there was anything more.
“By the way, Guy has been out for a few weeks now and hasn’t come back. Has he come into contact with you recently?”
“How would I know?”
“Well…”
Dino cowered again and just turned away and left.
Was I being suspected…? But Dino probably thought I couldn’t beat Guy with my fighting skills. Also, an assassin who frequently moved on their own could disappear without a trace, so I should not expect to be questioned any further.
Perhaps someone who could use appraisals would have looked at my combat skills when I first arrived. Since appraisal required magical power, reappraisal should not be done after the first time unless there was something wrong with the person.
That’s where I would have an opening to take advantage of.
When I finished what I had to do, I would not go back to the room I was given because I did not know what had been set against me.
Alone, I took another look around the guild as if to double-check.
I did not sense much presence of others in the assassins’ guild, but I did sense a thin presence, just enough for someone to be there. Since I was also removing my presence, there should be few people who could catch my presence.
If I were in this kind of environment, I could train my Concealment and Detection even if I didn’t want to…. Was that the reason why there were people with low combat ability but high skills in such areas?
I didn’t feel any sign of Kira in the guild. Perhaps she was out or working. She was a troublesome person through and through to have met, but it was also eerie that she was nowhere to be seen.
The other troublesome people in the guild were Radha the Shadow Master, Sharga the Combat Madman, and Sage the Sorcerer.
It would be hard to find Radha, given the title. Sharga, on the other hand, had a powerful presence and didn’t seem to hide his presence, giving me a sense of power that made it a bad idea to approach him with no countermeasures.
I stopped just before entering a certain corner. The place looked chaotic, with a strange mixture of visible magical elements.
This was… disgusting. Could this be [a curse]? The sorcerer, Sage…an old man in a robe hood stared at me with dark eyes from the darkness at the end of the passageway as I stopped, unable to continue.
“…”
…I guessed even elves could get old.
Since he did not step into that cursed territory and did not do anything when I left the scene, I assumed that Sage’s fighting style was passive.
I continued on my way to the far end of the Assassins’ Guild, a former coal mine.
From somewhere, I heard a low roar as if a wind were blowing through the air.
I knew it before I even approached it. My legs grow heavy, not wanting to go there. No one would usually come near it. I knew that death awaited me if I approached it.
Anyone who didn’t realize that didn’t deserve to live here.
I let my frightened spirit sink to the depths of my mind and took one step at a time, until I found a beast at the far end, chained and confined by iron bars as thick as a woman’s arm.
“Executioner… Gord.”
Gord, who had been giving low growls at my mutterings, looked up.
[Gord] [?????? ??]
[Magic Power: 167/186] [Strength Value: 531/546]
[Total Combat Power: 1281]
He was nearly three meters tall with long, twisted arms that seemed to be over two meters long.
The man, whose entire body was wrapped in bandages covered in filth, suddenly attacked me with a vicious glint in his muddy yellow eyes.
[Gaaaahhhh!!!!!]
Gagan!!!
Gord’s claws cut through the air a few centimeters in front of my nose as the chains that had been bound to the rock face were stretched to their breaking point and slammed into me, as if to distort the thick iron grating.
Gord’s entire body was caked with the chaotic magic I had seen in Sage’s area. Perhaps Sage had bound Gord with the magic spells.
This man was not just a beast. He might even be crazy, but his movements clearly showed a glimpse of sophisticated skill.
Perhaps the result of drugs, witchcraft, or curses…. When I gently touched the tip of his outstretched arm with my finger, as if seeking something, Gord pulled his arm back, as if surprised.
No one approached him.
No one would look directly at him.
No one would think of touching him.
I looked straight into Gord’s murky eyes and said to him in a small voice.
“Wait and see. I’ll give you the stage you wished for.”
[Aria (Alicia)] [Race: Human ??] [Rank 2]
[Magic: 172/180] 10Up [Strength: 142/145] 5Up
[Strength: 6(7.2)] [Endurance: 7(8.4)] [Agility: 10(12)] 1Up [Dexterity: 8] 1Up
[Short Sword Technique Lv.2] [Taijutsu Lv.2] [Throwing Lv.2] [Thread Manipulation Lv.2]
[Light Magic Lv.2] [Dark Magic Lv.2] [Non-Attribute Magic Lv.2]
[Life Magic x 6] [Magic Control Lv.3] 1Up [Intimidate Lv.3] 1Up
[Concealment Lv.3] 1Up [Night Vision Lv.2] [Detection Lv.3] 1Up [Poison Resistance Lv.2] 1Up
[Simple Appraisal]
[Total Combat Power: 216 (With Physical Enhancements: 242)] 45Up
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