Otome Game no Heroine de Saikyou Survival [WN] - Chapter 54
The Eccentric Armor Shop
Gelf, brother of Galbas the Dwarven blacksmith, was a man with a feminine side.
I had never seen him before, but I knew from that woman’s knowledge that such a man existed.
I stepped forward through the stiffened Feld and El and stood in front of Gelf, who was wearing a black leather top and bottom with a wide chest opening and was posing in a pretty, feminine manner, and placed my left hand on the counter.
“It’s an old one. Can you fix it?”
“Oh, my, you little cutie. You have something very unusual in your possession. It’s made of monster leather. What monster?”
“I heard the boots are from Night stalkers, but I don’t know about the armor. I think it’s a different monster because the strength and elasticity are different, but even if the leather is good, the other parts are getting ruined.”
“Wow! That one is a pretty rare monster. But you have to take care of the leather too, don’t you? There’s a limit to how much moisture in the atmosphere and magic power can regenerate it. I can fix it, but I have a favor to ask you.”
“Wait a minute!”
Mikhail grabbed my other hand and stopped me in a panic as I was about to head towards the back with my other hand being held by Gelf.
“…What is it?”
“What… you mean… him? You don’t think anything is out of place when you see him?”
Mikhail must have been wary and suspicious of me, since I was unidentified. Why was he so upset that it made him grab my hand and try to stop Gelf from taking me away?
“If you are talking about Gelf’s outfit, I have knowledge that such a person exists. As long as you know, there is no need to be wary of them.”
When I said this, Feld and the forest elf Mira’s eyes widened in surprise. Meanwhile, Gelf, who had been watching us with amusement, muttered something with a lovely face.
“You’re a manly girl, aren’t you?”
“Oh, I see, Mikhail, you’ve been talking to her a lot because you’re interested in her.”
Mikhail, who had been giving a relaxed smile until then, suddenly looked like a lost child.
“… ah no I apologize. I’ve been strangely curious about you ever since I saw you for the first time.”
“…”
What was it? Could it be that he was worried about me, the way he had been probing me in various ways?
Maybe there was a dangerous part of me I was unaware of, but he seemed like a troublesome man… Why didn’t he just say so clearly?
“Oh dear, don’t worry, I won’t take your princess anywhere. I’m an armorer. I just have some armor I want her to wear. We’ll be back in a minute.”
Gelf took me by the hand again, and this time, on the way to take me to the back, Feld and Elle’s murmurs reached my ears as if they were overlapping.
[…princess?]
***
I was taken to the back of the store, but for some reason I did not want to shake Gelf’s hand.
Why was that? Did I feel a kind of motherly feeling in Gelf that I had also felt in my mentor? It was strange to feel motherly feelings towards a man, but at least I did not feel guarded toward him.
‘Even Mira-chan’s face was teary-eyed and scared when she first met me. However, looking at this little princess’ reaction, I understand why Galbas must have liked this little princess.‘ As Gelf was wondering about the little girl beside him, a voice suddenly cut his thoughts.
“…How did you know?”
Galbas had told me to come here, but I had no reason to have any conversation with him about it, so I wasn’t going to talk about it.
“That knife on your waist, Galbas made that one a long time ago, didn’t he? He doesn’t like it, but I’m sure he’s pretty attached to it. I think the fact that he gave it to you is a sign that he is fond of you.”
“In a manner of speaking… I bought it.”
I hadn’t been able to pay for it yet, though.
“Same thing. If he didn’t like you, he wouldn’t have sold it to you. Well, I’m going to go all out to get you a perfectly suitable outfit.”
“…what?”
***
“Well, don’t worry. He’s a weirdo, but he’s not a bad person.”
(Is that so…)
The elf Mira, who had been acquainted with the armor maker since her low-ranked days, followed up in a way that was not a follow-up, but Mikhail complained in his mind that she had no power of persuasion even if she said that they were acquainted while wiping off his cold sweat.
Feld (a warrior) and Mira (a spirit user) were members of the adventurer party [Rainbow Sword], which Mikhail was introduced to by his grandfather as an escort, who were familiar with different places in the city.
The party had changed members several times, except for the leader, who was a dwarf and an elf, Mira, but the Melrose family had been asked to join the party on several occasions because of its reputation and credibility.
The party was now down to four members since the sorcerer retired a few years ago, and the party was in a state of full-scale inactivity, but the three members, except for the scout who was looking for a new sorcerer, had been working together again for about a year, as it was inefficient to work alone.
This time, these two, minus their leader, the dwarf, were responsible for escorting them around the city.
The tour of the city began at the request of Crown Prince Ervan von Cleydale, who, like the former baroness, lacked a sense of urgency, so he wanted Mikhail to show him the reality, part of the reason why Mikhail’s arrangement made it possible.
Although Mikhail and Ervan were friends, Mikhail was trying to determine whether Ervan was suitable to be the next king.
Mikhail basically did not trust others. He trusted his family, but considered only his grandfather and father worthy of his trust. Trust as an aristocrat was another matter, but if Ervan proved to be untrustworthy, he would have to think if he would really be of service to him in the future, he would be forced to cut him off and enlist the help of the young second prince or the first princess, who was of genuine high aristocratic descent.
Mikhail was the first one to spot her during his private tour of the city.
She was inconspicuous in the crowd. But for some reason, she caught his attention. Perhaps it could be said that she was a solitary person, or perhaps it was the way she stood there that made her look so beautiful, and perhaps it was the fact that he, who had lived as an aristocrat in the old royal family, could relate to her in some way.
As Mikhail followed her figure with his eyes, Feld noticed it and told him that he was being targeted by a delinquent in the city.
As an adventurer with a certain degree of power, it seemed that he was targeted because he suppresses his presence as much as other people, but Ervan, who grew up in a greenhouse, got involved because Mikhail wanted to help him.
The naive Feld and Ervan were unaware of her gender, but even dressed as a man, they found her fascinating, like a rosebud growing from a child into a girl.
Mikhail was intrigued by the solitary girl who was dressed as a man and was stronger than he was as a nobleman training with a sword. But more than that, he was irritated by her lack of common sense, as if she were a young child, which was out of proportion to her impression.
With such power, how could he not notice her eye-catching appearance? She even attracted unnecessary trouble, and Mikhail, who was supposed to draw a line between himself and others, couldn’t understand why he would be so disturbed by her, and he even expressed unnecessary sarcasm toward the girl he had saved.
When Ervan pointed this out to her, she was mortified, and while she was aghast at being made aware of the parts of her childish personality that she had forgotten as her body grew, she was taken away by the weirdo.
“Hah~y, So~ry for the wait!”
Gelf, the eccentric dwarf, returned. Being a gentleman, Mikhail wouldn’t do anything like peeking, but when he turned to see if she was all right…
“Wow, those clothes, Gelf…”
The only one who voiced out her reaction was Mira, which was probably to be expected, since all the men (Other than Gelf) were too stunned to speak, as if they all were spellbound.
“Gelf… it’s a little hard to move.”
“Was it still too big for you?”
She was wearing short leather boots on her feet and a fluttering leather miniskirt over tight-fitting knee-length leather pants that highlighted the curves of her body and hid her waist.
On her upper body, she was wearing a leather jacket of unusually short length, but inside it was only a thin shirt fastened by shoulder straps, which somehow made her more embarrassing to look at.
But perhaps what caught my eye the most was her face.
The tacky shawl that had hidden her face was removed, the ashes that had stained her hair were also gone, her hair was untied and draped over her shoulders, and her shining peach-blonde hair and jade-colored eyes gave her a mysterious beauty that caught my eye oddly, even though she was still very young.
“You…you were a woman?”
For some reason, Mikhail was more irritated by Ervan’s attitude than by Feld’s air headed line, who was staring at her with a red face standing right next to him.
***
“I’ll make you proper clothes when you’re a little older. Meanwhile, you’ll have to put up with that until your armor is repaired.”
“…Okay.”
Apparently, this outfit that I was made to change into was loaned to me as a substitute until the armor could be repaired.
But I didn’t understand why I had to wear full-body gear instead of a breastplate and boots. Moreover, he immediately recognized that the ashes in my hair were an illusion, and he even deactivated it and combed my hair.
“Actually, I was supposed to wear that, but I couldn’t wear it because I prioritized the shape too much. It’s too good to waste, so I wanted you to wear it and tell me how it feels to wear.”
“…That’s what you asked me to do earlier?”
Did he want me to wear something this thin and fluttery?
But this equipment seemed to be made of oak skin, which I had seen for the first time the other day, and even though it was thin, it had a certain amount of protection, as well as a certain amount of softness and elasticity.
I tried it on because I was told it was completely black and wouldn’t stand out, but did it really look inconspicuous?
I was also told that this was normal for female adventurers these days, but I couldn’t believe it, as Feld and the others looked at me with stupefied faces.
Why was I slightly reluctant to thank him honestly, even though he must have done something similar to Galbas who gave me this black knife…?
“You… were a woman?”
I received such a subtle comment from Feld, who wondered if I indeed looked like a woman in this outfit, but for some reason, I felt a bit bewildered by such a seemingly unimportant comment.
Mira the elf seemed impressed, but it felt like she was complimenting Gelf’s equipment. Elle was also looking at me with a misty eye, and Mikhail looked at me as if he wanted to say something, but eventually, he didn’t say anything, so I couldn’t discern whether my outfit was a proper one for an adventurer or not.
The atmosphere had become delicate yet again, so let’s just leave it at that. I could ask Gelf about this equipment and the equipment I had left with him when the repairs were finished.
I went outside first and pointed behind me to a nearby knight-like figure, saying they were still inside, and then disappeared, blending in with the flow of people.
Originally, I was planning to stop by the Adventurers’ Guild from here to find out more information about my target, the [Dawn Mercenaries], but there was a possibility that Feld and the others would stop by the guild, so I couldn’t go there in the daytime.
Still, that didn’t mean I was unable to get some information. I was sitting on a fence on a back road near the cathedral in the Royal Capital to kill some time and used Concealment moderately to fool the public eye, and after about two hours, I heard a voice coming from the darkness from a little farther away.
“Ash-hair. I want to ask you something”.
“…”
Probably a liaison to the assassin’s guild, but what did [“I have something to ask you”] mean instead of [“I have information”]?
I jumped down from the top of the fence I was perched on and started walking in the opposite direction from where I heard the voice.
[Hey!]
The voice from earlier stopped me again from different darkness, but I didn’t intend to stop.
“I don’t have a taste for conversing with people who don’t show themselves up.”
[…]
The liaison was silent at my words, and a few seconds later, a cat-and-beast woman with long, pitch-black hair appeared from the dimly lit alley ahead of me.
“Let me ask you something, ‘Ash-hair’. What did you do to Guy?”
“…”
This was [Shadow Master Radha]… I didn’t think she would come.
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Also check out my other novels: Reincarnated into a Game as the Hero’s Friend, Kuma Kuma Kuma Bear, and A Girl Who Was Told “You Have No Talent” Turned Out To Be A Talented Monster