by Sakon Kaidou
What a coincidence. We had the same destination.
I turned to Azurite. “Then I guess there’s no reason not to take it there, right?”
“True,” she replied.
“Then it’s decided. We’re going to the countess, too. We’ll take you there.”
“Thank you ver-y much.”
And so, led by Azurite, we all made our way to the countess’s residence.
The Quartierlatin mansion was quite unlike the Gideon mansion, which was the only other count’s residence that I knew of.
The Gideon residence was split into a simple, sturdy-looking main building and a luxurious guest house, while the Quartierlatin residence was somewhere in between.
The building was refined, but it didn’t put luxury above all else, and it was nowhere near as noteworthy as the gardens.
Even from the outside, I could see a wide assortment of colorful flowers and trees, gardened so harmoniously that it was almost fantastical.
I’d already thought that this town was in harmony with flora, and it seemed like the countess’s residence was the prime representative of this unity.
“As I said when we arrived at the town, this is all due to the countess’ tastes,” explained Azurite. “I hear that she’s been working to make this garden and the town the way they are now ever since becoming the ruler of the county thirty years ago.”
“Thirty years...” I murmured. That must’ve required a lot of labor and passion.
Does the countess have a reason for making this town as vibrant as it is?
Azurite talked to the guards at the gate, and, following some verifications, we were all let inside.
White pavement was leading the way from the gate to the building, but everything besides that was the garden I’d seen from the outside.
There were many people here.
Most of them were children. They looked somewhat unkempt, but they were having lots of fun. Some were eating sweets they’d been handed, some were playing around the fountains, while others were just looking at the flowers.
The adults here, however, didn’t have a uniform look. Many were masters, and many looked exactly like you’d expect “travelers” to look.
“Who are they?” I asked.
“The children are from the town’s orphanages, while the adults are guests from outside of town,” Azurite explained. “I hear the countess invites people to such tea parties every now and then.”
Was this all just philanthropic work?
Even if it wasn’t, the garden, town, and the faces of the children here made it hard to imagine that the countess was a bad person.
Suddenly, the mansion’s main door opened up, and a gentle-looking, middle-aged, noble lady walked out.
“Oh, my. Thank you so much for coming here all the way from the capital,” she said, as she walked up to Azurite and bowed.
Huh? She’s enough of a big deal to have a countess bow to her?
“Hey, Azurite, you—”
“No,” she cut my words short. “I’m only getting respect because I represent a certain someone. Am I right, Countess Quartierlatin?”
“Eh...? Oh, certainly. Ohohoh...”
It seemed kinda fishy, but if they insisted that was how it was, I had no choice but to leave it at that.
Anyway, Azurite and the countess’s talk needed to include confidential matters. Even though I was a cooperator, I was still an outsider, so I was told to wait in the waiting room until they were done. But...
“Can I wait in the garden, instead?” I asked. “It’s really magnificent, so I’d like to look around.”
“I see,” said Azurite, as she turned to the countess. “Would that be all right with you?”
“Certainly,” the lady said. “Look at it to your heart’s content.”
The countess gladly approved, and so it was decided that Nemesis, the lost cat, and I would stay outside.
Right after the two of them entered the building, we went to the garden that was full of playing children.
Oh, I almost forgot! I realized. The lost cat’s Master should be somewhere here.
I walked up to a nearby servant and said, “Excuse me, this cat is—”
“Wind!” Someone off to the side cut my words short. “Where were you?”
It was an old man accompanied by a centaur, kobold, and a harpy. They looked like Embryos, and they all had instruments in their hands.
I could remember seeing the two besides the harpy back in Gideon, so there was little doubt that this man was the cat sìth’s Master. Also, unlike in Gideon, the man wasn’t wearing a mask this time.
“Meow!” The cat named Wind meowed and leapt over to the old man.
Well, I’m glad to see the search didn’t take long, I thought.
Then the man and his Embryos walked over to me.
“Are you the ones who brought Wind to us?” he asked. “Thank you very much for that. Wind is quite curious, you see. It’s not rare for him to get lost.”
“No need to thank us. We just happened to have the same destination,” I said.
“I’m still grateful, though. We almost started to perform without a wind instrument.”
“Perform?”
“Oh, we are a group of traveling musicians. We were performing on the streets of the town this morning, and a servant of the countess invited us over to play for the orphans she’d invited for a tea party.”
I see, I thought. From what I’ve heard back in Gideon, he and his Embryo play music that’s first-class. It’s sure to make for a great tea party.
“Although my forte is composition, rather than performing, I couldn’t refuse the request of someone enchanted by my music...” he said. “Oh, where are my manners? I am Veldorbell, a wandering composer without a country. And these are my Embryo — Wind, Clavier, Percussion, and Strings.”
He gestured to each in turn, introducing the cat sìth, harpy, kobold, and centaur, in that order.
Names based on music... a group consisting of a cat, bird, dog, and horse... I mean, donkey... I guess the Embryo was based on the Town Musicians of Bremen musical.
“Ah, I’m Ray Starling.” I introduced myself, too. “And this is my Embryo, Nemesis.”
“Indeed!” she said. “I’ll be looking forward to your performance!”
“Heh heh, as you should... Hm?” Mr. Veldorbell seemed to realize something, looking at me curiously. “Ray Starling...? Are you the one they call ‘Unbreakable’?”
“Yes, that would be me.”
Man, I sure am used to that nickname by now...
“I see. I was there during the incident at Gideon, but I was given the death penalty before you entered the stage and shone. Such a shame I didn’t get to see it.”
“Oh, uh... that’s unfortunate,” I said and thought, Man, yet another victim of the lab coat shithead.
Oddly, Veldorbell’s reaction to my words was strange. He looked surprised, then made a wry grin.
He muttered something that I couldn’t make out. “She didn’t tell anyone? Well, neither my name nor face was on the wanted list, and I could use the save point without an issue, so I thought that was the case, but...”
“Um, is something wrong?” I asked.
“Oh, not at all. Anyhow, I got the death penalty for a reason. I don’t mind it, and neither should you.”
“Really?”
“Really. Now... the young lady, here, seems excited for our performance, so we will start right away. Are you ready, Wind?”
“Al-ways am!”
“Very well. Let’s begin,” said Veldorbell as he and his Embryo gathered in the open space prepared for them. “We shall now start our performance. I hope the music we play here tugs at your heartstrings as well as all the beautiful flowers here.”
Following a bow, they began playing.
The moment the music reached my ears, I actually gasped.
I was used to absurdly good music because I had the jack-of-all-trades Shu for a brother, but
this performance, conducted by Veldorbell and played by his Embryo, was so good that it actually overcame that and gave me goosebumps.
The servants and the travelers were visibly awed, and the children, in all their purity, were completely moved and overjoyed to hear it.
I’d heard their music in the plaza before the central arena in Gideon, but this performance was on a whole different level.
Suddenly, I realized that the harpy with the keyboard hadn’t been with them back then. This time, the whole group was here, and they seemed to be even better than they had been before.
Listening to their music made me lose track of time. The performance was over before I realized it, and everyone — myself and Nemesis included — showered them in applause.
“Play something cool next, mister!” shouted one of the children.
“No! I want a cute song!” exclaimed another.
This was obviously their first exposure to music of this quality. They passionately asked for an encore.
“Heh heh. No need to rush me, children. You will all get a turn,” said Veldorbell as he began the next song, clearly enjoying what he was doing.
◇◇◇
Residence of Countess Quartierlatin, study
Deep inside the mansion, in the countess’s study, Azurite and the lady were having a conversation.
“So you will be exploring those ruins, then?” asked the countess.
“Indeed. I wish to find out what kind of facility it is as soon as possible,” replied Azurite as she examined a set of documents handed to her by the countess. They contained all the information on the ruins that had been gathered since the ruins’ surfacing three days ago. “It seems like there hasn’t been much progress beyond the hall with the job change crystal.”
“Yes. They say there are lots of monsters beyond it... the mechanical sort, specifically.”
“Golems, I assume? Ruins are often full of them. What are they called?”
Normally, monsters had their names displayed above their heads. That was one of the laws of this world, which was the reason why Azurite was asking that. But...
“Apparently, their names are... varied,” said the countess with a hint of awkwardness.
“Hm?” Azurite raised an eyebrow as she turned a few pages on the documents.
She quickly saw that there had been encounters with machines called “Little Goblin” and “Teal Wolf,” among other things, and that they didn’t vanish when beaten.
“What could that mean?” she wondered. “Perhaps this is linked to the nature of these ruins. I’ll investigate that, as well.”
“That’s great to know,” said the countess. “Thank you very much.”
“No need to thank me or bow your head,” replied Azurite. “I’m only doing what I must. After all, I am the one who hopes that these ruins will have something that can turn the tide in the second war with Dryfe.”
Her eyes as she said that were full of either sorrow or resolution — it was unclear which.
“Then, will you involve Maste—?”
“I have no intention of using them in the war, countess,” Azurite cut her words short.
“But your companion is—”
“H-He’s...!” she roughened her voice for a moment before regaining her composure. “He is merely a cooperator in this investigation. That and the war are entirely different matters.”
Then, as though to gloss over the subject, she shifted her gaze back at the documents.
“I see,” said the countess as she looked at Azurite with gentle eyes. “But you trust him, do you not?”
“N-No! This isn’t trust!” she denied, as the small part of her cheeks visible below the mask turned red. She didn’t intend it, but the words that followed came out as bashful muttering. “It’s only that... I owe him a lot, so I had no choice but to accept his offer to cooperate. That’s all there is to it.”
The countess observed the blushing girl, with a smile on her face.
◇◇◇
Paladin, Ray Starling
Veldorbell continued his performance, filling the children’s little hearts with endless glee.
But man, there sure are a lot of children. I’m quite sure the number exceeds fifty.
I asked a servant about it, and was told, “These tea parties are a once-a-month event, and we invite all the children living in the town’s two orphanages.”
“There are a lot of orphans here?”
“Yes... many of them lost their fathers in the war, then lost their mothers some other way.”
War again, huh?
According to what Lefty had told me yesterday, Shirley’s father, the owner of the inn, had been a soldier in the war, too. So the knights definitely weren’t the only ones who’d suffered in the war.
“Oh? We can go indoors, too?” I muttered, as I discovered that the tea party’s area was not only restricted to the garden outside, but also contained a spacious room connected to it.
There was a sofa, a table, chairs, and so on. The children, who were tired from being out in the sun for too long, were cooling off here.
Curious about the interior, I walked inside.
There were lots of flowers growing within luxurious-looking vases, making the place feel both calming and gaudy. The walls had a number of portraits on them.
My guess was that the people portrayed in the portraits were the heads of this family, lined up in a chronological order. They had a sense of intimidation unique to such portraits, and some of the children were staring at them with both fear and respect in their eyes.
“Hm?” I murmured.
The portrait at one edge — likely the newest one — was different from the rest.
Instead of displaying only the head of the family, it displayed three people — a man in his twenties or thirties, and a younger-looking lady with a baby in her arms.
After a moment, I realized that the lady was the countess when she was young.
“What’s this portrait?” I asked the servant in the room.
“That is a portrait from thirty years ago, when Lady Zermina was still young. The ones with her are her husband and their son.”
So the countess’s name is “Zermina,” huh? I thought.
That aside, I couldn’t shake the feeling that the servant found it hard to talk about this.
“Did something happen?” I asked.
“Shortly after this portrait was made... her husband and son both passed away.”
“That’s just... How?”
“Apologies,” he said. “I cannot say anything more about their death.”
“It’s fine. Sorry for being presumptuous.”
So now I knew that Countess Quartierlatin’s husband and son were gone, and that she was controlling this region all by herself.
“That might be why she’s so kind to the orphans,” commented Nemesis.
“True...”
Perhaps her fixation on gardening had something to do with that, as well.
A few dozen minutes later, we were joined by Azurite and the countess.
The children instantly ran up to the lady, thanking her and chattering to her, all smiles, making it very clear just how loved she really was.
◇
Later on, Azurite and the countess began a tea party and, as Azurite’s cooperators, Nemesis and I were invited to join.
It was held on a second-floor balcony from which we could see the entire garden. Naturally, the balcony was covered in flowers, too.
Veldorbell was still playing, and we could hear the performance from here. He didn’t even take breaks between songs. He would finish one child’s request and then instantly answer some other child’s request, making it obvious that he was enjoying this immensely.
Though, I didn’t know how to feel whenever he started playing some anime song, or the BGM of some famous movie.
The tea party with the countess consisted of her thanking us for cooperating with Azurite and explaining the inner structure of the ruins,
based on the explorers’ accounts.
But when that was all done, we started to have an idle chat, and Nemesis, still curious about what we’d learned in the room, soon asked, “Why do you invite the orphans to these tea parties?”
The countess showed no aversion to giving an honest answer, and said, “I call the little ones here to distract myself from my loneliness. I once had a son — Emilio. While I was ill, my husband took him on a trip, only to be attacked by monsters.”
I was silent.
“I lost Emilio before he was old enough to run around... so seeing healthy children always soothes my heart,” she went on as she looked at the orphans in the garden. “It’s also the reason behind this garden. My husband was an Altarian diplomat, but he had gardening as a hobby, so being surrounded by flowers helps me remember him. The large tree at the center of the garden was transplanted there while he was still alive and well.”
The children... the garden... all of it was just a means of dealing with the loneliness from losing her family.
As saddening as it was, that wasn’t something anyone could fault her for.
As she looked at the orphans, I looked into her eyes, which made me realize something.
“Heterochromia...?” I murmured.
Her eyes had slightly different colors — the right was blue, while the left was green.
Hearing my mutter, the countess faintly smiled and spoke, “These eyes are quite common in the Quartierlatin bloodline. My son had them, as well.”
“Really?”
“Yes... They’re actually the reason why I also invite travelers to my tea parties.”
“You invite them because of heterochromia?”
How are those two things linked?
“After my husband and Emilio were attacked by monsters, my husband’s body was brought back to me, but they couldn’t find Emilio’s. He was but a baby, so maybe there was nothing left, but a part of me believes that he might’ve been saved, and that he is still alive and well somewhere...”
I was silent.
“That’s why I ask travelers whether they’ve seen a man with eyes like mine. It’s been thirty years since then, though, so I’ve half-given up on this.” She formed a listless smile.
I couldn’t help but open my mouth. “The possibility may be low, but as long as it isn’t zero, you should continue doing it. I think that, if you give up only half-certain about what became of him, the regret will haunt you far longer than it would otherwise.”