by Funa
The light we were following was that chemical you could find in glow sticks and stuff, just with the brightness turned up to eleven. I added a reflective plate to that and, voila, now we could light up the way in front of us.
We weren’t really in a rush to get anywhere, so it was plenty bright enough to get us to the next town at a leisurely pace. I tried using a gas lamp (or, more accurately, a carbide lamp) to try and keep with the feel of the world, but gave up when Ed showed some, uh, “slight,” resistance to the idea.
“Yeowch! That’s hot, missy! What do you think you’re doing back there?!”
The horses all bristled at me for trying to use the gas lamps, so there wasn’t much I could do about that.
All you had to do was fill a container with calcium carbide and water to make a gas lamp, and if you stuck a valve on it to control how much gas was released from the chemical reaction inside, you’d have yourself a simple, compact, and long-lasting light source. I thought it was the perfect time to use them, but it seemed Ed and the others thought I was just horsing around...
Heh. Horse puns.
Maybe it was because I didn’t go for your traditional lamp with the cover on it, but instead the ones used for fishing that had the flame exposed... Personally, I had my own idea of what those lamps looked like in my head: a long pole with a sturdy rubber band attached to one end, a lamp in the other, while strolling about in the river at night and trying to see what you could fish up. I know they banned them in most places back in Japan, but this is a whole different world.
All right, I’m totally gonna try doing that at a river sometime! Maybe the next time we make camp by one or something.
I still thought they were the best when it came to cave spelunking or fishing, but considering that I had the power to create potion containers with whatever features I wanted to have, it didn’t even really matter if it was a glow stick or lamp or whatever. I wasn’t about to try and force my tastes on anyone.
After finally making it out of the baron’s territory, we kept on moving forward for about an hour until we picked a random spot to veer off the main road and set up camp. Everyone was nice and full now so, after we all downed healing potions, we made sure to get Ed and the other horses all taken care of. I scattered some of my homemade bug repellant about, pulled out my bed from my Item Box, and hopped onto it with Belle to catch some sleep.
This bed had really come in handy over the years, I tell ya... Oh yeah, and just to make this clear, I make sure to air out the mattress and sheets in the sunlight, and to wash and change the sheets, too. Now that I think about it, this was the first time in five years this bed finally got to pay a visit back home! We may be running away in the opposite direction this time, but I’ve looking forward to sleeping on you forever and ever, good ol’ bed o’ mine.
As for Fran and the boys, they were already curled up on the grass. I made sure to give them some blankets from my Item Box, which I’m sure was more than plenty for warriors like them who were used to roughing it on the battlefield.
A few days later and we made it across Brancott’s borders without incident. We were now in the country of Drisard, a country to the northeast that shared a border with Brancott. There weren’t any border checks here, but there were supposed to be some once we reached the first town.
It was a heavily fortified city with walls surrounding it on all sides. It wasn’t like they were on bad terms with Brancott or anything, but it was another country’s territory. The Walled City of Selinas, a place that housed a decent amount of soldiers and acted as a stopping point for trade and business. Drisard was the first country we reached after a long string of roughing it outdoors, so I wanted to stay in a city for a good few days and study up on what Drisard is like. It’s said whoever controls information controls the world, after all. Roland and the others may have been well-versed on the four countries that surrounded Balmore, but not so much for anything outside that range. That was to be expected, really. Even if they did take the time to learn about the political affairs of other countries, it wasn’t like they could go in person themselves, so they wouldn’t have much of a chance to get any kind of fresh info. The same went for the other countries as well.
Roland was fairly well-known in his own country and the ones surrounding it, but here, he was the brother of some king from some country that didn’t really have anything to do with them. People may know the names of the royal family, higher ranking nobility, or military officials, but anyone else may as well be a nobody to them. The name of the protector of the Goddess still hadn’t quite reached that far, and, in fact, the name “Fearsome Fran” was more famous than the other title I’d given her.
But considering how young Francette looked now, there wouldn’t be anyone who would think she was the same “Fearsome Fran” in the war against Aligot from all those years ago. Not to mention Francette is a pretty common name, too, sorry to say. The same went for me as well. Considering how long ago this happened and how old I looked now, my appearance definitely wouldn’t match up to the rumors about me, though the countries surrounding Balmore should already know that much.
I had plenty of different variations in what people called me, too. Just like how Celestine’s name was also known as “Celestines” or “Celestia” and all sorts of other variations, I was also known as “Carol,” “Kaol,” “Demon Eyes,” “Executioner,” and a whole bunch of other nicknames. It was exactly like what happened when you played the “Telephone Game” with people.
...But what’s with those last two?!
There were also a ton of girls who were given my name over the past four years. It was almost blasphemous to name your child after a goddess, but it was no problem if a goddess had taken on a human name because she liked the sound of it. There were plenty of people out there who were hoping to gain even the tiniest sliver of favor from the Goddess, which explained the name’s sudden spike in popularity. That was why Kaoru, Carol, Kaol, and all those other names that sounded similar had suddenly become a commonplace name in this world (though it didn’t seem like there were any parents who wanted to name their kids “Demon Eyes” or “Executioner”). The fact that people called me an “angel” and a “messenger of the Goddess” was actually pretty well-known as well, but not enough that those nicknames became proper nouns or anything.
Anyways, what I’ve been trying to get at after that paragraphs-long explanation is that we wouldn’t need to make fake names for ourselves from here on out. The word may have already spread that I’d left Balmore, but it probably wasn’t the same for the king’s brother and Fearsome Fran being with me as well. Roland had been trying to stay out of the limelight in the first place to support his brother, King Serge, and it wasn’t like Balmore wanted to let everyone know that their most powerful warrior wasn’t home.
If you think about it, we probably stood out much less as a bunch of aristocrat siblings (plus some extras) on a pleasure trip rather than people on the journey for the sake of a twelve-year-old girl, which meant it was better for hiding my true identity. Three of us carrying swords wouldn’t be strange at all considering we had no entourage of guards to protect us, and that included the fact that two of them looked decidedly knightly.
Right, looks like I’m giving the goddess-slash-angel thing a rest for the time being. I wasn’t the tsar of the roaring potion trade in Balmore anymore, but the sheltered daughter of some lower-class aristocratic family, on a journey to study what it was like out in the real world. I’d be taking this opportunity to make some money while I was at it, too. I’d already made a killing selling my potions before, but it never hurt to have more money, especially when you just happened to have an Item Box with infinite space inside of it. If I ever ended up with money to spare, it might even be a good idea to start investing in Aligot’s shipping industry, or maybe even start up my own shipping company.
Oh, yeah... Back when I was a kid, I always thought that “tsar” was Russian for “bizarre” and they just shortened
it like it was their slang or something. It was only around middle school that I found out what it really meant, not realizing that it wouldn’t make sense in the first place since they probably had a different word to say “bizarre.”
Gahhh, I feel like such an idiot whenever I remember that... I don’t even want to think about it... But anyway! It’s time to put my cringy past behind me and start a brand new adventure!
Eventually, we spotted something that looked like walls far off in the distance.
So that must be the Walled City of Selinas!
This was the third country I’d visited since reincarnating in this world, and the first town was waiting just ahead of us. (Though I technically haven’t been reborn, since I’ve got a completely different body after Celes made me younger. This is more a reincarnation than just being transported to another world. Just saying.)
Alrighty, let’s get out there and do this!
We’d finally arrived at the Walled City of Selinas. It was a surprisingly simple task getting inside: All we had to do was get in line, then say where we came from and why we came to Selinas. It wasn’t like they could do a thorough background check here, and they couldn’t afford the time to conduct one, either. They’d just make sure to check the wagons for taxable items and take any obviously suspicious people to the guardhouse to see if they looked like any of the wanted posters they had on hand. With Roland giving off the aura of an elite, Francette looking like a knight, me looking like some kind of aristocrat’s daughter, and Emile and Belle looking like our escorts, there was basically no chance of them stopping us.
“We’re from the household of Earl Adan from the Kingdom of Balmore. I’m traveling together with my siblings to other countries in the pursuit of knowledge.”
That’s all it took from Roland to get us through. There wasn’t any guard who’d dare meddle with an aristocrat from another country. We’d obtained permission from the earl himself to use his name should anyone pry, so there shouldn’t be any problems there. Not that there was ever a chance of that happening, though.
Even then, while we said we were with the Adan household, that didn’t necessarily mean we were Earl Adan’s kids or anything. If we were just employed there, we could still technically say we were “with” them. So long as we at least acted the part, it wouldn’t be a problem.
I didn’t want to lie, so I made sure to get one copper coin from the earl before heading out as an advance payment for all the stories I’d tell him when I got back. Since he paid me to do so, that meant I could proudly state I was officially employed by the Adan family. Done and done.
“Woohoo! Our first town in a brand new country!”
The people who heard me shout smiled as they looked our way. Roland and Francette’s smiles, however, were more on the wry side after hearing me get so worked up.
Lighten up! Putting your feelings into words just makes you appreciate it all the more! I look like a little twelve-year-old girl anyways, so there’s no problem with me getting a little excited, damn it!
First things first, we needed to find ourselves an inn. We’d be in trouble if we put that off and ended up not having a place to stay. We couldn’t really go for any hoity-toity places, but it’d also be strange for us to go to somewhere that was too cheap when a majority of our group were girls.
Right, let’s try and find someplace somewhere in the middle of the fanciness scale, then.
After asking a bored-looking lady for recommendations, I finally settled on an inn after watching people coming in and out of it.
“Excuse me, do you have any rooms? We need two doubles and one single.”
Like hell I’m gonna get stuck in a room with one of these lovey-dovey couples!
“Yup, you got it!” the lady behind the counter answered. After running her eyes across us, she had a look of pity when she stopped at me.
...I don’t need your sympathy, lady!
The sun was still high up in the sky. We could find something to eat and gather information after it got dark, so I was going to take this time to do some sightseeing around town.
Roland and Fran were sharing one room, while Emile and Belle were in the other. I knew they were young and all, but we all huddled together to sleep when we were out camping anyways, and Emile and Belle had known each other since they were kids, so I couldn’t just tell them what to do now. With them all in their rooms, I snuck out to take a look at the town.
...It’s not much different here from the towns in Balmore.
I mean, I knew this wasn’t some country on the other side of the ocean or anything, and it wasn’t like crossing some invisible borders would suddenly cause the weather and plant life to change out of nowhere. The people’s dialects and mannerisms were pretty much the same, too.
Even border lines would change slightly over the years, though it’d definitely take some time before that happened. I’d have to travel a little farther if I wanted to get that elusive “exotic country” feeling.
I walked through the town, checking out the market stalls and their prices before coming across a slightly more rundown street. As I walked along it, I suddenly found myself with two men standing in my way. Turning around, I saw another two had blocked off the path behind me. These weren’t some sneering street thugs, but some men who actually looked like they meant business.
Yeah, it doesn’t look like this happened by chance... They were totally aiming for me. Well, crap. What do I do now...?
...And that was how I ended up in a cell. There was nothing I could really do about it, especially with my twigs for arms. Even if I tried to resist, they would’ve just pinned me down and made me regret it. My automatic defenses may have kicked in if they tried to stab me, but so what? Even if they didn’t, I couldn’t really resist if they had me held down anyway. Having them twist my arms or getting punched would still hurt, you know?
I’d had some pretty painful experiences here falling down or getting my fingers caught in doors and stuff, but Celes’s automatic defense system hadn’t activated then. Also, if I was wrong and that defense mechanism didn’t activate every time, then what? What if it turned out Celes just so happened to be looking by chance when that crazy guy with the knife came at me last time? I was too damn scared to try risking my life just to see if that was true or not!
I was pretty sure the people who caught me didn’t really want to kill me, though, which was why I let myself get captured without putting up much of a fight. They wouldn’t be able to get any money out of me if I was dead, after all. There were plenty of chances for me to escape, so I wasn’t too worried about it. But that was where the real problem came in...
“Sniff... It hurts...”
“I want to go home...”
It wasn’t just me who was captured. It looked like they hadn’t gone after me because they knew who I was; so why then? These people probably saw me as a twelve-year-old girl who belonged to the family of a wealthy trader or some aristocrat. Since I was staying at the inn, that meant I was either on my way to Brancott, or I’d just come in from Brancott and was on my way to Drisard. That also meant I shouldn’t have any connections in this town, so even if the people I came with tried looking for me, they’d have trouble finding their way around. If they could run away with me over the border, then there wasn’t anything anyone could do.
My conclusion: They were just your average girl kidnapping ring. I mean, there were only girls here, and cute ones at that. If they only went after the prettiest girls, I couldn’t be too hard on them, since that must be the reason why they went after me. Yup, definitely that.
But it’s not like I’m happy over being kidnapped because they think I’m cute. Seriously, I’m not!
“What’s wrong?”
Back at the inn, Roland and Francette had left their room to meet up with everyone for dinner. It was then they’d found Emile and Belle standing outside the door to Kaoru’s room.
“Well...no matter how much we knock, Miss—I mean, Kaoru, won’
t answer...” Emile said, hastily correcting how he called Kaoru. Even if it looked like there was no one around, you could never be too careful.
“She’s either sound asleep, went to the bathroom, or is already on the first floor eating... I say we head downstairs for now,” Roland said, heading for the staircase. They couldn’t just break down the door to check, so the other three reluctantly followed after him.
“Have you seen the girl who came with us?” Roland asked the lady running the front desk on the first floor.
“Oh, the little raven-haired girl? She left as soon as she got her room.”
“““WHAT?!”””
Not only did Kaoru like to eat, she was quite the stickler when it came to money as well. There was no way she would pass up on dinner after paying for it along with her room.
Even if she did go out for a stroll, she’d have been back by the time evening came around. That was just the type of girl she was, and everyone knew that well. If she wasn’t back by now, that meant she was in trouble.
“We’re leaving!”
Roland slammed his key down on the counter, followed immediately after by Emile. They only had those two keys between the two groups, so the girls ran right out of the inn after them.
What to do, what to do...
It seemed they’d brought me to a secret room inside one of the rundown houses in a poorer district. A corner of the room had been sectioned off and made into a cage where they were holding me and three other girls. They looked to be anywhere from five to ten years old.