“I do understand what you are saying, but Lady Emilia is cuuurrently studying such things, you seeee.”
“Studying, huh. Wait, you mean we lost her when we were talking earlier?”
“You truly do have an active mind. It is because you think so much that you can make such thoughtless-sounding statements.”
Subaru slouched from Roswaal’s apparent praise before giving his own chest a thump.
“Thinking while you live is just common sense. It’s the duty of every man to think on his feet for when the chips are down. That or your guts get spilled all over the floor.”
“I feel like your guts kind of did spill on the… Ahem. Back to the other subject… Subaru, do you know this country’s…the Kingdom of Lugunica’s situation at the moment?”
“Not the smallest, tiniest bit.”
“Hearing you say it like that, I’m shocked you’ve lived this long.”
That doesn’t sound like praise to me, Subaru thought while looking fondly at Emilia. He wasn’t trying to arouse her protective instincts, but she was certainly giving him that mother-hen feeling.
“By ‘situation’…you mean the country’s in a bad spot?”
Roswaal carefully chose his words.
“A fairly difficult situation, yes, for Lugunica currently lacks a king.”
Subaru’s breath caught as it sank in. He gave the man in performer makeup a guarded look as he sat straighter in his chair.
“There is no need for suuuch concern. The gravity of the situation is alreeeady well known to the public, you see.”
“Well, that’s good. I was thinking I’d learned a dangerous secret and would never get out alive.”
“It’s sad you’re hearing it first from us… Anyway, the nation’s highly unstable right now,” Emilia said.
I see, thought Subaru as that sank in. A kingdom without a king was in a very precarious situation. The sudden death of a king, from natural causes or otherwise, could shake a country to its core.
“But isn’t that usually dealt with by having a child of the king inherit and take over?”
“Usually, that iiis the case. Howeeever, that went awry due to an incident half a year ago when a great plague struck inside the palace walls.”
As Roswaal told it, they announced that the epidemic only affected those of a particular bloodline. And so, the king and his descendants dwelling in the castle perished.
“Can’t blame them for getting sick and dying. But what’s gonna happen to this country, then? If there’s no royal bloodline, what, start a democracy and elect a prime minister?”
“I do not cooomprehend the latter part of your statement, but presently, a Council of Elders manages the affairs of the country, formed from great families decorating the kingdom’s history. The country will continue to operate. However…”
After pausing a moment, Roswaal grew tenser.
“…a kingdom must have a king.”
“I suppose so.”
Even if just for show, you couldn’t have an organization without someone at its head, let alone a kingdom.
“I see,” reflected Subaru. “I’ve got the gist of it. In other words, the country has no king and is in a jumble while it’s trying to pick a new one. Your relations with foreign countries are deteriorating and you’re in international isolation. So a mysterious foreigner like me appearing is…super suspicious?!”
“Fuuurthermore, by making contact with Lady Emilia, you have become associated with the House of Mathers, you see… Though the evidence is circumstantial, that is all some would need to…”
Roswaal lowered his eyes and traced a line across his throat with his thumb. Though Roswaal looked like he was joking, Subaru suddenly broke out in a cold sweat.
He had a bad feeling about something. He’d picked up on it earlier, but it loomed larger and larger with each passing moment.
“Why is…the lord of the manor calling Emilia-tan lady?”
The golden rule of any household was that everyone paid respect to the person of the highest rank.
When Roswaal laughed, Subaru felt like the bud of anxiety in his chest had begun to bloom.
“Is it not naaatural to address someone of higher rank than I with proper reeespect?”
Subaru froze with his mouth open. He looked at Emilia so robotically that you could hear the gears turn in his neck. The girl, a grimace on her face, sighed with resignation.
“I don’t want you to think I was pulling the wool over your eyes, all right?”
“—Err, in other words, Emilia-tan, you’re…?”
Subaru stubbornly stuck to the nickname as she seemed to drive in the final nail.
“Currently, my title is royal candidate, one of those seeking to become the forty-second ruler of the Kingdom of Lugunica…with the backing of Roswaal’s House, that is.”
Her words made Subaru feel like he’d insulted Heaven itself.
3
—So the pretty girl he’d stumbled upon in the other world was a queen.
That word alone firmly established that this was a true-blue fantasy world.
Technically, she was a candidate to be queen. When he remembered his time in contact with her now…
“Man, three lives aren’t enough to pay for this, are they…?”
“Sorry to surprise you this much. I really hadn’t meant to keep quiet about it, but, well…”
“Hey, I’m not upset. You truly are as kind as an angel, Emilia-tan.”
“Eh?!”
Subaru’s overly direct words made Emilia’s face look shocked, then scarlet.
“Well, you know, you’re the reason everything’s happened since I’ve been here, Emilia. You’re seriously E M T (Emilia-tan’s a Major Treasure), that’s my honest opinion!”
“…Sigh. Now I think I understand how I got involved with you. You’ll brush off anything from anyone. Let’s just get to the point, shall we?”
Traces of redness still on her face, Emilia clapped her hands to reset the scene. Though still seated, the earlier sense of distance seemed to return; Subaru was forced to go along.
“I feel like I am interruuupting, but regardless, let us indeed get to the poooint, shall we? Is that fiiine with you, Subaru?”
“Based on my head not flying off my shoulders, I’m guessing it’s nothing all that bad.”
Roswaal whistled at Subaru’s words. Emilia looked equally taken off guard, for both surely saw Subaru’s words and actions as a sign that he had a firm understanding of their intentions.
Of course, both were reading far too much into it, but that flew way over Subaru’s head.
“Well, that’s what I guessed about the ‘point’ based on your telling me Emilia-tan’s a royal candidate and why that’s important, right?”
Emilia made a belated remark.
“…Subaru, are you actually smart, or are you simply wrong in the head?”
“Those are two extreme choices, you know?!”
Subaru agonized as Emilia stuck out her tongue at him a little. She was cute, so all was forgiven.
Notwithstanding Subaru’s internal simplicity, Roswaal followed up after Emilia’s “apology.”
“Your guess is quite on target. This matter is deeply related to what shall become of you. Lady Emilia?”
“Mm, I understand.”
Emilia, nodding when called, pulled out something and set it on the table. Her white fingertips pushed it forward. Subaru raised his brows when he saw it.
“—That’s that badge from…?”
Glittering atop a white cloth, it was a badge with a dragon motif, a jewel embedded in the center of its maw. It was also the key item stolen by the light-fingered Felt, which Subaru had returned to Emilia, its proper owner, coming back from three deaths to do it.
The deep, serene twinkle of the jewel struck Subaru’s eyes, filling him with newfound awe.
“The dragon is the symbol of Lugunica, you see, enough that it is known by the rather graaand name, the Dragon
friend Kingdom of Lugunica. Castle walls and weapons are often adorned with this symbol, but this badge is particularly important.”
When Roswaal took a pregnant pause, Subaru looked at him to urge him to continue. Roswaal shifted his gaze to Emilia to suggest she proceed. Emilia closed her eyes as her lips trembled.
“It is one’s qualification as a royal candidate—a test to determine if the person is worthy of sitting on the throne of the Kingdom of Lugunica.”
Her statement, said in a strained voice, made Subaru’s eyes go wide. The badge sitting on the table, a dragon with wings outstretched on the glittering jewel, supported the proof of her claim.
“H-hold on here… You lost the badge that proves you’re a royal candidate?!”
“That’s putting it rather crudely. A light-fingered girl stole it!”
“Same difference—!!”
With that great shout, Subaru smacked his palms against the dining table as he rose to his feet. The impact threatened to make utensils fall to the floor, but Rem’s quick follow-up prevented that. Subaru paid that no heed as he spoke.
“Wait, seriously, what’d happen if you didn’t have it?! That’s, like, the type of item that’s really, really bad to throw away, right?! They can’t issue another one?!”
“Weeell, if a candidate loses it, it won’t end with just talk and excuses, yeees?”
With Subaru all flustered, Roswaal adjusted the lapel of his unnecessarily large outfit as he spoke.
“A king carries the kingdom on his shoulders. It is thought that a person who cannot protect a single small badge cannot be entrusted with a responsibility as grave as an entire land.”
“Well, that figures. If anyone knew, it’d be a huge scandal… Which means?!”
The strife in the royal capital over the stolen badge and the warm reception now—it could mean only one thing.
Subaru continued, “It’s really bad if the public finds out you lost the badge. That’s why Emilia-tan was looking for it all by herself.”
Emilia replied, “…Yes, that’s right.”
“Felt was the one who stole it, but Elsa was the client, and she said someone else put her up to it…meaning someone’s trying to stop Emilia-tan from becoming queen?”
“That wooould appear to be the case. There is no simpler way to disqualify someone than to steal the baaadge.”
Inside Subaru, everything that had taken place the day before started to come together.
How Emilia stubbornly refused his help; Felt and her client, Elsa; Subaru being murdered three times over—all of it was rooted in the value of the badge. So, too, was why Subaru was there at the manor.
“Man, looking back on it, I did a super good job! Man, I need a bigger reward, huh!”
Subaru was full of himself now that he suddenly knew the importance of his own actions. He looked down at Emilia haughtily, wagging his finger teasingly. He was waiting for the punch line. But.
“Yeah, you’re right. You’ve been a huge help to me, Subaru. So much that merely saving your life isn’t enough. That’s how much this means to me.”
The way she lifted her hand to her breast, giving Subaru a serious look, put him at a loss for words.
The stiffness of his cheeks didn’t match the tense, serious aura all around him.
—Oh man, I seriously suck at reading the mood.
Subaru’s inability to read the tension in the air clashed with the serious look on Emilia’s face. Finally, amid his great embarrassment…
—
“…What are you doing?”
“Er, my hand just kind of reached out.”
With Emilia staring at him, Subaru had gently brushed his fingertips into her hair, not so much stroking her head as simply passing his fingers through the hair and enjoying the feeling.
“I’m an easygoing guy. I was thinking this would be reward enough for me.”
“…You stroked Puck’s fur, too. Subaru, do you have some kind of hair fetish?”
Subaru let out a yell at the harsh assessment.
“Hey, wait, fur and hair aren’t the same thing at all! Your silver hair’s really pretty!”
Emilia’s silver hair truly felt smooth as silk; its soft charm bewitched Subaru in an entirely different way from Puck’s fur.
But for some reason, Subaru’s words made Emilia lower her eyes with a pained look. Subaru tilted his head, not knowing the reason for Emilia’s action. His head was still like that when he felt a gaze from behind.
“Ah, perrrhaps we are in the way? We could leave you two to yourselves?”
“Your concern’s the dictionary definition of none of your business. And it’s still my turn to ask questions.”
Subaru continued enjoying the feel of Emilia’s hair as he used his free hand to point at Roswaal.
“I understand Emilia-tan being a candidate for becoming queen, but what about this business of you backing her?”
“You really aaare rather observant. You’ve picked up the preeevious matters quite well, though this is aaall second nature to any human born and raised in the city.”
“I’m honored to have your praise, Count. Though simple anime and romance novels kind of prepared my mind for this fantasy stuff.”
Like any reader, he’d been thrust into original scenarios with confusing, hard-to-remember world-building. Stuffing this level of background info into his head was no big accomplishment.
“Well, it is not something I was trying to conceal. My title is the Kingdom of Lugunica’s…I suppose technically I am lord of the outer regions, but my role sounds better expressed as…court magician, perhaps?”
“Court magician…? So you handle magic use at the castle?”
Emilia picked up where Subaru’s words left off.
“Yes. That’s the magician of the highest rank… He’s the foremost magic user in the entire kingdom.”
She looked a little dissatisfied nonetheless. Roswaal seemed nothing but pleased with Emilia’s reply, smiling as he brought some tea to his lips.
“So continuing the earlier topic, I stand in support of Lady Emilia’s royal candidacy. I am the shield behind her, her patron, sooo to speak.”
“Patron, huh.”
A representative for those backing her. So that was the position of the man before his eyes.
Subaru looked anew at the tall man in clown makeup before gently trading a glance with Emilia.
“I don’t mean to put this the wrong way but…Emilia-tan, you sure about this guy?”
“It can’t be helped. He’s the only one in the kingdom I can ask for support. In the first place, only a meddlesome eccentric like Roswaal would help someone like me, so…”
“Ah, I see. Process of elimination.”
“Quiiite a conversation you two are having right in front of your patron, if I maaay say so…”
Perhaps feeling somewhat slandered, Roswaal gave off an adult chuckle rather than anger. Maybe he had really thick skin—that or he simply took pleasure in ignoring people.
“So, back to the point, Rozchi. I get that you’re Emilia-tan’s sponsor. It’s cute how she goes from one extreme to another to hide how she’s a bit of an airhead, but acting on her own like she did yesterday in the capital, that’s kinda rare, huh?”
“I wooould call it unprecedented. Thooough Ram should have been with her…”
Roswaal made a strained smile as he shifted the topic to Ram. When Subaru looked at her, he saw she had the same hairstyle and face as Rem, standing beside her. At least you could nicely tell them apart by their hair color.
“Man, that totally smug ‘I got away with it, just as I hoped’ look gets on my nerves.”
Whether she intended to reflect on her error or not, he had her over a barrel. However, Emilia raised a hand in her defense with an awkward look on her face.
“Um, it’s not Ram’s fault. Yesterday I split up from Ram because I…lost out to my curiosity and wandered all around.”
“What’s that doe-eyed little
-girl excuse?! Emilia-tan being a big airhead doesn’t change the fact that she didn’t fulfill her lord’s commands. Is that all right…?”
With Emilia trying to cover for Ram, Subaru pointed a finger from each hand at her before he shifted them over to Roswaal.
“You dooo have a point, thoooough I share responsibility for Ram’s lack of discretion. But what are you trying to say, I wooonder?”
“Simple. You’re the ones who dropped the ball by taking your eyes off someone important like Emilia-tan. That’s where I came into the picture. I’m saying, if you had it all covered to begin with, none of this would’ve happened.”
Subaru’s little speech changed the looks on everyone’s faces.
Emilia raised her eyebrows, one of the twins looked apologetic while the other glared with hostility, Beatrice still had her heated gaze trained on Puck while Puck was precariously stuck headfirst into the egg yolk on the dish before her…and Roswaal made a pleasant smile, nodding as if he agreed.
“I seeee. Certainly Lady Emilia’s worth exceeds my considerable personal fortune. It is appropriate that you should seek a reward only from me, as her sponsor, iiis it nooot?”
“Yep. And you’re not gonna say no, are you, Rozchi? I mean, I saved Emilia-tan’s life and stopped her from dropping out of the royal selection. I’m totally her savior!”
Subaru rose from his seat and posed with a finger pointed up to the sky.
“I muuust admit that it is the truth. Now, then, would you care to elaborate?”
Roswaal, too, rose from his seat, looking down at Subaru from his superior height. Emilia looked worried as she watched Subaru and Roswaal stare each other down.
“Whaaat is it that you seek from me? I cannot refuse your request, if only to prevent this matter from becoming public knowledge. Nooow then, what is your desire?”
“Heh-heh-heh, that’s a noble for you; you really get it. Whatever reward I want! And you can’t say no, Rozchi! A man doesn’t take back his word!”
“That is quiiite a saying! I see, a man should make no excuses. No reneging on his word.”
Subaru’s petty villain behavior made him hear his popularity meter drop in his mind, but the entire effort was devoted to dragging that one statement out of him.
Re:ZERO -Starting Life in Another World-, Vol. 2 Page 4