“Um, your crown looks like it has cat ears.”
“Indeed! They are meant to imitate the ears of the ketolts!”
The main issue with his appearance were the cat ears on his crown, which made him look like a muscular, bearded man wearing, well, cat ears. I found out later that the crown was designed like that out of respect for the ketolt blacksmiths that supported this kingdom.
Now then, what to do in this situation? I thought as I stared at Hephaestus XIV’s back as we walked inside Pardoe’s mansion.
The Hephaestus royal family had 300 years of history. They had come into power right around the time Athenapolis was being taken over. The family most likely had some connections to the sacred family and the temple of the Goddess of Light. However, the royal family’s crown had ketolt ears, Hephaestus XIV himself was a follower of the Goddess of Fire, and he seemed to be on fairly good terms with the ketolts.
“I’ve heard all about you from my younger brother.”
“Younger brother?” The King turned around to speak to me, but I only cocked my head since it didn’t ring a bell.
“The temple elder. That’s my younger brother, there in the Goddess of Fire’s temple!”
My eyes opened wide in response. Clena and the others couldn’t hide their surprise, either. They looked similar now that I thought about it. If you stripped away the beard from the king in front of us, he’d look nearly identical to the temple elder. So that guy was the king’s younger brother, huh?
“Where is that black armor, by the way? I came here to see that.”
“I put it away. I couldn’t keep it on in this heat.”
“Ahh... well, that is understandable. It was rather stuffy inside my carriage, too. I suppose it would be a little cooler here if we had some wind clerics around.”
So wind cleric magic was the replacement for electric fans here? Though the heat in Hephaestusopolis really did call for some air conditioners.
The king had wanted to see my Magic Eater armor, but he had just missed us at the training ground in the temple, so he came here and had been observing Pardoe appraise our antique equipment. When he heard that I had returned, he couldn’t sit still and rushed to greet me at the front door. He was pretty light on his feet for someone of his size. He didn’t see anything we were having appraised other than the antiques, nor did he seem suspicious about the quantity of items, so we had no reason to worry for now.
We would normally have gathered at the reception room, but instead we went straight into Pardoe’s smithing room. One of the two guards standing at the door came along inside with the king. The smithing room was decently large, but right now the antiques were lined up not only on the desk and shelves, but also on clothes spread out along the ground as well. There was only one path to walk from the door to the desk.
From my party, only Clena and I entered the room. Maybe it would have been better for me to enter by myself, but Clena was my last resort for making judgments during our conversations.
When the four of us entered the room, Pardoe took one glance at us, then silently returned his attention to his appraisal work. This cat—er, person—was rather undaunted in the presence of the king. Though maybe they had just finished their introductions before I got here.
“By the way, is it true that everything Mr. Paul is appraising was retrieved from the demon lord’s castle in Hadesopolis?”
So Hephaestus XIV called Pardoe “Mr. Paul,” huh. There really was significance to him having a family name.
“Yes, that’s true. Hadesopolis was in the middle of the void, underground.”
“Hmm...” Hephaestus XIV fell into deep thought at my reply, then picked up a shield and sheathed sword from the ground. The shield was a knight’s shield with a scale pattern, while the sword was a thin rapier. Neither of them looked too gaudy, but they were decorated with elegant ornaments.
“Oh...” Clena let out a small gasp when she looked at them.
“Have you noticed, young lady?”
“Y-yes.”
I glanced over at her, not knowing what was going on, and she returned my gaze. She was trying to see if I reacted. She then looked back at Hephaestus XIV and continued talking. She was covering for me, who still hadn’t figured it out.
“The symbols on the shield and the rapier’s hilt...” She hesitated on finishing her sentence. Was it something bad?
“They’re the crest of the Hephaestus royal family.”
“What?!” The king finished Clena’s sentence. I yelled in surprise and then turned around to face him. “Huh? Hadesopolis was destroyed 500 years ago, so... huh?”
The Hephaestus royal family was formed 300 years ago, which was after the destruction of Hadesopolis. It wouldn’t have made sense for the Hephaestus royal family’s crest to appear on anything from there. Had we found out something we shouldn’t have? We could write it off as a fake, but if it were real, then this would be proof that there was some relation between the demon lord and the Hephaestus royal family. Though I didn’t know where the 200 year gap came from.
I felt the blood drain from my face.
“Oh no, don’t worry. I’m not going to seal your mouth shut just because I have a sword in my hands. If I wanted to do that, I’d just do it with my bare hands, you know?”
Hephaestus XIV noticed I had grown pale and offered me words of encouragement. The contents were a little disturbing, but it was true that the thin rapier looked like it would snap as soon as he tried swinging it with his brawny arms.
“You might be wondering why the Hephaestus family crest existed 500 years ago... but our royal family actually goes back further than even the sacred family.”
“...Really?”
“The Hephaestus royal family that formed 300 years ago, was the ‘human royal family,’ but another family existed even before that. The ‘ketolt royal family.’”
“...The ketolts?” I looked over at Pardoe, who returned a nod.
“Back then, we had the old royal family, and the current one is considered the new royal family,” Pardoe explained without looking worked up at all. Apparently this wasn’t any sort of secret information.
“I never knew...” Clena had her eyes wide, looking shocked. So she had never heard of this before, either.
“Well, it’s not something that comes up in conversation often. Many of the citizens here have no idea, either!” Hephaestus XIV said, then gave a hearty laugh.
This information was on the level of a scandal, but the party concerned looked entirely unaffected, and Pardoe joined in on the laughing as well. What was going on here? I couldn’t wrap my head around the situation and wracked my brain until the king spoke out to me.
“I heard about what happened in Athena. However, there was one big difference between our kingdom and Athena’s.”
“Difference?”
“The attempt to take over Hephaestus failed.”
“...Is that something you should say as the king?”
“It’s nothing more than a silly tale at this point.”
He explained that the new royal family had successfully usurped the throne back then, but due to the differences in technological power, they weren’t able to drive away the ketolts.
“So why is the new royal family still in power? If that were true, then the takeover should have counted as a failure.”
“That is what my ancestors thought as well, but...”
“The old royal family let them keep it, meow.”
“...Why?” Clena exclaimed in surprise at Pardoe’s words before I could.
I looked at the guard with my mouth still agape, and he also nodded with a grim look on his face. It seemed like this was a fairly well-known story.
“The old royal family was comprised of twelve families who were all related to each other. They were all blacksmith families, and the most skilled one represented the country as king.” Apparently the Paul family and the Remus family had both been part of it.
“So the old roya
l family was all related?”
“All of the blacksmith families with last names still are.”
Since the blacksmiths worked closely together since long ago, all of the families naturally started intermingling. It was such a simple fact that no one even thought to bring it up here.
I wasn’t being judgmental, but I had always thought that the Paul family’s mansion was a little too big for just a blacksmith’s. I had wondered if being a good blacksmith could earn him that much money, but it made sense now that I knew he was a descendant of the old royal family and was essentially treated like an aristocrat here.
“But why, though? From what I understand, the ketolt blacksmiths were the ones holding the kingdom together, and they could have taken the throne back anytime.”
“Well... being the king was a pain, I guess?”
“......Huh?”
“It was long ago so I don’t know the details either, but even if we had chased out the new royal family at the time, the sacred family might have kept targeting us.”
“Yes, that was the case. I heard the story of what happened in Athena from Haruno.”
“So in the end, we decided to just push the work of the king onto them.”
“Oh...” I understood what they were talking about now. The king and twelve families at the time had probably realized, too. Even if the new royal family ruled over Hephaestus, they had no way to drive out the ketolt blacksmiths. The ketolts would have been happier shoving the responsibility of being king onto someone else and focusing on their blacksmith work. I had heard that a skilled worker was harder to replace than a company CEO, and this must have been exactly the case. I see, so the option to leave the new royal family in place would certainly have been tempting.
“The one condition the old royal family set was that the new royal family had to become followers of the Goddess of Fire. We’ve been followers ever since, and hey, we have no complaints about it.” Hephaestus XIV said, then garishly flexed his biceps. His chest muscles were twitching a bit as well.
He was completely indoctrinated, that much was obvious. Well, as long as he was happy.
In any case, that was the reason why the old royal family had the same crest. The cat-eared crown was something the new royal family had made to acknowledge the ketolts, but the ketolts at the time were apparently just bewildered, wondering why they had gone so far. The new royal family back then was a bunch of nobles sent out by the sacred family at the time, and the temple of light had also sent out their own group of pastors. However, once the new royal family converted to the Goddess of Fire, the pastors were driven away and sent scurrying back to Jupiter. Even then, a smidgen of faith in the Goddess of Light remained, and that brought us to the temple of light in this kingdom now.
Come to think of it, Rakti had said that the demon lord had been summoned as a result of Goldfish acting rashly as a cleric. The sacred family’s and temple of light’s actions after the demon lord’s defeat went purely against the teachings of the Goddess of Light, according to Sera. From that perspective, the Goddess of Light herself could be considered a victim of all this as well. I felt like I could see her in a new light during my dream tonight.
The new royal family most likely had no choice but to follow the twelve families’ orders. Blacksmithing was their main industry—it essentially ran their economy. If the royal family so much as angered the twelve families, they could have been driven out in the blink of an eye. All they had to do was stop their smithing and the kingdom would collapse. No joke, that was how much power they had.
Looking at it another way, as long as the new royal family was faithful to the Goddess of Fire, provided cover against the sacred family and temple of light, and didn’t intrude on the ketolts’ work, they could rest easy. They had given up and joined the other side in a way, but then governed and protected this kingdom for the past 300 years.
The culmination of all those years of history was now flexing his muscles and posing flamboyantly before me. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Though when I looked at the flexing king and the exasperated Pardoe, I realized that this was a perfectly fine way for humans and demi-humans to co-exist.
“Ahh, and about this shield and sword. Would you give these to me?”
“You want them back in the Hephaestus royal family?”
“Of course, I will give you proper compensation... No, how about you bequeath them to me, and I present you with an award?”
“Like in an official manner?”
“Indeed.”
The shield and sword hadn’t been formally given to me by the royal family, and they must have been worried that the crest might be used to dishonor their name. I glanced over at Clena, who gave me a small nod. Looked like there were no problems.
“Are there any procedures we need to go through?”
“Oh, no need, no need. Though we will have to conduct a ceremony to present you with the reward.”
“I figured we wouldn’t be able to skip that. I can take you up on that, then.”
One of the guards behind the king was pressing down on his stomach, but I decided to not touch on what he was trying to do. In any case, the shield and sword with the royal family’s crest might have been worth an unimaginable amount, but I had no practical use for them. So the best move here would be to hand them over to the royal family, then exchange it for something we would have a little more use for.
“Is there anything you would like?”
“I don’t have anything specific I can think of... but I’d appreciate something that I could only get here.”
“That’s quite a demanding request, in a sense.”
“I guess it is.”
“Well, there we have it. I shall think of something befitting to award you with.”
“Thank you for the offer. Please go ahead and take the shield and sword.”
“I shall!”
I wondered if it was okay to let him take them without asking for an exact compensation value, but this was the king we were talking to. It’d be best to let him do his thing without kicking up a fuss. The worst case scenario would be getting a medal or a letter of recognition in return, but even then, we would have gained a connection to the royal family in exchange for something we picked up for nearly free. It was still a net positive. Most of all, I didn’t expect this giant king in front of me to do something so dull. He seemed more the type to try to surprise you with something out of left field. I was pretty sure of that. So I decided to just wait and see what he would come up with, for better or worse.
“Oh, should we show you the magic armor as well?”
“Hmm, not in here, no. Too cramped. Let us go out to the reception area!”
“I’ll have Rulitora bring it over, then.”
Hephaestus XIV had only wanted the sword and shield from the smithing room and didn’t show interest in any of the other antiques. He led us back out to the reception area. Rulitora was a step ahead of us and had already brought the Magic Eater into the reception area, propping it down like an armored doll. Hephaestus XIV ordered one of his guards to bring the sword and shield over to the carriage outside.
The table and chairs in the reception area were a size fitting for humans to sit down and around on. They must have had plenty of non-ketolt customers as well. We sat facing the king, who had two guards behind him. Clena, Rium, and I sat on the sofa, while Rulitora, Roni, and Rakti stood behind us. The three of them were considered ravers, so this was how we had to arrange ourselves. With the way Rakti was, she was making me feel less afraid and more guilty for making the Goddess of Darkness stand.
Crissa left the room to make us drinks, and not a moment later, Hephaestus XIV stood up to admire the Magic Eater armor. His eyes were sparkling in excitement. He must have also been curious because full-body armor was a rare sight in this hot kingdom.
After a while of him inspecting the armor from all sorts of angles, Crissa returned with a silver tray of drinks in hand. She had brought us a type
of drink called “lassi.” It was simply described as a whisked, drinkable yogurt. It could be sweetened, salted, or blended with fruit or spices according to preference, and could be made as a thick yogurt or thin and light. Crissa had made lassi with crushed fruit blended in, exactly how I would have wanted it. There was a slice of fruit perched on the rim of each glass. It was nice and chilled, especially soothing since I had just come back from training.
Once all the drinks had been set, Hephaestus XIV returned to his seat, took a gulp of the lassi, and suddenly started talking to me. “By the way, I have one question for you.”
“What is it?”
“You said you had defeated a demon general... what sort of demon was he?”
“You mean what he looked like...?”
“Yes.”
I didn’t know what he was getting at, but I had nothing to hide, so I replied honestly.
“He was a goldfish... oh wait, they don’t exist in this world. He was a demon that looked like a small fish. He was a cleric of darkness, and the one who summoned the demon lord himself. He could use magic to control all the metal weapons and armor around him.” I described him as accurately as I could, but in a way that didn’t make him sound too easy to defeat without exaggerating too much.
However, Hephaestus XIV’s face turned glum after that.
“Hmm... that’s not right.”
“Not right? What do you mean?”
“It is said that the demon generals have actually been living in a place close to Mt. Lemnos.”
“...The survivors of the demon generals?”
“You believed you had defeated a demon general, but there is no way a fish could have lived in that environment.”
Goldfish had been killed by boiling. He wouldn’t have survived high temperatures.
“What kind of place is it?”
“First of all, it’s hot. Though that much is obvious since it’s so close to a volcano. It is surrounded by steep cliffs on three sides and is right beyond an area that spouts poisonous volcanic gas.”
“That sounds crazy...” Apparently even monsters who lived on the volcano didn’t approach that area.
The Chaotic Stone Sauna Page 15