Outbreak Company: Volume 13

by Ichiro Sakaki

  Partly, I had come to Brooke for advice because he struck me as the most neutral of anyone in the mansion. But also, he was actually married, and I had thought, hey, maybe that means he knows a thing or two about love. At the very least, he wouldn’t play with me for his own amusement like Hikaru-san did. Or least, I thought he wouldn’t.

  “Ahh, hmm... Bit of a difficult spot, that, isn’t it?” Brooke said, after he had heard everything.

  Well, yes, yes it was.

  “Hikaru-san had this irresponsible idea about measuring who got me the most, like, excited.”

  “Excited, sir?”

  “Yeah. I mean, you know, who I felt the most naughty towards...”

  If you thought love could be reduced to its biological presentation, then the idea wasn’t completely crazy. But I thought maybe it was a little too, uh... direct might be the best word.

  “Brooke, why did you decide to marry Cerise?”

  There was a pause; Brooke folded his arms as if in thought, and tilted his head to one side. Lizardmen often got stuck being villains in fantasy works, and a lot of people were probably scared of their reptilian faces. But reptiles, from snakes to lizards, also often had big, cute eyes. Brooke looked almost charming with his head to one side like that.

  Hey—was this the first time I had ever sat down and talked to Brooke man-to-man?

  “In m’ own case, Cerise was chosen for me, so I didn’t have to pick my wife from among several competitors...”

  “Yeah. I think I remember you mentioning that.”

  Brooke was something of a hero among his people, and Cerise was the daughter of a tribal chieftain. They’d married because people had seen them as socially a good match, not—or at least not just—because of their personal feelings.

  “But still, you knew her before you were engaged, right?”

  “Ah... Yes, well...”

  “And did you feel anything for each other then?” That was something else I thought Brooke had talked about before. “You’re some kind of lizardman hero, right? There must have been all kinds of women who would have liked to be your wife. But you didn’t pick them.”

  “Ah... Well, true...” Brooke’s tongue slipped in and out of his mouth. “Cerise I knew from before m’ days on the battlefield... That is, from before I was called a hero, as you say.”

  “So she was sort of a childhood friend?”

  “Sort of, yes.” And so, it seemed, she had been the one for him from long before other women had flocked to him. Huh. So two childhood friends fell in love and got married... Their story was more dramatic than I’d realized.

  “So I’m not quite sure m’ own experience would be of very much help to you, Master.”

  “Hmm...”

  “Terribly sorry.”

  “No, no, not at all.” I didn’t want Brooke to feel he had to apologize to me. I had stormed into his house and started prying into his love life; I was the one who should be apologizing.

  “But...” Brooke said suddenly, as though he’d just had a thought. “Ultimately, t’ be together means many years, many tens of years, of being by each other’s side.”

  “Oh... Right. That’s true.”

  “But feelin’s come and go. Love at first sight, infatuation, they don’t last so long. I should think us and humans aren’t so different on that count.”

  I found I couldn’t think of anything to say. The whole discussion suddenly felt more serious.

  “So if I may say so, Master, maybe it’s not the most excitin’ person you should look for. Maybe it’s the one you feel most comfortable with.”

  “The one I feel most comfortable with...”

  I see. That was a legitimately important consideration if you were going to marry someone.

  “I remember how easy it felt t’ be with my wife, long before she became, if you will, my wife. It’s the same now. We’re still comfortable with one another. So I confess it doesn’t quite make sense to me t’ measure how excited you are, as a way of choosin’ a partner.”

  I didn’t say anything for a moment.

  “’Tis just my personal experience,” Brooke said. “Please feel free t’ ignore it.”

  “No... It means a lot to me, believe me. Thank you.” I nodded at Brooke, stood, and left the house.

  I pondered for a while. The person I felt most comfortable with, huh? That was good advice. I guess being the only married person in the house really did give him a different perspective. Even so, I was honestly still confused. It wasn’t like I had to choose one person and then instantly get married to them. But then again, even that was a sort of modern Japanese way of thinking about things—it might not be how it worked around here. People were considered to be adults at sixteen, and there might not be a clear demarcation between love and marriage.

  What was I supposed to do?

  I drifted back to my room and, yes, put my head in my hands again, still no answer in sight.

  Chapter Three: Believed Forbidden

  An unexpected visitor arrived first thing in the morning the day after Petralka had come to see me.

  I had just finished getting dressed and was heading out of my room to breakfast when I heard voices in the front hall. I went to see what was going on and found Myusel and Cerise, greeting guests.

  “Wh—What brings you here?” I asked of the unexpected party I saw standing there.

  One of them, just like yesterday, was Petralka. She had sneaked out of the castle yesterday, and I had been sure Garius was going to find out, give her a scolding, and then ground her for a while... and that’s why she was unexpected.

  But there was someone else I hadn’t counted on: Garius himself. He very rarely visited the mansion. Instead, we typically saw him when we went to the castle ourselves. If he was here, it was usually to accompany Petralka—and it looked like that was what he was doing today, too. In addition to the two of them, there were several knights who I assumed were bodyguards.

  Finally, there was a diminutive girl with short hair and sort of grayish skin. Lauron Selioz, the dwarf. I knew her for her exceptional skill in controlling magical puppets—she spent most of her time at the castle, having been given the duty of puppeteering Petralka’s body double. Today, though, I didn’t see the double, but rather a burly-looking puppet standing behind her. I recognized it as one of the work dolls from the Guld workshop.

  “Lauron, you’re here too? But why?”

  She didn’t respond, but bowed slightly when she saw me. She still wasn’t very expressive, and it was a little hard to tell what she might be thinking.

  “What’s going on?” The question came from Minori-san as she and Hikaru-san wandered into the foyer. Minori-san was in her uniform, and was even carrying her suitcase, the one with the concealed 9mm machine pistol. Her cell phone was hooked into the mansion’s security network, and she’d likely known about Garius and the others before I did. The weapon was probably inspired by the unusual fact that they’d brought a detachment of knights and even a work puppet.

  What in the world was going on here? I looked at Lauron again—and then I realized.

  “Shinichi. We must talk about—”

  “I’m so s-sorry!” I exclaimed before Garius could finish, throwing my head down in a bow. “I know I should have sent Petralka home as soon as she showed up yesterday, but... I just... I couldn’t...”

  Lauron, as I said, was responsible for Petralka’s body double. Meaning that while Petralka was away from the castle, she had to play the part of the empress. When Garius found out what had happened, he would have been angry not just at Petralka, but Lauron, too. He had obviously brought Lauron here to talk about yesterday’s shenanigans. In a word, he was here to complain about Petralka’s stopping by for a visit. Or so I had assumed.

  But instead...

  “No, that’s a separate topic,” he said brusquely. “And in that case, it is I who should apologize for the way Her Majesty foisted herself on you.”

  I blinked in surprise to
find Garius turning the apologetic tables. So... this wasn’t about Petralka’s visit yesterday?

  “Huh? But—”

  Then why was he here? I looked at Petralka, baffled, but she stood there with her arms crossed and her chest puffed out. She certainly didn’t look like someone who had just been given a dressing-down along with the keeper of her body double. “Garius claims he has some kind of business with you, Shinichi. And we have come along with him.”

  “You mean like extra content?”

  “Do not put it that way.” Petralka frowned.

  It looked like whatever this was, it really wasn’t about yesterday. “But what kind of business—” I was about to ask, but suddenly Minori-san practically shoved me aside.

  “Don’t tell me!” she exclaimed. “Could it be that you’re here to join the battle for Shinichi-kun’s heart?!”

  “Hold it right there, you rotten—”

  “If you are, I am so in your corner!”

  “Stop trying to make this all about your personal interests!” I cried, as our resident WAC stood with her eyes glittering and her hands joined in front of her chest as if in prayer.

  “Battle...?” Garius said, perplexed.

  “It’s nothing.”

  “And if I win this battle, Shinichi is the prize?”

  “I am not.” I groaned. Why did he have to home straight in on the worst part of this conversation? “Minori-san’s just off in her own little fantasy land—as usual—so please, don’t pay any attention to her.”

  “Hmm.”

  “So what’s this business you mentioned?”

  “Well, as it happens, we found a certain something at the castle,” Garius said, getting right to it.

  “A certain something?”

  “Yes. Namely, something known as ‘Forbidden Armor.’” Garius’s brow furrowed ever so slightly. “It has lain sealed away in a special storehouse, but—”

  “Ooh! Forbidden... Sealed away...” This sounded pretty exciting. Was it—you know? One of those crazy armors with some outrageous power? Like, when you put it on, it controls your brain? Or gives you superhuman strength, but erases your memories in exchange? Or maybe the armor fuses with your skin so you can never take it off?! Maybe it was like the equipment of some last boss in an anime or manga: when he’s defeated, he suddenly goes, “You have my thanks. Now I am at last free of this accursed armor,” and turns out not to be such a terrible guy after all before everything ends up great?

  “Certain circumstances have compelled us to begin investigating dangerous articles like this. This armor in particular, though, remains rife with mysteries.”

  “Really? What kind of mysteries?”

  “For one thing, we are told it is armor, but it has the shape of no armor I’ve ever seen.”

  “Huh?”

  Come again?

  “It’s difficult to explain—it’s almost a sort of globe. At a glance, it’s impossible to tell where a human limb could even fit in the thing. What’s more, there are too many gaps in the records accompanying the armor to explain why it was sealed up to begin with. Much about it is, at best, rather unclear.”

  “Geez, give me a break...”

  Then again, this thing was sort of an antique. And we all know how easy it is to lose the instruction manual to something that keeps moving from owner to owner.

  “However,” Garius continued, “there are letters carved on the armor’s surface that look familiar to me.”

  “Familiar letters? What kind?”

  “They look much like the characters inscribed on the cover of a book Minori once lent me.”

  “One of my books?” Minori-san asked, pointing at herself in surprise.

  Garius nodded briefly at her, then looked back at me: “I asked Her Majesty, and she confirmed that the letters look like those found in the books in your library, Shinichi. I came to ask for your opinion, thinking that perhaps the letters have some connection with Ja-panese.”

  “Letters..................”

  I knew Petralka was capable of reading Japanese at a grade-school level, so if it were simple enough, there would have been no need for them to come specifically to ask me about it. Maybe the letters were stylized, like something on the cover of a book, or maybe they involved difficult kanji or something. But how would anything like that get on some kind of “forbidden armor”? Maybe it only looked like Japanese, and didn’t have anything to do with my world at all...

  “In any event, I would like to begin by showing you the armor itself. Perhaps you and your friends will understand something that we could not.”

  “Okay... But just to be clear, we might not understand anything at all. In fact, I think that’s more likely. The resemblance between these letters and Japanese might turn out to be complete coincidence.”

  “Certainly. We’re prepared for that possibility. But you and your friends often have a different way of seeing things than we do, and we are hoping it might yield fresh insights here.”

  “Uh-huh...” So they were hoping for any kind of clue. It sounded like they weren’t getting anywhere on their own. “And where is this armor?”

  “In the carriage,” Garius said, turning around. “There are five examples of the armor. Each is in its own wooden chest, but I must warn you not to touch any of them. Some magical items take prisoner anyone who touches them, you see. One may presume that, being armor, any effect does not activate until the armor is equipped, but we can’t be too careful. To that end, Lauron is here to use the puppet to get the armor out of the chests.”

  “So just to be clear, you’re saying: look, don’t touch; definitely don’t accidentally put it on; and if we do, you’re not responsible for what happens?” Hikaru-san said.

  “More or less.” Garius nodded.

  Now we knew why Lauron was with them. I guess it made sense to take extra precautions when handling something called “forbidden armor.”

  “For the time being, we don’t even understand how one puts on this so-called armor. If none of you have any objections, Lauron will now bring out the chests.”

  “Er, fine, I... I guess...”

  We would just look at it. No problem, right? Surely it wasn’t, like, a bacterial weapon that would infect us the moment they opened the lid—right? If it were, it would have gotten Garius and Lauron already.

  That was my rationalization, anyway. But really, I was just very interested in this Forbidden Armor. An item by that name was practically a trope in manga, novels, anime, and video games—I never dreamed I would see the real thing.

  “How about we start by taking them in the living room? It’s the largest space in the house.”

  “Very well. Lauron...”

  “Yes, sir.” Lauron, and the puppet standing behind her, began to move.

  I headed for the carriage with Lauron-san. It was her puppet who would be doing all the carrying, of course. The problem was, not only was the puppet very large, but whatever this cargo was, it apparently wasn’t small itself. They would need a large entrance and hallway through which to bring the chests, and I was to help them find it. I trailed along behind Lauron-san, mentally reviewing various entrances and passageways.

  “Is this it...?” I asked as we arrived.

  “Yes. Please be careful not to touch it,” Lauron-san said as several wooden chests were lowered one by one from the carriage. There were five of them, all identical in size. They were so large, in fact, that I thought someone my size could have climbed inside and closed the lid. As for what they weighed, I couldn’t tell, but probably enough that a full-grown man would find them hard to lift. All of the boxes were blackened with age, the nails rusting: they had obviously been around for a long time.

  Once Lauron-san had unloaded them all, she had the puppet pick one of them up. I could hear the box groan with the strain.

  “This way, please.” I started off at a walk, Lauron-san behind me now. We had opened both doors of the service entrance, and went into the house that way. T
he front door was bigger, but the foyer was home to several furnishings and decorations that seemed likely to be hazardous for the puppet, so I decided to bring them around the back way.

  “Ahem. Are you quite all right?” I asked, feeling some trepidation, but Lauron-san replied, “I’m fine.”

  The source of my concern was the ongoing complaint from the wood of the box the puppet was carrying. Maybe the contents were heavy, or maybe the wood was in poor shape, or maybe the puppet was just grasping it too hard... In any event, I wondered if it might not be best to stop and adjust the thing’s grip. That was just my feeling, though. Lauron-san didn’t seem unduly disturbed. She was the specialist when it came to controlling these puppets, and it wasn’t my place to tell her how to do her job.

  And so I led them past the kitchen, toward the living room. That was when I heard my name: “Myusel~~!” And shambling down the corridor toward us came... Elvia-san. “Ain’t breakfast ready yet?”

  “Oh! I’m sorry...” The sudden visit from Her Majesty and Minister Cordobal had caused me to put my breakfast preparations on hold. “I’m afraid I have to help get this chest to the living room first.”

  “Aw, but I’m soooo hungry...” Elvia-san did indeed sound downright pathetic.

  After Her Majesty’s declaration the previous evening that “a woman’s fiftieth kilo is mere self-indulgence,” Elvia-san had declared that she was “cutting down” and left the room before she had eaten half her dinner. Then, it seemed, she spent the hours until almost dawn doing laps around the nearby area. It certainly would make a person hungry.

  “Please hang on just a little longer,” I said.

  “But I’m dying,” she said. Then her eyes lit on the box in the puppet’s hands. “So all you need’s to get this thing to the living room?”