Monster Tamer, Volume 5, page 4
I raised my eyebrow curiously as Shiran continued.
“The commander said that she would like to invite you to our country.”
“Huh...?”
“The fall of Fort Tilia is a major incident. The commander will no doubt be indisposed, having to explain the situation to everyone. Before that, she plans to return home to report to her father, His Majesty the King. At that time, she would like you to be present as well, Takahiro.”
I don’t get it... I had in fact heard that the commander was the princess of a certain country. The home Shiran referred to was probably the capital of that country, but...
“Why would she want me there?”
“Do we require any other reason than wanting to invite an honored guest from another world to a warm reception? Besides, you are our benefactor. You saved our lives by battling Juumonji Tatsuya, and you fought by our side on the battlefield. If you have other plans, however, then I do not intend to push the matter.”
“No, I don’t really have any plans...”
“It is customary to invite the great saviors to the imperial capital for a hospitable welcome. The other visitors will surely be going there. However, you will not be going with them, will you?”
“Considering my abilities, it would be difficult to live as some grand hero here. I didn’t even have the faintest intention of doing so to start with.”
I hadn’t lied when I’d spoken to Kudou two days ago. The most important thing to me was living together with the girls as their master. I had no plans of becoming some savior of the world.
“I’ll be fine so long as I can find a place to live in peace alongside Lily and the others.”
“If so, then I do believe this is a good proposal for you. How about taking the time to consider your options while consulting with the commander during your stay in our home country?”
It wasn’t a bad idea. My goal was to locate a safe place to live. However, it was hard to take action in this world when I knew nothing about the environment. I needed connections. Even if it came down to only securing provisions and living in the Woodlands, we still needed to come up with and execute a plan from scratch, which was sure to be a thorny path. Consulting a princess could expand my options considerably.
Our choice was between wandering into a foreign land with no help or starting somewhere I already had a reassuring ally. It didn’t need to be said which was the better option. All that was left was deciding whether the commander could be trusted...
I shot a glance over to Lily, who smiled back at me.
“Got it,” I said with a nod. “I’ll accept your offer. I’ll discuss it with my companions, but I don’t think they’ll object.”
“Thank goodness. I’ll inform the commander of such afterward,” Shiran replied with a broad smile.
“Oh yeah, what do you plan on doing, Shiran? I’m guessing you’re going back with the commander to your country too?”
Shiran’s position was extremely delicate right now. Nobody could tell at a glance that she was an undead monster. She looked slightly pale, but that was pretty much it. The only ones who knew of her circumstances aside from us were the members of the Alliance Knights who had witnessed her rampage when she came back as a ghoul. The knights who fought shoulder to shoulder in the Woodlands had a strong sense of fellowship. They wouldn’t even consider spreading rumors of their lieutenant’s secret. It was pretty unlikely that it would get out. Having said that, it could cause trouble for the company if it were to come to light.
Shiran looked troubled, but she still smiled happily. “I’m honestly conflicted...but thankfully, the commander has told me to continue serving as a knight. She scolded me, saying I should’ve already known just from the fact that I hadn’t been dismissed as her lieutenant.”
“Seems just like her.”
I had witnessed for myself that the bond tying these two women together as comrades in arms was far deeper than their simple connection as a lieutenant and commander. There was no way the commander would let her trusted subordinate worry about her future.
“I’m truly blessed.”
Shiran sounded somewhat bitter as she took out something dangling from a chain around her neck. It was a ring with a red gem in it. After she had turned into a ghoul, she couldn’t even put it on in front of anyone, but she couldn’t throw it away. It was proof she was a knight.
“I am a knight, just as before. I will fight for the sake of those I must protect. I cannot thank the commander enough.”
The runestone within the ring turned blue for a human and yellow for a ghoul. The red gem in Shiran’s ring was proof that she was a demilich. However, she was a knight before any of that.
Shiran was strong. Even as an undead monster, she still had many worries, but she gazed unwaveringly at what she was meant to be. It was this self-awareness as a knight that supported her so.
“I am of course grateful to you as well, Takahiro. I’m very glad we met.”
“Likewise. It seems we’ll be together a while longer. Let’s do our best.”
Shiran smiled wholeheartedly, half her face hidden by an eyepatch.
So we decided to leave Fort Tilia behind for Shiran’s home country.
Chapter 3: Reaching Out toward Happiness
Five days had passed since I’d heard about the commander’s plans from Shiran. Even though we had suffered more casualties from sporadic ghoul outbreaks, the final cremations had taken place yesterday.
Shiran said the soldiers were being granted a day of rest before leaving the fortress tomorrow. Dealing with the large number of monster corpses was also progressing smoothly due to Lily’s continual efforts. She had reported to me this morning that she was going to be done within the day.
I’ll leave out what happened at that time... She had been quite busy getting everything done before our departure, so the mornings were the only time she could take off. During those times, she’d unconsciously sought compensation. The daily exchange of offense and defense early in the morning had become more and more perilous as the offense grew stronger and the defense grew weaker.
I hadn’t gotten many chances to interact with any people aside from the Alliance Knights. I could only watch from afar. It looked like preparations were going smoothly. There was one thing I saw that I found rather surprising, though. This world had “automobiles.”
“They differ from those moving steel boxes of your world, though,” Shiran said.
They looked like simple covered wagons, but there was no horse to pull them. A runestone used the mana flowing beneath the earth as a power source to move the vehicle. They called them manamobiles. They didn’t move all that fast. Their maximum speed was just around that of a regular sprint, but their normal speed was around a walk. Gathering mana on the move was insufficient, so they stored up mana during the night when they were still, that way they could move during the whole day.
“Manamobiles, huh? The magic technology here sure is amazing,” I muttered.
“Eco-friendly, isn’t it?” Lily said. “I only know of it from memories, but it’s kinda like a solar car. Well, the only reason manamobiles don’t move during the night is because of safety, so it’s a little different.”
“I find your world far more amazing, Takahiro. You have technology that procures mana from sunlight, right? Mikihiko told me about it,” Shiran said.
“It’s a little different from that...but it’s fine to interpret it that way,” I replied. Explaining the difference would be difficult, so I was being somewhat evasive.
Incidentally, there were horses in this world, but they didn’t really use them much in the Woodlands. The animals were scared of this region, so it required special training to bring them here. That was why transportation of non-essential goods generally used manamobiles. Even outside the Woodlands, these vehicles required less labor to maintain than horses, so they were used pretty widely.
This time, they had to transport distressed soldiers suffering from the after-effects of injuries, so they were using the manamobiles to do so. They were also loaning us the use of one such vehicle. This was because it would be troublesome for Gerbera, Rose, or Ayame to be spotted on our way. I gratefully accepted their kindness.
After hearing the details of tomorrow morning’s departure, I headed over to see Rose. Lily still had to finish her work, so we split up in front of Rose’s room. There was a knight accompanying us, so we kept the flirting to a minimum. I gave her dainty body a light hug, then waved goodbye. Now alone, I turned and knocked on the door.
“Rose, it’s me.” My knocks sounded stiff, and they echoed through the corridor like a manifestation of the tension within me.
“Good morning, Master.”
What greeted me...wasn’t a faceless mannequin, but a gray-haired woman wearing clothes she’d borrowed from Lily and a mask covering her face. It was still unfamiliar to me, but this was what Rose looked like now. On the day Fort Tilia had been attacked, before we’d chased after Sakagami, I had rendezvoused with Rose to find that she was already dressed like this. The mask she was wearing now was brand new. There was a hole where her right eye would be, but just looking at the remaining eye through her mask, it was clear her face was no longer flat and unmoving.
Apparently, Rose had been secretly altering her entire body. Judging from her habitual behavior, I understood she was hiding it from me because she didn’t want me to see it until she was satisfied with what she made. It was a fixation of hers as a crafter.
Rose’s face had been damaged when she encountered the monsters pouring down on Fort Tilia. It was already a work in progress to begin with, so she didn’t want to show it to anyone. That was why I had yet to see the face she had hidden beneath that mask. Nevertheless, I could easily imagine it. She had an intricately made human face that was practically indistinguishable from a real one. I could tell that much from the single eye I could barely see. I’d been quite shocked when I saw her like this that night. She had been with Katou, but she’d looked like a complete stranger. Still, I could tell it was definitely Rose at the time through our mental path.
Currently, Rose’s body was still that of a puppet from the neck down. Her joints past her sleeves and below the hem of her skirt were clearly visible. The color of her skin was also the same as an inorganic mannequin, so she still didn’t really look human. However, at the same time, she was incomparably more of a woman than she had been before.
In a way, she had the loveliness of a doll. That mix of inorganic substance and femininity had a unique sweetness to it that made her shine. I fully agreed she looked like the “cute doll” she’d mentioned wanting to make.
Her gray hair fell down her back and was tied into a braid. She wore a dress that covered her body. Even the earnest gaze from beneath her mask was completely feminine, a stark contrast to her previous asexual appearance.
Maybe this was why I felt slightly bewildered talking with her now. The girl before me was Rose. My precious Rose. Nothing about that had changed. However, there was something mixed into that perception now, something I had previously overlooked. It was probably that I was now aware that Rose was a girl.
If I talked to anyone about this, they would be astonished at me for only noticing it now. I’d spent a lot of time with Rose, and I’d seen her gain the ability to speak and go from a simple carved puppet to more of a mannequin. I’d known from this process that Rose’s mind was feminine, and I’d discovered from her relationship with Katou that she had a side to her much like a teenage girl.
However, the change she’d gone through this time was decidedly different in some way. For the first time, I was aware that Rose was a member of the opposite sex, despite supposedly knowing that before. This was likely the cause of my bewilderment.
There was of course nothing to be bewildered about just because she was of the opposite sex. She was my precious companion, just as always. That was how it was supposed to be, but such logic didn’t help me feel any less perplexed. It was quite troubling.
After I knocked, Rose opened the door and I entered the room. There was another girl inside wearing a school uniform, with black hair that went down to her shoulders.
“Morning. You’re looking better, Katou.”
“Good morning, Senpai. Thanks to you, I’ve completely recovered now.”
Katou was sitting comfortably on the carpet in the middle of the room. There was a pile of wood carvings on the corner of the carpet. It seemed Katou had been practicing sensing the flow of mana by leaning against Rose while she created magic tools. She was trying to learn magic this way, for the time being.
“Masss—sss—ter!”
“Morning, Asarina. You’re looking good today too.”
Asarina, who usually acted docile while we were outside, stretched out from the back of my hand as Katou greeted her and played with her. I watched the charming scene play out and took a seat at the table by the window. Katou rose to her feet, patted the dust off her skirt, and then sat down on the bed.
I gestured Rose over to the chair in front of me. She looked at me from the one eye beneath her mask. I gave her a nod, and she took a seat, albeit hesitantly. Katou had the tiniest of smiles on her face as she watched Rose.
Up until now, from what I’d seen indirectly, Katou didn’t seem to be forcing herself. She had a morbid fear of men. Before Lily and I had headed to the fortress, when we were about to meet the group of students and knights on the path in the Woodlands, her condition had deteriorated sharply. Afterward, Katou had stayed behind with Rose and Gerbera.
On the day Fort Tilia was attacked, I had brought the two of them along with me to corner the double-headed wolf Berta and left Katou with the Alliance Knights. I’d heard later that she had collapsed once more while taking refuge in the Woodlands with them. She’d looked fine before we split up, but she had apparently been putting on a brave act at the time so as to not worry us. Forcing herself like that had ended up taking quite a toll on her, so she’d stayed in bed for several days following that.
I was the only man she didn’t fear or reject, perhaps because I had made an impression when I took her under my care, or because of the time we’d spent traveling together in the Woodlands. Regardless, I’d been anxious when I came to see her after hearing that she’d collapsed from being near men. I was relieved to be able to speak with her like this, even now.
I was suddenly conscious of what I was feeling. Before, I wouldn’t have acknowledged or even accepted this sense of relief. It seemed the change occurring in my heart ever since coming to Fort Tilia had taken my relationship with Katou in a good direction as well.
Just then, Katou looked over my way as she realized something. “Huh? Now that I think of it, is Kei not with you today?”
“No, she’s busy today because of the preparations for tomorrow’s departure.”
Up until yesterday, Shiran’s niece Kei would accompany me whenever I came here. We had asked her to tell us many things, things that were common knowledge in this world. We were about to set foot into the world of humanity, after all. We had allies, so things were still looking positive for the time being, but we didn’t know what could happen until we secured a stable livelihood. We needed to be as prepared as possible. The more knowledge we had, the better. It just so happened that over the last five days, I couldn’t really help out in the fortress due to my delicate position, so I had plenty of time to spare. That was why I had asked Kei to teach us in the meantime. Given tomorrow’s departure, however, Kei was busy today.
Katou’s shoulders slumped ever so slightly. “I see... That’s unfortunate.”
When Katou had collapsed the other day, the only women nearby were Shiran and Kei. Kei had helped Katou out back then, and she had also helped take care of her when she was bedridden in the fortress, so the two of them had ended up getting along well. So long as Katou feared men, having a girl like Kei around was reassuring. A natural bond had formed between Katou, Kei, and Rose. It was pleasant to watch the three of them chat.
“Oh, right,” Katou said, suddenly looking up at Rose. “Sorry, you had something you wanted to talk about with Majima-senpai, didn’t you?”
“I don’t mind waiting until after your conversation is done, Mana.”
Rose must have been waiting for us to reach a good stopping point.
“Hm? What did you want to talk about, Rose?” I said, urging her on.
“First is regarding the runestones I borrowed,” Rose replied respectfully.
“Oh? Did you figure something out?”
Rose had borrowed several runestone-based magic tools from the Alliance Knights. These were all placed on the carpet in the middle of the room. There was a canteen that created water from mana, a lighter that could create a small flame, a knight’s ring used to differentiate a human from a ghoul, a magic bag with expanded storage space and preservative effects, and a few other various tools. We had also received the unprocessed runestones we were hoping to get. These were kept in stock to make more rings for the knights. They didn’t have much value as runestones, so we had permission to fiddle with them however we liked.
“Just as you are aware, it is possible to manifest the same effects as magic by allowing mana to flow through a runestone. I had a fair amount of interest in this. I thought I would be able to create something of use to you, Master.”
I’d also thought of this myself. Even though I could manipulate mana, I couldn’t use magic. I had chosen to learn how to strengthen my body instead. I didn’t regret prioritizing my ability to avoid a crisis, but I wouldn’t complain about supplementing my strength with runestones. They were valuable goods, but if Rose could learn how to process them herself, it was a different matter. The problem was whether this was possible.
“I need to understand the structure of runestones before I can process them. I tried asking Kei, but unfortunately, she doesn’t know much about it.”
“I asked Shiran about this before too. She said runestones were created for people who couldn’t use magic in the first place, so they don’t need to know how it works to be able to use them.”
