1. Cover
2. Title Page
3. Copyright
4. Prologue
5. [CHAPTER ONE]   Temporarily Transferred
6. [CHAPTER TWO]   Consulted for Love Advice
7. [CHAPTER THREE]   Planned
8. [CHAPTER FOUR]   Contemplated Magic Power
9. [CHAPTER FIVE]   Collapsed Again
10. [CHAPTER SIX]   Hospitalized
11. [CHAPTER SEVEN]   Cornered
12. Epilogue
13. After the Epilogue…
14. [backstage]   Norbert’s Reports 2
15. Letters from Seiichirou
16. Afterword
17. Yen Newsletter

The royal castle was the residence of the king. It was a social gathering place and the cornerstone of the government. But it was also the workplace for all castle employees, including Seiichirou. Most of the work, however, was done in a building separate from the main tower, which was where the royal family lived and where guests were welcomed. Yet even in this separate building, the Accounting Department was at the far end, while His Excellency the Prime Minister’s office, to which Seiichirou had been invited, was centrally located.

“Sorry for calling you all the way here,” said the intelligent, handsome prime minister, his subtly pink-blond hair as perfectly combed as always.

He stood up from behind his desk and sat down on the sofa opposite Seiichirou. This was the seating area where the prime minister received visitors, and Seiichirou had been here many times before.

“Not a problem,” Seiichirou responded shortly, sipping a little bit of the tea that had been served to him. It was less bitter than usual.

Seiichirou didn’t like taking breaks from work, but when one was summoned by Camile Karvada, prime minister of the Romany Kingdom, you couldn’t very well ignore the invitation. Camile and his subordinates also understood Seiichirou’s nature, so recently they had begun to refrain from sending for him so unexpectedly, and had started serving him tea that was only mildly impacted by magicules. The entire reason why Seiichirou, who was merely assistant director of the Accounting Department, had such frequent opportunities to speak with the prime minister was because they were trying to keep up appearances that the “Strategy to Combat Miasma Without Requiring the Holy Maiden” Seiichirou had come up with was being carried out on the prime minister’s orders.

Ever since Seiichirou had gotten mixed up in the Holy Maiden Summoning and come to this world, he had reviewed and revised the royal palace’s sloppy accounting processes, came up with a new strategy to combat miasma without a holy maiden, and had also been attempting to implement said strategy. These were issues that Seiichirou could not tackle alone, given his position and social standing, so he had piggybacked off the names of Prime Minister Camile and Count Blanc (although he had been a viscount at the time), the adoptive father of his subordinate Norbert. Camile, who had always been opposed to the Holy Maiden Summoning, had recognized that their interests aligned and joined forces with Seiichirou. So now the kingdom itself had also begun working to bring an end to the need for the Holy Maiden purification.

Camile had even been the one to make Seiichirou a manager. Camile greatly appreciated Seiichirou’s corporate-slave mindset. There was no better term than convenient for someone who voluntarily worked even when left alone and who produced results that exceeded what was expected of them.

Both men were thoroughly rational, so they got along well.

Seiichirou was aware that Camile was using him, but Camile was also letting Seiichirou use him in exchange. And unlike Commander Indolark, who had a tendency to interfere, Camile was incredibly communicative, quick to take hints, and easy to work with, so Seiichirou took it all in stride.

So, although Seiichirou was used to being summoned to this room, he had no idea what this latest summons was about. He had already submitted the results of the second expedition, the exact calculation of expenses, and the estimate for the warden’s facility. Furthermore, the next expedition was still on hold. If this meeting was about the upcoming movement spell research, which was to replace the Holy Maiden Summoning, they were still discussing what the right balance would be with other departments. They had also issued a call to recruit personnel, but the interviews were supposed to be the following week. Had a certain sleepy-eyed sorcerer charged ahead with the research on his own?

Perhaps one of those plans had gotten pushed forward, or maybe another department or a noble had interfered… If a noble had interfered, there was very little Seiichirou could do about it, so it was likely another department. Aresh could probably keep the Third Royal Order in check, so Seiichirou guessed that one of the pencil pushers had probably complained about the draft budget or something like that.

Seiichirou tried to consider every explanation he could possibly image for the summons, but in the end, he was still caught totally by surprise.

“Oh, Sei! Welcome back! What’d you talk to the prime minister about? Oh! I mean, if it’s okay for me to hear about it.”

Seiichirou finally returned to the accounting office just before the lunch break. When Norbert saw him, he ran up to the man like a puppy who had found its master. Norbert had always acted like he was Seiichirou’s personal monitor. Seiichirou wondered for a moment whether Norbert was asking a question he already knew the answer to, but after seeing Norbert’s cheerful attitude, he dismissed the thought.

Seiichirou projected his voice as loudly as he could so that Norbert and everyone else in the Accounting Department who was secretly straining to eavesdrop could hear him.

“The day after tomorrow, I will be temporarily transferred to the church, so until that time I will be dividing up my duties and handing them over to you all.”

Somewhere at the heart of the government, where foreign bureaucrats frequently visited, the floor was covered in luxurious carpet. And pitch-black boots were trampling it.

“Prime Minister!”

Aresh shook off the guards who tried to hold him back—mostly knights of the Second Royal Order. He scowled at Camile, who sat beyond the door that had been opened by a fearful attendant. The crease between Aresh’s eyebrows was 30 percent deeper than usual.

“Commander Indolark. You’re being quite loud, don’t you think? What’s this about?”

Camile, who had been working on a document at his desk, pulled off his reading glasses and calmly gestured to the knights to have them stand down. Aresh barged in and stopped right in front of Camile’s desk, looking down at the prime minister while using the intimidating height difference to his advantage.

“This is ridiculous! What’s the big idea, assigning someone from the Accounting Department to the church?!”

In response to this question, which he had been expecting, Camile put down his pen with an unhurried—even graceful—movement, and looked back at Aresh.

“I thought I explained this all to the man in question, and he agreed to it… Was I mistaken?”

As Camile spoke, he tilted his head to look behind Aresh.

“…You weren’t mistaken,” Seiichirou, who had been dragged along by Aresh the entire way, answered with a nod.

They were formally offered seats in the lounge suite, and were served both normal tea and Seiichirou’s special tea. As Aresh inspected the tea, Seiichirou managed to catch his breath.

“I already told you this, Aresh. As I explained yesterday, the church has not submitted their income and expenditure report, so I’m being sent to investigate.”

“Yes, I heard you say that. But there’s no reason it has to be you.”

Seiichirou suppressed a sigh because this was the same back-and-forth they had repeated multiple times since the night before.

“I am the most knowledgeable about accounting, and many aspects of the church’s income and expenditures are unclear, so we may also have to restructure the administration from the ground up. That’s why we thought that it would be fastest if I went…”

Seiichirou had explained this several times, but then Aresh would give him that look that silently asked, “Have you not trained a successor yet?” and Seiichirou would avoid his eyes. If it had just been a normal investigation, another member of the Accounting Department could go, but if they were going to dredge up problematic areas and revise them on-site, it would be more time-efficient for Seiichirou to go himself.

“I was the one who decided that Seiichirou was best suited to handle this and the miasma strategy affair,” interjected Camile. He was the most powerful person in the government, but not even that authority weakened the ferocity of Aresh’s gaze.

“…The sacred relic is also stored at the church, so there are several different kinds of barrier spells there. The concentration of magicules is high. For someone like him, with no tolerance to them, this job is impossible.”

The church may have been unique in terms of its accounting, but they also used numerous spells and unique barriers to protect and worship the sacred relic, the church’s very reason for being, which made it a space rich with magicules.

“But Seiichirou went to the Demon Forest, the source of the miasma, and came back safely, didn’t he?”

“That’s…!”

That was because Aresh had carefully performed barrier spells on Seiichirou and had “trained” him slowly over time. Not even Aresh, however, was shameless enough to say that out loud.

Nor was Camile one to pass up that moment of opportunity.

“Besides, Commander Indolark,” said Camile, leaning back in his chair and crossing his legs, “your position as commander of the Third Royal Order and your marquess bloodline give you a powerful political voice. You ought to be a little more mindful of that.”

“What…?”

“I understand that you’re worried about Seiichirou, but you’re being too overt with your support. The plan to counter the miasma calls for me to give Seiichirou orders. If you act as Seiichirou’s ally so brazenly on top of that, you’re going to skew the balance of political power and provoke others’ animosity.”

If the prime minister and the commander of the Third Royal Order were to become allies, they would certainly be too powerful.

That was why Seiichirou had turned to Camile, not Aresh, for help with the miasma strategy plan. He and Aresh were too close.

The fact that they were now living together had spread as rapidly as could be imagined after Seiichirou’s dramatic exit from his previous lodgings, and Aresh acting like Seiichirou’s guardian had already become the stuff of legend among the civil officials and knights. Recently, some people had even started going out of their way to observe the pair in the dining hall. But despite this, during previous expeditions, Aresh had made it clear to all that he was going to do what Seiichirou wanted done. At this point, irrespective of the truth, the rumors had snowballed, and Camile had even heard people speculating that the members of the Third Royal Order were the yes-men of the Accounting Department, and that the knights were receiving money siphoned from the budgets.

“I’m not saying Seiichirou has to live there. What I’m saying is that he’ll commute to the church for a month. In that time, the shameful rumors about the Third Royal Order should disappear.”

“…”

After Seiichirou had been beaten up by those knights, Aresh had deliberately gone around acting as Seiichirou’s protector. Of course, it wasn’t that Aresh had no concerns about living together, or that he didn’t want to be by Seiichirou’s side.

However, even if Aresh disregarded the fact that Seiichirou was an otherworlder, Seiichirou had become too deeply entangled with the central figures of the kingdom.

Aresh just wanted to have Seiichirou where he could see him and protect him.

He hadn’t realized that those actions had directed suspicion and animosity not only toward Seiichirou but also at the Third Royal Order.

Aresh closed his eyes, as if he were letting these facts soak in, and when he opened them again, he looked at Seiichirou.

The otherworlder was so fragile that he would die if left to his own devices…

The dark circles that never disappeared, the glazed eyes, the lifeless face, the thin body…

Seiichirou was so different, so far beyond Aresh’s expectations. That was not just in regards to his waifish features, either—it included his work ethic, too.

“Aresh…,” Seiichirou said. “With the church’s cooperation, the miasma strategy and the research on movement spells will advance by leaps and bounds! There’s no reason not to make the best of this!”

Feeling Camile’s eyes also on him, Aresh sighed in resignation and then immediately sucked in a sharp breath.

That afternoon, all the departments were abuzz with the topic of the angry shouts that had been heard coming from the prime minister’s office.

Seiichirou returned to his room, toweling his hair dry. The bath in Aresh’s house was small compared to the communal bath he had used in the residence hall, but it was big enough for one person and quite lavish. When Seiichirou had first seen the hot water coming from the mouth of an animal that resembled a lion, he had wondered if it was some sort of joke, but it appeared as though the luxurious tastes of nobility were pretty much the same in this world as in his home world. When Seiichirou applied an oil that the maid Milan had suggested to his hair, then rubbed a floral-smelling soap and towel (also provided by Milan) over his body, his ragged hair and skin became positively lustrous. His colleagues in the Accounting Department had even remarked that Seiichirou smelled strangely good.

“Are you still upset?” asked Seiichirou.

Hanging the towel that he had used on a chair, Seiichirou observed the master of the house, who was reclining on Seiichirou’s sofa. Aresh had apparently taken a bath earlier, and he now wore a white shirt open at the chest and loose pants. Seiichirou slowly approached the sofa, feeling a bit out of sorts with Aresh not in his usual black getup. Examining the younger man’s features, Seiichirou saw that Aresh’s beautiful eyebrows were furrowed, and his thin lips were set in a slight frown. This look on his face, along with his clothes, accentuated his youth, and Seiichirou had to resist the urge to smile. At home, Aresh always shed his commander’s demeanor and looked totally different than he did in public, and this was especially apparent today.

“…What are you smiling at?”

Seiichirou’s grin had been noticed, but he switched to wearing an innocent expression instead.

The line between Aresh’s eyebrows deepened, but he tugged Seiichirou’s arm and pulled the other man onto his lap.

“Your hair is damp. How many times do I have to tell you to dry it thoroughly?”

“I thought I’d dried it well enough.”

“How so? You’re unbelievable…”

Aresh sighed, disappointed, then spoke, weaving together what sounded like a short song. A warm breeze blew across Seiichirou’s face. His once-damp hair was now smooth and untangled.

Magic really is an incredible and useful thing, thought Seiichirou.

But just as this thought crossed Seiichirou’s mind, he leaned his flushed body (though it was not flushed from the bath) against Aresh.

“I’m not upset,” said Aresh.

Seiichirou didn’t understand what Aresh meant at first, but then realized that Aresh was answering his previous question. Aresh sighed again as he combed his fingers through Seiichirou’s hair. It was an inconsequential thing to notice, but Aresh’s breath tickled his ear.

“Your body gets this intoxicated after just a minor wind spell. Why would you try to go to such a dangerous place…?”

Aresh seemed to already know what Seiichirou would say, so Seiichirou took advantage of this and refrained from answering.

“The church does have special wards, but the worst part is, prayer emits magic power. It’s probably the second-worst place for you to be, other than the Demon Forest.”

Since it was a church, Seiichirou had assumed that in this world of magic, what Aresh had just told him would indeed be the case, but the circumstances seemed as though they’d be worse than he’d thought.

“Well, in that case…,” Seiichirou started to say.

Turning down this job, however, was not an option for him.

“Please be thorough,” he finished.

Seiichirou swallowed Aresh’s next sigh.

Roughly 90 percent of the people in the Romany Kingdom were monotheistic and worshipped the god Abran. This would probably have sounded strange to the people of Japan, where a myriad of gods had taken root. However, this was a world in which said god occasionally delivered divine messages, so it seemed that Abran really existed, and in close proximity to humanity, at that. The main cathedral housed the pope of the Abran religion and was located elsewhere—it wasn’t the magnificent church in front of Seiichirou.

Seiichirou looked up at the white building, which was roughly thirty minutes by carriage from Romany castle, and absentmindedly calculated the cost of maintaining it.

It must be hard to clean the windows of such a tall building…

According to the documents Seiichirou had consulted, the church’s employees—or perhaps “devotees” would be more accurate—totaled around fifteen people. Even if he included the workers at the facility that housed and supported orphans (which resembled an almshouse), the number didn’t exceed twenty. Although there seemed to be monetary assistance from the locals, it probably wasn’t enough to operate such a fine church. In which case, it was reasonable to assume that a portion of its costs were being covered by an outside source. Seiichirou had checked the income and expenditures for the previous year, but unfortunately, since it had been made during a time when the Accounting Department had accepted insufficient reporting, there was no itemized list, so Seiichirou could glean nothing about what exactly the money had been used for.

As Seiichirou worked numbers on an imaginary abacus, he walked through the church gate and began to feel a suffocating sensation as well as something like humidity clinging to his skin.

“…Pheeew… Haaah…”

Seiichirou took deep breaths and relaxed.

Aresh had painstakingly applied a barrier to Seiichirou the day before. Seiichirou knew he ought to be fine.

After taking another deep breath, Seiichirou started walking again, and he saw a young, green-haired boy striking an imposing stance at the entrance. He might have been around thirteen or fourteen years old.

His features, which still looked rather childlike, were fine enough that one might even have called him pretty. His bright-green hair was on the long side, and his green eyes, framed by gorgeous eyelashes, looked at Seiichirou with hostility, hinting at the boy’s aggressive personality. Based on the black, flapping monk’s robe the boy wore over his white shirt, Seiichirou assumed he was a member of the church. And since the boy was waiting in front of the door, Seiichirou thought the boy might be his guide.

Seiichirou stopped a short distance away from the young boy, put a hand to his stomach, and gave a small bow.

“It’s nice to meet you. I’m Seiichirou Kondou, from the Royal Accounting Department. Please accept my kindest regards—”

“I want nothing to do with your regards, old man.”

Seiichirou’s eyes flew open mid-bow, and he saw the tips of the young boy’s shoes quickly disappear from his line of sight.

“What are you just standing there for? Any time I spend with you is time wasted, so hurry up.”

Seiichirou looked up and saw the boy glaring back at him from the entrance, seeming irritated. He followed, as the boy had instructed him to do (after a fashion). The boy huffed through his nose, then proceeded briskly inside.

He led Seiichirou not to a reception room, but to a modest room roughly the size of the one Seiichirou had lived in at the residence hall.

“Excuse me, I’d like to speak to the person in charge,” said Seiichirou, but the boy snickered.

“The priest is busy. He doesn’t have time to meet with someone like you.”

“Is that right? I’m sorry to hear that. Then I’d like to speak to the person in charge of your accounting.”

“Everyone’s busy. It’s impossible.”

It’s impossible?

Seiichirou wondered if the boy had decided this all on his own, but then he noticed several monks and nuns peering at him from the doorway, so that didn’t seem to be the case.

“I’ve received official orders from the royal palace, so I’ve come to investigate the church.”

If the boy was harassing Seiichirou because he didn’t like the otherworlder, that was one thing. But if he was fully aware of the circumstances surrounding this visit and persisted, his actions would be considered treason. After Seiichirou had stated his intentions, the boy scrunched up his pretty face and looked back at the monks and nuns peeking at them from the other room.

“Did you hear that?! He says he’s investigating the church like he’s so important! Civil officials from the royal palace sure are something else, huh?!”

The ridicule that followed made Seiichirou reorganize his thoughts.

He was obviously not welcome.

From their reactions, Seiichirou gathered that they were displeased with both Seiichirou himself and the royal palace’s investigation.

But this was his job.

Repeating himself would probably just add fuel to the fire, but Seiichirou was an envoy—the kingdom had officially dispatched him. Moreover, if the church did not cooperate, that would come at a price for them, too.

When Seiichirou looked around again, he noticed that all the monks and nuns he could see were quite young. Just how much did they understand about the situation?

“No one’s going to cooperate with you, so just do whatever you want until the end of your term.”

With those sharp parting words, the boy and the others left. He seemed to have been telling the truth about them not having any time to spare.

But more importantly…

“What? I can do whatever I want?”

“What are you doing here?”

At the sound of a low, carrying voice, Seiichirou looked up from the document in his hands.

Seiichirou had wandered the stone corridors and found a room that resembled a library. He had been perusing document after document, sorting out the ones of interest and copying down the information he needed. The church’s document management was sloppy. Regardless, Seiichirou had passed the time incredibly fruitfully. When he looked up, the sky was already crimson, dyeing the man’s pure-white clothes red, too.

…Huh? Pure white?

In this kingdom, the only people who wore clothes of pure white were members of the royal family and members of the church with the rank priest and above.

Which meant…

Seiichirou looked at the man’s face again.

His hair was slightly wavy, swept back, and seemed soft. His eyebrows were sharp, and his nose was well-defined. The shape of his mouth clearly communicated his resolve, and he glared at Seiichirou with intelligent eyes.

The following day, before the Light hour, Seiichirou visited the church again, and waiting for him with sharper eyes than before was the green-haired boy—Selio.

“Tch… You came.”

Sucking his teeth, Selio turned around without any regard for Seiichirou and quickly walked away. Although Seiichirou hadn’t been told to, he followed, feeling the heavy, humid magicules wash over him. He was brought to a different place than the day before, a large room that would be the right size for a conference. Selio wasn’t the only church employee, either. There were several monks, and their gazes were all fixed on Seiichirou. Seiichirou briefly thought they were going to put him on trial unofficially, but then the monks left the room so swiftly he was taken aback.

“I told you no one has time to deal with you,” Selio said mockingly.

Seiichirou thought that the church administrators themselves might be understaffed. The royal palace was relatively well-staffed, so he had assumed that it was like that for the entire kingdom, but apparently it wasn’t. He’d had this thought yesterday as well, but for an operation this large, twelve monks was not a lot.

“I see. That must be difficult.”

Prime Minister Camile had authority over government personnel, but the church, though it was under the protection of the kingdom, was an independent organization. Seiichirou couldn’t just interfere as he liked.

“It is! We’re not like you civil officials, creating unnecessary work…”

Wait, that’s my line…

“But if you had submitted your income and expenditure report, I wouldn’t have to come investigate.”

And then Seiichirou wouldn’t have had to leave his normal job and be temporarily transferred to the church, which was a very dangerous place for him. Selio, however, didn’t care a lick about what Seiichirou had to say.

“That’s your business, isn’t it? The church is an independent organization, after all. We’re not under the kingdom’s control, so who do you think you are, telling us to submit a report every year?”

As the kingdom’s official religion, the church was given preferential treatment and even subsidies—yet this was their attitude. Seiichirou had been sure that Selio was his guide because he was the accounting manager, but he had been mistaken. Most of these words would never have left the boy’s mouth if he knew even a little bit about accounting.

“…I’d like to meet the person in charge of accounting.”

“Cipriano’s not here.”

“Cip…?”

The name was difficult for Seiichirou, a Japanese person, to parse audibly. When he asked for the name again, Selio answered with a snort.

“You really came here without even knowing that?”

Seiichirou certainly didn’t know enough about the church. He had been so focused on the numbers that he had neglected any other information, which he regretted now. But even so, why would the church’s accounting manager be gone when the royal palace was conducting an investigation?

“When will he be back?”

“He went to a meeting in another town with Bishop Mateus, so he won’t be back for a while.”

Bishop Mateus again…?

Seiichirou pondered this, but Selio paid him no mind. For the rest of the morning, Selio escorted him around the church. Seiichirou was used to the royal palace as his place of work, but the inside of the church had an entirely different aesthetic. This church was probably so beautiful because it was in the royal capital. The stone interior, with its stained glass windows, decorative arches, and moldings, looked more fantastical than the interior of the royal palace. It was probably more striking to Seiichirou because he wasn’t used to it. There were statues, too, which Seiichirou suspected were portrayals of important religious figures or perhaps their god, but whenever he approached them, he felt a bit dizzy. Because they made him feel unwell, Seiichirou assumed they were genuine relics, and that it was their magicules making him feel that way. But Selio told him, “We put barriers on them to stop people from pulling pranks.”

So it’s a spell?

When it came to guiding Seiichirou around the church, Selio became talkative and proud, so they had not even finished seeing half the church by the time the bell rang. The bell indicated the start of the Fire hour as well as the start of lunch.

“We really don’t have anything to give you, you know, but since you’re an envoy from the royal palace, I guess I have no choice but to feed you.”

After a moment, Seiichirou realized he was being invited to lunch, and shook his head.

“Oh, that’s not necessary. I bring my own lunch, so don’t go to any trouble for me.”

Selio stomped away, his face bright red.

Now, lunch…and free time.

“What are you doing there?”

At the sound of that same low, carrying voice Seiichirou had heard yesterday, he looked up from the documents in his hand. Just as he had expected, a man all in white was looking at him with a domineering gaze. Seiichirou carefully put the documents on the desk, stood, and bowed.

“I’m sorry to disturb you, Priest.”

“What happened to Selio?”

“He went to lunch.”

“And what are you doing?” Siegvold asked, looking down by Seiichirou’s hands, where there lay papers, pens, and documents.

“Work.”

A vein in Siegvold’s temple twitched.

“Where are those documents from?”

“They’re not from the reference room you told me not to go into. They’re the visitor logs from the assembly room.”

“…Please get permission before moving any documents.”

“I did talk to the person who was in the assembly room, but from now on I’ll be sure to properly get permission.”

The monk in the assembly room had given Seiichirou a noncommittal response, although he had looked like he wanted to ask what Seiichirou was going to do with the logs, so Seiichirou had taken advantage of the opportunity and borrowed them. Siegvold looked at Seiichirou suspiciously after his quick answer, but his interrogation ended there.

“So, what about your lunch?” Siegvold continued.

At which point Seiichirou suddenly remembered…

“Oh… Come to think of it, I haven’t eaten yet.”

Siegvold’s brow furrowed.

“I can’t believe Selio left you behind—”

Seiichirou cut in, not wanting Siegvold to get the wrong idea.

“Oh, no, it wasn’t like that. He invited me to lunch, but I brought my own, so I declined.”

“I see. In that case, please come this way. Eating and drinking is not permitted here.”

Siegvold then led him to a courtyard with a small flower garden.

“…What is this place?”

“It’s a flower garden that was made by the Holy Maiden from two generations ago. She said flowers heal people’s hearts, and she took care of the flowers herself when she was at this church.”

“Two generations ago…”

The Holy Maiden two generations prior was recorded as being a nun from a rural area of the kingdom. So, after she had fulfilled her duty as the Holy Maiden, had she taken up residence at the church in the royal capital?

Seiichirou took in the shoots of grass, the flowers of various colors forming an arch, and in the center, the white stone statue that seemed to depict the Holy Maiden. Sadly, Seiichirou was not admiring the flowers—his mind was too preoccupied with the cost of maintaining the garden.

At any rate, the two men sat on one of the benches surrounding the courtyard and ate lunch. Siegvold showed no sign of leaving, and Seiichirou wondered if he was being monitored as he dug into the lunch that Pavel, Aresh’s chef, had made him.

“I heard that you’re an otherworlder, and that you were summoned here with the current Holy Maiden.”

After swallowing a bite of his sliced tsuhash and vegetables, Seiichirou nodded.

“Yes, that’s right.”

“I see… Truth be told, I also participated in that summoning ritual…”

And yet, the fact that they had already met once but Siegvold was only now identifying Seiichirou as an otherworlder probably meant that he had been one of those people who had been blind to everything besides Yua. In the same vein, though, if Seiichirou were asked about the summoning, he would only think, Now that you mention it, members of the church were there, too, huh…?

However, apparently, Siegvold was not like the others. He rose without a word, stood in front of Seiichirou, took a step back, then bowed with a hand over his chest. In this kingdom, that bow was the equivalent of a salute.

“Thank you for answering Abran’s call and working with the Holy Maiden to save this kingdom. I sincerely apologize for not introducing myself to you sooner.”

The priest had such beautiful features and spoke with such elegant mannerisms, it was like he had fallen out of a movie. Seiichirou nearly dropped his fork. He quickly put his lunch box to one side and got to his feet.

“Don’t be, I just got caught up in Shiraishi—I mean, in the Holy Maiden’s summoning… It was a coincidence that we came here together, and I’m an ordinary guy with no powers, so there’s no reason to thank me.”

“Nonsense. The summoning ritual was incited by the divine message of Abran. Your arrival also has meaning.”

If that were true, Seiichirou was hoping to see some comprehensive postoperative support. Seiichirou’s body did not agree with the air in this world or its spells, and initially, everyone had treated him like a parasite that had just jumped into the summoning on his own. He was tempted to file a complaint with the so-called god of this world, but seeing Siegvold’s unwavering stare, he held his tongue.

“You may not be the Holy Maiden, but that doesn’t change the fact that you’re a disciple sent by God.”

“I’m not that impressive…”

“Nonsense. It is the will of God.”

Seiichirou had never been received so well since coming to this world, but he felt somewhat uncomfortable. Perhaps this was what it was like to have responsibility thrust upon you and have everyone expect things from you. Seiichirou mentally floated the idea of asking Yua about that feeling the next time he saw her.

After that, Seiichirou couldn’t muster up the energy to finish his lunch. When he returned home, Pavel gave him a sad look and tattled to Aresh, who then lectured Seiichirou.

Papers were stacked messily on a desk. After a few minutes, Norbert glanced again at the small mirror propped up on the same desk. The way his hair was arranged above his left ear today didn’t look quite right, so he kept fiddling with it.

“Norbert! When we’re done for the day, you wanna go out for a drink?”

“Yeah, that sounds great! Let’s do it, let’s do it!”

Norbert was the son of a count and the biological son of the current king, but that latter fact was essentially a secret, and, in principle, employees at the royal palace were forbidden from using their social status as an excuse for their actions. Although not everyone abided by this rule, Norbert seemed to follow it. He was also the youngest in the department and had an easygoing personality, so everyone treated him with familiarity.

The person who had approached Norbert about drinks was a man three years his senior in the Accounting Department. This man’s family had their own peerage title, and he got along well with Norbert.

“But you haven’t made much progress with this, have you? Is it really okay for you to come out for a drink?” asked the senior, looking down at Norbert’s desk.

But Norbert smiled, looking completely unbothered.

“It’s fiiine! Sei won’t be back for a month, after all! I’ve got ages before then!”

Suddenly, a soft voice that still carried throughout the room spoke. “When did I say that was your only task?”

An immediate hush followed this… They could even hear the gentle flutter of the curtains.

Norbert forced his frozen neck to turn very slowly. Then he saw just the man he knew would be attached to the voice…the assistant director of the Accounting Department, Seiichirou Kondou, gazing at him with the ever-present dead-fish look in his eyes.

“S-S-Sei?! What are you doing here?! Aren’t you on assignment at the church?!”

“I have today off.”

“So why are you here?!”

“To see if you were slacking off.”

“Eep!” squeaked Norbert, sounding like the breath had been knocked out of him.

Seiichirou took documents off Norbert’s desk and flipped through them.

“I’m kidding. I came to do my own job,” Seiichirou said with his typical blank expression.

Norbert was relieved for a moment, but then Seiichirou continued:

“Well, part of my job is knowing what you’re doing at work.”

The blood drained from Norbert’s face again.

“B-but Assistant Director! Today’s your day off, right? Why did you come here…?” the other man from the Accounting Department fearfully asked Seiichirou, his superior.

But when Seiichirou answered, he looked as though the question had only confused him.

“Why, you ask? To do my work…?”

To Seiichirou, a day off was a day he could use to do work that had piled up, but at his own pace.

“B-but shouldn’t you rest on your day off?!”

“Then when will I do this work that’s piled up?”

Although Seiichirou had tried to delegate his work to others as much as possible, he still had too much on his plate.

Alongside his normal duties, Seiichirou was improving the kingdom’s accounting processes, working on the new miasma strategy, increasing the number of staff at the Royal Sorcery Department, and assisting with the research on summoning techniques. On top of all that, he was also on assignment at the church. It was unarguably more work than one person could handle, but practically none of it could be handed off to anyone else.

“Is it okay to tell Commander Indolark that?” asked Norbert.

“…I need to get it through your head who your boss actually is.”

“Eep!”

“But…I’m the one in charge here…,” came another voice.

Sadly, the voice of Helmut Somaria, the forty-two-year-old director of the Accounting Department, reached no one.

“Oh! Sei, you can’t eat that!”

Seiichirou had ended up doing his work as normal, and during the lunch break he had gone to get food at the dining hall, blending in with the rest of the staff from the Accounting Department. Seiichirou huffed at Norbert’s warning.

“I can’t carry on never eating things. I’m building a tolerance little by little.”

Because of Aresh’s support and Chef Pavel’s hard work, Seiichirou had been steadily improving his tolerance to magicules. He could now eat little bits of everything except extremely potent foods.

“What? Really?! Well, I’m going out for drinks today. Would you like to come, too, Sei?”

“Did you hear what I said?”

“Little by little,” Seiichirou had said. If he were to drink alcohol, he would immediately collapse. The other civil officials from the Accounting Department who were at their table were staring at Seiichirou in shock. Their superior from another world had lifeless eyes and did nothing but work; he had outstripped them professionally at the speed of light. Only Norbert could relax around him. Seiichirou was aware of this, too, of course, but he didn’t mind. As long as his relationships at his job didn’t get in the way of his work, it was fine.

“Yeah, yeah. That sucks!”

Only Norbert would say such a thing. Nevertheless, Seiichirou assumed that Norbert’s task of monitoring him must surely have concluded by now. How long was Norbert going to stay glued to his side?

“I wanted to ask about the church and stuff,” said Norbert.

“Yeah, I want to ask about that, too.”

“Huh? You do, Sei?”

Norbert’s eyes were wide. Seiichirou nodded, swallowing his sautéed tsuhash.

Seiichirou had come to the royal palace today not only for work, but also to collect information from Norbert. The only things he knew about the church were facts he had read in books. What did the church mean to this world—to this kingdom? What did the people who worked at the church mean to the royal family and citizens? Seiichirou had come to the realization that it was slightly difficult to do his work without this sort of complex information.

“Norbert, have you ever been to church?”

“Ha-ha-ha! What are you talking about, Sei?! Of course I have!”

Norbert laughed at him, but that was only to be expected in a land with an official religion, of which 90 percent of the population were followers.

Norbert explained that everyone went to church when they were six years old to be baptized. Similarly, coming-of-age ceremonies which were held at eighteen years of age took place at the church. People also held seasonal festivals and gave offerings there; the people of Romany were closer to the church than to the royal palace.

“And after all, I’m the son of a viscount— I mean, a count.”

“What does being an aristocrat have to do with it?”

Norbert explained that it was only natural for landowning aristocrats to support the churches on their lands—and for non-landowning aristocrats to support the church or the orthodox church in the royal capital.

“I see.”

Now that Norbert had mentioned it, there had been some familiar aristocratic surnames in the visitor logs Seiichirou had peeked at the day before.

“Plus, most of the official church positions are filled by aristocrats.”

“What? Really?”

“Yep. Pretty much the only people who can serve in the church are those raised in the relief house or people with a lot of magic power. Many aristocrats have a lot of magic power, so it inevitably shakes out that way.”

People with a lot of magic power were employed to serve the church because they used that magic power for prayer, rituals, and protecting the sacred relic. Seiichirou knew it was a place where he would experience discomfort. Had he just been feeling the effect of the magicules from the sacred relic’s barrier? Without Aresh’s barrier on him, Seiichirou would probably have collapsed on his first day.

Seiichirou thought back to the people who worked at the church. Some of them were certainly crude, and some of them were incredibly well-mannered. They were a mixture of commoners and aristocrats. The only person with an official position that he had met so far was Priest Siegvold. Seiichirou had gotten a strong aristocratic feeling from him before, but did that mean he was actually an aristocrat? Seiichirou wondered, What does it mean socially in this world for an aristocrat to put him or herself in the church?

“They say the job of serving Abran in the church itself is an honorable thing, but really, for aristocrats, a lot of them are in the church because they either have crazy amounts of magic power, or they’re a problem for their families, y’know?”

I see…

If an aristocrat got an official position in the church, that was one thing, but if they didn’t, there was either an issue with the person themselves or their very existence was a problem for their families. It was no wonder that aristocrats weren’t clearly identifiable in the church. Normally, it wouldn’t be strange for aristocrats to be distinguishable at a glance. However, Seiichirou didn’t know the reality of the situation yet.

Nevertheless, Norbert was able to say these things because he was fearless—or rather, because he had no tact—so they were probably his candid impressions.

After lunch, Seiichirou returned to the Accounting Department like he normally would, and Norbert asked him curiously:

“But wait—how can you come to the dining hall like normal? Wouldn’t it be bad if you ran into Commander Indolark?”

The fact that Norbert had asked such a question head-on, in such a nonchalant way, was exactly what made Norbert Norbert.

“Aresh never comes to the dining hall on his own, so it’s okay,” Seiichirou replied with a slightly smug look on his face.

Aresh only came to the dining hall to help with Seiichirou’s meals. As commander of the Third Royal Order, his meals were usually brought to his office. Norbert looked at him, amazed, and continued in much the same manner:

“Man, Sei, you’ve gotta be super scared of getting found out by Commander Indolark, huh?”

Unsurprisingly, Norbert’s workload for that afternoon increased.

“How nice. Civil officials get to rest whenever they please.”

It was Seiichirou’s third day at the church, after only one day away, and it began with that snide comment from Selio.

Seiichirou might have worked in the Accounting Department without rest, but everyone else working at the royal palace almost always took their days off. Naturally, though, this was not the case for industries of production, like farms. If you went to the markets, too, they were always open for business. When Seiichirou had asked the young boy who made his abacuses, Sigma, about this previously, Sigma had replied, “If we take days off, we’ll make less money, won’t we?” The church seemed to be open all year round as well, and even though citizens came to assist, Selio, the other monk apprentices, the monks, and the nuns all lived where they worked, so their lives and work were inextricably linked. As was the case in modern Japan, studying while working at a live-in job would make one’s days off feel a bit muddled. From his conversation with Norbert the day before, Seiichirou had gotten the sense that it was common practice for nobles to donate to the church, but he couldn’t help but wonder how the church in the royal capital had gotten into this mess.

Seiichirou contemplated this with a vague sense of discomfort, so he gave Selio a half-hearted response.

“Yeah.”

To reiterate—Seiichirou had not, in fact, rested.

“Tch! This is why I can’t stand civil officials…! Just do whatever you want!” yelled Selio, stomping away and trying very hard to make his footsteps loud, despite his the thinness of his body.

Seiichirou had scored some free time.

“You again…?”

In the study at the back of the assembly room, the now-familiar priest with chestnut hair, Siegvold, appeared, standing with his back to the sun.

“It’s always a pleasure,” Seiichirou responded.

Siegvold looked around, appearing exasperated, then looked back at Seiichirou.

“Where has Selio…? I probably don’t even need to ask anymore, do I?”

Well, it’s the same predicament we were in on the first day, so there’s probably no point asking.

Seiichirou said nothing, giving the man a slightly pained look.

“He’s a difficult child…,” said Siegvold. “His faith is very deep, but he’s too forthcoming with his emotions.”

“Well, isn’t that common for boys his age?”

Given Selio’s age, he would probably be a junior high school student or thereabouts. And if he had been raised from a young age in the closed-off world of the church, his values might have become slightly skewed.

“…Could he be doing this to get around his supervising duties…?”

As Siegvold’s purple eyes narrowed, his slightly lowered voice reminded Seiichirou of someone. Seiichirou calmly shook his head.

“Definitely not. Besides, he never seemed fond of me from the start.”

In fact, it would have been easier for Seiichirou to work without Selio’s supervision, but Seiichirou had no intention of stopping, even if Selio tried to deter him. Seiichirou was so confident he could fool the boy with his eloquence and competence that he didn’t care if the boy was there or not.

“Right… He certainly has very strong feelings toward nobles and civil officials, almost like an inferiority complex.”

If the church knew that and had still made Selio Seiichirou’s guide, they seemed to have quite some animosity toward the royal palace.

“Some of the monk apprentices are children without any relatives, and most of them are commoners, so they feel defiant toward anyone who comes from the royal palace. I’d like to get you another guide, but as this appointment came from the bishop, who is currently absent, I can’t just change it on my own.”

“No, don’t worry about it.”

Seiichirou, who had been born and raised a commoner, understood how they felt. He nodded, and just then, the lunch bell rang.

Then, for some reason, Seiichirou was in the flower garden with Siegvold again.

“The church would also prepare a meal for you, you know.”

Seiichirou had brought his own lunch, and, perhaps following his lead, Siegvold had brought something that resembled a sandwich. There was no one else in the flower garden, but it was well-maintained and bathed in gentle sunlight.

“I have allergies—there are a lot of things my body doesn’t agree with, so I bring my own lunch.”

“Things your body doesn’t agree with?”

“Yes. I don’t have any tolerance toward magicules and magic power—normal things in this world—and when I eat too much of something with a lot of magicules, it’s bad for me,” Seiichirou explained briefly.

Siegvold’s eyebrows furrowed quizzically.

“If I absorb too many magicules, I’ll be poisoned,” Seiichirou clarified.

“You’ll be…poisoned?”

“Yes. Basically, the nausea and dizziness exhaust my physical strength. Incidentally, I don’t have a tolerance to magic power, either, so healing magic—holy magic—has the opposite effect on me.”

“The opposite effect?”

“It will improve my wounds or my mood, but afterward I’ll get magic-sickness and run a fever.”

“Magic-sickness so severe you run a fever…? You’re not a baby.”

“Yeah, you’re telling me. I’m worse than a newborn, apparently.”

Aresh had told Seiichirou that if he had even the smallest injury healed, he would run a fever so high he would immediately feel dizzy, and that this reaction was worse than that of a newborn baby. Even Ciro, the medical director, had been surprised.

“I can’t believe it… You, a disciple…? But the Holy Maiden…”

“That’s because Shiraishi was officially summoned to this world as the Holy Maiden, right? Divine protection or something? Doesn’t something like that exist?”

“That’s… Yes, certainly… Divine protection…,” Siegvold said before falling silent.

I might have made a mistake, Seiichirou thought as he looked at the priest.

From what Seiichirou had seen, Siegvold was a devout believer. Until now, Seiichirou had so often been treated like the Holy Maiden’s tagalong—or rather, like a nuisance—but Siegvold had treated him politely from the beginning. This man was invaluable to Seiichirou as the first person to show him respect. But even that politeness was because he’d considered Seiichirou to have been summoned by the god he believed in. If, however, Seiichirou were a man without the divine protection of this world—a man who became gravely ill by simply breathing its air—was he really someone this world had sought out? Seiichirou didn’t have to think long about the answer—no.

Seiichirou was just an ordinary man who had gotten dragged into the Holy Maiden Summoning. His very existence was undoubtedly heretical in this world. Would this deeply religious man really treat a heretic in the same way he had treated him before? As a clergyman, would he treat Seiichirou with mercy?

No—enough of that wishful thinking.

Seiichirou steeled himself and faced Siegvold. The man’s chestnut-colored hair looked red under the soft sunlight.

Looking over Siegvold’s face again, Seiichirou noticed that his well-defined nose suited his thin lips. His face was so strikingly handsome, he even seemed a bit cold when he was silent. His eyes flicked upward, meeting Seiichirou’s.

“In other words…you’re a disciple that’s been given a trial.”

“What?”

Without thinking, Seiichirou had scrunched up his face, so he breathed and tried to regain his composure as best he could. No matter how absurd the thing Siegvold had just said was, he was still a powerful person in the church. Even though Seiichirou thought, What is this guy on about? he couldn’t show it in his expression. He tried to control the muscles of his face, but Siegvold did not stop talking.

“God’s divine discretion has brought you across worlds. Your inability to adapt to this world is nothing but a test from God. We, too, undergo trials and training to communicate God’s will to the masses and serve God. We also elevate ourselves and bring ourselves closer to God’s will.”

Siegvold’s expression was serious, and he looked intently at Seiichirou. This interaction reminded Seiichirou of whenever the enthusiastic switch of Ist—the oddball assistant director of the Royal Sorcery Department—was flipped. Seiichirou had probably flipped Siegvold’s switch by accident. As a modern Japanese man who was indifferent to religion, Seiichirou had no idea what expression he ought to make at a time like this.

For now, Seiichirou would mentally sort through Siegvold’s speech and absorb whatever he could.

“God’s divine discretion,” “We, too, undergo trials”… Seiichirou sensed respect and camaraderie in those words, not ill will. However, unless Seiichirou did something, Siegvold would paint him as a “disciple that had been given a trial.” Seiichirou had just heard some unsettling words, like training, and if he wasn’t careful, it was possible that this deeply religious priest would force him to train as a real disciple.

Looking at Siegvold now, Seiichirou felt a sense of foreboding, among other things.

“No, I’m a just a regular person who simply got dragged— I mean, who happened to come here in the Holy Maiden Summoning…”

“Of course not! Abran would never do something that has no meaning.”

Seiichirou believed that Siegvold, the other priests, and the sorcerers were the ones who had carried out the Holy Maiden Summoning, and that their god had merely shown them a divine revelation. Siegvold, however, thought differently about the matter. He believed that summoning humans from another world wasn’t a realm in which humans could tread—it was God’s domain—so they had merely been assisting God. Therefore, the Holy Maiden Summoning was God’s will, and by extension, the appearance of Seiichirou was also God’s will.

“No, really, it was just by chance that I touched Shiraishi—the Holy Maiden, I mean—when she was being summoned. It was just a coincidence…”

“Everything God does has meaning. Even things that seem accidental to our human eyes are God’s divine will.”

“…”

Seiichirou carefully scrutinized Siegvold’s words once again. All he could sense was that Siegvold felt no animosity toward him. He closed his eyes for two seconds, then replied:

“I see.”

In other words, Seiichirou adopted a stance commonly referred to as “looking the other way.”

“Whoa, he’s here again!”

As usual, Norbert arrived at work mere seconds before it was due to begin. And, upon entering the Accounting Department, his thoughts accidentally slipped from his mouth. The man Norbert was referring to looked at him with his usual glazed eyes. Then narrowed them.

“Perfect timing, Norbert. I have a task for you.”

“No! You’re kidding, right?! You heard what I said and just thought of that, didn’t you?! Or made it up, I should say! I’m sorry!!”

Clinging to Seiichirou’s cloak, a garment which indicated Seiichirou’s official position as a civil servant, Norbert somehow managed to avoid having his workload increased. Immediately forgetting the danger that had just passed, he started chatting with Seiichirou, who was working in the seat beside him like it was a matter of course.

“You’ve got another day off from the church investigation today?”

“My work schedule is the same as it was here.”

Because the church was open every day of the year, arrangements had been made to ensure that Seiichirou’s days off were the same as when he worked at the Accounting Department. The church had been informed of his schedule as well.

“And you came here to work again…? Don’t you have anything else to do, Sei?”

“What I do on my days off is my own business,” replied Seiichirou without even looking up from his papers.

“Oh? Your own business…?” Norbert asked, tilting his head, but Seiichirou did not respond.

Norbert, however, didn’t understand the concept of feeling discouraged or learning a lesson the hard way, so he continued peppering Seiichirou with questions as usual.

“That reminds me, Sei, have you been getting along with the church people?”

The way he said it sounded like an older relative asking a kid if he had made any friends at school. Seiichirou deflated momentarily, but then he remembered everyone at the church, looked at Norbert, and smiled slightly.

“…You may be an idiot, but you might be a good subordinate.”

“Huh?! Where’d that come from?! I’m blushing!”

As Norbert blushed, the other civil officials in the Accounting Department thought, Wait, he just called you an idiot in no uncertain terms, but it’s a good thing?! Norbert, however, seemed very pleased, so it was probably fine.

Seiichirou had gone to the church for three days, but Selio still flared up rudely at him, and the other monks and nuns avoided him and whispered about him. Norbert had been right—Seiichirou had caught glimpses of people who appeared to come from noble families here and there—but all of them had looked at Seiichirou, a man who had come from another world and was now working as a civil official, with extreme distaste. On the flip side, Selio and the others with commoner backgrounds seemed to dislike civil officials in general.

And then, more than anything else, Seiichirou had to deal with Priest Siegvold. Ever since that first day, Siegvold would come straight to Seiichirou whenever their eyes met. But perhaps it was more accurate to say that Seiichirou would bump into him unexpectedly wherever he went (after slipping away from Selio). One could have called the priest the caretaker of the church, so the fact that he was present was a good thing—it was proof that he was involved with the administration of the church—but unfortunately, this priest got in Seiichirou’s way.

And now that Seiichirou thought about it, no one in the Accounting Department had ever gotten in the way of his work, which reaffirmed his belief that he had been fortunate with his job. Although, technically, there had never been anyone in the department who could get in his way. They say you only realize the beauty of your birthplace after leaving it, after all. Even if Seiichirou’s real birthplace was an entirely different world…

And so, once again, Seiichirou spent his day off working diligently and enthusiastically.

However, that was not the full extent of Seiichirou’s work. He was supporting the research for a spell that could send him back to his home world, after all. Prime Minister Camile had even been taking action to secure researchers for the Royal Sorcery Department and making arrangements to increase the number of personnel, but unfortunately, because it was a highly skilled profession, he had not been able to find enough candidates. Because the members of the Sorcery Department performed spells, Seiichirou had assumed there was a sort of status associated with the department, but after seeing the reality of it firsthand, he had realized that might not be the case.

“It’s Kondou, assistant director of the Accounting Department.”

Seiichirou was on the very opposite end of the building, quite far from the Accounting Department. He knocked on the door of the Royal Sorcery Department’s laboratory, but there was no reply.

“Pardon me,” said Seiichirou, pushing the door open.

It was the middle of the day, but the lab was dimly lit. There were large desks covered and piled high with things like books, pens, and other unidentifiable objects. One object might have been some kind of dried fish. There was something hanging on the wall that looked like an animal pelt. The floor was littered, too—with both things and people. Seiichirou took care not to step on the royal sorcerers wrapped in blankets and headed toward the back, where the mess was the worst. He managed to step over what looked like a barricade of books and then called out to the bundle of blankets, who was the owner of the barricade.

“Ist. Ist! It’s Kondou. I’m here to get a progress report.”

The blankets began to stir, and then a head of pink hair, messy from sleep, popped out of the middle of them.

“Hmm? Morning already?”

“No, it’s the middle of the day. The evening Water hour, to be precise.”

The man’s sleepy eyes were even droopier than normal. This wasn’t a butterfly emerging from a cocoon—it was Ist, assistant director of the Royal Sorcery Department. As he got up, his head wobbled like he couldn’t keep it steady.

Assistant director of the Royal Sorcery Department.

As the name implied, he was the second-in-command of the department of magical research, which carried the entire kingdom on its shoulders—the number two.

Ist had the same rank as Seiichirou, and they were the same age as well. Compared to Seiichirou, whose constantly glazed eyes and dark circles gave off the impression that he was exhausted, Ist, who seemed vaguely absent-minded and childlike, did not look to be the same age as Seiichirou at all.

Moreover, the number one of the Royal Sorcery Department—the director—was a man who had obtained that position because of his aristocratic status. So in actuality, the number one sorcerer in the department was the baby-faced Ist, a man with lines from his blanket and traces of drool on his right cheek.

In this world, where magic was the norm and relevant in people’s everyday lives, the Royal Sorcery Department was the star of the government offices.

Seiichirou had been surprised the first time he had visited the Sorcery Department, which resembled a garbage dump. But he’d also felt a vague sense of nostalgia. When Seiichirou had lived in Japan, he had worked at an IT company. This lab very closely resembled the graveyard of system engineers before a delivery date. For this reason, Seiichirou regularly visited this room, which no one except members of the Sorcery Department wanted to go near.

“Oh, Kondo… Long time no see.”

“It’s only been six days. Anyway, I’d like the progress report, please.”

Ist was truly the greatest sorcerer in the kingdom, but because he poured every ounce of his brain power into magic research, there was not much else to him besides that. Incidentally, because Ist tended to drop all formalities and pauses for breath whenever he got excited, Seiichirou had jumped the gun and already told Ist that he didn’t need to be formal around him because they were the same age.

Seiichirou had entrusted Ist with researching a movement spell to get the otherworlders back to their home world, but as the one managing the budgets, Seiichirou needed regular progress reports. Seiichirou used these as a basis to allot budgets and even to put in a good word about the personnel issue. The one who had to deliver the reports, however, was Ist.

It probably would have been better if another sorcerer handled them, but the Sorcery Department had other work to do, and they couldn’t devote all their time to the research Seiichirou had requested of them—a spell to send him back home. Besides, all sorcerers were like Ist to some degree. Therefore, when Ist had complained that submitting a written progress report would be impossible, Seiichirou had thought, I bet. But Seiichirou had to be updated one way or another. He had considered having someone permanently stationed at the Sorcery Department to give him reports, but with sorcery being a specialized profession, the average person probably couldn’t understand what sorcerers were doing just by observing them. As Seiichirou had puzzled over this conundrum, Ist had suggested:

“Why don’t I talk, and you write down what I say?”

That was why Seiichirou regularly listened to and summarized Ist’s verbal reports, which often wandered from place to place and sometimes raced noisily along. A short distance away, from heaps of trash—or rather, from here and there around the lab—other sorcerers watched on.

“The otherworlder is amazing…”

“Even we sometimes have trouble understanding what Ist is saying…”

“There’s technical terms and stuff, but Ist also goes on tangents a lot and has a weird way of speaking…”

“And the otherworlder listens to him, summarizes it in his head, and writes notes, all while simultaneously using that weird ah-back-us tool thing.”

“Are all otherworlders like that?”

“The other world must be scary…”

“Probably, but I think this assistant director of Accounting is just a weird guy… Sort of like Ist…”

“““Oh!””” they all said in unison.

Despite the chatter of the sorcerers, who for some reason had come to an intense understanding about something, neither Seiichirou’s pen nor Ist’s rapid-fire talking paused for quite some time.

“…I see. I get it. It goes without saying that you need more people, but you also need funds to buy the tools that you need for the research, right?”

So they lacked people and things.

“Huh? You’re gonna buy some for me? Yay!”

“I haven’t said I’ll buy them yet. For now, I’m going to take this home and redo my preliminary calculations.”

“When? When are you gonna buy them? Tomorrow?”

“I told you, I haven’t said I’ll buy them yet. I’m going to the church tomorrow, so I can’t come here.”

“The church? Kondo, you’re going to the church? Then bring me that thing. The sacred relic.”

“That is obviously impossible.”

Selio had said there were barriers around the sacred relic, so just entering the room in which it was housed would probably put Seiichirou’s life in danger.

After their conversation, Seiichirou checked a few things, said a half-hearted good-bye to Ist, who had once again immersed himself in his research, spoke a bit with the other sorcerers, then left the lab. Seiichirou had entrusted Ist with the spell to send him home, but the Sorcery Department was also involved in monitoring the miasma barrier in the Demon Forest.

If they sleep on the floor, their bodies will start hurting and they’ll get poor-quality sleep, which will reduce their efficiency… Maybe I should have a nap room made for them or something.

Seiichirou put his own affairs on hold as he walked through the castle, pondering how the sorcerers at the Royal Sorcery Department could advance their research most effectively. Even though it was Seiichirou’s day off, he couldn’t just wander around the royal palace in his casual clothes. In his usual civil official uniform and his short, one-shoulder cloak indicating his managerial position, he looked right at home in the castle—except for his lifeless, glazed eyes.

Then he saw a girl running toward him, looking the way she always did—neither in a civil official uniform, nor a chamberlain uniform, nor even a dress.

“Kondou!”

She was the only one who called Seiichirou by his name with the correct pronunciation—the one who had dragged Seiichirou into this world, and the one who would save it—Yua Shiraishi, the Holy Maiden. She had been a high school student who lived in modern Japan without wanting for anything, but then she’d been suddenly summoned here as the Holy Maiden who was to purify the miasma of this world.

When Yua had first arrived, everyone had welcomed her warmly, and as the Holy Maiden, she had lived in the royal palace, spending her time surrounded by knights and maids and without a care in the world. However, after experiencing the purification journey, Yua had realized the dangers of this world and the perilousness of her own position and had asked to return to her home world after her mission was carried out.

“It’s been kind of a while, hasn’t it?”

At the same time, though she’d never had much interest in Seiichirou before, she now seemed to be relying on him as the only other person who was from her home world—and as her means of going home.

However…

“It has. It’s been a while since I’ve seen you, too, Prince Yurius.”

“Hmph. I don’t even want to see your face.”

Yurius, the firstborn prince of the Romany Kingdom, came up from behind Yua and responded to Seiichirou’s politeness with contempt. Yua’s former hangers-on did not approve of Seiichirou and Yua interacting, but they were only ever rude to Seiichirou, which made them even more annoying.

Seiichirou was proceeding with his plan to have a spell made to send them back home to Japan for selfish reasons, so he wished Yua would go back to not interacting with him. Unfortunately, Yua had become slightly distrustful of people and wanted to distance herself from those who had previously pampered her. From her perspective, Seiichirou, a man from her home country, was the only person she could fully trust. Yua was a sixteen-year-old girl in a different world who was feeling uneasy, so obviously Seiichirou couldn’t directly refuse her. Thanks to the punishment the knights who had beaten him before had received, along with Aresh’s watchful eye, other people didn’t harass Seiichirou. However, that protection didn’t extend to the prince currently standing in front of him. As a result, Seiichirou had to accept the Holy Maiden’s smiles and the prince’s glares and snide remarks simultaneously.

But even though Yua had become somewhat more careful, she didn’t notice Yurius’s attitude and continued talking.

“I went to the Accounting Department to see you the other day, but they said you would be gone for a while on another work assignment?”

“Yes, I’m currently on assignment at another location. Today’s my day off, so I came here,” Seiichirou answered, wishing she would stop visiting in the middle of work without any advance warning.

“Your day off? And you came to your workplace in your uniform?”

She asked the question as if it were strange, but Seiichirou didn’t understand what was so strange about it, so he nodded, his expression unchanged, as if it was a normal thing to do. Naturally, however, in a situation like this, Yua’s response was the correct one.

“Huh? I see… That sounds…tough? But if you can come here, too, that must mean you’re on assignment nearby, right?”

“Yes. It’s at the church in the royal capital.”

“What?! The church in the royal capital?! That’s where I go, too!”

“Huh? Oh, right…”

Yua’s words had jogged his memory. Yua was currently living in the royal palace while commuting to the church to assist with purification and healing magic. After going on the first purification trip, Yua had wanted to leave the royal palace, wary of the people there who had summoned her and welcomed her. But it would be difficult for a woman from another world to live on her own, and it would be catastrophic if anything happened to her. Seiichirou had jumped in to help persuade her to stay at the palace, and so now she was living in the royal palace while visiting the church during the day to broaden her horizons. And there was only one church near the royal palace that was worthy of welcoming the Holy Maiden.

“Do you like your activities at the church?”

“I do! I’m so happy there are so many things that I can do, like purifying the sick who come to pray and healing the injured! And everyone is so kind to me.”

Yua spoke energetically, as if she felt like her work at the church was more valuable than the time when she had been immersed in studies at the royal palace. Perhaps she had always been more inclined to practical application than book learning. Her reaction puzzled Seiichirou, and the faces of the members of the church floated in his mind’s eye, but then he remembered that the people at the church were probably nice to the Holy Maiden.

“Especially Selio… He’s a monk apprentice who showed me all around the church. He’s such a pretty boy! And such a good kid, too! He teaches me so much!”

“…Huh?”

“But I go to the church almost every day, and I’ve never seen you there! Isn’t that weird?”

“Well, the inside of the church is big, isn’t it? I mainly do office work, so I rarely ever go near the chapel.”

“Oh, I see. That reminds me, the relief house—”

“Yua, you’re the Holy Maiden, so you should just concentrate on your purification instead of working.”

Just as Yua had been about to say something, the heir to the most powerful person in the kingdom, neglected for the entire conversation, had interrupted her.

“Yurius… I’ve told you so many times, I want to do whatever I can to help.”

“I’ve told you, you’re the Holy Maiden, so you should only do the purificati—”

“And I’ve told you I don’t want that!” said Yua in a slightly raised voice, cutting Yurius off.

Then, looking surprised by her own reaction, she apologized, curtsied, and walked away rather quickly. Several people followed her from where they had been hiding, so it seemed as though she didn’t need to worry about guards.

Well…

Acting like he had neither seen nor heard anything, Seiichirou bowed and quickly turned to leave, but—

“Come with me for a minute.”

Seiichirou was stopped by the prince’s intimidating command. There was no way he was going to escape.

“Why…?! Why has Yua started refusing me…?!”

Seiichirou was forcibly brought to the prince’s private quarters. The room was filled with lavish yet surprisingly tasteful and subdued furnishings. The maid had brewed tea and laid out sweets, but Seiichirou couldn’t eat them, of course.

There was also a knight in front of the door wearing armor with green ornamentation—a member of the Second Royal Order, which guarded very important people—so it seemed unlikely that Seiichirou would be able to leave. He didn’t bother hiding his sigh as he got comfortable in his chair.

“Why does Yua rely on a feeble man with no powers like you, and not me? Answer me, Kondou!”

Perhaps because Prince Yurius had heard Yua call him “Kondou” more than anyone else, he addressed the otherworlder with the correct pronunciation of his name—and a heavy dose of intimidation. But even without asking, Yurius could probably figure it out if he thought about everything that had happened until that point, so what exactly did he want Seiichirou to say?

Yua would perform the purification as the Holy Maiden, but when that was finished, she wanted to return to her home world.

The kingdom wanted her to stay even after she’d finished the purification as the Holy Maiden.

Yua wanted to distance herself from those in the royal palace who had spoiled her and withheld inconvenient information from her.

The kingdom wanted to keep the Holy Maiden in the royal palace and use her diplomatically and politically as a symbol for the kingdom.

No matter which way you sliced it, reconciling these desires was impossible.

In particular, the kingdom needed a descendant of the Holy Maiden so that they could receive the divine revelation for the next Holy Maiden. Although Yua had probably not yet realized that the prince wanted to start a family with her, she seemed to have rationalized that he was trying to get closer to her because she was someone from another world. Even if she were to realize his true intentions, however, she was from a modern Japanese generation in which gender equality had proliferated, so she would probably feel extremely indignant about it.

How could Seiichirou explain this to the prince without making any waves?

Better yet, Seiichirou reasoned, the other adults around the pair didn’t harbor intense adoration for the Holy Maiden like the prince did, and they had probably recognized the prince’s feelings, so they should be the ones to gently break the news to him. Seiichirou looked around again, but none of the knights or maids met Seiichirou’s eyes. They were foisting this upon him.

“…Maybe Your Highness and Shiraishi—I mean, the Holy Maiden—have been clashing because you two have different values.”

“Values? But Yua comes from a noble family, so they’re probably not that different.”

Yua’s family had probably been wealthy, but nobility did not exist in Japan. In any event, she had come from a different world.

He’s kidding, right? He doesn’t even understand that? He needs me to explain things from that basic of a level? And everyone’s still avoiding my gaze…

“No, nobility doesn’t exist in the country we came from. It existed previously, but it has long been abolished.”

“Really? But, even so, Yua’s the Holy Maiden! It’s only proper that a Holy Maiden be treated hospitably. Lately, though, Yua’s been acting like she’s uncomfortable with that.”

That might be because she doesn’t want to be indebted to anyone, but she probably just doesn’t want anyone devoting themselves to her, Seiichirou thought as he chose bland, inoffensive words:

“…She’s probably just being modest.”

Yurius continued to complain to Seiichirou about Yua not giving him any attention, and Seiichirou continued to employ the skill characteristic of Japanese salarymen—that of being artfully evasive.

As firstborn prince of the kingdom, Yurius had very little free time himself, so after half an hour, he finally told Seiichirou to go, and released him. But just when Seiichirou thought he was finally free, he opened the door and saw a man with fierce features and a green cloak standing in his way.

Please, just let me work.

Seiichirou’s day off, it seemed, was not over yet.

In the Romany Kingdom, there were three Royal Orders of knights.

The First Royal Order was the organization that protected the country. They mostly provided defense within the borders.

The Second Royal Order protected the key figures in the kingdom—the royal family and nobles.

The Third Royal Order, with Aresh as their leader, protected the kingdom from magical beasts and invaders from outside the kingdom.

Each Royal Order was given their own color: The First Royal Order were clad in red, the Second Royal Order green, and the Third Royal Order black. Incidentally, the Royal Sorcery Department wore purple, the Legal Department wore blue, and the Accounting Department wore a subdued brown.

The green-cloaked man who had clearly been lying in wait for Seiichirou was the commander of the Second Royal Order. And Seiichirou, who had previously been deeply inconvenienced by the misconduct orchestrated by this man’s subordinate, already knew who he was. Seiichirou hoped, therefore, that the commander would forgive the slight crease that formed between his brows.

Although Seiichirou felt aggrieved on the inside, he made the appropriate bowing gesture.

“Commander Makovska. It’s been a while.”

Radim Makovska responded to Seiichirou’s politeness with a slight nod and then asked, “May I have a word?”

Seiichirou’s plan for the day had been to work in the Accounting Department in the morning and then do some research in the Royal Library in the afternoon. Yurius had already caused a massive delay in this plan, so he hoped Radim could cut him some slack.

“I’m very sorry, but I have some business to get to…”

“I won’t be long.”

If I don’t have the right to refuse, don’t even ask.

Radim brought Seiichirou to a reception room by the Knight’s Station. Seiichirou couldn’t help looking around restlessly on the way there, and Radim’s intense eyebrows dipped with concern.

“…You don’t need to worry. No knight will lay a hand on you.”

Seiichirou had previously been beaten by members of the Second and Third Royal Orders, who had called him the Holy Maiden’s tagalong and warned him to stop meddling in the kingdom’s affairs. Radim assumed, therefore, that it was only inevitable that Seiichirou would feel skittish around knights. Seiichirou, however, had much bigger concerns. This was the Knight’s Station—the place where Aresh, commander of the Third Royal Order, was very likely to be. After Seiichirou had been beaten by those knights, Aresh had healed his injuries, Seiichirou had received quite a lot of money in damages, and the Second and Third Royal Orders had owed him a favor. All of which had made budgeting and his other tasks much easier to accomplish. Seiichirou had already moved on from that incident. More importantly, Seiichirou’s current worry was whether Aresh would catch him working on his day off. Aresh was always telling Seiichirou to rest. What would Seiichirou have to suffer if Aresh found out he was coming to work on his days off…? If Seiichirou wasn’t careful, he could be confined to the house.

But, even scarier than that…Aresh might make Seiichirou take a real day off from work.

“…So…could we make this chat as brief as possible?”

“Right… Sorry.”

Radim, still assuming Seiichirou didn’t like the location because knights were around, looked apologetic as he offered Seiichirou a seat and took the one opposite.

“I wanted to talk about His Highness Yurius.”

There’s something else?

Seiichirou almost frowned at this, but then he remembered that the job of the Second Royal Order was largely to protect important people. Almost all their work had to do with the royal family. It was good the commander was so enthusiastic about his duties.

“Could you somehow act as a go-between for His Highness and the Holy Maiden?”

“I’m going home.”

“Huh?”

On his way back to the Knight’s Station, vice-commander of the Third Royal Order, Orjef Rhoda, came to a stop when he spotted a cloak in a color he very rarely saw.

“That was…”

A brown cloak signified a member of the Accounting Department. The Accounting Department was at the far end of the royal palace, and its members shouldn’t have had any business near a training center like this. Plus, the fact that the man was wearing a cloak at all meant that he had a managerial position. And speaking of Accounting Department managers, he had heard rumors that Aresh, commander of the Third Royal Order and Orjef’s own cousin, had impounded the otherworlder.

“I think his name was… Kon… Kon…ou?”

“Is something wrong with Seiichirou?” came a voice from behind him without warning.

“…!!”

Even though he was a knight, Orjef was so spooked he thought his heart was going to jump out of his mouth. He turned around and saw, as he’d expected, the familiar, handsome face he had imagined earlier.

“A-Aresh… Don’t startle me…”

Despite Orjef’s reproachful look, Aresh repeated himself, looking as unruffled as ever.

“You startled yourself. So what’s wrong with Seiichirou?”

“Seiichirou?”

Orjef tilted his head at the unfamiliar name, but when Aresh reminded him, “You just said his name,” Orjef realized that that was the otherworlder’s given name.

“Oh, just now I…”

But as Orjef started to speak, he suddenly remembered something. Aresh had always been proficient and incredible at everything, so he’d never had any interest in anything. However, he’d been doing a lot of surprising things lately, and all of them had to do with that otherworlder.

Everyone longed for the position of commander of the Third Royal Order, but Aresh had always performed its duties like they were a chore—like the honor had been forced upon him. Even with this attitude, however, he was stronger and more talented than anyone else, and as he came from a good family and was handsome to boot, no one had any room to complain. In fact, Aresh had even gained more sympathizers since assuming the position. For some reason, though, he had recently started keeping an eye on his subordinates’ movements and voluntarily doing administrative work without any reluctance. And from what Orjef had heard, it seemed that Aresh—yes, that Aresh—had even fallen in love with someone. Apparently, that was why he had started to work so hard at his job. Orjef was sure he would never forget the excitement he had felt when Aresh had first dropped hints about that.

That Aresh, who was so indifferent toward others, it was as if he had left his capacity for emotion in his mother’s womb… Orjef couldn’t believe that Aresh was capable of having special feelings for another person. Or that he would come to Orjef for advice about it! Orjef had suppressed his infinite curiosity with his knightly spirit and had patiently listened to Aresh’s story.

Although Aresh had told his story in a very matter-of-fact manner, the details had been so bittersweet that Orjef had almost instinctively writhed in agony, and recalled memories of his own childhood.

In other words…

That motivator for Aresh was something worthy of being called his first love.

Aresh had been perplexed by emotions for the first time, and Orjef had been thrilled to hear him talk about it. Orjef had avoided asking about the other party as much as he could, under the assumption that Aresh would stop coming to him for advice if he pried too heavy-handedly. Orjef did, however, investigate the people Aresh normally associated with. Obviously, he did want to know who this other person was. However, unfortunately, he hadn’t found anyone in contact with Aresh who fit the description. Other than the otherworlder.

Aresh’s behavior toward the otherworlder went well beyond any normal standards of overprotectiveness. When Aresh was around the otherworlder, he always put the other man first no matter the situation, and he constantly worried about him. To top it all off, Aresh had left his family’s home, whisked the otherworlder away, and started living with him. As soon as Orjef had heard about that, his belief had solidified…

The person on the receiving end of Aresh’s “thing” was that otherworlder.

If Aresh hadn’t come to him for advice, Orjef might never have noticed anything. In fact, there were many who saw the two men together and simply thought, Commander Indolark is surprisingly good at taking care of others! These people thought there was nothing more between Aresh and the oddball workaholic.

But when Orjef tried to look at their relationship through this platonic lens, Aresh seemed overly possessive of the otherworlder. And Commander Radim had just led that same otherworlder into the reception room… What would happen if Orjef told Aresh about this? The answer was as clear as day. Partly because they were in the middle of work, but mostly because he couldn’t imagine anything worse than the commanders of the Royal Orders fighting with one another, Orjef decided to feign ignorance.

“Well, I heard about the next expedition, and I was wondering if he would come.”

“Last time, he was forced by the higher-ups to do a preliminary inquiry for the plan to seal the miasma, but he’s so weak, he should never have gone to the Demon Forest in the first place. I will never let him go there again.”

Does Aresh have the power to decide that? Orjef wondered as he outwardly nodded in agreement. In any event, he thought it was probably prudent to get out of this area as quickly as possible.

“That reminds me, we’ve received the documents about the expedition. They’re in the office. Would you mind looking them over?”

“Sure thing.”

Aresh nodded and took a few steps forward, but then he stopped in his tracks and looked back. Orjef stood at the ready, wondering if Aresh had gotten an inkling about something. Then, Aresh—a man in the throes of his first love—looked at Orjef with a grave expression and said:

“I’m the only one who can call Seiichirou ‘Seiichirou.’ His family name is Kondou. If you’re going to address him, use that.”

Orjef agreed, feeling as if he were swallowing sand.

Meanwhile, Seiichirou had arrived at home and was greeted by their maid, Milan. As soon as he got to his room, he let out a sigh. His afternoon plans had been ruined thanks to Yurius’s complaints and Radim’s attempt to recruit him to make the prince’s love a success.

Today has been nothing but bad luck…

Seiichirou understood the kingdom’s desire to have a descendant of the Holy Maiden so that they could receive the divine revelation for the next Holy Maiden, but if the “miasma barrier” policy Seiichirou had come up with went well, they wouldn’t even need another Holy Maiden. They still didn’t know what was to come, though, or when they could expect something to happen. He understood their desire to have a backup plan. And although the prince appeared rather disconnected from reality, he did seem to have a crush on Yua. If that was something Yua reciprocated, they would need to further discuss her plans to go home, but right now, Yua wanted to keep her distance from Yurius. Yurius, not understanding this, kept trying to get closer to her, pushing her away even more in a vicious cycle. After all, if someone were to tell a high school girl from his home world, “I want your child as a backup plan, so become my wife,” Seiichirou knew they would be cut down with a single word: “Gross.”

“You seem a little tired,” commented Milan as she hung up Seiichirou’s cloak.

Seiichirou had insisted that he wanted to do as much of his chores on his own as possible, but Milan had pushed back by saying, “This is my job, after all,” and so she’d ended up looking after Seiichirou. She had realized very early on that Seiichirou yielded incredibly easily to the word job.

“No, I’m… Well, I guess I am.”

Seiichirou was many magnitudes more tired than his normal job made him.

Shaking his head, he switched his thoughts to work mode. He was doing okay collecting data at the church. They clearly viewed Seiichirou as the enemy, but their security was lax, so he wasn’t facing any difficulties in that regard. Sloppy security aside, Seiichirou was an auditor who had been officially assigned there by the kingdom, so they should have been submitting data to him. Moreover, the bishop and the accounting manager were both in another town on a business trip, but they would be getting back soon, so Seiichirou wanted to gather all the materials before then. The problem was that Seiichirou’s lack of knowledge about the political situation with regards to the church and nobility seemed to be hampering his progress.

As a member of the Accounting Department, Seiichirou only ever wanted to follow the numbers, but that didn’t seem possible with this assignment. The tendrils of the nobility wound their way into every crevice of the kingdom. Norbert had said all the powerful people in the church were nobles, and that while being sent to the church was publicly an honor, not everyone wanted to go.

When Seiichirou thought about powerful people in the church, the first person to pop into his mind was a certain priest who didn’t listen to him very much.

The priest clearly acted and carried himself in an aristocratic way, so Seiichirou’s conversation with Norbert hadn’t raised any suspicions about him. In fact, Seiichirou had suspected he was an aristocrat from the beginning. The priest seemed to have confidence in his work, and he was a thoroughly devout believer.

But among the monk apprentices the priest gave orders to, Seiichirou had caught sight of some incredibly condescending characters. They probably came from noble families, too. If they were expressing their own dissatisfaction with being in the church, Seiichirou could understand their attitudes.

To Seiichirou, a job was a job, so no matter how much he disliked the task, if he had been instructed to do it, he would have no other choice. Therefore, although he was incapable of understanding the root of their problem, he could understand how things had come to be that way.

Now that Seiichirou thought of it, he wondered if the nobles who joined the church were totally cut off from their families. He didn’t remember Siegvold offering his family name.

Milan was approaching him with a change of clothes, so he asked her this question. She had served the marquess’s family for a long time, so she knew much more about the aristocracy than Seiichirou did.

“It varies. As long as you belong to the church, you cannot receive the patronage of any one household, but some people do receive support from their parents. And some children of very respectable families are entrusted to the church for a while for etiquette apprenticeships, so they’re not completely cut off from their families.”

Now that Milan had mentioned it, Seiichirou remembered seeing a few incredibly lavish rooms when he had explored the church. Those must have been for the aristocratic children they looked after.

There was still so much Seiichirou didn’t know. He thought it would probably be best for him to check a few things with Camile, but Camile was the prime minister. He was, quite literally, the busiest man in the kingdom. While Camile could summon Seiichirou at the drop of a hat, even if Seiichirou did request a meeting, he wasn’t sure when that meeting would take place.

“Pardon me.”

The butler of the house, Valtom, knocked and entered just as Milan left.

“Aresh has returned. If you’d be so kind, would you go meet him?” Valtom asked with a perfect bow.

Seiichirou looked at the clock. It was still the Wind hour (around five in the afternoon). Aresh had come home incredibly early.

That was close…

If Seiichirou had stayed at the royal palace any longer, he would have come home later than Aresh, and Aresh would have seen Seiichirou in his official uniform.

Although Seiichirou’s blood ran cold at the thought, he went out to greet the man. Valtom had served Aresh since Aresh was a little boy, and although he was a butler, he was also like a parent to Aresh, or his stalwart ally, and the only person who could admonish him.

Valtom asking Seiichirou to go see Aresh meant that he had to do it, but Seiichirou was turning a blind eye to this for the time being. He had once wanted to ask the servants of the house what they thought he was to Aresh, but he hadn’t been able to pluck up the nerve to do it.

“Welcome home, Aresh.”

When Seiichirou greeted him from the spacious entrance hall, which looked like it belonged to a slightly upscale hotel instead of a house, Aresh’s eyes momentarily widened before he frowned.

“…What are you scheming?”

“Why the attack on my character?”

Aresh passed his cloak and bag to Milan and approached Seiichirou, looking even more suspicious.

“I’m just greeting the owner of the house. What do you take me for?”

“An over-the-top workaholic.”

This is the thanks I get for coming out to greet him… I’ll just stop doing it from now on, Seiichirou thought, but then Aresh began rubbing Seiichirou’s temple with his slender hand. His words and actions were incongruous, but overall he seemed pleased.

However, Seiichirou, who was born and raised in Japan, a country of modesty, nonchalantly distanced himself from Aresh’s touch.

“…”

The wrinkle between Aresh’s eyebrows deepened, but he couldn’t do anything more in front of Milan and Valtom. Pretending not to notice, Seiichirou tried to leave the room, but then Aresh directed his clear voice at Seiichirou’s retreating figure.

“I have the materials for the next expedition. Do you want to see them?”

“Yes, I do!” Seiichirou immediately yelped, and happily followed Aresh to his room. “We’re planning on finishing the purification during this expedition, so I suggested going with a sorcerer for the barrier as well as an architect and waiting at a nearby village, but that wasn’t accepted, huh?” Seiichirou asked aloud.

That was a shame, because it would have reduced the overall cost of the expeditions.

“We’re planning on finishing the purification, but it’s not a sure thing. We’ll have to do some checks afterward, and since there’s a shortage of sorcerers anyway, they probably couldn’t assemble enough sorcerers at one time to cast the barrier,” Aresh explained.

“So the expedition for the barrier will get rescheduled…?”

Seiichirou had revised the budget for the Royal Sorcery Department and had been able to increase it, but they hadn’t been able to hire more staff. It was quite difficult, since not everyone could become a sorcerer.

“You need a certain level of magic power to take a position with the Royal Sorcery Department, right? Are there really so few people who can meet those standards?” Seiichirou asked.

He had assumed that because this was a world where magic was commonplace, everyone could use magic, but it seemed that it varied greatly from person to person.

“In addition, if you’re going to work in the Demon Forest, you also need high magicule tolerance.”

Both magic power and one’s tolerance to magicules varied greatly based on the individual, so people who had both were akin to superheroes. That was why the knights of the Third Royal Order were so admired, and why they could walk around the royal palace like they owned the place.

“Members of the Third Royal Order have inner strength, are physically strong, and excel at magic control. Even if you have magic power, it’s useless if you can’t control it,” Aresh added.

“You mean it can go berserk or something?” Seiichirou asked, remembering the movies and cartoons he had seen when he was little where characters would lose control of their superpowers.

Aresh nodded.

“That’s right. That’s why almost all children with those tendencies are placed in the custody of the church.”

“The church…?” Now that Aresh mentioned it, Seiichirou remembered that there were barriers in every nook and cranny of the church. Moreover, aristocrats, commoners, and orphaned children all worked together there. Was this the result of the church assembling those with strong magic power and magicule tolerance, regardless of their social status? “That makes sense. I see…”

As Seiichirou looked down, deep in thought, he felt something soft touch the exposed nape of his neck.

“Aresh…”

“What?” Aresh answered while moving his fingers, which were entwined with Seiichirou’s.

Seiichirou was sitting between Aresh’s legs on the sofa—Aresh’s condition for letting him see the documents. There was no way for Seiichirou to escape. His right hand was restrained, and Aresh’s left hand moved to his inner thigh.

“Ngh…”

“I’m putting another barrier on you.”

Aresh weaved the songlike spell right beside his ear.

Seiichirou was engulfed by a gentle heat. Although he felt dazed, he looked back at Aresh with more awareness than before.

“Aresh—ngh—I’ll… I’ll do it with my mouth…”

Seiichirou had suggested this to thank him for the spell, because ingesting Aresh’s bodily fluids was the quickest and easiest method of acclimatizing his magic power—faster than just pressing their bodies together—but Aresh shook his head.

“No, it’s fine. Turn this way, instead,” Aresh said, easily repositioning Seiichirou’s body.

They were face-to-face. Seiichirou was, in other words, straddling Aresh’s hips. Naturally, he was startled and squirmed, trying to get off Aresh’s lap.

“Aresh! I’m too heavy…! Let me go…!”

“You’re not heavy at all. It’s fine, just calm down.”

There’s no way I’m not heavy! I’m a grown man!

Aresh’s arms restrained him, steady as a rock. Before long, Seiichirou grew tired and relaxed, and Aresh loosened his hold.

“Hey, what are you…?!”

Aresh untied Seiichirou’s loungewear pants, fastened only by a waistband cord, slipped his hand inside, and stroked him.

“Ahh…! I’m fine, Aresh, so you—!”

Seiichirou tried to escape Aresh’s hand by pulling his hips away. The large hand was stroking and rubbing him inside his underwear, and Seiichirou was having trouble catching his breath. Gradually, he started hearing a wet sound coming from the lower half of his body.

“Ahh…”

Schlick.

Just when Seiichirou thought he heard Aresh’s low voice, thick with desire, he also felt his cock being pulled out of his pants, and then another kind of heat, not Aresh’s hand, rubbing against it.

“…?! A-Aresh… Ah!”

Eyes wide, Seiichirou saw Aresh stroking both of their cocks at the same time with his big hand. Even if Seiichirou tried to escape, though, he was too drained from magic-sickness, and he was no match for Aresh when it came to physical strength anyway. He tried to persuade Aresh against this while pulling his hips away with all the strength he could muster.

“…! A-A-Aresh…! P-please… Ngh! Please let me use my mouth!”

“No.”

Hearing the heat in Aresh’s voice, Seiichirou looked up. Then he regretted doing so.

Aresh’s face was mere inches from Seiichirou’s, and Seiichirou saw that the beautiful young man’s cheeks were flushed, and that his violet eyes were filled with desire and looking right at Seiichirou.

“A-Aresh…! I c-can’t… This is…too embarrassing…!”

“Hahh… That mouth of yours talks a lot…,” Aresh muttered, breathing hotly against Seiichirou’s skin and nipping at his talkative mouth.

“Mnn… Ngh… Ah… Mmm!”

“Hahh… Ngh…”

Embarrassing wet sounds came from above and below, and Seiichirou had no choice but to cling to Aresh.

When Seiichirou awoke the next day, he found himself, as expected, in Aresh’s arms. He had already grown so used to waking up with Aresh’s body wrapped around his—that body that had touched him so much the day before—that he might have even gained a sense of security from it.

No, no, no! Seiichirou admonished himself when his thoughts began to stray in that direction. He shook his head.

There’s no point in getting used to this.

As one might expect of such a young commander from the most celebrated Royal Order, Aresh was very intelligent. He was a quick learner, and very perceptive. And it was clear that he was making use of a certain facet of Seiichirou’s personality… It wasn’t that Seiichirou was easily influenced, but he hated wastefulness, so he was quite adaptable in the sense of wanting to efficiently achieve the best results possible from any given situation. Because of that, Aresh was a formidable opponent.

However, this was not the sort of thing Seiichirou ought to accept in the name of efficiency. Even someone like Seiichirou had that much of a conscience.

“…Mm… You’re up…”

Just as Seiichirou was counting prime numbers in his head to calm himself down, a languid, beautiful voice, even lower than usual, came from overhead.

“Oh… Good morning,” Seiichirou said—a conditioned reflex.

Aresh smiled slightly, and he gave Seiichirou a kiss instead of a reply.

Due to Seiichirou’s negligence, that morning had been perfectly choreographed as one between lovers. Inside a carriage headed to the church, Seiichirou barely stopped himself from putting his head in his hands. He sighed.

He had to get a grip. The next purification expedition would be in six days. There was no definitive proof that it was going to be the last. Therefore, Seiichirou had drawn up a budget for a backup expedition and had also submitted a draft budget for the barrier warden’s building, for after the purification was complete.

The problems they faced were gathering the personnel to create the barrier and choosing the wardens. The Third Royal Order would be accompanying them on the expedition, and so, as this was a different matter from their original duties, it would have been unwise to use them for anything more than that. Well, Seiichirou actually would have liked their help, even if only with barrier techniques, and if Seiichirou asked Aresh, he probably wouldn’t refuse. But Seiichirou was always asking Aresh, and by extension, the Third Royal Order, for things, so there was concern that the balance of power in the royal palace would be affected. That was partly why Seiichirou had been temporarily transferred to the church—Camile was probably telling him in a roundabout way to find someone else to rely on, outside the Third Royal Order.

However, since both tasks they needed to carry out depended on people having the necessary innate constitutions, they weren’t attracting many applicants.

Working at the royal palace wasn’t limited to nobles. The Sorcery Department in particular was a collection of people with special skills, so there were many non-aristocrats. Even Assistant Director Ist was the third son of a merchant family. But you had to have a basic education to handle magic in the first place. Anyone who couldn’t read was out of the question. Additionally, if you were to work in the royal palace, you had to have a certain level of etiquette. For these reasons, commoners wishing to be sorcerers must have either discovered their magical ability at an early age or enrolled in a magic school, and these schools were only attended by children whose families could afford it. This naturally narrowed down the number of eligible candidates. On top of that, people with magic ability were in great demand across all professions. Although working at the royal palace was an honor, a sorcerer could make better money working for a noble family. Moreover, until recently, the Royal Orders had applied so much pressure to the Accounting Department that the Sorcery Department hadn’t had enough funds to conduct their research, so it was understandable that not many people wanted to take on the job.

Seiichirou wanted to secure six barrier wardens to work in shifts. They couldn’t take six people from the Royal Sorcery Department, so they desperately needed new personnel.

As Seiichirou considered this, the carriage arrived at his destination. The driver informed him of this, and Seiichirou disembarked. Looking up once again at the white stone building, so different from the surrounding brick ones, Seiichirou pondered…

In the custody of the church, huh?

“Tch. Here again today, nuisance?”

Seiichirou, who had gotten used to hearing the boy’s tongue-clicking the moment they saw each other, returned the greeting:

“Good morning, Selio. You look as busy as ever today.”

Selio’s bright-green eyelashes moved up and down as he blinked. When he was with Seiichirou, his face was set in a perpetual scowl, and as usual, he began to raise his voice.

“It’s because you’re here! I am busy, but because of you, I can’t work!”

The work done by the members of the church, including Selio and the other monk apprentices, was very diverse. They cleaned the massive church, welcomed civilians who came to worship, helped with the relief house, did their normal studies, and assisted with events organized by the church.

Seiichirou didn’t mind being left to his own devices, but because he had repeatedly wandered around on his own and looked at documents without permission, even Selio seemed intent on keeping an eye on him. With Selio glaring at him in the same room, Seiichirou decided that for now, he would summarize the data he had copied thus far.

But that didn’t even last an hour.

Selio had been doing some of his own work while keeping an eye on Seiichirou when suddenly, a man who looked about twenty years old and who was wearing a monk’s robe barged in without knocking and haughtily said:

“Hey, Selio! What are you doing? What happened to helping out at the relief house?”

“Huh…? Oh, I’m keeping an eye on this guy today, so I asked to have my shift covered…”

Selio looked puzzled, but the other man glanced at Seiichirou and snorted.

“You can leave a guy like that on his own. He’s just the otherworlder tagalong who can’t do anything anyway. Besides, you guys help out at the relief house, remember? Don’t blow it off.”

Seiichirou watched these events unfold, wondering if the young man’s clear distinction between himself and “you guys” meant that he was one of the rumored monks of noble birth. Even Selio, who always acted in a menacing way toward Seiichirou, didn’t seem to be in a position where he could talk back to this fellow. Although Selio glanced repeatedly at Seiichirou, who was bewildered, he agreed and left the room.

The other man also left, but not before spitting at Seiichirou, “Don’t step a toe out of line, you pleb otherworlder!”

“…So now you’re here?” Siegvold asked, massaging his temples.

“Yes,” Seiichirou replied humorlessly.

Seiichirou had not been sitting quietly where he was supposed to be, of course, and Siegvold had discovered him in the church library.

“Gracious… Those good-for-nothings. I’m going to call for Selio, so please go back to your room.”

“Oh, in that case,” said Seiichirou, who didn’t think he was included in the “good-for-nothings” group, “please let me go with you to the relief house.”

“…Why?”

Seiichirou hadn’t expected to be asked this. He tilted his head as he answered.

“The relief house is also under the jurisdiction of the church, so it’s part of the investigation. I’ve only seen it from a distance thus far, so I thought this might be an opportune time to visit.”

Seiichirou had been tasked with verifying the church’s income and expenditures. As such, he had to understand all expenses incurred within the church.

“Besides, if I go to the relief house, Selio can carry out his duty to attend me while still helping out there. Wouldn’t that be more efficient?”

“Efficient… Well…it would be.”

Siegvold looked at him grimly but agreed, so they set out for the relief house at once.

The relief house was situated beside the church, and until then Seiichirou had only seen it from far away, but he had seen children around it, ranging from toddlers to youngsters around Selio’s age.

“According to the documents I’ve seen, you currently have twenty-eight children, correct?”

“Where did you see documents regarding the relief house…? Were they from the reference room on your first day here?”

“Yes, well… Do you have any rules for when children graduate from the house?”

“Are you so unapologetic because you’re a civil official? Or is that just your personality?”

Siegvold had lowered his voice somewhat, but Seiichirou pretended not to notice this as he asked his next question.

“I get that a lot, so it’s probably just my personality. You do have an age limit for graduation, correct?”

Siegvold nodded with a disappointed look on his face.

“…That’s right. Children are cared for at the relief house until they turn twelve, upon which they are baptized and become monk apprentices or take a live-in job in town.”

So those who appeared to be twelve years old or older were monk apprentices.

“I see. Where do these kids find work?”

“Disciple, with all due respect, perhaps you should conduct yourself more like a disciple of Abran…”

“I’m not a disciple. So where do the children with no relatives find employment?” asked Seiichirou, pressing forward and ignoring Siegvold’s clear displeasure.

In the first place, the idea of Seiichirou being a disciple of Abran was something Siegvold had come up with on his own.

“Children without any relatives mainly find employment as apprentices to craftsmen. If they train and acquire a skill, they won’t struggle to earn their keep.”

“Craftsmen?”

Sigma, the boy Seiichirou had met at the market, had said the same thing, so this was probably a widely held belief in the kingdom. But…craftsmen?

“I heard there are many children here who possess a lot of magic power. Aren’t there jobs where they could make use of that?”

In the blink of an eye—

Siegvold’s violet eyes became even more vibrant.

“…?!”

Seiichirou’s body stiffened at the surge of magic power, even though he had a barrier on him.

“I don’t know what you’ve heard, or where you heard it…”

Siegvold’s handsome face had lost its color. Only his violet eyes seemed to be shining brightly.

“…but many of these children have become unable to stay with their parents because they couldn’t control their magic power. Here, we teach them that control so that they can live normal lives.”

They were in the custody of the church to prevent their magic power from going berserk…

Aresh had also told him about that the night before.

It probably would have been dangerous to leave a child who might lose control of their magic power at their parents’ house.

But to say that the children have become “unable to stay” there…?

It made it sound as if these children had caused problems, and that their families had had no choice but to place them in the custody of the church… It was a strangely specific way of phrasing it.

Sensing that it would be unwise to prod Siegvold further on the matter, Seiichirou quickly pivoted.

“…Is that right? Well, could you tell me about the activities that go on in the relief house?”

“You’d better ask Selio about that,” Siegvold replied, imitating Seiichirou and reverting to the conversation’s previous tone. He must have retracted his magic power as well, because it became easier for Seiichirou to breathe. “…Ah, he’s spotted us.”

The boy with bright-green hair broke apart from the crowd and ran up to them. He immediately started shouting.

“You! What’d you come all the way here for?!”

Seiichirou replied, completely unbothered by this:

“You’re my guide and supervisor, but you said you also had to work at the relief house, so I thought it would be best if I came to the relief house so you could do both at once.”

“W-well…”

“Wasn’t Fredrik supposed to be on duty today? Goodness… If he does that again, you tell me.”

“Yes, sir…,” Selio replied quietly to Siegvold’s scolding.

He can’t do that, Seiichirou thought, looking at the boy. It was clear to him that if Selio tattled about something like that, it would only make the situation worse for him. This Fredrik, who seemed to come from a noble family, was obviously very prideful, and from the looks of Selio, what had happened was probably a regular occurrence. Siegvold was probably also from a noble family, but of a different kind.

Siegvold reminded Seiichirou to rein in his independent wanderings and remember his position as a disciple, then returned to the church.

The moment Siegvold disappeared, Selio scowled at Seiichirou.

“Why did you come to the relief house?! This isn’t a place for someone like you!”

“Why…? Didn’t I just explain to you why I came here?”

According to Seiichirou, it was so Selio could do both of his jobs at once. (That was the pretext, at least—Seiichirou had actually come to investigate the relief house.)

“I heard you, but you were lying.”

Seiichirou blinked, surprised that Selio had called him out.

“It wasn’t a—”

“It was a lie! Because someone like you—a civil official like you—would never come here! You might be an otherworlder, but you’re not like the Holy Mai—”

“Oh, is that you, Kondou?!”

Selio’s belligerent shouts were cut off by the Holy Maiden’s cheerful voice.

Yua rushed up to him and, perhaps because Seiichirou was seeing her under bright sunlight or perhaps because she was wearing simpler clothes than he’d seen her wear at the castle, she looked like she would have in Japan—like a cheerful young girl you might find anywhere.

“So you really do come to the church, Kondou!”

Yua ran right up to him, her whole face lit up in a friendly smile. She didn’t look out of breath in the slightest. Seiichirou smiled back weakly, once again feeling envious of her youth.

“Didn’t I already tell you that?”

“But I couldn’t find you, even when I went looking for you! What’s going on? I thought you said you didn’t ever come this way?”

“Just doing a little investigating. What are you doing here, Shiraishi?”

Seiichirou had heard that Yua was working at the church to use her power of purification as well as her healing magic, so why was she at the relief house, and not the chapel or the treatment room?

“Oh, lately I’ve been helping out at the relief house, too.”

Why…?

Seiichirou just managed to stop himself from frowning in confusion.

Why do another job when you are needed elsewhere and have a unique power as the Holy Maiden? Don’t you know the phrase “being just the right person for the job”? Other people can help out at the relief house, but only the Holy Maiden can perform purification—do you understand that?

These thoughts crossed Seiichirou’s mind, but then he remembered that this girl was not yet an adult and had no obligation to work, so he bit back his questions.

“…Is that right?”

“Yes! Oh, but at this relief house—”

Just as Yua started to say something, a pale hand was suddenly thrust between the two of them.

“W-wait!”

““…?””

Both of their dark-brown eyes fell on the head topped with bright-green hair.

“Y-you two don’t get along, right…?”

“Huh?”

“What?”

Again mirroring each other, Seiichirou and Yua tilted their heads and looked at one another. Seeing this, Selio’s heavily lashed eyes widened, and he froze.

Whatever Selio thought, the truth of the matter was that Seiichirou and Yua had never once been on bad terms.

Seiichirou did think Yua was a pain, but he didn’t hate her. And Yua, for her part, had been so excited when she had first arrived in this world that she had slightly neglected Seiichirou, but she didn’t hate him, either. Plus, as of now, Yua could even be said to be attached to Seiichirou, as an adult from her home world who she could rely on. And as long as Yua listened to him and didn’t act out unnecessarily, the Holy Maiden was a great asset to Seiichirou, so he welcomed her acquaintanceship.

They had therefore never been on bad terms or at odds with one another for as long as they had known each other. When Selio heard this, however, his face turned stark white.

“What…? B-but… But…this guy’s diminishing the power of the Holy Maiden…”

Selio was probably referring to Seiichirou’s plan to cast a barrier in the Demon Forest and abolish the Holy Maiden system.

“Huh? Why would that make Kondou and I not get along?”

Yua—the Holy Maiden in question—looked at the flustered boy, her honest eyes surprised.

“Why? I mean, then the Holy Maiden would be insignificant…”

“Yeah, I’d be thrilled if I became insignificant! Because then I could go back to my home world!”

This time, Selio froze completely.

Now Seiichirou understood… Everyone in the church viewed him as an enemy because he was trying to eliminate the significance of the Holy Maiden, who was also an object of their religious faith. They saw him as an enemy of the Holy Maiden. Seiichirou had thought that it was strange for them to butt heads with a civil official who had come from the royal palace, but now he understood. As Seiichirou accepted this, he gave Yua a reminder, just in case.

“Shiraishi, even if the barrier is successful, you won’t be able to go home right away, you know.”

“Oh, I know that! The spell to send us back has to be completed first, right? Once the purification is finished, I’ll work really hard to help with that, too!” she said, balling her small hands into fists.

Looking at her, Seiichirou wondered if letting her meet Ist would be a good thing. Yua tended to get tunnel-visioned once her mind was made up on something (although not nearly as badly as Ist). Seiichirou couldn’t help feeling that if he let the two of them meet, it would cause an unpleasant chemical reaction. Then again, he would worry about that later—he had to do what he’d come here to do.

“Do you come to the relief house often, Shiraishi?”

“Huh? No. Today is only my fourth time here.”

Apparently, she had developed an interest in the place after meeting orphans who had come to the chapel to see the Holy Maiden.

“Oh, and at this relief house…”

Seiichirou remembered that she had just been about to say something like this a moment ago.

They probably wouldn’t have shown the Holy Maiden any of the unsavory aspects of the relief house, but conversely, perhaps they had revealed secrets about the place precisely because she was the Holy Maiden. Seiichirou urged her to continue.

“Yes? What is it?”

“The children don’t receive any education at all!”

“…What?”

Yua’s face flushed with agitation, and she continued.

“They don’t even let them go to school! They just help at the relief house every day! I don’t think it’s very good for their futures!”

According to Yua, the older children looked after the younger children and lived communally, doing cleaning, laundry, and cooking all day long, and except for the help of a few of the apprentice monks like Selio and some of the women from town, they did almost everything themselves.

“…Shiraishi—” Seiichirou began, but Yua stopped him, shaking her head.

“I know that not everyone can go to school.”

She was able to understand that much, at least.

“But just because they are orphans, they don’t get the opportunity to learn, and they work nonstop from such a young age… I feel so sorry for them…”

Seiichirou even knew of children from town who still had their mothers, but because their fathers had died, they’d worked from a young age and never attended school. There were tons of kids like that in the downtown area. That was just the way this kingdom—and this world—was. It wasn’t appropriate to compare it to modern Japan.

However, Seiichirou could agree with one part of the sentiment Yua wanted to express:

The children lacked the freedom to choose their own professions.

That was the point that weighed heavily on Seiichirou’s mind.

It was a waste. Losing out on such talented and capable people because of their birth or upbringing was a blow to the whole kingdom. Sigma was certainly talented, and the magic power the children at the relief house possessed was very valuable.

“That’s why I just wondered if there was anything I could do…,” Yua continued.

As the Holy Maiden, there’s a million other things you ought to be doing first, Seiichirou thought, but then he heard Selio’s voice.

“You’re really nice, Your Holiness…but that’s not possible.”

Looking back, he saw that Selio had finally become un-petrified, and that his lovely face was frowning.

“At the relief house, we don’t have enough time or money to do anything like that. We even have to do our own laundry and cleaning.”

“But…Selio,” Yua protested, “didn’t you have a job you wanted to do when you were little?”

“Well, I…”

“The little kids at the relief house tell me, you know, ‘When I grow up, I want to be a sorcerer at the castle!’ or ‘I want to be a knight!’ I just don’t think it’s right that in this world, their dreams can’t come true just because of the circumstances of their birth or upbringing.”

“The world Your Holiness is from…must have been a very peaceful world…”

“The world I came from also had war, discrimination, and even relief houses. But if you studied and worked hard, your dreams could come true just like everyone else’s. I want that to be the case for the people here, too.”

“It’s impossible, but…”

Selio’s eyes welled with tears.

“It would be impossible to change everything all at once, but it’s worth considering, isn’t it?” Yua asked.

As Seiichirou hastily scribbled something with his magic-ink pen onto the piece of paper he had been holding, he lowered his gaze and said:

“It would be difficult to establish an educational operation all in one go, but there could be a way of opening something like a private school for children who can’t attend a formal school. By putting the schools in churches, we can easily spread them to each city, elevate the public’s confidence in the church, and increase the number of worshippers. And this part may be wishful thinking, but with a greater vested interest from citizens, public aid to the church might increase as well.”

“Wh-what?! There’s no way things would go that smoothly…!”

“Wow, that’s amazing! It’ll be like an open-air classroom!”

“Y-Your Holiness…! What about the school supplies?! How many people do you think stay at this relief house alone?! You guys can’t prepare materials for that many people! Besides, what about the work at the relief house?!”

“Even if we don’t have enough for everyone, we can cut down considerably on the amount we need by using a shift system.”

“Sh-shift system…?”

Seiichirou showed Selio the note he had just written.

“Divide the children at the relief house into three groups, like this. On Fire day, group one takes classes, and groups two and three work. On the next day, Water day, group two takes classes, and groups one and three work. You could all manage with that kind of setup, couldn’t you?”

In this world, weeks were divided into six days. Two days a week would probably be enough for learning, even more so if the children weren’t used to studying in the first place. And if the students took turns using shared educational materials, they would only need one-third of the materials.

“As for the subjects, I think it would be a good idea to focus on teaching them basic reading, writing, and arithmetic.”

“Huh? But for a lot of jobs…”

“It’s impossible to improve rapidly in all areas. Even just being able to read, write, and do arithmetic will be very helpful for when they’re in town, and will expand the range of occupations available to them. Plus, if they discover a particular talent, they can go on to study at a real school.”

A scholarship system would be good to have, too. It would probably be a good idea for the royal family to finance it to help bright children go on to higher education, Seiichirou thought. If they cultivate brilliant workers, these children will later come work at the royal palace to return the favor. It’s preemptive recruitment—or is it more like grooming? But since this idea involves personnel recruitment, it would probably be a good idea to run it by Camile, too. I’m sure he’d be all for it.

“W-wait a minute! You can’t just make that decision…!”

“Well, now that that’s decided, I’ll have to identify all the children at the relief house and then consider appropriate age groupings. I’ll lay the groundwork for this at the royal palace afterward. What are you wasting time here for, Selio? You’re busy, so hop to it.”

“Y-you… I hate you so much!!”

Unfortunately, Selio’s heartfelt shout wasn’t even perceived by the Holy Maiden whom he admired so much, much less by Seiichirou.

The windowless room was blue, all the furniture was the same polished, dark-brown color, and the atmosphere was somewhat solemn. Seiichirou sat on the leather chair offered to him, in front of the antique table, with a few words of thanks.

“It’s been a while, hasn’t it, Seiichirou?”

Across from Seiichirou sat the most powerful man in the government, Prime Minister Camile Karvada. The handsome, older man had his pink-blond hair combed back. He leaned back in his chair, softening the gaze in his gray-blue eyes that glimmered with expansive intelligence and shrewdness.

Because Prime Minister Camile was a very busy man, Seiichirou had not seen him since the day he had last been in this room with Aresh, after he had received instructions on his temporary reassignment. Seiichirou had a heap of reports and questions for Camile, but he was forced to prioritize either Camile’s busy schedule or acquiring reliable and detailed information.

“I am very pleased to see you in good health, Your Excellency Prime Minister Karvada.”

Camile huffed a laugh through his nose.

“You don’t have to be so formal. You and I have a relationship, don’t we?”

The question was heavy with undertones, immediately flipping the rather academic atmosphere into one laced with salaciousness, but the relationship between Camile and Seiichirou was simply that of an incredibly distinguished man from another department and a middle manager—there was no private relationship to speak of. If anything, considering Seiichirou’s current work as well as the work they were doing to abolish the Holy Maiden Summoning, he would call them “accomplices.”

“I appreciate that. Now, shall I begin my report?” asked Seiichirou, trying to forestall any idle chatter.

Camile nodded, looking satisfied by Seiichirou’s reply, and urged him to continue.

“First of all, I would like to apologize for not having been able to compile a report with specific figures, because I have not yet managed to grasp the situation fully.”

“Yes, that’s fine. The bishop and accounting manager are currently absent, right?”

“Correct. For some reason, they are out on a business trip during the time they were warned a civil official would be coming from the royal palace to conduct an investigation.”

“I have arranged for them to return the day after tomorrow. But wasn’t their absence rather in your favor, Seiichirou?”

“That’s true. It was very easy to do research.”

Under normal circumstances, the accounting manager would have showed Seiichirou around as he conducted his investigation, but if the manager was absent…Seiichirou had really had no choice but to look around for himself.

“Your report is fine as it is. Let me hear what you think.”

“I cannot present you with any data, so I am reluctant to say this, but…there seems to be a discrepancy between the rank and number of aristocrats who have visited for worship, and the church’s donations.”

“Embezzlement?”

“I haven’t been able to consolidate the church’s internal operating expenses yet, so I can’t say for certain.”

Seiichirou had jotted down the names and numbers of worshippers in the chapel. He had identified the nobles among them and then calculated their estimated donations based on the information Norbert had given him, but from these calculations, it seemed to Seiichirou that the church should have more than enough to cover their operating expenses.

“Hmm… Do you have any idea how they’re spending it?”

“I don’t… But the relief house, the apprentice monks, and the priest aren’t involved, at least.”

“The priest…,” said Camile, his refined eyebrows twitching upward. “Oh, Priest Siegvold?”

“Do you know him?”

“Yes, he’s famous. Because of his social standing, certainly, but largely because of the amount of magic power he possesses and his good looks. But on the other hand, that sort of religious devotion is hard to come by in aristocratic circles.”

It was just as Seiichirou had predicted—even among nobles, Siegvold’s family was of the upper echelons. And despite his appearance, his expansive magic power seemed to be in demand, even among aristocrats. This made the life path of the children in the church even more puzzling.

“That’s right, your world didn’t have any magic, did it? Magic power is used for spells and magic tools—it’s a valuable source of energy—but it’s difficult to handle. It requires specialized knowledge and skills. That’s why children born with too much magic power train in the church to reduce the amount of magic power they have.”

“Reduce…their magic power?”

Whenever Seiichirou heard the phrase “a dangerous source of energy,” nuclear power always came to mind. It could produce a steady, massive supply of energy without emitting carbon dioxide, but it was also accompanied by a level of danger. Tempting propositions always came with risk.

Even so, was it possible to reduce the amount of magic power one already possessed? The fact that Camile had said this with such a serious expression suggested this was common knowledge in the kingdom.

“Speaking of which, how’s your resistance to magic and magicules coming along?”

Seiichirou not only possessed no magic, but he also had no tolerance to it, so even the most trivial spell caused his body to overheat, and absorbing too many magicules made his body weak.

“Fortunately, it is improving, albeit slowly.”

Because Aresh regularly cast weak spells on him, and because Seiichirou continued to eat foods containing low amounts of magicules, his tolerance was growing, bit by bit.

“That is very fortunate. However, you seem to have reined in a fellow who’s reputed to be as difficult to handle as Priest Siegvold,” said Camile, stifling a chuckle.

Seiichirou’s eyebrow twitched slightly. He exhaled.

“Rein in… You’re speaking of someone as if they were a horse…”

“Right, he’s more of a beast than a horse, isn’t he? They don’t say this in high society, but apparently, amongst the knights he’s called the ‘Black Beast.’ In which case, I suppose you’d be his chains, not his reins, eh?”

“Your Excellency…,” Seiichirou started to say in a defeated voice, unsure how to respond.

Camile’s eyes softened with amusement, but then his expression suddenly became serious once more and he continued:

“It’s no joke. Whatever your feelings are, you’ve become his chains. Unlike the Priest Siegvold’s chains, you are real, you can be touched, and you are vulnerable to boot. I’ll try to look out for you as much as I can, but you can never be too careful.”

So other people had finally noticed Aresh’s attachment to Seiichirou. Previously, regardless of what happened around him, Aresh had never shown much of a reaction and had only behaved as though it was all a waste of his time. The only thing that had elicited a reaction from him was this tired man without any powers who had come from another world as the Holy’s Maiden’s tagalong. Seiichirou had been working hard to carve out a position for himself, but he couldn’t help feeling as though he had been trying too hard—prioritizing it even over his work—and that he had mistaken the means for the ends. Camile had even temporarily transferred Seiichirou to the church to show him that he stood distinct from Aresh.

“I appreciate your concern.”

“Well, please be careful… Now, pivoting a bit, I hear you’d like to open private schools in the churches for the masses?”

“No, it’s nothing that ambitious.”

Children—primarily orphans—would be taught reading, writing, and arithmetic at the church by volunteers. That was it.

“As for the advantages of this plan, it would improve the church’s image, which would in turn improve the image of aristocrats who donate to the church. It would also attract more worshippers and probably make it easier to increase the public’s affinity for the church.”

With that, they might even be able to expect the townsfolk to provide aid for the church’s activities.

“Moreover, if people can read, write, and do arithmetic, it will expand their employment opportunities, curb crime, and increase the standard of living for ordinary people. The kingdom could even subsidize sending the brightest children to schools.”

As Seiichirou listed off all these benefits, Camile propped his elbow on the armrest of his chair and leaned his cheek against his hand.

“You are truly a brilliant man, but you’re going to go poking your nose into education, too?”

“I’m not going to be that pushy about it. It was the Holy Maiden’s idea in the first place. I just helped fill in the details.”

“The Holy Maiden, huh? She probably thought of the idea after seeing the children at the relief house. Even the children of aristocrats get that way sometimes.”

Camile went on to explain that there had been calls to reform the education system and the social hierarchy, but the reason these calls had never moved forward was because they cost money.

“My subordinates are currently putting together estimates of the proposal’s positive economic effects. We’ll be submitting that within the next few days for your consideration.”

“Ah, so that’s where your specialty comes in? …I’d like to ask you a question.”

“Of course.”

Camile leaned forward off the backrest of his chair, his blue-gray eyes fixed on Seiichirou.

“Seiichirou, what do you want to do to this kingdom?”

This kingdom that had abducted him alongside an underage girl they called the Holy Maiden?

What did he want to do to this kingdom that had abandoned him, the very air of which didn’t agree with his body?

If asked that same question, Yua would have probably replied with something like “I want to make this a kingdom where everyone is equal” or “I want to make this a kingdom where no one suffers from hunger or miasma.”

Seiichirou opened his mouth.

“Nothing.”

Seiichirou, on the other hand, didn’t want to do anything to this kingdom.

He really didn’t.

He truly had no desire to improve the kingdom or make its people happy, nor could he remember ever having such a thing in mind.

He was just trying to make his own job run more smoothly.

“The staffing shortage at the Sorcery Department is serious, and it will cause delays with the miasma strategy as well as completing the spell to send us home. However, those are not job positions just anyone can fill, so I want to recruit a wide range of people.”

Even though it was possible for ordinary people to work at the royal palace, it was impossible for uneducated people to do so. Even Ist had attended school.

“Ha! You…you really…”

Camile sank back into his chair, barking out a dry laugh. His tone of voice and expression were more childlike than Seiichirou had ever seen from him before.

“Besides,” Seiichirou continued, “it would be an enormous loss for the kingdom to overlook those with talent. Even if the kingdom paid for a hundred ordinary people to move on from a small, private school to formal schooling, it would pay for itself if even one of these people joined the Sorcery Department and achieved something. The fact that the kingdom doesn’t provide such a cost-effective service is a waste.”

Humans were a resource, too. Perhaps Seiichirou thought this way because his corporate-slave nature had been so deeply ingrained in him.

“Certainly. You’re right—a kingdom cannot carry on without its people. Not utilizing them effectively would be a loss.”

It seemed to be a quirk of Camile’s to chuckle in the back of his throat.

In any event, Seiichirou was glad that the prime minister, the highest-ranking manager of personnel affairs, seemed to be interested in the proposal. Seiichirou felt privately relieved, and then Camile stared at him again, a smile on his lips.

“Ah, what a pity. It is a pity, Seiichirou.”

“What’s wrong?” Seiichirou asked, assuming that the “pity” was a flaw in the plan they had just discussed.

But that didn’t seem to be the case.

There was a look in Camile’s eyes that Seiichirou had never seen in them before.

“It’s not about that. Truly…if not for that black beast, I would have kept you to myself and taken good care of you.”

Faced with the blatant desire of a superior, Seiichirou barely managed to gulp the saliva down his throat and say, “I appreciate your concern.”

Camile let out another dry laugh.

“Have you finished checking the equipment for the expedition?” asked Aresh, having completed his daily paperwork early.

Orjef nodded, amazed.

Aresh had really changed. Before, he would have never shown interest in this sort of task.

“We’ll be heading out the day after tomorrow, so we’re all good to go. I hope the miasma completely vanishes this time.”

“Yeah.”

Nor would Aresh have ever agreed with any wishful thinking. The change in him, a person who’d used to just go about his work dispassionately, was surely due to the influence of that otherworlder man.

“The whole expedition team has the day off tomorrow to prepare and rest. What are you going to get up to, Aresh?”

“Rest.”

His straightforward, short replies were the same as ever, though.

On the way to the training grounds, however, Orjef suddenly remembered something and called out to Aresh:

“Some of the knights are going to have a drinking party tonight, like a send-off. What do you say, Aresh?”

“No thank you.”

“I figured you’d say that.”

The other knights would probably have gotten nervous if Aresh had suddenly showed up at their drinking party. Orjef did think many of them would be thrilled at the chance to get closer to the commander they so admired, but having Aresh appear without any prior notice would be more like an act of terror.

Although, in Aresh’s case, I’m sure he just wants to get back to his new home as soon as possible.

Ever since Aresh had bought a house in the suburbs, he had started working even faster and rushing to get home as soon as he finished. To an outsider, he was probably acting like a newlywed… And, well, that wasn’t exactly incorrect. Orjef had no idea what it was about that otherworlder that drove Aresh so crazy, but he just wanted to maintain the status quo of quickly progressing with their work in relative peace.

As soon as Orjef thought this, Aresh twitched, suddenly stopped walking, and turned around. Seeing this, Orjef stopped walking, too.

“Aresh? What’s wrong?”

Orjef tried to follow Aresh’s line of sight, but Aresh had already started walking again at a very fast pace.

“…I told you, saying that isn’t going to change anything…”

“Can’t you do something…?”

Orjef quickly followed Aresh and heard voices he recognized. At the end of the corridor, he saw two familiar figures of different statures:

Commander Radim of the Second Royal Order, and the otherworlder—Seiichirou.

“What?! …Crap!”

Aresh’s walking speed increased another notch and then, without slowing down, he grabbed a handful of the brown cloak—its wearer had his back turned to them and hadn’t realized they were there—and pulled. Seiichirou, having been abruptly yanked backward, panicked and regained his footing before checking who was behind him. Then his face fell into a grimace. Seiichirou was probably the only person in the Romany Kingdom who would make such an expression at the sight of the beautiful knight commander.

“What are you doing here, Seiichirou?”

“Oh…Aresh…”

Orjef remembered hearing that the otherworlder was on temporary assignment at the church, but here he was in his uniform for the Accounting Department, looking as though he was reporting to work as usual.

“There’s no way you’re coming here to work on your day off…”

“No, there’s no way.”

Seiichirou straightened his posture and turned to face Aresh.

“I just came here today to give Prime Minister Karvada a progress report. However, as it is a part of my job, I simply wore my civil official uniform as my formal wear.”

The way Seiichirou answered so smoothly, without any hesitation, it really didn’t seem like he was lying—to people who didn’t know him very well, at least.

When Seiichirou went to the church after his day away, Selio greeted him not with his usual scowl, but with a rare smile.

“Heh-heh! It’s finally time for you to pay the piper!” Selio said, looking smug.

Seiichirou had been the only one on the receiving end here—or to be more precise, he’d been going around collecting things—so he tilted his head in confusion, but then he remembered that the bishop and the accounting manager would be returning that day.

In fact, Seiichirou had been awaiting their return for a while, but Aresh’s barrier-casting the night before had been so intense that his mind still felt slightly dazed and his body sluggish. Even so, Aresh hadn’t gone all the way with him, so he didn’t have any internal pain…

As for Aresh, he had embarked on the purification expedition early that morning.

“That reminds me. Shiraishi—I mean, the Holy Maiden—won’t be able to visit for a while, but she asked me to send you her regards.”

At the sound of Yua’s name, Selio visibly choked on his words and gritted his teeth. He seemed conflicted about something.

“…I do not approve of you or the way you attach yourself to the Holy Maiden and throw your weight around just because you two are friendly!”

Apparently, Seiichirou and Yua being on bad terms wasn’t the only reason for those who revered the Holy Maiden to hate him. Seiichirou could not recall ever throwing his weight around. However, the claim gave him a vague sense of déjà vu—he wondered whether the information had been deliberately planted, or if the rumor had just made its way here very slowly.

“…Ignorance will be your ruin, Selio. Why don’t you attend the school, too, once it’s finished?”

“Huh?! Are you making fun of me?!”

“It’s a good thing to be perceptive,” said Seiichirou, walking quickly into the church with Selio’s angry voice echoing behind him.

In the end, Seiichirou did not meet the bishop until the afternoon. Siegvold summoned him and led him to a drawing room Seiichirou had never visited before. It was decorated with a chic red rug, curtains, and other objects that had a subdued style but were of very high quality. Seiichirou could tell, because he had spent plenty of time in the royal palace and the mansions of the aristocracy since coming to this world.

“You’re the otherworlder who descended upon this world with the Holy Maiden? I’ve heard about you.”

Everything about the way Bishop Mateus behaved indicated that he felt superior to Seiichirou.

In fact, as the bishop of the royal capital, he was of high status, and most importantly, he seemingly came from an aristocratic family, so his attitude was understandable. But Seiichirou was an envoy from the royal palace before he was an otherworlder. Although, the bishop’s attitude suggested that he, along with the church, harbored antagonism toward the royal palace, therefore it was inevitable that he should feel that way.

In contrast, everything about the church’s accounting manager, Cipriano, indicated he was friendly. He was a thin man with narrow eyes who appeared to be around Seiichirou’s age or slightly older. His pale-blue hair was short, and he was the sort of man who would probably make a good impression on anyone, although they would likely also forget what his face looked like by the next day.

“I apologize for the delay in getting you the income and expenditure report.”

Cipriano went on to explain that during the time he had been busy helping with the Holy Maiden Summoning, he’d lost the report he had initially drafted. Afterward, while re-creating it, he’d been looking after the Holy Maiden, and then, because some problems had cropped up with another branch, he’d had to accompany the bishop on an official trip, so the report had been delayed again.

“Is that right?” asked Seiichirou. “But, you know, a deadline is still a deadline.”

Bureaucracy would never get anywhere if you asked about every single detail in an excuse.

“Aren’t you also the reason we had to suddenly start looking after the Holy Maiden?” the bishop interjected grumpily.

Cipriano pacified him, his expression troubled.

“No, Bishop. The Holy Maiden always planned on coming to the church, so I should have finished the preparations. This is all due to my inexperience.”

“In other words, you’re still working on the report, correct?” Seiichirou asked.

“Yes. I’m very sorry.”

Seiichirou had been convinced they were just going to hand over the report and kick him out, but if Cipriano was still working on it, that meant he could continue his investigation. Although he couldn’t get a read on their intentions, he wasn’t going to let this valuable opportunity that had fallen into his lap go to waste.

“Don’t be. In that case, I’ll be coming here for a little while longer. This is perfect timing, because I have a proposal regarding opening a learning institution at the relief house, on the Holy Maiden’s orders.”

“A learning institution?” asked Siegvold, although Seiichirou had assumed that he had already heard about the plan from Selio.

“The ever-considerate Holy Maiden has asked me to open a place in the church where both orphaned children and the children in town who can’t attend school can learn reading, writing, and simple arithmetic, and she has appointed me to oversee the planning stages.”

The part about Seiichirou having been appointed was a lie, but he was going to draft the plan because if he left it to Yua, no progress would ever be made.

“That’s great!” said Siegvold. “Just what I’d expect from the Holy Maiden and the disciple!”

Unlike Siegvold, who was all smiles, the bishop scowled.

“Using the church? You can’t just decide that on your own.”

“Well, it’s still in the planning stages right now. But I think there are many advantages for the church as well…”

Seiichirou then handed over the proposal he had drafted after his meeting with Camile. He had minutely laid out and slightly exaggerated the potential benefits to the church he had already explained to Camile, such as elevating the church’s status and the possibility for an increase in donations. After seeing that the bishop’s mood had visibly improved, Seiichirou looked around the room. Dealing with people who had clear objectives was child’s play—the tricky part was dealing with people in important positions who looked harmless and were forgettable.

“Abran made the right choice, after all!” said Siegvold. “Please let us help you with this, Disciple!”

And then there were those who were delusional, yet possessed both authority and initiative. That type of person was convenient.

After that, Seiichirou’s work at the church changed slightly. Selio still came out to greet him with a look of disgust, but for some reason, he began showing an interest in Seiichirou’s work, and above all else, he wanted to hear about Yua. Seiichirou knew very little about Yua herself, but Selio seemed happy enough hearing about their home world. And perhaps word had spread that Seiichirou was friends with the Holy Maiden, or perhaps the other monks and nuns had seen Siegvold or Cipriano talking to him in a friendly way, because then they, too, started to at least say hello whenever they saw him. And the biggest change was…

“Disciple.”

As Seiichirou was going over documents Cipriano had given him, the low, pleasant voice called out to him from the entrance. Seiichirou turned around and saw chestnut hair that looked gold in the sunlight. Then he saw purple eyes—an eye color which, surprisingly, was not seen very often in this world, but which was very familiar to Seiichirou—staring at him.

“Please stop calling me that…,” Seiichirou said, annoyed.

“But you are a disciple, Disciple,” Siegvold replied with a serious expression. “In any case, Disciple, it’s the Fire hour. Have you had lunch?”

“I’m not a disciple… Oh, I didn’t notice the bell ring.”

Actually, Seiichirou had noticed, but he had planned on ignoring it until he reached a convenient stopping point.

“Then let’s go eat now. You have a very small appetite even at the best of times, so if you don’t eat, you won’t be able to endure your trial.”

Ever since Seiichirou had brought up opening a learning institution, Siegvold’s micromanagement, which had always been present to some degree, had become even more pronounced. Particularly, he praised Seiichirou as a “disciple most serious about his test from God” for coming to the church despite having no tolerance to magicules, and he fussed over Seiichirou’s health. His reason for this was different from Aresh’s, but his attitude, paired with his violet eyes, gave Seiichirou awful déjà vu. Seiichirou was also in a tight spot, because this attitude also kept him from doing some of the reckless things he’d been thinking of doing now that that individual was away on an expedition. The purification expedition would take three days to arrive at the Demon Forest, and so, including the extra day that had been set aside, the party would return after seven days at the latest. In the meantime, the income and expenditure report had already been submitted once, but there had been so many calculation errors and so much inadequate labeling that Seiichirou had sent it back with those areas highlighted. Cipriano had not looked upset at all, and had even apologized.

Just after noon on the seventh day, the church suddenly erupted with noise, and Seiichirou learned that the expedition party had returned.

“The Holy Maiden has successfully purified the miasma!” cried Selio proudly, as if he had accomplished the deed himself.

Sparing him a sidelong glance, Seiichirou reviewed his Plan A proposal, the one drafted under the assumption that Yua would complete the purification. He had shown both plans to Camile, but he hadn’t wanted to antagonize anyone else by submitting tentative proposals too early, so he had refrained from doing so. He wondered whether it would be better to submit them immediately or to wait a day… For now, Seiichirou decided to ask Aresh how things were going.

The barrier that Aresh had so carefully applied was still in effect, so Seiichirou wondered optimistically whether Aresh had needed to apply it so intensely after all. When Seiichirou returned home that day, however, he was informed that Aresh was absent.

“The purification was completed successfully, but a pack of magic beasts were spotted in the nearby mountains, so the Third Royal Order stayed behind to take care of them,” said a messenger from the royal palace.

Seiichirou also received a letter from Aresh. After watching the messenger leave, Seiichirou returned to his room and opened the envelope. Inside was writing paper with gilded edges, containing a message in beautiful script that repeatedly told Seiichirou to take care of his health in Aresh’s absence, not to work too much, and to get proper rest. Seiichirou continued reading the letter through his annoyance, and at the end, it said:

I hope that you’ll drift to sleep alongside my soul.

Seiichirou thought the use of the word soul must have been an exaggeration…but then he wondered if perhaps this mission of Aresh’s was life-threatening. Milan had just returned from seeing the messenger off, so he asked her about it. She covered her mouth, eyes wide, and said, “Oh my!” Her cheeks were flushed, and her eyes were shining.

“Oh-ho! Aresh writes very passionate letters, doesn’t he?”

As it turned out, referring to the soul was an expression often used by knights to represent their feelings.

I hope that you’ll drift to sleep imagining that I’m by your side.

It was undoubtedly a love letter.

Yua visited the church three days after she’d returned home from the expedition.

She had been busy, because despite the fact that the Third Royal Order was absent, a party had been held the day after the expedition to celebrate the completion of the miasma purification. Incidentally, Camile had asked Seiichirou to attend, but Seiichirou had declined.

The sorcerers who had accompanied the expedition party and the Third Royal Order had stated that the miasma had completely vanished, but Seiichirou was told that he would only be able to take the construction workers to build the lodgings for the barrier wardens after this had been confirmed one more time.

As soon as Yua arrived at the church, she was given a very warm welcome by the townsfolk and the monks, and then she went to greet the bishop.

“Priest, shouldn’t you go to Shirai— I mean, the Holy Maiden?” Seiichirou asked Siegvold, assuming that, because he held Abran above all else, he must also have deep respect for the Holy Maiden. But the serious, stubborn priest shook his head.

“The Holy Maiden has fulfilled her mission. You are still working on your mission, Disciple… Plus, if I take my eyes off you, I don’t know what you’ll do.”

The past few days, Seiichirou had tried to skip meals or take documents home behind Siegvold’s back several times, so the man’s faith in Seiichirou seemed to have taken a nosedive.

“As a disciple, you should be a little more self-aware…”

Siegvold had grumbled that complaint to him dozens of times. Seiichirou’s reply remained the same each time, as well—it was a formulaic back-and-forth.

“I’m not a disciple.”

But even so, his annoyance with Siegvold’s attempts to treat him like a disciple were mingled with a sense of respect.

And Siegvold, too, admired Seiichirou’s tenacity and initiative toward his job, the indignity of his actions aside. Seiichirou carried out his work indifferently, even though it was work that he should never have had anything to do with at all. The man was not even born in the kingdom—he had come from another world entirely. Abran had given him a test and made his body weak to magicules and magic power, but Seiichirou nevertheless devoted himself to the people of this kingdom, even if it meant self-sacrifice. Siegvold naturally felt deeply impressed by this. In reality, Seiichirou’s behavior was simply explained by his proclivity, as a corporate slave, to continue working, but there was no way Siegvold would know that.

Siegvold also considered it his duty as a believer to help make this handicapped disciple’s activities easier.

“Could you stop calling me ‘disciple,’ at least? There are people around.”

Some of the monks were open in their dissatisfaction with the fact that Siegvold called Seiichirou “disciple” in addition to being so solicitous toward him. Even if Seiichirou wasn’t on bad terms with the Holy Maiden, he was still the Holy Maiden’s powerless tagalong.

“But you are a disciple, Disciple… Still, I suppose I have no choice. I’ll compromise. Then it’ll be…?”

“Kondou. Seiichirou Kondou.”

“Mr. Seiichirou.”

He’s not using my last name? Seiichirou momentarily pondered, but then he remembered that Siegvold had discarded his own family name.

“…Yes, Priest.”

“You call me by my name, too, then.”

“Huh? No, I don’t think that’s really…”

“I compromised. Shouldn’t you compromise, too?”

Seiichirou had been about to tell him that it wasn’t really necessary, but when Siegvold insisted, Seiichirou felt as though resistance would be futile and bit back a sigh.

“Okay, Mr. Siegvold.”

“Oh, there you are! Kondou!”

Seiichirou looked up at the sound of the cheerful voice and saw Yua running toward him, full of energy. He also spotted Selio jogging frantically after her, not wanting to be left behind.

“It’s been a while, Shiraishi. Great work with the purification expedition.”

Yua smiled bashfully at Seiichirou’s words of appreciation, looking much more grown-up than when he had first met her. Over the three expeditions, she seemed to have matured slightly.

Siegvold took a knee, bowed respectfully, and offered the Holy Maiden Yua words of sincere gratitude.

“I am so grateful for your work during this purification expedition, Your Holiness. Thank you again.”

“Huh?! C-come on! Please stand up, Siegvold! You already thanked me two days ago!”

Priest Siegvold had also been invited to the purification celebration. Siegvold slowly got to his feet and straightened up. A flustered sigh escaped Yua’s lips.

Huh?

“…Oh, Shiraishi,” Seiichirou added. “It doesn’t have to be now, but I wanted to ask you about the expedition.”

Seiichirou had seen the written report, but he wanted to know what it had been like from the perspective of Yua, both as the Holy Maiden and as an otherworlder.

“Yua’s busy! She doesn’t have any time to spend with you!”

“I wasn’t asking you, Selio.”

“Huh?!”

“Then would you like to go to lunch together? I want to ask you about the private school, too! …Siegvold, you can come as well, if you’d like…,” Yua added, glancing up at him.

Siegvold’s expression remained unchanged as he nodded.

“That sounds fine. I have to monitor the dis— Seiichirou’s meals, anyway.”

“Monitor? Monitor his meals?” Yua asked, tilting her head curiously.

Siegvold explained that if he took his eyes off of him, Seiichirou would skip meals. Seiichirou pretended not to hear him.

“Wow! This is such a beautiful place!” Yua cried.

They would have attracted a lot of attention in the dining hall, so the four of them had come to the church’s flower garden, which had become the place where Seiichirou and Siegvold took all their lunches.

“This flower garden was made by the Holy Maiden from two generations ago.”

“I had no idea a place like this even existed at the church!”

Selio diligently carried food over to the round, iron table in the middle of the flower garden. The church generally made simple meals, but apparently things were different for the Holy Maiden and the priest—for them, Selio had brought out a wide variety of foods.

“You won’t be having any, right?” Selio checked with Seiichirou, though it sounded like an accusation.

“Right,” Seiichirou replied, nodding.

As usual, he took out the lunch Pavel had made him.

“Oh, that’s right! If Kondou isn’t picky about what he eats, he’ll be poisoned.”

Seiichirou nodded. Yua had a good memory—she had only eaten a meal with him once before. But just then, Selio’s eyes bulged.

“What?!”

Had Seiichirou not told him?

“Selio, Mr. Seiichirou doesn’t have any magicule tolerance, so he has to be careful about what he eats and how he lives his life,” Siegvold explained.

In front of the entrance to the relief house stood a man…

“I’m here.”

His hair was a mild mixture of orange and pink, a color rarely seen in Seiichirou’s home world. The man grinning absently with sleepy, peridot-green eyes was a shut-in type, who was typically in the laboratory surrounded by his nest of books… But Assistant Director Ist of the Royal Sorcery Department was not being a recluse today. He looked different somehow, and Seiichirou realized it was because he had never seen Ist in sunlight before, except on one expedition. Seiichirou was impressed by the fact that Ist had seriously come outside for something other than work, but the most important aspect of the entire scene was where Ist had made his appearance.

“Why are you here?”

“Huh? You came to the office yesterday and looked at a bunch of documents, so I thought you were going to see the sacred relic.”

Seiichirou had dropped by the Sorcery Department the day before without any prior notice and had spent a long time looking for documents. But he had never imagined that Ist could be so perceptive and proactive about something he desired. Lamenting his own lack of foresight, however, wouldn’t improve the situation, and he couldn’t let this reckless sorcerer go unchecked.

“Who’s this guy?”

“Is he the visitor?”

Young children had already spotted the crowd forming in front of the relief house and gathered outside. Slightly older children, who could tell from Ist’s clothes that he was high-ranking, were more careful and watched from a distance.

“Hey, don’t do that! This guy’s a sorcerer from the castle…!” said Selio, boldly rushing out from among the children, perhaps fearing that the children of the relief house would be impolite to Ist and get scolded.

Seiichirou, however, was more worried that Ist would try to do something to the children. Surprisingly, Ist only sat in front of them, met their gazes, and asked:

“Have you already prayed today?”

“Nuh-uh, not yet.”

“They said a visitor was comin’ today, so we’d do it later!”

“Is that right? Can I go with you, then?” Ist asked, tilting his head.

He was speaking in the same tone as the children—though as a matter of fact, he was speaking in his normal tone of voice—and the children, perhaps sensing that his mental age was close to theirs, smiled at him, obviously at ease.

“You want to pray? Sure!”

“Ist, what do you mean by ‘pray’? …Ist!” said Seiichirou.

“Mr. Seiichirou, you know this man…?”

Siegvold responded to Seiichirou before Ist did. It wasn’t far-fetched to imagine that a priest like Siegvold was acquainted with the assistant director of the Sorcery Department. At the very least, they must have both been in the room when Yua and Seiichirou had been summoned.

“Oh,” said Seiichirou. “As you might know…this is Assistant Director Ist of the Royal Sorcery Department.”

“Mr. Ist. Welcome to Abran’s church.”

Siegvold extended his hand. Ist looked at it blankly for a while, and then, as if remembering something, he nodded and shook the priest’s hand. Seiichirou was reminded of the suffering the director of the Sorcery Department often underwent.

“So you were just saying…,” prompted Siegvold.

“They’re going to go pray, right? I’ll go with them.”

Ist spoke as if it had already been decided. Despite his odd appearance and mannerisms, Ist still held the position of assistant director of the Royal Sorcery Department. Siegvold, who was incapable of being unkind, looked to Seiichirou for help, but Seiichirou pretended not to notice. In light of Ist’s purpose—prayer—Seiichirou guessed that he was probably going to supply magic power to the sacred relic.

Yua had apparently been listening.

“Oh, you’re going to pray? Then I’ll go, too!” she said, raising her hand.

“…?!”

Seiichirou was shocked.

Wait! If “prayer” supplies magic power to the sacred relic…

Judging from Yua’s reaction, she had participated in “prayer” before. She spoke as if she did it daily.

Purification was the Holy Maiden’s highest priority, but they’ve been squeezing magic power from her, too?!

The Holy Maiden’s miasma purification was supposed to be prioritized above all else, and in the royal palace, Yua had been managed so that her magic power was not used for anything outside of training. A few healing or purification spells in the intervals between expeditions were probably not a problem, because they could be considered practice for her manipulation of magic or as a gesture to elevate the value of the Holy Maiden, but Seiichirou didn’t know the limit to how much magic power could be supplied to the sacred relic. If it was able to absorb boundless amounts of magic power, it could have influenced the purification. Yua had even previously tried to use a healing spell on Seiichirou when he had been feeling ill, and she had probably been praying with the children as an extension of her assistance to the relief house, but these things had surely not been reported to the royal palace. And indeed, Yurius’s face changed.

“Yua…have you been participating in prayer frequently?”

“Huh? Y-yes. I usually do when I help at the relief house…”

Yurius’s graceful eyebrows furrowed. It was the first time he had ever looked at her like that, and Yua seemed bewildered.

“Shiraishi.”

Yua turned toward Seiichirou, looking slightly panicked.

“Ist is going to show me around for the prayer, so could you show Yuri around here?”

“Huh…? Oh, sure…”

Seiichirou briefly glanced at Yurius and accidentally caught his gaze. Yurius looked away.

“Right,” said Yurius. “Yua, please continue with the tour.”

“R-right.”

Yua nodded with a smile, confused but relieved to see that Yurius was back to grinning at her like usual.

“Well, let’s go, Mr. Siegvold,” Seiichirou prompted.

“Go? Where…?”

Siegvold had apparently not been able to follow their conversation.

“To the location of the sacred relic, of course.”

“What?! You can’t—it’s a special place of worship, so outsiders need permission from the bishop to go in.”

“Is that right?”

Siegvold explained that it was usually open to the public during ceremonies, but that typically, only people involved with the church could enter.

“I see. Could you go ask the bishop, then?”

“This is so sudden…”

“No, not for me, but for Ist. He came all the way here, alone, without any appointment, for the sole reason of praying. You understand what that means, don’t you…?”

Ist was assistant director of the Royal Sorcery Department. He might have held the same rank as Seiichirou, but compared to the Accounting Department, the Sorcery Department was higher up on the totem pole. That department’s assistant director had come all the way here by himself and said he would participate. In other words…

“He’s not someone who’s going to listen if you tell him no. I really don’t know what he’ll do, so please hurry and check that he can. You don’t have that much time.”

“I’ll go right away!”

And so, after receiving permission from the bishop, Ist, the children from the relief house, Siegvold, and Cipriano, who usually led the worship, went to the prayer room. Seiichirou and Sigma joined them. To Sigma, the diversion was nothing special. He had just followed Seiichirou because Seiichirou was the only person he knew. However, because he had been trained as a craftsman, he looked at the decorations inside the church with great interest.

“Kondo, I am sorry for the delay in revising the income and expenditure report. I think I’ll be able to get it to you tomorrow,” Cipriano, the church’s accounting manager, said apologetically, his thin eyes narrowing even further as he smiled.

“Not at all, it’s fine. Tomorrow? Sure. I’m sorry to have made you go to the extra trouble when you’re already busy.”

If all went well, Seiichirou would probably also be saying good-bye to the church tomorrow, and if so, there were a number of things he needed to finish by the end of the day. Seiichirou focused all his energy into his legs, which felt wobbly from lack of sleep.

The prayer room they were led to was more modestly constructed than the prayer room visited by the public. The room was stone-paved and roughly two hundred square feet in size. A white rug was laid out on the floor. Stained glass was inlaid in part of the ceiling, and the light from the ceiling painted the rug with a kaleidoscope of colors. There was a platform directly facing the door, which appeared to be an altar, upon which lay a foot-tall statue with a blue, jewellike object implanted in it.

That had to be the sacred relic.

The statue was of a man with a dignified face. Seiichirou had seen a large statue that resembled this one in the prayer room for the general public, so he assumed this was the god Abran. Physically speaking, Seiichirou was feeling terrible.

Siegvold, standing beside him, didn’t notice Seiichirou’s worsening complexion.

“It’s as beautiful as ever…,” said Siegvold, letting out a sigh of rapture. “When I was young, I couldn’t control my magic power, so I wondered if I was an evil child.”

Siegvold explained that he had then been brought to the church, and by praying to Abran in this prayer room, he had calmed down, and had then vowed to serve God for his entire life.

You just calmed down because you had your excess magic power absorbed…

Of course, there had probably been a psychological aspect to Siegvold’s transformation as well. After Siegvold’s spontaneous magic outbursts had abated, he must have felt as though he was able to rely on God and had learned to control his magic power. In fact, from the way Siegvold had described it, he also seemed to think the sacred relic was simply an object of worship. He’s lived in the church all this time and never noticed? Seiichirou thought, but after remembering Siegvold’s personality from the month they had spent together, Seiichirou thought that Siegvold might very well be in the dark. Siegvold wasn’t a man who would approve of embezzling donations or absorbing magic power from believers.

But Seiichirou, distracted by these contemplations, had been careless.

Well, it was also partially due to his lack of sleep and his intoxication from the magic power which filled the room.

“Mister, look out!!”

Seiichirou didn’t notice the cluster of magic power heading straight for him until he heard Sigma’s voice.

“Huh?” Sigma said, sensing that something was out of place.

Sigma had been kicked out of the house by his mother. Then he had visited the relief house and then, for some reason, had ended up joining this group to pray.

“What’s wrong?”

The one who had heard Sigma speak was the sleepy-eyed man who had just earlier been driving Seiichirou, a civil official and a very important customer of Sigma’s, up a wall. This man was also wearing a cloak, so although he didn’t really look it, he must have been an important person from the castle.

“Oh, no, it’s just… I was kinda thinkin’— I mean, I just thought that the way I prayed before was different…”

“Oh? You’ve prayed before?”

“I don’t got much— I mean, I don’t have a lot of magic power, so I did at my baptism, but that was five years ago, so maybe they’ve changed how you do it…”

Sigma faltered as he answered, trying not to speak discourteously, but the other man, Ist, nodded several times, unbothered by Sigma’s awkward attempts at formality.

“You’re right. It’s been a while since I’ve prayed, too, but it wasn’t like this before. When you pray like this, too much of your magic power gets absorbed, which can upset the circulation of magic power in the body and make some kids lose control.”

“What? Magic power…gets absorbed…?”

“Huh?”

Sigma, who only knew of prayer as a ceremony to convey thanks for the divine protection of the god Abran, was surprised, but Ist, who oversaw the Royal Sorcery Department, the umbrella organization for the magic power of the kingdom, did not understand that anything was strange about this information, and tilted his head. Ist had always had vast amounts of magic power and was more interested in spells than the average person, and because he excelled at seeing the flow of magic power, he had always understood that prayer supplied magic power to the sacred relic. He’d assumed that everyone else knew that, too. Ist didn’t know, therefore, what Sigma was surprised by, and because he had a rule to not think about things he didn’t already know about or have an interest in, he passed over the interruption and continued the conversation.

“That priest seems to be able to sense it, so I guess prayer is pretty much like this all the time now,” said Ist.

He was pointing at Cipriano, who was giving the children instructions and leading the prayer. Sigma couldn’t understand what Ist was talking about, but he tried his best to follow along.

“U-um, does that mean you can tell how much magic power someone has? Sir?”

“Hm? How much…magic power?”

“Huh? Um—yes. Magic power.”

“Yes, I can tell. The Sorcery Department is full of people with high perception abilities, after all.”

“The Sorcery Department?! Are you a sorcerer, mister?!”

“Yes, I’m from the Sorcery Department. And today I’m actually wearing my cloak like I should be.”

Sigma set aside his follow-up question (“Do you usually forget to?”). To commoners, especially those from the merchant part of town, civil officials in the royal palace lived in a totally different world, so people like Sigma didn’t know the departments were classified by color or even what their cloaks meant. Regardless of whether they were of noble or common birth, however, children admired knights and sorcerers all the same. Sigma, in particular, admired sorcerers who did research and created useful spells and tools more than he did knights who went into battle. Although Sigma did not realize that the sorcerer in front of him was the top sorcerer in the kingdom, he looked up at Ist with a twinkle in his eye.

It was mysterious—as soon as Sigma knew that Ist was a sorcerer, even his sleepy eyes and incredibly dirty sleeve cuffs seemed cool, like he was exhausted from research. Ist was always sleepy-eyed, even when away from his research; he didn’t listen to people when they were talking; and his sleeve cuffs were always dirty. But Sigma had no way of knowing these things.

“Oh, oh! Then—then wouldn’t it be a relief if there was a tool that could let even people without any perception abilities tell how much magic power someone has?!”

“Hmm?”

“I said, wouldn’t it be a relief if someone without perception abilities like me had a tool that could make that visible?”

During the course of their short conversation, Sigma had noticed—perhaps because he had a young sister who was similar—that Ist wasn’t able to catch what someone said to him on the first try, so he had repeated himself. Ist was not particularly hard of hearing, however. It was just so easy for him to get lost in his own thoughts, and he had a very patchy notion of what it meant to listen to others, so most words just ended up going in one ear and out the other.

When it came to something that interested him, however, that was a different story.

Ist had, in other words, heard what Sigma had just said perfectly. He had just been asking Sigma to explain. In detail.

“What would it look like? Something people without any perception abilities put on their eyes? A tool people wore? Observing others with glasses?”

Suddenly, Ist began talking very quickly while moving closer to Sigma. Sigma leaned back, answering Ist’s questions to the best of his ability.

“U-um, that would be fine, I just thought it would be good if anyone could see that and be able to tell, so maybe put the value somewhere everyone can see it at a glance or something…”

“At a glance? How would you do that? Numbers? Words? What about people who can’t read?”

“N-not words… Like, colors and stuff…”

“Colors?! Make it so the amount of magic power changes the color?”

“Um, not that… Well, is there even something that magic power changes anyway?”

“Yes, there is. There is. A substance called quercil that gets bigger when exposed to magic power. It’s poisonous, though. It can be extracted from a crystal often used in spell research.”

“Does it change color when exposed to magic power? Or does it just get bigger?”

“Yes, that. It expands.”

“In that case, why don’t you put it in a rectangular mold where only the bottom can come into contact with magic power?”

“And when it expands, it will stretch upward.”

“Right. And if you make it so the pressure of the expanded part changes the color…”

“The amount of magic power will change the color! We did it!!”

“Wait, this is still just hypothetical! It’s not finished yet…!”

Sigma quickly stopped Ist, who had been about to start cheering, but secretly, Sigma also wanted to jump for joy that they had conceptualized a finished product. Sigma had always loved making things. His hands were dexterous, so he had wanted to become a woodworker like his father, and he enjoyed making wooden toys for his little sister. As an extension of this desire, Sigma had also, after much thought, made tools to help with monetary calculations at his stall and had tried inventing tools to make housework easier. Most people shied away from things they had never seen before, and it was hard to get people to understand the tools, even if Sigma explained them. Only his mother and little sister happily listened to his explanations. But in the midst of all this, he had met Seiichirou. It had been the first time someone else had praised his creations—Seiichirou had even given him money for them. For Sigma, this had been an astounding experience. And now, the young boy’s possibilities had grown once more.

This excitement, however, was short-lived.

The man beside him, who had until that moment continued to rattle on at a rapid pace, suddenly noticed something and turned his head. Ist was looking at the praying children and the priest leading them… Something was odd.

One small boy’s body began to tremble.

“This is bad. It’ll overflow.”

“Huh?”

After a vague, inaudible murmur, Ist took something out from the cuff of his sleeve. By the sound of it, Sigma could tell that Ist was holding a collection of small, hard objects that resembled stones. At the same time, Ist started muttering a spell that sounded like a song. Ordinary people weren’t familiar with spells—they only ever saw them used in church or during ceremonies. Even in this emergency, though, Sigma’s shock and anxiety was tinged with excitement at getting to see a spell up close. Ist reached out his arm, which the necklace-like bundle was wrapped around, toward the child, and the trembling child’s body gradually relaxed.

“Oh no, it got out,” said Ist indifferently, his tone very different from when he had been chanting the spell.

“Huh?”

Just as Ist spoke, however, Sigma saw something fly out of the child’s body at great speed. Then it flew straight at Seiichirou, who had been talking to the priest in the back of the room.

“Mister, look out!!”

Seiichirou hadn’t noticed because he had been busy talking. There was nothing Sigma could do. If he were to try to intercept such a large cluster of magic power, he would get seriously hurt. Sweat broke out all over his body, but just then, a white light filled the space in front of Seiichirou.

Siegvold had thrown out his arm and immediately cast a barrier to protect Seiichirou.

For a moment, light covered the entire prayer room and nothing else could be seen, but then, when it seemed the cluster of magic power had safely dissipated, Seiichirou, Siegvold, and the room looked the same as before.

“Th-thank goodness, mister…”

As Sigma slumped to the floor, behind him, the child from whom the magic power had burst from looked around, unaware of what had just happened. It didn’t seem as though there was anything wrong with him. Cipriano was checking on the child and looked pleased, so Sigma once again returned his gaze to Seiichirou.

“Huh?! Mister?!”

“Seiichirou! Seiichirou, hold on!” said Siegvold.

There, in Siegvold’s arms, was the limp figure of Seiichirou.

Seiichirou did not respond to Sigma or Siegvold’s calls. His eyes were blank, and his breathing shallow. If the cluster of magic hadn’t hit him, why was he like this? As Sigma and Siegvold panicked, Ist came running up and examined Seiichirou.

“M-Mr. Ist,” said Siegvold, “what in the world is this…?”

“Yep, I knew it. His ward wore off,” replied Ist, looking carefully at Seiichirou’s unfocused eyes. Then he abruptly put his lips over Seiichirou’s.

“What?!”

“…!!?!”

Sigma and Siegvold were seized with shock, but Ist ignored them and put his tongue into Seiichirou’s slightly open mouth as the limp man continued to be held by Siegvold.

“Ngh… Ugh…”

“Hmm… Hmm… No good, huh?” muttered Ist, saliva dribbling from his mouth.

Sigma was totally confused. Siegvold, equally confused, quickly took Seiichirou in his arms and used the cuff of his sleeve to wipe Ist’s spit off the prone man’s lips.

“I-Ist, in this holy church—at a time like this—what are you doing?!”

Ist tilted his head, sleepily stared into Siegvold’s violet eyes, then nodded.

“I suppose it’d be faster with the same person who cast the barrier. You’ve got lots of magic power, Priest.”

“Wh-what…? The same…?”

Ist, the only one who understood what was happening, nodded again. Sigma was lost—he wanted to ask for an Ist interpreter, but the only one here who could do that was currently at death’s door in Siegvold’s arms.

“Stop joking around,” said Siegvold, lifting Seiichirou up in his arms. “We have to hurry and get him to the treatment room—”

Just as he was about to carry Seiichirou to the church’s treatment room, Ist stopped him, his expression filled with concern.

“No, you can’t. If you take him to the treatment room, Kondo will die.”

“Die?!”

The shock of these words made Siegvold freeze once more, but what Ist said next utterly destroyed Siegvold’s train of thought.

“So, Priest, would you please sleep with Kondo?”

“Oh, Aresh!”

Yua had opened the door to find Aresh still in his expedition overcoat.

After she had parted ways with Seiichirou and the children had left to go pray, she had taken Yurius around the relief house, explaining her plan to him.

“Aresh. You’ve returned from the expedition?” asked Yurius.

Aresh, who had been looking around as he came through the open door, seemed to have just noticed the pair of them. He bowed to Yurius.

“Just a short while ago. The Third Royal Order has returned home safely without a single loss.”

“All right. Good work.”

After the formal greeting, Aresh once again straightened up and looked around.

“Welcome back, Aresh!” said Yua.

“Yeah… Thanks,” said Aresh. He had almost left his response half-hearted, but then, remembering that Yurius was right there, he had made his reply more polite. Aresh’s eyes, however, continued to roam the space. “Where is he?”

To whom that word referred to went without saying—in other words, Aresh was looking for the man so obsessed with work that he was reckless with his own health.

Immediately after Aresh had returned from the expedition, he’d discovered that Yurius was fortunately absent from the royal palace, so he had postponed his report and returned home. That was, of course, to check on the man Aresh’s thoughts had been preoccupied with throughout the entire expedition. Also, to say that he had missed him. No—it was also to complain that the man had never sent a single reply to the letters Aresh had delivered every day with his regular reports. Before Aresh had left the royal palace, however, he had met one of that man’s subordinates, who had informed him that said man was currently at the church.

Even though his scheduled temporary assignment at the church was supposed to be over.

That man was already physically weak to magic power and magicules, and without Aresh’s thorough barrier, going to the church itself was suicide. Nevertheless, Aresh had also been gone longer than planned, so why now, when the barrier had probably almost worn off, had Seiichirou continued to go to church? Aresh regretted his own thoughtlessness when he had taken into account the end date of Seiichirou’s assignment and decided it would be all right to extend his expedition.

Aresh remembered that that man never acted the way he wanted him to.

And so he hadn’t paid any mind to the subordinate trying to stop him and had ridden his horse straight to the church.

“Kondou, you mean?” said Yurius. “He’s at the prayer room with the kids from the relief house.”

Unlike Yua, who had tilted her head, not understanding who was meant by the word he, Yurius had guessed immediately. But this answer made Aresh furrow his brows.

“The prayer room…? You don’t mean the place where the sacred relic is, do you?”

“Oh yes! That’s right,” Yua said. “He said he wanted to go see the sacred relic— AH!”

The roar of an explosion had interrupted Yua’s reply.

“What? What?! Wh-what was that…?!”

“There’s no fire!” said Yurius, surveying the area with Yua in his arms. “That explosion… It might have come from the prayer room!”

Aresh had run off before Yurius had even finished his sentence.

“Wh-wh…what…did you just…?”

Siegvold was so shaken, his voice sounded shrill. Female visitors to the church often said Siegvold had a calm, beautiful voice, but the current state of his voice was rather inevitable.

“After all, you put the barrier on Kondo earlier, didn’t you?” Ist asked.

“I did, but how is that related to s-s-sleeping with him?”

“Hmm?”

In contrast to Siegvold’s panic, Ist tilted his head, acting as though nothing was strange about his request.

“Did you not know Kondo has poor tolerance to magic power?”

“Huh?”

Now that Ist mentioned it, Siegvold remembered Seiichirou telling him as much in the flower garden. But even so, Seiichirou had been regularly coming to church without any problems, and he hadn’t seemed to be taking any precautions other than being careful about what he ate. Then Siegvold remembered… Seiichirou had been stumbling earlier and had looked ill.

“Yes, usually he has a barrier covering his entire body that protects him against any external magic power or magicules.”

“Such an advanced barrier?! Wait, but if that’s true, then…”

“It’s useless now. The barrier has almost entirely worn away.”

“…?! He was aware that he has no magic power or magicule tolerance, but not of the barrier?!”

“Hmm? He was aware of it.”

“…?!”

Siegvold’s surprise was reasonable. If that was true, then Seiichirou had continued to come to church, even knowing the burden it would place on his own body.

Seiichirou’s condition that morning had deteriorated due to the disappearance of his barrier, and yet he had come all the way to the prayer room… As Siegvold held Seiichirou in his arms, he was deeply impressed by the man’s self-sacrifice. In fact, Seiichirou’s wobbliness had mostly come from his lack of sleep, but there wasn’t anyone who could point that out.

“So, now Kondo has acute magic-sickness, and if the magic doesn’t get acclimatized to him, his body’s going to go into overdrive.”

“Oh… So before, that was…”

The abrupt kiss had been Ist trying to impart his own magic power into Seiichirou… Siegvold was momentarily relieved.

“Yeah, but Kondo’s got a predisposition that makes it hard to acclimatize magic power to him, so that little bit of mouth-to-mouth wasn’t enough. Plus, it’s easiest for the one who cast the magic to acclimatize it. So, please pour your magic power into his body as quickly as possible.”

“B-but that’s…”

Siegvold understood what Ist was so dispassionately trying to convey.

But that meant having sex with the exhausted, grown man in his arms who had horribly dark under-eye circles.

The man who had been summoned from another world by God, who had neglected himself and served this kingdom, who had endured God’s test, and who was now weakened because of it…

Siegvold tightened the muscles in his core and steeled his resolve.

“…I understand. It will be a lifesaving act. I will take responsibility for this and sleep with Seiichirou—”

“That won’t be necessary!!”

At the crunching sound of something breaking and a voice so low it sounded as if it might have crawled out from the bottom of the earth, everyone looked around and saw a man dressed in black from head to toe, his clenched fist sunk into a wall.

“What…?! Who…?”

The man looked so sinister that Siegvold unconsciously held Seiichirou closer to his chest, as if to protect him, but as he did this, the man in black erupted with a magic power that could only be described as homicidal.

“Aresh!” called Yurius, running up behind him.

Siegvold finally realized that this intruder was Commander Aresh Indolark of the Third Royal Order. Aresh’s bloodlust subsided, but the fire remained in his eyes as he bounded toward Siegvold—or rather, toward the man in Siegvold’s arms, Seiichirou.

“I manage everything about that one. Give it back,” Aresh announced, glaring at Siegvold.

For a moment, Siegvold had no idea what Aresh was talking about, but when Aresh reached out his hands, he realized “that one” meant Seiichirou.

“‘Give it back’… Mr. Seiichirou is not a thing. Besides, he’s very weak right now. I cannot give him to you.”

The commander of the Third Royal Order was regarded as having exceptional talent as a sorcerer and a knight, but Siegvold’s answer was firm. Siegvold believed he had to personally protect Seiichirou, who had collapsed after sacrificing himself for the kingdom and its people.

“…”

Waves of pressure rolled off Aresh. Siegvold could feel their weight, but he didn’t recoil. He returned Aresh’s glare, and his eyes, the same shade of purple as Aresh’s, were full of resolve.

Faced with these two handsome men glaring at each other and the pressure emanating from them, the others in the room were speechless—all they could do was look on. The voice that did break the silence came from between the two men.

“Ugh… A…resh…?”

“…! Seiichirou! You’re awake!” said Siegvold. As the one physically holding Seiichirou, he noticed him coming around first.

Seiichirou had a fever caused by magic-sickness. He turned his unfocused, blurred gaze toward Aresh and let out a hot breath.

“Ah… Thank goodness… You’re safe…”

“…!!”

After muttering that single sentence in a tone of sincere relief, Seiichirou lost consciousness again. The two purple-eyed men froze.

“Right…,” said Yurius. “Siegvold. Aresh usually manages Kondou’s physical condition. Kondou will be fine if you leave this to Aresh. Hand him over.”

“Oh my god, I was so surprised when I heard you collapsed, Sei!”

Norbert, wearing his civil official’s uniform, was waving his arms around dramatically as he spoke. Seiichirou was lying on the bed, his upper body elevated. His complexion, which had improved recently, was still somewhat pale.

It had been two days since the incident at the church.

Seiichirou had been protected by Siegvold’s barrier just in the nick of time, but it had given Seiichirou magic-sickness, and he had collapsed. Although Seiichirou’s memory was hazy, apparently Aresh had appeared just in time and taken him to the medical office. Seiichirou had received treatment, escaped death’s clutches, and had then been ordered to rest in the hospital for three days.

Seiichirou hadn’t seen Aresh since then.

“That’s enough of that. Just hand over the documents I asked for.”

“Should you really be doing this while you’re recovering?”

“I’m fine.”

Although Seiichirou had been ordered to be on bed rest, he had taken advantage of the fact that the medical office was in the same building as his workplace and, when Norbert had come to visit, had asked the young man to bring documents to him so he could work. Speaking of visits, Siegvold had also come to visit Seiichirou as soon as he had regained consciousness.

“I’m so sorry!”

Seiichirou had been shocked by Siegvold bowing his head as soon as he had entered the sickroom. It was still difficult for Seiichirou to get up, so from where he lay in bed, Seiichirou had managed to ask Siegvold to raise his head, which Siegvold had eventually done, albeit with a gloomy expression.

“Even though I knew you didn’t have any tolerance to magic power, I put you in danger.”

Despite Siegvold’s low spirits, Seiichirou could confidently say that his problem that day had been lack of sleep, that he had intentionally accompanied them to the prayer room, and that he would have gone there even if Siegvold had tried to stop him. To the contrary, if Siegvold hadn’t put up a barrier, that cluster of magic could have caused Seiichirou grave injury as well as magic-sickness. And even if, hypothetically, he had managed to barely cling to life after being struck by such an impact, Seiichirou would have had no choice but to receive a healing spell, which would have worsened his magic-sickness. That one blow would have been the difference between life and death.

“So there’s nothing you have to worry about, Mr. Siegvold. More importantly, thank you for saving me. Without your barrier, I probably would have died instantly.”

Seiichirou nodded at the other man, but Siegvold looked unwell.

“Mr. Siegvold?”

Then, Siegvold seemed to make his mind up about something. His violet eyes found Seiichirou’s, and he opened his mouth.

“Actually…”

The day after Norbert’s visit, and the day before Seiichirou was to be discharged from the hospital, he was visited by Valtom, Aresh’s butler.

“How are you feeling, Mr. Kondo?” he asked, handing him a get-well gift. Seiichirou accepted it, feeling embarrassed.

“Thanks to Aresh, I’ve already recovered, but I was told to rest until tomorrow to be on the safe side.”

“That is good to hear. Mr. Aresh has said he will come pick you up when you are discharged tomorrow.”

Seiichirou was quite surprised by this. By the time he had fully regained consciousness after Aresh had treated him for magic-sickness that day, Aresh had already left.

The shoulders of Ciro, the director of the Medical Bureau, had slumped as he muttered, “This isn’t a love hotel,” before he’d ordered Seiichirou to stay at the hospital for three days and filled Seiichirou in on the situation.

Ciro had explained that it was clear Seiichirou had developed magic-sickness, but that Aresh had first carried him to the medical office so that he could get a thorough medical examination and so that, if anything unexpected were to occur, it could be properly dealt with. On the way, Aresh had supplied him with small amounts of magic power and acclimatized it.

Then, just like when Seiichirou had been beaten by the knights, after engaging in a certain activity in the backroom of the medical office, Aresh had moved Seiichirou to a hospital bed and left before Seiichirou had woken up. Seiichirou had assumed that Aresh would return very soon afterward. Although he was a bit disappointed, he convinced himself that Aresh was probably busy with post-expedition work.

However, Seiichirou also wondered whether he was interpreting it that way because he wanted it to be true.

So then, when he heard that Aresh was coming to pick him up the next day, he felt momentarily relieved. But then Valtom delivered more news.

“Aresh has been bedbound because his magic was depleted…?” Seiichirou repeated.

“To be precise, his magic was depleted, and then he drank too much magic restoration tonic, causing him to fall ill.”

Aresh had been born with a lot of magic power.

However, having just gotten back from an extended trip consisting of the purification expedition and then having to eradicate magical beasts, supplying Seiichirou with magic power on top of all that had taken quite a lot out of him. Moreover, because the medicine to restore magic power circulated and amplified magic power in the body, it was not recommended that anyone ingest large amounts of it at once because of the huge burden it placed on the user’s body. Aresh had taken too much of it and become bedridden at home.

So that’s why…

Seiichirou had thought it was strange.

He’d thought it was weird that Aresh hadn’t come to lecture him under the guise of a sympathy visit, but in greater measure, Seiichirou had found it odd that Aresh had left him in the care of the medical office. The Aresh that Seiichirou knew would have brought him home and kept a close, watchful eye on him.

Although maybe it’s presumptuous of me to say something like that confidently…

“Mr. Kondo.”

Despite his concern for Aresh’s welfare, Seiichirou had been trying to think things through logically to avoid acknowledging his own relief when Valtom called out to him in quiet voice.

“I have known and taken care of the young master…of Aresh…since his infancy. He even asked me to join him when he left his parents’ house. I know this is overstepping my position as a butler, but I do feel a sort of parental love for him.”

Valtom spoke modestly, but it was evident that Aresh owed Valtom a great deal, and even Seiichirou could tell that Valtom’s position was much greater than that of just a butler.

“Therefore, Mr. Kondo, my greatest priority is protecting the young master’s health.”

Valtom lifted his head and met Seiichirou’s eyes. Seiichirou had never seen the man’s intense gaze before, and he naturally sat up a little straighter.

“I am fully aware that by telling you this, I am disobeying the young master’s wishes. I am prepared to be punished for it. But the young master’s health is the most important thing in the world to me.”

“Right…”

That was only natural.

Seiichirou had never met Aresh’s parents, but in aristocratic families, the servants took care of the children more often than the parents did. Valtom’s service to Aresh was heartfelt, and his love for Aresh might have exceeded that of Aresh’s parents.

“After the young master met you, he cast aside his apathy and became more energized than I have ever seen him before. And then he fell in love, and I was overjoyed. I intended to watch over whatever path he wanted to take.”

Hearing for the first time how Valtom viewed them made Seiichirou feel more flustered than he expected. Seiichirou had always wanted to ask the people in the house how they saw him, but he had been too afraid to do so.

“You are my savior, too, Mr. Kondo, for inspiring the young master to live.”

Seiichirou didn’t think he had done anything that impressive, but it seemed that Valtom had been greatly affected ever since Aresh had started running around taking care of the otherworlder.

“However…”

Valtom’s gaze became ominous again.

“…the young master cannot live without his health. I want to respect the young master’s wishes, but, though this may go without saying, I wish to care for his physical health before anything else. Although perhaps these are just the thoughts of old age.”

“No, I understand…”

Valtom’s point was logical. If he loved Aresh like a parent, it was only natural he’d think that way.

To Seiichirou, Aresh was the strongest person in this world—he had vast stores of magic power, he was skilled with a sword, and he was a commander. Seiichirou had relied on him too much because of this.

But Aresh was still a human being, and both his magic power and his physical strength were limited.

When Seiichirou had heard that Aresh was going to hunt magical beasts after the expedition, he should have felt concerned. Why had he taken it for granted that Aresh would always help him?

“I’m sorry… I’m solely to blame for this situation.”

Seiichirou knew he had the bad habit of forcing himself to plow through whatever circumstances he met and neglecting his own health when it came to work, but he now realized for the first time that Aresh’s health was also affected by this. Seiichirou had been the one to push Aresh’s health into this predicament, just as had happened with Aresh’s hunt for magical beasts.

“There’s no need for you to apologize to me. The young master decided on his own to go on the hunt because he wanted to impress you.”

Valtom winked and gave him a small smile.

“However, I do want to preserve the young master’s health, even if that means making him unhappy with me.”

These were natural feelings for a parent to have. Seiichirou felt a little envious that Aresh had someone who was so unconditionally concerned about his health at a time like this. Seiichirou didn’t have a parent in this world—an unconditional and absolute ally.

However…

“Please just bear in mind that there is someone who suffers when you fall ill, Mr. Kondo.”

…Seiichirou was suddenly reminded that he did have one unconditional, absolute ally.

The morning Seiichirou was set to leave the medical office, he woke, ate the low-magicule meal served to him, and got ready to go home. But the medical office was located in Seiichirou’s workplace, and all Seiichirou had were the change of clothes Milan had prepared for him and the work documents Norbert had brought him, so he finished getting ready very quickly.

“So? How do you feel?” asked Ciro casually, wearing a long, white coat. Seiichirou was sitting on the bed, waiting for Aresh to pick him up.

“I feel great, thanks to you. I was able to rest.”

“You made your subordinate bring you documents and worked, didn’t you?”

“I hardly worked at all.”

When Seiichirou pressed Ciro about the price of his hospitalization, Ciro explained that he didn’t need to pay anything because he was a civil official. Seiichirou was again impressed that the benefits of working at the royal palace extended to something like this, and by the generosity of their employee welfare system.

Very soon after Seiichirou had started talking to Ciro, Aresh arrived ahead of schedule.

“Your color looks a lot better,” he said as soon as he entered the room.

Then, without even looking at Ciro, he walked up and stroked a finger against Seiichirou’s cheek. As he did so, Seiichirou studied Aresh’s complexion. It looked the same as it always did. If Valtom had never told him that Aresh had been bedridden, Seiichirou would never even have known. The fact that Aresh had gone to the trouble of getting Seiichirou hospitalized while he himself had recuperated in bed at home implied he didn’t want his own condition made known. Valtom had been fully aware of this when he’d told Seiichirou and had been prepared to be punished for doing so, but Seiichirou was neither that thoughtless nor that foolish. Adults often pretended to be ignorant of things other people didn’t want them to know.

“I’m sorry for worrying you.”

“Not at all,” Aresh replied sarcastically, but it didn’t seem like he was going to deliver his usual lecture. He simply stroked Seiichirou’s face.

But now that Seiichirou thought about it, it was their first time seeing each other after two full days—their first meeting since Aresh had treated Seiichirou and brought him back from the brink of death. Aresh must have been concerned.

Seiichirou could almost physically sense Aresh’s feelings, which he never tried to hide, being transmitted through his skin. Uncharacteristically, Seiichirou felt heat rise to his face.

“…? You feel hot. Do you still have a fever?”

“…No, I’m fine.”

“You two should go home before you start flirting with each other,” said Ciro, who had been sitting, ignored, behind Aresh. “How many times do I have to tell you that the medical office isn’t the place for that sort of thing?”

Ciro’s voice brought Seiichirou back to his senses. He dodged Aresh’s hand and thanked Ciro.

“Thank you for everything you’ve done, Director.”

“Stop being so reckless.”

“I will,” Seiichirou immediately replied.

“Will you really?” Aresh asked, looking suspicious, but he was in a much better mood than Seiichirou had imagined he would be in. Considering Seiichirou had been in a coma, he had been prepared to receive a tornado of a lecture once he had recovered.

“Oh, Kondo, you’re already going home?”

Although Seiichirou inwardly puzzled over Aresh’s mysterious good mood, he was just reminding himself that not getting a lecture was the best possible outcome when there was a knock and the door opened. Ist appeared, along with…

“Sigma?!”

“G-good morning.”

It was Sigma, the woodworking apprentice from town.

“Why are you two together…?”

Did they know each other? Seiichirou combed through his memories. He remembered having seen them talking out of the corner of his eye when he had been talking to Siegvold at the church, but that was the extent of what he knew about their relationship.

“Who is he?” Aresh mumbled in Seiichirou’s ear.

“The boy who made my abacuses,” Seiichirou whispered back.

Sigma’s eyes remained glued to the muscular, dark-clothed man by Seiichirou’s side as he spoke timidly.

“Well, um, Ist invited me to see the Sorcery Department…”

“What?!”

“When we met at the church, we got really pumped talking about magic tools… I like woodworking, but I’ve always wanted to make magic tools. But I don’t have much magic power, and it costs a ton of money to make magic tools anyway, so I thought the only people who could work with magic tools were engineers employed by aristocrats, so I figured I’d never have anything to do with them, but then Ist asked if I’d make them together with him…”

“What?!”

Seiichirou stared in silent, open-mouthed amazement for some time.

Seiichirou had noticed Sigma’s ingenuity. He had noticed that Sigma liked to make things, and that he had ambition. That was exactly why he had wanted to have Sigma study in the private school, then attend formal school on the kingdom’s scholarship, and then one day work at some department or another at the royal palace… Seiichirou would have been thrilled if Sigma were to join the Accounting Department. He’d never thought that Ist would beat him to the punch. Seiichirou, clearly bitter, nearly asked Ist, “You’ve snatched him from right under my nose, haven’t you?” Ist, however, didn’t seem interested in Seiichirou’s irritation. His sleepy eyes were wide and sparkling.

“Kondo, I’ve made something amazing! Sigma gave me the idea for it. It’s just a prototype, though.”

“Ist, you…”

“Believe it or not, you can measure magic power with this!”

“Tell me more.”

“Hey!”

After Seiichirou’s dramatic change of tune, he had leaped up and tried to run over to Ist, but Aresh had stopped him by getting a secure hold of his head.

“You’ve been hospitalized and you’re just getting discharged today. What is motivating you to work right now? We’re going home.”

“What…? But, well…”

“We’re going home.”

“…Right.”

Aresh had saved him from the brink of death yet again. Seiichirou couldn’t go throwing a tantrum now.

“Ist, do a write-up for me aft… Oh, right, you can’t.”

Ist was incapable of writing up reports. Even if he did try, it was clear that it would be full of abstract phrases and generally be a composition only Ist could understand.

“Oh, I’ve done a basic write-up of the mechanics and the materials used,” said Sigma, offering Seiichirou three sheets of paper.

Seiichirou’s eyes widened.

“Sigma, you’re the best!”

Without a second thought, he hugged Sigma, along with the papers.

“Huh? No, not really, I just always saw the costs submitted when making things at my supervisor’s place, and I always needed to decide on prices for the things in my stall, so I just added them up like I usually would…”

What brilliance! Incredible! I want him in the Accounting Department after all… No, having a kid like him in the Sorcery Department would also be a huge help. But I want to raise such a brilliant boy by my side…

As Seiichirou began agonizing over this with Sigma still in his arms, Aresh again pushed Seiichirou back with a hand over his forehead, snapping him back to reality.

“You little… Do you remember what I just said?”

“Yes, of course. We’re going home. Sigma is going to private school and then formal school, so he probably won’t be getting a job anytime soon— Ouch, ouch, ouch! Aresh, you’re squeezing! Okay! I shouldn’t do that, right? I’ll take the papers home and leisurely look over them there— Ouch, ouch! I shouldn’t do that, either?”

From Ciro’s perspective, Seiichirou was obviously at fault in this situation, so he didn’t put a stop to any of this. Sigma looked on in bewilderment. Ist was already thinking of something else and not paying attention at all. Then, with the worst possible timing, Siegvold, having come to celebrate Seiichirou’s discharge, walked in.

“Seiichirou is in recovery! What are you doing to him?!”

Taken in isolation and without any warning, the scene looked like the muscular knight Aresh was unilaterally assaulting the recovering, feeble Seiichirou. Siegvold panicked and tried to save Seiichirou from Aresh, but there was no way a knight hardened by battle would lose to a mere priest. Aresh brushed aside Siegvold’s hands and secured Seiichirou in a prison of his own arms.

“I’m sorry for troubling you, Mr. Siegvold,” said Seiichirou. “This is nothing, so please don’t worry about it. Aresh, I was wrong, so please let go of me… Guh!”

For some reason, before Aresh let go of him, he squeezed him even tighter—so tight that Seiichirou thought his breakfast might come back up. Then Aresh released his hold, and Seiichirou compared the handsome men—one in white and one in black—who were standing before him.

I see. It’s not just the color of their eyes—they have similar builds, and even the energy around them is similar…

They were probably around the same height. Their looks were different up close, but from a distance they looked similar, like they were brothers or relatives. Neither Aresh’s nor Siegvold’s mannerisms, however, were like those of brothers.

Could the marquess family have had an illegitimate child? …It does happen. There’s even one in the royal family.

“Seiichirou, are you feeling better now?”

Without resolving the standoff with Aresh, Siegvold’s violet eyes turned to Seiichirou.

“I am, just as I told you when you first came to visit me. These three days I was hospitalized were like a vacation, so…”

“I see…”

Siegvold looked at Seiichirou, then at Aresh. His expression didn’t look dangerous like before—it was more like a covert glance. Then he glanced at Seiichirou again. For some reason, his face turned red, and he looked away.

“…? Mr. Siegvold, did you need anything from me…?”

“No, nothing. Rather, if there’s anything I can do to help with the matter we discussed the other day, please let me know.”

And with that, Siegvold bowed and left the room.

“What did you discuss the other day?” Aresh asked indignantly, but Seiichirou shook his head.

“I’ll tell you after we get home.”

The day Seiichirou regained consciousness, after Siegvold had come all the way to the medical office and apologized, he’d hung his head and confessed something.

Which was…

“Well, the cluster of magic that flew toward us… It wasn’t just an accident.”

After Aresh had taken Seiichirou away from the church, the prince had questioned Siegvold about the situation.

It was then that the two other people who were there at the time, Assistant Director Ist of the Royal Sorcery Department and the boy from town that Seiichirou had brought along, had said something strange.

“The way they pray and the incantations are different from how they were before.”

Because Siegvold had been talking to Seiichirou, he had not seen the children pray, and as a priest, he usually did not take care of the children of the relief house, so he hadn’t accompanied them to the prayer room recently, either. When Siegvold had asked how they’d prayed and what they’d said, Ist had recited it perfectly—astonishingly, he had memorized every word and every movement. It was different from the “prayer” that Siegvold knew, and it used more magic power than was necessary. This also confirmed that Cipriano had intentionally triggered the spontaneous magic discharge in the child who had lost control of his magic power—or, more precisely, he had caused the discharge and then aimed it directly at Seiichirou.

When Seiichirou heard this, he was horrified. He had never imagined that someone would go to such unabashed lengths to prevent their embezzlement from being exposed. If Ist had not coincidentally been there, the whole matter would very likely have been written off as nothing more than a child’s lack of magic control.

As a priest, Siegvold had promised that he would go to any lengths to provide testimony about this incident.

Seiichirou’s temporary assignment at the church came to an end with the submission of the income and expenditure report during his hospitalization.

“Welcome home, Mr. Aresh and Mr. Kondo.”

When Seiichirou finally returned home with Aresh after his three-day absence, he was greeted at the entrance by Valtom, Milan, and Pavel, the chef.

Technically, they were probably there to greet Aresh, their master, but Pavel seemed to have been quite worried about Seiichirou’s absence. He was on the verge of tears as he asserted, “I will make you healthy, Mr. Kondo!”

Seiichirou was a little nervous seeing Valtom again after their last conversation—especially with Aresh by his side—but when the expert butler met Seiichirou’s gaze, he smiled with all-knowing eyes and bowed. Seiichirou became even more frightened of what and how much Valtom had guessed, but he decided to grin and bear it.

It was still midmorning, but Seiichirou had been told to take off work until the next day, so he was organizing his work desk to put away his papers and things when Aresh came in. Aresh was also off work until the following day.

“Seiichirou, come here.”

Aresh called him over to the sofa, and Seiichirou dutifully obeyed. Just then, Milan brought up some tea along with Pavel’s specially made low-magicule baked goods. Thanks to Pavel, Seiichirou had started to dabble in more indulgent foods. When Milan left again, Aresh searched Seiichirou’s face, tracing its contours as if to make sure of something.

“You’ve lost a little weight.”

“Really?”

Lately, Seiichirou had been eating three square meals a day… But even if he excluded the past three days and included the time from before Aresh’s expedition, it was true that Seiichirou might have been a little neglectful of his meals.

Then it suddenly occurred to Seiichirou—this was the first time since before the expedition that he was directly facing Aresh in a clear state of mind. Seiichirou examined Aresh, too. His features were still so handsome that they didn’t seem natural, but Seiichirou felt as though Aresh’s cheeks were slightly sharper than normal.

“I think you’re the one who’s lost weight.”

“When an expedition is extended, that’s somewhat inevitable. You, however, are naturally skinny, so you must be more careful, for the sake of your health.”

Aresh traced a hand along Seiichirou’s waist, and even Seiichirou could feel his bones at the surface. Seiichirou’s slender body was a far cry from Aresh’s burliness. As one would expect from a knight, Aresh’s body was covered in muscles. If you looked at just his face, he gave off the impression of a model or a prince, but once he undressed, he was undoubtedly a warrior.

Aresh also had violet eyes that could suck anyone in.

They were unlike the sparkling blue eyes of Norbert and Yurius.

They were also different from Siegvold’s eyes, which resembled a calm sea.

Now that I’m looking closely, I guess they aren’t that similar…

But for some reason, Seiichirou was reminded of Siegvold, and his thoughts drifted to the church.

The church’s income and expenditure report had been officially accepted, and the investigation and audit of its contents were mostly complete. There was no more work that Seiichirou had to do at the church.

Since Yua and Yurius were so enthusiastic about the church-sponsored private school, Seiichirou figured it would probably be more exciting to put them at the center of operations, so Seiichirou would be working exhaustively on the project from behind the scenes. The income and expenditure task, too, would be finished once Seiichirou presented the documents to Camile and gave his report. Seiichirou had virtually no political power, so he had no part to play beyond that.

But what was it that felt so out of place?

It wasn’t that the bishop and the accounting manager had been kept away on a business trip.

It wasn’t that, for a while afterward, they had submitted blatantly inadequate documents, pushing the submission date back even further.

It wasn’t even that Seiichirou had almost gotten injured.

Something was bothering him.

“Seiichirou.”

Seiichirou suddenly snapped out of his reverie. Aresh was looking at him, a line between his furrowed brows.

Right, that face…

“I’m fine. There’s nothing wrong with me.”

“Are you sure? You lie so easily.”

But as Aresh spoke, the line between his eyebrows softened. Seiichirou was moved by a feeling that was hard to describe.

“Yes. I really did rest for those three days. What about you? Aren’t you tired after going on a hunt after the expedition?”

“I’m fine now… I worried you, didn’t I?”

“…? Yes.”

Seiichirou had been worried that Aresh had gone off to hunt magical beasts immediately after the purification expedition, but had he ever told Aresh as much? Though Seiichirou pondered this for a moment, he couldn’t deny that it was true, so he admitted it.

“Um, Aresh…”

“What is it?”

Now that they were face-to-face, Seiichirou hesitated to say it, but he made up his mind and opened his mouth.

“Is there anything you want?”

“What?”

Aresh’s thoughts were written all over his face—What is he talking about? Seiichirou cleared his throat and repeated himself with as calm an expression as he could muster.

“It would have to be something I’m capable of giving, but…is there anything you’d like me to do, or is there anything you want?”

Aresh didn’t even try to hide his suspicion, clearly wondering why Seiichirou would come out and say something like that. Seiichirou looked away and tried to argue his point again.

“It’s just—you saved my life again, so I’d like to show my appreciation. But you won’t accept money from me, right?”

“Of course not.”

Aresh received a much higher salary, so he was wealthier than Seiichirou anyway. Previously, Seiichirou had received money from the knights who had injured him and had given it all to Aresh as a fee for the treatment he’d provided, so Aresh had had no choice but to accept it, but there was no way he would accept money with the way their relationship was now. Even with Seiichirou’s living expenses, they had gone into mediation with Valtom and had somehow gotten Aresh to accept the stipend given to Seiichirou by the kingdom, at least.

“So I wanted to pay you in some other way—with something I can do.”

“Paying with your body?” Aresh grumbled in astonishment. “You can’t seriously…”

But Aresh suddenly stopped himself midsentence. So there is something, thought Seiichirou, repeating his offer.

“You can pick anything. I owe you my life, Aresh, so you can even ask for something slightly unreasonable.”

In an unusual turn of events, Seiichirou was the one drawing closer to Aresh on the couch. Aresh, cornered at the edge of it, pressed his lips into a thin line and looked down and slightly off to the side, clearly conflicted. It must have been something very difficult, or something hard for him to say. Seiichirou had initially thought that Aresh might impose restrictions on Seiichirou’s health or work, but that didn’t seem to be the case. He had been pondering how to avoid such a scenario, but all that thinking seemed to have been for nothing.

What came to mind next were things of a sexual nature… But Aresh was usually not very happy when Seiichirou offered to do things to him. Instead, Aresh would ask to make out, which Seiichirou often declined because it was embarrassing and inefficient. It’s probably that, huh? While Seiichirou imagined all the possible scenarios, Aresh seemed to have steeled his nerves.

“Anything…right?”

“Anything.”

Except asking me to stop working or to drop dead.

“Then…change the way you talk.”

“Huh?” Seiichirou said a bit stupidly, momentarily unable to comprehend what had just been said to him. He turned the words over in his mind.

He still didn’t understand.

“Huh? Is something rude about the way I speak? Did I say a word you’re not supposed to say here or something?”

In the eight years since he had become a working adult, Seiichirou had thought he had developed a good grasp of how to speak respectfully, but maybe he had been doing something wrong. Or maybe he had been using slang that had a different meaning in this world. After he asked, however, Aresh looked dismayed and shook his head.

“No, it’s not that. I’m asking you to change the way you talk to me.”

“How should I change it? Which part of it is impolite?”

“It’s not that… I’m saying I want you to talk to me like you talk to that kid.”

“Huh?” said Seiichirou, this time in the most puzzled tone he could manage.

Seiichirou stared at Aresh, but he was looking away awkwardly.

Kid? He said “kid,” right? The only kid I can think of that I’ve seen with Aresh recently is Sigma. The way I talk to Sigma?

“Um… If you’re talking about Sigma, he’s a kid from town. I’m a customer of his street stall. Our relationships are totally different…”

“So what? I’m closer to you than that kid is, aren’t I?”

Seiichirou was, of course, closer to Aresh in terms of intimacy, but if it were a question of social standing, Seiichirou was closer to being on Sigma’s level. Aresh was an aristocrat and a commander, after all. Seiichirou looked at Aresh, unsure how to respond.

Does this mean…that this man, as beautiful as a sculpture…this aristocrat, the strongest knight in the kingdom…is jealous of a ten-year-old kid from the merchant area of town…?

“Ugh… My chest hurts…,” said Seiichirou, suddenly hunching over with a hand on his chest. Aresh’s head snapped up and he grabbed Seiichirou’s shoulder.

“…?! Where?! How does it hurt? Show me!”

“Not like that… It’s just…my heart skipped a beat for the first time in a long while. It’s not an illness or anything.”

Never had Seiichirou imagined that this commander would try to compete with a child.

When Seiichirou looked up, he saw Aresh watching him with a puzzled but worried expression. He was obviously a gorgeous, handsome man.

I’m…totally done for.

“I’ll be counting on you, then.”

There was no reply, but there never was, so Seiichirou didn’t wait for one. He simply shut the door, turned on his heel, and walked back to his own department on the opposite end of the building.

One month had passed since Seiichirou had started his temporary assignment at the church. His last day had technically been during his hospitalization, but now that his task was finished and he could return to his own workplace, his sense of nostalgia was…nonexistent. Seiichirou had been reporting to the Accounting Department for work every time he’d had a day off from his assignment, and the medical office where he had been hospitalized until just the other day was located within the royal palace, so if anything, he was rather tired of seeing the place.

Even so, when Seiichirou opened the door to the Accounting Department and was immediately greeted by Norbert—“Welcome back, Sei!”—and all the other employees with smiles on their faces, he felt secretly relieved.

Seiichirou was grateful that he could concentrate on his own work. He had visited the accounting office on his days off, but with his hospitalization, it had been six days since his last visit, so work had piled up quite a bit. Because he had visited the Sorcery Department that morning, Seiichirou threw himself headfirst into work to make up for falling behind. He became so immersed in his work that he didn’t even realize that the lunch break had started. Then his lunch “date,” who had not been seen in the Accounting Department for quite some time, appeared in the office.

“Seiichirou! The Fire hour started ages ago! What happened to lunch? Hurry up!”

The black-clad knight, with his low, carrying voice and his loud footsteps, flung open the doors of the Accounting Department.

The few people who had already finished lunch and were relaxing; Norbert, who had been grumbling and waiting for Seiichirou to wrap things up; and Seiichirou, who had been concentrating on his work, all looked up at the man. Aresh, ignoring everyone else’s gazes, stared at Seiichirou as he marched up to him. His stance was imposing as he stood in front of Seiichirou, assistant director of the Accounting Department. Coupled with his remarkable physique, Aresh’s presence was incredibly intimidating.

“Seiichirou, you heard the midday bell, didn’t you? Then what are you doing?”

Seiichirou immediately sensed that he would only make Aresh grumpier by telling him that he hadn’t heard the bell because he had been concentrating.

“I did hear the bell, but I wasn’t at a good stopping point,” he answered instead.

It didn’t make a difference.

“I’ve told you so many times to make sure you eat your meals, haven’t I? Besides, didn’t we agree to eat in the dining hall together on days we both work at the royal palace?”

Seiichirou wondered if he ever had agreed to something like that, but before Seiichirou had been assigned to the church, that had in fact been their daily routine. Perhaps Seiichirou had just gotten wrapped up in his normal work after being absent for so long, or perhaps this was a habit that Seiichirou had developed from secretly working on his days off. At any rate, he was certain that nothing good would come of resisting Aresh, so Seiichirou put his papers together and got to his feet.

“Sorry, I got too wrapped up in catching up on work. Let’s go, Aresh.”

The day before, after a long discussion, the two of them had reached a stopgap compromise in which Seiichirou would address Aresh slightly less formally. Aresh huffed and turned on his heel, appearing disinterested in what Seiichirou had just said, then walked away as if it was a given that Seiichirou would follow. But Seiichirou could tell—Aresh’s mood had improved.

“I-in that case, I’m going out to eat today!” said Norbert.

“What are you talking about? You’re coming, too.”

Seiichirou grabbed Norbert by the collar as he tried to run away, then followed Aresh.

Seiichirou got food in the dining hall, instructed, as ever, by Aresh. They’d just reached seats that were in full view of the public when suddenly, someone called out to them—someone who, like Aresh, was not supposed to be in a place like this.

“May I join you as well?”

Seiichirou looked up and saw rose-blond hair and a blue cloak.

Camile Karvada, the most powerful person in the Romany Kingdom’s legal system, was smiling at them.

“Oooh, here we go again…,” Norbert muttered.

Seiichirou ignored the young man, privately thinking that Norbert was going to help him eat every last bite of his enormous serving of side dishes again today.

“You’re feeling better, I see, Seiichirou?” Camile asked as he began to eat the food his chamberlain brought over to him as if it were a matter of course.

“Yes, fortunately,” Seiichirou replied, resigning himself to the prime minister’s company.

More than half of the lunch break had already passed, so few people remained in the dining hall. But even those people were so far away it was as if there were a barrier applied to the table—there was no one within a radius of fifteen feet around them.

“It seems the church’s income and expenditure report was correct and complete.”

“Yes…as a written report.”

The income and expenditure report had been submitted right after Seiichirou’s hospitalization, and it abided by all the stipulations required of a written report.

“I also received your report about the matter you mentioned before. Thank you for all your hard work.”

Seiichirou had already completed and submitted a document comparing the total donations with the amount of money the church was likely spending on operating expenses, which he’d harbored doubts about.

“Not at all. That was just my job.”

And that was the extent of the work Seiichirou had been entrusted with.

“The miasma has finally been suppressed, and I would certainly like for everything to settle down, but I can’t let the current situation continue unchecked, either. And you mentioned something about magic power, didn’t you? That incident could be useful, too, right?”

Seiichirou knew that Camile was telling him to help put a leash around the church’s neck. But Seiichirou was just assistant director of the Accounting Department. He was merely a public figure who did financial calculations.

“Please forgive me. Religious institutions are difficult to deal with in many ways. You’re asking me to make political moves, but I can’t,” said Seiichirou, making a show of shrugging his shoulders as if to say, “It’s outside of my jurisdiction.”

The most Seiichirou could do was work out estimates. There was no way he could meddle or interfere with religion or politics.

Camile raised an eyebrow, as if he were saying, “Oh?” But there was a limit to what Seiichirou, an insignificant accountant, could do.

“I’ve checked with the aristocrats who were listed in the worship book as not having donated money, compared the names against last year’s Accounting Department documents, and put together a summary with concrete figures, which I’ll present to you later. I’m sure this will distress the aristocrats whose generous donations were underestimated or the ones whose names were omitted, so would you please discuss that matter with the Legal Department?” asked Seiichirou.

The corners of Camile’s mouth rose.

“Also,” Seiichirou pressed on, “the Sorcery Department is currently developing a tool which can quantify the magic power generated from the special prayer along with the magic power needed for the barrier, so that will be prepared and submitted to you shortly. Additionally, we are in the process of confirming some facts with vendors that chiefly utilize magic tools, so I should be able to hand that over to you as soon as it’s finished.”

When Seiichirou had stopped by the Sorcery Department that morning, the device that measured magic power was nearly completed. Of course, there was room for improvement, but for now they just needed quantifiable data and visible results. Seiichirou had requested that the numerical units of measurement be more exact.

With Norbert’s help, Ist had come to understand the overall workings of the barrier around the royal capital. Ist was exceptionally talented at perceiving magic power, and because he had done research on the royal capital defense barrier on his own without being asked, he had been able to analyze it quickly.

“Right, that’s great! You really are incredible, Seiichirou. If you ever get tired of that black beast over there, do give me a shout.”

Camile chuckled. The other civil officials were chatting amongst themselves, watching the group from afar although they couldn’t overhear their conversation. Norbert, however, was close enough to hear what they were saying, and his eyes went so wide it seemed as though they might pop out of his skull. His gaze quickly darted between Camile, Seiichirou, and the black beast himself, from whom a dark aura seemed to be radiating.

“Funny joke,” said Seiichirou, trying to play it off even though internally he was sweating bullets, wondering where on earth that comment had come from.

Camile’s blue-gray eyes, however, were unexpectedly serious, staring at Seiichirou so intently it took his breath away.

“I think it’s because I like your composure and your objective approach to work, but you’re really on board this time, aren’t you?”

Camile spoke as if he saw into the depths of Seiichirou’s heart, just as Seiichirou would have expected from the politician entrusted with the entire kingdom. It was a bit frightening, but Seiichirou also respected the man’s keen insight. The man probably had no equal when it came to discovering concealed motives.

Seiichirou had taken a step back from the church investigation.

Unlike the miasma strategy, the barrier planning, and the research on the spell to return home, the circumstances surrounding the church investigation had very little to do with Seiichirou himself. The only advantage of taking the job had been dissuading people in the royal palace from thinking that the Third Royal Order was at Seiichirou’s beck and call. It was good that the kingdom’s budget would be carefully examined and increased as a result of the investigation, but Seiichirou wasn’t that concerned with the development of the kingdom. Seiichirou’s home was elsewhere, and he would return there one day, after all. He was just doing his job.

However…

“That’s right,” said Seiichirou. “My life was intentionally targeted, so I want to follow this through to the end.”

Cipriano had clearly been trying to kill Seiichirou.

Seiichirou had the right to know why, and to get revenge.

To do that, he needed to expose the true state of affairs in the church.

“…What do you mean? Tell me exactly what’s going on.”

“Oh!”

Seiichirou’s demeanor had previously been composed, but now anger had bubbled up inside him.

During his conversation with Camile, the emotions that Seiichirou had been subduing had gotten stirred up, making Seiichirou blurt out the truth of what had happened.

In high society, Aresh was referred to as the Ice Nobleman. He was called the black beast amongst the civil officials and knights of the royal palace. He was the strongest knight in the Romany Kingdom. And Seiichirou had forgotten that that very same man was right beside him.

I’d like to thank everyone who has picked up this story, whether you’re reading it online or in print. I just can’t believe this is the second volume!

This was only possible thanks to everyone who bought the previous one. Thank you so much.

I’m very sorry that my slow writing pace has kept you all waiting for so long.

In the first volume, we were worried that Seiichirou’s emotions might be frozen and unyielding, but in this volume, he seems to have become a bit more human, hasn’t he? He is just as much of a workaholic as ever, though.

Previously, Seiichirou was in a constant state of anxiety at the precariousness of his own position, having been suddenly transported into another world, but thanks to his hard work, he has established his position and has realized that he has some people on his side. Even his facial expressions have softened considerably. Aresh’s devotion and love were also partially responsible for this.

When it comes to Aresh, I’ve been told that he barely made any appearances in the first volume, and in the second volume…I’m sorry to say that it’s more of the same.

There aren’t many works in the Boys Love genre that can make the other romantic lead rejoice that it’s been so long since they’ve reunited, but…I guess it’s like that saying, isn’t it? “Absence makes the heart grow fonder,” or something. It’s probably something like that. Seiichirou’s primary focus is work, but it’s not like he’s forgetful.

A manga adaptation of this story has also begun to be published on the internet.

I was just as incredulous about that development, too. When I heard about it from my editor, I remember thinking, What in the world is he talking about? as I replied with something like, “Oh, right.” My editor probably thought, What’s this person’s problem?

The artist, Kazuki Irodori, draws each chapter and illustration with so much care that I’m incredibly moved when I see them. The facial expressions that can’t be conveyed in the novel are also mesmerizing, so if any of you haven’t read it, please, please do!

In the beginning, when Aresh and Seiichirou aren’t involved with each other at all, it’s so exciting to see their expressions when they look at each other.

It’s also fun to see depictions of characters who don’t appear in the novel’s illustrations.

Speaking of illustrations, I would like to use this opportunity to express my gratitude to Kikka Ohashi, who drew the illustrations for the second volume of this work as well.

It was a dream come true to once again be able to enjoy Kikka Ohashi’s depictions of the characters, so subtle and full of personality.

The new characters in the second volume, Siegvold and Selio, were also fantastic—they were just as I had imagined them.

Siegvold’s sense of seriousness and good breeding came out so clearly. And the priest clothes are kind of sexy, aren’t they?!

Plus, the lovey-dovey picture everyone was so eagerly awaiting is incredible. It was a little reward.

Finally, for all the hard work they have put into the publication and launching of this book, I would like to thank KADOKAWA; my editor, Ohashi; everyone involved in binding and proofing the book; the printing offices; the bookstores; and all of you.

Let’s meet again if we have the chance.

Respectfully yours, Yatsuki Wakatsu