“Wow. I was really teleported…”

　　After Zenjirou had briefly greeted the n.o.bility, starting with the prostrating governor of Valentia, he was taken to his private chamber and said this admiring while looking out of the window.

　　This was the residence for the Duke of Valentia, sort of the centre of the seaport city.

　　As a matter of common knowledge, the t.i.tle Duke of Valentia was inherited by royalty from generation to generation, so the residence was actually almost never used and the administration was in the neighbouring residence of the governor, but right now the residence had been whipped into perfect shape to accommodate Zenjirou. One would not believe that it had been desolate a short while ago.

　　The opened window let in the dazzling sunlight and the salty breeze typical for a seaport city.

　　Aside from that, his vision was filled with the stony harbour that reminded him of an old city in Europe he had seen on TV before, and the marvellous vast blue sea.

　　Most of the stones used in the harbour were white, so it beautifully contrasted with the blue of the sea.

　　“You just have to add the royal red to it, and you get a tricolour. Man, I feel like singing now.”

　　The colours blue, white and red reminded him of the soccer team he had been a fan of in j.a.pan, so he unconsciously mumbled to himself while narrowing his eyes to slits to the reflection of the sun on the water surface.

　　At this point, the door was knocked and the familiar voice of a woman resounded.

　　“Master Zenjirou, may I have a bit of your time?”

　　“Ah, yes.”

　　When he permitted it reflexively, an acquainted woman entered as expected.

　　“Excuse me, Master Zenjirou.”

　　The woman was middle-aged and wore carmine red maid clothes.

　　Her name was Ines and she was the Head of the Cleaning Department in the Inner Palace.

　　Amongst the older waiting maids in the Inner Palace, she was exceptional slender and graceful.

　　Like her position suggested, she was in charge of the cleaning in the Inner Palace, but needless to say, that was not the only expertise she was capable of.

　　She was qualified enough to lead all the waiting maids in the Inner Palace in place of Supervisory Maid Amanda without any problems, if she ever felt like it.

　　Zenjirou stood with his back to the window as Ines approached him. She dropped an elegant curtsy in front of him and reported the matter.

　　“Sir Raffaelo Márguez requests an audience with you. What may I tell him?”

　　“Oh, he does?”

　　He was about to ask her what he should do, but quickly swallowed down these words.

　　(Oops. I’m still too used to leave all the decisions to Aura.)

　　Self-reflecting, Zenjirou quickly mused on his own.

　　He had arrived here in Valentia literally a moment ago, but had done so through Aura’s “Teleport” magic, so he was not the least bit exhausted from the trip, to the point that it did not even feel like he had gone to the faraway coast in the west until he had looked out of the window.

　　As far as he was concerned, he would have liked to have some time to get accustomed to the climate and customs here, but this was not a vacation.

　　It was a business trip, so it was only natural to bring forward work.

　　(The question is if I’m risking to be ‘looked down on’ when I accept his request right away.)

　　Zenjirou recalled his lessons with Lady Octavia, but unfortunately could not remember something that was a good match for his current situation.

　　In that case, he had to make a decision for himself.

　　After pondering for a moment, he began to speak.

　　“Okay. I’ll meet him. Prepare a room.”

　　Since he did not know whether it was right to meet him or not, he decided to abide by his preferences. And his way of proceeding was to get work done as soon as possible.

　　“Yes, as you wish.”

　　The middle-aged maid lowered her head respectfully upon the instructions of her master.

　　Approximately one hour later.

　　In one room of the residence, Zenjirou met the man, who called himself Raffaelo Márguez.

　　“It is a pleasure to meet you, Master Zenjirou. I am Raffaelo, the eldest son of Manuel, the current head of the Márguez Family.

　　I cannot thank you enough for agreeing to meet me so suddenly today.”

　　Smoothly delivering his greeting, the man bowed elegantly. Zenjirou remained seated in his chair as he watched him.

　　(So that’s Raffaelo Márguez. One of Aura’s former husband candidates…)

　　He was probably in his early thirties and had an average height and build. His looks were personable, but not distinct enough to call him beautiful.

　　If anything, his features were too average to leave a bigger impression. At least he was not as rememberable as General Puyol Guillén, whom you would never forget again after meeting once.

　　“It’s okay. I wanted to talk to you, too. For now, sit down.”

　　Even after more than one year, Zenjirou was still not used to speak in an haughty tone, but this time he used it with pleasure.

　　His dislike for the former husband candidate of his wife made his sharp tongue and condescending manner appear more natural.

　　“Yes, thank you.”

　　Raffaelo sat down in a chair across from Zenjirou with a large rectangle table in-between them.

　　The motion for setting the chair in place for himself was bizarrely un.o.btrusive as well. It must have been some kind of “elegant movement”. He had internalised to move smoothly without upsetting those, who watched him.

　　“Speak up, Sir Raffaelo. Did you already meet with the girl, who claims to be a ‘princess from the North Continent’?”

　　Zenjirou folded his hands on the table and asked, whereupon Raffaelo Márguez nodded a bit.

　　“Yes. We only exchanged pleasantries for a bit, though, because I was only ‘sent’ here by Her Majesty three days ago as well.”

　　The rumour that a self-proclaimed princess from the Uppsala Kingdom had arrived on a s.h.i.+p with four masts, was spreading so fast that probably everyone in Valentia already knew about it.

　　And it goes without saying, since there was no way to hide the giant four-master anchoring in the harbour.

　　“Give me a brief synopsis. What was the princess like?”

　　“Hmm, her name is Freya Uppsala and she is a girl of seventeen or eighteen years. According to herself, she is the crown princess of the Uppsala Kingdom, which lies on the North Continent.”

　　“Any credibility?”

　　Raffaelo answered the short question from Zenjirou without missing a beat, as if he had prepared his reply beforehand.

　　“If my personal opinion is all right with you: I would like to think that she is saying the truth. Her manners were slightly different, probably because of the difference in customs of our countries, but her way of behaving and speaking seemed sophisticated and habitual to me.”

　　In this case, her youth actually gave her more credibility.

　　Admittedly, this world also had clever con artists, who could act aristocratic to the point that even real n.o.bility and royalty were fooled, but these people had inevitably gone through decades of training. The age of Princess Freya made that impossible.

　　“I see.”

　　Keeping his expression in check, Zenjirou nodded once.

　　Aura had said that they could a.s.sume that she was indeed the real deal, because she had a large s.h.i.+p with four masts, and she seemed to be right. Needless to say being a real princess did not rule out the possibility that she was trickster.

　　After all, royalty was more or less resorting to deception when negotiating for their country.

　　If you underestimated her for being a young girl, you were at risk of losing everything.

　　“Since you only greeted her, you don’t know their motive yet?”

　　“No. I have not inquired about that so far. But she mentioned it was more or less a coincidence that they ended up here. They were indeed heading for the South Continent, but apparently got into a storm on the open sea and veered off course.”

　　“Aha…?”

　　Zenjirou could not hide his surprise towards the report from Raffaelo, and widened his eyes a bit.

　　When they arrived here by chance through a storm, then there s.h.i.+p was definitely damaged. That in turn meant that they could get their hands on some of the know-how of the large four-master by lending a helping hand for their repairs out of “good-will” instead of providing something in exchange for it during negotiations.

　　Anyway, as long as it was within Aura’s expectations, he had already been instructed on how to act, so Zenjirou did not have to pause for a decision.

　　“Then we have to provide the manpower to repair their s.h.i.+p. If the s.h.i.+p’s damaged, we are to do our best to fix it. That’s the will of her Majesty Aura, too.”

　　“Yes, very well. I will act upon it immediately.”

　　Zenjirou emphasized the fact that it was an intention of Aura as well, and whether he understood the implication or not, Raffaelo simply affirmed it without changing his composed facial expression.

　　(Immediately, eh. Guess he’s exactly the guy Aura said he would be.)

　　When Zenjirou heard his answer, he a.s.sessed the man sitting across from him with that in mind.

　　Aura had described the man known as Raffaelo Márguez as a “civil servant, who was extremely capable, but also pa.s.sive beyond help”.

　　In other words, he would bring about the best results as long as he had received orders, but would never be proactive himself.

　　If anything, that type of man was rare in the Carpa Kingdom, where ambitious men were in the majority.

　　Aura might have readily accepted him as her husband, if his loyalty were to be directed at the country itself instead of his family.

　　“Nevertheless, the craftsmen in Valentia do have their own jobs during the day. Of course I will try to make them cooperate as much as possible, but it remains questionable if they alone can repair such a big s.h.i.+p.

　　With your consent, I would like to call in some craftsmen from ‘outside’.”

　　Raffaelo Márguez kept a straight face without so much as batting an eye as he proposed that with a calm voice.

　　Zenjirou kept cool, too, when responded contrived to the suggestion.

　　“Aha. And by ‘outside’, you mean craftsmen from the County of Márguez?”

　　On a rare occasion, his words had an obvious tinge of sarcasm, but the successor to Count Márguez answered in the affirmative without wiping the smile from his face.

　　“Yes. I regret to say that I, despite my advanced age, have hardly ever left my home domain so far, so I am afraid that have rather few connections to others. Fortunately enough, the County of Márguez is not that far away from Valentia.”

　　“I see…”

　　“I would be delighted to get your approval.”

　　“But you need the permission of the Queen to bring people from other domains into Valentia.”

　　“Please rest a.s.sured. My Father and Her Majesty have already come to an understanding in the Capital. Here is the relevant doc.u.ment.”

　　With these words, Raffaelo pulled out a four-fold dragonskin parchment from his pocket and put it onto the table.

　　Zenjirou glanced at Ines, who stood at attention next to him. The middle-aged maid recognized the cue, smoothly moved over to the table, picked up the parchment and handed it to Zenjirou.

　　“Hmm…”

　　Zenjirou skimmed over the opened parchment, but much to his sorrow, he could not even read half of it. He did studied a bit every night, but so far he could only understand the language used in the Carpa Kingdom as good as a j.a.panese middle school student understood English.

　　For now, he recognized the signs of Aura and Count Márguez under the doc.u.ment, then returned the parchment to the waiting maid.

　　She took it and set it down on the table in such a way that Zenjirou could see it as well. Then she read it out aloud with a clear voice.

　　“I will read it now.

　　During his appointment as the a.s.sistant of Zenjirou Carpa, Raffaelo Márguez is given free rein in regards to…”

　　The content of the dragonskin parchment read aloud by the waiting maid Ines, was more or less exactly what Raffaelo had said before.

　　In short, it registered the right for Raffaelo Márguez to call in more personnel from outside during the current affair, when there was a shortage of manpower to resolve any circ.u.mstances.

　　In that case, the Márguez Family had to shoulder all the expenses for the personnel from outside, though.

　　(I see. In other words, the Márguez get a piece of the cake, too. In exchange, Raffaelo will play the faithful subordinator here and the Márguez cover a part of the expenses, too.)

　　It should go without saying, but Queen Aura and Count Márguez had already reached an agreement on this matter for the most part.

　　The reason that Aura had not told Zenjirou about it directly was that it was part of the advertis.e.m.e.nt to the Márguez Family that “Zenjirou was merely a figurehead and Raffaelo in charge”.

　　Personally speaking, Zenjirou naturally had wanted to be filled in beforehand, but also realized that Aura was way better than him in making such decisions.

　　“Fine. You seem to be saying the truth. When Her Majesty has given you permission, I can’t object. Do what’s necessary.”

　　Zenjirou spoke with a callous tone, as if he had stopped caring.

　　* * *

　　“d.a.m.n, I hardly slept at all.”

　　On the next day, that honest proclamation was the first thing Zenjirou said when he woke up after spending the night in the residence of the Duke of Valentia.

　　Amidst the faint sunlight that crept in through the gaps of the tightly closed wooden shutters, he stretched himself abundantly on the bed to vitalize his sleepy body.

　　“Uh… Ugh…”

　　Technically, his night had lasted longer than usual, but he still felt sleep-deprived.

　　Although he had expected to face some inconveniences outside the Inner Palace, he clearly had been naïve in his thinking.

　　The hottest season was already over, but the nights in the Carpa Kingdom were still sultry. And now his body could not adopt to the sultriness, because he had set up the air conditioning in his bedroom at home.

　　The only proper light he had was the crank-powered LED flashlight he had brought with him from the Capital, so it was not easy to stay up doing something, either.

　　His cell phone could be charged through that crank-powered flashlight, so he had brought it with him as a clock, but his game consoles were all left at home. Zenjirou was regretting his choice a bit now.

　　Because he was playing less and less with the game consoles these days, he had not felt the need to bring them along, but now that he had spent a night in Valentia, he noticed that he had a lot more spare time than expected.

　　Thinking back, the reason why he recently no longer played games at night was that he spent his time either discussing things with Aura or training his magic.

　　But needless to say, neither Aura, nor his computer, which replayed the spells with the correct intonation, were here right now.

　　Admittedly, he could practice his control over the magical output, even without such a playback device, but Zenjirou was not blessed with enough patience to just keep staring at his own hands for hours while increasing and decreasing the emission of magical power, respectively.

　　As a result, he had not known what to do with his free time, so he had turned off the lights and gone to bed early, even though he had not been sleepy.

　　“Man, I was a bit too naïve. I’ve got to try harder to acclimatize here.”

　　Dressed in his blue pyjama, he said this and quickly got out of the bed.

　　For his pyjama as well as his leisure wear and underwear he had brought along the clothes from Earth.

　　Aura had reminded him that he would have to wear the official attire non-stop for his duties during the day, and advised him to wear something comfortable in private at least or he would come to regret it later. Taking her piece of advice to heart, he had packed a considerable amount of clothes and it seemed to pay off.

　　Even in his familiar pyjama he had slept badly. If he had worn the traditional nightwear, he might have not gotten a wink of sleep.

　　“Back then during business trips, I could sleep just fine in the provided bathrobe of the hotels, though. Guess I can’t compare a hotel in j.a.pan with a residence in a different world.”

　　While saying that, he fumbled around to open the wooden shutters.

　　“! Gah, the sun sure is bright here.”

　　When the morning sun flooded the room, Zenjirou narrowed his eyes to slits.

　　At that moment, the door was knocked.

　　Like always, he wanted to respond with “Yes, come in” at once, but swallowed down these words in the nick of time.

　　This was not the Inner Palace. The casual tone he always used there never got him into trouble, because he could trust the waiting maids of the Inner Palace to keep their mouth shut up about it.

　　Normally it would not be well-received when he interacted casually with the waiting maids as royalty. Not only would it damage his own reputation, it could possibly have a bad influence on Aura as well for taking such a man as her husband.

　　“What’s the matter?”

　　Zenjirou varnished his way of speaking and expression for public appearance, then spoke to beyond the door.

　　“Y- Yes, excuse me for disturbing your rest. I brought your change of clothes.”

　　As expected, an unfamiliar voice of a nervous young waiting maid resounded from the other side of the door.

　　“Enter.”

　　Although Zenjirou was a bit fed up with having to use a stage phrasing in his own room as well, he bluntly gave his permission.

　　“Yes, excuse me.”

　　The door opened with these words and three young waiting maids entered the room.

　　The first maid opened the door, the following maid carried the third formal attire for male royalty in her hands and the last maid closed the door behind her.

　　Their demeanour indicated sophistication as servants beyond their years, but the tanned faces of the girls were pitifully ravaged by nervousness.

　　Well, no surprise. Zenjirou was the third most, if not second most important person in this country. The waiting maids in the Inner Palace had gotten to know him, but the people of Valentia had only heard rumours about him, so to them he simply was a “man with enough power to easily execute them if he felt like it”.

　　Foolish n.o.bility that punished their servants for fun was a minority in the Carpa Kingdom, no doubt, but at this point, the girls did not even know enough about Zenjirou to judge whether he belonged to that minority or not.

　　“Good morning, Master Zenjirou. We have come to help you get changed.”

　　The three young maids bowed towards him, whereupon Zenjirou tried his best not to sound friendly in his reply.

　　“Good. Go ahead.”

　　He put forth an effort to appear calm and understanding in order to ease the unfounded nervousness of the girls while maintaining a dignity, so he would not be called a failure as royalty.

　　That act was rather tiring, but he told himself that it was also part of his job. Still in his pyjamas, he spread his arms a bit and waited for the maids to approach him.

　　From his point of view, it was rather embarra.s.sing to have young girls help him get changed, but he still could not put on the “third formal attire” by himself, because of its complicated dressing method and tieing strings.

　　Of course he could take off the pyjama by himself, but there was no meaning in doing only that by himself when he could not continue afterwards.

　　So he had spread his arms resigned and expressionless. Thereupon the three waiting maids skilfully took off his pyjama and dressed him in the third formal attire.

　　Feeling bashful about posing as a dress-up doll without saying anything, Zenjirou broached an harmless subject.

　　“Actually, where’s Ines?”

　　The maids flinched for a moment when their temporary master suddenly called out to them, but one of them answered him right away.

　　“Mrs. Ines has gone to the kitchen to issue instructions. Afterwards, she wanted to arrange today’s schedule with Sir Raffaelo and Sir Damian.”

　　In the Inner Palace, Ines had only been in charge of cleaning, but here in Valentia, she was the Supervisory Maid in effect and kind of acted as a secretary for Zenjirou at the same time. In a way, she was busier than Zenjirou, the nominal delegate, and Raffaelo Márguez, the actual delegate.

　　After the waiting maids finished dressing him, Zenjirou briefly looked at himself in the big gla.s.s mirror from the Inner Palace and then checked with the maids.

　　“I’m supposed to meet Princess Freya after breakfast, but when do I head to the dining room?”

　　“The cooking staff is preparing breakfast right now. As soon as it is done, someone will come for you, so please wait here until then.”

　　His calm tone and facial expression seemed to have eased a bit of their nervousness, since the young waiting maids now answered smoothly and clearly.

　　“I see. Fine. You’re dismissed until then.”

　　But the maids looked a bit troubled at each other when he said that. A person of n.o.ble rank with servants usually did not mind the presence of maids in the room.

　　If anything, it was the custom to have at least one servant around for the purpose of issuing demands at any time.

　　Going by that common sense, it was not commendable to dictate their retreat now. Zenjirou was aware of that, but it would suffocate him to be attended by maids all day long.

　　Even if it seemed dubious, he had to insist on this selfishness.

　　“You‘re dismissed.”

　　“Y- Yes.”

　　“Very well.”

　　“Please call for us if you need anything.”

　　When he gave them the order again, the waiting maids obediently complied, albeit perplexed.