062 – Dungeon
“You have… a younger sister?”
“Yes.”
“Um… Her hair color is… different.”
“She’s adopted. My mother adopted her when I was four. She’s three years younger.”
“Ah, at that point, you could consider each other as good as blood siblings. …But, Mr. Mihan, your parents…”
“That’s right.”
“…That must have been difficult.”
“Raising a disobedient younger sister alone is quite the struggle.”
“Isn’t that how all younger siblings are?”
Perhaps because Miss Ella also had a younger brother,
she nodded as if she understood the torment, and looked at me with eyes that suggested I had been through so much.
‘I apologize, Miss Isabella.’
I began earnestly crafting Isabella into the world’s most disobedient younger sister.
…
“Oh, that’s right…!”
“Yes?”
Miss Ella, who had been in the middle of disparaging my fictional sibling, seemed to suddenly snap back to reality.
She began to explain the reason she had returned to my room in the first place.
“I came back to tell you this, but I forgot.”
“What is it?”
“My mother wishes to meet you, Mr. Mihan.”
“Me?”
“Yes, she wishes to host the benefactor who facilitated the Duke’s family’s title upgrade.”
“Benefactor? Haha… That’s a bit of an, well, embarrassing way to put it.”
Ella’s mother, Julia Arlay, wants to meet me…
“Since you have a younger sister, I’ll tell my mother that your younger sister will be coming as well.”
“…You’re inviting Isabella too?”
“Yes. Since I know she exists, it wouldn’t be quite right to exclude the sister, would it?”
To think I must escort Isabella-ssi, as my younger sister, to the Duchy of Eloise.
Traveling there alone to meet my lover’s mother for the first time was nerve-wracking enough, but to also bring along a ticking time bomb of a cat…?!
“Haha… guess there’s no helping it, then.”
I couldn’t express my true feelings outwardly.
I quickly returned to my room, intending to synchronize our memories with Isabella-ssi and fabricate shared childhood experiences.
“Since the Academy is on temporary break, why don’t you come tomorrow?”
Strike while the iron’s hot, as they say.
To Ella-ssi’s request that I visit the manor as early as tomorrow…
“I already have plans tomorrow, but would this weekend be possible? I have a prior engagement with Her Highness, the Princess.”
I explained that tomorrow, His Majesty and I were scheduled to entertain Princess Asher…
“…The Princess?”
“Yes.”
“…”
Ella-ssi’s cheerful expression, though only for a fleeting moment, noticeably darkened…
“Then…”
“Yes?”
“Could… Could I also come… tomorrow?”
Ella-ssi suddenly requested to join my schedule.
“Should you?”
His Majesty’s words to treat her with ease echoed in my mind.
I decided to include Ella-ssi in the group of people entertaining Princess Asher tomorrow.
‘If I entrust Princess Asher to Ella-ssi? Then that means I can just lie in bed! Perfect!’
Absolutely not, it’s not because entertaining Princess Asher is difficult.
Decidedly not, it’s not because my stamina can’t keep up with Princess Asher, who is unable to utilize Ether.
This is all~ a decision imbued with my uncle’s wishes that we all enjoy ourselves together.
…
It seemed Ella-ssi was worried that I would be alone in a room with the mature and womanly Princess, engaging in this and that.
Regrettably, I was pretending not to realize this fact.
Knock, knock, knock…
“…It seems the Princess has arrived.”
“Seems so.”
“I’ll… I’ll go open the door.”
“Ella-ssi.”
“Yes?”
“Please take care of her today.”
“…What do you mean?”
“The Princess.”
“Huh?…”
“You’ll understand soon enough.”
I decided to take things easy and get plenty of rest today.
*Creak-*
“Good day!”
“…!!! The sun of the Mado Kingdom graces us…!”
“Hmm? Ah, isn’t that the Margrave’s daughter?”
“It is an honor you remember me…!”
“Who is this sister?”
“I, I greet the Imperial Princess…!”
Forgive me, Miss Ella.
Truly, the sort of incident you fret over will not occur.
The alpha male Mihahn seducing the Imperial Princess?
Seducing her invites problems of…significant magnitude.
“Uncle!”
“Asher, you’ve arrived?”
“Mi…Mihahn-nim…? To…To the Imperial Princess…?”
Ah, that’s right.
I neglected to mention to Miss Ella that when Her Highness Princess Asher is present, I address even His Majesty with casual speech.
Well…
Our Miss Ella is a very clever woman, after all.
I shall trust without reservation that she can manage admirably on her own.
“Have we arrived at an inopportune moment?”
“Don’t worry. Think of it as your own home~ Come in comfortably, Leonardo.”
“Indeed~ My home, my home~.”
“…Your, Your Majesty…?”
“The Mado Kingdom is all your home. Of course~.”
“Mihahn-nim??”
*
The Royal Dungeon, beneath the Palace.
Here, dozens of prisoners languished, bound by shackles forged from Etherium metal.
Possessing the property of absorbing Ether, these Etherium restraints, numbering six to eight per prisoner, rendered the dream of escape an impossibility.
“Number 17, come forth.”
“Stop… Please stop…”
“Drag him out.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Don’t…! No…! Stop…!”
For criminals whose crimes exceeded even death in their heinousness, the future that remained was neither more nor less than human experimentation.
“Don’t! I said don’t!”
And so, on this day, Prisoner Number 17 was being dragged away to fulfill his role in the human experiments concerning the range of healing scrolls when…
*Drag… Drag…*
“Hm?”
Within Cell Number 49.
The corpse of a woman, missing the upper part of her head…
Stood upright, right there.
“…Huh?”
The guard, leading Prisoner Number 17 under the soldiers’ command, rubbed his eyes and checked the interior of Cell 49 once more.
As if that would change what he’d seen.
“A c-corpse…!”
Clearly, the corpse, which should have been collapsed on the floor and motionless, was standing—an absurd situation he immediately tried to shout to the soldiers guarding the area…
*Thwish-*
The corpse waved its hand once.
At the same moment the steel bars were torn like paper, the guard and the soldiers were sliced in two.
Just like that.
“Stop her!!”
“The Succubus Queen’s corpse has revived!!”
“The Knights are coming!”
“We must hold her here!”
The body of the Succubus Queen, who had clearly died after having her head blown apart…
*Thoom- KABOOM!*
“What the…”
“Run!”
“When will the Knights arrive?”
“At least 20 more minutes…!”
“How are we supposed to hold that monster for 20 minutes…!”
It began to tear down the Imperial Palace.
…
“…What?”
The prisoner called Number 17 by the guards, Teylon, the first thing he saw upon regaining consciousness was…
The interior of the Imperial dungeon, crumbling all around.
“…Huh?”
Moreover, four out of the six aether restraints binding his wrists and ankles were broken.
“…Oh, what the hell.”
Without hesitation, he circulated aether to shatter the restraints around his neck and abdomen.
“Haa… This is it, *this* is it.”
He barely had time to savor the feeling of aether flowing through his entire body.
Realizing that if he escaped from here, the Imperial family would come after him…
“Escape!! Now’s the chance! This is our chance!!”
He began to individually free the imprisoned inmates.
*
“The old man went up to the ramparts, got hit by some magic the vampire threw, and then just fell straight down…”
“oooh!”
“…He fell from the ramparts…?”
“You managed to survive, it seems. Truly fortunate.”
Princess Asher, Miss Ella, Your Majesty, Miss Isabella.
For your attentive ears, my audience of four.
I began to recount my grand operation to survive the Mihen vampire den, exaggerating just a touch, of course.
“The moment we arrived at the vampire den, the Lord demanded that they bring you to him. Why? Because you looked unbelievably strong.”
“That’s right! You can do anything!”
“Exactly!”
The truth was more like, ‘Our talking cat is actually a primordial Trueblood vampire, and all the vampires fell under her control!’
But I knew that ‘Mihen fought hard and negotiated with the Lord there’ sounded far more plausible.
“But it was there, that you truly sealed the deal.”
“What kind of deal?”
“‘If I succeed in inflicting even a single wound upon your person, you will release the hostages,’ I said to him.”
“Gasp… so, what happened?”
“That arrogant Lord accepted your proposal, and a battle ensued?!”
“Ensued?”
“You severed one of his arms!”
“Eek!”
With a touch of glee, I began to spin the tale in a manner accessible to Princess Asher.
Myaong~
Miss Isabella watched me, utterly amused, as if I were the most interesting thing she had ever seen.
She even forgot she was a cat, and clapped her front paws together enthusiastically.
Mya~…?
Suddenly, she stopped her actions and began staring at something.
Miss Isabella, who had abruptly halted,
“…”
Silently bolted out the window.
At that very moment…
BANG BANG BANG-
“Mihen! Mihen!!”
“Professor Layton?”
Professor Layton began to violently pound on the dormitory door.
When Miss Ella promptly opened the door for him.
“Your Majesty, terrible news…”
“..What is it, Layton?”
“More than half of the prisoners incarcerated in the underground dungeons have escaped.”
“..!!”
We received news that an unforeseen danger had befallen the Magocracy.
“..I’m sorry, Mihen. We must return to the Imperial Palace immediately.”
“Ah, …alright.”
“Let us go, Asher.”
“Uncle, come with us too!”
“…Uncle too?”
“Yes!”
“Uh… why would I?”
“Because Uncle can do anything!”
“Uh…”