Chapter 171

Rescue (lol)
Now then, since I’ve sent the report, all that’s left is to wait for help to arrive. I took out a table and chairs from the Treasury and began preparing for a tea party. There were plenty of snacks, and the tea was already prepared. Yes, it was three o’clock.

“All we have to do now is wait, and everything will be resolved.”

“Yeah. I don’t know who you contacted, but once word gets out, that old man’s finished.”

The king shouldn’t be so incompetent as to overlook the abduction of a foreign princess for selfish reasons. If he ignores it, even Arland would be forced to act.

“Um, who exactly are you…?”

“I’m just an adventurer.”

The madam looked at me suspiciously. True, maybe the tea party wasn’t the best idea. Well, even if she finds out, it’s no big deal. If it gets troublesome, I’ll just return to Arland. I’ve taken down quite a lot of monsters, so maybe they’ll finally let me hunt within Arland again.

Most of the monster territories within Arland are currently being swiftly cleared out by the Arland army under my father’s command. Since the Empire’s been quiet lately, it seems they’re using the opportunity to rapidly expand our living space.

In reality, they’re just freeing up all the honeycomb-like monster zones inside the country to make internal development easier. Thanks to that, laying down railway lines is easier too. Work? My brother’s been caught by the Prime Minister.

Big brother is amazing at politics. He’s moving with the force of a complete regime overhaul. The opposition must be in tears. He’s got all sorts of leverage on them, and most of the interests tied to me are entrusted to him. He’s running the government with a good balance of carrot and stick. Thanks to that, both Father and I can move freely.

The madam seems to have decided not to press any further.

While enjoying the tea party for a while, I received a telepathic message from Helios.

(My Lord, I have reached my lair, but there are not enough storage bags.)

At that moment, a message from Helios came through. Apparently, the storage bags he brought weren’t enough to hold all the treasure. Just how much had he been hoarding?

(In that case, come back here for now. If you show your guild card to the gatekeeper, they’ll let you into the capital, so don’t force your way in, okay? Let’s meet at the Adventurers’ Guild.)

(I am also free.)

(Where are you right now?)

(I’ve been right in front of you this whole time! Hurry up and get me out already!)

Glancing toward the wall, I saw Mr. Coote peeking out. Apparently, he had entered through a collapsed part of the outer wall of the royal capital and walked over. Then he dug a tunnel from near Baron Uzal’s residence to come rescue me. With Mr. Coote’s sharp claws, digging tunnels is easy... or rather, he apparently loves digging so much that he was moving at an incredible pace, but then got caught up in the earth spirits’ underground expansion and became part of a wall.

“You showed up on your own before I even called you. If I needed you, I could’ve summoned you.”

“I feel like you’ve been treating me a little too roughly lately. This was supposed to be the perfect chance to heroically rescue my captured master and prove my worth… Curse those meddlesome spirits!”

Seems he’s not happy with his recent treatment as a pet.

“Oh well, let’s help him out. Anon!”

“Roger~”

Anon and I each grabbed one of Mr. Coote’s whiskers and gave a good pull.

“Owowowow! Not the whiskers, please! They’ll come out!”

Mr. Coote whimpered and cried out, so we stopped. But in my palm, one of his whiskers remained.

≪Obtained Mr. Coote’s Whisker≫

Without hesitation, I shoved the whisker into Mr. Coote’s nose.

Mr. Coote desperately shook his head, but since his body was stuck, he had little range of motion. We spent some time entertaining ourselves like that.

Apparently, the escape tunnel Mr. Coote dug had already been buried by the earth spirits.

“… Can you let me out already?”

“Just shrink down.”

“Ohh!”

He hadn’t realized he could’ve gotten out from the start just by switching to puppy mode.

Once Mr. Coote turned into puppy mode and slipped out of the hole, the spirit of darkness returned shortly after.

—It seems the farce is finally over—

“Looks like our ride is here.”

“That was fast.”

“So it seems.”

The madam clenched her fists. She clearly had no intention of forgiving the bald man who had tarnished the family name that had been passed down for generations.

The sounds of clashing swords and shouting drew closer. Then the door to the surface opened.

“If it comes to this, I’ll use them as hostages—!”

≪Bald Baron appeared≫

“How dare you trample on the pride of the Uzal family!”

The moment she saw the baron’s face, Lady Maria instantly closed the distance and landed an elbow strike right into his gut. As the baron bent over in pain, she followed up with a heel drop. It was a smooth, flowing combo so fast the guards didn’t even have time to react. A fighter, was she?

I pulled out my revolver from the holster on my waist and shot at the guard’s sword as he drew it, knocking it aside. In that opening, Anon, clad in fighting spirit, delivered a spinning kick to the jaw—and it was our victory.

"Young Lady, are you safe!?"

"We found the Young Lady!"

"Young Lady, I always tell you not to act recklessly..."

"Please, act like a proper noble lady."

After knocking out the balding baron and his merry band, a swarm of knights arrived. They were a bit dirty in places, likely from the resistance they encountered.

All the gathered knights rushed toward Anon with teary eyes. Lady Maria was properly protected as well, and the ones who had resisted were all tied up—though she did keep kicking and punching the baron from time to time.

And when the baron regained consciousness and began yelling, they all jumped on him, saying, “He resisted, right?” and “Looked to me like he was holding a knife,” and “Let’s say we found this on him and call it armed resistance.” Then they started beating him up again. Is that really okay, Ostland?

“Haha… I figured it would be this group.”

“You know them?”

“They’re my family’s disciples. Most of the decent knights in the capital are trained by our household.”

And yet those same “decent disciples” are piling on additional charges right before our eyes. Well, I guess it’s fine if he really did resist.

Also, Anon seems really popular with the knights. They’re all terribly worried about her. Well, her father is apparently the commander of the Royal Guard, so that makes sense. Normally someone of a higher status would be expected to fill that role, but it seems the Sheffield family is a bunch of eccentrics.

The only daughter of that Sheffield family… Hmm, why hasn’t the topic of a fiancé come up? I glanced at Anon.

The answer is probably that Anon is too much of an oddball.

“Princess, you’re in no position to talk.”

True, I don’t have a fiancé either. The royal family of Arland tends to prioritize strength over blood ties, and because of the power balance among the Five Dukes, political marriages are rare. Nobles of other races value bloodlines, so they don’t seek marriage ties with human royalty, and if they were to form such bonds, the Five Dukes would lose power.

So the royal family of Arland actually has a fair bit of freedom in choosing their partners. In my case, I suspect my father and brother are secretly working behind the scenes. A doting parent and a siscon joining forces—no wonder they’re making nobles cry.

“Also, if someone marries the princess, their noble house will become too arrogant.”

Alicia muttered under her breath with a weary look. Maybe we’ve accumulated a bit too much wealth and power. Time to spread some of it around and trim things down a bit.

After being rescued from the Uzal estate, the knights suggested I take shelter at the royal palace, but I politely declined. I was going to teleport back to Arland anyway.

I mean, if I seriously wanted to escape, Ostland would have a hard time catching me. This time I let myself get captured on purpose, and if I wanted to run, I could’ve done it any time. Besides, I get the feeling I shouldn’t go near the royal palace. My instincts are warning me—I’ll either run into the young princess or that pervert.

The former is fine, but the latter is trouble. He’ll definitely cause problems. Best to make a quick exit.

Anon and Lady Maria said they’d go to the palace.

“Alright, then I’ll vanish until the trial.”

“Got it. I’ll contact you once the date is set.”

Anon and I waved goodbye to each other.

“I have been waiting.”

When I got to the guild, Helios was already there. Isn’t that a bit fast?

“I flew close to the capital. I take great pride in my speed, you see.”

“No one saw you, right?”

“I flew as high as possible. Even if someone did see me, they wouldn’t be able to tell I wasn’t a wyvern.”

Well, Helios can fly at several thousand meters altitude. As long as he doesn’t roar, he won’t make any noise, so it should be fine.

“Hey, I heard there was a dragon sighting in this area.”

“Let’s hunt it before the Woof-Meow Club gets to it! Move, move!”

Yeah, he has definitely been spotted!

No wonder things are getting noisy. And if we leave things alone, adventurers will rush out of the guild to beat us to it. Right now it’s just a sighting report, so there’s no official subjugation request yet, but dragon materials are valuable loot. And the stronger the dragon, the faster people try to take it down. I doubt any adventurer in this country could beat Helios, though.

Anyway, I’ll have Helios head back to his lair and continue collecting the treasure. While he’s at it, I’ll have him revert to his dragon form somewhere far away from people to make it look like he’s leaving the capital area. If I don’t, it’ll turn into a whole commotion.

By the way, I haven’t told Alicia about the treasure. She thinks the idiot Helios got mad at the baron and ran off on his own, so I just let her believe that. And now I have a massive hoard of treasure that Helios “gifted” to me.

What to do with it... I’ll secretly stash it in the castle’s treasure vault and pretend it was a hidden national reserve all along. Lately, the Noble Council has been whining that my personal donations are just me expanding my influence, so repeating that pattern too often will only stir them up.

But if we say the kingdom already had this hidden wealth, there’s no issue. There’s enough here to cover several years of the national budget—this should give Arland some breathing room. I was the one who made the castle’s security magic tools, so sneaking into the treasury should be no problem… probably.

“Alright, time to head back to Arland.”

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