Chapter 18: Pushing Through Brancott

Kaoru and her merry companions were currently on the verge of passing the border between Balmore and Brancott. Borders here weren’t as big a deal as they were back on Earth, seeing as countries didn’t have the manpower or the funds to watch over the entirety of their vast borders. Hell, if you went off the beaten path, through the forest or over the mountains or something, you could cross over into other countries all you liked.

There weren’t many people who actually went with that option, however. Why? Simply because they could still get in normally without doing so.

There were no passports or photo IDs in this world. Everything was on paper, so making forgeries was a cinch. You could just swipe a person’s documents and pass them off as yours to the guards, no sweat. It wasn’t like they had any way of telling if you were the real deal or just faking it.

Border checkpoints were only that in name alone. In reality, they were just small guardhouses, whose main function was to collect a fee from any wagons that passed by them, in accordance with how much they were carrying. Wagons couldn’t pass through forests or mountains, so their only choice was to stick to the main roads. Anyone on horseback or foot didn’t have to pay the fees for things they brought across since, if they had, smaller merchants wouldn’t be able to afford taking their wares across. More evil business practices would run rampant, if that were the case.

Kaoru and her group were on horseback, and had barely any luggage between them. Kaoru had already thrown the heavier and more annoying bits of her stuff inside her Item Box, anyway. Basically, they had a free pass to get across the border.

...Or, that’s how it should have been, at least.

“Right this way, please.”

As Kaoru and the others tried crossing the border, they were abruptly stopped by a soldier and led to a small guardhouse.

“You must be the angel and her companions? We shall prepare a carriage to guide you to the capital posthaste, so please wait here and relax in the meantime.”

How did it end up this way?! Kaoru screamed on the inside.

Before leaving Grua, Kaoru had made sure to say goodbye to her friends and everyone else who had helped her, as well as everyone else who would be affected by her leaving. If she hadn’t, who knew what sort of uproar the capital would have been left in. Before they could do anything to stop her or beg her, teary-eyed, for her to stay, she’d already left on her journey.

If they weren’t going to take a boat, then the only way to reach the mainland was through Brancott. However, there was a certain “thing” lurking in Brancott: Fernand, the crown prince.

Kaoru wanted to push her way through Brancott before word of her journey got there, since things could get really annoying really fast if they were to get held up there.

With that in mind, she wanted to make it through Brancott as fast as possible, before word traveled to the aristocracy or the royal family. It was all but guaranteed that Fernand would have assigned a spy to keep track of her whereabouts.

When that spy caught wind of Kaoru’s journey, instead of using messengers on horseback, they didn’t hesitate to send a message through the channels normally used for national emergencies.

The royal palace was in an uproar over the news, of course. Kaoru, the personal friend of the Goddess, was coming to Brancott, and they couldn’t let this chance go to waste.

There was absolutely no chance that she could be heading in the opposite direction. The only things to be found there were steep mountain ranges, and further beyond that, the Aligot Empire. If she were setting out on a trip from Balmore, then she had to be heading toward the mainland and, to get there, she’d have to pass through Brancott. Thus, the royal court, aristocrats, and of course, the prince, were all champing at the bit to make the most of this opportunity. They’d placed carriages and elite guards all along the roads into the kingdom, so as to secure her the moment she entered the country.

Oh boy, this doesn’t look good. Now what...?

If they haul me off to the palace, they’ll start questioning me and asking for all sorts of things. Since this is that arrogant, selfish prince we’re talking about, it was totally possible he’d my former co-workers at the restaurant as hostages, just so he can make demands of me. That, or they might be suspicious that I’m actually the same “Kaoru,” and try to expose me for who I really am...

Oh crap, oh crap, oh crap!

But this is just a border guard. If I try to make a break for it, then of course he’ll send people after me. If they then caught us, they could charge us with illegally crossing the border, and who knows what they’d do to us after that...

Hrmmm...

“Should we off him, Kaoru?” Emile put in, casually suggesting murder.

I’d told Emile to only refer to me as casually as possible right before we left on this trip. It would only attract attention to us if a sixteen-year-old like him was acting incredibly respectful toward me, especially when I only looked to be around twelve.

Belle had just turned twelve and was already a little bit bigger than me. Like her height, and her...ch-chest... All right, sorry! I was trying to make it seem less terrible for me! It wasn’t just a little, but a whole lot bigger...

We were all pretending Belle was older than I was, and had made her practice being more casual around me, as well. After all those years together, it was a force of habit of hers to keep calling me her big sister, after all. But, considering the situation, it wouldn’t be that bad to have me be the older one here, since it wouldn’t be all that strange for me to be this small if I was just a year or two older than her. If the gap between us was going to keep on getting bigger, though, then it’d eventually get suspicious. That’s why I thought it’d be a better idea to have her be the older one from the beginning... But I guess now wasn’t the time to be thinking about all that, huh.

“No offing anyone. I’ll try to think of something, so keep cool for now.”

“...Got it.”

After being led into the guardhouse and offered a seat, the guard brought out wooden cups filled with wine for everyone. Usually a dinky little guardhouse like this should only have some room-temp water, at best, so they probably had this prepared beforehand, on the chance that I happened to come this way. I didn’t want to let it go to waste, so I made sure to at least take a sip.

Yeah, that’s lukewarm red wine all right...

“Room temperature” was probably more accurate. If anyone in Japan proudly served you a glass of room-temperature wine, though, it’d be pretty hard to be happy about it, and the same went for here. Their “room temperature” was actually pretty dang warm, but as they didn’t really have a way to keep it chilled, I wasn’t going to complain.

“So...what seems to be the problem?”

“Oh, no problems here. I received orders from the king to give you a warm welcome, should you enter our kingdom, and to have you escorted to the royal palace immediately,” the man explained. It appeared he was no ordinary guard, but a slightly higher-ranking soldier, posted here to lead me to the palace.

“What makes you think I’m Kaoru?”

“All the higher-ranking soldiers of our country were present to see you during the proceedings in Balmore and committed your appearance to memory. Our regular soldiers merely memorized what you look like after studying your portraits.”

Gyahhh!!! What the hell is that about?! So you’re not gonna just let me go, is that it?! Just how tenacious are you, man?! Are you a stalker or something?!

I was planning on playing dumb, but it looked like he was certain I was the Kaoru they were looking for. He was probably going to argue back if I denied it now, so my only choice was to give up and admit it. If I tried denying it and things got heated, my “big brother” Roland, his fiancée Francette, and my other “brother” Emile might try slicing and dicing their way out of this—especially Francette. Things could get dicey real fast...literally.

By the way, here was our current story: Roland was the oldest son of the family and engaged to Francette, while Emile was the second-oldest and Belle was his fiancée. I was the oldest daughter of our makeshift family, of course.

I could have made us all brothers and sisters, but that would have been plain weird to have the two couples flirting with each other when they were supposed to be related by blood. I didn’t want any weird rumors floating around about us, so that was why I went with the current setup instead. I wanted to avoid any stories of brother and sister complexes among our group, thank you very much.

Still, no matter how you sliced it, Roland looked like royalty, while Emile looked like the most common commoner you’d ever laid your eyes on. I was planning on explaining it away by saying that Emile was an illegitimate child, conceived with a maid and raised like a commoner, but I was pretty sure it wouldn’t come up. It’d take a fairly reckless person to pry into a noble’s family affairs.

Anyway, our reason for traveling was that Roland wanted to take a trip to another country while he was still young, and his brother-from-another-mother Emile was there to accompany him, as well as their two fiancées. I was here as the chaperone to watch over the two couples.

Based on my smooth skin and the other decidedly not-commoner-like features about me, I was planning on saying I was the sheltered daughter of some lower-ranking aristocrat who was not at all wise to the ways of the world. That would also make it seem more natural for everyone to prioritize protecting me without raising any suspicions.

...What, you think that’s pushing it? Look, don’t worry about it. This is the kind of situation where they’d probably expect a more believable lie if we wanted to fool them, and that’ll actually make our story even more credible! Sheesh, get off my back...

Oh yeah, I wasn’t calling Roland “sir” or anything on this trip, either. I know he’s the brother of a king, but he was the one who had decided to tag along with me. I was just going to treat him like another one of my traveling companions. It’d be a pain in the butt to give him special treatment when everyone else was supposed to be acting more casual around each other. If we kept calling him “sir” all the time, people were bound to find out that something was up eventually, though I made sure to ask him if it was all right first.

...Not like he could really say no to me, though.

“We’ve finished preparing a carriage for you, so if you will just follow me this way...”

The guard made to lead us somewhere, but I casually brushed him off.

“Oh, no thanks. Ed and the others would get jealous if we rode something being pulled by other horses!”

“Huh...?”

“I guess we’ll be off, now!” I stood up from my seat, and the other four followed suit.

“W-Wait! Hold on a second, please!”

We ignored the panicking soldier as we left the guardhouse. We hopped on our horses once we were outside and set off once more. We’d already made sure to talk things over, with me declining his offer to be taken anywhere by carriage. Now they shouldn’t be able to say we tried to illegally force our way across the border.

Consequently, the checkpoint was in complete chaos as we left it behind us.

“I wonder if that guy sent a messenger on ahead?” I yelled to Roland over the sound of galloping horses.

“Yeah, I bet they already took off a while ago!”

“Then how about we give them the slip?”

“Let’s do it!”

I figured that the soldier from before would come chasing after us, with the carriage he had prepared for me in tow. But that would never be able to catch up with us, so it didn’t really matter. We’d make it to the capital ahead of the messenger, finish what we needed to do, and get out of there before they could do anything about it. For that to happen, though, we’d need about a twelve-hour head start. If we could just make it through the capital and speed along faster than their messenger horses, then no one would be able to keep up with us. Not only did we have Ed’s family, but we also had horses specially bred to be used by royalty. I even had healing potions. No problems there.

“Hi ho, Silver!” I shouted, trying to set the mood a little.

Ed got mad at me.

“You’re using that name again! Just what kind of horse are you cheating on me with, missy?!”

...Sorry.

It didn’t take long for us to overtake someone we assumed to be a messenger, but we were expecting that. It was going to take them a good few days to reach the capital, so they had to keep to a certain pace to get there at all. They couldn’t just keep pushing their horse as hard as they could, or else they’d just run it into the ground. It was possible they could’ve prepared other replacement horses and switched them out every few hours or so, but that probably wasn’t the case. They didn’t know where I was coming from in the first place, and they also thought I’d be slowly trundling along in the carriage they’d prepared for me.

The messenger stared at us in blank amazement as we passed him by. If he tried chasing after us now, his horse definitely wasn’t going to make it without collapsing at some point. Thinking about it from his side, he might have been in shock that we appeared to be so reckless as to push our horses this hard. No matter what happened, I doubted a common soldier would have enough cash on him to buy replacement horses that he hadn’t planned on getting in the first place. All he could do was focus on trying to reach the capital as fast as he could within his available means. He was most likely thinking that we couldn’t possibly keep up this pace, either, and that he’d be passing our exhausted horses in no time. He didn’t once think this gap between us would keep getting wider as we got closer to the capital...

It had gotten dark, so we started getting ready to set up camp. All I had to do was take out our tent, which was already put together, from my Item Box, and it was ready in an instant. We were traveling light, since we had only packed the essentials, and we could keep pushing on until it was too dark to press onward, since it took no time for us to get our camp gear ready. The messenger, on the other hand, would have to stop at a town to take care of his horse and rest for the night, which meant the distance between us was only going to get greater.

Horses needed substantial water and care, so pushing them to the brink and then leaving them outside to set up camp was highly impractical—if you didn’t have cheat powers, that is. At this rate, keeping our twelve-hour lead would be a piece of cake, and I wanted to put that time to use when we were in the capital.

At first, I was just planning on being as stealthy as possible while getting into Aras, so I hadn’t really been concerned with a time limit. I’d sneak in, then sneak back out. Easy. But now that we were racing against the messenger before he could tell the country I’d arrived, my plans had changed to charging through as fast as possible.

Ed and the others were practically jumping for joy at all the feed, apples, corn, sugar cubes, and potions I gave them, but then I received this comment:

“Excuse me, Kaoru? Could you not give my daughter so many sugar cubes, hm?”

Now Ed’s old mare was getting mad at me...

Leaving the messenger in our dust long ago, we finally arrived in Aras, the capital of Brancott.

There were plenty of people who knew me from back when I lived and worked here as a waitress, but even if we ran into them, it still wouldn’t be a problem.

If we ran into someone who knew that I’m the Goddess’s friend, though, then I’d really be in trouble. There were people who had happened to catch a glimpse of me during the peace talks in Balmore and, according to that border guard, there were plenty of other soldiers who’d been ordered to memorize the details of my appearance. That was why I had decided to go ahead and change my hair and eye color again, and have everyone walk all around me, so I wouldn’t stand out as much. Despite that, no one in my party so much as batted an eye at my sudden transformation. To them, I wasn’t the “friend of the Goddess” everyone else knew me as, but rather a goddess from another world entirely.

There was only one place I really wanted to visit in the capital. After hitching Ed and the other horses up, I used another potion to change my hair and eye color before opening up the doors.

“Hey everyone, long time no see!”

“K-Kaoru!!!”

That’s right, I was back at the Big Belly Bistro, the restaurant I had once worked at as a waitress, where I had run my own counseling service.

“K-K-Kaoru!” The landlord came running out of the kitchen after hearing everyone call my name, throwing her arms around me and squeezing tight.

I-I can’t breathe!

“You were okay after all! We were all so worried about you when we heard you disappeared! People said you’d been hurt! It must’ve been so hard for you...and you haven’t grown even a little bit since then...”

Oof... Hitting me right where it hurts...

“Kaoru!”

The next person to come running over and give me a big hug was Aimee.

...You’re still working here? Shouldn’t it be about time for you to move on, girl?

“Thank goodness... Thank goodness!” she cried repeatedly, tears of joy streaming down her face.

“H-Hey, where’s Agathe?”

“She went off and got married to one of our merchant regulars!” Aimee pouted. “He only had a tiny business at first, but the moment he married Agathe, it suddenly took off. Now her new father-in-law calls her ‘the gift of the Goddess.’ She even has two beautiful baby boys! She couldn’t get any happier if she tried, tch!”

Ah... I know how you feel, Aimee! I know that feeling so much it hurts!

As I stewed in my feelings of simultaneous empathy and jealousy, the door to the restaurant suddenly flew open.

“Kaoru!”

Speak of the devil. Agathe came running inside, tears welling up in her eyes. One of the customers had apparently had the good sense to let her know that I was here. It looked like her new family basically lived next door.

She might be a mother of two now, but she’ll always be the cute little Agathe I waitressed with. That said, she was a married woman, so I almost felt like I should be adding a “Mrs.” in front of her name or something.

“Kaoru, I heard about your injuries! Are you all fixed now?!”

“Oh, yeah. I got to take a swig of this amazing medicine, ‘the tears of the goddess,’ and that patched me up, good as new.”

“Th-Thank goodness... I tried putting all the things you told us about into practice at my husband’s company after I got married! When I did, we got a huge surge of customers, and our business really took off! Even now, the trade guild still calls me things like ‘the ideal wife for a businessman,’ and I have all this influence at the gatherings of the merchants’ wives, and... Oh, you know what, never mind.”

Yeah, I kinda figured that’s what happened. Agathe and Aimee had overheard the advice I gave customers when I ran my consultation service, and I made sure to tell them the essentials of the Japanese service industry on our breaks and stuff. They both should have had an even playing field, since they both learned the same things from me, but I wonder how Aimee and Agathe’s situations had ended up so different? It was truly a mystery...

Afterward, I introduced Roland and the others to my former co-workers as my traveling companions. I then proceeded to have a great time chatting with the restaurant staff and the regular customers.

Fran had left to find us an inn sometime during all the talking, so that meant I had a free pass to smashed-ville, population me.

...Or that’s what I thought, but they wouldn’t let me have alcohol, and said that kids drinking booze “was a bad thing.” I already looked like this four and a half years ago, people! I was way over fifteen now, which meant I was absolutely a proper adult!

Everyone pretended to be surprised, but they just handed me juice anyway.

Damn it... Really, guys?

Roland and the others sipped at their tea and said that they weren’t foolish enough to drink alcohol smack-dab in the center of enemy territory.

Oh yeah, I guess this is “enemy territory” for them...

After that, we all had a good time reminiscing about the good old days. It was a ton of fun for me, but eventually it had to come to an end, as all good things do. Not getting home at a decent hour for most of them would just start up all kinds of family issues.

Should you really be here instead of with your new family, Agathe? Well, I suppose she is the head of her family, so she’s probably fine...

I made sure to ask everyone a favor as the festivities wrapped up.

“Hey, all, can I ask you to do something for me? I don’t want you to refer to me as the Kaoru from four and a half years ago, but as her older sister, who just happened to stop by and see the restaurant that had been so kind to her younger sibling. Otherwise, those people who chased me away in the first place are just going to catch on and come after me...”

Everyone agreed, of course. Even if one of them messed up and let it slip, the others would step in and play it off by saying something like, “What, you couldn’t tell the difference? I know they look alike, but weren’t you listening to what she said?”

Someone suggested that I call myself the younger sister, since my appearance hadn’t changed at all from the last time I was here, but I’d already told the prince before that the older one was living here in Aras.

Crap... I messed up on that one.

When I woke up, I found myself in one of the capital’s inns. I hadn’t actually gotten around to drinking last night, but I was pretty wiped from all the partying we did.

It had been a long time since I’d had a good night’s sleep in a proper bed. After we figured out our sleeping arrangements for the night, Fran took Ed and the other horses to the stables to make sure they were taken care of. They must have picked up on what she was trying to do and as a result they just followed after her. Not gonna lie, that was pretty dang convenient. I was sure it must have been a little shocking to anyone who saw Fran leading that train of five horses without her actually doing anything...

I was the last one up, apparently, since everyone had already washed their faces and gotten dressed.

C’mon, at least wake me up, guys!

And why was everyone all gathered around me and staring at me while I was asleep?!

You all like to ogle a girl’s face while she’s sleeping, is that it?!

Anyway, whatever. We usually slept all huddled together when we were camping, so they’d already seen what I looked like when I was asleep... Still didn’t mean that I liked what was going on here, though.

I ain’t putting on a show, people! I’m gonna start charging if you wanna look that bad!

...The scary part was, I feel like they’d actually have been happy to pay for that show.

After finishing up breakfast, we were on our way again. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary around the inn, so it looked like the messenger still hadn’t arrived yet. I suppose that even professional messengers must have to turn in for the night. Traveling by starlight wasn’t just exhausting, it was also inefficient. Getting a good night’s sleep and getting yourself ready for the next day was far and away the more efficient choice, which meant that we shouldn’t have lost any of our lead, and the gap between us should still be about the same. That meant that we didn’t really have to force ourselves to go faster than we already were.

Considering the composition of our group and that I had potions to hand out, we were leagues faster than a single messenger who didn’t have any replacement horses to get him to the capital efficiently. After we got out of this country, we could camp outside less and begin spending the night at inns more often. We could even stick around in each location a bit longer to give this a more “road trip” feel to our journey.

Dang, I’m starting to get excited about this! All right, time to get out of here!

“Well done on spotting Miss Kaoru! I’ll be sure to reward those guards at the border for their efforts. When should we be expecting her arrival?”

It was evening when, in the audience chamber of the royal palace, the king and his son, Crown Prince Fernand, were all smiles after hearing the news. The messenger who had brought it, though, didn’t seem quite as ecstatic.

“I’m not so sure about that, Your Majesty...”

“Hm? They’re using one of the carriages we had stationed all around the border, no? So I’m sure you must be able to at least make an estimate, depending on when they set off, correct?”

“W-Well...it appears Miss Kaoru and her group didn’t use the carriage we prepared, and instead chose to continue on using their own horses...” the messenger answered hesitantly.

“Well now! They may have preferred their own trusty steeds over a carriage, I suppose. There are those who put their own horses over any others, after all, so I suppose there’s nothing to be done about that... Then, what time should we expect them to arrive?”

“They passed by me fairly quickly after I first set off, and I haven’t seen them since, Your Majesty...”

“Wh-What was that?!”

“They shouldn’t have been able to keep that pace up all the way to the capital. Their horses would have collapsed from exhaustion in no time at all. That’s why I assume they must have either strayed from the main road to take their rest, or otherwise they pushed their horses too far and now their journey is at a standstill. Since I don’t know which scenario they’re in right now, it’s a little difficult to predict when they will arrive...”

“Ah-ha, I see. So that’s what you meant.” The king looked relieved to hear that and sat himself back down, after having been on the edge of his seat just moments before.

Fernand, on the other hand, looked anything but at ease.

“Did you consider that Kaoru is almost certainly carrying healing potions?” he said, barging into the conversation.

“Oh...”

The king and the messenger were at a loss for words. Over the past four years or so, the so-called “Miss Kaoru researchers” of the capital had come to the conclusion that she had some sort of invisible bag that could be filled with any number of potions that she might need. There were plenty of situations where it wouldn’t make sense otherwise—particularly the war against the Aligot Empire—and there were even those who’d seen Kaoru pull things out of thin air.

Normally, there wouldn’t be anyone who would even think of using valuable healing potions on their horses, but this was Kaoru, after all. The word “normal” didn’t really apply to her.

“Gather all the soldiers you can! I want them scouring the capital for Miss Kaoru, and the rest of them stationed on all the roads coming into and out of Aras, now! Fernand, you head to that restaurant, just to be safe!”

Everyone who was gathered in the room scattered and rushed out in a hurry, with Fernand not even offering a reply to his father before dashing out of the audience chamber himself.

“Yeah, we had Kaoru’s big sister stop by here last night. So what?”

“Wh-What?!”

The owner of the restaurant answered brusquely, since he recognized Fernand as that “Fernie” guy who’d hounded Kaoru when she still worked as a waitress. Kaoru had given instructions in case something like this was to happen, and they made sure to follow them and give him the runaround. Still, there was one detail that didn’t escape Fernand:

If Kaoru and her sister had supposedly not met since they had gone their separate ways, then there was no way that she would know about the restaurant.

That had to have been Kaoru herself...

“But, boy, were we surprised to get a customer out of the blue who looked just like Kaoru! Some of our workers even went over and started hugging her! It really turned into quite the commotion, I tell ya.”

“Huh?”

“After everything settled down and we heard her out, that’s when we figured out she was Kaoru’s sister. Even she was surprised! She had no idea the restaurant that she’d happened to pass by was where her little sister used to work. We all decided to throw her a welcome party last night, and it got a little crazy, what with all the celebrating we did.”

“...”

Right when he thought he had solid proof, it had gone up in smoke in an instant. If only Fernand had been there when it had happened, then he would have known... No matter how much he regretted it now, there was no changing the fact that he hadn’t been, though.

“Did the sister say anything about what she was planning on doing next?”

The owner thought things over for a second before acting like she had just remembered something.

“She didn’t say where she was going, but she was absolutely livid when she heard Kaoru had been hurt and chased out of the capital. Can’t say I blame her. She kept muttering things like, ‘They tricked her,’ and, ‘I’ll never forgive them,’ with this terrifying look on her face. Her eyes were scary enough to make kids cry, I tell you! Just like her little sister.”

Fernand turned pale as soon as he heard those words. He had a horrible feeling that he knew who the “they” and “them” Kaoru’s sister had been referring to were...

A horrible, chilling feeling...

“S-So, where is Kaoru...I-I mean, Kaoru’s big sister, now?” Fernand asked, his voice trembling slightly.

“Who knows? I think the people traveling with her must have found an inn somewhere.”

The moment he heard that, Fernand left the restaurant without offering a word of thanks.

“Tch. You may be hiding the fact you’re a prince, but to me, you’re nothing but a scumbag. Like hell I’m gonna forgive the person responsible for driving Kaoru away in the first place!” the owner spat out, after the prince had left.

Kaoru had figured Fernand would come sniffing around to try and find her, and it looked like her prediction was right on the money.

Fernand made a beeline for the first inn he could find. While most people would have thought it was obvious to search the inns first, the prince was only searching the more luxurious inns, the ones that the nobility and important merchants might stay at.

It was true that at least half of Kaoru’s traveling companions were used to staying in such grand places. They did have a king’s brother, his fiancée (who happened to be a national hero in her own right), and a goddess with them, after all. But Kaoru would never stay at any of those inns, and she’d made sure to tell everyone as much immediately after setting off on this trip. Francette would never have chosen one of those fancy places to spend the night.

All this went to show how little Fernand truly knew about Kaoru, and that all his work was nothing more than wasted effort...

“So she left early this morning then?”

“Yes, Your Majesty!”

The search of the capital was still ongoing. According to the soldiers who had been sent to investigate the inns, however, it appeared that Kaoru and the others had left the capital first thing in the morning. All they’d discovered was that she’d cleared out of her room, but it was apparent that they weren’t planning on staying longer if they’d already packed up all their things and left. There was also a possibility that they hadn’t liked the inn they had stayed at and had moved on to find another one, but that was a slim chance at best, especially since the guards had already done a sweep of every inn in the capital.

“What about stationing troops along the roads to follow her?!”

“We’ve already sent word to them, Your Majesty, but it was already evening by the time we received your orders. We called an emergency assembly and split our forces into squads after giving them their mission, but trying to travel on a moonless night would only have brought harm to the horses. That’s why it was decided that they are to set out first thing tomorrow morning.”

“Hrm... We’ll be a whole day behind her, but I suppose there’s nothing we can do about that...”

The king of Brancott wasn’t ready to give up just yet. Kaoru’s group had pushed themselves to the brink just to reach the capital before the messenger, but now that they’d achieved their goal, they wouldn’t have to move as fast anymore... That was his reasoning, at least.

But having returned after searching the inns, Fernand had a hunch about just what was going to happen... He had the awful, sneaking suspicion that she was going to slip through their fingers yet again.

“So this is the town you wanted to visit, Kaoru?”

“Yup! I only really want to poke my head in and say hi to the guild, so I doubt it’ll take that long.”

It looked like Francette had finally gotten used to acting casual around me (even though it took Belle and Emile almost no time at all). Her body might be younger, but it looked like the inside of her head was just as empty as ever... Though, I shouldn’t really be talking smack about her, since I could practically feel some karma creeping up, ready to smack me right back for that.

All right, time to go inside!

It was way earlier in the day now than the first time I’d come to the guild. If I had decided not to visit during the busier hours, then only the people on the night shift would have been here, which meant I’d have even less of a chance of seeing who I came here for. That was why I aimed for peak business hours, when most of the employees for the guild would have to be on duty.

Jingle, jingle.

All eyes were on me when they heard the bell above the door announce me coming in. Yup, just the same as last time. The only thing different now was that, instead of going back to whatever they were doing before, they kept on staring at me.

...It was a pretty big difference, actually.

“Huh? I-Is that you, Little Miss Angel?”

Hey, it’s the guy who gave me some sausage back then! After he asked me for that massage, I was flooded with all sorts of requests that got me food and copper coins. I’ll never forget what you did for me, man!

“Thank goodness you’re all right!”

And the boar steak guy, too!

“Gene!” the scary-looking receptionist who’d taken care of me when I first got here shouted. With a silent nod, the hunter whose name she called stood up and latched the front door shut, with the other hunters getting to work shutting the windows as well.

Uhhh... What’s going on here?

Roland and Fran put their hands on the hilts of their swords, while Emile and Belle stood on either side of me. Emile had his hand on his sword as well, but Belle was still hiding that she was carrying a knife. The tension in the air was so thick that you could cut it with said knife, which was when the receptionist shouted out for all to hear:

“We’re so glad to have you back at our humble guild, Miss Kaoru, friend of the Goddess. On behalf of the guild, let me offer you our most heartfelt greetings to have you here. This time, we swear to the Goddess Celestine that we won’t let you be taken away by any rotten, fat-cat aristocrat!”

She came out from behind her counter and knelt down before me. Now that the other hunters knew who I was, they followed suit as well.

Roland and the others finally breathed a sigh of relief and took their hands from their swords. That included Belle, whose hand had been twitching in anticipation, waiting to pull out her knife at a moment’s notice.

Back when I first began selling my potions, my lack of stock and not having proper distribution channels meant that they only circulated domestically. When they finally began spreading outside the country, I made sure that this was the first town they were shipped out to, and that the people here received priority shipments of potions appropriate for how much a small town in the sticks with its own guild would use. I was sure that those who were distributing the potions were confused as to why some tiny, far-flung town in the middle of nowhere was getting that much before the royal capital even got any, but they weren’t about to question the creator of the miracle medicine—and for good reason, too.

As soon as the potions arrived at the guild, the staff knew exactly what the items were—and who had made them. Afterward, the members heard one piece of shocking news after the other: the war with Aligot; the descent of the Goddess at the peace talks; Aligot’s miraculous comeback after the war; the end of the Holy Land of Rueda... And at the center of all this was a single girl.

Even though they hadn’t been able to protect the girl from being taken away, she was still trying to show how thankful she was for what they had done for her in her time of need. They’d been waiting for the day she might return to this town, just so they could show their gratitude to her—or that’s what I wanted to think, at least.

But I didn’t want people kneeling before me. I wasn’t into that sort of thing. That was why I took a different approach...

“I’m starving! Does anyone want a massage? I’d be willing to take two sausages or a quarter of a boar steak as payment!”

Everyone stared at me blankly for a moment before they caught on to what I was trying to say.

“If it’s sausages ya want, leave ’em to me! I’m gettin’ ’em, and I ain’t lettin’ anyone say otherwise!”

“Then I guess I got that boar steak covered. Right... Now who’s the guy who got the drink before?”

“That was Dalson, right? He’s out on a job right now, so I’ll cover for him!”

“Damn, does he have some bad timing! I bet he’s gonna be kicking himself when he hears about this...”

Laughter broke out among the guild members as they stood up, and I got to work tending to their massaging needs.

“M-Miss Kaoru, what are you doing?! Please, stop!”

Francette went back to being all formal in her rush to try and stop me, but I just ignored her. This was the first town I’d visited, where I got my start in this world. Everything had begun right here.

Before I knew it, I felt my mouth twitching. Yup, this was my smile, all right... I get told to stop showing it so much, since it makes kids cry, though.

When I glanced up, I could see the scary receptionist lady’s lips curled back to reveal her teeth as she made some sort of horrifying expression... Oh, wait, I guess that was a smile, too, huh?

“Me next!”

“Then me after him!”

With a swift elbow strike from Fran and a pinch on the back of his hand from Belle, Roland and Emile’s cheerful remarks quickly turned into yelps of pain.

Time flies when you’re having fun, and this was no exception.

“Right, then it’s about time for me to get going.”

“I see... Feel free to come stop by again anytime,” Gilda, the receptionist, said, back to her normal self now.

The other hunters were there to see me off as well, and... Oh yeah, that’s right!

“Scary recep— Er, Gilda...take this.”

Oh crap, I can’t believe I almost forgot!

I pulled a small wooden box from out of my Item Box.

“What’s this?” she asked, a curious expression on her face.

“Do you understand what I mean when I say that I’m leaving the country?”

She thought things over for a second before the realization set in. “Th-There won’t be any more potions going around?”

Ding ding ding, we have a winner!

“These are specially made potions with Celes’s blessing. Their quality will never deteriorate; in other words, they have no expiration date.”

Everyone’s breath, hunters and workers alike, caught in their throats when they heard just what I’d given her.

“I-If anyone found out about these...”

It was only natural for her to be worried, and her concern was certainly not unfounded. It was all but guaranteed that the nobles would come to take them for themselves. But I’d already planned ahead for just that possibility!

“Not to worry, they’ll lose any effects they have the moment they leave this building. Also, if anyone other than a pure, worthy person belonging to this guild tries to use the potions for themselves, then they’ll turn into poison.”

Despite calling it poison, it’d only give them about two or three days of cramps and nausea. They’d definitely wish they were dead by the end of it, though.

Of course, everyone at the guild turned pale from shock when they heard my explanation, and rightfully so.

“That’s why I think everything should be alright. So, with that, good luck, everyone.”

Gilda made like she was going to kneel again, but I stopped her by throwing my arms around her instead.

Oh, no, you don’t! I hate it when people do stuff like that!

“Huh...?” Gilda was taken aback by the sudden hug.

“I hate it when people do that,” I said softly to her.

“You do, huh... I guess you would, wouldn’t you?” Gilda said with a grin.

“Hehe...”

“Ahaha...”

We shared a laugh and smiled at each other. Two very horrific, unsettling smiles, at that.

“Oh, Goddess, what am I looking at?!”

“They look like they’re the heads of some sinister organization or something!”

“I’m gonna have nightmares about this tonight...”

“Shut it!”

After Kaoru and the others had gone, the people gathered there ended up kneeling once more. It looked like it was going to take some more time before the closed-off guild was back to normal.