Chapter 284 – Bear-san Returns To Crimonia & Marcus’s Perspective Giving Thanks For The School Festival (1/2)
Chapter 284 – Bear-san Returns To Crimonia & Marcus’s Perspective (Giving Thanks For The School Festival)
After I promised Noa to give her a copy of the picture books, she began to read the books on the table again. Fina also gave up and sat down to read them with her. Now, I was only left with the problem of finding a way to add Noa to the story…
Deciding to put that aside for now, I turned towards Tilia since I remembered I had another reason for visiting the castle.
「Tilia, would it be possible to meet His Majesty today?」
I asked her as she continued to ride on Hugging Bear’s back. It would be a pain to meet him, but I had promised to give him some cotton candy… It would be best if I did it today and be done with it.
「With Father?」
「Yeah I want to see him before I head home. If it’s not possible, then could you at least give him a message?」
When I came to see Tilia today, the soldier that let us in hadn’t dashed straight off to report our arrival to the king, which could have only been due to Eleanora-san telling him not to.
「I planned on giving him some cotton candy before I left, but if I can’t meet with him today, I’ll bring him some next time. So, could you tell him that?」
Since I had cotton candy machines in my Bear Box, I could make some at any time. If he was unavailable today, I could just make it for him the next time I came around
「Hmm… Could you wait just a moment?」
Tilia gave it some thought before responding as such, climbing off of Hugging Bear, and leaving the room. She returned rather quickly, however.
「I just asked him to come, so I think he should be here in a little bit.」
So, basically, she went to call him over? Did she mention I was here, or…?
「I can go find him myself if that’s better.」
「No, it’s fine. If he can’t come, he will just send someone to tell us.」
This most certainly wasn’t something that should be normally done. Calling the king over for some cotton candy… There was no way that was how it worked, right?
Yet, to my disbelief, the king soon waltzed into the room as if nothing was out of the ordinary.
「You’re in Tilia’s room today, huh?」
「Tilia helped me out a lot during the school festival, so I decided to pay her a visit to thank her.」
「I see. Still, what exactly is going on here?」
Tilia, Flora-sama, and Shuri were playing with the Bears, while Noa and Fina enjoyed reading the picture books. This was definitely not what a princess’s room should normally look like.
「I wanted to see Yuna’s summoned beasts, so I asked her to call them out.」
Tilia, who was riding Hugging Bear again, backed me up about the situation. The king gave up the issue after giving her another glance before turning to me instead.
「So, what is it, then? I heard that you wanted to give me something.」
「I promised you some cotton candy the other day. Would you like it now?」
「Ahh, that! I’ll have it now, yes.」
The king had only recalled it when I mentioned it. If he had forgotten it altogether, I would have just left the issue behind me. Well, doing it this way was still better than ignoring it and having him pester me about it at a later date.
I quickly began preparing all the things needed to make the cotton candy: I placed a cotton candy machine and some sugar on the table. When I took out the machine, the king looked at it with some curiosity.
「What’s this?」
「It’s the machine that makes the candy.」
I turned on the machine and started making cotton candy, with the king intently watching me. After some time, thin threads began to billow out of the machine, which I quickly began wrapping around a stick. It didn’t take long for the first cotton candy to be complete.
「Is this made from granulated sugar only?」
「Yes. It is sweet, so here, something to drink as well.」
I said and took out some tea from the Bear Box.
「You item bag can fit so many things inside…」
My Bear Box wasn’t like a certain unnamed robot cat’s multi-dimensional pouch, so it only contained things I had put inside. Well, sometimes God put some items inside without telling me first. Luckily, he didn’t do it that often.
「Anyway, you sure do know how to make some strange things. I haven’t ever heard of candy being made from just sugar before.」
Well, he was the king, so I found it perfectly normal for him not to know about things like that. It was best that his chefs learned about all the new foods, so the king could focus on his own tasks.
As I pondered that, the king bit into the cotton candy.
「It’s quite sweet.」
「It is made of only sugar, so of course it’s sweet.」
「It’s interesting how it melts in your mouth: such a strange feeling.」
「Father, I want some too.」
The king gave some to Flora-sama as well, and she ate it happily. With this, I had fulfilled my promise, so hopefully he wouldn’t bother me with it at a later date.
「That reminds me, Eleanora isn’t here. Where did that woman go?」
「Eleanora-san went home to pick up some documents for work.」
I had completely forgotten about that and decided to keep the fact that she had started chatting with Shia a secret. After all, it had been my fault for suggesting that specific shop to them.
At this point, Flora-sama had fallen asleep after playing so much. In order not to wake her, we decided to leave the castle as I had already given Tilia my thanks and fulfilled my promise to the king.
「Yuna, please come again. Make sure to come when I’m home, though.」
That largely depended on when I came around next time, but I also hoped that we would be able to meet again. However, thinking back on all my visits up till now, it should be quite unlikely unless we arranged to meet.
Back at the mansion, Eleanora-san returned in the evening and complained to us that the king had scolded her again.
「I just talked with Shia and her friends and discussed their dinner plans with Zelef before going back to work. Nothing he should get mad over.」
Didn’t that mean she wasn’t working most of the time? Part of that was my fault, but I still thought that an adult should be able to manage their time themselves.
「Obviously, my daughters are more important to me.」
Of course she would say that… Eleanora-san’s way of responding without thinking first was just like my parents, just the other way around, in this case. I kind of wanted to tell her that those issues weren’t of life and death, and her job should come first, but who was I to tell her that?
After dinner, I asked Eleanora-san if it would be possible to print out some copies of the third volume of my picture book. She could also directly pass all the volumes to Noa, so I wouldn’t have to worry about it any longer.
「Mother, you’re mean! You didn’t tell me about the picture books.」
「I was sure Yuna-chan already told you about them since you both live in Crimonia, so I didn’t bother.」
「Even so…」
Noa pouted, not very convinced by Eleanora-san’s reasoning.
「Also, the one who drew the picture books was Yuna-chan.」
Now she was trying to push the responsibility onto me. Yes, we lived in the same town, so I was technically closer to Noa than Eleanora-san. Yes, the artist was me. And…
Hmm… Now that I thought about it, I couldn’t really argue my way out of this.
「When I finish the next volume, I’ll give it to you as a present, okay?」
「That’s a promise!」
Noa made me promise, so now I had to quickly think of some plot for the next picture book…
「Anyway, Yuna-chan, you’re heading home tomorrow, right?」
「Yes, since we can’t stay in the capital for too long.」
I couldn’t drag Fina and Shuri around much longer, so we had already decided to head home tomorrow morning. If I could use the Bear Gate, we could return to Crimonia instantly and could stay a while longer, but certain people were stubbornly against doing so.
「Okay, I’ll prepare a carriage to bring all of you to the gates of the capital at least」
「We’ll go together with Hugging Bear-chan and Swaying Bear-chan. Shuri, let’s ride together.」
「Okay!」
「Marcus and the others are coming to see you off in the morning, so make sure you wait for them.」
That seemed rather unnecessary, but I couldn’t just tell them that we didn’t need the carriage or the send off.
Also, since both Noa and Shuri were looking forward to travelling, we couldn’t use the Bear Gate even though I wanted to. I had already given up at this point and decided to ride the Bears home.
「Fina-chan, Shuri-chan, you can come and visit anytime.」
「Okay.」
「Thank you.」
「Noa, listen to Cliff, okay?」
「I will.」
「Yuna-chan, let me know if this girl acts selfishly.」
「Mother!」