Side story 9 - About what happened to “that” (2/2)

That’s right, I’m one of the most influential merchants around here, and not to be too arrogant, but I’m probably the richest person in town, most likely. All my new products are usually extremely popular. My intuition is telling me that this will sell really good as well.

“Alright! I’ve decided, I’m going to go visit Duke Claes’s mansion right away!”

Saying so, I took the toy snake that was given to me in my right hand, and held my son’s hand in my left as I left the store.

I kept looking at the toy snake I just obtained. The more I look at it, the better its craftsmanship seems to be. I really feel like it seems a little too realistic.

But anyways…… Although I’m pretty sure this toy snake will sell well, I wonder what exactly it was created for in the first place.

★★★★★★★

“……Achoo!”

Suddenly, my nose itched, and I sneezed mightily. Keith who was watching me furrowed his eyebrows.

“Nee-san, it’s unbecoming of you as a noble girl to sneeze like that.”

“Hey, I can’t help it. If it wants to come out, it’s going to come out.”

Together with my sneeze, my nose had become runny as well and was dripping. At seeing so, Keith furrowed his eyebrows even more, and sighed deeply, and this time he brought out the crystallization of many years of effort by me and Tom-san, which I had placed on my shelf.

“……Also, nee-san. These past few days, I’ve been finding these toy snakes scattered all over the mansion…… Shouldn’t you give it a rest already?”

“H, how could you say that! Keith, really, how hard do you think Tom-san and I have been working on these! I absolutely won’t throw them away!”

“……Even if you say that, having them all over the mansion…… I feel like we’ve been getting strange looks from visitors to the mansion.”

“I mean, since I went to all the trouble of making all of these, it would be a waste to not use them……”

Since I felt it would be sad for them to not see the light of day, I couldn’t help but decorate the mansion with them…… But unfortunately it seems that everyone in the mansion is against it.

Even though at first they all said “how cool,” now they’re all saying “they’re in the way, get rid of them,” it hurts……

I started feeling a little down, while Keith subtly looked in my direction.

“In the first place, you made one of these first a really long time ago…… Exactly what are you using it for?”

“……T, that’s……”

There was no way I could tell him whatsoever that I intended to throw it at Jared in case of an emergency, so I could only stare at Keith in silence, and he sighed yet again.

“Anyways, you’re going to have to throw them away. If mother returns and sees the mansion like this, you’re going to get lectured again.”

Well…… indeed, father and mother just happened to be out on vacation right now, but when they returned, they would probably complain about seeing the mansion like this.

Not only that, I remember that I decorated one of mother’s favorite flower vases with a toy snake as well…… at this rate, it’ll probably get quite dangerous. Well, I understand that, but……

“……Mm. But, since I went to the trouble of making them, throwing them away is a bit…… At least, if anyone wants them, they can have them.”

I mean, for the fruit of my efforts to never see the light of day…… it would hurt too much.

“……If only such a person would ever appear.”

Keith seemed to be looking off in the distance as he said that.

This was a story about some toy snakes that were considered to be in the way right before they became a huge hit in town.