Chapter 17 - To the Promised Land (1/2)

“Now, Klaus-sama, please hold this flower properly.”

I picked a faint thin pink rose with pruning shears.

I handed it to Klaus who turned into a bouquet-creation machine.

Klaus seemed to have been scolded by his parents last night, there were bags under his eyes.

He didn’t suffer major injuries, but his whole body should be full of scrapes and abrasions.

There was also a large bandage plastered on his cheeks and forehead, which made him look like a boy from a manga.

Nevertheless, the spots where his skin wasn’t ruined were youthful as was his privilege as a beautiful character.

Ah, my Erica the Marvelous Villain’s body also didn’t have rough skin.

It was appreciated by the plain fact that there wasn’t any muscle pain even though usually I only exercised a little.

“Ufufu, Klaus-oniisama. Today you will listen to what I say, right?”

Today we were walking through the Knot Garden of Spring Palace as promised.

All of the gardeners were looking happily at Ann who seemed to be in high spirits.

Followed by me with the pruning shears, and Klaus who held a lot of flowers.

There was an impression about our group that Ann was a princess, while Klaus and I were her attendants.

Spring green eyes froze.

Klaus’ eyes were also blinking rapidly. Ooh, comrade.

“Erica, did you stay up all night?”

“Yes, I was cleaning up a little……Klaus-sama, good work on enduring the scoldings.”

“It’s not ‘good work.’”

Huh? Was he feeling tired?

I tried to think in Japanese, but in fact it was a conversation in this world’s language.

Here the polite expressions were fuzzy, so there shouldn’t be any regulation about that.

“……The preaching, ……no, my father’s teaching, it’s not over yet. I just had a momentary break.”

“Hii.”

“After that, it seems to be my mother’s turn……”

“Hii……Klaus-sama, please live.”

It seemed to be a considerably strict family.

But, that was the Harvan couple way of showing their affection.

They were strict because they were worried inside out. Surely.

“There is a very beautiful rose over there!”

“I guess we have no choice. There are only two or three more.”

“Onii-sama! If you don’t reflect properly, I would like to let Otou-sama and Okaa-sama know……”

“Kuh…! Let’s go, Erica! If we let her be, she will reap all the roses in this garden!”

“I won’t do that!”

“Yes, yes. Ann-sama, you can cut as much as you like.”

Klaus was reluctantly going along with his sister’s selfishness, while his sister was enjoying herself to the utmost uninhibitedly.

Above all, these siblings were good friends with each other.

(Aaah~~, at last, one of my death flags has completely broken……it was a tough death flag……)

I felt completely out of my mind.

The lack of sleep was also adding to that, I was just like a flower-picking machine with a fully automated garden commentary feature.

It was wonderful that I wouldn’t die even if I was absentminded.

“Erica-oneesama, what is that yellow flower over there?”

“It is a wooden rose native to the southern part of the continent.”

“Lovely! Erica-oneesama, I’m going to see it up close!”

“Yes, go ahead, Ann-sama.”

Since last night, Ann had been calling me ‘Onee-sama.’

What was it, this classic girly novel sensation.

I felt a bit happy, but I was pretty embarrassed by the compensation.

Could you let me replace the rosary?

Since there was no culture to wear a cross on this continent, as expected, it became the star crystal necklace? Sounds ominous.

“Good grief……, I don’t know where she gets her inability to stay calm, that girl.”

A lot of flowers chosen by Ann were held in both hands of Klaus.

Today’s Ann was unforgiving towards her older brother because of the lingering excitement of yesterday’s adventure.

I also dazedly cut the rose as Ann commanded and handed it over to Klaus.

With that synergy, suddenly he was holding a tremendous amount of roses.

Beside the massive amount of flowers that Klaus currently held, what was horrible was that the flowers that had been brought to Ann’s room was about three times of those flowers.

It was not a joke or a hyperbole, she could truly reap all the flowers throughout the garden.

“She’s exactly like Klaus-sama. She’s very curious. Aah but, Klaus-sama lacks Ann-sama’s courteousness.”

“Oi, Erica……no, Lady Erica. Just now, what did you say?”

“Oh my, Klaus-sama. Please, have a look. It’s a lovely large-flowered rose.”

Slanders were more likely to carry to other people’s ears, how troublesome.

While turning my eyes off him who was pouting, I cut out a diluted crimson rose that caught my eyes with pruning shears.

I adorned Klaus’ hair with the cut out rose, glossing over his previous question while making fun of him.

Fuhaha. How was it? It was inevitable if both hands were blocked!

“Oh, it really suits you, Klaus-sama.”

“Wait a minute! Stop that!”

Klaus’ cheeks were dyed in shame.

This one was excellent!

In order to shake off the rose inserted in his hair, Klaus hurriedly shook his head.

However, it seemed that the thorns tangled well with his hair, and it didn’t fall off easily.

I did it, that was fun! Rose-san good job!

“Oya, Klaus-kun, you’re surprisingly pretty cute.”

“Well! Edward-oniisama, welcome back!”

“Geh, Edward!?”

My older brother’s traveling clothes were the same as when he was about to leave, and in his hand he was holding a leather bag, which was the Wunderkammer.

As usual, although it was a groomed appearance and a graceful conduct with no gap, I could see a slight tiredness in his complexion.

Did Edward-oniisama stayed up all night?

“Damn……! Stop it! Don’t look at me like this!”

Klaus concealed his face with a bunch of roses.

His ears were bright red.

Anyway, that phrase, you’d better quit it somehow, Klaus.

“You don’t have to hide. Isn’t it pretty?”

“Guh……Remember this, Edward Aurelia! This shame, I will definitely get rid of it!”

Leaving behind a needlessly embarrassing parting remark, Klaus ran in the direction of Ann and escaped.

I wondered if it was that embarrassing to be seen by Onii-sama.

Maybe he had a one-sided rivalry with the alchemist Edward.

“Because the news reached me by owl delivery, I came home in a hurry, but……I’m sorry, Erica. Did you almost die because of the trap I set up?”

“No, I was able to dispel it safely, so it’s alright.”

Rather, I gave a lifetime of thanks to his super powerful death trap.

I couldn’t go to bed with my feet facing Onii-sama1.

“Rather than that, I’m sorry I devastated your supplies for exploration.”

“It’s okay. I heard the story from father yesterday. To think that the leftover of my supplies had helped my lovely little sister to survive. I’d rather be proud.”

“Onii-sama……”

Onii-sama crouched down to look at me and gave a soft smile.

For a moment, I felt tears seeping out.

It was nice, to have an older brother.

However, with the next words, the angelic smile of Onii-sama changed instantaneously to a dark smile.

“Oh, but for the time being, please tell me later, as much as you remember about the details of who used it and how much they used it.”

“……What are you going to do?”

“It’s a secret. Erica doesn’t need to be bothered by that, so please be relieved.”

Klaus……Onii-sama seemed to charge a full payment for the wands and the potions.

What a salt to his injury. Misfortunes never came singly.

If my older brother’s invoice arrived, I guessed he would be selling out some forest from the planned inheritance.

Let me plead to my older brother at least to repaid my life debt.

Anyway, after Klaus became Duke of Harvan, he should do his best in territory management and compensated for the deficit.

Even so, I was at a lost.

Whether it was alright to tell my family about what happened in the Ruins of Visitor.

That huge monster Zaratan could be a scandal of Aurelia of the West.

“I also went to the ruins secretly a few times, but I could hardly reach the place I wanted.”

“What is the destination place?”

“My friend investigated through literatures, but in the deep part of that ruins, the remains of an unknown gigantic creature seem to be sealed.”

“O-oh……, is that so–. I don’t believe it–”

“In relation to the surrounding soil and the distribution of star crystals and the distribution of veins, with Ruins of Visitor as the center, even if it is a small estimation, it is likely that a diameter of at least 5 kilometers is formed on the base of the remains of that creature.”

“Hii……5 kilometers, huh……?”

“It’s an impossible dream, isn’t it?”

I heard that it was formerly city sized, but to think that it was a creature that exceeded 5 kilometers in length.

Somehow, the imagination was too much.

It was good that the Zaratan we met was in his small form.

I didn’t feel like we had a winning chance at all if it was the original size Zaratan.

Ancient alchemists would be forced to use the Wand of Sailor’s Song and risked their lives on that last resort.

“That’s right. I don’t think you will go to the ruins anymore, but if you get lost for some reason, don’t go deeper than the seventh layer.”

“Uu……why is that?”

“A group of tough monsters were living in the eighth layer. The good thing is that they were barely wiped out, but if you used a few big magic, you would unfortunately deal a fatal damage to the labyrinth. Worst, the layer might collapse.”

“T-that is dangerous……”

“I was consulting with a collaborating researcher whether we should reinforce the labyrinth or dig a tunnel to repair it. Either way, since it is beyond the scope that can be investigated secretly from father, I must arrange a way to send an official investigation team through Leandez Magic Academy.”

The shrewd Onii-sama had to have secured a position in that investigation team.

I understood.

Oh, by the way, my stomach was feeling painful because I was feigning ignorance.

“That reminds me, yesterday, when we were inside, we heard a loud noise that felt like the ground was breaking downstairs.”

“Ah, maybe it has collapsed already. Is digging a tunnel the right choice? Even so……what was the trigger, there should have been no mechanical linked with other layers……maybe I missed it……”

It was painful to be pointed out the inconsistencies more than this.

After all they were poor lies and the secret was getting ridiculous.

“By the way, Onii-sama! It’s amazing that there was such a big creature!”

“Oya, are you also interested in the giant creature, Erica?”

Rather than interested, perhaps I should say that I had a bad experience with that creature himself.

“Alchemist Jaconius, commonly known as Zaratan, Erica also knew about that, right? There is a theory that the person called Zaratan was possibly the name of that gigantic creature.”

“There are people in Leandez who noticed such a great thing, huh…”

“There are also other theories, such as that theory, the secret organization theory, and the alien theory, that it was an ancient super-energy generator facility with a built-in space control mechanism.”

As one would expect, those were such outrageous theories, Onii-sama.

It seemed that he had a group of professional editor that loved outrageous conspiracy theories.

“Onii-sama, the giant creature theory……”

“Oh, there are several folklores that supports it.”

Edward-oniisama was hesitating for a moment.