Settling Matters 4
There were two princes in the kingdom, yet their bond ran so deep that the question of succession never sparked a fight. The wise and benevolent first prince possessed every quality of a sovereign; the valiant and sturdy second prince, every quality of a general.
I'd heard the story from the kingdom's historical society, so there was probably a little embellishment on their abilities—but the bones of it weren't rumor. Two princes, and the younger one had gladly accepted his elder brother as heir. According to the gossipmongers, the second prince simply preferred riding out with the knight-commander to clear monsters…
What is it with this place? Is it fashionable for second sons of noble houses to just run away from home?
"We're only on the fortieth floor and we've already been named Heroes, and now a princess is showing up from the kingdom… At this rate, by the ninetieth floor aren't we going to be called the Heroes Who Will Save the World and end up looking like some cult leaders?"
While I was thinking that, Han Se-ah and her viewers launched into a noisy discussion about the princess. A princess from a fantasy world had just appeared—of course everyone was going to get excited.
Especially if that princess was praised as the most beautiful woman in the kingdom.
The kingdom's greatest beauty, the kind of woman anyone who met her once couldn't help but fall in love with. A heart as lovely as her face, pious enough that if she entered the Temple she could become a Saintess. And thanks to that, she also served as a mediator in the power struggles between the royal family and the Temple.
…Or so I'd been told, for the first time in ten years, by people from the information guild I'd used as a connection.
Because of a princess who'd suddenly been written into the game scenario, everything I thought I knew had been wiped clean. As far as I'd known, the royal family and the Temple weren't quite at the point of open war—but the moment either side showed a weakness, the other would sink its teeth into their throat without hesitation. And now, supposedly, they were getting along just fine.
"A princess… Katie, have you ever met her?"
"No. I only ever lived up north, so I've only heard the rumors. Northern nobles who'd visited the capital would come back with flushed cheeks practically worshipping her—I heard that until I was sick of it."
Beautiful, kind, and wise. Had they really just built a fairy-tale princess character and called it a day? The stories floating around were anything but ordinary. And of course, there was no way I could have gone ten years without hearing about someone this famous.
She was a gacha character, same as that doting northern Great Bear of a father—that much was obvious.
"So I guess we're heading to the capital, then?"
"Obviously. No matter what, we can't exactly tell a princess to come into the Tower. Just sending an invitation to a commoner-born adventurer is already more than we deserve."
"Unlike the recognition of our brothers and sisters, even if we've been named Heroes, we still haven't received the royal family's acknowledgment."
Of course, even if she was a character who'd been thrown together overnight, her power was real. She'd won the favor of nobles from the capital all the way to the north, had ties to the Temple, and got along well with her brothers—a walking incarnation of political influence.
No matter how kind she was personally, once someone reached that level, the people around her would inevitably start grinding us down. Wearing the Hero title didn't mean a commoner-born party could go stiff-necked and defiant in front of someone like that.
And so the newly minted Hero party's journey to the capital was decided.
The Adventurer's City—forcibly turned into my second hometown, the place players arrived at the moment they created a character—and the kingdom's capital were completely different. Not different the way Seoul and Busan are different. Different from top to bottom, start to finish.
A city where adventurers gathered to kill the monsters pouring out of the Tower, and merchants gathered to trade the Mana Stones those adventurers brought back. In the messy back alleys, poor alchemists set up makeshift workshops in noisy clusters; the main streets were packed with every kind of merchant imaginable. That was the city.
The capital, by contrast, was land shaped by the nobles and the people who'd flocked to their power, all centered on the royal palace. Unlike the chaotic city, even the width and angles of the roads had been meticulously planned into a clean, orderly layout.
"Wow… the streets are really gorgeous."
"Maybe because there's no snow to clear, but it is clean and beautiful."
Thanks to that, Grace—who'd grown up in a slash-and-burn farming village—and Katie, a northern duke's daughter, both sat in the carriage with their mouths slightly open, peering around like country girls who'd just arrived in Seoul. Irene watched their faces instead of the window, smiling with gentle affection, and Han Se-ah grinned as she filmed the whole thing.
Built along the walls of the royal palace, the capital's streets held not a scrap of filth—not even dust. Magical tools kept everything clean, and every dirt road had been paved over with stone.
Even the markets had no shabby street vendors' stalls; only neat shop buildings lined the way. At a glance, it felt like looking at a well-kept European tourist district. Factor in that magical tools kept the cleanliness running in real time, twenty-four hours a day, and it was better than modern Europe.
Thank god this wasn't a world where people dumped shit out the window and everyone wore high heels just to dodge it. If it had been, I'd have gone off to some mountain hollow to farm alone instead of living on an estate full of magical tools.
"We've got an invitation, but that doesn't mean we can meet her right away, so we'll have to stay in the capital for a few days at least."
"Yeah, a princess must be incredibly busy."
The clean clop of hooves on clean streets. Even so, it was a place where people lived, so the roads were crowded enough that there was plenty to look at—especially since there were no dirty, shabby poor folk; everyone was dressed in fine clothes.
Handsome men and beautiful women in black uniforms patrolled with swords at their hips, and lovely shopgirls in matching uniforms stood in front of stores holding small magical tools, advertising something or other.
If the Adventurer's City was a lively country market, the capital's streets brought to mind a carefully arranged department store. Something about the glittering, polished shine made you want to look around, so even as the party talked, their eyes kept drifting to the windows.
"So where are we staying?"
"This is the merchants' district. I heard there's another area where the inns for visitors to the capital are clustered. Word is the facilities on the western street are the most expensive and luxurious."
As the conversation flowed, the topic naturally turned to lodging. We were on a schedule to pay respects to a nation's princess—there was no way a morning visit, midday meeting, and evening return home was going to cut it. We'd need to secure a place to stay, present the invitation at the palace, and settle in to wait for several days.
Katie, who'd only ever heard other people's stories about the capital from up north, finally pulled her gaze from the window and looked at me as she mentioned the western street.
Of everyone in this carriage, the one most familiar with the kingdom's capital wasn't the noble Katie—it was me, the adventurer. To scrape together gold coins with eyes only for magical tools, I'd had to target the capital's nobles, the real big spenders.
"We probably won't need to find lodging ourselves."
"Huh? Why not?"
"Because we're guests the princess invited personally. Hero or not, would she really tell people she invited herself to stay in some inn? She'll put us up in a villa and have us wait there."
"Ah… yeah, that makes sense."
"You're from a noble house… Doesn't the northern grand duchy at least have a villa in the capital?"
"Come on, I only finished my coming-of-age ceremony and then ran away from home. If I used that villa now, Dad would come sprinting down here."
Only after I brought it up did the villa occur to her; Katie nodded. Why was a noble young lady who clearly had a luxurious villa in the capital even talking about inns? She seemed a little embarrassed herself, eyes curving as she answered in a coaxing, playful voice—cute enough that I let it slide.
The carriage we were riding in right now had been sent by the royal family after their talks with the Temple, hadn't it? The comfort was incomparable to the cargo wagons we usually took, or even the noble-house carriages I'd ridden for commissions. It was so comfortable it put the back seat of a limousine I'd never even sat in to shame, and drowsiness came on naturally.
As if agreeing that I was right, the carriage came to a smooth stop. When the door opened, people were waiting—no, maids.
"Greetings. Magician Hanna and her companions."
"Ah—hello?"
The woman standing at the front of the group inclined her head slightly.
Time had left its mark—an elderly face lined with wrinkles—but her back was as straight as bamboo. Tall for a woman, and with that upright posture, she carried a presence that made her seem imposing despite not being particularly large. Han Se-ah stammering out a greeting on pure instinct was the only natural response.
Snow-white hair, a wrinkled face, a posture so ramrod-straight it looked like an iron rod had been driven down her spine, and footsteps that moved with elegant precision. A clean black dress that covered every inch from ankle to neck, and a pure white apron that still declared, unmistakably, that she was a maid.
Head of the household staff. An unyielding presence whose bearing alone commands respect.
"So this grandm— uh, ma'am? Wait, so the head maid is stronger than Grace unnie was back when she was a beginner…?"
A woman with one more star than Grace in her bow-wielding adventurer days began to lead us inside.