The King's Proposal
Morning.
Kiera was staring out the window.
Far off in the garden, ordinary adventurer parties were arriving one by one.
House Toledo was busily preparing its ambitious Eastern Expedition, with Hero Kiera at its head.
The plan was to reclaim part of the continent's eastern territories, which had fallen to the Demon King's army, and thereby broadcast House Toledo's prestige far and wide.
Which meant the investment behind it was staggering.
Dozens of ordinary adventurer parties had been hired to support Kiera in battle, and hundreds of laborers were being mobilized for their comfort and provisioning.
Needless to say, a mountain of supplies was being poured into the campaign as well.
It would be no exaggeration to say that House Toledo had bet everything on the Eastern Expedition.
But the Hero the Duke trusted so completely was a mountain of worry all her own…
Even today, she covered her face with her hands and let out a long sigh.
It was pitch black.
She couldn't see a way forward.
A few minutes later, Lucy entered the room and relayed the Duke of Toledo's message.
He proposed they go hunting together that afternoon.
"Tell him I'm feeling ill."
"You're avoiding him again? You keep refusing to go out, and the Duke's starting to look pretty irritated with you."
She'd lost count of how many times she had turned him down now.
The next day.
The Duke of Toledo proposed a monster subjugation alongside the commoner parties that had just been recruited, framing it as a way to build cooperation and camaraderie.
Kiera refused that too.
Without the Hero's power, there was nothing she could do.
She avoided every battle and showed her face only at social gatherings.
And so, bit by bit, the misunderstandings began.
Word was spreading through the Duke's household that Kiera was arrogant.
That if something didn't suit her mood, she would refuse even the Duke's own requests and do exactly as she pleased.
And then came the whisper that she enjoyed staying out late every night at the social halls, carousing.
For his part, Duke Toledo was deeply displeased with Kiera's attitude of rejecting his invitations time and again.
But every time it came up, his eldest son Yosef would plead with his father—and the affection Kiera had cultivated with him all this while paid off.
Head over heels on his own, Yosef labored tirelessly to defend her and shield her.
Thanks to him, the grumbling within the household quieted down to a degree.
And then, a few days later.
Kiera at last set out on the Eastern Expedition with the House of Toledo.
Once the grand departure ceremony had concluded, a column of some five hundred people streamed out of the city.
At the head of the procession, riding beside Kiera, Yosef spoke up.
"Our first destination is Nofha, the capital of the Basilite Kingdom. We'll stop there to resupply, then continue on our journey."
"I see. Understood."
Kiera answered listlessly and pulled her hood down low.
Ever since her black hair had begun growing back, she never went anywhere without a hood.
I'm still the Hero. The Hero's power will come back to me. It has to.
She bit her lip, her face tight with anxiety.
Her horse, for its part, placidly kept trotting forward.
A great crowd of people followed behind.
Nofha, capital of the Basilite Kingdom.
The moment they passed through the city gate, well-paved roads and city blocks laid out as neatly as a chessboard spread out before them.
"Wow, it's been ages since I got a whiff of the big city~ Whew, hah~"
Maru looked around with a bright grin.
The first thing to catch his eye was a golden statue of a female Hero.
Standing five meters tall, it was quite large.
Astonishingly, it was made entirely of pure gold, erected in the plaza before the gate where everyone could see it.
He drifted over without thinking and looked up at it.
"That face looks oddly familiar for a statue."
"You've seen it plenty in your history books, I'd wager."
Edward said with pride.
"It's a monument to Lady Alexia, who saved our kingdom from a rampaging dragon twenty-five years ago. Back then, our kingdom was in ruins—there wasn't a single corner untouched—and it was this woman, then only eighteen, and her companions who rescued a nation on the verge of collapse. True Heroes, the both of them."
"She slew a dragon at just eighteen? That's no joke. I've never heard that story before—this is news to me."
"Isn't it remarkable? I wish I could be as strong as Lady Alexia someday."
The two of them chatted for a while before the golden statue.
"Now then, shall we head to the palace? I can't wait to introduce you to my father and mother."
"Hold on a second."
Maru straightened his posture before the golden statue, pressed his hands together, and closed his eyes.
(Mutter, mutter)
"What did you wish for?"
"Nothing much. I just have this condition where I have to pray whenever I see a hero."
"Now that's a fine ailment. I'd love to catch it myself!"
The two of them headed straight for the royal palace.
Once inside, they met the King and Queen without any trouble.
"Good, this visit didn't cost me any money. But the moment I see you, I forget how to breathe."
The King treated his son, returned after so much hardship, with cold indifference.
"How did you escape? No—never mind. The young man standing beside you. You there, tell me. Was it you who rescued the Prince?"
Maru hesitated for a moment.
Edward's being looked down on even worse than I thought.
He stole a glance at Edward.
Utterly oblivious to the atmosphere, Edward was gazing at the King with a proud, self-satisfied expression.
No thought behind those eyes at all.
He was simply an idiot.
Well, what do I do now.
Maru cleared his throat and answered loudly.
"I… have no talent for combat. In truth, it was thanks to His Highness that I escaped with my life."
The courtiers nearby tilted their heads.
"The Prince saved him? That doesn't seem very likely."
"If he'd really wiped out a bandit gang, the sun would rise in the west."
Amid the murmuring, Edward poked Maru in the ribs and winked.
"So the plan begins—I take the credit, and you take the treasure? Fufu, much obliged."
Looking at that guileless face, Maru was struck by a sudden wave of regret—but having said it, he decided to see it through to the end.
"Prince Edward's performance was truly magnificent. He dispatched ten bandits all by himself, you know."
"Is that true?"
The onlookers made skeptical faces, as if they couldn't believe it.
The King watched the reactions of his courtiers, then straightened in his seat.
He'd been cold at first, but his son had distinguished himself—so inwardly, he must have been pleased.
The King gestured with his hand.
"Then tell me in detail how the bandit gang was put down. Spare no praise for the Prince's exploits."
Maru played the clown before a crowd of onlookers.
Sweeping his hands and feet in grand flourishes, he embellished Edward's nonexistent heroics until the assembled courtiers were gasping in admiration.
"The Prince truly did all that?"
Everyone was dubious—but with a witness present, they had no choice but to believe it.
"And after felling the leader of the bandit gang, His Highness said this to me! 'You there! A bright future lies ahead of us! I have cleansed every last bandit from this land—so rise up and march boldly onward!'"
"Ooooh!"
The courtiers broke into applause and cheers.
When the tale was done, the faces of the King and Queen were brimming with delight.
Edward, for his part, was shameless to the last—knowing full well it was a lie, he simply smiled and raised his hand in acknowledgment at the crowd's enthusiastic response, without a trace of embarrassment.
"Hahaha, that's just the kind of man I am!"
And so the audience with the King ended pleasantly for everyone involved.
Afterward, Maru was assigned a fine room and took his rest.
"Ugh… what am I even doing?"
He rolled around on the bed for a long while.
Then he sat up abruptly, poured water into an empty cup, and offered a prayer to the heavens.
"O God, can You hear my voice? O God? God?"
No response.
"Ignoring me again, I see."
Unfortunate, but he'd have to put it off until next time.
He had something to ask.
Why his chest had ached when he'd nearly finished off the bandit gang.
He was zoning out, thinking back on that moment, when suddenly a knock sounded at the door.
It was the elderly head steward.
"His Majesty requests your presence."
Now?
"I'll be right there."
He didn't know why, but when the King summons you, you go.
He tidied his attire and stepped outside.
The King was not waiting in the main reception hall, but in a small parlor tucked away in a quiet corner.
"I called you here because I wished to say thank you."
The King wrapped Maru's right hand gently in his own two wrinkled ones.
"Thank you for making my worthless son something to be proud of."
Maru's eyes went wide with bewilderment.
"…You knew all along?"
"Of course I did. I raised the boy myself—how could I not know? Him, wiping out a bandit gang? Pigs would sooner fly."
"Then please forgive me for speaking falsehood before Your Majesty, lofty as the heavens."
"The bandits are dealt with, the Prince is showered with praise by his people—everyone's happy. Why would I punish you for that?"
The King smiled warmly.
"But there is one thing I must ask. Did Edward put you up to it? On this point alone, I wish to hear the truth."
Maru answered at once.
"It was my own decision. I swear it—His Highness never requested it. Before I came here, I heard the rumors about the Prince and felt pity for him. That is all."
"Good. That puts my mind at ease. If Edward had forced your hand, I would have reprimanded him. If it isn't so, then thank the heavens."
Going by what Edward had told him, Maru had assumed the King was nothing but stern and terrifying—but he was, in truth, a father who loved his son more than anyone.
The King released the hand he had been holding and picked up a scroll resting on the table.
"Will you not make a bargain with me? A man like you, I trust, would carry it out well."
He held the scroll out to Maru.
Maru took it and unrolled it. It was a letter of appointment.
Appointment of a Royal Clerk
Maru looked at the King.
The King was sipping a drink made of apples, honey, and vinegar.
"I think you may have handed me the wrong document."
"You've risen in the world as of today. Congratulations."
"You can't possibly mean to appoint me as a clerk. Hold on. What exactly about me are you appointing?"
"Your acting."
"I'll be leaving now."
"I won't keep you long. With your help, I want the Prince's standing restored and the court's respect earned with it. Perform your duties well, and I'll carve out land from my own demesne so you can settle here."
"Land, hm. Not bad. But I'm not one to be attached to land."
"Then what more could you want? Name your desire."
"The land."
"Didn't you just say you weren't attached to it?"
"On second thought, land does sound rather nice. It would make an achievement worth bragging about to my mother."
"You have parents? A commoner holding land—she'd be overjoyed, I suppose. What in the world is 'rather nice' supposed to mean?"
"Nothing at all. One month. I'll stay by your side for exactly one month."
"Half a year."
"Two months."
"Five months."
So the haggling went back and forth, and in the end the King asked only one thing: "Do for me exactly what you showed them."
In other words, Maru was to play the part of a clerk with no talent for combat while making it appear as though the Prince himself had wiped out every monster and bandit gang they encountered.
"Only the three of us—you, me, and Edward—shall know of this arrangement. A secret is best kept by the fewest possible people. Not a word of it to the Queen or the Princess, either."
"I don't trust people much these days. I'd like a written oath, properly drafted."
"Bold, aren't you, making demands of me."
"That's how I was raised."
And so, from the following day onward, Maru began dragging Edward around the capital's outskirts, raiding every bandit hideout they laid eyes on.