The Dragon's Lunchbox Delivery
I might be crazy, but am I as crazy as you? Think about it. The real problem here is that you lost your family heirloom. I didn’t go out of my way to destroy metal. So why am I the one being called a thief? If we’re pointing fingers, you’re the thief. Not me.
“……”
“Am I wrong? In this harsh world, the idiot is the one who brought something that important out in the open. I deserve an apology. Because of your brainless stunt, I got dragged into this mess too. Why drag an innocent person into your problems?”
My face was shameless, but deep down I knew the truth. If this blew up, the one who’d end up bleeding was me.
Making the Pedri family’s heirloom disappear was a serious crime that could cause massive trouble whether I was the Saint or not.
It was serious enough to spark conflict between nations.
But since Robenin was the one who forced me into committing this felony, I figured he should share some of the responsibility.
[Master, that’s not what you said before?]
⟨ System Message ⟩
“What? Are you trying to spout nonsense again?”
[When you were kidnapped before. The teachers scolded you, and you said the slave trader was the bad one, the lost child wasn’t at fault…….]
“I was a kid back then! But Robenin is an adult, so he should take responsibility for his own mistakes!”
As expected, Robenin didn’t seem to agree with my opinion. He looked ready to do something dangerous to me, but Ash, who had been on high alert the whole time, moved just as fast to stop him.
To my eyes it just looked like the two of them exchanging quick hand gestures, but some kind of silent battle had clearly taken place.
“Calm down. It’s true that you made a mistake!”
“……That woman’s words are basically begging me to kill her right now……”
“Could you please refrain from cutting down the person the public reveres as the Saint with the sword I lent you?”
Seeing the veins bulge violently on the back of Ash’s hands as he gripped both of Robenin’s wrists, I realized my guts were hanging way farther out of my body than I’d felt.
This must be the courage forged by a dragon!
“Hohohoho! Think carefully about who’s in the worse position here! You may be the black sheep of a ducal house, but I am the Saint beloved and respected by everyone in this era!”
“Is that really something you should say about yourself?”
“What can I do when it’s the truth?”
I elegantly swept my hair back over my shoulder, but the chopped-off part ruined the effect.
“Crowell, now that I think about it, you were a noble too.”
“……Huh?”
“Let me ask. What title does your family hold?”
Robenin wasn’t the type to flaunt his ducal bloodline, but the way I was speaking was more than enough to warrant punishment.
If he felt like it, I could easily end up behind bars. Insulting and looking down on an imperial ducal family was no light offense.
There was quite a high gap in status between me and Robenin.
“Sigh, unless you’re about to propose to me, could you stop caring about my family? Of course I’ll reject the proposal too.”
“Are you actually insane?”
I could feel the sincerity dripping from his words. Robenin looked ready to tear me apart with killing intent, but I didn’t back down.
Since I’d whipped him so hard, it was about time to offer him a carrot.
“You just need to remember one thing. If you mess with me, you’ll never find out where Tenebra is or where the dragon’s lair is for the rest of your life. So there’s nothing to gain from provoking me. And obviously, you have a lot more to lose than I do. If you stay on my good side…… who knows? I might take you to the dragon’s lair?”
“……Are you serious? Earlier you said absolutely not.”
“Yeah. I’m the type who never goes back on her word.”
“Why did you change your mind?”
“What I promised the dragon was to keep the lair’s location a secret. Delivering a lunchbox is fine…… ahem. I can’t tell you the location, but I thought it might be okay if you went with me.”
I decided to change my way of thinking.
If I sent him alone, Adelaide would explode with rage over leaking the lair’s location. But bringing one extra human along in twenty years—when I was supposed to meet Magi—would just count as delivering a lunchbox.
If I couldn’t kill that guy with my own power before then, borrowing Magi’s strength to deal with him didn’t seem like a bad idea.
What was the point of having a dragon friend if not for moments like this? It was perfect.
“……Are you really trying to be nice to me?”
“Of course.”
“Young master! Anyone can see she’s trying to feed you to a dragon!”
Ash was great most of the time, but sometimes he got overly sensitive.
Why couldn’t he understand that good things were just good?
“What’s wrong with that? That’s what he wants.”
“That’s right. Meeting a dragon and testing my strength against it has been my lifelong wish. I thought it would be impossible.”
“It’s a good wish.”
“If you help me, I’ll look at you a little more favorably.”
“I’ll pass on that.”
“I’ll also wait for Tenebra to be restored.”
Did he really want to meet a dragon that badly? For the first time, the hostility in Robenin’s eyes toward me softened just a little.
“When will you take me?”
“There’s an appointed day. When that time comes.”
Robenin and I dramatically reached something like a ceasefire agreement.
Incredibly, there was even a moment when we looked at each other with satisfied expressions.
“Good. When is that day?”
“Twenty years from now.”
“……That’s far.”
“Huu…… Oh god, thank you.”
As Robenin grew disappointed, Ash visibly relaxed.
True to his reputation as the continent’s most famous battle maniac, he seemed to become incredibly simple when faced with an opponent he wanted to fight. Thanks to that, I felt like I was starting to figure out how to handle him.
I saw an opportunity and subtly offered a handshake, but he completely ignored it. Looked like I still had a long way to go.
[Still, it’s a happy ending, right? No blood was shed.]
“No. Ash bled.”
[But it wasn’t Master’s blood, right?]
“That’s true.”
It would’ve been better if I’d fought Robenin and won, but unfortunately the timing wasn’t right yet.
I wasn’t the strongest on the continent, and I had never aimed to be. But to defeat that socially inept redhead, I had a dirty feeling that whether I wanted to or not, I’d have to aim for the position of the continent’s strongest.
My natural enemy was overwhelming, and he was a single monster whose head contained nothing but the desire to become stronger.
When Ash and I returned to the city, we ran into a common problem. From the carriage storage area onward, Robenin had been following us like a shadow.
I got annoyed and told him to go his own way, tried coaxing him, Ash begged him, I cursed at him and even threw rocks, but nothing worked.
Before I knew it our lodging was right in front of us. Growing impatient, I grabbed Ash by the collar and shook him.
“Do something about him. He keeps following us!”
I whispered so no one would hear, but I wasn’t exactly speaking gently enough to be ignored.
“If he really starts following you around it’ll be a disaster! That’s Robenin Pedri! No matter how you look at it, it’s not natural to have him as a companion!”
“I know, but……”
“Above all, we can’t use him as a guardian. Even I, a foreigner, know that Duke Pedri’s son is close to the Second Prince! If we say we met by chance on the road, who would believe that? The empire’s elders aren’t fools!”
“Jeanie, thank you for worrying about me, but please calm down.”
“Even if we set aside whether he can be a guardian or not! If that tactless guy sticks around, it’s only a matter of time before the kids find out your identity! He’ll keep calling you ‘Your Highness’! Then you’re completely finished!”
I was fuming and shouting through clenched teeth, yet Ash remained perfectly calm.
Was the fact that Robenin kept following us only a serious issue to me?
“As you just experienced, the young master isn’t someone you can reason with. I don’t want to speak ill of him, but…… he’s not someone common sense works on either. When he gets this stubborn, there’s nothing to do but let him be.”
“How can you say that!”
No matter how much he wore a hood and covered more than half his face with a mask so it wasn’t immediately obvious he was Robenin Pedri, a menacing, pitch-black figure trailing after us was bound to draw attention.
The aura he gave off was on a completely different level from an ordinary traveler—chilling.
To put it simply, it was like a bloodstained blade lying on the side of the road. His very existence grated on the nerves.
“He won’t act as rashly as you think. The young master may do as he pleases, but he’s not a fool. Besides…… right now he seems more interested in you than in me.”
“……Let’s be precise. He’s interested in Tenebra, not me.”
“Yes. Please try to return Tenebra to him quickly. What he wants most is that sword. Before it was the family heirloom, it was the sword he cherished most. He’s been swinging it since he was nine years old and made it his own. No other sword will be able to fill that place.”
“It’s not something I can do whenever I want, okay? It takes time…… and above all, I need the dragon’s help.”
I whispered the last part especially quietly.
Even though it was a noisy evening with crowds everywhere and Robenin probably couldn’t hear, I was still nervous he might.
Because then his dragon obsession would only get worse.
“The dragon’s help…… was it that difficult?”
“Yeah. I can’t restore it alone.”
It was nice that Ash caught on so quickly.
“This is troublesome. The young master isn’t the type to give up easily before he gets what he wants.”
“Should I just tell him the lair’s location? Then he’ll leave, right?”
“You mustn’t. Jeanie, it’s a problem if the young master is put in danger, but if you do that you’ll lose the dragon’s trust.”
“Of course I’d lie. I’d point him in the exact opposite direction of the real lair. At least then he won’t be able to bother us while he’s gone.”
“……The moment he realizes he was deceived, he’ll try to kill you. I might not be able to stop him then.”
What if I sent him as far away as possible so he couldn’t return for at least half a year?
Ah, but since Robenin didn’t have warp sickness like me, there probably weren’t many places that would take him that long.
I racked my brain for ways to shake him off, but honestly I already knew the answer.
“In the end, the only way is for you and me to team up and kill him, huh?”
“As soon as the sun rises tomorrow, I’ll contact the Pedri family and ask them to send someone.”
Ash naturally ignored my perfect plan.
“Will that even work?”
“We have to try.”
Even as he said it, he didn’t seem to hold much hope in that method. It looked like that was the only measure he could take for now.
“Calling them is fine, but…… surely not.”
“Is there some problem?”
“Lasshamu won’t be the one who comes, right?”
Because every ominous premonition I’d had lately had come true, I couldn’t help but voice the thought that had just crossed my mind.