Medial Plains (1)

It took four days for the carriage that left Capatia Port to cross the border of the Grand Duchy of Capatia.

Even when crossing the border, Ceres’s nameplate was all that was needed for instant passage.

“This is power.”

The party was truly impressed by Ceres, who showed off her nameplate and puffed out her chest proudly.

They couldn’t help but be impressed.

If Ceres hadn’t been there, the party would have been exhausted at every stop, asking where the village was, where the inn was once they found the village, how many in the party, how many rooms they needed… inspections, searches, and whatnot.

However, with Ceres in the party, her nameplate alone solved everything, not only bypassing inspections and searches but also eliminating the need to find inns as they could go straight to official residences.

Ceres’s promise to provide accommodation and meal expenses had not been wrong.

It’s just that it wasn’t provided with her own money.

“But now that we’ve left the Grand Duchy of Capatia, I should start using my own money.”

“Is that so?”

Ludvik, sitting on the seat that had now been rearranged into a round table shape, gulped down the fruit wine he was holding and looked outside.

It was a truly blue day.

For a time entering winter, the sky was remarkably high and blue, with patches of white fluffy clouds drifting here and there.

That vast prairie spreading out so wide that no mountains could be seen.

That vast prairie where deep brown hues were more prominent than green, probably because the harvest had already finished.

A prairie so vast and wide that the horizon could be seen.

‘It’s completely different from Marlen.’

Ludvik smiled bitterly as he looked at the scenery.

Having been born and raised in Marlen, which had many more mountainous areas, this was his first time seeing such a vast plain.

Compared to the horizon he had seen in the great desert he crossed to get to Evian, the horizon visible from this plain had a different kind of vitality.

“Uncle, where is this?”

“Here? Uh… hmm.”

Ludvik picked up Rubina, who was crawling onto his lap, and sat her on his knee.

However, he couldn’t answer Rubina’s question.

Ludvik didn’t know where this place was either.

More precisely, he knew it was some kind of plain, but he had forgotten the exact name.

“…It’s the Medial Plains.”

Bigrin, sitting next to Ludvik, murmured in a quiet voice.

Although Bigrin had been acting as if she had no interest in Rubina, she seemed to have intervened slightly when Ludvik couldn’t answer and was fumbling.

“Wow, sister knows everything.”

Rubina exclaimed in admiration, her mouth wide open.

In fact, Rubina had asked where this place was before asking Ludvik. She had asked Yona, and then Alec.

But neither of them knew.

Kairoc and James were sitting in the back row due to their size, and Rubina was honestly too lazy to go that far, so she finally found the answer from Bigrin after going through Ludvik.

“I don’t know everything.”

Ahem, Bigrin cleared her throat softly and turned her head away from Rubina.

But an undisguisable smile had appeared on her lips.

From here on, it’s imperial territory.

The Capatian Imperial Territory, Medial Plains.

With the abundant water source of Lake Cantasia and vast prairies.

Thus, the Medial Plains became the empire’s largest granary.

Considering that a significant portion of the grains distributed in the empire were harvested from these Medial Plains, the scenery visible outside the carriage was spectacular.

“She’s sleeping well.”

Rubina was sleeping soundly, snoring lightly while tightly held in Bigrin’s arms.

This carriage journey was also Rubina’s first, and since she was only ten years old, an age where frequent napping is normal, it wasn’t strange.

“Indeed. She’s sleeping well.”

Although Bigrin had said she disliked children, there must have been some change of heart, as she was treating Rubina quite kindly.

“You’ve changed a lot too.”

“What’s with that sudden remark?”

“You know, when you were growing up in the cathedral orphanage. You hated kids. You said they only cried, were noisy, and threw tantrums.”

While Yona had only stayed at the orphanage for about half a year, Bigrin was the same age as Yona, so they had been quite close during that short time.

And in that short time, as far as Yona remembered, Bigrin didn’t like children.

In contrast, Yona quite liked children.

“That was then. This is now.”

“What happened? You’ve become much more generous since becoming a saint.”

“…People can’t always stay the same. Doesn’t the position make the person?”

‘The position makes the person…?’

To Yona’s ears, those words sounded exactly like saying that Yona, as a healer, was far beneath her.

“What do you mean by that?”

“What do you mean, what do I mean?”

Suddenly, as Yona’s tone became sharp, this time it was Bigrin who was taken aback.

She thought they were finally having a friendly conversation, but Yona had bristled up again for some reason.

“‘The position makes the person,’ are you looking down on me because I’m a healer?”

“W-what are you talking about…”

Bigrin was about to say that she meant now that she was a saint, shouldn’t she change accordingly – but she closed her mouth.

Why, why should she make such an excuse?

There was no need for that.

They would part ways once they reached Inpula anyway, so there was no need for this.

“…Think whatever you want.”

“Hah, really. This is ridiculous.”

“Hey now. Why are you two fighting?”

“Hey, why are you fighting with the Saint?”

Ludvik and Alec intervened simultaneously.

Ludvik to Bigrin, Alec to Yona.

“No, she said something strange-“

“No, she misunderstood what I said-“

With their words strangely overlapping, Yona and Bigrin glared at each other.

After a clash of gazes that seemed to spark, the two finally turned away from each other with a “Hmph!” snort.

Thanks to this, the air in the carriage became unbearably chilly.

It was so bad that even Ceres tried to throw a few jokes before giving up and returning to her seat to open a book.

“Mr. Alec, have you been to places like this often?”

Ludvik, sitting next to Alec, gestured towards the carriage window.

“No, this is my first time too.”

Alec also glanced out the window following Ludvik’s gesture.

That endlessly stretching plain was a spectacular sight even for Alec, who was born and raised far away before drifting to Evian.

How could there be no mountains in sight?

He had heard there was a great forest beyond, but it was hard to believe as there were not even hills, let alone mountains, visible in this vast plain.

And crossing that vast plain-

“Oh, that.”

Alec squinted his eyes and stared in that direction.

That tiny dot-like thing visible far in the distance was, in Alec’s view, clearly a person.

“What is it?”

“Over there, far away.”

“Oh… isn’t that a person?”

At Ludvik’s words, everyone’s attention turned in that direction.

“Regent, please look over there.”

As soon as Ceres approached, Ludvik pointed out the window.

Thanks to getting considerably closer in the meantime, the identity of that dot-like thing was clearly visible as people.

“Their appearance looks quite terrible.”

As Alec said, the people’s appearance was truly a mess.

They were wearing clothes, but it was clear they had just thrown them on haphazardly, and they were carrying heavy loads on their backs. The children looked dirty and their faces were in such a state that it was clear they had suffered some misfortune.

More than twenty such people were approaching in a line from the opposite direction of the carriage.

Ludvik got out of the carriage, and Louis, the captain of the cathedral knights who had been accompanying them on horseback as a guard, also dismounted and approached the line of people.

As they got closer, they could see how shabby their appearance was, and moreover, they looked completely devoid of energy as if they hadn’t eaten for days.

As the two men approached, a bit of color seemed to return to the people’s faces.

“Hello there.”

“Oh, y-yes! Yes!”

The man at the front of the line kept bowing deeply to Louis, greeting him. It wasn’t strange behavior given Louis’s knightly aura at a glance, but they seemed to want something even more than that.

“Are you perhaps the representative?”

“P-please speak comfortably, my lord. We are all humble commoners!”

“Ah, I see.”

Ludvik glanced at Louis with a slightly incredulous expression as his speech immediately changed to informal. Even if they introduced themselves as commoners, does it change so quickly? Ludvik thought to himself that nobles will be nobles. After all, being the captain of the cathedral knights, he must be a noble.

“Where are you coming from?”

“W-we are from, t-two days away…”

But the man couldn’t answer immediately.

It seemed like he had something he wanted to say, but couldn’t bring himself to say it out loud.

“Tell me what’s going on.”

After hesitating a bit more, the man finally opened his mouth cautiously.

“My lord, I’m terribly sorry, but could we possibly get a little food? The children and our companions have been walking for days without eating…”

“What, food-“

Ludvik stretched out his arm to stop Louis, who was about to burst out angrily.

“Oh my, is that so? Well then. Please wait a moment.”

After saying this, Ludvik lightly pulled Louis’s arm and turned around.

“Look, you can see the adults and children are starving. The Celestial God’s teachings tell us to help such poor people, so why are you being so harsh? We can eat a little less and share some food. I’ll explain it well to the Regent, so don’t worry.”

“Even so, that food was purchased with the donations of believers. To casually distribute it privately…”

Ludvik cut off Louis’s words and smiled brightly.

“Come on, why are you so inflexible? Who said we should use that food?”

Then he put his thumb and index finger together in a circle and shook it slowly.

“Let’s have the Regent buy it, that’s what I mean. Not the Chief Elder. The Regent has a lot of money, doesn’t she?”