Ch.169169. Complaining Without Reason

Could it be thanks to Celia bringing up the engagement?

The Duke, now in a good mood, treated us with the utmost hospitality.

Since the North isn’t exactly a place for entertainment, he held a banquet exclusively for us within the ducal residence.

During the event, we witnessed the Duke’s cruel and cold demeanor as he expelled Broon, who was still complaining about his tongue pain, but nobody said anything about it.

‘Sorry, Broon.’

But considering you never appeared in the game, you’re probably destined for an unfortunate end anyway. It’s a shame I never got to have a proper conversation with you, but don’t be too sad about it.

Anyway, this lavish treatment still felt awkward.

They could just serve the food and let us eat, but instead, each diner had one or two servants hovering nearby… it was unbearably uncomfortable.

I should just eat a reasonable amount, sit for a while, and then slip away…

“Ludion, where are you going?”

“Hey, where are you off to, Ludion?”

“Aren’t you two a bit too obsessed with Ludion?”

I couldn’t escape.

In the end, I had to stay until sunset.

///

Late evening.

Only after the Duke’s quasi-banquet ended could I finally escape.

Celia had unusually left early, and Alkine said she wanted to spend time with her mother since she was home. There was a minor incident where the Duke sulked because she wouldn’t play with him, but that’s not important enough to dwell on.

So on the way back, it was just Lilith and me.

But something was strange. Our assigned rooms should be in opposite directions, yet Lilith showed no intention of leaving my side.

If we continued like this, we’d end up at my room. She’s not Celia, so I didn’t think she’d be planning anything like that.

Perhaps sensing my questioning gaze, Lilith cautiously called my name.

“Um, Ludion.”

“Yes, magnificent saint. What can I do for you?”

“That ‘magnificent saint’ thing is really… never mind. Um, you know.”

Lilith stopped there, unable to continue.

She kept moving her lips without speaking for quite some time, which was so unlike her that I unconsciously spoke up.

“What is it? Why did you stop?”

“It’s nothing, really. Nothing important.”

For something supposedly unimportant, it seemed quite significant.

“So, will you do it with me too?”

See? It was important after all.

“…Do what?”

“Don’t pretend you don’t know. The engagement, of course.”

…Right. I did know. I’d accidentally read her thoughts earlier, so it would be a lie to say I didn’t know.

She’d been glancing at me repeatedly, looking like she had something she wanted to say…

I was curious about why she was acting that way, so I read her mind…

[She envies the other two people.]

[She wants to have that kind of relationship with you too.]

[Actually, she doesn’t want that kind of relationship.]

[Actually, she does want it.]

[Actually, she might not really want it after all.]

I witnessed her inner self fighting hard.

After seeing that, I couldn’t pretend not to know.

So I was about to give a positive answer when suddenly, another voice spoke beside me.

“Miss Lilith. The Imperial Palace won’t officially recognize your engagement.”

“Eek?! What? Where did you pop out from?”

“I’ve been here the whole time?”

Wait, didn’t you say you were going back to your room to rest?

I was startled too, honestly—she appeared so suddenly and at such close proximity that I couldn’t react.

Celia explained that it wasn’t really surprising.

“I was lying. Miss Lilith kept glancing at Ludion like she had something to say, so I stepped aside.”

“You didn’t step aside at all.”

“I just needed to be out of sight. What more do you want?”

It was sophistry, but Lilith didn’t seem interested in arguing. She just sighed deeply and said what she wanted to say.

“Imperial recognition… would be nice, but it doesn’t matter if I don’t have it. I’ll ask the church.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes. I’ll handle it myself.”

“…It’s irritating how boldly you’re asking, Miss Lilith.”

“Isn’t that a bit harsh?”

Thanks to Celia’s interruption, the atmosphere lightened a bit.

“Um, I never actually agreed to an engagement.”

“…You won’t do it?”

I was going to tease her, but things got serious again.

Her expression suggested that if I even joked about refusing, something terrible would happen, so I quickly gave the positive answer I had originally intended.

“If you want to, then sure.”

“Okay.”

“Um, Miss Lilith? Just in case you’re wondering, you know you’re last in line, right?”

“That’s for Ludion to decide.”

“…Ludion?”

“I don’t know anything about that. I’m going to bed.”

Feeling like some great responsibility was approaching, I fled to my room, leaving the two of them behind.

Somehow, I ended up with three confirmed engagements while here.

‘The North… maybe I shouldn’t have come.’

Even though I know this sequence of events isn’t because of the North, I can’t help thinking that way.

Everything is clearly going well, but somehow I feel an endlessly growing burden in exchange.

“I guess these are happy problems.”

“Is it okay to be engaged to three beautiful girls at once?” When I think about it that way, it really does sound like complaining about having too much of a good thing.

///

Time passed slowly in the North.

There was nothing to do.

The North is a dangerous place, the frontline where monsters frequently appear.

Logically, they don’t expect tourists, so there’s nothing to do for entertainment.

Of course, if you look at it differently, you could have endless fun hunting monsters… but while that might have been enjoyable in the game, fighting monsters in reality wasn’t particularly pleasant.

With our strength, we could probably annihilate them completely. And seeing people’s reactions to that might be interesting.

But the situation wasn’t particularly dangerous, so there was no real need to do that.

So all I’d done was walk around the North with Alkine, watching her greet people.

Rumors about me had apparently spread quickly, as people kept saying how well we matched, which made Alkine beam with happiness.

That was literally it. Otherwise, I’d been holed up in the ducal residence, resting, eating, and resting again.

It felt something like this:

You book a pension for a trip, but when you get there, there’s nothing to do, so you just rest mindlessly at the pension all day and think, “I should have just stayed home.” Have you ever felt that way?

That was exactly my situation now. If I was just going to rest like this, I should have stayed home. Well, home being the academy dormitory.

Perhaps my ungrateful thoughts were detected, because trouble suddenly erupted.

“A monster invasion is coming.”

The North’s experience point copying event… no, the monster invasion event had occurred.

In the game, the monster invasion event was the North’s only reason for existence—a random event with random trigger conditions.

I had never particularly feared or been wary of this event.

Anyone who came to the North would have specs high enough to chew through ordinary monsters, so if it happened while I was here, I would have thought “what luck!” and happily participated.

There was a reason it was called the experience point copying event.

But in our current situation… while we did have the specs to chew through monsters, there was no such thing as experience points in reality, so there was no real need to get involved.

“We can handle this ourselves, so don’t worry too much. It happens all the time.”

That’s what the Duke said.

And it was true.

Fighting monsters was everyday life here. Just because they were swarming in large numbers didn’t make it a huge deal.

Tomorrow was our last day, and we were scheduled to return. We could just rest peacefully on our final day without exerting ourselves unnecessarily.

“…No one’s thinking that, right?”

While it might be a common occurrence, that doesn’t mean it’s safe.

Unlike normal times, the onslaught of monsters pouring out was dangerous even for the North’s experienced warriors.

The Duke’s “handling” meant just that—handling it. There was no guarantee everyone would be safe.

I know. Even if we help now, this will happen again when we’re not here, and then there will be casualties like before.

So what I was about to do was mere self-satisfying hypocrisy.

Even if I stepped up, I’d just be a supporting role. The real help would come from the three women here.

‘But that’s fine.’

I’ll do what I can. This is much better than doing nothing because I’m obsessing over useless concerns.

And everyone seemed to agree with my opinion.

“Everyone except Miss Lilith.”

“Everyone except Lilith.”

Except Lilith.

“I never thought that! This is slander!”

She protested her innocence, and she was actually right to feel wronged.

[She feels wronged because she never thought that.]

In truth, she was the most skilled at monster subjugation.

She already had a record of unexpectedly winning a competition to clean up remaining monsters after defeating demon forces.

She wasn’t the type to pass up this rare opportunity to beat Celia and Alkine.

In the end, we unanimously decided to participate in this monster invasion event.

“No, really. You don’t have to come…”

Somehow only the Duke’s opinion was ignored, but that couldn’t be helped.

Well, just stay put. Everything will be fine.