While I was feeling a cold sweat running down my back, Mother Dragon seemed
to be smiling slightly.
"I have nothing to say about that."
"Huh?!" Did she read my mind?!
"I told you, this is a place created by the synchronization of your mind and my
own. Even without speaking, you should be able to hear my voice."
"..." ...So we can communicate just by thinking, is that it?
When I chose to think what I wanted to say, without putting it into words,
Mother Dragon nodded.
Well, damn. We weren't just having a heart-to-heart; what was in our heads was
open to the other party.
There could be no fairer place to negotiate, but it meant that I couldn't lie to her,
either. No, maybe as great as Mother Dragon was, she was good enough to tell lies in
her own heart? When I thought that, Mother Dragon shook her head.
"Even I cannot do that. No creature can lie in their heart."
"Is that right?" I asked.
"Yes. Also, you don't need to say things out loud, you know?"
"No... I find it a bit unsettling, so please let me speak out loud."
This was a space where nothing could be hidden. I decided to ask her about it
straight out.
"So, about the Mechadra... you were saying you had nothing to say about it?"
"I have no intention of telling you what you can and can't do with remains when
the soul has already departed, and, on a physical level, the bone had been replaced
by stone."
"...Even if they were the bones of one of your kind?"
"You people put the fossilized remains of your own ancestors on display, too,"
she said. "I can't say I have no reservations about it, but it is unavoidable. All living
beings eventually die, and then rot away. Animals, plants, humans, and dragons
alike, we all return to the soil in the end. In that case, are we to lament that as we
tread the earth, we kick those who were once our brethren?"
I was surprised. Even though she was an object of worship, Mother Dragon spoke
in realistic terms. Also, if her mention of returning to the soil was in reference to
being broken down by microbes, I really couldn't afford to underestimate the
dragons' knowledge.
"If it's not about issues with the Mechadra, why have you set up this meeting?" I
asked.
Mother Dragon narrowed he eyes a little. "You who have a familiar smell, King of
Elfrieden and Amidonia, Sir Souma Kazuya. I would like for you to come visit the
Star Dragon Mountain Range."
"The Star Dragon Mountain Range?" I asked.
Mother Dragon nodded quietly. "In the near future, we will hold a ceremony for
the young dragons of the Star Dragon Mountain Range to form 'riding contracts'
with the knights of the Nothung Dragon Knight Kingdom. I would like for you to
participate in that ceremony."
"Huh?"
I was going to participate in the dragon knights' ceremony? ...Wait, didn't the Star
Dragon Mountain Range have no diplomatic relations with anyone outside of the
Nothung Dragon Knight Kingdom? When I tried to ask for more details, Mother
Dragon's body began to shine like when she had first appeared. It was so bright, I
squinted my eyes.
Just before her form vanished, Mother Dragon left me with these words:
There is something I wish to entrust you with.
◇ ◇ ◇
When I opened my eyes, I was on a bed in a dark room.
I looked around with my mind still hazy. It was probably still night. It was dark,
but the moonlight streaming in through the window allowed me to make out the
inside of this neat and tidy Western-style room.
This is... Oh, right. I'm in Liscia's room.
Last night... or rather, every night lately, unless I was especially busy with work...
I'd gone to sleep and woken up in Liscia's room. Of course... well... that was so we
could do a lot of fooling around.
When I looked next to me, as expected, I found Liscia's sleeping face. It was hectic
the next morning if we did it in the governmental affairs office, and when it came to
my room, half of it was my doll-making workshop, and the other half was where we
spent time as a family, which made it awkward; so, as a result, we were using Liscia's
room every night.
"Nngh..." Liscia, who had been lying on her back next to me, asleep and naked,
seemed to lift her head up, but then rolled onto her side. Then, slowly opening her
eyes, she rubbed the sleep from them and looked at me. "Mmm... Souma?"
"Sorry. Did I wake you?"
"...No. It's fine. What's up?"
"Oh... I just had a kind of incredible dream..."
"A dream?"
That was when it happened.
Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhh...
Suddenly, there was a sound like that. It was a mysterious sound, almost like a
siren, or perhaps the howling of some creature. We could hear it from a considerable
distance, so it must have been at a very high volume, but it didn't make our ears ring
at all. It wasn't going to wake those who were asleep, probably. I had never heard it
myself before, but I imagined it was like the singing of whales.
I put on my shirt, and pulled on a pair of pants, then got out of bed and went over
to stand by the window. When I did, I saw a large shadow in the sky flying away to
the northwest.
"How unusual," said Liscia. "That's Mother Dragon on one of her sightseeing
flights."
Liscia stood next to me, naked except for the blanket wrapped around her.
"Sightseeing flights?" I asked.
"It's my first time seeing it myself. On rare occasions, there are times when
Mother Dragon flies around the continent. She doesn't do anything in particular, but
the Mother Dragon worshipers say that good fortune comes to those who see her
out on her sightseeing flights."
"Good fortune... huh."
Liscia seemed to think it was a coincidence, but when I considered the dream I'd
just had...
It was a dream, and yet not a dream... Is that it?
I had a premonition that something was about to happen again, and I let out a
small sigh.
◇ ◇ ◇
The next day...
While I was still concerned by the events of last night, I was working like usual in
the governmental affairs office when an exhausted Prime Minister Hakuya came in.
"What's wrong?" I asked. "You look horribly tired."
Hakuya walked over, and then said to me with a tormented look, "Your Majesty...
Could I ask you to get away from the castle for a while?"
"...Come again?"
Get away from the castle? He was telling me to get out of the castle? I was kind of
the king here, you know?
"You're overthrowing me?" I asked. "Really, Hakuya, if you want the throne, it's
okay, I don't mind letting you have it."
"Don't talk nonsense. I don't want that thing."
"'That thing'? Now listen..."
"It's fine. Just listen. Just recently, you announced the date of your wedding
ceremony, right?"
When Hakuya asked me that, I nodded.
The other day, I'd announced that I, who was still just a caretaker who had not
formally ascended the throne yet, would carry out the coronation ceremony which
would make me the fourteenth king, along with my wedding ceremony with Liscia
and the others, at the end of this year. I had decided to do it this way because
handling the big events all at once would be easier on the national treasury.
However, Hakuya said it was causing a problem.
"The castle is now being flooded with proposals from nobles, as well as from the
kings of medium-sized and small states in the Union of Eastern Nations, all of whom
want to form marital ties with you, sire. They're hoping to slide in now, before the
marriage ceremony happens."
"It's a last minute rush of suitors, then?" I said. "Can't you just refuse them?"
"We could, but... these are all houses whose position makes it hard to refuse
when they say, 'Even if you are going to refuse, we would like to meet with you at
least once before you do.' Recently, the number of marriage proposals brought to the
castle has been on a rising trend, and the section responsible for them is about ready
to burst at the seams."
"...There are that many people sending me marriage proposals?" I asked
trepidatiously.
"No, they aren't just for you, sire. The single men at your side who are seen as
having promising futures, every one of them, have been receiving a fairly large
number of marriage proposals, too."
So if they couldn't marry into the royal family, they at least wanted to marry a
retainer with a promising future. That was probably an easier challenge for them to
clear than becoming a member of the royal family, after all. Honestly... if you were to
say that this was all nobles ever did, it would be true, but... still, it was impressive
that they could keep it up like this.
"Incidentally, the most popular of your retainers is Sir Poncho," Hakuya said.
Poncho? Now there was a surprise.
"Not Ludwin, the handsome captain of the Royal Guard?"
"It's true, Sir Ludwin is incredibly popular, but the House of Arcs is a great house,
and the only people who can propose to him are of the nobility and the knightly
class," said Hakuya. "On that point, Sir Poncho is of low birth, and so even common
mercantile families send marriage proposals to him. Furthermore, while Sir Ludwin
feels out of reach, many women seem to think they could easily seduce Sir Poncho."
"...He's being taken lightly, huh."
If the marriage proposals were piling up for Poncho, that meant he was popular,
too. Though he was pudgy and rotund, he was also a gentle and considerate young
man. More than that, his food was delicious. On top of that, he had led the country to
a solution for its food crisis; and if you considered the way he was almost worshiped
as a god of food in the Amidonia Region, there had to be a lot of women who would
want to marry him.