MaruMA:Volume04:Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Quite literally staying at his desk from morning to night, he was working on approving four days worth of documents.  His Excellency, Gwendal von Voltaire, stands up unsteadily from his chair.

He was working so hard he didn’t even stop for lunch so even though his head was swimming with numbers and roundabout documents, he was starving.  With the intention of pouring some alcohol in a nice cup of hot tea, he reaches out to the tea kettle sitting in front of the fire.

He had to leave the castle the next morning.  That’s the reason he pushed himself so hard.

The nearly-assassinated Demon King had disappeared and the royal advisor Lord von Christ had worked himself into another panic.  He’d made a huge fuss about becoming a monk or something and had left, leaving all of the pending paperwork at the castle unattended.  Gwendal is called every time something like this happens as he is someone who finishes his work with scary resignation.

“… Honestly, what’s the point of having a royal advisor?”

In the first place, on what planet is there a king who takes the person who tried to kill him to be rehabilitated by becoming a monk?  From his point of view, the attempted assassination itself was just a farce.  His two younger brothers were there.  The king wouldn’t have been killed by something so silly.

On the other hand, if you get involved with that kid, 9 times out of ten it ends up not being a decent situation.  He unconsciously grabs his right wrist.  There’s still a scar there from where he was chained to Yuuri.  It’s completely healed, but when it gets cold like this, sometimes the bones creak.

“Maybe I should soak in a hot spring…”

“Are you inviting me to go to a hot spring?”

After being called out to by the Red Devil who appears out of nowhere, the eldest son almost jumped in surprise.  Opening the door he had definitely locked, Anissina von Karbelnikoff comes striding forward.

“I, I wasn’t inviting you.”

“That’s unfortunate.  Whether you were inviting me or not, I decided a little while ago that I was going on a journey by myself.”

“You’re… going on a journey?”

Looking almost directly down on her tied up, fiery-red hair, Gwendal is struck speechless for a moment.

“That’s right, by myself… I’m going for it.  There’s nothing more disgusting than tea that a man has made…  And the magical power of the men in this country is too weak.  There has to be somewhere in this world where someone with even greater magical powers than the demons is waiting to meet me!”

Bon voyage from the Great Demon Kingdom.

“But anyway, why don’t you hire a secretary in this castle?  Your work efficiency won’t improve otherwise.  If you would like, I can let you borrow the Magic-Powered Secretary No. 1 I invented, Ms. Voluptuous.”

Please don’t.  That thing only makes sexy poses and doesn’t bring you a single contract.  And on top of that, there’s nothing voluptuous about it.  Nothing at all.  And besides, the reason the secretary is faking an illness to get out of work is because Anissina has been hanging around the office.

She pours red tea into a white porcelain tea cup.  Steam comes up in between the two.

“You said the men in this country have weak magical abilities, right?”

“Yes, I said so.  Do you have an objection?”

“… Have you tested anyone besides your older brother, Günter or myself?”

“No.”

With a look on her face that says ‘why would you ask something like that?,’ the Mad Magicalist hands her childhood friend the tea.

“You’re the strongest and you’re only at this level, so I have no interest in weaker men.”

He doesn’t know if he’s being complimented or insulted.  But, he can’t hate something small and cute even if it bites his hand.

Just in case, I wait until I can hear Wolfram’s signature ‘Gghgpihh-ghgpihh’ before I get dressed and leave the room.  I don’t really think I need it, but to alleviate some of my guilt, I bring along Windpipe No. 1.  Wearing round sunglasses at nighttime and a flashy pink knit hat and using a cane even though I can walk perfectly fine, I’m a very suspicious nightwalker.

I believe that those under 15 shouldn’t be allowed to spend the night somewhere and those 15 and up have a curfew of 11.  By Earth standards it’s only 9:32 pm so it’s perfectly fine to enjoy some light target practice.  Besides, I luckily had some change in my wallet and this is the town where the night never ends, Las Veg… Atami!

“Huh?”

Opening the door at almost the exact same time, a little girl all bundled up comes sneaking out.  She sees me and immediately stops.

“You’re not… on your way to the toilet, are you?  It’s a little shabby here, but there’s a bath and toilet connected to your room.  So that means, you’re running away?”

Greta silently shakes her head.  I find it hard to believe that a ten year old would sneak out for a night on the town, so I can only assume that the elementary school girl’s leaving is an assassin’s escape.

“Ah, that’s fine.  If you’re going to escape, now’s the time to do it… is what I’d really like to say.”

Letting a little girl walk around alone at night and perhaps letting her get involved in some sort of accident is weighing on my conscience.  Pushing open the door, I point to the two empty beds.

“Go back to your room and go to bed.”

She shakes her head again in refusal.  And then, she opens her mouth for the first time in a while.

“I’m looking for someone.  I saw them this afternoon.”

“You’re looking for someone?  How do you know someone in this touristy town?  Ah, are you from here?  Were you raised in this resort town?”

“No.”

Oh man, this kid only speaks in single words and phrases.   But now that I’m listening, her voice is low for a ten year old girl.  Not so low that it was manly, but it sounded devoid of innocence.  I wonder when she learned to speak while suppressing her emotions.

“Hey now, think hard.  Was it really them?  Are you sure you didn’t just mistake them for that person?  Hey wait.”

Without even waiting for me to finish speaking, she began to walk down the wooden hallway.

“I have something for them.”

“Something for them?  … But you can’t walk around town by yourself at night!  You’re going to get kidnapped by some kind-looking man.”

Well, she might be fine since she’s not wearing ruby slippers.

As if I was chasing after my daughter, the two of us left the hotel.  The town was bright and energetic, but the sounds I hear aren’t from the Electrical Parade, but from drunks, flirty women, and swearing from gambling halls.

“However you look at it, it seems like this isn’t really a place the two of us belong.”

Even so, the elementary school student keeps pushing her way through the streets and a middle-aged drunken man approaches her.  He had a splendid drunken stagger, but now wasn’t the time to be admiring that.  What if he sexually harassed her or something?  I pulled her away, but unlike before, she didn’t scream.  Yuuri Shibuya has gained affection points.

As I was thinking that, I saw a lady clutching her stomach and crouching down in a dim part of the roadside and none of the passersby stopped to help her.  Maybe she was pretending to be struck by a chronic illness and was really a pickpocket like on period dramas.  In any case, I had a child with me and I decided it was best to avoid risky behavior so I just grip Greta’s warm hand.  If the lady really was sick with a stomach ache, someone would definitely help her.  I tell that to myself and move to walk past her but…

“Are you alright?”

It was contrary to my middle class sense of justice, but my mouth and body moved on their own.

I look into the face of the squatting woman.  Her lips were so pale, it was obvious even in the unnatural light of the shopping district.

“… my stomach hurts… I’d really appreciate it if you’d let me ride on your back.”

“That’s fine.”

As long as I was careful not to get my wallet taken, giving her a ride on my back was okay.  Handing Greta Windpipe No. 1, I move to place a hand on the woman’s hunched back.

“Hey you!  What are you doing with my woman!?”

With the angry words coming at me from over my shoulder, my hand stops immediately.  Damn!  She wasn’t a pickpocket, it was a straight up blackmailing scheme!

“I hope you don’t think you’ll just get away with putting your hands on another man’s woman.”

It was a very clichéd threat.  Hesitantly turning around, I saw a group of three ill-bred looking men.  They had long straight hair parted down the middle like a bunch of folk singers had back in the day.  Their muscles were bulging and they all looked fairly strong.

“If you just empty yourself out, we’ll be in a better mood.”

“No way.  First of all, I haven’t been constipated lately, and second of all, it’s just absurd that emptying myself out would put you in a better mood.”

Even if I act tough I’m outnumbered and with a child.  Thinking that in the end my kindness is going to be defeated by evil and I’ll end up having to pay them, I feel like crying in embarrassment and frustration.  It’s not too late young ones, won’t you try repenting with a ‘never mind?’

The hand I had moved to defend my wallet to the last was grabbed from behind.  Pulled with all of their strength, I’m forced a few steps backwards.

“This way!”

The owner of the voice drags us through the nighttime shopping district at a run.  The pale green hem of their slip dress is lifted in the wind.  Panicking, I return my gaze to the back of our savior’s head.  The swaying locks of their dirty blonde hair are cut off at the nape of their neck.  Their thin, long, sun-tanned legs are kicking up as high as an athlete’s.

We ran for about five minutes.  In the light of a dim-lit back alley that you wouldn’t expect from a main street, the girl finally stops.  Having run a mid-distance race at full speed, Greta and I are completely exhausted, but this wild goat of a girl just pants lightly.

“Those guys are persistent, but we should be fine this far away.  You had a cane so I was worried if you’d be able to run, but you’re not injured or sick, huh?”

“Oh… I was told… to stop… using it…  Anyway…. thanks… you saved… us… But you know… you’re really fast!”

“I loved running when I was a child.  If I was a man, I’d have liked to deliver letters.”

It doesn’t seem particularly related to postal delivery, but I imagine the courier painted on the side of delivery trucks and think that it’s juuuust a little impossible.

“Huh?”

I’d seen Wild Goat Girl before.  With her non-existent-breast cleavage and the thin clothes trying to accentuate it.

“Are you the girl who hit on us earlier this evening?”

“That’s right, young man with the child.”

She holds up her palms.

“It’s alright, I won’t hit on you anymore."

“Hey, those under 15 have an 11 o’clock curfew… oh I guess it’s still early.  But still, a middle-school student walking around at this time of night with those super exposing, sexy clothes isn’t right!”

I’m giving her an old-man’s lecture right after I’d just got done thanking her.  Acting hypocritical is a personality trait I hate, but I don’t want this kind girl to live so dangerously.

“I might seem like an idiot for saying this after you saved me, but where do you live?  I’ll walk you home.”

Wild Goat Girl furrows her eyebrows as if she’s troubled by this and is smiling only with her mouth.

“You can’t take me home; it’s far away.”

“So you really were planning on spending the night somewhere.  Somewhere like the room of someone you were flirting with.”

“Yeah, I do that too, but… I usually stay in the store.  You walked by it before, right?”

“The store… you mean you’re camping out there? ... Hey, you know it’s really not good to date people for money and stuff like that.  Although me saying this like a goody-goody is kind of embarrassing.”

“Eh?”

For example, if I forced these honor student ideals that’ve come right out of some middle school student’s diary on the girls at my high school, they’d call me annoying or bat me away.  As a joke, the entire class would ignore me starting the next day. But I’d probably say it anyway.  I believe I’d be able to force a smile as well.

If a good-hearted friend of mine tried to do something unethical, no matter what the result was, I’d say it just like I am now.

“I know it’s really annoying that I sound like your parents or your teachers, but in this case they kind of have a point, and you know, me saying something so shamelessly is kinda, well, you might even say ‘It’s my life!’ or something like that, but you, you should take… take better care of yourself, or something.”

The under-15 girl who wanted to become a postal worker is staring at me with red-brown eyes, her lips slightly parted.

Please someone tell me I’m right.  Give me a pat on the back.  Take away this embarrassment.  But even if nothing gets solved, I’m going to say it anyway.  In short…

“I’m against making out without love!  Here, put this on!”

Trying to hide my embarrassment in vigorous movement, I rip off my down jacket.  It’s a lot heavier than a ‘Made in Modern Japan’ version, but the warmth is the same.

“… Thank you.”

“Ah, yeah, and anyway, your home.  Even if it’s far, I’ll take you there.  You saved me so I’ll handle the bus fare… oh there’s no buses.  Carriage fare, then.  If you spend the night at a store, your parents will worry, you know?  If you worry them too much, they’ll age prematurely.”

Talking about parents and homes, the silent child crouches down.

“I’m not talking about you, Greta.  I’m not going to force you to go home.  Right now I’m talking about Wild Goat Girl.  I’m talking about her home.”

“Wild Goat?  Is that me?  My name is Izura.  I got it from the last princess of Svelera.”

I’ve heard that name before, but I’ll start with the place name.

“Svelera?  You live in Svelera?”

“My home and family is in the country even now.  I guess it’s been three months since I came to Hildyard.”

This is no longer a conversation where I can make a fuss over carriage fare.  Fare for a two-night, three-day sea voyage wasn’t something I could take care of with pocket change.

“Why did you specifically come here from Svelera… why did you run away from home?”

“I didn’t run away from home!”

Wild Goat Girl’s, or rather, Izura’s red-brown eyes clouded with tears.  Perhaps thinking it bad, she roughly shakes her head and wipes them away.

“I wanted to stay with my family but… There’s nothing left in Svelera.  In order for my family to survive, I had to come here to work.” What!?  But the rain they were wishing for fell!  Even if it was just the one part, wasn’t that part of the suffering in their rough environment taken care of?

Like I’m replaying a DVD, in my brain I relive the incident from four months ago.

If it would rain, Nicola said that everything would get better in Svelera.  If it would rain, the people wouldn’t have to live in thirst, they wouldn’t have to buy imported alcohol and fruit, the wells and fields would have water, grass would grow and they’d even be able to raise livestock.

That rain fell.

“Then Wild-… Izura, are you working in Hildyard for living expenses?  So you were hitting on me for rent… I’m sorry…”

“It’s nothing to apologize for.  Besides, you haven’t done anything wrong to me.  Hey, you even lent me your jacket.  Since I’ve come here, you’re the nicest customer I’ve had.”

On the other end of the narrow street, a warm light was coming closer.  It would swing back and forth and then stop, gradually getting larger.

“… I’m hungry,” Greta murmured as the smell of soup spread in the air.

“Hi… Higomokos….?”

“No.  Hinomokou.”

As far as literacy rate goes, the child is about 7% smarter than me at the moment.

In a swords and magic world with demons and a Demon King, there was a ramen stand.

On the other side of a curtain that said ‘Hinomokou,’ an obstinate old man was stirring a pot with his super-secret soup base.

Around that time, Wolfram was having a dream.

Yuuri screamed, “I’m against making out without love!” and he replied with “If you’re talking about love, it’s right here,” but in his mind he was thinking, ‘what does he mean, ‘making out?’’

His snore was ‘ghghpihh-ghghpihh’ as always.

Have a nice dream.

Even though he’s a white man no matter how you look at him, he’s got a crew cut and Japanese style twisted headband.  His eyebrows are prominent and scraggly, and his bulging chest is peeking out of his animal hide jacket.  I wonder if he’s gotten all macho-muscled from making noodles every day.

“Brother, you’re a real man for lending a woman your jacket nei?”

“’Nei?’  Well, I am a man…”

Eating ramen on a cold night is appealing, but what was handed to us was a soup that’s hard to call a Chinese dish.  The bowl is filled with amber-colored broth right up to the brim with a shrimp and clam topping and the noodles are 100% semolina flour cooked to a perfect al dente.  The contents of this bowl are…

“…. Seafood spaghetti?”

“No, hinomokou.  It’s food they serve at the palace in Zorashia nei.”

“It’s palace food!?  But, what’s ‘nei’…”

Deciding children are first, I push the bowl in front of Greta.  I lightly tap the wobbly bench next to me for Izura, who looks like she’s uncomfortable standing.

“Sit down, Izura.  I’ll buy.  Think of it as thanks for saving us.”

“But-”

“That’s nice nei, seeing a customer treating a prostitute to some warm food.  You’re going to make me cry nei.”

“Prostitute!?”

Maybe because my voice sounded hysteric, Greta raises her face out of the bowl.  The strand of spaghetti she was slurping up is hanging out of her mouth.

“Weren’t you just messing around for some change?  A prostitute is well, you know, a profession, and if you’re in a profession that makes you a pro!?  A professional… uh, sex worker?  A person in the sex industry?”

I wonder if that’s the proper term for it.  From a modern-day Japan, sports loving high school boy’s perspective, I only ever hear the term ‘prostitute’ in old, drunken songs my father sang.

“The sex work… or rather, prostitution I guess… even though you’re so young!?  You’re still in your teens, and not even halfway through them yet.  Even if you gain four or five years you still won’t be legal, you know!?  You absolutely should not be involved in sex work or prostitution!  Uh well, minors pursuing jobs in the sex industry will create a problem in the infrastructure of the country…”

While I’m spouting out ideals from the side of my personality fueled by middle-class justice, the imagination of the ‘healthy and dirty-minded 15 year old boy’ side of my personality was going ahead at full speed.  A girl this young and cute doing ‘this’ and ‘that.’  Once the image pops into my head, I can’t get it out no matter how hard I try.

“Anyway, stop that sort of work immediately!  If there’s a problem with your boss… ah damn it!”

I’m so embarrassed I feel like my face is going to light in fire.  I feel like, no I want to explode from my feelings of guilt and disgust. “What are you thinking, damn it!?  You should be ashamed of yourself!  In any case Izura, you can’t continue prostituting.  You shouldn’t ever go back to that shop.  If you have nowhere to stay… ah.”

After taking two, three steps back and clasping her hands together, she turns on her heel and runs.  With her athlete-worthy legs, I can’t even see her back after a few moments.  Did she realize her lack of morals or was she just not able to eat my ramen?

“Clothes,” said Greta, her head still turned in that direction.  Wild Goat Girl had run off wearing my jacket.

“Who cares about the coat!  Ah, I’m horrible!  While I was saying all that, there was some unbelievably perverted stuff going on in my brain…”

“Brother, don’t get so down on yourself.”

The old man in the shop, pectoral muscles twitching, gives me some spaghetti soup.  In the middle of the steaming bowl, there was a curled up, scarlet shrimp.

“You’re a good person nei.  I’m impressed.  At the very least, have some hinomokou poured in this family heirloom, cheer up and get home.”

“Family heirloom?”

It’s a ramen bowl that is clashing with the romantic, swords and magic atmosphere of this world with its bright red, Chinese style patterns.  I imagine if I ate it all, there’d be a dragon painted on the bottom.

“You might even be able to see your future on the surface of the clear broth.”

“My future?  No way.”

When I casually look down, there’s a woman’s face showing on the surface of the thin, amber broth.  She has short hair and a boyish face and eyes of a strange color I’ve never seen before.

“Uwah!”

My back straightens reflexively. That’s my future!?  That was a girl’s face, not mine.  So does that mean I’m going to date that girl in the future!?  I can finally get a female girlfriend!?  Well guys can’t be a girlfriend, anyway.

Glancing to the side, I see Greta peering into my bowl.  Oh, that’s the face that was in my soup.

“It was you.”

That’s right.  The future isn’t something you can easily understand.  Like I’m going to let some old guy in a ramen stand tell my future.

Paying with the change in my pocket, we left the hinomokou store.  However, since we ran so much, I have no idea where we are.  I couldn’t see any hints in the dark as to which direction the hotel was.

Greta has nestled her warm body against mine and is grabbing onto my right hand.

“It’ll be fine.  For now, let’s just go towards where there’s light.  Once we get out on the main street, it’ll be easy to figure it out.” I’ve got Windpipe No. 1 in my left hand and a child in my right.  Luckily, at least my stomach was full so I could walk forward without worries.  The alley gradually widened and we came out into the open.

Under the high moon and twinkling stars, there are several huge tents lined up.

“Ah, this place was on the way.”

I looked around for the main street in the circus plaza.  If we can cut through the back way here, it’ll be a straightforward walk back to the hotel.  In the far distance, I can see a bright haze.  The front entrance must be over there.

“It’s pretty far, but can you walk?”

I can feel her nod through my arm.

The events for the day seem to have ended and the surroundings are growing quiet.

I’m noticing for the first time now that I’m seeing it from the back, but there are three large tents that the sightseers can enter and then some small bungalows serving as sleeping facilities for the troupe members.  Everyone’s probably sleeping in preparation for tomorrow's show.

Greta stops abruptly.

“What is it?”

“I heard something.”

“Well of course you heard something.  People are living ther- … hey.”

Pulled along by the now suddenly running child, I slam my right foot down as if I’m falling on it.  I’m now completely ignoring the warnings of the veteran health care provider, Gisela.

“Hey wait you!  You can’t just go in to places like…”

Using some sort of underhanded trick, Greta rips open the cloth seams and enters the backstage of the freak show.  There are several cages the size of small trucks in the room and a three-headed animal is casually yawning.  It’s that smell unique to livestock.  The largest one moos.

“Mosa--!”

“Freaky animals!”  Greta exclaims happily, holding a lamp from the corner.  It’s the first time I’ve seen her acting like a child.

“Shh, Greta.  This isn’t some freaky animal; it’s just a normal cow.”

“But it only has two horns.  Usually they have five, right?”

“From my point of view those would the freaky ones.”

Because it would be dangerous to let a child carry around a flame, I hold the slightly hot, golden object and point the light into the cage.  I notice that there’s a slip of what looks like a bill of money under the straw that an animal is curled up on.

“Someone dropped their money there.  What a waste.  Denko’s gonna cry.”

Sticking Windpipe No. 1 through the bars of the cage, I try and drag the money out.  If I can just push the dry grass to the sides…

“But man this is a serious stink… huh?”

There wasn’t just one single bill of money, but a mountain of thick bundles.  I pull one out with the T-shaped part of my cane.

“Eh!?  No way!”

The bundle was so thick and heavy, if these were Natsume Sousekis, this would be around 200,000 yen.   If these were Fukuzawa Yukichis, it’d be 2,000,000 yen.  If these were Nitobe Inazous… that’s hard to calculate. But under the straw, these same bundles are spread all over.

“Hey, why is there so much money here?”

“Mosa--!”

There’s no point in asking a cow.

But why would they think of hiding this much money in this bizarre spot?  And on top of that, the bills in the bundle are all unwrinkled and brand new.  What’s the advantage in getting new money covered in animal feces and urine?  If my banker father found out about this, he’d bawl his eyes out.  I bring it closer to my nose as if I’m about to smell something scary.

“Uwah, gross!”

As I thought, or as I feared, it smells of ammonia so bad it could be an insect repellant.  I drop it without thinking.  It makes an especially loud noise as it hits the dry ground and flips over.

“… huh?”

The reverse side is blank.

“F-fake money?”

There are cranes on the back of Souseki and pheasants behind Yukichi.  There’s a high probability that these cheap, one-sided prints are still being worked on.

And they’ve hidden this in-progress counterfeit money in a safe place.

Have I just discovered something I was not supposed to see?  The best course of action should be to retreat immediately and leave the rest to the police.  I don’t know if it’d be the police, the FBI, or the Secret Service, though.

I shove two or three bills in my pocket for evidence, and I call out to the child next to me.

“I’ll let you see the animals tomorrow after we have properly paid the entrance fee, so tonight we should leave quickly.”

My fingertips touch something wet.

“Hey Greta, your nose is running.  Well I guess since it’s proof that you’re healthy it’s fine… huh?”

A dog!?  Startled, I turn around and see a sturdy animal that looks like a Japanese Mastiff.  It's baring its canines shiny with drool at me in a silent battle stance.

I thought up a little joke that a doggy is by my side so this is a ‘doggycide,’ but it wouldn’t understand the pun.

“Gah, stop!  Please forgive me, madam!”

I’m pushed down and trapped with just one of its front legs.

“If you don’t want this brat to stop breathing, put down what you have and behave.”

Standing there is a man with a body build like a bouncer wearing a Russian style fur hat and holding Greta down with one hand.

Back to Chapter 3

Return to MA Series

Forward to Chapter 5