Chapter 1: ss - 1

About half a day had passed since my and Aine’s departure from the Royal Capital.

It would take about three days by carriage to reach the town of Ludlow.

There was still a long way to go; and there, we got caught in an unexpected roadblock.

“Bridge restoration work?”

“Yes. And it seems it will take about a day…” the coachman replied with a troubled face. 

It’s good until we got on the carriage heading from the Royal Capital to the next town, but to think that we’d run into this problem.

I sent a glance towards the bridge.

It was not that long of a bridge; it was damaged only to the extent where a person could go through it without any problem, but not if a carriage was to go through it.

In fact, some carriages were also forced to stop on the other side of the bridge.

“Is there any other route besides this bridge?”

“Indeed, it’s not like there’s no other route, but… as you can see, we would have to go all the way down with the carriage. And if we keep going towards the plain over there, it will gradually become a plain, but to be honest, I’m afraid it would take a considerable amount of time. I believe it would be faster to wait here than to make a detour.”

From what the coachman said, it seemed there was no other choice but to wait.

If the bridge would be fixed by the time we could return to the original route after making our way to take a detour, I supposed it’d certainly be better to wait.

I looked at Aine sitting beside me. Aine also rightly understood the situation, “yeah, I’m fine with waiting,” and willingly nodded to it.

“If you’re fine with it, then fine by me. Let’s wait here.”

“I’m so sorry. This is the first time something like this has happened for me, too…”

“No it’s fine, it’s not like you’re the one at fault.”

“Now then, I will go back to check on the situation again. Although the place is like this, please enjoy your time,” the coachman said, and then left us.

The people repairing the bridge were probably the workmen from the Royal Capital. I could also see several knights of the Kingdom as the guards.

The bridge itself was apparently managed by the country. I’d be grateful if they would take this opportunity to put up a few backup bridges, though.

“But then again, this right after we left the Capital… it’s somewhat not a good sign, huh.”

“This much of a trouble is just an unavoidable part of traveling.”

“Well, yeah.” Aine stretched her arms, “It might be nice to take it easy in this kind of situation once in a while,” and carefreely said so.

“…If you’re fine with it, then that’s good, but we’d have to think of a way for a countermeasure.”

“Countermeasure? What for?”

“That of course, for your heat.”

“…Ah.” Hearing my words, Aine leaked out a realization voice like she’d finally remembered it.

The ‘Sexualification Collar’ fitted on her neck—the troublesome part of it was, after all, not knowing when it’d make her go into heat.

If the carriage was moving, it might not be that noticeable even if she were to go into heat.

However, in the current situation where the carriage was not moving, to be honest, the people around could just go see if they wanted to.

“C-certainly, it completely slipped my mind.”

“I somehow had the feeling you did. If we ask, we might be able to return to the Capital, but what do you want to do?”

“…No, we better not do that. Those guys could also still be lurking, too.”

The “those guys” Aine was referring to were the assassins from the Empire.

This time, I’d been able to notice their movements sooner in part because of the request from the adventurer’s guild.

However, we currently got no more information than that—certainly, the possibility of enemies lurking in the Royal Capital was plenty conceivable.

In that sense, waiting around here would definitely be safer.

Aine had also arrived on that conclusion, by thinking calmly—

“B-but… i-if I got into heat now, it’s gonna be bad, isn’t it? I mean like, the walls are also thinner than at an inn, and others can just go peek if they want to, don’t they…!?”

…Though, it didn’t seem to be the case.

Certainly, right now Aine was in a situation where it wouldn’t be weird if she were to go into heat.

It would give a piece of mind for the rest of the day if it would come late at night, or maybe early morning; though, I supposed only this would all be a matter of luck.

I lightly put my hand on Aine’s shoulder. “Aine, it’s all right. I will do something.”

“E-even if you said you’ll do something… what will you do?”

“You’re right. Can you wait here for a bit? 

I got down from the carriage, and headed to the coachman who was checking on the situation on the bridge.

It was just right; he was talking to a knight guarding the vicinity of the bridge.

“Can I have a moment?”

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“! Is something the matter?”

“About the reason why this bridge is broken, I’d like to hear about it.”

“Aah, in that case, I’ve just checked about it. I am told that some big monster destroyed the bridge…”

“Monster?”

“Yeah, that’s right. It seems it was aiming for the load of a carriage crossing the bridge. Since it was aiming for it from the bottom, it seems it was barely reachable, so it immediately gave up.” The one who replied to my question was the knight.

“By ‘barely,’ does it mean it jumped up from the bottom of the bridge? I think the height is rather high, though. Is the monster sighted?”

“…Before that, who are you? Why are you asking the monster?” The knight looked at me with a slightly inquisitive expression.

It seemed he was being vigilant towards me who’d suddenly got into the conversation.

“My apologies. I’m Lunois Styler—I’m an active adventurer.”

“Lunois Styler…? By ‘Lunois,’ The Second Sword Saint!?” The knight opened his eyes wide and shouted in surprise.

…My name was fairly well known in this country, pretty much. For better or worse, I supposed it was because I’d been working diligently, amidst the limited number of S-rank adventurers.

“I suppose some people call me that, too. And so, can I hear about it?”

“! Ah, y-yeah, the monster’s name. So the people attacked saw the monster’s shape; based on their report, it’s assumed that the monster destroying the bridge is Glass Frog.”

“I see, it was right to check.”

“…? What does that mean…?”

“One of the monster subjugation requests I’ve taken was the Glass Frog. it seems to have been confirmed a little away from this area, but it looks like it has moved here.”

Previously, I’d taken several requests from the adventurer’s guild after meeting Aine.

One of those was a monster subjugation—it was exactly a Glass Frog.

Glass Frog was a big bodied frog with a slightly transparent body.

Perhaps as a result of its size, it was very slow even though it was a frog; if I had to say, it was a type that would lie in wait to ambush its prey.

But, its size was genuinely big; as such, its threat even as a monster was unmistakable. As for the adventurer’s rank, it was a monster considered to require several people around B to A rank to subjugate it.

Now I knew what had caused the broken bridge—I finished the talk, and headed back to the carriage.

“Welcome back. You looked like you were talking about something, though…”

“I’ve asked what caused the bridge to be broken. It seems to be caused by the target of the subjugation request I took.”

“! Does that mean, a monster broke that bridge?”

“Yeah. I suppose it stretched its tongue to aim for a carriage. The monster’s name is Glass Frog—I believe it’s a monster that inhabits the wetland, and hardly seen around here.”

“Why did it come to a place like this, I wonder…”

“I don’t know the reason… Though, there are some individuals that are chased out of their habitat and begin to move independently; it was what I’ve also heard. It probably lost the territory war. I still don’t know if it’s making its nest here, but it seems that the bridge was broken only a few days ago.” As Lunois said so, Aine looked a little questioning.

“…Lunois, so by asking about that, you’re not planning on taking it down, are you?”

“You’re right. We’ve also got time, and it can be a natural excuse to be away from here. It’s not like it’s killing two birds with one stone, thou—”

“Of course you can’t do that!!” Aine raised her voice, interrupting me. I spontaneously opened my eyes wide and looked at her.

“Why are you so angry…?”

“What do you mean why… Haah, you’re not forgetting about your own injury, are you?” Aine astonishingly said.

I’d gotten discharged from the hospital only a few days ago—with an eyepatch on, my field of vision was not very open. And my body should also not yet return to its shape.

That was something I knew best, and I was saying ‘the injuries also included.’

“This much of an injury is not a problem. Fortunately, the monster that destroyed the bridge also has fought other individuals. Even the current me can win with no problem.”

“That’s not the issue! Geez, have you also forgotten you promised me? You promised no work until your injuries are fully healed… I do know I’m being unreasonable. But, I’m worried. That’s why, I want you to rest at least until we get to the town of Ludlow.” Aine, who’d been angry until earlier, suddenly became meek.

She might be feeling responsible for my injuries. Of course, she wouldn’t have to worry about it, but telling her that right here right now would probably be meaningless.

“Then let’s do this. We’ll go to the riverside under the bridge, and investigate the monster’s movements. If there’s no monster around, we won’t chase after it. It will only be just an investigation around here. How about it?”

At my proposal, Aine looked a little troubled. Despite being ‘just an investigation around here,’ we would have to fight if there was a monster.

Aine was definitely thinking about that point—that said, there was no doubt that my proposal was a considerable compromise.

And as long as there was the objective of moving away from here temporarily, Aine would definitely not outright reject it.

“…Well, if it’s like that, it might be all right. For one thing, there’s also the fact that a monster destroyed the bridge. I guess we better at least make sure there’s no monster here, making sure it’s safe.”

“Then it’s settled. I’ll go tell them we’re heading to investigate, so you go ahead and get ready.”

“Yeah, I got it.”

Completing our talk, both Aine and I would head under the bridge to investigate the monster. Although work was half of the front, with this, it would save us from having to worry about the surrounding eyes even if Aine were to go into heat.

Taking with us just a little food and the supplies needed for sleeping outdoors, we made our way to the bottom of the bridge.

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