Chapter 124
I am Zelando, eldest son of King Zeurasia of Rudek. It is a pleasure to meet you.
Once the reunion greetings between Lururia and Lufa had wound down, Zelando introduced himself, and the people on the Imperial side naturally grew restless. Of course they did. Even I had been surprised when he said he would come along.
General Gafor asked with his eyes, "Is that true?" I replied with an affirmative bow.
"Well... It is a pleasure to meet you. I am Tsetsedora, fourth son of Emperor Drak of Greedle. Prince Zelando, did you go out of your way to come greet us?"
"Yes. I asked the king to let me accompany you. I thought it would be discourteous for none of our royalty to be present when an imperial prince from your country was coming."
"I see... Thank you for your consideration. I will be sure to tell my father about this. Gafor."
"Yes, Your Highness. Leave it to me. As soon as Prince Tsetsedora departs, I will send word immediately."
Tsetsedora nodded, looking satisfied with Gafor's answer.
"Then shall we discuss the rest on the way? Lururia, are you ready?"
"Yes, I'm ready whenever you are." Lururia, already mounted before I knew it, smiled.
"Gafor, I leave things here in your hands while I'm gone."
"Yes, Your Highness. Take care. Roa-dono, I humbly ask you to look after him." General Gafor bowed deeply to me.
"I promise to see him safely home." With that, we finally set out for home.
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"I heard what happened this time. That must have been difficult."
Prince Zelando rode just ahead of me. Though he was still far from an accomplished rider, he actively engaged Prince Tsetsedora in conversation from horseback.
"Yes. Who knows what would have happened without Roa-dono's advice..."
"You mentioned that earlier as well, but what exactly did Roa-dono do?"
Zelando's eyes shone with eager curiosity. Tsetsii asked me whether he could tell Zelando. If Prince Zelando pressed me on the details, contradictions might emerge, but he should be fine. Lapiria-sama, who was ever-perceptive, was happily talking with Lufa and Lururia.
With my permission, Tsetsii...
"Then allow me to explain. But first, Prince Zelando, please call me Tsetsii as well. Roa-dono calls me by my nickname, so it feels awkward to be addressed by a title by a prince."
"Understood. Then please call me Zelando, too—without an honorific."
"Very well, then... It all began when the ship carrying Lururia went adrift..."
Tsetsii began speaking as if he were telling a story. He fluently recounted even the story of the drifting ship, which he had not witnessed himself. Lururia must have told him quite a lot.
Yet these two were an imperial prince and a prince from enemy nations, and they seemed remarkably compatible. They had grown quite friendly in a short time. With Tsetsii older and Prince Zelando younger, they looked like brothers.
Prince Zelando was the eldest son and had no older brother, while Tsetsii was the youngest and had no younger brother. Perhaps this was a refreshing experience for both of them.
"At any rate, I'm glad everything went off without a hitch," Wickhart said to me as we were about to make it through Yoros Corridor.
"Yes. Still, we can't let our guard down."
Even so, as Wickhart had said, I had thought that if anything was going to happen, it would be while we were passing through the corridor. Once we were out, we would head for the royal capital with 4,000 soldiers around us. Even if someone harbored ill intentions, they would not be able to make a move easily.
I secretly breathed a sigh of relief as I continued watching the imperial prince and the prince grow animated over the story of the drifting ship.
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"Hey, could we stop by Gadeland before going to the royal capital?" We spent the night at the fortress we had planned to use, and Lururia brought it up over dinner.
Normally, I would have said no, but there were circumstances that made a blanket refusal impossible.
"Um... if things go well this time, we'll be heading to Gadeland, won't we?" Prince Zelando was the one who answered.
"Oh? Is that so...? Ah, I see." Lururia understood the implication from Zelando's single remark. Tsetsii, meanwhile, looked puzzled and asked, "What do you mean?"
Lururia gently explained it to Tsetsii.
"You see, wouldn't we be going by sea to pick up Brother Fillemas, who's in Gorbel? If you think about it, that makes sense. We may have set foot in Rudek like this, but Gorbel, where a major battle took place only recently, isn't in the same situation. Gorbel couldn't accept Rudek soldiers either, right? So we would go by ship to Gorbel's coast, and Gorbel would send Brother Fillemas out on a small boat or something. That way, Rudek and Gorbel wouldn't have to come into direct contact. What do you think?"
"That's right, Lururia."
I silently marveled as I answered. How had she figured out all that so quickly? This matter had been brought to us by an Imperial envoy who had visited Gorbel to coordinate the schedules for Rudek and Gorbel just before we left.
The envoy was currently waiting in Rudectrad. Regardless of whether the talks succeeded, arrangements had been made for him to return with Tsetsii and the others.
According to the envoy, the Gorbel side had responded in an extremely halfhearted manner: "Just tell us the schedule and we'll put Fillemas out to sea. Do whatever you want after that. Is Fillemas the only one you need? Do you need the others too?"
Rudek also did not want Gorbel soldiers wandering around near the border, so the matter was settled without much trouble.
Assuming King Zeurasia and Tsetsii's meeting went smoothly, our plan was to head straight to Gadeland, take a ship into Gorbel waters, secure Fillemas, return to Gadeland, and then make for Yoros Corridor again via the route by which we had once escorted Lururia home.
That was the basic plan.
"That's good to hear. I wanted to greet that general who became Lufa's foster father, too. Zackhart-sama, was it?"
Seeing how quickly her mind was working, I figured she must have been pulling quite a few strings behind the scenes during this rebellion, and I felt I somewhat understood why General Gafor had allowed Lururia to accompany us.