A Suggestion to Seek Asylum

I visited an Imperial city and met a man who claimed to have come from the same original world as me.

His name was Akira—a Japanese man. Just as the rumors said, he possessed the utterly bizarre ability to produce huge amounts of mayonnaise.

And, like me, he had apparently received a blessing from the Imperial Emperor that made him difficult to kill.

I was trying to decide whether to tell him the original purpose of my visit—the suggestion that he seek asylum—when a woman he'd made a pass at came to visit, turning the place into a battlefield.

So I bought another tart from Shangri-La. This time, it was a fruit tart.

I took a tart covered in colorful fruit out of the box and placed it on the table, drawing everyone's attention.

Everyone then sat quietly at the table and began eating the tart in silence.

"What blissful sweetness! Oh, this is incredibly delicious!"

The woman who was apparently the merchant's ex-wife was also savoring the tart. She had originally been the daughter of a noble.

"Now that things have settled down, may I talk to you, Akira?"

"Yeah..."

"Have you completely cut ties with the Emperor?"

"Yeah, I'm not going back. Why the hell did I have to be worked that hard? It makes no sense. No matter how good the pay is, it isn't worth risking my life."

"How did you escape?"

"They were working me so hard that I snapped. I told the Emperor, 'Let me have a go!'"

"What? Seriously?"

Apparently, he had actually done it...

"Isn't that a little dangerous?"

"Yeah, of course it is, but I did it... Well, it was the other one, you see..."

I could pretty much guess what Akira meant.

"So then—I used my blessing as much as I could, used the magic tools I'd made as much as I could, and kept at it until the Emperor passed out with their eyes rolled back. Then I left them completely gaping and fled."

I decided not to ask what exactly had been left wide open.

"What the hell? Wouldn't they execute you if they caught you?"

"Well, they might... That's why I ran to this city."

Since this city bordered Sobana, sending a punitive force here would make people suspect an invasion of the Kingdom, causing tensions between the two countries to rise sharply.

The Emperor had only just taken the throne and was in the middle of consolidating their position. There was no room to fight another country.

Akira and the others had taken advantage of that.

"When I was escaping, I almost filled the White Palace with oil and let the Red Cat loose."

Apparently, Red Cat meant setting something on fire.

"It might have been really bad if you'd actually done it."

"I thought so too, and stopped myself at the last moment."

I understood the situation now. But he was a pretty dangerous fellow.

Would it really be all right to let someone like this seek asylum? I still had some reservations, but...

"I have good news for you. Would you like to seek asylum in the Kingdom?"

"What?!"

Everyone's voices overlapped. I also told them that I had come from the Kingdom's side.

"If you come to the Kingdom, the Empire won't be able to lay a hand on you."

"That is true, but..."

"And if you stay near me, I can supply you with some goods from our original world. Of course, I'll charge you. I also think I can negotiate with the royal family and secure you a certain position."

I was speaking in terms only Akira could understand, so the others might not have known what I was talking about.

"Wouldn't we just be worked to death again...?"

Akira seemed to have become deeply suspicious of everything. His working conditions must have been truly brutal.

"Well, capable people do get called on, but they receive rewards. And unlike the Empire, you won't be commandeered without question. There are some unreasonable nobles and royals, but..."

I had been dragged into that sort of thing myself.

"As I thought..."

"But that's probably similar no matter which country you go to, right? I have a royal warrant of safe conduct from the king, so I can keep the nobles away from you."

"What did you do to receive something like that?"

"Well, a lot of things—haha."

Akira and the others exchanged glances. Of course they would have trouble deciding.

"The Empire doesn't seem likely to invade the Kingdom for a while. The Republic is the dangerous one."

"The Emperor told me that too. I'm surprised a republic exists in a world like this, though."

"Aside from that, there's only monster hunting. Besides—with Akira and me together, we should be able to handle even dragons. After all, there would be two Dragon Slayers."

"You took down dragons too, Kenichi?"

"Only lesser dragons and wyverns. We also have an archmage on our side, and if Reiran of the Night Crow joins us, we'd be a force of a hundred men."

"Hmm..."

Akira and the others seemed to be struggling with the decision.

"Will it take you a while to reach a conclusion? If it's only a few days, I can camp outside and wait."

"In front of our house?"

"Yeah. I have all the equipment in my Item Box."

"What about your party?"

"They're at the ducal estate in Sobana, on the Kingdom side."

"You're acquainted with the Duke of Sobana too?"

I told Akira that a princess was accompanying my party. He listened to the story with great interest.

"The princess assigned me to recruit you and the others."

"What...? That's a pretty serious attempt to poach us, isn't it?"

"Exactly."

Even so, they probably wouldn't reach a decision easily.

I went outside and began preparing a campsite. I took a lawn mower out of my Item Box and started cutting the grass.

The raucous sound of the mower drew Akira out the front door.

"You even have something like that?"

"Yeah, it's convenient. I have a chainsaw too."

"What about motorcycles and cars?"

"Of course."

"Seriously? How do you get fuel? Is it some kind of cheat where you refill it with magic power?"

"No—I can only use diesel engines, but I make biodiesel fuel with chemicals and magic tools. The oil you produce should be vegetable oil, so you can use it for biodiesel fuel too."

"That's still way too much of a cheat..."

He seemed thoroughly dumbfounded.

"And what the hell is this 'mayonnaise ability' supposed to be? Are you kidding me?! Bring out whoever's responsible! Damn it!"

"Come on, don't get so worked up."

"Easy for you to say... Can you make computers too?"

"I can bring them out, but without the internet, they're just expensive boxes."

If I only wanted to do calculations, I had an abacus. I had bought a laptop, but I had only used it to digitize books.

Spreadsheet software seemed like it would be convenient for accounting and the like, though...

"...I suppose that's true... But what do you think all this is? Being thrown into a world like this—what's the point?"

"Who knows? Maybe someone up above is watching for entertainment..."

I pointed toward the sky.

"So they're watching to see who does something interesting? In that case, my ability would be a dud."

"But you defeated a Red Dragon with that dud ability, so you're a long shot who actually won big. If you'd been betting, you'd have hit an enormous payout."

"It sounds plausible enough that you should stop saying things like that. It's not funny. Besides, I was a long shot, but I didn't receive any reward, did I? ...Oh, I did become able to use an Item Box..."

Akira said his Item Box had about the capacity of a single house. Its maximum dimensions were around three meters.

My Item Box was considerably more capable.

To show him, I took an off-road motorcycle out of my Item Box.

"Whoa! Is that a Ho○da two-stroke?!"

"I can't get ordinary gasoline, so I use the mixed fuel meant for lawn mowers and chainsaws."

"Can I ride it?"

Come to think of it, Akira had said he traveled by motorcycle.

He straddled the motorcycle and kicked it once. The engine started.

Then he performed an accelerator turn on the spot before riding down a path through the grass on one wheel.

He was an excellent rider, and it was obvious he was used to the machine. He raced about a hundred meters before returning.

"Hahaha! This thing's incredible! Sell it to me!"

"I have no objection, but I won't be able to supply fuel unless you stay near me. Your oil won't run it, and if it breaks, I can't repair it. You don't have any tools or even oil for maintenance, do you? If it gets a flat or the chain breaks, that's the end of it."

"Yeah... You're right."

While talking about the motorcycle, I finished cutting the grass and brought out a small tent.

If I was alone, this would be plenty. I decided to bring out a deck chair and parasol as well.

"I wonder if there's any way to expand an Item Box."

"Who knows? It doesn't say anything on the status screen either..."

Akira seized on my mutter.

"You can see a status screen?!"

"I can, but it only lists my name and age."

"What kind of nonsense is that...?"

He seemed thoroughly disappointed. Apparently, he had hoped skills, arts, or something similar could be added later.

I sat in the deck chair and began reading an e-book from Shangri-La.

Akira returned to the house to continue his family meeting.

Now, how long would it take them to reach a conclusion?

------◇◇◇------

The sound of the noon bell reached me from far away.

I was hungry, so I decided to eat. I took a pot of hot water out of my Item Box.

It was convenient being able to do things like this when I had boiled the water too long.

I took out a cup of noodles and began pouring in the water when Akira came over.

"Cup noodles?"

"Want some?"

"Is that all right?"

He looked like he wanted some, so I decided to treat him. He returned to the house once, then came back to me.

His companions seemed to be eating inside the house.

"You really can make anything, huh? You said you need money, but not Japanese yen, right?"

"Ordinary gold coins and jewels work fine too."

Two middle-aged men sat slurping cup noodles together.

"So, have you reached a decision?"

"Yeah, I've decided to seek asylum. I was planning to do that from the beginning. I was making preparations here, but I ran into various problems..."

"Problems? What kind?"

"Money."

According to him, most of his companions' wealth was stored inside cards called guild cards.

They couldn't walk around carrying huge quantities of gold coins. The total came to 500 million yen.

"I see. Imperial guild cards can't be used in the Kingdom, so you'll need to convert the money and bring it into the Kingdom. Even exchanging it will take time."

"Exactly."

Let's see... If Akira's wealth was 500 million yen, that would be 2,500 Kingdom gold coins. At thirty grams per coin, that's 75 kilograms...

"That would be about 100 kilograms in gold alone, right? But if you have an Item Box, it should be easy enough."

"Yeah, it's already inside my Item Box—All right! It's settled! I'll prepare after we finish eating, so wait for me. Slurp—delicious! It tastes great when you haven't had it in a while!"

Akira slurped his cup noodles with obvious enjoyment.

"You'll get sick of them soon enough. People here can't slurp their noodles like that, either."

"Haha. I guess it's a skill unique to Japanese people."

"What about this house?"

"It's fine."

Apparently, he had rented the house on a six-month contract. The rent had been paid in full.

"You need a guarantor to rent a house, after all."

"It's the same in the Empire? It is in the Kingdom too."

"But at least we can finally say goodbye to life on the run and settle down somewhere peaceful."

"I recommend Dalia or Astrantia, the provincial cities where I used to live. The royal capital has too many people and is short on supplies."

"Yeah, the Imperial capital is like that too. I guess people who leave their villages think they can somehow make it work if they go to the Imperial capital..."

"If both countries have slums, they aren't exactly developed nations, are they?"

Akira also seemed happy to have found someone he could communicate with. We could even understand one another when we used foreign loanwords.

Once we finished our cup noodles, I entered the house with him.

Inside, the women were packing their belongings.

"But, Akira, how were you planning to cross the border? You need a permit to pass through the gate."

"That's the problem. Sensei has been trying to get one on the black market, but at most we could get a single permit—and that's why!"

"That's why?"

"I was planning to climb over the wall in the back."

So that was why he had made his campsite near the wall.

"I could return to the Kingdom side and get a permit, but... That sounds like a hassle. Shall we climb over the wall?"

"Do you have a ladder in your Item Box?"

"I have a ladder, but I have something better."

I led everyone out of the house and over to the wall, then took single-pipe scaffolding out of my Item Box.

Everyone there stared in astonishment at the iron-pipe jungle gym that appeared before us.

"What the hell is this?! Single-pipe scaffolding? You can fit something this huge in there?"

"This is about the largest thing that will fit."

"Did you make it?"

"I brought out the pipes and had my family help me assemble it."

"I don't believe it..."

This would let us reach the other side, but there was one small problem: Akira and Reiran-san's clothes.

Akira looked unmistakably like an Imperial soldier, while Reiran-san looked like a mage at a glance—and she had enormous breasts on top of that.

"Our clothes are a little problematic, I suppose..."

"If the authorities arrest us, I think they'll release us quickly if we say we're acquaintances of the duke, but I'd rather avoid trouble."

The other women should be fine. I bought clothes for Akira and Reiran-san from Shangri-La.

I thought trousers alone would be enough for Akira.

"For now, Akira, why don't you just change your trousers? What's your waist size?"

"I think it was 88 when I was in Japan..."

"Here you go."

I bought a pair of whitish work trousers from Shangri-La—they cost 2,000 yen.

For Reiran-san, I bought a white blouse and a navy maxi skirt.

"Women's clothes in this world are right-front too, aren't they?"

"Yes, except for prostitutes."

I bought the sort of pullover blouse I had previously bought for the women in Dalia.

"Here you go, Reiran-san. You'll only need to wear it until we reach the ducal estate, so please put up with it for a little while."

"I understand."

Akira and Reiran-san took the clothes and returned to the house to change.

After waiting for a while, Akira came running back.

"Hey, Kenichi! This won't work. Sensei's chest won't fit in the clothes!"

"Seriously?! How big is she?"

"Heh heh heh. They must be the biggest breasts in the world, after all."

"I can't deny that—but what are we going to do?"

In that case, a stretchy material would be better. I searched Shangri-La and decided to buy a knitted sweater—it cost 1,600 yen.

It was black, with a design that left the shoulder area widely exposed. It was long enough, and her chest should fit in it.

"Click."

I handed the sweater that dropped out to Akira.

"This will definitely stretch. I'll take it to Sensei!"

Akira returned after handing the sweater to Reiran-san.

While I was talking with him, Reiran-san came over to us wearing the black sweater.

"I-is this all right?"

The sweater stretched enough to contain her breasts, but it was pulled taut over their shape, producing devastating results.

Akira saw Reiran-san blushing and fidgeting, and shouted.

"Fire!!"

"Direct hit!!"

I got carried away and shouted along with him. Then Akira moved behind Reiran-san and began groping her enormous breasts.

"H-hey! Akira, stop that!"

"Fuhihi! Is this it?! Is this what you like?!"

To put it bluntly, he was the very picture of a middle-aged pervert. Since he really was a middle-aged man, I suppose it couldn't be helped.

His fingers sank into her soft-looking breasts—honestly, I was jealous. I wanted to grope them too.

When I got home, I would put Primula in a sweater and try it myself.

"Hey! Ahh!"

"How could I possibly not grope her after being shown this?! No, how could I possibly not?! Parenthetical rhetorical question!"

"Hey, Akira—you're not planning to start here, are you?"

My calm retort seemed to bring Akira back to his senses.

"Phew... This isn't the time for that. For Sensei's breasts to make me lose control like this—they really are something else."

"Enough already!"

Reiran-san was angry, but sometimes a man simply couldn't stop himself from groping breasts.

"Fuhihi, sorry!"

"Honestly! If you're going to do that... do it somewhere no one else is around..."

They looked lovey-dovey just from the outside looking in...

"You may be on the run, but you don't seem the least bit miserable."

Akira reacted to my words.

"Of course not! No matter what happens, keep things bright and fun! The creed of Some-or-Other Brigade!"

"Life: Enjoyment and Excitement! Hahaha!"

Akira and I said it in perfect unison.

"They're talking nonsense again, nyaa."

Akira's family seemed to be having fun.

"Once we choose a base and get a house, we'll be able to do as much of that as we like."

"Exactly! Finding a place to settle down comes first. Our own sarai, you know!"

There was also a song called Sarai, though apparently the word was Persian.

"Um... Akira-sama, should I wear clothes like that too?"

After seeing Reiran-san in the sweater, Annerose-san hugged Akira.

"Heh heh, yes, eventually. Once we've found a house and settled down, I'll lavish plenty of affection on you."

"I-I'm always kept clean and well-groomed, so please use me as an outlet for your desires whenever Akira-sama wishes..."

"A refined-looking former noblewoman like her even neighs like a horse."

"H-how embarrassing..."

"There's no need to be embarrassed, Annerose. The female knight who lost to my ch○○ over there neighs like a pig."

"Gah! Kill me!"

The female knight grabbed at Akira—here we go again.

"But Kenichi, Sensei is the most amazing one here."

"T-that's not true!"

"Once she latches on, she won't let go."

"A softshell turtle?"

"Yeah, a softshell turtle."

Beside Akira and me, who were nodding, Myaa tilted her head.

"A softshell turtle, nyaa?"

"Myaa, there was an animal like that in our homeland. It's similar to a turtle."

"Was it as big as that, nya?"

"No, it wasn't that big."

A turtle? According to Akira, it sounded like there was a large snapping-turtle-like creature. Huh. I'd never seen one.

"A turtle... It sounds delicious."

"It really is delicious. Nobody else would eat one, so I ate it myself. It was tasty, though the meat was insanely tough."

"Softshell turtle is delicious too. Was it something like that?"

"I've never eaten softshell turtle, so I can't compare them, but it was incredibly rich, with the flavor concentrated in it. It also had a lot of gelatin, so it might be good for beauty and health."

I'd definitely like to try it if I got the chance.

"If you're Japanese, of course you'd eat it just to see what it tastes like."

"Exactly. Is it edible or not? Does it taste bad or good? You can't help being curious."

"Most of my family are picky eaters who refuse to try things."

"Haha, same here."

Akira looked at the women standing behind him.

"Still, having so many women must be difficult."

"Isn't it the same for you, Kenichi?"

"I have a wife and two beastfolk. The beastfolk don't make many demands... and the other one is a child."

"Yeah... The only good thing about receiving the Emperor's blessing was that. Before I had the blessing, they used dubious drugs and dubious magic to drain me dry."

"T-that's not true!"

It was Reiran-san who denied it at once, but...

"What are you talking about, Sensei? You were the worst of all."

"..."

Reiran-san crossed her arms in front of her body and fidgeted, but the breasts squeezed between them were causing quite a spectacle.

Damn it! No matter what I did, my eyes kept going there...

"Ahem!"

I pulled myself together and continued.

I had them load their belongings onto a pallet I took out of my Item Box. Otherwise, I would have had to store each item one by one.

They had the beer and cola I'd given them, but aside from that, they had only the bare minimum: bags, pouches, and the like.

They really had fled with nothing but the clothes on their backs and been living from day to day.

Even so, it seemed that was still better than being worked to death by the Emperor.

"All right! Store it all!"

At Akira's shout, their belongings disappeared before my eyes.

From what I heard, the specifications of Akira's Item Box also seemed to follow the same rules as mine and everyone else's.

"Anything except living things can go in, right?"

"I wonder where the line is drawn."

Akira had a point.

"I don't know the details. For example, a plant is still alive immediately after you pull it out of the ground, but it can still go into an Item Box."

Even ordinary storage should scoop up airborne microorganisms along with whatever was stored, so I had no idea how that worked.

If I planted seeds that had been in my Item Box, they would germinate, so plants seemed to receive rather lenient treatment.

Insects could be stored even when they were half-dead, but they would be completely dead when I took them out again.

The rules seemed to be somewhat harsh toward animals.

"More importantly, are you ready?"

"Yeah! I'm as ready as I'll ever be!"

Akira's family nodded too, so they must have steeled themselves.

After rebelling against the Emperor, they had no place to settle down in the Empire.

Thinking about that, I was glad I hadn't ended up falling out with the royals. It had all worked out in the end.

If we had fought them head-on, we wouldn't have been able to stay in the Kingdom either.

And Akira and the others were being hunted by the Empire. If I had met him under those circumstances, the two of us would probably have been clutching our heads.

Even so, I had a feeling that returning to the royal capital would lead to more trouble.

Still, we had gained two incredibly powerful mages as allies.

Well, somehow, it would work out—but that's what they call wishful thinking.