Kyou kara Ma no Tsuku Jiyuugyou!

I didn’t think that me losing my sight is even more surprising to Adalbert than me showing up in the middle of the desert.

When three people put dishes laden with food on the table, he’s pacing on the sandy ground covered with only a mat, asking again, “Why are you here?”

So I tell him about what happened at the oasis a few days ago, and explain all about coming to the equestrian tribe stronghold—all while there’s a feast in front of me. To a starving high school student, this is basically an interrogation.

Once he finally finishes hearing out my tales of heroism, Adalbert kicks the table leg angrily. The impact spreads to me, making my wounded shoulder and palm hurt like h.e.l.l.

“d.a.m.n, how did it get to this? I only came here to get a look because I heard there was some rare ingredient, to think this chunk of meat is actually a clueless mazoku brat!”

“Ingredient!?”

So the equestrian people who carried me here to excitedly think I’m tonight’s dinner? No wonder they were so excited.

“Even I don’t know if this is lucky or unlucky.”

“On the other hand, what kind of meat do you mean by meat? Seisakoku doesn’t have such a b.l.o.o.d.y culture, do they?”

“No, no, the equestrian tribes don’t have such a culture.”

The muscleman waves his hand in denial, causing a huge gust of wind. His muscles are surely swaying too.

“Apparently the West considers people with black hair and eyes a delicacy for immortality, you should have heard about that, right?”

“So it’s a delicacy… Can’t believe it’s not a miracle medicine.”

To think that after living seriously for sixteen years, I’ll be treated as an ingredient. Right now I can finally understand how the deer and monkeys in the Chinatown market feel like, they’re surely absolutely tearful as well. But that’s all my fault for not disguising myself properly.

Maybe it’s because Adalbert gave an order, one of the equestrian people unties the bonds on my hands. They’re moving the food, so I a.s.sume they’re the equestrian people in charge of preparing food and beverage.

“Anyway, sit down first.”

“Mn…”

The truth is I don’t really want to approach the dinner table. The reason is simple, faced with so many delicious dishes, I’m just not confident I can stand it. Seeing my hesitation, Adalbert bursts out in laughter,

“Relax, I won’t stop you from eating!”

“Eh, really?”

“That’s right, I’ve already fed the ‘luggage’ over there anyway, it doesn’t make a difference.”

What luggage? Don’t tell me he treats that round thing on the bed as luggage? I really can’t agree with that, Adalbert, even your bed sheets are part of your family—but before I get to lecture him, my attention is inevitably drawn to the steaming hot food.

“I can really eat? You won’t wait until later only to tell me I have to pay fifteen thousand in service fees?”

“I won’t, sheesh.”

As soon as I hear his reply, I say ‘itadakimasu’ in my heart. But my hand stops, just at that moment.

Because I can’t see.

I know the food is right in front of me, I just have to reach out my hand to feel the heat, and I reach down to touch the warm plates. But with night approaching, and there being only a brazier in the room, forget the food on the plates, I don’t even know where the cutlery is.

The huge shadow sitting opposite me tilts slightly, maybe he’s c.o.c.king his head.

“What’s the matter? Aren’t you hungry? Or are you a vegetarian?”

“Of course not! I’m so hungry my head’s spinning, meat and fish are my utmost favorites!! It’s just that, hold on… Ugh—Where’s the spork?”

“Oh, right, you can’t see.”

Adalbert grabs my hand and moves it ten centimeters to the side.

“The meat fork is here.”

“Thanks.”

But I can’t return his friendliness. Holding the equestrian people’s fork… they might not have sporks here, huh… I try to challenge the middle of the plate, and as expected the results are disastrous.

The fork doesn’t sink into anything. What a shame, let’s try again. The second time I feel it poking into food, but the food falls off on the way to my mouth. The third time the fork scratches against the cutlery, resulting in a sharp screech that makes me want to hold my ears.

Disappointed, I hold my head low with the fork in my hand.

“Whoa—”

Adalbert says in a tone of extreme respect,

“You’re so cla.s.sy, ‘Your Majesty’, purposely using a meat fork even when eating this sort of countryside food. Sorry, I for one have lived in the wild for too long, so I just grab the food with my hands.”

“Eh, grab with my hands?”

“That’s right, this is a dish of wild and tasty finger food. I made it, so I’m surely right when I say that.”

As soon as the words leave his mouth, Adalbert immediately reaches his hand out for the plate in front of him, and I only know that when I hear some light hand noises. But I stare at his shadow in surprise too, watching him bring the soft meat to his mouth with his hands, even making chewing sounds.

“How’s that, you don’t have to put on such an act with the meat fork, just take big bites like a man.”

“Then please pretend you never saw this.”

“That’s the smart way. If you did something like this in front of that man who’s forever dripping, I bet he’d faint from the shock, huh? Oh, yeah, why don’t you pick up the plate? Although that looks worse, but anyway we’re at the edge of a desert like this, there’s no need to talk about customs or manners here.”

I bring the food to my mouth as he told me too, and a sweetness mixed with many ingredients immediately melts apart on my mouth. The thick soup slides down my throat, aromas and flavors lingering. It feels as though rather than sliding into my stomach, everything rises to the top of my head.

This is the happiness I’ve awaited for so long, that of once again experiencing how it feels like to eat.

“Chef, this is just too delicious. Is this fresh b.u.t.ter? Or yogurt with a tinge of sourness?”

“Yogurt? No, that’s kefir fermented milk.”

“Wait a sec, why would there be kefir in Seisakoku… Ow!”

The edge of the plate touches my wound, and my brow creases with the pain. I want to press the wound with my left hand, but Adalbert seems to have taken note of everything, I didn’t expect him to have such a considerate side despite being so buff.

“Hm, what’s the matter with your palm?”

“…Just a light injury.”

In truth it’s not a light injury, and the wound doesn’t seem to have closed yet either, so it hurts like h.e.l.l whenever I hold something. But this is all my fault, so there’s no reason for me to complain.

“It must be because you simply used a short sword you’re not used to, and overexerted yourself so you got cut, right? It’s a common novice mistake.”

“Guess so.”

Amused, Adalbert chuckles once, and then I hear the chair opposite making a sound.

“Let me heal it for you.”

“Eh?”

“I said, I’ll help you heal that wound right now.”

If it’s true, I really couldn’t ask for more. But how was he going to heal it? Besides I’m not that close with him either, so I don’t know if he’s just being kind without asking for anything in return. Should he ask for some reward, the me right now really can’t give him anything.

“Look at you, all suspicious, don’t tell me you’ve forgotten who I am?”

“Aren’t you Adalbert? Lord von Grantz Adalbert…”

“Wrong.”

He reaches out his body for the end of the table, his voice becoming very close.

“I’m not Lord von Grantz, but Grantz. Not a mazoku soldier or an aristocrat, just Adalbert Grantz. Unlike you and His Excellency the third son, I can’t use convenient majutsu, because I’m not mazoku.”

“Come to think of it…”

Wolfram and I have suffered at the hands of Adalbert’s houjutsu before. And even earlier before that, when I still couldn’t tell left from right, nor did I know of the skies and seas, it was also this man who played around with my brain. It was thanks to him that I can understand the language here.

“You’re perfectly fine, even on s.h.i.+nzoku land.”

“That’s right, now do you want to be healed or not?”

“Of course…”

“Alright, then give me your hand.”

He holds my hand, recently freed from its rope bonds, and pulls it towards him.

“Put your hand on my chest… Ah, hey, hey, don’t touch the nipple! Don’t go simply touching!”

“Waa, sorry!”

Murmuring “really, even though it’s through the clothes you shouldn’t simply touch”, Adalbert puts my hand on top of those enviable chest muscles, near his collarbone.

“Listen up.”

Before I can ask, “listen to what?” I already hear the powerful heartbeat. Technically I shouldn’t be able to hear a person’s heartbeat directly with my ears, but it echoes in my head through my palm, and brings with it a wave of heat. After that is the impact, finally the power that fixes my body.

But this healing process comes with intense pain. That wave of heat tears apart the closing wound, cutting through the veins before seeping in slowly through the wound. Of course all this is just a feeling, when in fact the wound doesn’t widen or bleed.

That power seeps from my left palm to the arm, even running over to the injured right shoulder.

I can’t help but yell pathetically.

“It hurts…”

“Try to bear with it.”

“Majutsu is gentler than this!”

“Is that so? To humans houjutsu is gentler, but the fact that you find it painful proves that you’re closer to mazoku.”

“How can that… Ow!”

There’s an intense pain like an electric shock, and I pull my hand back subconsciously, my body falling backwards together with the chair from the knockback. But the back of my head doesn’t hit the floor.

This is all thanks to the people who burst through the cloth screen into the tent.

Conrad holds up the chair from behind, Hazel grabs my hand to prevent me from sliding off, while Wolfram points at Adalbert and says in a voice on the verge of losing it,

“Adalbert! What are you doing in a equestrian tribe tent!?”

“You should ask yourself that, Your Excellency the third son.”

I don’t blame him for being so surprised.

So sorry you had to get mixed up in this rookie mission.

Conrad and Wolfram planned to follow us from the start.

After the deep blow to the plan I came up with myself, even if I wanted to leave the town and act on my own, that is still just too rash. However, if you tell me to helplessly face the destroyed town, then leave without a care after even its water supply had been monopolized by others—Well, I can’t do something like that either.

So after lying dejectedly on the damp bed, this is the plan I came up with.

Have Saralegui impersonate Yels.h.i.+, and then announce to the chief of the equestrian tribe—

All the land on this country belongs to Emperor Yels.h.i.+, even the water supply in the desert is Emperor Yels.h.i.+’s property, so no one is allowed to trespa.s.s or fight for domination over it.

To allow Saralegui to impersonate the emperor of Seisakoku, I have no choice but to go alone with him. After all, it’s not natural for the s.h.i.+nzoku emperor to have mazoku guards with him, no matter how you look at it.

Because of that I talked things over with Conrad and Wolfram, hoping they would agree to the two of us going alone, but the two mazoku were worried about the high probability of danger when we’re without a single guard.

That’s why I asked them to follow behind us at a distance they wouldn’t be noticed.

They appeared as promised.

The trustworthy guide Hazel Guides came along too.

Everyone else stayed behind in the town to help with healing and reconstruction.

Adalbert doesn’t stand up, just looks sideways at Wolfram, who’s huffing in anger,

“If you get too mad you’ll go bald, y’know, Your Excellency the third son.”

“Shut up, mind your own business!”

It occurs to me that Hazel Graves doesn’t know Adalbert, so I took it upon myself to introduce them.

“Hazel, he is Adalbert.”

“A hunk that looks like an American footballer.”

“Thanks for the compliment, old hag.”

“…To think he knows he was being complimented.”

She did say it in English.

“Explain yourself to me loud and clear, Grantz!”

“Yes yes yes, I’m sorry, Mr Captain.”

The captain of the ‘Find Me Team’? So Wolfram is the captain, that really makes me deeply thoughtful.

“Although some menial thing like this isn’t worth reporting to Your Majesty the Maou, it seems I am the messiah."

“Messiah--!?”

Wolfram and I yell at the same time.

The messiah who, according to what Saralegui heard from the chief, showed up a few days ago is actually Adalbert… Wait a sec, why is he the messiah? Because he’s a muscleman? Because he’s an American footballer? Because he’s a quarterback? If he wasn’t the messiah, but instead a helper sent from the Alliance, I would understand that better.

The two equestrian tribe officials standing on the sounds hold moldy paper in their hands, yelling in unison and even pointing their finger towards somewhere that fits the conditions.

“Apocalypse!”

“Apocalypse!”

Hazel translates it just for me.

“Apocalypse, the messiah legend?”

“What apocalypse, that’s too pessimistic. On the other hand, what kind of guy is that messiah? Where did he come from, and where is he going?”

“Hold on, my farsightedness has gotten worse recently. Uh—The messiah who comes from the sea has blue eyes and a strong chin, a handsome man carrying a seductive mermaid…”

“Strong chin?”

“Seductive mermaid?”

“Eh—So it’s nothing to do with musclemen, huh—”

Conrad, Wolfram and I, the three of us are surprised by different things.

Even if the strong chin is a characteristic Adalbert was born with, but what’s up with the seductive mermaid part? Could it be he’s not happy with his muscles, and even tried to grow a fishtail?

The scene is suddenly dead quiet, it seems I’m the only one out of the loop. Conrad and Wolfram probably found the answer, both looking at the same thing.

“Eh--!? What what? What did you discover—Tell me, sheesh—”

“Conrad, do you think that’s a mermaid?”

“Why are you asking me?”

“Aren’t you better versed with that kind of thing?”

What kind of thing are you versed with, huh, Conrad.

“Speaking of which, are there mermaids here? Is it okay for mermaids to stay on such a dry desert!?”

“…If you want to say being all tied up is seductive, I guess that counts.”

“Maybe it’s the hair.”

“No, it might actually be the beard, the beard.”

“Beard? Do mermaids have beards!?”

Hazel, who has no interest in mermaids or perhaps saw them long ago, ignores our unease and continues,

“The messiah who came from the sea, saves the wind, saves the earth, saves the fire, saves the goldfish[1]… Ah, that’s wrong, saves the gold, saves the water, saves the tombs, saves the people, saves the fish, saves the insects…”

Putting aside the goldfish fis.h.i.+ng for now, he even has to save the insects!? Feels like a SOHO worker who accepts any CASE on the spot-- I can’t help but start pitying this messiah.

“Anyway, since I came from the sea while carrying something that looked like a mermaid, I’ve been treated as the messiah. Whatever, since it feels really relaxing, and since I’ve already been identified as the messiah, there’s nothing I can do about it either. So I was thinking of taking the honorary t.i.tle for a day, only before I know it it’s been five days.”

Honorary t.i.tle, huh, I imagine him wearing a ribbon that reads, “Messiah for the Day”.

“Since I was taken to be the legendary man, naturally I’m treated quite well, but these guys really have terrible food and drinks. Drinking wine as bland as water, eating dried fruits and bread that can’t be any harder, it’s just too much… By the time I realized it, I’m already in the kitchen making food for the whole tribe.”

“In other words, you ran all the way here to Seisakoku to save the insects suffering in the desert?”

Adalbert taps the tabletop.

“Hey, have you been listening closely at all?”

“But how did you get here? I know, you used the convenient tools Anissina made to get here, right? Like the Anywhere Door or Bamboo Copter[2].”

I suffered quite a bit before reaching here, so I have mixed feelings about someone getting here so easily. But the chair under Adalbert’s b.u.t.t makes a sound, and he shouts in surprise,

“What? Didn’t you tell him?”

He seems to be addressing Wolfram.

“I came here with His Excellency the third son to find you.”

“You’re a member of the ‘Find Me Team!?" If that’s so, how did you end up as a messiah-c.u.m-head chef in an unknown tribe?”

Just because he was hugging a mermaid.

How mysterious, how dazzling must a mermaid be, to mess up the life of an American footballer muscleman? d.a.m.n—I really want to see, I wonder, between it and Denmark’s Little Mermaid statue, which is more beautiful?