Chapter 251
A while later, Azurite felt a dull pain in his chin as he woke up leaning against an alley wall.
“Uuugh… It hurts…”
“Are you alright, Lord Azurite?”
One of the bodyguards knelt and checked him over as he handed him a leather canteen. His consciousness cleared somewhat after drinking the cold water chilled by the winter air.
“And I thought proposing marriage was a great idea…”
After graduating from the Royal Academy of Magic, he planned to assist his father, who worked as an administrator in the town of Heidenfiel. However, before taking on that role, he was advised to take a wife and settle down with the red-haired girl who was also an old acquaintance of his.
Although his father’s decision was influenced by the girl’s connection to the Vest family, who had been in charge of the rapidly growing town of Velheim for generations, he also genuinely preferred Muriel over another stranger’s daughter, as she was always brimming with curiosity and had a joyful smile.
(I always found myself drawn to her back at the academy, so I guess I had feelings for her since then)
When a quest was issued as a condition for their engagement, he fought against a skilled adventurer but was defeated. It made him reaffirm his feelings for her, but it also brought out new feelings from within.
(I have to stop fooling myself by pretending to be understanding)
As a young quasi-mage who had the opportunity to be acquainted with the Tempest Witch, Azurite, who originally had a thirst for pure strength and magic research, decided to take a different path than his father intended.
Meanwhile, Muriel, who had involved the silver wolf disguised as a human, was waiting for the results in her room at the Vest mansion.
She tried to act normally and calmed herself by reading a book titled “Geographical Conditions and Mammalian Distribution,” which was recently added to the library.
She followed the fine letters written on the parchment for a while until she reached a stopping point, looked up, and let out a sigh.
(Ugh, I can’t concentrate on this new book)
Although it would be difficult to capture a wild animal who had slipped into town, its pursuers were a forest hound and a quasi-mage who could use search magic, so it was most likely to be caught within the day.
“I’m sure Archer would be able to catch it, but…”
The image of the silver kobold who hunted prey and gathered food with impressive skill as they travelled from the forest to the settlement appeared in her mind.
But as she wandered through the forests and fields in search of animals to study, she realized that luck played a significant role, and she considered that things might not turn out as she hoped.
(Hmmm~, there are so many variables)
Feeling a sense of unease, she glanced around until a bookshelf along the wall caught her eye. Muriel placed the complicated book on the table and stood up. She walked over to a corner of the shelf where fairy tales and stories were kept, picking up her favorite book titled “A Love Song Howling At The Moon”.
The book was simple, but it had been read repeatedly until it was worn out.
The story was set in an ancient time when werewolves and humans were at odds with each other. A young werewolf acted as a decoy during a battle to let his companions escape and was injured in the process. After escaping through the forest and reaching the riverside, he was unable to move due to exhaustion and bleeding. That was when he met a village girl carrying a bucket of water.
He tried to pass off as a human by shifting, but he was confused and in severe pain, so he ended up shifting into a human with wolf ears. The girl immediately recognized him as a werewolf and guessed that his injuries might have been caused by the humans who were clearing the forest.
Feeling a bit of guilt and pity for the werewolf, the girl secretly looked after him while hiding from her parents. They became close after a few days, and he began to open up to her.
The girl became drawn to him because he was rational and strong-willed and not like the rumors that painted his kind as man-eating fiends, but…Their relationship was discovered by the villagers and the werewolves who were looking for their comrade.
They tried to mediate between the werewolves and the humans, but… both sides refused to listen, and the girl was captured by the lord to be burned at the stake as a witch.
Her parents could not do anything and could only watch in a daze. Meanwhile, the young wolf gave up trying to persuade his companions and went to rescue the girl alone. He breaks through the guards waiting for him, but he runs out of strength and is consumed by the flames together with the girl.
Moved by this scene, the werewolves and humans reached a compromise and decided to stop fighting, choosing instead to live separately from that moment forward.
At least that was how the story went, but…
(Uwaaah was it this e****c?)
Someone knocked at the door as Muriel blushed when she realized that the story contained an intimate depiction of the couple, even though it was geared towards children.
“If you’ll excuse me, Milady.”
“Sure, go right in.”
Dressed in her maid uniform, Natalie entered the room in response to Muriel’s voice, took a glance at the book, and blurted,
“Ah, that’s quite an e****c book you have there.”
“Auu~”
The playwright who wrote it was quite famous, so the story was rather well-known.
“I heard that there’s a play based on this book at the royal capital that uses the Holy Beast of Selkram as inspiration. In it, the guard unit is mowed down in a fistfight, and the village girl is carried away. I also heard that one of the scenes features an amazing sword fight supervised by the Steel Sage, Lord Greio himself…”
“….. That sounds fun, I kind of want to see it.”
If it were the silver-haired werewolf who slaughtered the Valley Ant Queen who falls under threat level B, then he certainly wouldn’t have any trouble breaking through the lord’s guards, even if they set a trap and ambushed him.
(He’s already pretty much gone past being a Kobold, hasn’t he…?)
Muriel smiled, thinking that it would lead to a happy ending if she were the village girl in the story.
Then, remembering her purpose for coming over, Natalie delivered the news that Archer had successfully captured the Lesser Buncle just as Muriel had hoped.
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