CH 104

Chapter 104: The Image of the Emperor

After parting with John, I hurried ahead with Peiyu and Ivy.

The two servants carried our luggage and proceeded along the way.

Ivy, who I thought was slender as well as Peiyu, was surprisingly strong and did not look as if she was having a hard time walking with the luggage.

I thought about slowing down the pace if their stamina didn’t catch up with them, but it seemed there was no need to worry about that.

I was walking at a normal pace with them in tow.

“Ahmm …….”

Ivy suddenly spoke up from behind me.

“Umu?　What is it?”

I turned my head and asked Ivy.

“E-Emperor ……-sama, .”

“You shouldn’t call him that.”

Peiyu pointed this out to Ivy, who was unfamiliar with the term while acting as a senior colleague.

“There is no need to call him ‘Emperor,’. You should address him as Your Majesty.”

“Y-Yes. Your Majesty, right?”

“That’s right. And since we are traveling incognito, you must call him Master so that his true identity will not be revealed. When you return to the capital, you should address him as Your Majesty.”

“Y-yes …… eh …… yes.”

Ivy was confused.

She’s confused, and she’s having a hard time understanding it all at once.

“Don’t think too hard. For now, you should address him as Master. Once you get used to calling His Majesty, you’ll naturally understand.”

“I-I understand.”

“So, what are you talking about?”

“Ah. Um, Master, about the water…is it okay?”

“Water?”

“If we continue along this road, we’ll end up in the desert. ……”

“Yeah.”

I nodded slightly.

Entering the desert – that was the original purpose.

Ivy is carrying our luggage with Peiyu, and she’s from around here.

She must be concerned about the lack of water in our luggage.

“If that’s the case, it is going to be fine.”

“But in the desert, if you don’t have water. That …… will kill you.”

Ivy said straight out, “You will die”.

I’ve never been in the desert, I only know about it.

However, the flip side of this is that I do know the desert.

I know that a desert is a place where there is no water source anyway, and the availability of water is a matter of life and death, no joke.

Ivy is concerned about that.

For me, that knowledge is enough.

“So me saying it’s fine isn’t enough to reassure you, huh.”

“Uh, yes. ……”

“Hey, that’s disrespectful to Master.”

“S-sorry.”

“Okay. You just started working for me, so it’s understandable. Let’s get rid of that anxiety now.”

I said that and took out the Livyathan.

Livyathan, which can change size at will, is usually smaller than a needle and hidden in the ear.

I took it out and restored it to its original size.

“F-from where ……”

Ivy was surprised.

I smiled at her. And said, “Don’t be surprised just yet.”

As Ivy paused, I stood still, turned around, and held out the Livyathan.

“Can you do it?　Livyathan.”

{That’s too easy.}

As Leviathan responded, a trickle of water dripped from the tip of its tip.

Although it is just a small amount of water, like a spring from the area, it is still a strange sight for an uninformed person to see water flowing endlessly from an object called a “sword”.

Sure enough, Ivy is astonished.

Ivy’s mouth gapes open in astonishment.

“W-What is this ……?”

“Water evaporates and escapes into the air. Livyathan can transform that escaped water into the water at will.”

“T-that’s possible?”

“Yeah.”

“Wow. ……”

Ivy was amazed and at a loss for words.

If I didn’t show her an actual example, she would probably wonder wha I was talking about, but since she can see “the sword keeps producing water” right in front of her, Ivy has no choice but to believe it.

“For this reason, we don’t need to carry water with us. I’ve only read about it in the literature, but even in the desert, there is water available, even if it is only a little. So there must be some way to produce water, even if it’s just a little, right?”

“Y-Yes.”

Although this was also something I had read about in the literature, I assumed that the locals knew about it and asked Ivy to concur.

Sure enough, Ivy knew, and the conversation went smoothly.

“Livyathan can gather water better than any of those methods. And you can even bathe in the desert if you want.”

I chuckled.

“B-Bath!?　But …… this would work. ……”

Ivy was surprised, but seeing Livyathan continually producing water was persuasive after all.

Although she was surprised, Ivy had no choice but to be convinced.

On the other hand, beside her, Peiyu looked proud.

☆

Once we entered the desert, Peiyu’s fatigue became more and more visible.

Her walking pace slowed as she frequently got her feet caught in the sand.

Ivy, perhaps because she is from this region, showed no noticeable signs of fatigue.

“Let’s take a break.”

“Y-yes.”

Peiyu’s face was noticeably relieved when I suggested that we take a break.

I looked around.

The sky was clear and unobstructed.

I held up my hand.

I shaped the ring still on my thumb to create a large wall in the sun’s direction.

It became a shield, creating a fairly wide area of shade.

“Cool ……”

“Unpack and get some rest. Ivy, too.”

“U-understood.”

“And drink some water.”

The two girls nodded at my words.

Peiyu put the luggage down and slumped to the ground, but Ivy seemed to have some room to breathe and came over to me.

“Is there anything I can do for you, Master?”

“No, not at the moment. Rest up.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah.”

“Master resembles …… John-sama.”

“Umm?　What do you mean?”

I was interested in the reason why she said I resembled John.

Smiling, I asked Ivy back.

She answered timidly,

“Well …… the part where you tell us we can take a break when we’re done with our work.”

“Fumu?”

I thought for a bit.

After a moment’s pondering, I understood.

“Oh, you’re talking about ‘Recovering it back’ huh”

“Recovering it back?”

Ivy nodded her head at my words, this time in the opposite direction.

“Did you work for a cheapskate employer before John?”

“Y-Yes. A little bit before he sold me.”

“I see.”

I nodded.

Among employers, I understand that there are people like that.

That’s how they think.

They think that if the people they pay to work for them are not working, they will lose their wages.

Therefore, they demand that the people they hire work without a break.

This is a kind of stinginess.

In other words, they think they have to recover their money.

Needless to say, I do not have such a mindset.

To a certain extent, it is an essential feeling for merchants, and I don’t deny it, but I don’t intend to do it that way at all.

“John must have learned by watching the way I do things, I suppose.”

“I-Is that so……”

“Well, then, you can keep on doing what you’re doing. I don’t ask you to work endlessly. Rest when it is available.”

“I understand. ……”

Ivy backed down after that, but she didn’t seem to be completely convinced.

“Fumu, is there something on your mind?”

“Eh?”

“You’re not satisfied with my methods, are you?”

“T-that’s ……”

“You can tell me what’s bothering you.”

“……”

Ivy stared at me.

She was looking at me, wondering if it was really okay to talk about it.

I glanced at Peiyu.

She was still exhausted.

She was resting in the shade I’d created with her eyes closed thinly.

I decided that I would listen to her long until Peiyu recovered.

So I waited patiently.

Perhaps it was good that I didn’t rush her, but eventually, Ivy began to open her mouth.

“M-Master is …… really the Emperor–or is it His Majesty?”

“Fumu.”

I gave a small nod.

“Not the image you have in your mind of the Emperor, huh?”

I asked Ivy with a cheerful smile.

“Yes. ……”

“So what’s the image?　The image of the Emperor in Ivy’s head.”

“Well, ……”

“You can speak frankly. I’m the one who’s asking you after all.”

“Y-yes. You know, …… wearing all these sparkly clothes, having a huge crowd of people with him, and eating very extravagant meals. “

“Extravagant. What’s it like?”

“He’d have a hundred dishes on the table, and he’d take one bite of everything and throw the rest away.”

“Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!”

I laughed out loud.

It was just like the stereotypical image of the common man, and it was funny in a roundabout way.

“I don’t do that. Not to begin with.”

“Eh?”

“You can eat a hundred bites of everything, but you don’t need that many unless you’re a glutton.”

“T-that’s right.”

“What else?”

“Well, you can get …… all beauties, and um …….”

“Ha-ha-ha-ha, yeah, yeah.”

I laughed so hard at this stereotype.

“That’s not so wrong. My father, the previous Emperor, had dozens of concubines and hundreds of female courtesans. The Emperor must have an heir, and the only way to ensure that he has an heir is to rely on numbers.”

“And you, Your Majesty?”

“About that, I have three of my own.”

“Eh?　That’s all?”

Ivy is surprised.

Apparently, it was far less than she had expected.

Well, I guess there aren’t many.

I understand that.

I’m the dullest Emperor in the history of the Empire, I guess.

“……”

Ivy stared at me with a blank expression on her face.

I can tell what she’s surprised about.

Even merchants around here have a few concubines of their own.

“Fuu, it is true that I may not be the Emperor you think I am. You’ll find out if I’m really Emperor or not when you return to the capital. Until then, just trust John.”

“Y-yes.”

Ivy was a little flustered but nodded honestly.

It seems that the “trust John” thing worked.

“Now …….”

When the conversation was over, I looked at Peiyu.

I looked at Paille to check her recovery and see if she was ready to go.

“Mm?”

“Master?”

Peiyu seemed to have recovered sufficiently.

She seemed to have noticed the change in my expression.

I was looking at her back – and beyond.

Beyond the endless expanse of sand, the horizon shimmering with heat, there was a group of people approaching us, raising a cloud of dust.

“Horses, huh”

“Eh?”

Peiyu was surprised and turned around.

Ivy turned her head in the same direction as us.

The horses with people on them were making a cloud of dust.

It wasn’t one of the horses we normally see, neither a warhorse, nor a packhorse, nor a beautifully bred horse for dressage.

“Are there horses that are unique to this part of the country?”

I asked Ivy.

“And, specific to this region?

“Yeah. ……The ones that are good at running in the desert, that sort of thing.”

“Yes, there are, but ……”

“I see.”

I nodded and turned my attention back to the dust.

In the meantime, a group of people on horseback came this way and surrounded us before we could say anything.

There were about 30 men mounted on the horses in pairs.

And all of them were dressed like ruffians.

I looked around at them.

There was only one man who seemed to have a decent atmosphere.

He had one closed eye and a large scar across his face at an angle to the eye.

“Just a so-so guy huh?”

The man looked at us and said something like that.

“What are you?”

“Oh, we just want some money for a few drinks, that’s all.”

“It’s a robbery, I see.”

I nodded.

They are exactly what they look like.

“Don’t talk nonsense.”

“What if I don’t stop talking?”

“It’s a vast desert, and you’ll just be one more dried-up piece of meat.”

“Is that so?”

“M-M_Master.”

Ivy was trembling with fear in her eyes.

“Don’t worry about it.”

“B-but…”

“You’ll see.”

I chuckled and turned to the men, —-to the bandit leader.

“Livyathan.”

I call out Livyathan’s name without drawing the Demon Sword.

{Yes}

“Don’t kill him.”

{As you with.}

Livyathan responded, and —immediately.

Around my body — a column of water began to spout.

It was only as thick as a child’s water pistol, but the force was incomparable.

Just like water needles, — over a hundred of them shot out at once, instantly piercing through the limbs of all the bandits.

“Aaaaah!”

“Aaah!”

The men all fell from their horses, pierced by the water needles.

As I had ordered, Livyathan took it easy on them and didn’t kill any of them.

Some of them were wounded enough that they might as well be dead, but none of them were killed anyway.

“Wow…….”

At that moment as she witnessed it, such words escaped Ivy’s mouth.