CH 28

Translated by TrinityVox

Edited by Schwarzel

After their conversation in the courtyard ended, the griffons flew off. Since they’d be living in the Magic Forest for a while, they’d meet again.

“Stay healthy okay, Guri-chan, Gurin-chan, Gurinpicchi-chan.”

“Pie, you’ve named their whole family?”

“What, names are important.”

“Considering all that, you gave them really simple names.”

“Really?”

Alexei thought she hadn’t changed one bit. She would always name them simply and clearly like that.

“The one-horned mouse I’m living with now is named Ikkaku-chan-pe.”

“What? You’re living with a magical beast?”

“Yeah. It somehow got lost-pe.”

Alexei remembered the report Sergei had given him. It wrote that she was taking care of flowers alone and embroidering. It was also written that she was speaking in a foreign language to her pet, this was most likely her dialect.

She was living alone in a detached building. Thinking that she may have been lonely there, Alexei’s chest hurt.

“Speaking of which, would you let me meet Ikkaku-chan?”

Eleonora nodded, smiling.

Then, after seeing the griffons off, Alexei dispelled his sound barrier and Eleonora became silent.

“Is Sergei here?”

Alexei hurriedly called for Sergei and explained to him what Eleonora had learned about the way magical beasts live.

“So what you’re saying is the holy light won’t make all the magical beasts disappear.”

“That’s right. We can’t destroy all of them. In the first place, it’s difficult to think that they would leave the forest to attack humans. Besides, since their lifestyles are contained within the forest, they can maintain ecologic equilibrium. By the way, what are the magical beast experts doing now?”

“After the annihilation of the magical beasts, there were very few left to study so there are almost no experts anymore. There weren’t many experts to begin with, so they’ve decreased quite a bit. But it certainly still remains a division of the imperial research institute.”

The magical beast experts of the empire became a forgotten existence.

“Gather those experts and have them start on new research concerning magical beasts.”

Hearing the two converse, Eleonora hoped, from the bottom of her heart, that the tragedy of the magical beasts would never happen again.

“And we’ll have Eleonora’s cooperation in this research. Is that okay, Eleonora?”

With strong conviction, she replied.

“…Yes.”

Thus, Eleonora, who came to the castle with her homemade pies to teach Alexei its great qualities, somehow ended up as someone who was granted the power to control magical beasts from God.

(I don’t get it, but I somehow became an amazing person. Though His Highness said it arbitrarily. Yeah. I’ll work my hardest to ensure that tragedy doesn’t happen again!)

She had a newfound determination, but she wasn’t exactly sure what she had to do.

“…What am I supposed to do specifically?”

Alexei smiled in response to her question.

“Today, after seeing you ride the griffon and land safely, I think the fear and hate towards magical beasts have been swept away. I want you to become the mediator between humans and magical beasts.”

(Can I fulfil such an important role-pe? No, I have to work hard for Guri-chan and the others-pe!)

“…Yes, I will try my best.”

Seeing their conversation, Sergei chuckled because he could understand clearly that Alexei was becoming proactive toward Eleonora. He quickly began to meddle.

“Eleonora-sama, do you have any plans after this?”

“…I don’t.”

“Your Highness, you still have things to talk about, don’t you? What if Eleonora-sama joins you for dinner and you can continue to discuss things?”

“Ah, yes.”

Smiling, Alexei turned to Eleonora.

“I want to invite you to dinner Eleonora.”

“…I would be delighted.”

“I will assign female attendants and knights to you so feel free to look around the castle until dinner. I still have work to do so I’ll be in the office. If anything happens, come to the office.”

Looking back, Alexei left the area with difficulty. Sergei followed him out.

After only Eleonora remained, she decided to have the female attendants show her around the castle. First, she was brought to the garden.

(It’s so spacious-pe. Wahhh! There are pretty flowers blooming here-pe. Those are the flowers Ham-chan gave to me as a present before-pe. He called it a sparkling star flower-be. After I became Eleonora though I learned that it’s actually called Multistella. But I think sparkling starflower sounds better.)

“…I heard it’s very difficult to raise Multistellas. You must have an excellent gardener here.”

Hearing this, a gardener close by took off his hat and bowed deeply. Seeing this, Eleonora asked the aged gardener.

“…Are you the one who chose this flower?”

“No, the emperor chose this. Not just the Multistella, he also chose this plant with purple strawberries called Pulpurgo, and this golden apple bearing Aolmuralis. These plants are all difficult to raise, but His Highness would often use his magic to encourage them to grow.”

(Aren’t these all the flowers I like? They’re easy to raise in the Magic Forest but growing them anywhere else is extremely hard-pe. It’s pretty hard to even get the seeds in the first place.)

Eleonora was stunned.

(He said they were all chosen by the emperor-pe…Ham-chan even mentioned these small details to the emperor-pe?)

Thus, the possibility that Alexei could be Ham-chan finally dawned on her.