Chapter Two Hundred and Forty: The Kingdom’s Laws (Diehild’s POV)
“How did I appear in the eyes of Alchemist Karen, I wonder?”
In the bathing room of the queen’s palace, Queen Diehild was having her body washed. She unhesitatingly exposed her ageless, voluptuous body that seemed impossible to believe had borne six children starting from her thirties, as the clinging rose fragrance was washed away.
What was being lathered on her body was the beauty soap, one of the princess-branded cosmetics set sold by Alchemist Karen. This soap potion with the same fragrance as the flower Karen called chamomile was apparently impossible to reproduce even by her disciple, and continued to be out of stock.
Those who couldn’t obtain this soap had no choice but to purchase ordinary soap—not potions—from merchants who made soap following the recipe Karen had made public. Even soap without potion effects apparently improved skin luster and maintained cleanliness better when used. Solid soap without fragrance was already incorporated as strategic supplies for both the Royal Knights and the Royal Guard. It was reportedly valued for being easier to handle than soft soap and better at removing dirt.
The knight orders reportedly requested soap potion deliveries from particularly talented E-rank alchemists building their delivery records, yet so far, no one else had succeeded in supplying this soap potion.
Even C-rank alchemists who accepted individual requests couldn’t make it, and B-rank alchemists had such high pride that they disliked being forced to use others’ recipes, so they couldn’t be compelled. However, even if they were forced, they probably couldn’t make it anyway. Diehild had also asked the royal alchemists, but even they said they still couldn’t make that potion.
Some nobles tried to pressure Karen, but that was stopped somewhere before Diehild even needed to intervene. Especially when high-ranking adventurers from the Adventurers’ Guild got involved, even the royal family couldn’t track the flow of power.
After Diehild’s body was washed, the court ladies withdrew. Only three ladies-in-waiting remained at Diehild’s side as she reclined in the bathtub, and they answered Diehild’s question.
“As an ordinary commoner girl, she would likely feel honored that Your Majesty spoke to her so amiably.”
“As the daughter of an adventurer who couldn’t have a search party sent for him due to his low rank, she likely felt disgust at the motherly face Your Majesty showed toward Her Highness Waltride, who receives attention despite not fulfilling her duties.”
“As Her Highness Waltride’s friend, she may have been pained by Your Majesty’s coldheartedness.”
The three ladies-in-waiting each stated different opinions. All of them were quite plausible. What Karen had outwardly shown was the third emotion as Waltride’s friend, but there was also the possibility that it was an act.
“If Alchemist Karen’s behavior was an act, then my response today was truly half-hearted.”
However, whatever intention Karen might have been hiding, it probably wouldn’t have been a fatal mistake. She must have appeared as a queen who put the nation first—not favoring her daughter, yet not entirely free of maternal attachment.
Diehild let out a long, heavy sigh.
She knew that the Adventurers’ Guild had moved and detained an A-rank adventurer. That A-rank adventurer was a dungeon expedition participant who had lost her mental equilibrium after losing her partner, who was both a party member and her husband, in the dungeon expedition. The resentment wouldn’t have been strange if directed at the king, who had ordered the dungeon investigation. However, that resentment was directed at Karen, but before it could reach Karen, it was settled through the Adventurers’ Guild by someone’s intervention.
At A-rank, adventurers were treasures of humanity. Only those with even greater power or abilities were permitted to bend the will of such precious fighting forces. If all adventurers were to turn their backs, a nation would fall.
When Diehild was still a girl, there had been a country that perished that way.
“Still, what could possibly have happened in the dungeon to result in taming a pegasus? Waltride’s explanation made no sense.”
She had summoned Waltride to explain, but the girl grew frightened before Diehild and failed to give a coherent account. She said there had been a pegasus on the dungeon’s eighth floor. If one only heard the words that she had received the egg from a pegasus who had come to retrieve her child’s egg that had been kidnapped by those plotting to overthrow the Kingdom of Earthfill, it sounded just like the return of King Sybilla, but the reality was different. Upon closer questioning, it turned out Waltride had been unconscious for most of it and did not truly understand what happened.
The one who had arranged everything was Alchemist Karen. What exactly was this alchemist’s intention in creating this situation? Why did she have enough influence to move the Adventurers’ Guild? Was she the guild’s pawn?
“Until now, Waltride wasn’t given significant trials precisely because His Majesty had given up on her, but at this rate, there’s no telling what kind of trials His Majesty might impose.”
“Are you worried?”
“Worried? Indeed. I’m terribly worried that making Waltride stand out even more will cause the adventurers to abandon our kingdom.”
There once was a country called the Kingdom of Zektas. It was located far to the west—beyond the great river Granas, past Diehild’s birthplace, and even beyond the western forest.
This country had been abandoned by adventurers who could no longer endure the arrogance of the king and the tyranny of the nobles, and perished unable to stop a great stampede. Diehild hadn’t actually witnessed that state with her own eyes.
The western forest was part of the great central woodland of the continent, filled with numerous unconquered dungeons. Only capable adventurers—or a few people protected by them—could cross that forest. Even so, they had had diplomatic relations. But from a certain day, those diplomatic relations were severed.
What Diehild saw were the many adventurers crossing the forest. Skilled adventurers came to the Kingdom of Earthfill, to Diehild’s territory, crossing the forest while protecting only the people truly important to them.
“To adventurers, their homeland is not necessarily something they must protect. However, the stronger they are, the more accustomed they are to the goddess’s trials. Therefore, they will follow reasonable principles. We must not let them think our kingdom’s laws are unjust.”
Seeing her parents welcome and accept the adventurers who had crossed the forest with their families, Diehild decided to do the same on a national scale. For that purpose, she had gone through fierce struggles to become queen and was here. The king seemed to have his own thoughts, but Diehild wasn’t patient enough to wait for the results of those thoughts she wasn’t permitted to share.
When Diehild rose from the bathtub, the ladies-in-waiting wiped her body and draped a robe over her.
“Continue to monitor Waltride.”
Troublesomely, her bloodline was legitimate. The pegasus’ existence appeared like proof that the ancestral King Sybilla had acknowledged Waltride. If she had remained in her ugly form, not just fat but bloated and distorted in strange ways, it would have been one thing, but now, at least in appearance, she had come to closely resemble Diehild when she was a young woman who had won the queen’s position. To uninformed citizens—especially adventurers—Waltride would appear as an existence symbolizing the Royal Family.
“If Waltride acts against the Kingdom of Earthfill’s national interests—”
The softness and sweet scent of the newborn Waltride returned vividly to her memory, but as if averting her eyes, Diehild looked at the black-clad figures who had silently appeared behind her and knelt.
“—Do what must be done.”
After watching those who immediately vanished after responding "Yes", Diehild sat on a couch and drained the wine poured by her lady-in-waiting in one gulp.
