“…Well, couldn’t you have been the ruler then, instead, Liscia?” I asked.
“You’d have needed to seek my approval for each and every one of your reforms, you know? Wouldn’t that be a pain?”
“Well… Yes.”
Now, Liscia wasn’t pigheaded in any way, but if I had needed her approval for every little thing, my reforms would have been going much slower. Besides, if the person with ultimate deciding power and the person driving the reformation were separate people, there would be no guarantee that the members of a counter-reformation faction wouldn’t try to get between the two and stir up unneeded trouble.
“Your father made a brave decision by transferring everything to me at once, huh…” I said.
“You’re right… I’m sincerely able to see how impressive that was now.”
Though, it did mean the burden had been shifted to us.
We both sighed in unison.
“So, if you wanted it, Souma, a polygamous relationship is… possible,” Liscia said.
“You’d be okay with that, Liscia?” I asked.
“I wouldn’t be happy about it, but if it keeps you on the throne…”
“That’s being way too understanding…” I murmured.
“I’ll tolerate up to eight, myself included.”
“That’s a lot! I couldn’t take responsibility for that many!”
Now, when she told me I could have a harem, it’s not like the idea wasn’t appealing, but… I dunno, I could only imagine it being a lot of work. I wasn’t the type that could bear to disagree strongly with women, and I could tell that the more of them there were, the more constrained I’d feel.
“By the way, why did you choose that number?” I asked.
“I can have you all to myself for one day a week,” she said.
The weeks in this world were eight days. Incidentally, there were four weeks in a month, making each of them 32 days. There were twelve months in a year, so this world had a 384-day year.
Wait, that’s why?! I realized, registering what she had said.
When she said that, Juna and Aisha started whispering about something.
“If there were eight of us, do you think we would only get it once a week?”
“It doesn’t have to be that way, I’d think? If you and another wife each invited the other on your days…”
“I see. It’s not necessarily just once a week! You’re brilliant, Madam Juna.”
“…But wouldn’t you want to have him to yourself?”
“Ooh, there’s a conundrum.”
No, no, Aisha, Juna, why are you getting so into talking about this?!
Having them at the same time… I can’t say I wouldn’t be into that, but I’d have to become king for that. I was torn between my realistic personality, which wanted to avoid the hard work involved if I took the throne, and my desire to pursue that masculine ideal.
Just then, as I was starting to feel incredibly awkward…
“No, you can’t do that! Absolutely not, Hal!”
“Why won’t you understand?!”
At a table far away from ours, a young couple in military outfits were having an argument.
The man was a tall human with distinctive red hair. He looked like he was over 190 centimeters tall. He was broad-shouldered, and even through his uniform, I could tell he had a solid build.
The girl, on the other hand, had blonde hair in a short bob, with two triangular ears up top, and was a little on the petite side.
Is that girl a mystic wolf, I wonder?
“That girl’s a mystic fox,” Liscia told me, but I couldn’t tell the difference. “You can tell by their tails. She has a fox tail, see?”
“They’re both canines, so can’t we just lump them both together as mystic dogs?” I asked.
“If you say that, you’ll get both the mystic wolves and the mystic foxes angry. Kobolds are mystic dogs, so it would be like lumping humans together with apes.”
“…Tell me about all these things I shouldn’t say to certain races later, please.”
That’s another world for you. You never know when you’ll step on a landmine like that, I thought.
As I was thinking that, the mystic fox girl was pleading. “I’m begging you, Hal. You can’t go to the Carmine Duchy right now! Army General Duke Georg Carmine is hostile to the new king. There could be a civil war!”
“That’s exactly why I’m going. If there’s going to be fighting, that’s a chance for me to get promoted, isn’t it?” The one called Hal, who seemed to be a young man of about 18, gave her a dauntless smile.
The mystic fox girl, on the other hand, wore an expression clouded with anxiety. “Hal, the way you think about war is too simple. Your father called you back home because he was worried about you being like that!”
“It’s none of my old man’s business! He’s served under Duke Carmine for years, but now that things don’t look so good, he’s hiding in the capital, the coward! I don’t need to listen to him!”
“Your father understands what’s happening. Duke Carmine is rebelling without just cause.”
The two kept quarreling.
As she was watching them, Liscia clapped her hands together in recognition. “I thought I recognized him! The man is Officer Halbert Magna.”
“Is he someone you know?” I asked.
“He’s the eldest son of a distinguished family in the army clique. Since his academy days, his combat abilities have put him well above the rest of his peers. He entered the land forces after graduating, but… I guess he’s returned home since then.”
“He sounds surprisingly well known,” I mused. “Well, how about the girl, then?”
“I don’t know… I’ve never seen her in the army…”
“That girl is Kaede Foxia,” Juna answered on Liscia’s behalf.
Huh? Why does she know? I wondered.
“Because she’s a regular here,” Juna said without my asking. “If I recall, she mentioned she’s a mage serving in the Forbidden Army.”
“If she’s in the Forbidden Army, is she an earth-type mage, then?” I asked.
This world’s magic could be divided into six elements: fire, water, earth, wind, light, and dark.
Fire, water, wind, and earth manipulated their respective elements for attack spells, while light was generally healing-type magic. Dark was unique in that it didn’t, strictly speaking, manipulate darkness. All the unique spells that didn’t fall under the previous five elements were lumped together under the “dark-type” categorization.
In terms of magic type, my Living Poltergeists would have been dark.
Every person in this world was aligned with one of these elements, and they could use magic to some degree. As you would know from Liscia and Aisha’s training, people could imbue their weapons or attacks with magic of their element, as well.
Those who could cause greater magical effects than ordinary people were called mages. Mages could manipulate flames, cause whirlwinds, form craters in the ground, and sink battleships with their incredible powers.
When mages joined the military, their type determined where they were sent. Fire users went to the army, wind users to the air force, water users to the navy, and earth and dark users (not that there were many of the latter) went to the Forbidden Army, while light users were distributed equally and played a similar role to combat medics.
Honestly, I was opposed to this inflexible way of distributing them, but the army, navy and air force were under the control of the Three Dukedoms, so I couldn’t mess around with them.
Someday, I want to reform that system.
While I was thinking about all that, Kaede and Halbert kept arguing.