“Honestly…” Liscia puffed up her cheeks a little as she plopped herself down on the bed. “These things happen because you have a bed here. Maybe I should break it?”
“Please don’t,” I said. “Where would I sleep?”
“You finally made a room of your own, didn’t you? Or would you rather use my bed? Use a different one each day.” Liscia gave me a heavy stare.
Did she mean that I should use her, Aisha, Juna, and Roroa’s beds, taking turns in a different one each day…?
“I think I’d be too nervous to sleep, so let me pass on that, please,” I said.
“Geez,” she muttered. “I’m being hounded by Marx to ‘Produce an heir, quickly!’ you know?”
“Urkh… Could you wait a little longer on that? I do have something in mind.”
“Something in mind?” she asked.
I rose from my bed and stretched. “I’ve finally stabilized the internal political situation in the country. I’ve got a secret pact with the Empire, too, and though there are some countries nearby that worry me, things should be stable for the time being. Well, that’ll depend on what the Demon Lord’s Domain does, though.”
“I suppose…”
“Also… I’ve managed to convince myself that I should become king,” I said.
“I wish you’d say you’ve resolved yourself to do it instead.”
“Resolved myself to it… Maybe I have? I’m prepared to face the consequences.”
“I’m not really getting the difference there,” said Liscia.
“There’s nothing standing in my way. So…” I puffed up my chest to look more confident. “Now I’m going to do as I please. Up until now, securing my power was the first priority, so I was avoiding policies that would cause too much of a stir in society. If a policy had been too out there, it would have caused needless internal confusion, and that could have benefited a foreign adversary. But now, I don’t have to worry about that. I’m going to do more and more to remake this country.”
I declared this pretty forcefully, but Liscia still had a dry look on her face.
“That’s fine, but… what does that have to do with you still not having laid a hand on me?”
I was silent.
It looked like I’d failed to dodge the issue. I’d thought I’d managed to change the topic, too…
Let me say now, it wasn’t that I was adverse to doing those things with Liscia and the others. No, really, I wanted to act all lovey-dovey with them. I mean, the current situation was giving me a serious case of blue balls. But, before that, there was something I needed to accomplish. For Liscia and the others’ sake, too.
“W-Well, you’ll find out the answer eventually,” I said.
“You’re not just dodging the issue?” Liscia demanded.
When Liscia tried to stare into my eyes, I averted them the best I could manage.
“I really do need more capable people working for me,” I said.
I was seated around a “kotatsu” table with Liscia, Aisha, Juna, and Roroa, who had woken up after having gone back to sleep, and we were eating lunch. I’d decided it was a good time to broach that topic.
This was my room in the castle, which I’d made after Hakuya had informed me, “It’s about time you got a room of your own.” The truth was, I had been allotted the room much earlier, but I’d been using it as a storage room for the Little Musashibos. Since he’d insisted I use it, I had given it a major remodel. For that, I’d used the financial support for supporting the king’s lifestyle (my salary) and went wild with major renovations to suit my tastes… and what was the result?
The two small rooms, each of which were around the size of a six-tatami-mat room (which would be 106.7 square feet), were connected by a door between them, creating a room almost like a Japanese apartment.
One room had carpet laid over wooden flooring, and that was where my work space with a treadle sewing machine was. It was a room where I could focus fully on making clothing or accessories, purely as a hobby, or dolls like the Little Musashibos.
The room that would serve as my ordinary living quarters was, thanks to some nice touches by the designer (me), a perfect reproduction of a Japanese-style room. As soon as I’d heard that there was a tatami culture in the Nine-Headed Dragon Archipelago, I had procured a number of those straw mats and laid them in this room.
Also, there was an area in the center of the room that had been dug out, on top of which I’d placed a round table with a blanket stuffed in between the space where our legs went and the bottom of the table. There was another hole dug out inside of that dug-out area, and beneath it I had installed the heater Genia developed based on an idea I gave her.
Basically, I had recreated a hori-gotatsu.
In the dug-out area where our feet rested, there was a dome-shaped iron grate, keeping us from touching the heater. It was a lovely space, warm in winter, and nice and breezy in summer once you took the blanket out. Truly, it was a space that let you feel the designer’s (my) attention to detail.
And, well, that was the sort of room I’d made, but all of my fiancées really liked it, especially Liscia, and they had taken to staying here. The hori-gotatsu was really popular with them. It had gotten pretty cold outside, after all.
After the annexation of Amidonia, Hakuya had said, “Please, understand, this is necessary to maintain your authority,” and forbade me from using the general cafeteria, so I had taken to having my breakfast and dinner (lunch was usually in the governmental affairs office) here around the table with Liscia and the others.
Most of the meals were made for me by the castle chefs, but on days like today, when I wanted to eat something Japanese, I made it myself. I had rice, soy sauce, and miso to work with, after all.
The meals I made were a novelty to them, so Liscia and the others liked them, but Hakuya and Marx weren’t happy about it. It wasn’t the taste they didn’t like. It was that I was making plain-looking food, serving it to my fiancées, and we were all eating it like it was delicious, which was pretty far from their image of what a king should be like. I didn’t see why even the food I ate had to be fit for a king, though…
For starters, neither Liscia, I, nor the others were the type to indulge in luxury. Juna and I were both former commoners, Liscia had lived a military life where supplies were limited, and having grown up in the forest, Aisha would eat anything so long as it tasted good. Even Roroa seemed interested, saying, “If we could make eatin’ food from your world a hot trend, it’d sell, don’t ya think?”
Besides, even though the food might be simple in appearance, it used rice, which wasn’t that common yet, so the cost was actually pretty high.
Today’s lunch, by the way, was oyakodon, miso soup, and nukazuke.
“Big Sister Ai, could ya pass the pickles?” Roroa asked.
“Mmf, mm-mm-mf (Here, Roroa),” Aisha said through mouthfuls of food.
“Hold on, Roroa,” said Liscia. “You have rice on your face.”
“Hm? Thanks, Big Sister Cia.”
Roroa let Liscia pick the grain of rice that was stuck by her mouth off of her face for her.
Juna looked on warmly as Aisha shoveled food into her face.
If you could cut out just this scene of all of us around the kotatsu, we looked like a real, happy family.
“Lady Aisha,” said Serina. “Would you perhaps like another serving of miso soup?”
“Mmf. I–I would, Madam Serina.”
“Ma… Lady Juna,” said Carla. “We’ve got… There is another serving of rice for you, too.”
“Hee hee! No need to be so stiff and formal, Carla,” Juna giggled.