“Well, what is it? Can you tell Papa~n? Uwah~ what is it?”
“Tonight’s dinner~”
“Mm, mm!”
“It’s Papa’s favorite!”
“Mm! Papa~n will be very happy! What’s for dinner tonight?”
“It’s Gabra fish à la meuniere.”
“Is that so― What’s wrong? Rii-tan?”
Raeven saw the unhappy expression on his son’s face and frantically followed up with a question.
“I should have been the one to say it!”
A bolt of lightning seemed to flash across Raeven’s back.
“Is that ~chu er, I mean, is that true? Well, then it’s Papa~n’s fault. Please forgive me. Rii-tan, do you want to tell me anything?”
As Raeven looked at her with furrowed brows, his wife, not knowing what to do, covered her face.
“Rii-tan, why don’t you tell Papa~n?”
With a hmph of annoyance, the boy jerked his head aside. The small motion had a massive impact on Raeven. With his despair-filled face, he looked like he had just been ordered to commit suicide.
“I’m really sorry, Rii-tan, Papa~n is a moron and forgot everything, could you tell me?”
His son glanced at him from the corner of his eye. He didn’t seem ready to make a decision yet.
“Not telling Papa~n? Papa~n’s going to cry~”
“That ― About that, it’s Papa’s favorite fish~”
“Really now? Papa is so happy to hear that!”
Raeven couldn’t help kissing his son’s pink cheeks. Because it tickled, the boy laughed innocently.
“All right, then let’s go have dinner!”
“―-I don’t think it’s ready yet.”
“―What.”
An annoyed expression spread over Raeven’s face, as though a basin of cold water had been dumped over his head. Although it was an easy matter to order the chefs to hurry up, they still needed to follow the appropriate steps to do their work, and those steps had to be executed with specific timing. Thus, if he selfishly disrupted their routine, the food would not be as good as it could be.
As such, even if he was not happy about the wait, Raeven did not give those orders. It was also because he wanted his son to have the best meal possible.
“All right, your father needs to work. Let’s go.”
“Kay~”
Raeven could not hide the despondence he felt as he heard his son’s lively reply.
“Koff! Wait, actually, I’m done with work.”
“Really?”
“Yes, really. Don’t worry, work is over.”
“…Is that so? It’s not good to procrastinate.”
“…”
Even if his wife turned a cold stare on him, Raeven would not let his son go. He clutched the boy tightly, and sighed as he felt the heat from his son’s hot body flow into him.
“…Well, I was already at a dead end anyway,” he muttered. “Not like I could finish it in a day.”
This was not an excuse. He did not have anything urgent to take care of.
His wife nodded in acknowledgement.
“I understand, but still… it seems really troublesome.”
“That’s what I said. I don’t need more arms or legs to do my work, just good heads.”
“How about my brother?”
“He’s talented, but given that your family’s busy enough with its domain as it is, I don’t think I could call him over, right? Do you know anyone else who can be trusted?”
Raeven had already asked this question several times, and his wife had given him the same answer; there’s no noble who can deal with these matters like you can.
The truth was that if someone else was like that, his life wouldn’t have been as difficult as it was now. In the end, all that he could do was to look among the commoners. If this was a place like the Empire, where there was a centralized system of education that trained people up for public service, it would have been fine, but in the Kingdom, looking for hidden talents was like finding a needle in a haystack. All he could do was listen to rumors of talented people and recruit them.
As he thought of how much time and effort this would need, Raeven’s heart sank. At this moment, his son had a good idea.
“Papa~n, I want to help you to work too~”
“Uwah~ Rii-tan, thank you very much! I love ~chu most of all!”
Raeven did not stop kissing his son as he continued his baby talk. This was without doubt the happiest moment of his life.
He could forget the stress of his daily life and achieve a small measure of peace.
Even if I have to sacrifice myself, I will protect all of this, Raeven vowed in his heart.
It had been two months since the Empire’s declaration of war, and now it was winter.
In villages all over the Kingdom, the bulk of the work had transited from outdoors to indoors. Fewer people ventured outside now, and not many people were still working. This was true even for the adventurers, who typically worked all year round.
Although there were cases where hungry monsters suddenly appeared in villages and requests were hurriedly made, for the most part, there was less to do. It was more dangerous to explore ruins or unknown frontiers during this period. Because of that, adventurers treated this season as something of a vacation, and channelled their energies into training, recreation or their side businesses.
That said, the Fortress City of E-Rantel was not like that. It was filled with life and energy.
This commotion, however, was somewhat different from that of other cities. The activity here was not born of the usual energy of city life.
The source of this energy came from the outermost sector of the Triple Fortress.
The countless people gathered here were shabbily dressed, and were probably peasants. But their numbers were astonishing ― there were around 250'000 of them.
Of course, E-Rantel did not always have so many people in it.
It was true that E-Rantel was the nexus of trade and traffic between three kingdoms, with people, money, good and other things flowing freely through it. Because of that, the city was a large one.
However, that by itself was not enough reason for just one sector to be packed with 250'000 people.
In that case, why were there so many people here?
The ones who could best shed light on this was a group of young men.
Carrying bladeless spears ―more like sticks, really― many young men stabbed and thrust at dummies made of wood and straw, clad in rusted armor and shields.
This was combat training. Everyone gathered here today ― the 250'000 citizens taken from the Kingdom ― had been conscripted to fight the Empire.
Loud battlecries rang out everywhere. Of course, not many of them were actually shouted in earnest.