Leave a comment

Meanwhile, Gemel had drowned himself in alcohol.

“T-That monster… It’s him! It’s definitely him! The mountain turned him into a monster and he came back, I tell yoo-woah! Bleagh! Hic… H-He’s gonna kill me…”

Dangling a practically empty bottle with him, he wandered through the night city from street light to street light.

He was alive. He survived in the dragon’s mountain, consumed the dragon’s power to grow strong, and now, he came down to the city.

He got some details about that girl called Lucella from Tim and everything coincided.

There was no doubt. That Lucella was “he” whose name he had forgotten.

Normally, this would be an absurd thing to even consider.

But Gemel was someone who never thought too deeply about the details and this time it just happened to work in his favor to see through the truth.

According to Tim, Lucella had lost the memories prior to entering the mountain.

—Memories? He has no memories? Am I safe then? But if he remembers it, I’ll become a murderer. Before that, that monster will kill me… will kill me for sure…

In his fear, Gemel thought about what would be the best move now.

But after drowning in alcohol and turning his simplistic thinking even worse, he came to a decision.

“Burp! Hic… right, let’s run… Yeah… I’m gonna survive this, haha, wahahahaa!”

Run somewhere far away. That was it.

Adventures weren’t bound to a place from the start. The Seventh Dice had enough power to go anywhere…

“You’re Sir Gemel, the leader of the Seventh Dice, yes?”

When he was addressed, Gemel finally noticed the existence of a man standing before him.

In the spiraling, rainbow-colored alley, he saw three men in black with two heads and four arms.

“Who… outta the way, imma keep drinkin…”
“I heard you entered the depths of Mount Kuguse back when it was still off limits.”

Those words made Gemel sober up a bit. Now the man before him appeared as one, with one head and two arms.

Nevertheless, there was still a man in black.

“Agh? Da heck are you…”

Gemel gauged the distance with the man in black, still holding the bottle of alcohol.

Some people did know that Seventh Dice entered the mountain since he talked with some traders about it when selling the herbs, but someone approaching him in an alley like this about it would mean they had some kind of a motive. It could be a threat, or a threat, or maybe a threat.

“Please relax. I didn’t come to blame you for it. Rather, I even admire you and would like to borrow your strength.”
“What…?”

Gemel put his guard up but the man in black didn’t move.

He continued talking unconcernedly.

“I want a guide. How about it? Of course, I will provide appropriate compensation…”

It was an honest and dry invitation like that of a thickheaded government official.

Mount Kuguse was a silent mountain, but it was said that flames dwelled inside it.

And that was the reason why the red dragon settled down on it.

To back that claim up, hot water… apparently gushed out of it from here and there. Lucella unfortunately never witnessed any of it during his stay on it, however.

Building a hot water fetching facility there and creating a pipeline to the city would be a next-to-impossible task, but fortunately, there was a spring source at the foot of the mountain near where Kugutfulm was, so the hot water drawn from there was spread through the city.

For that reason, this city had been known as a hot-spring resort since the old times.

“Is the water temperature good, Lucella? The water here is too hot so they cool it down before using it, but the equipment isn’t maintained anywhere other than the place we use, so I’m not sure how it is here.”
“It’s good… I mean, I probably wouldn’t get a burn even if it was boiling…”
“Ahahaha… you have a point. I mean, boiling water wouldn’t put a single wound on my beautiful skin either. You who lived on the mountain would totally be fine.”

Inside the bath that was three times bigger than an average household’s, Lucella was enjoying his first bath in a long while.

Viola’s voice came from the outside of the window where she was tinkering with the equipment.

This was the inn that the Golden Helmet used as their base. This was the indoor bath attached to one of the guest rooms.

“So you’re using the entire inn as a base? That’s amazing. I guess that’s to be expected of the city’s top party…”
“I mean, this is Wein’s grandma’s inn. She’s already old and couldn’t handle the strain so she closed it down, but then we said we would use it. We have meals prepared for us and pay the ‘hotel charges’ too, but we can be flexible with it and choose not to accommodate guests when we are not feeling well.”
“…Mr. Wein’s appearance made me think he was a fugitive or something, but he was actually a local huh?”
“Ahahaha… Wein’s the type to focus on looking the part and has looked like that since we were beginners. But now we’re the top party in the city. Looking the part is important too. After all, something that is only true in appearance can eventually become the real thing.”

Viola peered in through the window while laughing loudly.

She was peeking quite shamelessly. However, the steam from the room quickly clouded her glasses.

“Ms. Kafal isn’t with you?”
“She said she would come, but I told her not to.”
“Oh my, why did you do that?”
“Do you even need to ask…”

Viola already understood Kafal’s behavioral pattern very well.

Kafal wanted to follow Lucella to the bath, but Lucella declined it. It was probably because he found it embarrassing in various ways, but Kafal was dejected by it for some reason, so Lucella felt like he had done something bad.

—Is it really that shocking to be denied following me in the bath? For a Dragon, I mean… She did lick my body all over in the mountain. Was she trying to do something similar in a human way?

In the mountains, perhaps that was acceptable. But this was a human city.

“I think… Kafal really wants to keep caring for me with all she has.”
“Perhaps. Why not let yourself be spoiled?”
“Uhh…”
“Is it embarrassing?”
“That’s part of it…”

To say it accurately, it was because he was embarrassed about being treated as a kid so much. But there was a reason why he started feeling that way.

“I… feel like… she spoiled me more on the mountain… But that’s because I was overwhelmingly weaker in the mountain, so I had to rely on her to even survive… But this is a human city, and I’m acting to protect Kafal now… so maybe it’s because my feelings are a little different now… I mean, I guess part of the reason is the public gazes too…”
“I see, I see. You may not be wrong, Lucella, but that might make Ms. Kafal lonely.”
“I… suppose that’s the case.”

If Kafal was still spoiling Lucella as before and simply chose the human method for it, this would probably make her very lonely…

“Lucella!”
“Wah?!”

But then, Kafal suddenly pulled the door open and entered the bathroom.

She was originally a fake body being manipulated by magic, but the flaming dress was now gone from her body, leaving her stark-naked.

Her skin was sublimely white. Her youthful and supple body had a perfect molding that gave a sense of functional beauty, but a certain part of her was in a heavyweight class, as if it was the symbol of motherhood.

“Wein… taught… me. Humans… learn… true… feelings… by… ‘naked relationship’.”
“What did that b̲a̲s̲t̲a̲r̲d̲ teach you!!”
“Wash.”
“Wait, hold it for a second!”

Kafal, with a sponge in her hand, dragged Lucella out of the bath and had him sit before her, and then proceeded to polish every part of her body.

“So passionate.”
“That’s normally something you say about lovers…”

The spectator peeking from the window expressed her impressions.