Fortunately, the emperor’s proposal to arrange a marriage for me was called off.
– Baron Mars will soon play a crucial role in the battle against the Heavenly God Church. Surely you’re not thinking of letting him get swept up in unnecessary emotions and risk jeopardizing the mission?
The reason? Luna’s firm opposition.
Listing one logical reason after another why I shouldn’t be involved in a matchmaking arrangement, Luna charged ahead like an unstoppable train. The emperor who was initially flustered by her sudden outburst seemed to become intimidated by something and quickly retracted his offer, admitting it had been a mistake.
Now that I think about it… he even seemed to be sweating cold sweat.
Was the emperor’s health perhaps worse than expected?
Come to think of it, the palace, for all its vastness, didn’t seem well-heated.
I’d been freezing when I met the emperor.
Well, it’s not like it’s easy to keep such a massive space warm.
“I should mention it to the princess later. Maybe she can do something about the palace’s heating.”
“Why?”
“It was chilly inside when I went to see His Majesty. I don’t think it’s well-insulated.”
“That place? No way…”
The noble lady looked skeptical, but I made a mental note to suggest improvements to the princess when I had the chance, then shifted the topic.
“Anyway, do you need any more information on Pollo? It’s been about two months since your last date with him, right?”
“Huh? O-Oh… th-that’s…!”
The noble lady grew flustered and stammered. Perhaps everything that had happened recently had made her forget.
“There’s still some things I need to think about! I-I’ll tell you later!”
“Ah, I see.”
Well, since their first date ended in failure, she probably wanted everything to go perfectly next time.
Rather than pushing the idea now, it was only right to wait until her feelings settled and she was ready to plan something more special.
“Oh, there you are.”
“Princess? Were you looking for us?”
At that moment, a familiar face approached us.
With her usual grace, the princess walked up and stood before me.
“Hmm. Mars, do you notice anything different about me today?”
“You changed your lipstick. It’s a bit lighter than usual, but it suits you well. You also trimmed your bangs a bit, and your hair looks shinier. Did you change your conditioner? Looks like you’ve lost a bit of weight too. Are you eating properly?”
“Wh-What? Uh… I-I see…”
The princess seemed flustered by my detailed observation, and even her tone faltered.
For some reason, I found myself on the receiving end of the noble lady’s cold, disapproving stare. This prompted the princess to clear her throat and change the subject.
“Ahem! A-Anyway, let’s get back to the main point. Actually, if our club doesn’t have any activities lined up yet, I have a place I’d like to recommend.”
“A recommendation, Your Highness?”
“Hmm… I suppose it’s more of an investigation than a recommendation. A few months ago, a territory in the east requested reinforcements. The reason was to get rid of monsters that have been ruining the farmland.”
“Ah, those kinds of pests show up from time to time.”
Not all monsters were harmful to people.
Many of them had weak aggression, but among them were creatures that stole crops or dug up the ground. They were essentially natural disasters from a farmer’s perspective.
Even if a monster wasn’t particularly aggressive, that didn’t mean it posed no threat at all. If an ordinary farmer tried to deal with one, they could easily get injured.
These types of monsters tend to move in groups, which is why knights or mages must be called in to subdue them.
However, in smaller territories, there often weren’t enough skilled fighters available, so they sometimes requested reinforcements from outside.
“They show up in our territory from time to time too. When they do, I take care of them, or the Helios family lends us a knight or two.”
“Right. But during administrative processing, it was found that this particular territory hasn’t paid their taxes this month. Upon investigation, it seems the monster infestation has ruined the harvest, leading to this result.”
“So wiping out the monsters in that territory will be our mission this time.”
I’d been wondering what to do for the next club activity, and the princess had just handed me the perfect bait.
I’ll need to think of a plan to spark something between Pollo and her during this volunteer mission.
“What’s the name of the territory, by the way?”
***
The small and quiet territory of Marcel, located in the eastern part of the Empire.
Strange events had started occurring there, though no one could say exactly when it began.
“Honey… You don’t look well. Maybe you should take it easy today…”
“Shut up! Don’t you dare lay a hand on me, woman!”
“Kyaa!”
The gentle wife, who had come to see her husband off to work, was knocked backward by his sudden burst of rage.
As she fell, her elbow got scraped, leaving a minor wound. But her husband just clicked his tongue at the sight and left the house without a word.
“Hic… sob… Honey…”
In fact, this couple had once been known as one of the most loving in the entire territory.
They’d known each other since childhood, gradually came to understand each other’s hearts, and lived a peaceful life together, working the land like any ordinary couple.
But at some point, her husband had begun raising his voice at her whenever he came home, treating her like she was something filthy and beneath him.
Eventually, his time at home had grown so brief, it was as if he was avoiding the place altogether.
Even today, he’d only stopped by to retrieve some emergency money he had hidden away. If not for that, he likely wouldn’t have come home at all.
“Ellen, dear newlywed. Are you home by any cha—oh my goodness! What happened here?!”
“Ah… Grandma Jornu…”
“Heavens! You’re bleeding! You need to get that treated right away! Where’s your first-aid kit?!”
Thanks to the timely arrival of her elderly neighbor whom she called Grandma Jornu, the woman called Ellen was able to treat the wound on her elbow.
“Did your husband come by just now?”
“Sob… Yes. He dropped in for a moment and then left right away…”
“Goodness… What on earth is going on with the men these days…? Even when we file reports, there’s no response at all.”
The once-ordinary men of the Marcel territory had begun acting strangely just a few days ago.
At first, people brushed off the men’s dazed, absentminded behavior, thinking it was just fatigue from farm work.
But things quickly grew worse.
What they all had in common was that they began neglecting and mistreating their wives or lovers.
Even though Marcel was a small territory, it wasn’t as if there had never been any worthless husbands before.
However, once most of the men in the territory started acting the same way, a quiet sense of suspicion began to stir among the women.
In the end, they called the authorities or even visited the lord’s manor themselves to demand an investigation. But what they got in return was armed suppression and surveillance.
The police and newly formed male vigilante groups roamed the villages, watching to ensure women didn’t “step out of line”.
In a situation where they couldn’t even report what was happening, much less run away, the women were forced to live under tight control.
“If they were at least still working the fields, that’d be one thing. But they’ve abandoned everything and just disappeared to who knows where… At this rate, we’re all going to starve to death.”
“You’re right…”
In the end, all the remaining farm work fell to the women.
They weren’t incapable of farming. After all, they had watched and learned, but farming inevitably required strength.
Now that every man in the territory had changed, they were barely getting even a fraction of the usual work done.
“Still… Grandma, isn’t it dangerous for you to be here? What if you get caught by the patrols?”
“Forget it, forget it. What good would it do to keep an eye on an old hag like me. My husband’s dead, I’m withered and dried up, all alone. They might as well let me go see him and tell me to hurry up and die too.”
Ellen let out a small chuckle at the old woman’s cheeky remark, but in her heart, the worry and sorrow for her husband never stopped gnawing at her.
“It just doesn’t make sense. How could every man change like that, all at the same time… Could it be some kind of curse?”
“I’ve been thinking the same; magic or some other strange nonsense… but what would commoners like us know about things like that?”
They had their suspicions, but no proof. And having spent their whole lives farming, they had no clue how to deal with such a crisis.
On top of that, the Marcel Territory was quite far from the other lands. Unless someone made the effort to come here, there was no way anyone outside would even know about the strange events happening in the region.
“Oh! Grandma! Remember how we filed a petition to the Empire a while ago, asking for volunteers to help us deal with the monster wrecking our fields? Do you think maybe someone from there might come check on us?”
“That did happen… but it’s been two months already. If that petition had been accepted, they would’ve shown up long ago…”
“I know, but still…”
At the old woman’s realistic response, Ellen hung her head low and sunk deeper into despair.
Grandmother Jornu too wore a sorrowful expression as she embraced Ellen, this still a young newlywed…. hoping to comfort her in her pain.
***
“Is that Marcel over there?”
“It’s a bit farther off than I expected.”
“It’s been quite some time, so the fields look like a mess. All the fields we can see are on the verge of withering.”
Just then, a group of men and women set foot in the troubled land of Marcel.
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