Volume 4 Chapter 7: The Guard Station

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Author: 夜州 (Yashu)

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The carriage carrying Liltana arrived at the guard station.

The guards all became nervous at a noble suddenly showing up at the station, bodyguards and all.

When Nigeet, who had been the coachman, opened the door, Liltana got off with an angry expression.

“Umm… what business do you have here at the station…?”

While glaring at the guard who had asked the question, Liltana opened her mouth.

“There has been a kidnapping in the nobles’ district!”

At those words from Liltana, the guard became even more nervous. For the ones in charge of security in the nobles’ district, a kidnapping in the nobles’ district was their mistake, and allowing such a thing to happen wasn’t some simple blunder either.

“?!… p-please tell us about it inside. I’ll go call the person in charge immediately.”

Led by the guard, Liltana and Nigeet went to a simplistic reception room. Quite unlike nobles’ reception rooms, it was a room for meetings only, with no furnishings or decorations at all.

Liltana, in a bad mood, sat down in the center of the sofa she was gestured to sit down on, and Nigeet went and stood behind her. The guard left the room, saying ‘I’ll go call the boss immediately’.

Not long after, a well-built man wearing a slightly fancier outfit than the rest of the guards who was most likely the guard’s boss entered the room, and sat down in front of Liltana, with another guard sitting down next to him to write everything down.

“Well if it isn’t Your Highness the Imperial Princess Liltana. I apologise for having to make you come to such a place. I am Balatta, and I manage this station. Pleased to make your acquaintance.”

Balatta, the guard captain, had already checked the carriage before entering the room. To become the captain of the guards, he had to be able to recognise any noble’s coat-of-arms at a glance.

If he wasn’t able to, he might have been disrespectful to them, so he had had to commit them all to memory thoroughly.

And Liltana’s carriage didn’t just belong to some noble from the Kingdom. It bore the coat-of-arms of the country of the Baisas Empire. As she was a student from another country, Balatta made sure to pay special attention to be polite.

Then, Balatta continued speaking.

“So, Your Imperial Highness… if you could tell us about what happened.”

“Got it. Nigeet, you tell them. You can just repeat what you said to me.”

“Yes, Liltana-sama. Well then, this was a little earlier, but––”

Nigeet explained the situation. As the story continued, Balatta frowned.

“Three pitch-black carriages… Oy, go find out if there was anyone who saw such carriages enter the nobles’ district.”

A guard, who had been standing in a corner of the room, nodded, and left.

“Thank you for the valuable information. I’ll have people check each noble’s mansion, as well as send word of this to the royal castle. It’s our job from here on.”

Putting his hands on the table, Balatta bowed deeply.

Liltana, happy with how the captain, Balatta, had treated her politely, left the station soon after.

She got in the carriage, Nigeet climbed up onto the coachman’s mount, and the carriage began to move.

“Now, let’s return to the mansion.”

Making a slightly worried expression, Liltana opened her mouth.

“––hang on a minute… Actually, go to Cain’s place.”

“But that’s… You haven’t even told him to expect you to go over… If we just go over all of a sudden, Liltana-sama, Count Silford won’t have time to prepare a proper reception for you…”

Nigeet was confused by Liltana’s instructions, but Liltana’s resolve was firm.

“You know where Cain’s mansion is, right? It’s fine, so just take us there.”

“––Understood.”

Nigeet sighed, but changed the direction the carriage was heading in, and they made their way towards Cain’s mansion.

◇◇◇

Making sure that Liltana and the others had left, Balatta called for even the off-duty guards and told them about the emergency and what they should do.

The station had about sixty guards manning it, working in shifts, but in case of emergencies, all of them could be called on.

The protection of the nobles’ district within the royal capital was simply such an important task.

And, less than an hour later, all the guards had been gathered. Then, Balatta called out to all of them.

“This is the first important case that has happened since I became the captain of the station here! We have received information that there was a kidnapping incident in the nobles’ district today. The information contained the fact that the criminals had three black carriages. I want you to search for them in threes. If you find them, two of you stay there and one come back to report. Then, move out everyone!”

“““““Yessir!!!”””””

The guards all formed groups of three and left the station, fully-equipped.

They split up into two groups, one to try and find the carriages, and one to check on nobles who had daughters who might have been kidnapped.

Of course, there was also a team sent to investigate records of who had entered the nobles’ district.

Balatta called out to the vice-captain, Delga, that he himself would be going to the royal castle to report this, then left the station.

While Balatta was away from the station, Delga would take charge of the station.

As everyone else had left to search for the carriages, Delga opened his mouth in the now deserted room.

“Hey, you erased the evidence, right…?”

As if in response to those words, the door opened and three guards entered the room.

“…Of course. We have disposed of the records of entrances into the nobles’ district. However, we didn’t erase those of that girl. If the captain finds out she’s a commoner, he’ll lose interest, right? Anyway, to think the Imperial Princess’ carriage would see it happen… Those guys screwed up real bad.”

A guard abused them while sitting in a chair, putting his feet up on the table.

“Come on, don’t say that. We can definitely squeeze more money out of them. And if Balatta is held responsible for this, then I’ll become the captain. Then, the higher-ups will also understand that this is what happens if you let a commoner become the captain.”

Delga, who was badmouthing them in the same way, was ‘Delga von Jinlitt’, the son of a noble. As the third son of a baron, he had no right to inheritance, and, feeling dissatisfied at having to lead a life as a commoner in the future, he had gathered people in a similar situation and gotten himself an extra source of income working for companies behind the scenes.

The current captain, Balatta, was a commoner, and as he was a sincere person who was good at what he did, and had been appointed captain due to his abilities.

All that had awoken envy in Delga.

The four of them had a short meeting around the table, then returned back to their respective jobs.

“To make such a fuss over a single commoner brat… Well, it’s not like she’ll see the light of day ever again anyway…”

Delga muttered to himself while smiling evilly and gazing out of the window at the scenery.

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TN: honestly, this is all Yuuya’s fault because he set up a kingdom, clearly dividing people into nobility and commoners. Like, the dude came from an era where kingdoms (and other single-head-of-state governmental forms) had been proven to not work / work badly, and even his own home nation was a democracy. I’d get it if he were to experiment with different types of democracies, or just copy Japan, but why a kingdom? anyway, everything’s Yuuya’s fault

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