Master and Slaves

"Master, Lord Azret has come."

Hm? There should be nothing today.

"What is it, I wonder. I will go look."

"Lord Azret is waiting in the drawing room."

When I moved to leave the living room, Lotte called to me.

"Thank you."

I had nearly gone to the entrance.

I thanked Lotte and headed for the drawing room.

"What is it?"

Enter the drawing room, and Azret sat on the sofa looking at a loss, the same as yesterday.

"Hey, Hiroyuki. There is something I want to ask."

But the moment I asked, Azret straightened his posture.

"What is it?"

"Hiroyuki, you know a person called Hiiro Astal."

...

"Then, Muriel. I am going."

"You truly will not take anyone."

"Ah, yeah. Sorry."

"N-no. I am sorry."

Muriel bowed her head with the worried face as it was.

From Muriel’s side, she was probably worried I might not come back, like in the royal capital.

"I am reflecting on that too. I will not use this as much as I can. And Azret is there too, so if anything happens I will contact you at once."

I tapped the broadsword belted on the left of my waist.

"Yes. Understood. Then, take care."

Even so Muriel smiled and saw me off.

...

"Well, that is why you are popular, Hiroyuki."

Walking the two of us to the destination, the adventurers’ guild, Azret said that while nodding repeatedly.

"What do you mean?"

"No, bowing your head and apologizing to a Dule is not something one can do often."

"Is that so?"

I twisted my head.

I liked the Dules, and it would be fine to say I loved them.

If so, what I did wrong was wrong, and there was no need to put on airs.

Apologize obediently, and their moods improved too.

"A master can suppress a Dule with force."

That was probably the difference between a lover or family, and a slave such as a Dule.

...What did Freit do?

One was his elder sister, one his niece.

He himself had said he loved the two.

Even so, did he not bow his head?

"Well, even without that, one does not do it in front of people, normally."

I see. That was so too.

For form, I was a master of Dules.

A master under a slave’s thumb looked terribly unreliable.

Come to think of it, Rosina had looked under Sheena’s thumb.

Now I understood that had been acting or something.

But she had looked unreliable.

Fine when it was only us, but in front of a third party, better to stop?

"At most, that is probably your good point, Hiroyuki."

Lifted up, dropped, lifted up again.

What did Azret want to do with me?

"Now then, we have arrived. Here."

Azret pointed at a large four-story building.

True, above the large entrance with double doors, on a large sign again, "Adventurers’ Guild" was written.

"Come, this way."

Follow Azret’s guidance, and on the opposite side from the building’s entrance there was another pair of double doors.

Noise could be heard from inside.

"Even this, it is daytime now, so it is still better."

Azret smiled wryly, then opened those double doors and went in.

I entered after Azret too.

There was a restaurant of a certain size.

About twenty round tables, and at five of them customers were holding a banquet with tankards in hand.

What were they doing in the middle of the day?

And there were about twenty counter seats too.

Here about two sat and were eating.

"This is where the adventurers drink and eat, and exchange information or take requests... ah, there, there. Hey!"

Azret explained to me while looking around the shop.

Then, apparently the person he wanted was there. He stopped the explanation and raised a hand to call to them.

Everyone in the shop looked this way.

But the unrelated people soon lost interest and returned to their meals and talk.

"Here, here!"

Among them, a man of one group of men and women sitting at a round table raised a hand.

"Hiiro!"

At the same time, one woman shouted my alias and stood.

Then that woman came to me with quick steps.

Large tears floating in her eyes.

"Why... why did you not contact me!"

The woman came to in front of me, shouted that, and hugged me tight.

"I was worried..."

Eh? What? What is this?

To me, confused, I did not understand what was what.

The woman, after hugging me, parted her body and looked up at my face.

"I am truly glad."

There was a face I knew, spilling tears.

Somehow her face looked red.

"Ah, yeah, Beata."

From the suddenness, answering was all I could do.

I wanted to praise myself for being able to say the name well.

No, I had known they were here.

I had heard from Azret that there were people searching for me.

We had fought together when we exterminated the giant rats in the royal capital, about that much, but I had not thought they would put out a search request.

I had fled the royal capital, and had used an alias, so normally they would not reach me.

But Azret had come to visit me, the name different but the appearance similar.

As expected of a veteran adventurer.

That sharpness of intuition was probably necessary for an adventurer.

So we had been brought here by Azret, but I had not thought I would be hugged.

Maybe satisfied, Beata smiled at me, returned to the round table with quick steps, and patted the empty seat beside her own.

Sit there, maybe.

...Had Beata been that kind of character?

She had seemed to have more restraint...

I had only met her a little, so there was no way to know the real her.

Which meant, was that her true self?

"I will keep this from Muriel and the others."

While I was at a loss, Azret beside me whispered at my ear and winked.

No need to do unnecessary things.

I moved to say that and swallowed the words hard.

"Come, come, let us go."

Then, knowing my heart or not, Azret took me and headed for them.

...

"Heh, something like that happened."

"That is right. Giant rats boiled out one after another, and I alone went around and cut them down, bang bang."

"That is amazing!"

Was that how it was?

Truly a big mouth.

I put in a cut in my heart at Heinz, the noble and vanguard, who was telling Azret an emphasized, or rather almost a lie, and escaped reality, and still looked at the situation I could not escape.

Beside me sat Beata, a priest-warrior of the Surmares order, drinking.

Ale, a commoner’s drink fermented from barley malt, and the strength was not that high, apparently.

Even so, the eyes of Beata, who had drunk several cups of it, were glazed.

Hugging me might have been because she had drink in her.

"Ah, that will not do. It was a good chance, and yet."

On the seat opposite Beata, with me between, sat Rita the thief.

Oops.

Must not call her a thief.

"So, what was a good chance?"

I asked toward Rita.

"Rita said it to Beata. Borrow the power of drink, and you can do anything."

Then Fiene the magician, sitting beyond Rita, answered in Rita’s place.

"Muu. I did it, did I not."

Rita grimaced.

"But you drank that much."

"Does she have memory, I wonder."

"Hah."

Rita and Fiene looked at Beata and sighed.

The Beata in question was rocking her head back and forth and starting to row a boat.

"Detoxify?"

Il the elf, sitting beyond Beata, asked in a voice barely heard by us.

"It is fine, is it not? If she wakes now, she will probably be down."

Fiene answered while waving a hand.

Why would she be down?

"The one who is drunk by the drink is at fault."

The last one, Ovnil the dwarf, muttered from further beyond Fiene.

Then he drained a tankard somewhat larger than ours in one go.

How many cups was this?

In that small body, where did that drink go?

"Hey, hey. Get that drunk, and you will be snatched by a kidnapper and made a slave."

Heinz, who had interrupted his talk with Azret, cut into our talk.

"In this city it is no joke."

To that, Fiene frowned and cut in at Heinz.

"It is not that. There are proper rules about slaves, and the guards patrol, so public order is on the good side."

"But it is the city of slaves, so..."

Azret smiled wryly and defended this city, but Heinz returned that, looking suspicious.

But Azret should be the senior as an adventurer. Why was Heinz looking down like this?

"There really are many, slaves."

Rita heard Heinz’s words and looked around.

At one of the four tables with people, there seemed to be a slave.

There, a sturdy man had a small cat-eared woman sitting on his knee, and drank while kneading her exposed ample breasts.

The clothes were not slipped off the skin. They were open large from the start, so she might be a Dule.

That woman did not dislike it, put a hand around the man’s neck, wore an alluring smile, and seemed to be flattering the man.

"...It makes me sick. The man... and the woman..."

Fiene glanced at them with eyes as if looking at something dirty, then downed the ale in one go.

"I am Beata! Please, forgive me!"

There Beata stood suddenly and shouted in a loud voice.

We flinched and looked around.

The gazes of everyone in the shop turned this way, but soon returned.

The people at the table with the slave did not seem to mind either.

Her tongue had not been working, so they probably had not understood what she was saying.

Everyone except Beata, including Fiene, sighed in relief.

The Beata in question had fallen face down on the round table and was sleeping.

Well, each had their own thinking.

"A-anyway! Good that Hiiro came back! Now there are three magicians! The next request, we will succeed for sure!"

"Yeah!!"

To Heinz’s forced, absurd words to close it, the four except Beata raised their hands and answered.

No, I was not a companion.

I looked at Azret. He smiled wryly and looked at me.

Now then, what to do?

...

Azret and I ate some snacks in place of lunch, then withdrew early from them, who were getting lively.

As things were, being a member of that party would become an established fact.

In that situation, I, who had a little drink in me, and Azret too felt a sense of crisis.

Well, it was talk at a drinking place after all, so I did not think it should be taken at face value.

Anyway, Azret, having finished one job, returned to the inn he was renting, and I returned to Freit’s house too.

On the way, I met a rare pair.