"Phew."
Rei let out a sigh of relief as he dropped off the felled logs and immediately slipped away from the area in Gilm where the Alchemists gathered—the place where Treant Forest wood was magically processed.
Alchemists were largely driven by curiosity.
Bringing a fairy to such a place meant that truly anything could have happened.
Fortunately, the fairy Nielson was inside Rei's Dragon Robe.
In fact, perhaps because the simplified air conditioner made it comfortable, she was fast asleep inside the robe.
The fact that she kept sleeping even as Rei moved around showed just how comfortable the inside of the Dragon Robe must be.
Honestly, Rei had his thoughts about Nielson behaving like that, but if she had been awake, there was a high chance it would have turned into a major commotion, so in that sense, it was a relief.
"Alright, now for the real thing."
"Umu. An audience with Lord Daskar, huh... I wonder if Lord Daskar will truly be alright?"
Elena, who had not entered the Alchemists' facility, spoke up upon hearing Rei's words.
If Elena had entered the facility, the Alchemists would surely have taken interest in her Magic Items and crowded around her.
The Adventurers and Woodcutters they had encountered in the Treant Forest wouldn't have done anything discourteous to Elena, but he couldn't expect the same from the Alchemists in this facility.
Elena's whip-sword Mirage was certain to especially pique the Alchemists' curiosity.
In that sense, it was only natural that Elena had waited outside the facility.
"So, how is Nielson doing? It doesn't seem to have caused any commotion, so I suppose there's no problem."
"Yeah. She's sleeping soundly inside the Dragon Robe. Though the question is when to wake her up."
If Rei were to wake Nielson under the current circumstances, she would be curious about everything on the way to the Lord's Manor.
It wouldn't be strange at all if Nielson, succumbing to curiosity, ended up flying all over town.
That was exactly why Rei wanted to avoid waking Nielson in the middle of town if at all possible.
But if he let Nielson keep sleeping and only woke her upon arriving in front of Daskar, she would likely reproach him.
From Nielson's perspective, she would be suddenly woken up right in front of her negotiation partner—though it was questionable whether she actually viewed it that way.
Thinking about it normally, it would be unreasonable to expect Nielson not to feel dissatisfied with Rei for putting her in that situation.
"Hmm. In that case, how about asking for a little time before meeting Lord Daskar, having a room prepared, and waking Nielson there?"
"...That really is the simplest approach."
Rei agreed that Elena's suggestion was the only option.
(Should I just ask Grimm to make a birdcage that prevents fairies from teleporting? ...Ah, Grimm. Come to think of it, I probably should have asked Grimm about fairies.)
It was truly a belated thought, but considering this matter, Grimm—who had lived a long time; or rather, since he was Undead, the expression "dead" might be more accurate—might know something about fairies that Rei did not.
(I also want to find out whether the Dragonias corpse we left in the other world can be used as material, so I'll drop by the Underground Space once this is over. Though I'm hesitating on whether it's a good idea to bring Nielson to where Anastasia is.)
Harboring such questions, Rei headed toward the Lord's Manor while talking with Elena and Ara and stroking Set.
There were a few people along the way who wanted to play with Set, but realizing that Rei was in the middle of work—or perhaps seeing that the famous Elena was with him—no one tried to speak to them.
A few people did try to approach, but companions who understood the situation stopped them.
And so, they eventually arrived at the Lord's Manor...
"I never expected Lord Daskar to be the busy one. It saved us this time, though."
In one of the rooms of the Lord's Manor, Rei muttered those words.
Rei and his party had sought an audience with Daskar, but they were told that Daskar was currently meeting with someone else and asked to wait a while, then guided to this guest room.
"You think so? Lord Daskar is the lord of Gilm. And with the Expansion Construction underway, many people want a piece of the interests and profits. That alone means there are many who wish to see Lord Daskar. In that sense, I think something like this is not uncommon."
For Elena, this level of thing was probably only natural.
However, in Rei's case, whenever he had gone to see Daskar before, he was mostly able to meet him whenever he wanted.
Considering that, this situation was just slightly unexpected.
"But for Lady Elena and Lord Rei to come and not be able to see him immediately... who could be here? Could it be someone truly important?"
"Ara is likely right. Setting me aside, if Lord Daskar can't see Elena immediately... could it be someone from the King's Faction?"
Elena was someone that Daskar could never treat carelessly.
After all, she essentially served as a goodwill ambassador from the Noble's Faction.
In reality, the stronger implication was that she served as a deterrent and watchkeeper to prevent Noble Faction Nobles from interfering with Gilm's Expansion Construction.
More accurately, Elena's desire to see Rei was the biggest reason, though.
Regardless, there was no doubt that Elena was an important figure to Daskar.
Originally, despite being located in the Noble District, it would have been more fitting to have her stay at this Lord's Manor rather than Marina's house.
However, at Elena's request—and also at Marina's request, who knew Daskar's embarrassing childhood history—the current arrangement had come to be.
"Rei, shouldn't you wake Nielson soon? If you do it now, it's still before Lord Daskar arrives."
"Hm? Ah, right. Nielson. Hey, Nielson. Time to wake up."
Rei took Nielson out from inside his Dragon Robe and called out to her.
Nielson, who had been sleeping in the cool air of midsummer, opened her eyes as she was jostled repeatedly on Rei's palm.
"Nn... nnn... huh?"
On Rei's palm, Nielson looked around at her surroundings.
What spread out before her was a scene she had never seen before.
Until just moments ago—before Nielson fell asleep—she should have been in the Treant Forest.
And yet, when Nielson woke up, she found herself in a place she had never visited before, so it would be unreasonable to tell her not to be surprised.
That said, Nielson's surprise lasted only a few seconds; in the next moment, curiosity won out, and she was looking around with fascination.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa. What's this, what's this, what's this?"
Flapping her wings and flying through the air, Nielson zoomed around the guest room.
For Nielson, who only knew natural surroundings like forests and groves, the various things now before her eyes must have been extremely novel.
"Calm down! ...Just so you know, the furniture, vases, paintings, and such in this room are all quite high-quality. If you break anything, it'll only hurt our position in negotiations."
In truth, Rei didn't have the discerning eye to identify genuine articles to that extent.
Still, since it was a guest room Daskar had prepared for Rei and Elena, he couldn't imagine he would deliberately place fakes in such a place.
There was a possibility that forgeries existed that could deceive the discerning eye of whoever Daskar... no, whoever was in charge of procuring these items.
However, someone who worked in a frontier—a place where rare goods became so commonplace they were everywhere—would have an extremely sharp eye.
That said, there was a difference between raw materials and artworks.
"I know that! But it's all so new, so what's the harm? ...Whoa, whoa, what's this? Somewhere to hide when something happens?"
Saying that, Nielson slipped inside a vase placed in the corner of the room.
To Rei, it didn't look like a particularly expensive item, but still, since it was placed in this room, it was easy to imagine it had a value appropriate as an artwork or fine art piece.
"That's a vase. Normally you'd use it to display flowers and such. ...In the first place, you're about the only one who would actually get inside a vase like that. Could Ielo fit in one too?"
"If it tried, it probably could, and Ielo is curious about things precisely because it's small. If it were here, I'm sure it would have happily gone inside."
Elena replied to Rei's words.
In fact, Ielo did fly around various places inside Marina's house, but Rei didn't know much about that because whenever Set came over, Ielo would play with Set.
Ielo exploring the inside of Marina's house was largely because it simply had no one to play with.
If a friend like Set came over, naturally Ielo would not play alone but with Set.
And since Set's body size made it impossible to enter Marina's house, the play area would be the courtyard.
That was why Rei had never seen Ielo moving around inside Marina's house.
"Come on, come back here for now. There are baked sweets here."
Judging that being inside the vase was dangerous in various ways—dangerous for the vase, not for Nielson—Rei lured Nielson over with the baked sweets on the table.
Nielson must have been more interested in the baked sweets than playing inside the vase.
Flapping her wings, she flew over to the table.
"Baked sweets, you mean these? They smell really good."
"Yeah. ...Have you never had them before?"
"That's right. First time seeing them, and eating them."
Baked sweets—cookies, by Rei's understanding.
Nielson held a cookie nearly half her body size with an expression of pure delight.
"Nom."
Nielson bit into the giant cookie.
Naturally, since it was a cookie, biting into it caused fragments to crumble off.
Even those fragments were about the size of Nielson's own hand.
Nielson happily ate the scattered cookie pieces too.
Watching her like this, she really didn't seem like the type to play pranks that could cost someone their life.
Nielson, happily stuffing her cheeks with cookie, was, to put it conservatively, adorable.
She didn't seem at all like part of the group currently causing various pranks in the Treant Forest.
"Is it good?"
"Yes!"
A radiant smile—this was probably the kind of smile that phrase referred to.
Thinking that, Rei ate a cookie himself.
At any rate, as long as Nielson was absorbed in the cookies, he didn't have to worry about things in the room getting broken.
That said, while there was a fair number of cookies, Nielson appeared to be eating far more than her own body size.
Yet her eating speed showed no sign of slowing, and on top of that, seeing that her figure hadn't changed at all, it wouldn't be strange for Rei to wonder just where all those cookies had disappeared to.
"Hehe."
A small laugh reached Rei's ears as he watched Nielson.
Rei was slightly surprised when he saw who it was.
Because the one who laughed was not Ara but Elena.
If it had been Ara who laughed, Rei wouldn't have been that surprised.
But seeing Elena smile while looking at Nielson... yes, that was unexpected for Rei, and precisely because it was unexpected, he found himself captivated by Elena's smile.
Elena, naturally noticing Rei's gaze, turned a puzzled look toward him.
"What is it?"
"Ah, no. Yeah. It's nothing."
Averting his eyes from the golden hair that looked as though sunlight itself had become her hair, Rei drank his black tea, his cheeks faintly tinged red as if to hide his embarrassment.
Elena, who had asked the question, looked puzzled at Rei's behavior.
"Hmm, I see. ...Hm?"
While harboring doubts about Rei's demeanor, Elena decided that if Rei said so, then so be it—but her gaze was suddenly drawn toward the door.
A moment later, Rei and then Ara turned their gazes toward the door as well, and eventually, the sound of knocking echoed through the room.