“Ah, this is truly something special.”
After the women had finished their turn, Jin and Reinhard entered the bath.
“Jin, you truly are a mystery through and through.”
Reinhard spoke as he stretched his limbs out in the hot water.
“Sometimes it’s almost as if you weren’t born in this world at all.”
Jin’s heart skipped a beat for a moment at those words.
“No, I don’t mean that as a mere metaphor,” Reinhard continued, his eyes fixed on the steam-covered ceiling. “You might not know this, but there is a legend in my country.”
“A legend?”
Jin listened intently, hearing the word for the first time.
“...They say that beyond the sun in the sky, there exists another world.”
“What?”
Perhaps taking Jin’s reflexive question as disbelief, Reinhard waved a hand in front of his face as if to signal that he didn't quite believe it himself.
“A world in a place like that... it sounds unbelievable, I know. But well, it’s just a legend, after all.”
He went on.
“They say our ancestors came from that world.”
“They came from there?”
“Yeah. Whether they came to pioneer a new world or were driven out of their original one, the legend doesn’t say.”
Jin had never heard such a legend, and his interest was piqued.
When he commented that it was an intriguing story, Reinhard smiled. “That’s unexpected. Are you interested? In that case, there should be a storyteller who passes it down in the Celuroa Kingdom, which we’re scheduled to pass through later.”
After saying that, his demeanor shifted completely.
“By the way, Jin, changing the subject—what do you think of Lady Beena and Elsa?”
“Huh?”
Jin went blank for a moment, unable to keep up with a conversation that had suddenly pivoted one hundred and eighty degrees.
“I mean, even from my perspective as her cousin, Elsa’s looks aren’t bad at all. And Lady Beena is quite exceptionally cute, isn’t she?”
His gears finally starting to turn, Jin called the two of them to mind.
“Beena is... well, I suppose she’s like a handful of a little sister.”
“And Elsa?”
“She’s... hmm, a slightly risky little sister.”
When he answered, Reinhard wore a smile that was somewhere between troubled, happy, and a wry grin.
“I see. So they’re like sisters to you, Jin,” he murmured softly.
As an aside, when Soleil and Luna—who had overheard Jin’s remarks—told Reiko later, it was said that Reiko wore a truly exquisite smile that could have been interpreted as either relief or joy.
＊ ＊ ＊
The dinner menu consisted of chicken and vegetable stew, fried white fish, plain omelets, salad, and baked apululs for dessert.
“Ho, this is delicious. You call this a ‘fry’?”
“Yes. It’s made by dusting the fish with flour, dipping it in beaten egg, coating it with breadcrumbs, and then deep-frying it in oil.”
“Heh, I didn't know there was a way to cook like that.”
It seemed that not only Beena but Reinhard as well was eating it for the first time, and the fried fish was a massive hit.
Elsa seemed to have taken a liking to the baked apululs, and Reiko was discreetly offering her seconds.
Noticing that Reiko seemed to be in a particularly good mood, Jin wondered if something good had happened.
“So this is a baked apulul. It really is delicious.”
Previously, when Beena had tried to make baked apululs at home, she hadn't been able to because sugar was too expensive.
“The recipe seems simple. Maybe I’ll memorize it and make some for my siblings when I get back.”
“Speaking of which, how are your brother and sister doing?”
In response to Jin's question, Beena explained that both of them were completely healthy now and were currently helping with the garden maintenance at Earl Kuzuma’s estate.
“The earl has been so helpful in so many ways,” she concluded.
Meanwhile, Elsa was just receiving her third plate of baked apululs.
“Hey now, Elsa, are you sure you should be eating that much?”
Reinhard, unable to watch in silence any longer, finally spoke up.
“Mm. It’s fine. This will be the last one.”
Saying that, she popped the baked apulul into her mouth.
“Haha, I’m just glad you like it,” Jin laughed, popping a piece of baked apulul into his own mouth.
“It’s a bed, but the bedding is the same!”
The guest rooms were Western-style and equipped with beds, but the bedding itself used magic silk floss. Beena was practically dancing with joy.
“Ah, these pajamas were made from thread taken from a Ground Caterpillar, weren’t they? They feel so wonderful against the skin!”
Ruby 100 quietly slipped out of the room.
“I wanted to sleep on tatami.”
For Elsa, who had muttered those words, Aqua 100 brought in some spare tatami mats and lined them up on the floor to create an impromptu Japanese-style room.
“Thank you.”
When Elsa said that, Aqua 100 bowed and left the room. Left alone, Elsa lay down on the tatami mats.
“...Happiness.”
After enjoying the sensation of the tatami for a while, Elsa crawled into her futon and fell asleep with a look of utter satisfaction.
“Thank you for your help, that’s enough for now.”
Reinhard spoke to Amez 100, who had folded his discarded clothes for him.
Even as the fourth son of a count’s family, Reinhard had a habit of doing as much for himself as possible. He had declined her further assistance, saying he would put on the magisilk pajamas himself.
“Understood. Please call if you require anything at all.”
With that, Amez 100 exited. Watching her retreating figure, Reinhard felt a slight sense of threat from Jin’s golems, which moved and behaved exactly like humans.
“I definitely never want to make an enemy of Jin.”
It was a rare, honest confession of Reinhard’s inner feelings.
＊ ＊ ＊
“...And that’s the story he told me.”
Meanwhile, in his own room, Jin was telling Reiko about the legend he had heard from Reinhard.
“I am sorry, Father. I have never heard such a story,” Reiko replied.
So, Reiko didn’t know it either.
In that case, was it a legend known only to a specific lineage or region?
“If I get the chance, I’d like to ask for more details.”
Even Reinhard had only recently learned that this world was a sphere, yet this ancient legend spoke of another world beyond the sun—in other words, in outer space. There was no way Jin wouldn’t be curious.
“Maybe people were flying through the sky in the distant past,” Jin murmured softly.
If he could go to space one day, he wanted to try. Jin found himself remembering the picture books and television images of the cosmos he had seen as a child.