Oukoku e Tsuzuku Michi

Of course Mack and Yakov are appropriately in military uniform.

「Why am I the only one without......」

「It's your fault for breaking it despite not fighting. We don't have any spare armor.」

Christoph wrecked his armor and sword when he fell down the stairs and is the one exception not in matching attire. Moreover, his horse escaped and he had to run in his underwear. His servant-like appearance doesn't feel out of place though and won't hinder us.

「To enter the town, you need the governor-sama's......」

The gatekeeper who asked for a bribe the last time trembles as he attempts to say something, but one glare makes him hastily open the gate and kneel on the spot. The power of proper attire is incredible.

We headed in a straight line toward the governor's mansion.

The lookouts stationed on the towers practically tripped over themselves to beat us there, so I'm sure the governor also knows of our visit.

I wonder how they will prepare in the few minutes until we arrive.

「F-for Your Great Majesty to grace this back country with your presence is an honor! I must say however that it was too sudden for me to provide an adequate welcome......」

Upon entering the mansion, the governor himself along with his entire family and the guard captain are kneeling at the entrance.

The guard captain, like we saw last time, possesses a trained body while the governor matches the image I had in my head of him with a pot belly and a wily look.

「No matter.」

I say curtly as I make eye contact with the governor.

Without me even saying anything, he starts shaking and sweating.

The news of such a big arrest should have reached the governor as well.

「You know why I'm here, yes?」

「Eek! I didn't think such crooked people would be so prevalent in this land that you entrusted to me! I-I will be more careful so it doesn't happen next――」

I figured he would say something like that.

Having scoundrels in one's territory may be the fault of the governor, but in the end they are merely an underground criminal organization who has neither directly hurt the kingdom or troubled another noble.

They only caused suffering to the children of poor peasants.

In that case, all that needs to be done is to reflect, swear loyalty and pay an increased tax to get let off lightly, no?

That's what he must be thinking.

He's not wrong.

According to customary practice, this should be treated as a minor blunder and the mistake is not serious enough for the governor's title to be stripped.

Of course I don't have to follow the customs, though that sort of discussion is not even necessary.

「Strange. That's not the apology I was thinking of.」

I say over my shoulder as I quickly hold out my right hand.

Rebecca, wearing proper clothes, passes under my arm and stands in front of the governor.

Celia crawls through my legs and stands in front of Rebecca.

「Governor Claumark! How dare you allow a criminal organization to inhabit the lands given to you by His Majesty!」

「You have committed serious crimes of lining your own pockets with dirty money and hurting the citizens!」

They nailed their lines, but I doubt he will simply say sorry.

「Please wait! I will apologize as many times as needed for allowing criminals to operate! However, I won't accept the accusation that I took part in the wrongdoings and accepted bribes!」

The governor stands up firmly in opposition.

Well, he would be hanged if he admits to those charges so of course he will argue.

「I don't remember doing that at all! If you're going to accuse me of those things, I'd like you to provide some proof!」

「We got testimonies from arrested individuals saying you and the guard captain are on good terms with the organization!」

Rebecca takes a firm step forward.

「Are you saying that you trust a bunch of rascals more than you trust me, someone who has kept this territory without disorder or starvation for ten years!?」

The governor pushes forward with a step of his own.

Oh, he's better than I expected.

「Even without evidence, that is what His Majesty said! Just accept it!」

Celia stomps several steps forward.

「So be it, then execute me! But write my crime as being not to His Majesty's liking!!」

The governor pushes Celia a few steps backward.

Changing the crime to that won't change the result, but it will leave a bad taste in my mouth.

I silently call the two girls back and step forward myself.

「Don't you recognize my face?」

The governor and the captain fix their gazes on me.

It's like a play I saw one day.

The two of them become astonished when they realize that I was one of the scoundrels in town, then they fall flat on their asses and surrender.

Then the case will be closed.

「Yes, I do. I was invited to the lowest seat of the coronation ceremony.」

「I accompanied my lord to an audience and saw your face.」

They easily recall and then tilt their heads.

That was different than what I was thinking.

「Okay, then behold this royal seal!!」

Celia reaches into her shirt and sticks out the symbol of the king.

「「A-aah!!」」

The two kneel down, but don't do anything else in particular.

Weird.

「Your Majesty, Your Majesty, you didn't meet the governor during the infiltration.」

Rebecca whispers to me.

Oh, I guess not.

「If you wanted to do what you were thinking, you'd have to be in the same attire as back then. Asking if they know your face when dressed as the king will only make them say they saw you in the palace. And it's not unusual for a king to possess the king's seal.」

Celia whispers.

It seems I misunderstood a couple things.

「So, do you have any proof Your Majesty?」

The governor asks on his knees.

「Argh enough! Rebecca!」

I pull Rebecca close to me, rip her clothes and lift her up with her legs spread apart.

「Gyaaa!! What are you doing!!?」

Rebecca is wearing her usual sexy outfit underneath her black formal uniform.

The governor could only stare in awe while the guard captain stood up and let out a small gasp.

「You're the naughty woman and the perverted thug from back then!?」

「You idiot!」

The guard captain hastily tried to cover the governor's mouth, but it was too late.

「Indeed. I see you haven't forgotten that we entered the town by bribe!」

It's settled now.

I stomp my foot down as Rebecca pinches my thigh.

「My eyes and ears are better than any proof, you can no longer talk your way out. Come clean!」

The guard captain slumps his shoulders, the wife faints, the daughter wails, and the male relative collapses to the floor in a daze.

Meanwhile, the governor is hanging his head, his shaking gradually stopping.

「I admit it, Your Majesty. I overlooked them, took bribes and lined my pockets...... I am a villain!」

The governor springs up and rushes over to the wall to grab a sword on display.

「Since I'm a villain I guess there's no problem with me pointing my blade at the king! It's too bad you came with so few people!!」

Oh, that's how you're coming at me, I think to myself with a grin.

「Men, assemble――!! This person here is pretending to be His Majesty and has even forged a copy of the royal seal! Take him out!」

Guards scramble from all over and gather near the entrance.

「A fake of His Majesty? Wasn't there an escort outside the town?」

「I saw him during the South Yuguria war. That is definitely the real......」

「My child will be born next month. If a fight breaks out, I'm running.」

Celia, Rebecca, Mack and Yakov rush at the guards.

「If you're going to bare your fangs at Aegir-sama, then there's no need to argue! It's easier this way!」

Celia swings her sword at a height so low that it skims the floor and gouges a piece of a guard's heel.

She stabs her sword into the throat of the guard after he spins around and falls, then twists her wrist for the finishing blow.

「Ultimately, this is how it ends!?」

Rebecca hurls daggers weakly, which are easily deflected.

However, multiple poison needles she threw simultaneously landed on the enemy's face, causing the guard to scream and writhe on the floor.

「When you first brought up evidence and all that, I thought this was going to be a boring expedition, but this is the clincher!? I knew being with the general is never dull!」

Yakov parries one of the two spearheads thrusted at him with his sword.

The other one touches his body, but the angle is too shallow and the tip doesn't pierce him.

「This ain't a match. You don't get anything just by making contact!」

Yakov sweeps his sword at the stomach of the guard that closed the distance, grabs the other guard by the hair and slams his face into the floor, then crushes his head with his steel boot.

「――」

Mack drops his battleaxe on the head of a guard, caving his body into where his stomach is.

As for Christoph――

「Uwaaaaaaah!!」

He is outnumbered, but he is not lagging behind the guards who have given up from the start.

Meanwhile, I face off against the governor and the guard captain.

Normally, the captain should be the most veteran out of the group.

「Hardlett, the demon......no still. Either way I'm doomed, aaarggghhh!!」

The captain charges.

If I had to rate his slash out of ten, it would be about a six.

I draw him close before casually deflecting his sword with the part near the base of the Dual Crater, then swing my sword without putting any weight behind it.

「Guwah!」

The light slash cuts down to the bone of the captain's dominant arm, forcing him to drop his weapon, then the lunge that follows no later than one second after goes through his heart and out his back.

His body twitches twice and falls to the floor as I pull my sword out and turn it toward the governor.

「I was a decent warrior in my younger days. I'm a man who put up a good fight against the powerhouse opponent in the third round of a martial tournament!」

「Wait, is that supposed to be good?」

He went on for so long that I couldn't tell.

Whatever.

「Here I come!!」

He has an admirable spirit at least.

I receive the leaping strike head on, lower my hips and send him flying with brute strength.

As the governor flails in midair to adjust his body to land, I take one step forward and swing my Dual Crater vertically for a single strike, then pick up a fallen sword at the same he lands, and throw it at the governor's family, barely missing the daughter's face.

「Hiiih! Kyuu......」

The daughter swoons from the sword grazing her, and the governor, who was still in a stance with his sword, is split in half a few seconds later from his throat down to his crotch, spilling out most of his guts.

「I can't show this to his daughter.」

I point my bloody blade at his family and gesture at the two male relatives and the son.

「I-I'm a distant relat――」

I chop his head off before he can complete the sentence.

「I stopped, but he didn't listen to――」

I also smash his head before he finishes speaking.

The twenty or so son saw what happened and grips onto a sword, then charges in with a desperate yell.

I receive his attack head on, push him back to get him off balance and cut through his shoulder.

「Judgement!!」

Celia slits the throat of a guard at the same time, and the others finally drop their weapons and kneel on the ground.

I declare in front of the guards and the remaining family of the governor.

「For abusing his authority to make a fortune, siding with thugs and turning the people he was supposed to protect into slaves, he deserves to be executed and his family put to death.」

Celia nods.

「But the man responsible is already dead and the last shred of manliness he showed was not unpleasant.」

Celia tilts her head adorably.

「Furthermore, the wife is still in the prime of her womanhood and the daughter is about to blossom, to reap them is absurd.」

Celia tries to cover my mouth from behind.

「Therefore, he will be dismissed from his post as governor and his house will be destroyed! The females of his family will be confined in the capital, branded with the mark of dishonor, and will only be free after bearing two of my children.」

I push aside the coiling Celia and Rebecca and inhale deeply.

「Case closed!!」

「「Goshーーー!!」」

With the issue resolved, Rebecca moves into the governor's house with escorts and knights to conduct a thorough investigation to check if there are other conspirators, collect evidence, and confirm if there have been other wrongdoings committed.

By the way, Rebecca's unit is much better than the escorts in this line of work, finding hidden clues one after the other.

It was wrong for them to put on armor after all.

Meaning their ineptitude was not their own fault, but rather the fault of the person who organized them......

As I was tapping the floor, contemplating what punishment I should give Rebecca, the sound changed to a thud.

「There is an underground to this place.」

I swing my Dual Crater and bash the floor.

The blade penetrates the floor and the surrounding parts of the floor cave in to reveal a staircase leading down.

「If I don't hurry, time will be pretty tight.」

I run down the stairs, and cut open the securely locked door with a single slash.

「H-h-how annoying......you are. Are you going to......torture me again......? Heh, do your worst...... burn me...... beat me...... violate me......do as you please......」

Located behind the door was a blindfolded girl with her hands bound by a chain hanging from the ceiling.

She is wearing similar tight clothing to Rebecca except hers are ripped and her groin area is mangled to the point it looks unrecognizable.

Her entire body is covered with traces of being whipped and bruises, her fingernails are all gone, and a mixture of blood, semen and excrement is leaking from her crotch.

I sever the chains without saying anything, and catch her before she falls into the puddle of waste products on the floor.

「You're safe now. You did well to endure. Good on you for surviving.」

When I remove her blindfold, the girl looks at me in shock.

After she surveys the individuals surrounding me and sees Rebecca and the full-plate escort instead of the governor's troops, she sighs in relief for nearly thirty seconds and then passes out.

「Wipe her down with a clean cloth and warm water. After that, take her to a doctor and give her a bath. It might be too late, but give her a contraceptive pill too.」

I take the smelly, to say the least, girl......the captured spy, sling her over my shoulder, and mutter one thing to Rebecca.

「Now it's really finished.」

But as it turns out, there was one more act.

That is regarding the freed children.

The kids who have grown up a bit were returned to their parents from where they were kidnapped, however many are too young to figure out where they are from or have parents that were killed during the kidnapping process or were sold off by relatives and have no home to return to.

Those who were raped and tormented as slaves don't have education, let alone the common sense of how to live, so if they are set free, the girls will only be oppressed in a different place and the boys can only become bandits like I did in the past.

「It can't be helped. I'll look after all of them.」

「In other words, you'll make them your lovers?」

Don't say it in such a scandalous way.

There are young kids who can't tell man from woman yet.

「Mah-jes-tee.」

「Mah-jes-tee's lov-er?」

The kids speak clumsily.

See, what good is it to make such infants into lovers?

「But look.」

Rebecca urges a girl to step forward.

It's the girl who led everyone out of the underground.

She is in her mid to late teens.

Her rags were discarded and she was given the escort's spare undergarments, but she is somewhat conscious about the bagginess of the loose clothing especially around her chest area.

From the small glances I steal from the gaps, her breasts are sufficiently developed and her hips are perfectly shaped for childbearing.

The girl gives me a polite bow and lightly grips my hand.

「For now, let's make them all my lovers for convenience's sake. I think that's best. By the way, where did Gildress go?」

That guy, is he doing something unnecessary again?

「He embraced a villainous woman he captured in the governor's bedroom. I told him to hand her over, but he asked me to overlook it as his seed was already in her.」

Rebecca let out a scornful snicker along with her answer.

「You can't tell if a woman is pregnant so quickly after sleeping with her. Is that guy stupid?」

Celia looks at me curiously.

「The thing is, her belly was pretty inflated. Well, she's just an underling so no big deal. Let's go home. We left the capital for such a long time, I'm sure there will be problems when we get back.」

Don't say that.

Now I'm picturing Adolph waiting for me.