Chapter 210: East, Ishay (5)
I don’t know if it was the heat of the hot springs or the atmosphere, but I almost lost my nerve at their sudden boldness, though I managed to get out of there with my sanity intact.
It was dangerous in more ways than one.
“Amon, rumor has it that women’s moans emanated from the hot springs during the night. Did you hear that?”
“I heard.”
“Yes, it seems that the code has been broken, and there’s even talk of a mass orgy in the hot springs.”
“An orgy…? Some creep…”
Amon and Crank, both with serious faces, chimed in.
The morning passed quickly, and by the afternoon, as the sun was setting, the cadets were on their way to the Palace Banquet, an event that had been scheduled at short notice.
“Orphele, Zetto… Do you guys know anything?”
Crank asks, unnecessarily questioning me and Orphele.
“……”
Orphele glanced at Crank with a look that had nothing to do with him.
“Well, maybe a group orgy has gone too far…”
I pointed out the rumor, which had been grossly exaggerated.
There had only been one moan in the first place, what orgy could there be.
This is why rumors are so scary.
Suddenly, a cheerful voice came from the group of women walking beside me.
“A group orgy…? What is it…?”
It was Lucia.
She smiled at me with her usual innocent smile, devoid of any malice.
The rumor must have carried all the way to the other side because she raised her voice in response.
It was a difficult question to answer but if it’s not directed at me, I don’t necessarily have to answer it.
“…Mr. Zetto?”
As soon as I thought that, Lucia pointed at me.
“Uhm…that’s…”
I was stumped.
How do I explain the mass orgy to this seemingly innocent girl?
‘I heard from Keraph that Lucia was acting suspiciously.’
But right now, it didn’t matter if she was innocent or not, if she was asking because she knew or if she truly didn’t know.
“”……””
The silence that followed was immediate, and I could feel all eyes on me.
Everyone was watching to see how I would explain Lucia’s question.
“Gu, since it’s a palace banquet, will there be bread?”
“Hmmm, I think there will be more rice than bread, but since they’ve invited the cadets, there might be some.”
Amon and Crank were already clueless. It seemed unlikely that they would be able to help.
Neither Yuri, Aizel, nor Kaen would offer me a saving hand at this point but they were watching closely to see how I would explain it.
“A group orgy is…”
I began, as everyone held their breath in anticipation.
“It’s something you only come to understand when you’re truly grown up. Perhaps it’s still too early for Miss Lucia.”
The words themselves were so far from innocent that I couldn’t help but stumble over them.
“Ji, a real adult…!”
Lucia’s eyes narrowed as she digested my explanation.
Just then, a man who seemed to be a real adult to Lucia stepped in her path.
He might have seemed like a real adult to Lucia because he’d been doing all the harmful things that adults do: drinking and smoking.
Or, if that was intentional, it could just be that Lucia likes to get people in trouble.
“I, uh, Instructor Kaliman… I wanted to ask you something.”
The man scratching at his coarse beard tilted his head at her question.
“Cadet Lucia, what is your question?”
“Instructor Kaliman, have you ever had a group orgy…?!”
“…Never.”
“Then do you know what it is, and are you a real adult, Instructor?”
“……”
The baton was eventually handed over to Kaliman, who was innocent of any wrongdoing.
For me, it was a good thing, but as I watched his face grow serious as he alternated between Lucia’s smile and scanning his surroundings, I felt sorry for him.
Kaliman’s choice was…
“Hey, Edward, your cadet has a question.”
He used Edward, who was leading the cadets, as a shield.
After all, Lucia was in Class A, and Kaliman was in charge of Class C. As a result of Kaliman’s clever offloading, Edward approached us.
“What’s going on?”
“You’re supposed to be answering Cadet Lucia’s questions. I’m overwhelmed with questions from our own Class C cadets.”
“That’s true.”
Edward nodded, and Kaliman patted him on the shoulder and quickly moved away.
Edward, whose eyes were barely visible, nodded as he listened to Lucia’s question.
“I suppose that’s what you were wondering, Miss Lucia?”
Everyone who had remained silent swallowed hard as Edward smiled his usual devious grin.
He had to answer well.
He had to remember that even though she was Lucia, she had the letters Windless after her name.
Get it wrong, and you might get a claim from the Windless family, one of the continent’s four elemental families, saying something like, “My child has been learning something strange at the Academy.”
“A group orgy, by the way, is when a group of men and women get together and have sexual intercourse.”
Edward gave her the exact definition of the word, without any purification.
“Intercourse…?”
I stammered and Lucia shook her head.
“To make a child.”
“You mean, they get together and make a child?!”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“Then… We’re going to need a really big bed, because it’s going to be cramped if we all have to hold hands and lie down.”
“”……””
Lucia’s next answer puts a question mark on everyone’s face.
Even Edward stood with his mouth open and his jaw clenched as he tried to make sense of her answer.
After a few moments, her words make sense.
Perhaps Lucia’s mother, Cecily Windless, had told her that if she slept while holding a man’s hand, she would have a child.
‘And that if several men and women gathered together to lie down holding hands, they would form a round circle, and that’s why they needed a big bed.’
Thanks to Lucia’s vivid imagination, she didn’t have to lie.
“It would be nice to have a big bed, wouldn’t it…?”
“Instructor Edward, you are a true adult!”
“A true adult…”
Edward pauses for a moment, wondering what that meant.
Then he shrugs his shoulders and flashes that wicked grin again.
“Well, you’re not wrong,” he says, “I’m going to have a little one of my own soon.”
“”A child…?”
The cadets in Class A blurted out in unison, stunned by the sudden news that Edwards dropped so casually.
“Instructor Edward, is your wife pregnant?”
Aizel asked cautiously.
She had met Edward’s wife, Vanessa, at the bar before.
“A little bit.”
Everyone shuddered.
If you’d never seen Edward with Vanessa, you wouldn’t know he was a doting husband.
Looking back at his smile now, I realize that it wasn’t so much a sinister or suspicious smile as it was a warm smile at the thought of his child.
“Congratulations again.”
I shouldn’t have been surprised.
“Thank you, Cadet Zetto. Oh, by the way. Cadet Zetto, would you mind coming over here, I need to talk to you for a moment.”
I pushed my way through the crowd of cadets who had been discussing Edward’s marriage.
Once we’re a few feet away from the cadets, he whispers to me.
“The invitation to the banquet… could it have something to do with Cadet Zetto?”
“…Why me?”
“From what I’ve heard, this banquet is to celebrate the princess’s return to health, and the city seems to be in a festive mood because of the good news.”
I follow Edward’s gaze and see the city’s residents chattering and laughing.
It looks like the royal family has been handing out wine and meat to the residents as part of a banquet.
“But what bothers me personally is that, quite coincidentally, the princess’s condition improved only a day after we arrived in Ishay. I’ve been giving the cadets free time, but the instructors can’t get the same break – we had a cadet die outside the academy not too long ago, and I’m aware of every cadet’s general movements.”
“And…I must have been the only one who missed it.”
“Yeah, you just disappeared, like the ground was going out from under you.”
Edward looks at me, the corners of his mouth turning up.
“Not that I’m trying to stop Cadet Zetto, on the contrary, it’s because of you that the cadets were invited to the palace and got to attend the banquet, so that’s a good thing, right?”
Edward seemed to know more about me than I realized.
“But Cadet Zetto needs to be careful, and I don’t want you to push yourself too hard, at least not to the point of getting hurt.”
“…I see.”
If a cadet were to get hurt, the instructor couldn’t escape the responsibility. In any case, it was unavoidable now that I was in the academy.
“Well, no matter what, we’re rooting for Cadet Zetto, and you can expect the Academy’s ‘gift’ for you to be ready as soon as the Journey to the East is over.”
Finally, Edward patted my left shoulder, where the prosthetic was, and smiled.
‘A gift.’
I hadn’t done anything to deserve a reward right now, so I guess it wasn’t just any gift.
A gift that required preparation.
Perhaps it had something to do with Bernice but there was no information, so I couldn’t guess.
For now, I had to think about the ‘reward’ in front of me.
‘What kind of reward would make Shui give me?’
***
People were laughing and talking and raising their drinks to the sound of lively wind chimes.
“So this is what a banquet in the East feels like.”
“It’s a little more lively.”
“Still, banquets are not for me.”
Taking a mouthful of sake, Yuri stuck out her tongue and yelped.
“More than that, where’s Zetto?”
“Over there, next to the princess.”
Crank pointed off in the distance.
Yuri followed his finger and turned her head, where a dark-haired woman in a fine oriental dress who appeared to be a princess was chatting with Zetto, laughing merrily.
“How did you…?”
“From what I heard earlier, it sounded like she wanted to meet the Returned from Paradise.”
“Zetto has become quite famous after what happened last time… it’s not so strange that someone from high places would want to see him.”
“Hmm… I wonder what they’re talking about.”
Yuri, who was looking at Zetto and Princess Kimei, said bluntly.
“Wouldn’t talking to Zetto make any girl laugh normally?”
Crank gestured emphatically with his face.
“…”
At that moment, Aizel set down her drink with a clatter.
It was her tenth glass.
“Aizel, don’t you think you’re drinking too much?”
“…”
Amon asked, but Aizel didn’t reply, just glared at Zetto.
It wasn’t much different from Yuri or Kaen but it was so unnerving to watch that scene that she felt like she had to have another drink.
***
“I heard about it from my uncle. Thank you again.”
Kimei bowed her head in gratitude, somewhat sheepishly.
“No, thanks to you, I got to eat some delicious food.”
“Would you like me to help you with your food if you are uncomfortable?”
Kimei asked, tilting her head, she tended to blush when she drank.
“How could I ask a princess to do such a thing, I’m fine.”
I realized that if I did something like that, it would make the women over there glaring at me look very bad, while Sierra, who was right next to me, was stunned.
Next, Kimei’s uncle, King Shui, who was next to me, spoke up.
“By the way, it’s been a while since I’ve heard from you. You’re quite a famous person, an immortal man who experienced a miracle from the gods. I was impressed with the information. ”
“Haha, you’re being flattering. I’m not exactly immortal.”
I think they figured out my alias of ‘Returned from Paradise’.
Well, neither of them had access to any information about me.
That was a good thing for me, as it lent credibility to my ‘series of journeys’.
“If only I had carried that scroll with me, I wouldn’t have been imprisoned for several months. I broke out in a cold sweat trying to explain myself to my brother in the middle of the night.”
Shui clicked his tongue wistfully as he recalled his time in confinement.
He did not wonder what he had to say to his brother, Kchandar, King of Ishay.
“What about that law book…?”
My ears perked up at the mention of the scroll.
“It’s the one I used to keep with me when Kimei was under threat, in case she was kidnapped.”
“Oh, you mean ‘that’.”
Kimei clapped her hands as if she knew what it was.
“Well, he’s not much use in combat, and there are plenty of law books with more power than him, but are you still interested?”
“A little.”
No, I’m very, very interested.
‘I won’t be surprised if I get kidnapped again someday.’
I don’t know what it is, but I think it might be something I need right now.