Outbreak Company: Volume 12

by Ichiro Sakaki

  “Minori-san, listen to his cute little dreams,” Hikaru-san said with a smile, continuing to pour poison in the WAC’s ear.

  “It’s a sin to be so dense,” Minori-san replied.

  “A crime.”

  They were nodding constantly at each other. Even Matoba-san had turned around, arms crossed, and joined the nod-fest.

  I wanted to ask what was wrong with all of them, but even I wasn’t that stupid: after yesterday, I had an inkling what they were talking about. Seriously, though, the idea that Petralka was in love with me was just Myusel’s mistaken impression—and as for Myusel herself, there was a good chance she just thought she was in love with me because she was glad that I treated her well.

  Not to brag, but I don’t have a single personal quality that could possibly cause anyone to fall in love with me. Objectively speaking, I’m just a totally hopeless otaku, nothing more and nothing less. Totally average looks and abilities—or maybe below average. The type to thoughtlessly form a huge crush on a girl just because she’s nice to me (and even worse, to tell her about it).

  I never wanted to feel that crushing, suffocating, wish-I-could-jump-in-a-hole-and-disappear sense of humiliation ever again.

  “Ugh, a man who doesn’t know the first thing about a woman’s heart is the most terrible thing, isn’t he?” Hikaru-san said, looking at me with what might have been disgust.

  “It’s okay,” Minori-san replied with a smile. “As long as he understands men’s hearts instead!”

  Hey! That doesn’t make any sense!

  “Fair enough. Ever thought about switching sides, Shinichi-san?”

  “I told you, no way!” I said, shaking my head vigorously to drive the point home.

  And then there we were, standing before the door to the audience chamber.

  As I’ve explained before, there’s more than one audience chamber in Eldant Castle. We normally went to the smaller one to make our morning reports to Petralka, but the very first time I had arrived in the castle, I had been shown into the bigger one.

  For the meeting with the ambassador from the Kingdom of Zwelberich, they had naturally chosen the larger room. Big enough for Eldant’s ministers, knights, and other courtiers to attend, the room was sumptuous, as befitted a chamber for the reception of foreign dignitaries. Sumptuous and, let it be said, imposing, showing any visitors just how rich and powerful the Empire was.

  A knight announced us as we entered the room: “Amutech General Manager Kanou Shinichi-sama, Ayasaki Hikaru-sama, and their cohorts Matoba Jinzaburou-sama and Koganuma Minori-sama have arrived!”

  The enormous door opened with a portentous creak. The first thing I saw was the red carpet laid straight down the center of the room. The royal guard stood at attention on either side, and farther along, it was lined by about a dozen ministers as well. And at the tail end, at the very far side of the room, was the throne, sitting up a step higher than everything else around. The ornately decorated seat was currently filled, of course, by Petralka.

  “Mm. We are glad you’re here.”

  The throne was designed to be impressively large (who would pay any attention to a tiny throne?), but it looked even bigger with the physically petite Petralka sitting in it. She looked like she belonged there, though; today she was absolutely projecting her authority as Empress. Standing to either side of her were Prime Minister Zahar and Garius, who must have circled around and beat us there using some other entrance.

  “Welcome, Shinichi-dono, and all of you. How kind of you to attend on such short notice,” Zahar said, smiling broadly. To me, he looked perfectly normal, not obviously anxious about this occasion. Prime Minister Zahar was a friendly-looking man with white hair and a white beard—but he had his hand on the rudder of the nation’s political course, or so it was said. Prime Ministers in stories always turn out to be villains, taking the ear of the ruler to put their evil plots into motion. Zahar, though, appeared to break the mold. He seemed like a grandfatherly figure to Petralka, genuinely interested in looking after her and helping her grow up to be a better empress.

  In any event...

  I bowed to Petralka and her entourage, but then said hesitantly, “Are they sure about having us here?”

  I didn’t necessarily mean here, in the audience chamber—I meant that the knights had led us almost to the far end of the room. Except for the important advisors, we were among the closest to the throne. Maybe it had been discussed in advance, because none of the other attendees showed obvious displeasure about it. I was glad to be somewhere I could see Petralka’s face clearly, but it would probably put me right up close to the Zwelberichian ambassador, too.

  “Well, this was where they put us, and I guess the ambassador’s likely to call on us right away,” Minori-san whispered to me. “So why worry?”

  Sometimes Minori-san sure could be—what should I call it? Bold? Optimistic? Startlingly nonchalant? I still wondered if this was really a good idea.

  “What’s important is, just try not to screw anything up,” she added.

  “I won’t!”

  “If the ambassador turns out to be a little girl, no exclaiming ‘IS THAT REALLY AN ARCHETYPAL LITTLE GIRL CHARACTER?!’, okay?”

  “Geez, I’m never going to live that down, am I?” I swear I understood by now that it had been a mistake.

  I looked in the direction of the subject of my long-ago faux pas—namely, Petralka herself—and our eyes met. Just for a second, her cheeks flushed, more like an ordinary young woman than an empress. Maybe, in spite of how good she was at hiding it, she really was a little nervous.

  And then the knight’s voice boomed through the chamber again. “The Sixth Prince of Zwelberich, the honorable Rubert Wollyn, has arrived!”

  His voice faded away, leaving a deafening silence.

  The ministers began to look toward the entrance, and we followed their gazes. Come to think of it, I had been in the castle’s audience chambers many times, but always as the guest, never as the host, if you will. Some knights approached the huge door and began to slide it open again—it looked massive and powerful, like the wall itself was moving.

  A figure could be seen as the door opened...

  “Is that him?” someone muttered.

  A young man stepped into the audience chamber. His clothes had puffy sleeves and legs, an elegant outfit that practically screamed, “Hey! I’m a prince!” He came walking down the red carpet with an assured stride. The dark stripes on his outfit made the gold buttons and other ornaments on his chest and shoulders stand out; they glinted in the light each time he moved.

  So this was our ambassador—Prince Rubert. I took him to be about the same age as Garius, or maybe a little older. He had clean, handsome features, and his radiant golden hair was kept a little shorter than Garius’s silver locks. His lips were graced with a quiet smile—he was the very picture of elegance.

  I watched him as he approached the throne... and suddenly our eyes met. Realizing that it might be impolite if I seemed to be staring at the prince, I reflexively looked down, but I thought I saw Rubert’s smile widen almost imperceptibly. I sort of felt like if you looked in the dictionary under nice guy, you might find his picture. Or under prince, for that matter. I found myself wondering whether a commoner like me should even be breathing the same air as him, among other somewhat self-hateful things.

  “I’ve been remiss in not calling on you sooner, Empress Petralka,” Prince Rubert said, stopping in front of the throne and kneeling. Several people behind him—I had hardly noticed them, but they must have been his attendants—likewise knelt, moving in perfect unison. The prince might have been older, but as Empress Petralka commanded the higher station, hence this show of deference.

  “Raise your head, Prince Rubert,” Petralka said with great gravity. “It has indeed been some time. Is all well with you?”

  “As ever. But I see Your Majesty has grown even more beautiful since we last met.”

  “You may dispense with the flatte
ry,” Petralka said with a wry smile.

  “Then I will dispense with little, for I speak from the heart.”

  Rubert’s finely-formed lips spoke words that would have gotten a normal guy a “Huh? What’s this BS?” reaction. But coming from a guy who could give Garius a run for his money when it came to sheer good looks, somehow they didn’t feel out of place. It was startling—in fact, kind of incredible.

  Next, Rubert turned to Zahar. “It gladdens my heart to see you well, Elder Zahar.”

  “I see you haven’t changed, my Prince,” Zahar replied with amusement.

  It was obvious that Prince Rubert knew them. I guess that made sense, considering that they were each among the rulers of the respective countries.

  Just one thing surprised me...

  “...Been a while.”

  Huh?

  Toward Garius, and no one else, Rubert sounded different—unless I was just mishearing things. There wasn’t any obsequious deference, not even any real politeness, just three short words. Yet the emotion in them was impossible to miss; it wasn’t brusqueness so much as... a friendly familiarity, maybe...?

  “Indeed...” Garius didn’t return Prince Rubert’s smile; in fact, his response seemed to be deliberately ambiguous. He didn’t even seem to want to look the prince in the eye. Someone Garius didn’t want to make eye contact with? Who was this person? If I looked very closely, I thought I could detect the slightest flush in Garius’s pale cheeks—in that regard, he really was a lot like Petralka. Could it be he was... angry? Or...

  “I have come here to reaffirm the continued friendship between my Kingdom of Zwelberich and the Holy Eldant Empire, and to...”

  While I stood there trying to put the pieces together in my mind, Prince Rubert launched into his ambassador’s spiel, and the discussion moved on to the state of affairs in each nation, the details of the alliance, and other topics. Honestly, political talk like this went straight over my head, so I just sort of let it go in one ear and out the other.

  There’s something seriously weird going on with Garius, though...

  He was forcing himself to appear composed, but to those of us who knew him, it was obvious how unsettled he was. He would stare straight at Prince Rubert, but when it seemed like their eyes might meet, he would hurriedly look away. His left hand would clench as if fighting to control some emotion, then suddenly relax.

  As for Prince Rubert, he was mostly talking to Petralka, but could be seen to glance at Garius every once in a while. If their eyes happened to meet, his smile would deepen. But when Garius looked away, it seemed to amuse him even more.

  What was going on here? Seriously, what was the deal?! I didn’t know the answer, but the hairs on the back of my neck were standing up. Desperate to communicate how I was feeling, I turned to the person beside me...

  “‘...right?’”

  ...and discovered that Minori-san’s lips were moving discreetly. “Hm...?”

  “‘Yes, I know. I understand how you feel.’”

  “Minori...san?”

  “‘Wh-What do you mean by that?’ ‘I’ve longed to see you.’ ‘F-Foolishness. It’s much too late...’”

  “Hello? Earth to Minori-san?”

  “‘Too late? You wound me.’ ‘Then why did you abandon me all those years ago?’ ‘That was a misunderstanding.’”

  Minori-san continued looking at the ground and muttering to herself. She didn’t sound normal, either. She was putting on some kind of voice, unusually low, and she changed her precise tone from line to line, like one person playing two parts. It was like she was... what was the word... doing ADR?

  Okay, so there wasn’t really any dialogue to dub over, and she wasn’t recording anything anyway, but forget about that. I was blown away to realize...

  “‘I want to set that misunderstanding straight. Tonight, in my room...’”

  Was she improvising a BL script involving Garius and Prince Rubert?! Talk about a one-track BL mind! But... wait. I had to admit that when I listened to her dialogue, it went a long way towards explaining the weird vibe between the two of them. Her ability to come up with a BL conversation on the spot and immediately act it out, though... that was the fearsome power of Koganuma Minori............ No, not the time!

  “Koganuma-kun?” I could see Matoba-san raising an eyebrow, as perplexed by Minori-san’s behavior as I was.

  “Hoo... Ooh hoo hoo hoo hoo...”

  The bad feeling I had about this kept getting worse and worse, and now it was accompanied by a sense of déjà vu. Minori-san’s eyes went seemingly vacant behind her spectacles, then they flashed dangerously.

  “IS THAT REALLY A BL—”

  “Hrk!”

  The rotten WAC thrust her fists into the air, howling, but two hands immediately slapped themselves over her mouth from either side.

  He didn’t say anything.

  I didn’t say anything.

  Matoba-san and I looked at each other from either side of the erupting Minori-san and nodded. For the first time, I sort of felt like the two of us were completely in tune... Okay, not the time for that either!

  “Hm? Something the matter?” Prince Rubert turned as he noticed the two of us trying to suppress Minori-san.

  This was bad. Of course we were going to stand out when we both suddenly slapped our hands over her mouth. Even Petralka and the others were goggling at us.

  “Oh! Well, uh...” I sent my brain into overdrive, hoping to come up with an excuse. “This woman is, uh, she’s sick!”

  “Well, well... Is she going to be all right?” the prince asked considerately. “She needn’t strain herself here. We can summon a doctor...”

  “N-No need! She’ll be fine in a few minutes! She just has these little attacks!”

  Yikes... this prince seemed like about the nicest guy in the world! No way could I confess that Minori-san had been secretly making up a BL conversation between him and Garius!

  “I see old fondness has made my greetings overlong,” Prince Rubert said, turning back to Petralka and the others. “And when an ill person was waiting on me—my sincere apologies.”

  “No, really, think nothing of it,” I said emphatically. Now Hikaru-san was helping us to restrain Minori-san, too; I felt like we were the ones who should be sincerely sorry.

  Still, how I felt was one thing, how I had to act was another. With regrets to Prince Rubert, I wanted this audience to be over, and quickly. Minori-san looked like she might actually explode if things went on much longer. Having these two handsome men, Rubert and Garius, right next to her was physically dangerous.

  But then Rubert said, “I do, though, have one last thing to mention.” He didn’t seem to notice how panicked I was, or at least he acted like he didn’t. “I’m afraid I didn’t come here simply to exchange pleasantries. I have an important request to make.”

  “Have you?” Petralka replied. “Tell us; you needn’t hesitate.”

  At that, the Sixth Prince of Zwelberich stood up straight as a post and still as a statue and looked directly at Petralka.

  “I, Rubert Wollin, the Sixth Prince of Zwelberich—” His voice was clear and carrying; it almost sounded like he was singing. “—do address myself to the Holy Eldant Empire, bosom friend of my nation, and its empress, Petralka an Eldant III, worthy of all love and respect: to her I humbly propose marriage.”

  The last echoes of his voice faded away in the suddenly silent audience chamber.

  ............

  .....................

  .................................Huh?

  It took me a moment to grasp what he had said. And I wasn’t the only one.

  “............Huh?” On the throne, Petralka was blinking in amazement.

  “Whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaattttttttt?!”

  The audience chamber filled with my confused cry and the murmuring of every minister, counselor, and VIP in the room.

  Chapter Two: When G-----s Met Ru
bert

  “Her Majesty—married?” Myusel’s eyes were round as saucers.

  It was about half a day after Prince Rubert’s stunning proposal of marriage. We’d said goodbye to Matoba-san, who claimed he had to go to the JSDF garrison to report to the Japanese government. The rest of us came back to the mansion.

  We had gone to the castle with the intention of giving Prince Rubert Amutech’s formal greetings, but things at the royal residence were in no shape for that now, and we had withdrawn for the time being. The fact that deciding to do that—and getting permission for it—took a full eight hours told you just how crazy things were in the Eldant government right now.

  Our dinner was some food Myusel prepared in a big hurry. I had told her we would presumably be dining at a banquet at the castle this evening, so we wouldn’t need dinner; I felt a little bad about suddenly dropping in with a party of hungry employees. Before long, though, Myusel had produced a meal using whatever was on hand, but which still tasted just as good as ever. It was one of the many things I found amazing about her—but, er, forget about that for now.

  “I don’t know,” I said to Myusel, whose face seemed to have frozen into a permanent expression of shock. “She didn’t answer right away or anything. It doesn’t look like the Eldant government was expecting this any more than we were...”

  “I see... No, I suppose they wouldn’t.” Myusel nodded, sounding like she was talking to herself as much as to me.

  “Honestly, proposal or no proposal, I can hardly picture Petralka getting married...” Well, wait. That wasn’t really true, was it? Why, just yesterday, I had been fantasizing about Petralka and me standing at the altar. But still, the idea that she might actually get married felt a little unreal.

  “I disagree,” Hikaru-san said, elegantly sipping some soup. “If anything, I would say it’s incredible that the subject hadn’t come up already.”

  “Y-You think so?”

  “Her Majesty is seventeen, right? Very much a grown woman. I’ve heard it said that in Japan’s Heian Era, girls as young as thirteen were considered ready to be married.”