How the Prince Makes Friends Chapter 41

There was no way that wildcat, who went out of his way to avoid the servants, had managed to get himself a snack. He had probably been busy sorting medicinal herbs instead. And even if he had eaten something, he wasn’t the sort of brat who would stop the prince from eating under the pretext of being full himself.

The brat had figured it out. He had realized that the prince had already eaten at the main palace. He had even noticed that the prince’s physical condition was different from usual.

Even Evan, who had been right beside him, hadn’t realized that the prince was suffering from indigestion. Yet this brat had noticed it in the brief time they’d spent together, deliberately brought him to the greenhouse, and even prepared plum tea.

Their oblivious little kitten had simply assumed it was normal for his friend to fiddle with his hand and let him continue. But looking more closely, Evan realized that Nihil was actually massaging it.

Eventually concluding that he was the only person who could make sure the wildcat got fed, Evan sighed discreetly and spoke up.

“Your Highness, if you don’t mind, may I eat here?”

“Oh! Sir Evan, you were hungry! I’m sorry I didn’t think of you. Hurry and sit down. Make yourself comfortable.”

Evan had never asked to eat in front of the prince before, so he had worried that Rianus might find it strange. But without a hint of suspicion, Rianus simply nodded and accepted the situation with a casual, “If you’re hungry, you should eat.”

Welcoming the prince’s complete lack of perceptiveness, Evan carefully unwrapped a neatly packaged sandwich and placed it on the tea table.

How am I supposed to get him to eat this?

Wondering how he could naturally persuade Nihil to eat the sandwich, Evan glanced at him.

Nihil happened to meet his eyes and casually tossed out a remark.

“Why are you staring at me like that? Don’t worry. I won’t steal your dog food—”

Before Nihil could finish, Evan, incensed by the words dog food, shoved the sandwich straight into his mouth.

“Wut’s th’ dog f’od taste like, ya damn wildcat?”

“……”

Having successfully shared his dog food, Evan smiled with satisfaction.

Why was I even worrying about it? If I just shove it into his mouth, he’ll eat it.

Evan offered him the dog food with a forced smile, his teeth clenched. Nihil looked up at him, silently holding the sandwich between his teeth for a moment. Then he released Rianus’s hand, which he had been fiddling with, and ate the sandwich without a word.

Evan had been a little worried that Nihil might spit it out, but seeing the brat eat obediently without resisting softened his heart again. Perhaps he really had been hungry.

Oblivious Rianus watched the two of them with a pleased expression, delighted that his escort knight and his friend seemed to be getting along so well.

Nihil finished the sandwich in just a few bites, wiped his hands clean with the napkin provided, and took hold of Rianus’s hand again, resuming his little massage.

“But, Neil, it hurts. Can’t you be a little gentler?”

“…Should I stop if it hurts too much?”

At Rianus’s complaint, Nihil paused. He let his eyebrows droop as though he were genuinely disappointed.

“N-No, no! It doesn’t hurt at all. You can keep going.”

Rianus wanted to grant his friend anything he wanted, so he shook his head vigorously. It hurt a little, but he decided to endure it.

Evan munched on his sandwich while watching the two little boys with a complicated expression.

One was enduring the pain for the other’s sake, while the other was even pretending to be disappointed as he continued giving him a massage.

As Evan wondered how he could possibly explain this peculiar relationship, he realized that this was what happened when someone who knew everything and someone who knew nothing tried to be considerate of each other. He would probably witness plenty more strange scenes like this in the future.

Wanting to rescue the prince, who kept flinching from the pain, and feed the wildcat at the same time, Evan held another sandwich up to Nihil’s mouth.

Nihil frowned slightly at the sandwich thrust in front of him, but once again, he obediently took it between his teeth.

Evan felt rather pleased, as though he were watching a wild animal cautiously accepting food despite its wariness.

Rianus wiggled his newly freed hand a few times before taking another sip of plum tea. It was more drinkable than he had expected. Since Nihil seemed to like it, too, perhaps he would start drinking it more often.

“Neil, do you like plums?”

“…Yeah. I just feel like having them once in a while.”

Nihil’s answer came a little late. The truth was that the plum tea had been prepared for Rianus from the very beginning.

Still, if he had to choose, he preferred plum tea to milk tea.

“By the way, Rian. Did something happen today?”

“Hmm, nothing much… Oh, I asked His Majesty about the things you wanted to know. It seems no one at the main palace has mentioned you yet. The Countess doesn’t seem to have said anything about you either, apart from the fact that I take good care of you. Apparently, Carus didn’t say a single word even when His Majesty asked him.”

“Anything else?”

“Well, I talked with His Majesty in the morning, then attended my statecraft lesson and listened to His Majesty discussing… um, state affairs.”

Rianus had nearly let slip that he had eaten with the King, so he hurriedly changed the subject. Nihil had already guessed the truth, but he simply nodded as though he knew nothing and listened attentively.

Rianus began explaining everything he had heard, step by step.

“…So I suppose the Grand Duke is investigating it.”

“That’s why you brought the holy water.”

“Huh? Holy water?”

Evan, who had been carefully rolling the bottle of holy water in his hand, flinched at Nihil’s remark. Rianus, who had no idea what they were talking about, merely tilted his head in confusion.

“It’s nothing. Do they need a monster?”

“I don’t know whether it was a monster or a demon, but that falls under the Grand Duke’s jurisdiction. Now that we know it’s related to them, we can’t interfere carelessly. But the Grand Duke has no leads either, so it seems the investigation has been delayed. Our kingdom doesn’t have any connections with the Eastern Empire, so I think they were hoping to establish trade relations through this incident. It’s a shame things turned out this way.”

“So they don’t need a monster or a magic stone, then?”

“I don’t know all the details, but the reason the Grand Duke is troubled isn’t because of a monster or a magic stone. It’s because he’s worried it might be a demon. A demon powerful enough to evade the Grand Duke’s tracking would have considerable strength or influence.”

“Hmm. It wasn’t a demon. It was a monster.”

“Huh?”

“And I already destroyed the magic stone, so I can’t give it to you.”

“…What?”

“Actually, I blew up the pirate ship, too.”

“Uh… What?”

Rianus’s mind couldn’t keep up with Nihil’s disjointed explanation, and he stared blankly at him. Seeing his confusion, Nihil repeated himself clearly, emphasizing each word.

“I. Blew. Up. The. Pirate. Ship.”

“Uh… Why?”

“Because I was being kidnapped.”

“H-Huh?”

Kidnapped? By whom? Nihil? On a pirate ship?

The additional explanation only made Rianus more confused. Evan, who already knew that Nihil was responsible for blowing up the pirate ship, felt a throbbing headache from the unhelpful explanation and pressed his temples.

Nihil tilted his head.

“Am I going to be taken away now?”

“Huh? N-No, no! Why would they take you away? Um… You did a good job…?”

Rianus had no idea what he was supposed to say, so he instinctively praised him. After all, Nihil had defeated some bad people. That was a good thing, wasn’t it?

Leaving Rianus to his confusion, Nihil held out his hand toward Evan.

“Hand it over.”

“……”

Evan hesitated briefly before handing Nihil the small bottle of holy water he had been holding. Nihil placed it on the table and rolled it back and forth as he spoke.

“Your dog—no, your knight—knew I was the one who blew up the pirate ship. So he seems to have mistaken me for a demon… I killed the monster, and I blew up the pirate ship, but I’m not a demon. And for the record, there were no demons on the pirate ship.”

“…Neil, could you explain a little more? I honestly don’t understand what you’re saying.”

Rianus’s pupils darted wildly. Nihil tapped the bottle of holy water a few times, opened it, and dropped a single drop onto the back of his own hand. He held it out for Evan to see before continuing.

“I was feeling unwell, so I fell into a deep sleep. When I opened my eyes, I was out at sea.”

“Uh-huh?”

“In other words, I was kidnapped while I was asleep.”

“????”

Rianus had never imagined that the truth behind the pirate ship incident, which he had assumed had nothing to do with him, would come up again through his own friend’s mouth like this.

Nihil glanced at a shadow wavering in the corner of the greenhouse, then continued, calmly recalling the events in order.

“They probably picked me up to sell me because my hair color was unusual… Anyway, I’d been asleep for a long time, and when I woke up, I was hungry. I’d also lost something. So I was slightly … I’m slightly… I’m in a bad mood.”

Evan figured that Nihil’s definition of slightly was probably very different from his own. It was a good thing he had made sure the wildcat was fed on time.

“So I was a little… sensitive. Then that thing started biting at me.”

“B-Biting?”

“The monster.”

“……”

Rianus blinked repeatedly, trying to piece together Nihil’s words and imagine what had happened.

Evan felt cold sweat trickling down his back. The wildcat was still explaining everything in a calm, gentle voice, but Evan was now absolutely certain that no one should ever mess with him when he was in a sensitive mood.

Watching the two of them in turn, Nihil shook his head as though to prevent any misunderstanding and continued addressing Rianus.

“Let me make this clear first. I don’t kill living beings indiscriminately. That kind of monster is merely a mass of condensed magical energy. Besides, I was genuinely in a bad mood at the time. So I did nothing wrong.”

“Yeah! Neil didn’t do anything wrong! The monster was bad.”

“That’s right. The monster was bad.”

Nihil nodded in agreement with Rianus. It was an utterly shameless sight.

Evan narrowed his eyes and asked, “So how did you kill it? Even knights have trouble dealing with monsters.”

Monsters weren’t necessarily overwhelmingly powerful, but physical attacks were largely ineffective unless they were imbued with aura. Moreover, they would continually regenerate until the magic contained in their core had been completely depleted. That was why knights and mages had to patiently wear away their demonic energy with aura or magic until the monster exhausted its supply.

“Normally, you gradually strip away the demonic energy until the monster runs out of magical power and disappears. But I can see its core, so it wasn’t difficult to deal with.”

Evan’s eyes widened at Nihil’s astonishing statement, delivered as casually as if he were discussing the weather.

“You can see that, too?”

“Magical energy is simply a transformed form of mana. If mages and knights who wield aura know the trick, they shouldn’t have much trouble locating the core either. The energy around it is slightly different. If you need me to, I can teach you how. Just bring me a few monsters alive.”

“……”

“Neil, you really are amazing!”

Evan was at a loss for words, but Rianus looked at Nihil with sparkling eyes, like a child listening to the adventures of a hero.

Nihil wanted to tell him all sorts of things to live up to those expectations, but in truth, there wasn’t much more he could say.

“Anyway, I was hungry, and I was annoyed at the people who kidnapped me. So as soon as I could see land, I blew the ship up and escaped. The monster was in an underground compartment near the stern. If that matches the location where they found the traces of demonic energy, then those traces must belong to that monster.”

As the explanation continued, Evan let out a deep sigh and rummaged through his clothes for writing materials.

“…I need to submit a report, so please give me a detailed account.”

But Nihil shook his head at Evan, who was preparing to write one.

“There’s no need to submit a separate report. The shadows are too deep.”

“……The shadows?”