How the Prince Makes Friends – Chapter 82

Author: isuzuuy

Even as they cried, the children refused to back down, clinging tightly to Rianus. He continued to struggle, but when he saw the children trembling with fear, he bit down hard on his lip.

Pan, who had been lying down, sprang to his feet in surprise. However, Nihil shook his head as if telling him to stay put, leaving Pan at a loss about what to do.

The boy who had tied Nihil up looked down at him, sitting quietly, and spoke in a dry voice.

“It’ll hurt less if you don’t resist and just die quickly.”

“……”

After saying that, the boy lifted Nihil and approached the host.

“We’ve chosen today’s prey.”

Nihil, who had become the prey, gazed up at the host through the hood covering his face.

The boy holding him and the gambling den’s host smelled similar.

They were probably father and son.

Nihil’s eyes, hidden beneath his hood, grew dark and cold.

How should he punish a piece of trash who had thrown his own child before a hunting dog?

“Let my brother go!”

Rianus tried to resist again.

He knew Nihil would be safe, but being separated from him still made him uneasy. If Nihil were left in front of that vicious hunting dog with his hands and feet bound, even his extraordinary friend might get hurt.

However, no matter how hard he twisted his entire body, he couldn’t break free of the children’s grip.

The host frowned as he watched Nihil. Ever since entering the hunting grounds, the boy hadn’t cried or raised his voice, and he had even sat quietly while being tied up.

“He’s too well-behaved.”

“What do you expect me to do about a kid who behaves himself?”

“Maybe the antidote hasn’t taken effect yet.”

The spectators didn’t seem pleased either, and jeers erupted from the crowd. What they wanted was for the children to cry, beg for their lives, and struggle wildly before being savagely torn apart by the dog’s teeth.

The host figured it was because three new children who didn’t know any better had arrived. He decided he should start with a different game to set an example.

He jerked his chin toward Rianus, who was being held by the other children.

“Bring that one over, too.”

“…We agreed there would only be one prey at a time.”

“Shut up and bring him here.”

The boy glared at the host with murderous eyes. The host threatened him, asking if he wanted to become the prey instead.

Nihil didn’t like the host trying to drag Rianus into this as well, so he stretched his leg through the bars and kicked the man squarely in the shin with a loud thud.

“Ugh!”

The pain must have been considerable, because the host clutched his shin and collapsed to the floor. The spectators found even that entertaining and cheered for more.

“Y-you little bastard!”

Unable to stand it any longer, the host entered the hunting grounds with a whip in hand. After making sure the cage door had been locked, Nihil glanced at Evan.

Evan discreetly gave him a thumbs-up.

I need to buy at least an hour, then.

The kitty had gone to request reinforcements with the children, and it would take another hour for the Royal Guard to assemble and reach this place.

Rescuing the children would be easy enough. Evan could simply smash everything to pieces, grab them, and run. But Nihil wanted to make sure every last piece of trash in this place was caught and locked away.

If he looked even slightly suspicious, all the people funding this operation would flee.

That was why, even though he wanted to beat the man in front of him to a pulp, Nihil couldn’t do it. Doggy could probably handle their bodyguards without much trouble, but he wouldn’t be able to catch everyone if they scattered in different directions.

Who knew not being able to use magic would be this irritating?

If he’d known the remaining children were in such a terrible state, he would have acted a little more carefully…

But it was too late to intervene openly now. His role was to protect the children until the guards arrived while keeping the audience entertained enough that they wouldn’t leave.

As Nihil pondered how to keep the spectators from leaving, he saw the host preparing to swing his whip. He wriggled around, cut the rope with his dagger, and promptly scampered away.

“…Huh?”

The boy stared blankly at Nihil, who had leisurely slipped out of his grasp.

“W-what is this? He has a knife! What the hell were you doing without even checking his belongings?!”

“Neil doesn’t know anything.”

When the host shouted furiously, Nihil shrugged and acted like an innocent child who had no idea what was going on.

Nihil approached the children holding Rianus and waved his knife around, going, “Boo! Boo!” The frightened children backed away on their own.

“Pan, stay right next to Shel.”

“…Who’s that?”

“My little brother.”

“……This kid?”

“Yeah.”

Pan couldn’t figure out why Nerr was Shel, but he was certain that the person he needed to stick close to was Neil’s little brother. So he hurried over and stood right beside Rianus.

Nihil tucked his dagger back into his clothes and took the cane from Rianus.

Looking at how the two sides had split into groups of three, Rianus whispered to him.

“Neil, what are you going to do? Beat them up?”

Even though Nihil was younger than the others, Rianus thought he could easily handle children like them.

But Nihil shook his head.

“I don’t hit little kids.”

“Then what are you going to do?”

“But I do hit grown-ups.”

“…Huh?”

Before Rianus could fully understand what he meant, Nihil suddenly dashed off beside him.

The host was startled by Nihil charging straight at him and swung his whip. Nihil let the whip coil around his cane, then yanked it away.

“W-what?!”

Before the host could even react to having his whip stolen, Nihil began lashing out with it. The man flailed and scrambled away in alarm.

The whip, swung wildly by the seemingly frail child, mostly snapped harmlessly against the floor. But whenever the host tried to step on it or grab it, it would accidentally strike him right in the face.

Pointing at the host’s face, which had turned red from the blows, Nihil giggled.

“Your funny-looking face is even funnier now!”

The children were speechless, staring blankly at the spectacle. Eventually, the host seemed to decide that getting his whip back would be difficult, so he shouted at the burly man outside the cage.

“What are you waiting for?! Open the cage!”

The burly man gave the host, who was getting thoroughly humiliated, a somewhat pitying look before pulling out a bunch of keys.

Nihil didn’t miss the opportunity. Pretending to swing his whip around wildly, he smacked the back of the burly man’s hand. Then he swiftly snatched up the fallen keys and declared with a bright smile,

“I got the keys!”

“……”

Silence fell over the entire arena. Even Evan’s quiet mutter of “Crazy bastard” was audible.

Nihil looked around at the silent crowd and tilted his head like a clueless little boy.

“Whyyy?”

“Y-you little punk! Hand those over right now!”

“What? No! I got them! If you want to escape, get them yourself, mister!”

“What kind of bastard bought such a defective little brat?!”

“Neil isn’t defective!”

With his hands on his hips, Nihil sharply turned his head away as though offended. He looked every bit like a childish little boy with a few screws loose.

But the supposedly defective little Nihil soon smiled brightly again, as if he’d never been sulking, and tugged at the host’s collar.

“W-what kind of kid has so much strength…!”

“Mister! Play with Neil!”

“Get lost!”

The host was dragged along in a panic. Then, in a fit of anger, he tried to kick Nihil. But Nihil stumbled over his own feet and accidentally dodged the kick.

“Ow, I fell—huh? Mister, what’s wrong?”

Nihil asked innocently, as though he had no idea what was happening, while the host fumed with a bright red face after kicking nothing but air.

The host tried desperately to catch Nihil, but the boy only ran around giggling and shouting things like, “The ugly mister is it!”

At first, the spectators watched with mocking laughter. But when the host, who kept getting humiliated, began to look exhausted, they started jeering at him to do his job properly.

“When are you going to start?!”

“You can’t even catch one kid?!”

“Catch another one, then!”

“Do it properly!”

Nihil seemed to be running out of ways to kill time by tormenting the host, so he began thinking of another game.

“The other grown-ups don’t seem to be having fun.”

“Y-you little…”

“Then shall we play something else?”

With that, Nihil pulled a copper coin out of his clothes and held it up.

“Ta-da!”

“W-where the hell did you get the money…?!”

“Let’s play heads or tails! If you guess correctly, I’ll give you one of my belongings. But if you guess wrong, you have to give me one of yours!”

“Are you trying to make a fool out of—”

“Here it goes!”

Ignoring the host completely, Nihil casually flicked the coin into the air.

The spectators, who had been jeering moments ago, fell silent without even realizing it, their eyes fixed on the coin. It was a perfectly fitting reaction for gambling addicts.

Nihil caught the coin on the back of his hand and smiled brightly.

“Heads or tails?”

“Heads.”

The answer came from someone other than the host. Evan, who had been watching the scene, spoke up to help set the mood.

“That’s heads, right?”

“Neil doesn’t know. What do you think, mister?”

“T-tails, I think.”

“What are you talking about?! Heads! It’s heads!”

The arena grew noisy again. The host was so caught up in the atmosphere that he even forgot he was supposed to be angry.

“Heads!”

“Heads? You’re not going to change your answer?”

“No!”

At the host’s confident shout, Nihil discreetly checked the coin on the back of his hand and flinched.

“Can’t you change it?”

“I said I won’t.”

The host puffed out his chest, convinced he had guessed correctly.

“Aw, what a shame. It’s all that mister’s fault.”

Nihil grumbled and blamed Evan. Then he deliberately raised his hand to show the coin to the spectators, Evan included.

After checking it, Evan spoke up.

“It’s tails.”

“What?”

Shocked to hear that it wasn’t heads but tails, the host approached to check for himself. The coin was lying with the lettering facing up.

The copper coin bore the face of the founding king on one side and one of his famous sayings on the other. Children often mistook the side with the saying for heads.

Nihil tilted his head like an innocent child who didn’t understand anything and checked again.

“This is tails?”

“That’s tails.”

“Wow! Then that mister was wrong, wasn’t he?”

“Looks like it.”

Nihil smiled brightly and held out his hand to the bewildered host.

“You were wrong, so give me one of your belongings.”

“……”

Already caught up in Nihil’s game, the host forgot that he was supposed to be catching the child and began rummaging through his pockets.

Of course, he had nothing worth giving away. The only things in his pockets were stimulants that doubled as an awakening agent to help the dog go wild.

Thinking this might actually work out well for him, the host handed Nihil one of the two stimulant pills wrapped in a small piece of paper.

“Here. Have some candy.”

“Candy? Yay!”

Nihil bounced up and down with delight at receiving the candy, but the suspicious smell made him tuck it into his pocket without eating it.

“…You’re not going to eat it?”

“Later. We’re going to toss the coin again, so go away.”

Nihil told the host to get lost, then scampered away himself to put some distance between them before tossing the coin again.

“Heads or tails?”

“If I guess correctly this time, hand over the keys.”

“And what if you’re wrong again?”

“……”

The host considered giving Nihil the remaining stimulant, but then remembered that the hunting dog had given birth to puppies just the other day and couldn’t go properly berserk without the drug. He hesitated.

Then he remembered a scrawny little puppy that looked as if it might die at any moment and quickly answered,

“I’ll give you a puppy.”

“A puppy? You have puppies?”

“Of course! A very cute puppy, born just recently to the hunting dog.”

“Okay! Hurry up and choose!”

“Heads.”

“Hmm…”

Nihil discreetly lifted his hand to peek at the coin again, then spoke.

“You’re not going to change your answer?”

“I’m not changing it.”

“Hmm, you said the side with the writing was tails, right? There’s writing on this side, too…”

“……”