Chapter 5- The Queen
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When we arrived at my room four other maids were waiting for us with a multitude of dresses, most of which were composed of a gown with a matching petticoat. The maids seeing me for the first time all had a complex look on their faces but with just a nod of Lucilla they all regained their composure.
(Just how important is this maid inside this palace?)
After she made sure there was no problem Lucilla left and the maids started showing me the dresses one after another but the ones that hit my eye were only two: one was red with black ornaments while the other one was green with a pattern that looked like the eyes on a peacock’s tail going all around the petticoat.
(The red one is obviously the best-looking one but the people that will attend the party probably don’t know how I look yet and if I were to appear in front of them with a red and black dress I might cause some heart attacks. The green one really puts one’s mind at ease if I have to say so; I’ll go with that this time.)
The maids helped me wearing the green dress after I told them it was the one I was going to wear and, while I was going around the room to feel how comfortable the dress was, which of course wasn’t at all, Lucilla returned.
“Hero Fortuna, if you have finished changing, Her Majesty the queen would like to meet you before the party.”
“Yes, of course, please lead the way.”
We left my room and went on the second floor, when we reached a door that looked like the others to me Lucilla stopped and knocked.
“Your Majesty, I’ve brought Hero Fortuna.”
“Come in.”
At the words of the queen Lucilla opened the door and gestured me to enter.
When I entered I saw a woman in her forties, with a blue and black dress, sitting on a sofa in front of a coffee table, on top of the coffee table there where two mugs full of something that smelled like tea.
“You must be Hero Fortuna, we haven’t met yet, but as our maid must have said to you I am the queen of Olivedias Kingdom, Zillya Deae Carian.”
“It’s an honor to meet you Queen Zillya.” Saying so I bowed while holding my dress.
“Please sit, and don’t be so stiff.”
At the words of the queen I sat on the sofa on the other side of the table, as to be in front of her and [looked] at her.
Name: Zillya Deae Carian Race: Human Lvl: 41 Job: Queen HP: 3258 MP: 2367 SP: 1014 STR: 189 DEF: 176 AGI: 243 INT: 195 WIS: 194 Skills Dagger mastery lvl 5 Alchemy lvl5 Hand to hand combat lvl3 Torture techniques lvl 6 Keen hearing lvl3 Poison resistance lvl 3 Stealth lvl 4 Shadow magic lvl 3 Lie detection lvl 2 Titles Shadow Queen
(What the fuck is this! Is she really the queen? Well, the job is listed as queen so she must be. But this is not what the status of a queen should look like!)
“I actually wanted to ask you a couple of things Fortuna, if it doesn’t bother you of course.”
“Please, feel free to ask me anything.”
“Very well, then. My husband should have told you already that your appearance is the same of a demon that is described in a legend of our world, no one, except for her, ever had that appearance in the history of this world. Why then do you think he didn’t let Gabriel kill you the moment they saw you?”
“I really don’t know.”
“It’s because of the hero summoning ritual conditions.”
“The conditions?”
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“You see, the hero summoning can only be done once every ten years, but it is made so that the person who is summoned would be willing to accept to be the hero, to a certain extent. Specifically it has three conditions: first the summoned person must be loved by the light, this means that he would be able to use holy magic but also that it is in his heart to help people in need; second he must have some kind of combat experience, with priority given to those who have experienced killing; finally the summoned person must have no attachment to the people of his world.”
(Ohiohiohi, these conditions are almost impossible to have at the same time in a normal person! If I, a god of light who was incarnated tens of times throughout history who doesn’t care strongly for any person alive, wasn’t on Earth, would they have managed to summon someone?)
I was looking at the queen bewildered.
“When I heard the conditions the first time I too was really surprised and thought that no one could really satisfy all three of them, but the summoning was a success and you appeared in the centre of that magic circle. What’s more you accepted immediately the role of “hero”, without showing discontent and following all our instruction. There isn’t a single person in his sane mind who would do this. So it begs the question. Who are you really, and what is your goal? Don’t lie because I will immediately know if you do so.”
When the queen finished talking I sighed, closed my eyes and had a deep breath. Seeing all this, the queen didn’t say a thing, probably thinking that I was just preparing an answer for her, instead I started meditating and [looked] around the castle: around the room there were no guards and even Lucilla had left.
(Probably the queen was told what the truth stone detected and had enough confidence in her abilities to request to be left alone.)
I kept [looking] around the castle until I found what seemed to be the private chamber of the queen, in the room I found a hidden locked box and [looking] inside I saw various documents that shouldn’t really be there.
(Okay, this should be enough to stop her from meddling in my vacation here.)
I opened my eyes, the queen was there, smiling, waiting for my answer.
“I would prefer if you didn’t meddle too much in my businesses, Your Majesty”
The smile on the face of the queen quickly disappeared but soon returned, it wasn’t the warm smile she had before though, but a cold smile that could send shivers down anyone’s back.
“I think I did not get what you just said, it seemed like you said I shouldn’t meddle with your business, but that can’t be right.”
“Oh no, I said exactly that”
Saying so, I sipped from the mug in front of me and smiled to the queen.
“Don’t fuck with me! You will explain yourself here and now!” She shouted while standing, the smile she wore before was nowhere to be seen.
(Oooh, she’s angry!)
“Please Your Majesty, calm down; I just don’t want to be bothered. I think I don’t want it almost as much as you don’t want the other nations to find out you’re abducting demi-humans from the border to make them into disposable soldiers against the demon army.”
The queen’s face went blank and she fell down on the couch as I took another sip from the mug.
(Wow, this is really good, I should ask Lucilla what it’s made from.)
“I don’t know how you got that information but I can’t let you live now that you know such things.”
As soon as she finished talking she took a dagger out of her dress and got up from the sofa, he face now expressionless, ready to kill me.
Soon her face went blank again, seeing that her arm, with dagger, rings and everything was now in my hand and no longer attached to her shoulder. She looked at where her arm was, just to see nothing there but blood gushing out.
(I tried out of curiosity but I didn’t think I would actually manage to teleport it away with my divinity locked.)
“I’d rather you didn’t try to kill me if you don’t want the next one to be your heart instead of your arm.”
“How!? I saw the report of your status, it was just a bit over that of a common soldier! Who the fuck are you!? Don’t tell me you actually are…Leliah?” Her face was now full of terror as she crouched down on the floor while holding her shoulder, trying to stop the blood that was still flowing out.
(How many times can this woman change expression in just a few minutes! It’s astonishing. Anyway, I should clean this mess up before it becomes even worse.)
“Stop with this shit, I’m not your archdemon. Hear me out, if you stop meddling with me I will return this arm to the place it belongs, almost as if nothing happened, also I won’t speak about your behind-the-scene deeds to no one but if you just try to speak of what happened here today or you interfere with my having fun I will kill you so fast you won’t even realize you died. Do we have a deal?” I said, tapping my shoulder with the severed arm.
(Oh shit, the dagger fell, where did it go now?)
“Fuck you!”
“No, no, no. It’s “of course I accept”, say it after me. Of…”
…and she spit on me, her face was now the image of anger itself.
I hit her with her arm.
“Of…”
“Screw you!”
I hit her again.
“Of…”
“You fucking cunt, I will kill you with my own hands!”
(She probably meant hand, singular.)
“Aaaah, this is getting nowhere, and I really wanted to do all this hero stuff. Why the hell did you have to ruin everything! Look, there is even blood in my tea now, and it was so good. Hear me out, you will now agree to the deal, it will be as if this never happened and I will save this country’s ass from the demons, OK?”
“Why should I after all this?”
“Because you can detect lies and if you don’t agree I will hit you with your husband’s and your sons’ heads next instead of your arm.”
“You psychopath!”
“Answer me.”
“I agree to the deal.” She said looking at me still angry.
“Good.” I teleported the arm back where it was meant to be along with most of the blood she lost, which made the queen bewildered.
“Who are you to be able to do such a thing?!”
“Ah ah ah, no questions.”
“…right.” She said biting her lips.
“Well then, if this was everything you needed for me, I would like to go to my room until the party, Your Majesty.”
“Yes, you are free to go.”
At the words of the queen I went out of the room and started walking towards my room. While walking I found myself in front of Lucilla who was returning to the room where I had the talk with the queen.
“Hero Fortuna how was your talk with the queen?”
“Oh, we just drank some kind of infusion and had a natter.”
“I see, a natter…”
Leaving Lucilla, who froze with a troubled look on her face, behind I started walking towards my room again.