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Volume 3 Behind the Scenes 2.3

Translator: Reflet
Editor: Weasalopes

２．One Day In Wulls Castle

　Wulls had been quite peaceful lately.

「Elena-chan, morning～」

「Yeah, morning」

　The octogals came to Elena first thing in the morning at breakfast. Her movement had become sluggish as an after-effect of the emilrad, so the octogals were the perfect partner to spend the time with because they didn’t mind those things.

「Elena-chan, you alright～？」

「I guess I’m alright.」

「Are you eating properly～？」

「From now on, as you can see.」

　Elena said, looking at the maid. In front of her was a cart with breakfast on it. This was breakfast customized for Elena specifically, since she couldn’t eat all that much in the morning. As for what it consisted of…

「I smell tea～」

「I smell rice～」

「Porridge～？　Porridge～？」

「Looks like today’s tea gruel.」

　Tea gruel, eaten regularly in Western Japan, Wakayama, Nara, as well as South Osaka and parts of Kyoto. Porridge made from roasted and stewed green tea was truly refreshing. You could eat it cold and have it still taste good, plus it was good for the stomach. Truly a meal worthy of recommendation to someone who’s under the weather.

　The only problem would probably be that rice was hardly in circulation, even thought you could technically get some of it from Ortem. Currently, the only people who could eat it were those at the harbor with connections to Azuma Workshop or the royal house. It wasn’t a matter of finances, but a matter of opportunity.

「Will you all be eating too？」

「We don’t need any toda～y」

「Full energy～」

「If there’s any left we’ll taste test～」

「Okay.」

　From previous experience, you would assume the octogals to be gluttons, but their physiology made it so that they didn’t want to eat much at full energy. Maybe because they sampled new recipes from the head chef yesterday, the octogals didn’t really want to eat much today. And Elena knew that they in fact enjoyed porridge because they had eaten it several times with her before. Actually, the octogals generally didn’t comment on the taste of anything unless it was truly bad.

「How about a drink？」

「Tea ple～ase」

「Roast green tea love～」

「You heard them.」

　The maid obeyed and poured roast green tea for the octogals. She had a bitter smile on her face; probably out of slight amusement.

「Delicious.」

　Finishing the last spoonful of light porridge from the lacquered bowl, Elena gave a contented sigh and expressed her gratitude for the meal. This morning was, as expected, still difficult to really eat anything for breakfast. She had eaten porridge that filled up 60% of a regular-sized bowl and a little bit of scrambled egg, and two cuts of pickled vegetables; not an especially large meal.

　And because Hiroshi and his friends had taught them a lot about pickled foods, today’s was rice bran pickle.

「Already done？　Already done？」

「Is it hard？　Is it hard？」

「I’ve just never been too keen in the mornings.」

「Will you eat later？　Will you eat later？」

「I can eat fairly well at lunch, so don’t worry.」

　Elena reassured the octogals with a light pat on the head and a smile. This was something that happened every morning. Also, the remaining porridge and side dish would go to waste at this rate, so Elena had ordered a manual laborer to eat the remainder whenever that happened (of course they enjoyed it). There was generally never any habit of discarding food in this castle.

「So what are you doing today？」

「We’ll play with Mark-O in a bit～」

「Okay, but don’t distract him too much from work, alright？」

「It’s fine～、We know when to behave～」

　The octogals said before pouring their own tea and drinking it. They didn’t sound very trustworthy, but the octogals always behaved in the proper situations, so they truly did know when to behave.

「Time to go～」

「Play nice now」

　After chatting a bit over tea, the octogals proclaimed their departure and leapt off from Elena’s head and lap. After watching them disappear from sight, she stretched lightly and went off for a walk as part of her rehab. Although she did hear Mark scream about halfway through.

「……Life is peaceful.」

　This was a usual occurrence and the octogals never did anything all that bad, so Elena just left it at that.

　Just before noon that day, in the king’s office.

「This is all I have for the petition. How about you, Layotte？」

「That’s it for me too. I haven’t heard any information lately from the open or hidden side of the world that warrants any action on our part. It is truly peaceful.」

「Although it truly pains me to think that things became this way as soon as Katarina-sama left……」

　Farlane was just too peaceful nowadays. Any administrator should be grateful for these things, but to drag an outsider into this mess and have them clean it up rather than the actual person responsible was, in many ways, painful.

「Speaking of headaches, we also must think about your and Elena’s weddings.」

「Yeah, just thinking of the family Older Sister marries into hurts my head.」

「With all the inward unrest, any decent options were all taken……」

　Elena was already twenty, an age that most would say was at the last line before being too late. Aearis’ position was shaky, plus Katarina had wrecked a lot of things, so as a result Elena’s marriage period had completely eluded her. Age-wise and status-wise, any good partner for her was pretty much taken.

「Elena-chan’s late～？」

「And it’s the fact I can’t deny the possibility that truly grieves me……」

「Lay’s gonna be single for life～？」

「I couldn’t care less, but my position doesn’t allow that.」

　The king and Layotter ignored the octogals as they suddenly appeared and spoke. They had to list any potential suitors for Elena that looked ok.

「And marrying her off outside the country is out of the question.」

「Yeah. Even if Older Sister is a bit late in age and is carrying the aftereffects of a poison that nearly killed her, we cannot just let the potential queen heir of our country become the concubine of some forty, fifty year old man. Plus everyone in the other royal houses that might accept Older Sister is rather dodgy with the way they treat women.」

「And the same goes for the crown princess. The eldest among the unmarried crown princes are is seven years old. Even with all of our leniency, I really do not think anything below thirteen years of age is a good idea.」

「Even for Older Sister Magdarena, we had to adjust some things to meet the expectations of the other party. And that prince so happened to be thirteen and able to handle the marriage with no issues. This situation was quite different from Older Sister Elena’s.」

　Layotte analyzed the current situation, clearly troubled. By this point, Elena had no room to try and get a place in the royal families outside the country.

「But I also wish to avoid marrying her off to the nobility of other countries. If we go about it the wrong way, it might destroy that country’s power balance.」

　Even Princess Maria, who had married into the collateral line of the younger brother duke, had unintentionally shifted the power balance in Malkt to an unbelievable degree. So if the crown prince’s sister and direct heir to the blood line of Farlane, Elena, were to ever marry an earl or marquis from another country, who even knew what would happen with their internal affairs.