After Marquis William Hemming’s explanation ended.

The room was filled with a deep silence.

“Haa…”

And as if breaking that silence, a deep, very deep sigh leaked from Dorothea’s mouth.

William flinched so visibly it would have been amusing to watch from the side.

“I-I did everything I could! I safely got the lady out! I treated her as well as I possibly could! It’s not my fault that swarms of crazy mice suddenly appeared in the territory!”

“It’s annoying, so just be quiet for now.”

“Gulp.”

William’s mouth shut like a clam.

It was an appearance all too pitiful for someone known as the king’s beloved favorite and a power player who ruled the kingdom.

But it couldn’t be helped.

Things like power and authority only worked on those bound by worldly common sense. Putting on airs in front of these madmen, who had outwitted the continent’s strongest nation not just once but twice, would be foolish. It would only result in losing one’s head.

And of course, if one’s head was physically removed, they’d certainly have no more worries, would they?

Seeing the Marquis glancing around nervously, Adelaide’s gaze changed to look somewhat sympathetic.

She had softened her view of the Marquis after hearing that he firmly rejected the traveler’s request for the lord’s wife.

“Miss Witch.”

“…I know. This problem won’t be solved by taking out my anger on this man. More importantly, it feels like we’ve been scammed, doesn’t it?”

“Scammed?”

“I’ve heard that in the past, during chaotic times, there were many mages or witches who used this method, though it’s decreased a lot recently. They’d complete a contract that intentionally induces misunderstanding in the other party, then extract the desired payment according to that contract.”

At Dorothea’s words, the Tin Knight tilted his head.

[The ‘Tin Knight’ asks if someone had such abilities wouldn’t it be faster to just take what they wanted from the beginning!]

If the former lord’s wife was the goal from the start, they could have just incapacitated the people of the Marquis’s territory with the ability to put people to sleep and then taken her.

But the traveler deliberately removed the mice, then demanded the lord’s wife as payment.

To the Tin Knight’s question of whether this wasn’t too roundabout, the witch answered:

“No, in this case, the very act of ‘going through these complicated procedures’ becomes a source of power. It’s like a ritual in itself.”

Because Dorothea often replaces all sorts of procedures with mana, it’s hard to understand, but originally, necromancy often required going through quite complex processes to achieve a single desired result.

For example, a curse where you put the target’s hair into a doll made of straw, and on a dark night when no one is watching, with a knife in your mouth, you stab the doll with nails and a hammer.

Actions that intuitively seem unnecessary and wasteful actually have meaning and become a source of power.

“Ah, come to think of it, there were quite a few such stories in fairy tales. Like a powerful mage who could turn someone who broke their promise into a mouse with just a gesture, but is pathetically defeated by soldiers who have nothing to do with it.”

“The older the mage or witch, the stronger this tendency. This is closer to ancient esoteric arts than modern magic. The problem is that these are as troublesome to undo as they are difficult to establish…”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ asks if it wouldn’t work to just split that traveler guy’s head in two!]

“Sometimes it can be undone that way, but other times the situation gets worse,” Dorothea clicked her tongue as if it had become annoying. “Tsk, there’s no helping it. We’ll just have to look into various things for now.”

At those words, Marquis William Hemming’s face brightened.

“A-are you going to help!?”

“Don’t get too excited. We won’t know if we can solve it until we look into it.”

“I understand. Please, I’m begging you! If the children never wake up at this rate, the people might rise up en masse!”

[The ‘Tin Knight’ says that the nobles he’s seen so far would probably just carry out a mass slaughter if a rebellion occurred, but this uncle seems naive!]

No, maybe he just lacks the power.

Thinking that inwardly, Dorothea sighed again, lamenting their that journey never progressed smoothly.

***

The first place the Tin Knight’s party visited was the guest annex where the former lord’s wife was staying.

Numerous guards were on high alert around the annex, and their demeanor was extremely stern.

“Is there anything unusual?”

“No, sir!”

“Pay close attention and don’t take even small anomalies lightly. Even if it’s an overreaction, it’s a hundred times better than letting things get out of hand.”

“Yes, sir! We won’t miss even the smallest shadow!”

It was truly the ideal image of a superior and subordinates.

Though it somewhat looked like they were trying to appeal to Dorothea’s party, saying, “Look how hard I’m working!”

And inside the mansion.

The gaze of the female knight standing proudly as if guarding the bedroom door recognized the party.

Her eyes, tinged with fatigue and vigilance, widened in surprise, and a single address leaked from her mouth, “Young Lady…?”

“Ronnie!”

Before the other guards around could stop her, Adelaide rushed forward and tightly embraced her former servant.

After exchanging greetings full of various emotions—joy, poignancy, longing—Adelaide wiped her moist eyes and said, “I’m sorry for making you wait so long. Are you hurt anywhere?”

“No, the Marquis provided various conveniences. I also kept hearing news about you, Young Lady.”

Ronnie forcefully swallowed the words that followed, that the content she heard was so outrageous it was hard to believe.

The truth of the story was clearly evident just by looking at Adelaide’s appearance.

…You’ve grown tremendously. It’s a level I can hardly even gauge.

Ronnie hadn’t been idle for the past year, either.

Originally close to being mediocre, she had steadily worked hard using her experience with the Tin Knight’s party as a starting point, and had long since grown into a full-fledged knight.

Even to such a Ronnie, Adelaide’s change was dazzling.

Her gait, standing posture, every small gesture exuded an inexplicable strength and confidence.

The atmosphere of a beautifully blooming flower still remained, but the once ignorant flower had shed its naivety, blossoming into a flower that wouldn’t yield to even the world’s hardships.

“I came to see Mother’s condition.”

At Adelaide’s words, Ronnie, who had been lost in thought, returned to reality.

She nodded, then opened the door and let the party inside.

“──.”

Seeing the woman lying quietly on the bed, Adelaide momentarily closed her mouth as if struck dumb.

Then she approached the bed and grasped the woman’s hand.

To avoid disturbing the quiet reunion between mother and daughter, Dorothea, who was watching from a distance, asked Ronnie, “I understand being shocked after losing her husband and son in succession, but it’s a bit strange to not regain consciousness for over a year. There’s no separate injury to her body, correct?”

“We had relatively well-known doctors examine her condition, but they all said that the mental shock had a big impact and nothing else. The royal family even sent a priest for a while, but even receiving holy power had no effect…”

“Hmm.”

Dorothea twisted the hair draped over her shoulder.

Her gaze fell on Sophia, who also seemed lost in thought.

The traveler pointed to the wife who wouldn’t wake up from sleep, and when that was refused, the village children wouldn’t wake up from sleep.

It felt too coincidental to be mere coincidence.

Thinking there might be some kind of curse involved, she tried dispelling it, but to no avail.

The next place she visited was the temporary lodging where the sleeping children were said to be gathered.

Even though they weren’t gathering all the children in the territory, but only the children of servants and soldiers, the number was not small.

Marquis William Hemming said with an anxious look, “Of course, even if a person has fallen asleep, they can’t not eat anything at all. We have to feed them at least thin porridge or something, and even that isn’t a very effective method. We could somehow make the former lord’s wife endure for a long time using magic or whatever for just one person, but it’s impossible to give such treatment to each of these many children one by one. At most, we can hold out for a few months. And that’s only for the children here; the children in their own homes are probably in worse condition.”

In other words, the incident needed to be resolved as quickly as possible.

The Marquis’ own children were already grown and working in the royal palace, so they weren’t involved in this incident, but rather because of that, the distance from the victims was growing.

“Hmm.”

This time, too, Dorothea tried dispelling as a test or tried to grasp magic energy, but as with the former lord’s wife, there was no particular reaction.

There were three possibilities.

Firstly, it was a simple disease, not involving any mysterious power in the first place.

If it were just one lady, that might seem plausible, but the situation where all the children in the territory didn’t wake up immediately after rejecting the traveler’s demand was clearly unnatural, so this was excluded.

Secondly, it was magic used by a mage far above Dorothea’s level, so she couldn’t detect it.

This one honestly wasn’t very likely either. The first person that came to mind was her teacher, the Witch of the East, but the teacher Dorothea knew was someone who would just turn the place into ruins if something annoyed her, not someone who would use such petty tricks.

Lastly it was a mysterious power, but it wasn’t mana-based like the magic Dorothea used.

Underground foreign power, or, heavenly holy power.

Either way, it was a power Dorothea had encountered before, but her understanding of it lagged somewhat compared to mana.

If the user of the power intentionally tried to hide its identity, there was a possibility she might not be able to detect it.

[The ‘Tin Knight’ asks if Dorothea has figured anything out!]

“…I’ve got a rough idea, but I’m not sure if this was done targeting us or if it’s just a coincidence in timing.”

Scratching her cheek, Dorothea asked the Marquis, “Do you know anything about the whereabouts of that traveler guy?”

“We searched the area around the territory several times after the children became like this, but couldn’t find anything plausible.”

“Then for now, we’ll try treatment with Sophia’s holy power, and if that doesn’t work, we’ll try intervening in the dream—“

Before Dorothea could finish speaking, suddenly the surroundings became noisy.

Marquis William Hemming urged the servants with an irritated face, “We have important guests here, what’s all this commotion about?”

“M-my lord! It’s him! That guy has appeared in the street!”

***

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