Infinite Dendrogram: Volume 12 Page 2

  Though, Quartierlatin’s mass-produced models could be a common sight soon. When that happens, I should be able to ride Silver around without standing out.

  “...No, you would not. You will stand out no matter where and what you ride. Consider your apparel.”

  I’ve been thinking this ever since you pointed it out back at Quartierlatin, but... aren’t you making a bit too much of a deal out of my appearance?

  “You think I am...? After seeing your Storm Visage, the mere thought of your appearance changing again fills my heart with worry. Hm...?”

  Nemesis looked ahead, seemingly noticing something.

  I followed her gaze and saw a clockwork horse ridden by a familiar person.

  “Ray, Nemesis... It’s been a while.”

  “Liliana. It really has.” It was Liliana, riding a mass-produced white Prism Steed.

  I’d arrived here alongside Azurite, so I did meet Liliana once before logging out; apparently, she’d gotten a new mount since then.

  “You switched to a Prism Steed?”

  “Yes. It was time for my trusty horse to retire, anyway, so I visited Quartierlatin and got myself this one.”

  That was a sign that they were now being distributed to the kingdom’s knights.

  The units that could be mass-produced in Quartierlatin — “Second Model Prism Steeds” or “SMPS” — were better overall than the replicas excavated earlier. They had barriers and could fly, which made them better suited to be a knight’s mount than the average Demi-Dragon-tier monster.

  Their only real drawback was that the barrier and flight were only unlocked if you had Prism Authorization level 1. As a Prism Rider myself, I found that part to be quite a mystery.

  Well, perhaps it made sense at first glance, but I didn’t understand why this condition was put in place at all. Originals such as Silver could fly and create barriers even if you didn’t have the Prism Rider job, yet with replicas, the Prism Authorization skill was absolutely necessary for those functions.

  While the other skill — Prism Beast Enhancement — seemed pretty standard, Prism Authorization seemed like exactly that — an authorization.

  Hell, even though Prism Beast Enhancement was clearly related to the Prism Steed’s skills, it was less like “this skill activates this ability” and more like “we removed the limits because you have this skill.”

  B3 had said that it was like a limitation to prevent those who didn’t have the Prism Rider job from using them, but honestly...

  “Ray? What is the matter?” Liliana asked.

  “Ah... Sorry,” I said.

  “You have a tendency to lose yourself in thought,” Nemesis commented.

  ...Perhaps, I thought. I did often focus on my thoughts too much after being distracted by something.

  Rook had said that he had a similar habit. He actually had to say that; no one would’ve known about it otherwise, because his thinking speed was so great that it never seemed like he was lost in thought.

  “Liliana, what about Elizabeth’s... Her Highness’ bodyguard duty?” When we were at Gideon, Liliana was either standing by Elizabeth’s side or looking for her after she’d run away. What was that tomboy princess doing now that Liliana was away from Gideon?

  “Oh, I received a new order from Her Highness Altimia, so I entrusted her to Sir Lindos for the time being.”

  Sir Lindos was quite the serious man. I could only hope that Elizabeth’s shenanigans wouldn’t completely break him.

  Though, something she said had me curious.

  “An order from Azurite?” Unlike with Elizabeth, I didn’t have to use “Her Highness” there. I had Azurite’s permission to call her just that, and I’d got it again with Liliana listening.

  “I know this will be temporary and all, but what could possibly be more important than protecting Azurite’s sister?” I asked.

  “...My apologies, but I can’t say that on my own discretion.”

  Oh, so this was something classified.

  “Her Highness gave me another order, though. It involves you,” Liliana continued.

  “Me?”

  “Yes. She said she wanted me to find you and Barbaroy and bring you both to the castle.”

  “But... why?” I didn’t quite understand why she required us both.

  “Apparently she has a request for you.” A moment after Liliana’s words...

  “...I feel some trouble brewing.”

  ...Nemesis telepathically spoke words she’d said many times before.

  Liliana led us to the castle, then straight to Azurite’s office. I instantly noticed the mountains of documents around her, which told me everything about how busy she was.

  ...Well, she was the current political heart of the kingdom, and she’d been away in Quartierlatin recently, so I supposed that the work had piled up.

  “...You sure look busy,” I commented.

  “I’m leaving Altea again tomorrow,” Azurite said. “I need to get all this work out of the way while I still can.”

  ...What was this masked swordswoman intending to meddle in this time? Though, she wasn’t wearing her swordswoman clothing this time — she looked like a normal civil official, and...

  “Not wearing your mask today, huh?”

  “...Why would I wear it in the castle?”

  Good point, I thought. Hell, in here, it would be worse if she actually did try to hide her royal status.

  “Anyway, what’s up?” I asked. “Liliana mentioned a request.”

  “Yes,” Azurite nodded. “I need bodyguards for a trip to Gideon. You’re returning there too, are you not?”

  “That’s the plan. I have nothing against taking this job, but... do you need a bodyguard?” Azurite was clearly stronger than me — hell, she was actually on the level of a pre-Superior, if not an actual Superior. At the very least, she would’ve stood a way better chance against Logan than I did.

  “I won’t be going alone,” she continued. “The person in question has a Master bodyguard, so I thought I would get my own Master retinue to match, but...”

  She became silent for a moment.

  “The only Masters I’ve been in close contact with are you, Barbaroy, the parasite, and the Master bodyguard I just mentioned...” Well, that made sense. She did say that she had been avoiding Masters until recently.

  Also, though her attitude towards Masters had changed, she still called Miss Eldritch “parasite.” I could almost hear her voice, saying “That’s sooo meaaan.”

  “Ohh, and you actually know the Master bodyguard, do you not?”

  “I do?”

  “Master Jiangshi, Xunyu.”

  Oh, Xunyu. I did know her. She was one of those people who beat the shit out of me to help me become stronger.

  ...Hm? Hold on, but Xunyu’s the bodyguard of...

  “...So, about this bodyguard request.”

  “As I mentioned, you would have to protect two people: me and Canglong, the third prince of the Huang He Empire.”

  ...Failing this one would mean some serious diplomatic trouble, I thought.

  “Like I said, I don’t have any connections among Masters,” Azurite continued. “As things are, you are the only one I can trust enough to request something like this.”

  “Well... thanks?”

  “No need to thank me. This request is officially for you... and Barbaroy.”

  Aren’t you two, well, you know...? I thought, but couldn’t bring myself to say it out loud.

  “You can contact her, yes? I told Liliana to search for either of you, because I thought I’d get in touch with both of you if I could reach you.”

  “I do have her address and can contact her, yes...”

  “Please do, then. Give her this message from me: ‘This is a bodyguard request for a trip from Altea to Gideon. You will protect me and the third prince of the Huang He Empire. Aside from you, Ray, Liliana, and Master Jiangshi, Xunyu will also be acting as bodyguards. We will ride your dragon carriage,’” she said before pausing for a moment. “‘If you haven’t forgotten your involvement in the capital blockade incident, you are in no position to say no.’”

  Her tone of voice as she spoke that last sentence sent a chill down my spine.

  I logged out, called B3, and passed it on. Her reaction? She instantly logged on and accepted the request.

  Thus began our strange party’s trip towards Gideon.

  Let the quest... begin.

  ◇

  At the moment, we were riding B3’s dragon carriage along the Sauda Mountain Pass leading towards Gideon. Liliana was the coachman, and the carriage was being pulled by her SMPS.

  Of course, the royal family had their own Prism Steeds, so they didn’t actually need to borrow B3’s. However, due to recent circumstances, Azurite couldn’t use any of them.

  The kingdom had been infiltrated and terrorized by the imperium’s Superiors multiple times now. It had occurred both deep in the south and the very north of Altar, meaning that nowhere was completely safe. If they caught wind that she was traveling between cities, it wasn’t out of the question that they would take the opportunity to cause another incident like the Clash of the Superiors or the events at Quartierlatin’s ruins.

  Thus, she had to be covert. It was important to hide the fact that the carriage contained the first princess of Altar and the third prince of Huang He, so Azurite couldn’t use the fancy dragon carriages of the royal family. They stood out too much, and there was the threat of someone sabotaging them.

  Azurite could go to Gideon all by herself, of course, but this time she had a guest of honor: the young prince. She couldn’t let a foreign royal ride a standard dragon carriage. Therefore, she needed a carriage that fulfilled all these conditions: didn’t explicitly belong to the ro
yal family, wasn’t meant for extravagant ceremonies, looked good in spite of that, and was highly functional, comfortable, and tough. An interior with spatial expansion would’ve been a nice bonus.

  Now, that seemed like a tall order, but what do you know — something like that actually existed.

  We were riding it right now, in fact. B3’s dragon carriage was an absurdly good quality product from Legendaria. Even the most luxurious carriages available on Altar’s market were all outdated and lacked certain modern features, meaning this one surpassed them in every aspect.

  Azurite had already ridden it from Quartierlatin to the capital, so she was already aware of its utility and value. Even though she had her mask on, I could tell by her eyes that she was thinking about how she could use this thing. And B3, being partially responsible for some severe damage to the kingdom, wasn’t in a position to refuse to provide her carriage and services for this very serious escort quest.

  At least she’s getting a reward, I guess, I thought.

  “Also, Azurite probably has many other things to be concerned about besides the dragon carriage,” Nemesis added telepathically.

  Yeah. Regardless of what they are, we do have a bit of a problem here...

  “This really is an impressive dragon carriage,” Azurite remarked.

  “...That’s true,” said B3.

  “Don’t look so worried. I won’t confiscate it.”

  “...Oh, I definitely wasn’t worried about that.”

  “I see. By the way, how much do you think this carriage is worth?”

  “...Somewhere over a hundred million.”

  “Really, now? Not that it’s relevant, but that’s nowhere near the losses caused by the capital blockade.”

  “...”

  ...The air between them was absurdly cold.

  I really appreciated two things right now: the fact that Xunyu and the third prince were in the cabin at the back, and the fact that this carriage had spatial expansion, which let me sit a decent distance away from them.

  “...Those two are the same as ever,” Nemesis commented.

  As Nemesis implied, Azurite and B3 didn’t get along too well, to put it mildly. B3 was constantly reminded of the damage she’d dealt to the economy by partaking in the blockade. Her right to use save points was at risk. The victim in this situation had really grabbed her tormentor by the scruff of her neck.

  “I gotta say... They’re like rock-paper-scissors.” Based on what Shu had told me, Miss Eldritch had made the royal family sign several contracts in exchange for services from The Lunar Society.

  Because of this, the royal family had to humble themselves before Miss Eldritch, and Azurite’s uncomfortable relationship with Miss Eldritch had made her deem the girl a “parasite.”

  With that in mind, the three girls had a dynamic that went like this:

  Azurite was strong against B3, but weak against Miss Eldritch.

  B3 was strong against Miss Eldritch, but weak against Azurite.

  And Miss Eldritch was strong against Azurite, but weak against B3.

  Again, it was like rock-paper-scissors with them.

  Or maybe it’s like that trilemma between a frog, snake, and slug.

  “...You better not start comparing them to those vermin out loud,” Nemesis spoke telepathically.

  I know. I realized that myself right after thinking it.

  “B-By the way, what did you order Liliana to do that was more important than her duty as Elizabeth’s guard?” I asked Azurite, in a weak attempt to make the mood more bearable. I knew that Liliana had been given an important order, but she didn’t know if she could tell me what it was.

  “I had her transport a broken national treasure to Quartierlatin and act as my agent in a request to repair it. Liliana was easily the best person for the job,” Azurite answered.

  Transporting a national treasure definitely seemed like a serious job best left to people you trusted a lot.

  But why bring it to Quartierlatin, of all places...? I wondered.

  “National treasure... Ah!” I exclaimed as I remembered one particular broken treasure and what was currently being built in Quartierlatin. “The Prism Steed, right?”

  “Yes. That precious heirloom that has been with our country for as long as it existed, only to break in the last war.”

  Gold Thunder. That was one of the original Prism Steeds, last used by Celestial Knight, Langley Grandria — the strongest knight in the kingdom, who’d sadly been slain in a battle against Logan’s Mythical-rank devil.

  I’d heard that Gold Thunder had been damaged so badly that even its auto-repair function no longer worked. “Can it really be fixed?” I asked.

  “That is still unknown,” said Azurite. “All we found in the ruins was an SMPS manufactory. Nothing else. However, that’s where the kingdom’s few machine-focused Masters are located, so giving Gold Thunder over to them seems a lot better than just keeping its shattered remains locked away.”

  By “machine-focused Masters,” she was mainly referring to Blue Screen.

  “Though, I am somewhat concerned about leaving the task to the former core members of the rather infamous Sol Crisis,” Azurite added.

  “They haven’t exactly had a change of heart since then, but they can be trusted to complete quests with attractive rewards,” B3 commented. “Unless their end goal is just PK itself, most PKs do have an eye for profit. I believe they’ll do the job as long as the pay is good.”

  “I see. Very convincing, coming from you.”

  “Ghh...” ...And so the mood in the carriage was back to square one.

  I realized now that I couldn’t change her mind, so I just said “I’ll go check on them,” and went to the back cabin.

  There, I found Canglong, the third prince of Huang He, and the abnormality that I was quite used to by now — Xunyu. Side note: she was keeping her Tenaga-Ashinaga shorter than normal, so it didn’t look like she was uncomfortable in this relatively tight space.

  “HuhH? WhAt’s up?” she asked.

  “The air over there is really suffocating...” I said.

  “What, theY havin’ a cAtfight or sOmethin’? ShoUld ya reAlly bE comin’ hEre?”

  “Not that kind of suffocating.”

  And what would I have to do with any catfights? I thought.

  “I suppose not even a person of Master Ray’s caliber can feel comfortable in the presence of quarreling ladies,” Canglong commented with a smile devoid of malice.

  Despite being a prince, he was really modest, always adding “Master” before my and Xunyu’s names. He even insisted that we talk to him like we normally did. I wasn’t sure if it was okay for a prince to behave like that, but according to him, “I may have imperial blood, but I am not very involved in politics. You don’t have to be so considerate of me.”

  Is that how most third princes are? I wondered.

  “Yeah, I guess I can’t feel comfortable,” I said. “Girls are terrifying when they fight. They mainly use words...”

  “...You knOw who yoU’re talking abOut, right? You reAlly think thEy wOn’t pull oUt their weapOns?”

  ...They might, I thought, as a clear picture of armor-clad B3 and Azurite brandishing Altar formed in my head.

  And B3 would lose because of compatibility...

  “I doubt it will come to that,” Nemesis commented. “They have a common... friend in you.”

  “I hope that keeps them from escalating things...” I said. “Let’s change the subject.”

  “YeAh.”

  “Canglong, what were you doing in the capital all this time? If I recall correctly, you were originally supposed to head to Gideon a month ago, during The Clash of the Superiors, right?”

  “Yes!” Azurite and Canglong both were supposed to come to Gideon on that fateful day. However, they had to postpone their arrival due to the recent Epidemic. That, the effects of Franklin’s Game, and the incident at the ruins had kept Azurite busy for a long time, rendering her unable to go to Gideon until just today. What had Canglong been doing during all this time?

  “This journey served a diplomatic purpose, as well as broadening my own horizons,” he answered. “I spent that time experiencing the capital and the port city to the west.”

  “I wAs with him whEn he was oUt, by thE way,” Xunyu added. “As he is nOw, his stats arE low.”

  I see. It’s probably not exactly like that, but it sort of reminds me of a long school trip.