Chapter 442 144 – Perserios territory – part 1- Settling in (part 2) ”Is it really okay to leave things as they are?”
Burushi asked while outing unpacking her belongings in the room she was given by the Perserios family.
The Perserios castle itself wasn’t the same type of castles as the one belonging to the Espine family or even the royal family.
The two latter ones could be used as defensive structures – there was no doubt about it, but in the grand scheme of things, there were also a lot of thoughts put in to make them as comfortable and pompous to show the status of the owners.
As for the one that Zoemi and Burushi were currently in…
It was a military fortress through and through. Every room was built with efficiency in mind and it was furnished in the same manner. There was no space for luxury, and it was not eye-catching in any way except for its size to make sure that even if the barbarians ever breached it, they will not gain anything except the roof over their heads.
To begin with, most of the chambers had been turned into barracks for troops as the Perserios castle was the most convenient spot for their main forces to station at, as even if the border of the Bellcephora kingdom was actually breached, the attacking forces had two ways of advancing.
Either attempting to scale a magically augmented wall, or trying to pass through the fortress.
That all lead up to a specific conclusion – the blond girl receiving her own room and not sharing one with any of the female troops was a show of clear favoritism.
Of course, Zoemi also received a room on his own, but since he was actually a high noble and a sage fulfilling his obligation towards the crown – that was a given.
Burushi on the other hand was not.
”What do you mean – is it okay to leave things as they are-? I am not leaving anything.”
Zoemi stopped dusting off the shelves that the blond-haired girl was going to use and furrowed his brows in confusion.
”I meant the really bad rumors about you. With what you said before it is almost certain that Arisu or at least Arisu’s supporters are behind spreading them all over the kingdom. You might have changed your mind and gone back to the original plan but we did leave the most efficient and convenient place to fight those very rumors.”
Burushi breathed out heavily and pointed out, waving around a small blue box and a bottle of perfumes.
”And don’t get me wrong, that whole obligation sounds like a step in the right direction, except that there is no audience from various noble families from all over the kingdom to report back to their relatives about how great you are. You know what I mean by that, don’t you?”
She added pointing at the black-haired boy with her perfumes.
”That since my father married into the Perserios family their account about me being helpful would be regarded as highly biased in my favor?”
”Yah.”
Zoemi asked rolling his eyes to which Burushi simply nodded with a straight face.
”(Master – the puppets said that they are working hard to fix that image thing~!)”
”(They said it will be easier since you won’t be in the Academy to mess things up with being un… unpredcise…. unpreditc… uuu…! Unpredictable…)
The second of the boy’s resident sentinels chimed in happily just as Zoemi was trying to come up with a response.
Interestingly enough, the first sentinel that was always the smarter and more aware of the pair ended up stumbling on her words and got embarrassed – but they did give a rather interesting explanation nonetheless.
”I… have someone taking care of it already.”
Zoemi said out loud, although he didn’t manage to make himself sound too convincing.
”You do…?”
”Apparently.”
Burushi asked, raising her brows – to which Zoemi hurriedly nodded, trying to cut her short before she would try to learn more and ask who exactly was delegated to that task.
”…”
The blond heroine squinted her eyes at him, very clearly realizing that there was something off about the black-haired boy’s reaction…
”…alright, I agreed to cooperate with you so I will at least give you the benefit of the doubt.”
She ended up sighing and shrugging her shoulders with a slightly annoyed expression.
”Then, what are we supposed to do here?”
Burushi put down the perfumes but not the blue box and laid down on the bed even though there was still quite some stuff to unpack.
Instead, she started to play around with the box opening and closing it while waiting for the boy’s answer.
”We will be well behaved and fulfill the orders given to us by the Perserios family.”
*clap*
”…”
Zoemi answered without much care flair to which Burushi shut her box with a surprisingly loud sound and stared daggers at him.
”You don’t have a plan?”
She asked in disbelief.
”What plan? Perserios territory wasn’t mentioned all that much in the game, besides, aren’t we already past the end credits in the timeline?”
The black-haired boy turned around, huddling his shoulders defensively while speaking in a hurt voice.
”…are you saying that you cannot plan for the thing that you didn’t play through in the game…? How in the world did you survive up until now?”
The heroine raised her brow and asked in utter disbelieve.
”That’s not what I meant!”
Zoemi groaned, clicking his tongue and shaking his head in annoyance.
”Listen, the obligation must be fulfilled or I will get in trouble, what I plan for is just doing what I am told until I will be freed from that duty. I do have plans afterward, depending on the outcome of the dealing with the barbarians, but I am not going to butt in in Devios’s strategy!”
”Oohh… now see? That’s a much better answer. It actually explains things. Alright. So… we are free until tomorrow?”
The black-haired boy declared in an exasperated and slightly embarrassed voice, to which the blond-haired girl’s eyes widened in realization before she nodded and asked in a much happier tone.
”Yeah. It’s like Devios said after he wrote down all of my answers. We can settle in our rooms and walk around the castle if we want, but the actual tour and intended schedule would be given to us the following day during the breakfast.”
He confirmed.
”Neat~”
Burushi snickered and opened the blue box again to glance at its content with satisfaction.