Marionetta

The Brave Party that has shown minimal results so far still had the trust of the Royal Family, but pressure has been steadily growing lately from their surroundings. Yet Gray was still doing something to bring even more anger down on his head.

“Hey Gray, are you sane?”

“Completely Gise. I already don't feel a need to go visit Marilyn.”

“That's why I'm feeling troubled.”

“Why?”

“I like Warren's tea.”

“Oh, well I can still bring you along with Marionetta sometimes.”

Standing next to Gray was a pretty little girl with red hair and freckles. She was currently tightly clinging to Gray's left arm.

This was still the night of Warren's big event. Gray and Marionetta, who had somehow worked up a good atmosphere, shared a meal at a nearby cafe that had opened back up again after the event. That was when Marionetta confessed that she, along with everyone else in Warren for that matter, already knew Gray was the Hero. Gray's voice rang in shock.

“Does Marilyn know too!?”

“Yes. But Marilyn told me, ‘If a guest calls themselves Gise, then their name inside the store is Gise.'”

Marionetta watched Gray anxiously as his whole face turned red.

“I see, I'm so shameful.”

“No, that's not it at all! Hero is very nice!”

The two of them finished their meal in silence after that before leaving the store together.

“Well then here, I have a companion waiting for me at an inn so”

“Yes, thank you for tonight.”

“By the way, where do you live?”

“I actually just moved to one of the redeveloped apartments near Lily Garden just the other day.”

………..

After a brief silence, Marionetta continued, determination in her voice.

“Hero, would you mind walking me back to my room?”

Gray didn't have any reason to refuse. Standing on her right, he took her south, through the bustle of the town. Eventually their hands naturally met with each other as they walked, and it wasn't much longer afterwards that they were walking with their arms linked together. Marionetta leaned on the Hero's arm. Everything from the tenderness of her chest, to the heat from her body, to her soft breath stimulated him. The two of them didn't say a word, but everything they felt was transmitted through their linked arms.

Then in front of her room.

She turned to face him.

He was caught in her eyes until those very eyes unexpectedly shut themselves.

His lips naturally moved towards hers.

It was just his lips touching hers. A sweet, kind, pure kiss.

Silent, she turned her head away, inviting him into her room.

That night, the Hero became a man.

The next morning Gray ate the breakfast Marionetta had prepared, was made into a man once again, and then made to leave. As he was walking out the door, he left behind the words, “I'll come pick you up.”

He wasn't gone long before Ellis and the others came to visit.

Returning to the inn in the early morning, Gray ignored Gise's rebuke for not having arranged a proper hotel room and said, “Today I'll be increasing our party members by one.” Then leaving the inn, Gise followed him through Freedom Promenade and to Marionetta's home. That was when Gray introduced Gise to Marionetta.

“Since this girl will be a new party member from now on, please give her your best regards Gise.”

At Gray's words, Marionetta quickly lowered her head. That was how the conversation from before began.

Marionetta was from the same village as Ken and his friends. She had lived with her father who had been their village's only sorcerer. Her father had used his knowledge and skills to heal the villagers' injuries and treat disease. It's rare for a mage to deal with ordinary villagers, so he and his daughter were held quite highly.

The girl grew up hearing various stories from her father ever since she was little, so her heart naturally danced when she heard rumors that a Hero had appeared inside the capitol. She acted on those feelings and spoke to her father.

“If I were to ever meet the Hero, I want to be more powerful, even if it's just a little.”

The father laughed at his daughter, telling her, “If you want to help the Hero, then you need to learn magic for the Hero.” And so she began learning how to use various types of healing and auxiliary spells. Every day was an enjoyable one.

It was the attack from the demons that destroyed that happiness.

The village was destroyed, and her father who had fought back was naturally killed. All the young people were taken away somewhere, and Marionetta was made into a sacrifice for the Demon Lord.

The mask-wearing Demon Lord was fear itself. When the silent Demon Lord stole away Marionetta's maidenhood, she tried to focus more on her fear than the pain in her lower abdomen. Marionetta shuddered, cried, grit her teeth, and clenched her fists.

One day, the Demon Lord threw onto her a terrifying order. “Step on me.”

Ah, the Demon Lord is going to torment me after this. He will slowly deprive me of my human dignity bit by bit from now on. Thinking this, Marionetta came to the solemn decision to kill herself.

“Forgive me Demon Lord.”

Finally she bade farewell to the Hero whom she had never gotten the chance to meet, and she bit her tongue.

When she woke up, her tongue was back. From then on, the Demon Lord never called her. She spent her day simply, inside a white room with no windows. But then one day, the Demon Lord cast a spell on Marionetta.

By the time Marionetta had come back to herself, she was left alone on a road near Warren. All memories of the Demon Lord had been completely erased.

The first person to find Marionetta, who had just sat herself on the side of the highway doing nothing, was Hanna who had been busy cleaning up the highway since the early morning. When Hanna took the catatonic Marionetta back to her store, Ken's surprise caused him to shout.

“Marionetta! You're alive?”

Marionetta came to her senses hearing Ken's scream and remembered everything up to the point where the demons had just destroyed her village. Marionetta began sobbing and collapsed right there on the spot.

After Ken had brought the matter to Ellis, she realized rather quickly that Marionetta's memory loss was artificial. However, there was no way of knowing why she was here. Did she escape? Was this a trap by the Demon Lord? To try and find out, Ellis brought Marionetta close to the Demon Lord.

Marionetta was thus entrusted to Margherita, put to work at Master's Hideaway. Naturally Ellis and Margherita informed Marilyn and Machel about Marionetta's circ.u.mstances and their suspicions about her connection to the Demon Lord.

Yet she was able to live a peaceful life from that point on. A few of the guys from Ken's hometown, in other words the people who had grown up with her, had approached her favorably. But, the Hero still lived on inside Marionetta's heart. In those lost memories she couldn't recall, one had become entangled, filling her with admiration for the Hero.

Then finally, the Hero had appeared before her. The Hero she longed for. An adorable, slightly dim Hero.

Marilyn had grown bored with the overly honest, innocent Hero. So she had silently pa.s.sed the Hero off to Marionetta.

Then like this, Marionetta's feelings could be fulfilled.

Gise grabbed Gray's arm, pulling him away from Marionetta and hissed into his ear.

“Oi, you're going to just invite a girl you don't know to become our companion? What are you going to do if she ends up being a spy or something?”

“What are you saying at this point Gise? We already have three shady members as it is. And if I can see Marionetta, I won't need anything else. I'm begging you Gise.”

Marionetta inserted herself into the conversation at this point.

“I, I can use some basic magic, would that help?”

“For example?” Gise asked in an unsettling tone, but Marionetta eagerly replied.

“Healing, appraisal, and support magic.”

Hoh, Gise was impressed. Especially since until now they had been a party with no healing system.

“Alright, but I have a condition. Marionetta, we'll pay the boarding fee here, so leave this room as is. That way we'll have to return so you can regularly clean this place up. Now that the Wight Labyrinth has disappeared for some reason, we need a reason to come visit Warren without our other three idiot party members getting suspicious. Also, try and keep your night club activities in moderation.”

Gise's final words caused both of the young lovers to blush a bit.

“Well then, after making a quick stop back in Skycastle, let's go conquer some high level dungeons, Hero.”

“That's right. Gise, thanks.”

“Thank you very much, Gise.”

Thus the Brave Party welcomed its sixth member.

“Is it alright Mistress?”

“Yeah, it's best to scatter the bait here. The Hero was likely to take her home with him anyway. It's better at this point to have her become a wonderful mage and act alongside the Hero.”

After confirming that Marionetta had spent a night with the Hero, Ellis visited her room after Gray had left. Upon hearing about how she wanted to travel along with the Hero, Ellis gave Marionetta a Grand Magical Ring and a Howling Plush Toy that she had copied earlier. The ring would make it easier to use magic and aid the Hero while the plush toy could let her communicate with them in case something went wrong.

Ellis and the others left the room as Marionetta bowed to them several times over, thanking them with tears in her eyes and asking that they send her regards to all the girls at the shop who had helped her. Incidentally, Claire had actually cast the spell {Find Marker} on that Howling Plush Toy that Marionetta had been given.

Now Ellis could know wherever the Hero would end up going. And even if Marionetta was somehow a trap set by the Demon Lord, any trouble would end up on the Hero's head. It was no longer Ellis's problem.

“Well, let's look forward to it.”

At Ellis's words the other four girls all smiled as if they were children having found a new toy.

One day, once the city had calmed down from Freedom Promenade's opening, Maria instructed Ellis and the others to come visit the Council Room. She told them it was about a, “Call from the capitol”.

When the five had arrived, they found that all of the guild masters were already there waiting for them. Maria rose up and began giving them an explanation.

“Just a little bit ago we received confirmation from Duke Marsfield, the five members of Warren's Jewelry Box have been officially ordered to visit the Royal Palace inside the capitol.”

The contents of their instructions were as follows. First off, the five girls are to arrive at the Citadel City Marsfield today and visit the Duke's castle upon their arrival. The following day they would serve as the Duke's escorts, traveling to the Royal Capitol Skycastle. Lord Chaffee would have everything in order by the time they get there, so they would follow his instruction.

“How can a mere human think he can command us! Is he stupid or something!?”

The Frost Dragon Ah-nyan voiced his complaints from around Katie's neck, and Maria gave him an ill-tempered smile in response.

“No such orders have been given to the Guardian Dragons. We would never be so rude as tell our guardians such a thing. This order has only been given to five of Warren's citizens, ‘the members of Warren's Jewelry Box'. Although, if Ellis and the others don't arrive at the Citadel City today, then they will have defied their summons, and an appropriate punishment will be handed out. So I suppose it's up to what you want.”

The Land Dragon Rchin raised an angry roar from inside the cord carrier on Ellis's back.

“Oi Maria, don't you think you're being awfully impolite using these small tricks. Know that if any harm comes to the girls, we won't hesitate to turn that city into a lump of ashes.”

Ellis jumped in on the exaggeration train.

“Right, should we just attack the capitol then? Steal right before the Hero's eyes.”

The girls and their dragons all shared the same look in their eyes. Meanwhile the four guild masters looked like they had just swallowed a bitter bug. The Thieves' Guild guild master Baltis grumbled to Ellis.

“Oi, Ms. Adviser. Are you looking to turn this city into a battlefield?”

“It's just a joke Uncle. But, we might not be able to quell the dragons' anger. Please understand at least that.”

Ellis made just a slightly despondent expression as she lied through her teeth. It didn't amount to much in their mini-sizes, but the dragons each tried looking as threatening as they could, furrowing their brows, letting a small growl echo in the back of their throats, slightly lowering their heads, moving their tails back and forth like a swinging sandbag, and echoing a *Pi~ Pi~* cry to intimidate.

“So we'll ride Fe-rin and Su-chan over to Marsfield, and then we'll take a carriage over to the capitol?”

Frau posed a rather naïve question to Maria. But on her part, Maria did hesitate to give her an answer.

“Please don't be angry. It sounds like the Duke wants to ride on the dragon with you.”

“That's over our capacity limit. Su-chan can let two people ride on, while Fe-rin can take three. Well, it'll be slow going, but I suppose we could have Rchin be carried again and have the Duke ride on his back.”

But Claire proudly puffed her chest, denying Reeve's reasoning.

“Heheheh, you're forgetting that Pi-tan can fly now. He can carry a person.”

“Then it's settled. Let's hurry up, grab the Duke, and go to the capitol.

“Katie, don't forget the greetings to the Thieves' Guild. For Marsfield and Skycastle both.”

“Frau, the capitol is filled with interesting food from the northern regions, so be sure to check them out yourself.”

“There are also many skilled craftsmen at the Capitol's Workshop Guild, well, the water and sewage system in Warren is better. Still, you could learn a lot Claire.”

“You guys, please don't p.i.s.s off the Royal Family while you're there.”

The masters each pa.s.sed off their farewells to one of the girls. And in this way, Ellis and the others were set up to go meet with the King of Skycastle, ruler of the Almerian continent.

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