Summary of the last chapter in three lines

Overcapacity carriage.

Stopped by the gate and impatient Dorusu.

Dorusu runs not long after arriving.

They’re guided to a room that clearly spells waiting room. There are chairs and sofas inside, and the fruits and sweets that Roury wants are also arranged on the central table.

When Roury enters the room, she joyfully goes to the table right away.

The others also sit down, only Souta makes himself at home and wanders around.

Souta looks for people's presence around the room, but he finds no sign of people on the other side of the wall, behind the ceiling, and in front of the entrance.

「Dorusu's efforts seem to be bearing fruit, I can’t feel the sign of lookout.」

「Right, I feel a bit sorry though.」

Dina thinks about Dorusu’s busyness after he separated with Souta’s party.

In fact, Dorusu was running to the room Souta and others guided to via a different route, and then he hastily made everyone in the surroundings keep away from the room.

Ignoring the chain of command, he had done the feat of running around contacting every person concerned and convince them to keep away from the room in such a short time.

Although he has enough ability to know the difference of power between him and Souta, and his quick wit and execution speed are highly regarded by others. The other party this time is bad, and since his position is stuck between the two, the evaluation Souta and the others can give is only from the middle management standpoint.

「Well, he’s maybe in the wrong, but this is still in line of his job, so it can’t be helped.」

Souta says so while shrugging.

Even to Souta, his appropriate response and speedy switchover are evaluated highly in his book. But still, his friends are the top priority, so Souta is strict to him.

「Souta-dono is strict to people who are not his comrades isn’t he.」

「That's true, I guess. In the first place. I don’t have blood relatives here. Because of that, I want to keep the comrades I want to protect within my reach.」

Hearing Souta, Dina nods with a smile.

Despite his growth and changes in his tone and appearance, Dina is pleased that Souta’s nature has still not changed.

「More importantly, we need to do something about that.」

At the end of their gaze, there is Arezel who is unable to settle down.

Although she was calmed down after her conversation with Dina in the carriage, she became nervous again from the unfamiliar sight once they entered the castle.

And as the reality about the audience with the king sinks in more and more, her tension reaches the peak.

「Arezel, come here, let’s eat these sweets together.」

Arezel turns her gaze to Roury who beckons her.

「N-No, I am fine, Roury-sama can eat it all.」

Right after she answers her, Arezel starts to wander around the room again.

「A-re-zel. Listen to me and come here.」

Roury goes and catches the roaming Arezel and then forcefully drags her to the table.

「Here, eat this, this and also this, they’re delicious.」

「Geez, Roury-sama is so pushy…… Delicious! What is this, this is seriously delicious!」

「Isn’t it. Here, eat more.」

Roury is irritated with Arezel who was wandering around, she is not consciously trying to relieve her tension, but her action still calms Arezel down.

「That’s a natural airhead isn’t it, it seems somewhat familiar……」

「Right, umm, when I see Roury-san, it reminds me of the beastmen’s hero-san.」

Souta holds Dina’s shoulders and greatly nods.

「That’s it! I thought that she somewhat resembles someone. That’s right, so her atmosphere is similar to that fellow. Wild, pushy, and free, yeah, exactly that person. Haaa~ I feel somewhat refreshed.」

「I-Is that so, it’s good.」

Reddish tinge appeared on Dina’s cheeks who answers like so.

Looking at those two, Narasu feels pleasant.

When Roury and others enjoying the sweets, knocking sound can be heard from the door.

「…… You can come in.」

As the representative of everyone who stops moving, Souta answers the knock.

「Pardon my intrusion. Our side is ready for the audience, I have come to guide you…… are your preparations complete?」

This time, it’s not the butler-style man who guided them to the room who comes, but a female knight clad in armor.

Her gaze is sent to the fruits Roury and Arezel have in their hands.

When Arezel notices the gaze, she returns the fruit in a hurry.

While Roury throws the fruit into her mouth when she notices the gaze.

「Sigh, seriously, you guys are…… sorry for that.」

As she sighs, Narasu lowers her head to the female knight and apologizes.

「No, it’s fine really.」

As the knight knows about Narasu, she stops her from lowering her head with her hands.

「Well, you heard what she says, so will you please guide us?」

「……You are Souta-san aren’t you? I already heard the story from Dorusu-san, I sincerely wish you don’t rub the n.o.bles the wrong way.」

She puts up her forefinger to bring Souta's attention.

「I don’t know what you heard from Dorusu…… But as long as the other party doesn’t start anything, I will also do nothing.」

The female knight who already antic.i.p.ated Souta’s answer sighs, and then she moves again to guide the others.

「My order is just to guide you, I don’t know what will happen afterward, so for now, let’s go.」

By chance she happened to work at the castle, by chance she knew Dorusu, and by chance she caught the minister's attention.

She received this guiding duty was because of those overlapping coincidences. From the talk before, she had a feeling there would be trouble, so she wants this duty to quickly finish, or at least, that’s what she believes will happen.

After turning a few corners, they enter a wide pa.s.sage with a large door that’s incomparable to other doors they see on the way.

When Souta and others arrive by the door, the guard and the female knight talk about something.

「Well then, please proceed through the door once it opens. From there just go straight to the king…… Oh right, please stop about ten steps before the king. Since it seems the talk will advance inside, I will excuse myself.」

After bowing to Souta and the others, she leaves the place hurriedly.

Dina thinks about asking a few question, but it doesn’t happen as the guards already stand in front of the door.

「Well then, I will open it.」

Ahead of the opened door is the red carpet that continues until below the king’s throne, knights are arranged on both side.

In the vicinity of the king are his aides, and one of them is the minister who had been mentioned a few times so far.

Just like what the female knight said, they keep going straight and stop ten steps before the king.

The one that opens their mouth first is the minister, not the king.

t/n: i hate this chapter and next chapter (and probably the next 3 chapter after that too), they’re hard to translate, i don’t really understand the difference between keigo and standard j.a.panese, even though i unconsciously translate keigo into polite sentence, not knowing whether i do right or not is bad,

btw, sorry i’m late, my internet has been down for a couple of days, it just back on on thursday, this one finished on friday morning, but because of my messed up sleep hours, the editing takes longer because me and the editor don’t online at the same time (our timezone difference is only 2 hours), next chapter already half finished, you will only get 2 chapters this week, so i apologize beforehand because it will end in cliffhanger