Chapter 565 「Shameless!? Lewd!?」

Anyway, once we launched into space from the Imperial Guard Fleet’s exclusive spaceport inside the Imperial Palace grounds, we headed straight for the Grakkius Secundus Colony. On top of suddenly having five completely unexpected passengers, all five of them had boarded without anything resembling proper travel gear, so things were a bit of a mess.

That said, our group was basically all women, so when it comes to the absolute basics, they could lend each other stuff for the time being; it could be worse. Under their combat armor, the imperial guards were also wearing standard-issue space suits—the skintight, classic-SF type—so there was no problem with them walking around the colony to go shopping. Those suits show off their figures a bit too much, though, so it’s normal to throw a jacket or some other outer layer over them.

Plenty of spacers like mercenaries and interstellar peddlers go out dressed like that regardless of gender.

「Sorry my stuff is the only thing that fits you size-wise.」

The imperial guard ladies all have pretty solid builds for women, so Mimi’s, Elma’s, or Kugi’s outerwear just doesn’t fit them. Tina’s, Whiska’s, and Neve’s go without saying. Mei doesn’t wear anything over her maid outfit, so she doesn’t even own clothes like that, and Dr. Shouko only has the lab coat she wears over her regular clothes.

So in the end, I lent my jackets out to the palace guards. Luckily for them, I keep several copies of the exact same design in rotation, so we’ve got enough to go around. Huh? You calling me lazy? Can’t be helped. Thinking about what to wear every single day is a pain. Uniforms are the best.

「N-no, it’s not that I mind or anything…」

For some reason, Isolde and the other imperial guards, wearing my jackets over their suits, were all fidgety and unable to settle down.

「They’re freshly washed, so it’s not like they should smell or anything… If you don’t like them, you can borrow Dr. Shouko’s lab coat or just have the fabricator spit out something random.」

「N-no, that’s not it. I said it was fine, didn’t I? We’re fine. Yeah. Everyone else is okay with it too, right?」

At Isolde’s prompting, her colleagues all nodded up and down in agreement. If you are fine with it, then great. I mean, shouldn’t you girls start introducing yourselves sometime soon, though? No? You’re ‘just the escorts’, huh…? Look, there’s a good chance we’ll be stuck together for over a month from here on out. Huh? You need to brace yourselves mentally first? …Right. I don’t really get it, but sure, let’s go with that.

「As for Lucia-sama—Lucia-san, I think it’d be better if I lent her something.」

「Um, no, how should I put this… Mimi-san’s clothes are a little… shameless, or rather, a bit lewd…」

「Shameless!? Lewd!?」

Over there, Mimi was staring at Lucia in shock. Well, I mean, yeah. Mimi’s fashion is pretty aggressive. Lots of skin on display and all that. Personally I think it’s cute and suits her, so I’ve got no complaints.

「It’s just… not quite what a noble young lady ought to be wearing…」

「Much less Princess Luciada… I mean, Lucia-san is of such high and noble blood and all…」

「I think it’s fine. If you’re going to pass yourself off as a merc, you should go that bold at least.」

Our noble-lady group—Serena, Chris, and Elma—each chimed in with their opinions. As expected, Elma was on this side.

「U-ugh… When you put it like that…！」

「Shameless… lewd…」

Lucia agonized, while Mimi stood there in utter shock. They are having quite the commotion over there, too. For the time being, Lucia can probably just barely squeeze into one of Elma’s space suits, so we could fudge things with that and then go buy her some proper clothes.

Huh? Mimi’s space suit? Mimi’s is custom-made… mostly because of her chest size. It does have a fitting function, but if the difference in size is that drastic, well… yeah. It’s not like Lucia is small, either—in general terms she’s on the glamorous side, I’d say.

There are plenty of big-busted people like Mimi out there, so even if it’s technically custom, it’s not that much trouble. Species like Kugi’s that have tails are actually pretty rare, though, so making a space suit for Kugi is a lot more of a hassle.

Apparently Kugi picked one up last time we went to the Vuelzarus Holy Empire. She even brought back the manufacturing data, so from now on we can have them made over here as long as we provide the data.

Still, if we’re already in this much of an uproar just getting clothes so we can go buy clothes, I shudder to think how the rest of this trip is going to go. ŘἁN𝖔₿ËṢ

☆★☆

「I’ll be returning aboard the Black Lotus. Please have the Donner accompany us as an escort.」

「Um, there’s, you know… the matter of face and standing for Lady Christina’s escort ship and all that…」

「And what exactly is the problem with me going home on my husband’s ship?」

「It’s not… that there’s a problem, per se… but still…！」

No sooner had we arrived at the Grakkius Secundus Colony than Chris and her escort, Edeltrud, started arguing about something. Looks like they are butting heads over which ship Chris should ride back to the Dareinwald domain on. I can’t entirely blame Edeltrud—or rather, the Dareinwald County forces—for how they feel. The ship Chris had taken to come to the imperial capital this time was a high-speed cruiser called the Donner. It wasn’t the newest model out there, but it was probably one of the top-class elite ships in the Dareinwald County forces.

In purely practical terms, as a warship its specs—firepower, armor, and shield capacity—are all higher than the Black Lotus’s. In other words, it’s safer. For the Dareinwald County forces, who can’t afford to let anything happen to Chris, wanting her to ride the Donner home is only natural. If she doesn’t board a county ship at a time like this, it could look, depending on who’s watching, like Chris, the future countess, doesn’t trust her own military’s strength.

「I understand that it’s a matter of face for the county’s military. I do understand that. But you also understand the… special circumstances of my marriage, don’t you?」

「I do, but still…」

Edeltrud looked like she was about to cry. The ‘special circumstances’ she meant were the fact that, as her husband, I also had multiple other partners besides Chris. Naturally, that included Serena and Elma. In other words, daughters of other noble houses.

「It’s not like we’re trying to argue over who comes first or anything. But if rumors start going around that my relationship with Hiro-sama is distant compared to the other two—or compared to his other partners—that would be troublesome.」

「Right, yeah…」

So it isn’t just Chris’s selfishness; the fact that I married Serena and Elma too—Serena especially—is the root of the problem here.

From the perspective of the Dareinwald household’s retainers and subjects, Serena, daughter of Marquis Hawles, isn’t someone who stands on equal footing with the Dareinwald family—she’s an obvious outsider from a clearly higher-ranking house who has come into their territory.

If rumors start that Serena is closer to me than Chris is, the retainers and commoners who are already wary of Serena—or rather, of House Holz—might start making a fuss. That’s what Chris was getting at.

「It’s only for now. Actually, why don’t you just transfer over here as my escort? I’ll tell Garius to bring anything he has to say directly to me, without dragging you into it.」

「Yes, ma’am…」

Things look rough over there in their own way. Internal politics of House Dareinwald, I guess. I mean, the Dareinwald domain is practically a little interstellar kingdom in its own right, with multiple star systems and noble houses under it. There’s no way the whole county is one monolithic bloc. I’m sure they’ve got all the usual turf wars between the civil and military branches, factional squabbles within the forces, and so on.

「You say that like it’s completely someone else’s problem, but you’re going to be a party to it too, you know?」

「I refuse, fair lady. This lowly one wants nothing to do with such troublesome affairs, forsooth.」

In response to Serena’s jab, I took a firm stance of absolute refusal. There is no way I could handle all that political-power-balance nonsense. Elma looked exasperated at how brazenly I was washing my hands of it.

「That’s not how this works…」

「Okay, fine. Then I’ll just beat them all into submission one by one. A storm of duels. Violence is the best.」

「Isn’t that line of thinking just a little too savage? Too mercenary, even for you…？」

Hey, I am a savage mercenary. If anyone’s got complaints, they can all line up and I’ll knock some sense into them, one after another—that’s about all I’m good for. I mean, I could always use psionic powers to mess with their heads, too, but either way it boils down to the violent option.

More importantly, can we hurry up and go shopping already? We’re behind schedule as it is!

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