As an outsider, Kabe should have been the sort of person who drew extra scrutiny everywhere he went. Anyone who kept glancing around in a foreign land ought to have been a prime target for the soldiers' attention.
But every single soldier, after noticing the green-haired girl walking ahead of him, would ultimately shift their gaze away and selectively ignore this unstable factor altogether.
The moment Kabe noticed that, he walked with even greater peace of mind.
The one who felt displeased instead was Brandish, who was leading the way in front.
Without turning around, she continued in that same listless tone and said,
"How long are you planning to follow me? Are you trying to come home with me or something?"
"You are my guide. Naturally, wherever you go, I go."
Kabe answered as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
"...I knew it. I should never have accepted this assignment in the first place."
A wave of helplessness rose in Brandish's heart, but she showed no intention of stopping. Instead, she continued leading Kabe through winding turns and twisted streets until they arrived in a high-security residential district filled entirely with detached houses, where the guards were even stricter than before.
"Tch. Do not tell me this whole area is where the Empire's important figures live.
How decadent. As expected, whether it is an empire or a kingdom, the people at the top are all rotten in exactly the same way."
Kabe clicked his tongue and delivered his opinion with a look of deep disappointment.
Brandish ignored him completely. Reaching her house, she pushed open the door and walked inside.
Just as she turned to close it, she was surprised to find that Kabe, who had been following her the whole time, had suddenly disappeared.
"He left? Finally, I shook off that annoying guy. Now I can sleep in peace."
Letting out a sigh of relief, Brandish closed the door and turned around.
Then she froze on the spot.
At some unknown moment, Kabe had already changed into a pair of cute pink bunny slippers and was standing in the middle of the living room with his hands on his hips.
"Hmm... it is passable, I guess. Still a bit worse than my house."
As he said that, he casually walked into the kitchen and, with practiced familiarity, started rummaging through the refrigerator.
"Hah, for such a big fridge, this is all you have? Though this chocolate pudding is pretty good."
At the entrance, Brandish's face had already gone dark.
'The nerve of this guy. Does he not have even the slightest sense of boundaries?
And more importantly, how did he even get in here?!'
During the brief moment in which she was doubting her entire life, Kabe had already emptied out her refrigerator.
"Ahh... I am so sleepy. Do you have any spare rooms? Let me sleep for a while."
'What is he, some kind of pervert? He actually asked to stay over at a girl's house without even blushing.'
"The first room on your left."
"Oh, thanks."
After thanking her, Kabe directly entered the room she had indicated and shut the door firmly behind him.
'He really went to sleep?'
Looking at the tightly closed door, Brandish tilted her head with one hand on her waist.
'Whatever. As long as he stops bothering me and goes to sleep too, that is fine.'
She quickly gave up thinking about it and happily went upstairs to her own bedroom.
Returning to the bed that still held a trace of warmth, feeling the soft comfort of the blanket wrapping around her entire body, Brandish peacefully closed her eyes.
...
'Wait. What if he sneaks into my room while I am asleep?'
That thought suddenly popped into her mind.
At first, Brandish did not take it seriously. She rolled over and prepared to keep sleeping.
What a joke. She was one of the Empire's rising stars, a genius mage with a future chance of joining the Spriggan Twelve. Who would dare barge into her room?
'But what if? Even Lady Irene is paying attention to him, so his strength probably is not bad either...'
Brandish turned over again and stared fixedly at the bedroom door.
But after watching it for a short while, she turned over once more.
'No, no. This is the capital. He would not dare.'
'Wait... how did he get through the door just now? I did not even see it at all.'
Thinking of that, Brandish turned back toward the door again and silently shifted a few inches deeper under the covers.
'Is he some kind of speed-type mage? Then I really do have to be careful...'
'But no matter how fast he is, opening a door should still make some sound, right? As long as there is even the slightest noise, that will be enough for me to react and kill him.'
For the next half hour, Brandish spent the entire time tossing and turning in bed.
At last, after going through all kinds of mental struggle, she suddenly came to a realization.
'So why exactly did I bring him home in the first place?!'
Inside Irene's luxurious private office in the Imperial Senate.
Sitting quietly behind her desk, watching Heine and Juliet fool around, Irene lifted her coffee cup and took a light sip, then frowned and murmured softly,
"It is getting a little cold.
That girl Brandish... is she taking a bit too long to handle this?"
As she spoke, she raised her eyes and glanced at the clock on the wall. The hands showed that it was now 9:10 in the morning.
"...I will wait a little longer."
Kabe: Zzz
Brandish: ( ? )