I Became the Patron of Villains (Novel) - Chapter 133 - Border Zone (1)

Chapter 133 – Border Zone (1)

===================

Translated by Jinmu

Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

===================

After Blue Moon’s regular meeting ended…

“What did you think?”

The magic orb that had been used for the video conference shut down.

While Yuna stood there blankly, Hidan came in from the next room.

She opened and closed her mouth as if she did not know what to say.

Then she finally spoke.

“…Um.”

“Go on.”

“That was really a meeting, right?”

“It was.”

“…That?”

“Yes.”

“…Talking about turning the second prince into an Outer God incident so that a statue to Blue Moon can be built… that counts as a meeting?”

“The second prince did try to slander Blue Moon once before.”

“…Well, then maybe he deserves it, but still…”

“At least up to the middle, it was a normal meeting, wasn’t it?”

“Even so…”

Yuna took a breath and began listing everything that had left her stunned.

“Crimson Moon and Golden Moon were fighting over marrying the Great Moon. Green Moon boasted for more than thirty minutes about a gift he received from him. Silver Moon heard that there was another person slandering him and smashed a window and jumped out before the meeting had even ended. Isn’t all of that a little too much no matter how you look at it?”

“Hmm…”

“And was Purple Moon always that talkative? I’m sure he wasn’t before. He used to be quiet, but today he spent more than two full hours talking about nothing except the Great Moon.”

That was not the personality the moons used to have.

They had changed far too much.

As a complicated expression rose on her face, Hidan also fell silent.

…Because he was not very different from her.

Especially lately, the meetings had become worse.

The intensity of the fanaticism had grown even fiercer than when he first started attending them.

Has the Great Moon learned some kind of hypnosis or something?

That thought, which Radan had voiced once before, passed through Hidan’s mind as he looked at Yuna.

Her face practically said, This is not the meeting I wanted to see.

Then…

“Hidan.”

“What is it?”

“Do you think the Great Moon maybe has some kind of cognitive manipulation ability? Or hypnosis? When I saw him from far away before, he didn’t seem like that kind of person at all…”

In the end, Yuna had reached the same conclusion he had.

“…That could be.”

He did not bother denying it.

####

The border zone and the Allied Kingdoms lay roughly a month away from House Palladio.

That was only natural.

The Kingdom of Asteria sat in the east, while the border, from the perspective of the Allied Kingdoms, lay all the way beyond Caliburn on the western edge.

Because of that, Alon had already spent well over two weeks traveling by carriage.

But he had no time to get bored.

The reason was the sentence he had acquired together with Kkamangi, the Death Shadow Dragon.

Unity of Shade.

“My lord, what are you thinking about so hard?”

Alon had been staring at Kkamangi, who was busily picking up roasted sweet potatoes beside the campfire.

At Evan’s question, he answered slowly.

“I still cannot get a feel for it.”

“Ah, the magic?”

Alon nodded.

The magic won’t manifest at all.

While traveling toward the border by carriage, Alon had repeatedly tried to use Unity of Shade.

But he still had no idea how to make it work properly.

What is the problem?

Of course, he knew there could be several issues.

As the dragonkin had said before, magic that used phrases and sentences had to use the correct and proper terminology to produce the intended effect.

Even so, this case bothered him.

In previous cases, even when he did not fully understand how to use a phrase or sentence, the magic itself had still manifested to some degree, even if imperfectly.

But Unity of Shade consumed mana and then did absolutely nothing.

Could this be a spell that has to be used in some special way? Or is it a spell that only works with a true dragon, making it impossible in the state of a Death Shadow Dragon?

The question grew larger and larger.

“My lord, now that I think about it, there was something I forgot to mention.”

“What is it?”

That was when Evan spoke up.

Alon collected his thoughts and turned his gaze toward him.

“It’s news I heard in the domain we stopped at this morning. Apparently, a lot of Time Gates have been appearing recently.”

“Time Gates?”

“Yes. They said Time Gates, which used to appear only near the towers, have started showing up all over the place at the same time.”

It was not surprising news.

Well, the original story starts in less than half a year now, so it makes sense for them to begin appearing.

He had expected the number of Time Gates to start increasing from here on.

After all, the original protagonist Elivan began his adventure when the next phenomenon after a Time Gate, a strange gate, appeared in his village and threw it into danger.

At the moment, Alon’s attention was so focused on the Five Great Sins, which were effectively tied to the end of the world, that he had not spared much thought for Time Gates.

But Time Gates were also one of the main incidents that drove the story of Psychedelia.

There were quite a few Time Gate incidents serious enough to put an entire kingdom in danger.

Even so, Alon was not too worried.

The reason was the protagonist.

That was right.

Even if Alon did nothing, the protagonist of the original story, Elivan, would go around closing those Time Gates.

He’ll manage them on his own.

Unlike the Five Great Sins, which could destroy one or two countries the moment they descended, Time Gates would not become catastrophic so long as they were dealt with in time.

That was why Alon was not deeply concerned.

Maybe when his first adventure starts, I should help him a bit just in case. I can give him some extra things too. And if he is weaker than I expect, maybe I should keep him in Lartania for a while and train him.

While building his own plans around the hardships Elivan would face, Alon bit into a sweet potato that had already gone lukewarm.

“…It’s good.”

“My lord, every time there’s a campfire, you eat sweet potatoes. Haven’t you gotten tired of them yet?”

“No. They always feel new and delicious.”

“…Is that so?”

Evan, who seemed to have tired of sweet potatoes, was eating potatoes instead.

I don’t think I used to like sweet potatoes quite this much.

Why are they so good?

The question crossed his mind for a moment, but he simply shrugged and pushed the rest of the sweet potato into his mouth.

On a cool night beside a campfire, sweet potatoes were still delicious.

####

About two more weeks later, Alon finally reached the area near the border.

“Wow. From way over there, it’s nothing but wasteland.”

Looking at the high wall that marked the border and the sandy wasteland beyond it, Alon began turning possibilities over in his head.

How should I get across?

The wasteland between the Allied Kingdoms and the Empire.

To players, it was known as the Badlands.

It was guarded by the Allied Army, so it was not a place one could enter easily.

No, an ordinary noble was not even allowed to set foot in it.

Even when playing Psychedelia, it was a zone that could only be crossed a few times, and then only through special quests.

The reason was partly the Empire, but mostly because they were trying not to awaken the Cursed Maw, if I remember right.

The Cursed Maw.

At this point in time it had not revealed itself yet.

But in the future it would become one of the Four Great Powers together with the Hundred Ghosts of the Jungle.

That force had made its home in the wasteland.

There were also several other petty reasons, but in the end, that was the main one.

Should I use the dog hole after all?

He thought of the one hidden passage in the wall, the only dog hole in the barrier covered in dozens and hundreds of magic circles.

Then he clicked his tongue awkwardly.

I’d rather not if I can avoid it.

If he used the dog hole, he could certainly get inside.

But if there were another way, he did not want to use it.

Passing through that place was more exhausting than expected.

Exactly how it was exhausting, I don’t know.

But whenever he had used the dog hole in the game to level in the wasteland, the message You have consumed too much stamina always appeared, and every party member’s HP dropped by fifty percent.

While he was still considering the matter…

“Should we head to the village first?”

“Yes.”

The sun was already setting, so they decided to spend the night in the village from which the border zone was already clearly visible.

And there, after they arrived…

“Teacher?”

“…Yutia?”

“Brother.”

“…Saint Yuman is here as well.”

He ran into a very strange combination.

“What brings you here?”

He had only a moment to be surprised by the unexpected meeting.

Then Yutia, walking quickly through the crowd of clergy while wearing a calm smile, asked her question.

Alon answered.

“…I have some business at the border.”

“At the border?”

“I do. Why are you here?”

But before Yutia could answer, Yuman cut in.

“There have been recent problems at the border, Brother, so we are heading there to repair the gate.”

Yutia looked at Yuman with a smile that stiffened very slightly when he cut her off.

But Yuman paid no attention to that gaze and added with a gentle smile,

“If you also have business at the border, Brother, then come with us.”

Outwardly Alon showed nothing, but inwardly he brightened at once.

If he went with them, there would be no need to use the dog hole.

“…Would that really be acceptable?”

“Of course.”

With that unexpected stroke of luck, Alon gained a very comfortable way to enter the border.

####

The Allied Army defended the border.

As the name suggested, it was formed by drawing soldiers and knights in fixed proportions from each of the five countries that represented the Allied Kingdoms rather than a single state.

At present, the commander of that border force was Kiryana, who a few years earlier had been known as the Second Sword among Caliburn’s Five Swords.

She was not flustered by the sudden arrival of a saint and a cardinal.

She had already been informed from above.

In fact, the person who interested Kiryana more was the Marquis Palladio who had arrived with them.

Not only had she not received any report that he was coming, she had also once incurred a debt to him in the north and still had not properly thanked him.

But that lasted only a moment.

Kiryana soon found herself in an awkward situation.

No, really, it was almost ridiculous.

That situation was this.

“…It would be best if I were written down as his guarantor.”

“No. You may write my name instead.”

They were arguing over whose name should go on the guarantor line for the marquis.

The saint and the cardinal had come to repair the gate, so they needed no guarantor.

But in the case of Marquis Palladio, he needed a definite guarantor in order to enter the border zone with them.

Only one guarantor was required.

Only one.

One of the two standing in front of her merely had to sign their name.

And yet because of that single signature…

“…Saint Yuman? I will stand guarantor for Teacher, so please do not worry.”

“No, Cardinal Yutia, I will do it, so please do not concern yourself. I heard this sort of thing makes you very uncomfortable.”

“How could that be? I might feel that way with others, but not when it comes to Teacher. Something like this does not trouble me at all. That is the relationship we have.”

“The same is true for me. Between Brother and me, this is nothing, so there is no need for you to worry.”

They had already been engaged in this contest for more than ten minutes.

“…”

Kiryana looked at Yutia and Yuman.

Both wore cool smiles.

Neither was smiling with their eyes.

If anything, there was something faintly chilling about them.

“Saint Yuman, perhaps you should stop being stubborn now. Teacher also seems to be growing uncomfortable.”

“Would it not be better for the Cardinal to stop being stubborn instead?”

Seriously, what are they even doing this over?

Even Kiryana had begun to feel uncomfortable as the two clerics started using more openly aggressive wording.

“Please stop being stubborn.”

“Cardinal, please, you should be the one to stop. When Brother was being criticized at the allied summit last time, you did nothing. There is no reason for you to try so hard now just because Brother is watching.”

“Do not worry. I had already sent him a letter before Saint Yuman even knew anything. I think of Teacher far more than you do.”

As the atmosphere turned so sharp that it looked as if the two might truly start fighting, Kiryana barely restrained the urge to press a hand to her forehead.

Just what exactly is Marquis Palladio?

She looked toward the cause of the dispute.

But Alon himself…

Why are these two acting like this?

…was just as lost.