TGBAP 22

Chapter 22

[What about the things I told you to do?]

“Here.”

When Kaiser opened his pocket space, all sorts of items came pouring out in a rush.

I was surprised because there was more than I expected. Setting aside the things I told you to buy, what are all those countless luxurious boxes supposed to be?

[I thought you said you spent all 1 gold on snacks? You bought all of this within 4 gold?]

As Ria rummaged through the items with a dumbfounded expression, Kaiser swept his long hair back with a huff.

“Praise me.”

The swear rose to my throat, but I forcibly held it back.

“Everything from Lucian’s clothes to his shoes, I bought with my own money.”

At the beyond-imagination words, Ria’s eyes widened. Then Kaiser threw his head back with a kya-ha-ha-ha! laugh.

“Honestly, with the money you gave, you could only buy stuff like burlap. I can’t put something like that on that face, can I?”

[…That’s true, but he’s still young, so I was going to buy cheap ones considering he’ll grow quickly.]

“Tut-tut. If they get small, you can just buy new ones.”

[Not everyone has money like you.]

Still, well…… it’s not bad. I don’t know what the texture is like, but the clothes were overall in good condition.

No, beyond being good, they were pretty.

“The shoes take time to make, so we have to go pick them up later. Lucian memorized the whole route, so from now on he can go alone. Of course, if you’re worried, then I can…….”

[Thank you, Kaiser.]

Kaiser paused, still with his arms crossed, and looked down at Ria. Ria smiled brightly.

[Thanks to you, Lucian was able to go to the village safely and even wear such nice clothes. Thank you so much.]

After a moment of silence, Kaiser’s face flushed bright red.

Poom—!

Along with something bursting, dense smoke scattered through the air.

“Ria! Hyung! I put the candy and jelly in glass jars! I did we— huh?”

Lucian, who had just come running out from the kitchen, flinched at the sight of a creature he’d never seen before.

“……Hyung Kaiser?”

Lucian and Ria’s gazes were fixed on the spot where Kaiser had been standing.

When the smoke cleared, what appeared was a small dragon with bright red scales.

Kaiser blinked his light green eyes and fluttered his wings. The flapping grew fiercer, and he circled the ceiling again and again.

“Wow! Wow! Hyung? You’re insanely cool!”

[He looks a little smaller than last time.]

“S-shut up! If I go back to my true form, the mansion will collapse!”

Maybe he’d calmed down a little; Kaiser shouted sharply. He hmphed and turned his head away, then slowly descended. Lucian dashed over to him.

“It’s a real dragon!”

“Of course it’s real—do you think it’d be fake?”

“You’re so cool! Cooler than in fairy tale books! Way! Way! Ten million times cooler!”

“Of course! Where else would you see this noble figure? ……Go on, say more!”

Still weak to praise, Kaiser willingly stepped into Lucian’s praise prison.

Just a moment ago I thought he’d matured, but I guess that was all my imagination.

“Ugh, still, it’s stifling. It’s more comfortable than polymorph, but still.”

His size was roughly similar to Lucian’s.

According to what Kaiser said before, this appearance is about the size of a newly hatched hatchling.

Since an adult dragon is as huge as this mansion, that’s probably not wrong. Most dragons don’t go around in their true form; they either change their appearance with polymorph, or, like Kaiser now, just shrink their size. Otherwise, they stand out too much.

[How big is your true form? Last time I saw it, it felt like it was a bit smaller than this mansion.]

“Now it’s probably bigger than the mansion. Mom says my growth is faster than others. A magic genius, beautiful, smart, and even huge! Heh-heh, at this rate, won’t female dragons be lining up for me?”

[…He really can’t keep his mouth shut for even a moment.]

At least he doesn’t need to worry about female dragons flocking to him. They’d try to approach, but the moment he opens his mouth, they’d all run away.

“I want to see your original form too. Right now you’re super cute.”

When Lucian, now somehow riding piggyback on Kaiser’s back, chirped that he was cute, Kaiser’s eye twitched.

“Cute? You said cuuuute?”

“Huh?”

Lucian’s feet floated up. It was because Kaiser flew while carrying Lucian.

“How dare you insult me with the humiliating word ‘cute’! Once you see my noble true form, you won’t be able to say that!”

No idea why he was angry, he fumed and said he’d show him his true form, then headed to the backyard with Lucian.

At the sudden turn of events, Ria stood there blankly, then hurriedly followed after them.

[Hey! What if someone sees……!]

The moment Ria went outside the mansion, she cast a barrier over the entire estate. Thankfully, after she spread the magic, Kaiser returned to his true form.

The small dragon gradually grew larger.

His scales, teeth, claws, and even his wings. His claws were larger than an adult human.

“Krrroar……! Now you can’t call me cute, right?”

Kaiser laughed boisterously. He must be laughing like he usually does, but maybe because he was so big, his voice echoed thunderously inside the barrier Ria cast.

Meanwhile, Lucian had been dangling off Kaiser’s back, and since Kaiser returned to his true form, he was still clinging to him.

Now it wasn’t clinging—it looked like he’d been dropped onto that vast back.

In an instant, Lucian was higher than the mansion’s second floor, and the cold wind brushing his cheeks left him dazed.

At that moment, Kaiser turned back, and their eyes met. Light green eyes bigger than Lucian’s whole body.

They were fascinating pupils like a snake’s, but to Lucian, they were terrifyingly frightening. In the end—

“U-uu…… s-scaryyy!”

He burst into tears.

The majestic red dragon panicked and tried to soothe Lucian on his back, but Lucian only wailed that he was scared.

At the truly ridiculous sight, Ria burst into laughter.

“Don’t just laugh! Hurry up and calm him down!”

Only Kaiser looked like he was going to die of despair.

* * *

“……I’m never going back to my true form again.”

After the commotion, Lucian cried for a long time, then fell asleep in Ria’s arms.

Kaiser, back in small-dragon form again, flopped down beside the sleeping Lucian in a ragged state.

[See, who told you to? He just said you were cute.]

“Cute is a word you use for small, itty-bitty things. It’s absolutely not a word that suits a huge, majestic dragon! Remember that well! To dragons, ‘cute’ is an insulting word!”

Judging by how he was fuming, it didn’t seem like he was lying. Is ‘cute’ really something worth getting that heated about? But then something came to mind.

‘Pfft! This small, itty-bitty thing is cute.’

Yeah, that would sound unpleasant.

Kaiser, who had been fuming, soon wilted with a pshh, and flopped back onto the bed again.

He always squawked and only cared about himself, but he’d done everything under the sun to try to calm an eight-year-old child, so it must have been exhausting.

“Just who is this kid, that he became your groom?”

Ria, quietly stroking Lucian’s hair, paused.

Kaiser, wearing an indifferent expression, was watching Lucian sleep with soft snuffling breaths.

“Looking at how he acts, it’s like he’s a newborn baby doing everything for the first time. First time in a crowded place, first time in a village, first time snacking, first time buying things. I’ve lived a long time, and this is my first time seeing a guy like this.”

[…Lucian was like that?]

“Yeah. He was like me when I first went into the human world.”

When he first succeeded at polymorph, to celebrate, his mom and dad took him to a human village and bought him this and that. It reminded him of that.

Was it when he was forty-two? A few years before he discovered this mansion.

[Lucian is imperial royalty.]

Kaiser’s half-lidded eyes snapped open. Kaiser floated up onto the bed, mouth opening and closing as he pointed at Lucian.

“What? This little— I mean, him?”

Kaiser started examining Lucian carefully. Snow-white hair, pale skin, beauty that stood out even among his peers. When he lifted the eyelid of Lucian’s closed eyes, vivid golden irises appeared.

“Uunng……!”

Lucian stirred. Ria hurriedly made him let go.

[What are you doing to a sleeping kid.]

“……Wow. Those really are golden eyes. Why did I only notice now?”

Truthfully, to Kaiser, humans were all the same. At most, Lucian stood out a bit, so he lingered a little more in his mind. Beyond that, there was nothing worth remembering.

“Why the hell is a royal here!”

“Ueeng…….”

With the child sleeping right beside them, Kaiser couldn’t calm down at all.

As if he weren’t a dragon who only knows himself.

Ria glared at Kaiser and led him out of the room. Sighing, she closed the door behind her.

[I don’t know exactly either. About three months ago, people from the imperial palace suddenly came and married me to Lucian.]

“?? They can see you too?”

[Do you think they can? Getting married to me was just an excuse. Do you know what my reputation is? A terrifying virgin ghost in this haunted mansion! They said all your vital energy gets sucked out if you come into this mansion, or you die a gruesome death—spouting all kinds of bizarre nonsense.]

“So what you’re saying is, those human bastards forced Lucian to marry you even though they don’t even know you exist?”

[Yeah. A spirit marriage ceremony. They said the mansion would quiet down if he married me, but do you think that makes any sense?]

“Wow…… I’d only heard people say humans are full of insane bastards, but this really goes beyond imagination. Even us dragons don’t do that!”

[Exactly. But that’s not the problem. Outwardly, Lucian is known as an orphan, dressed up like imperial royalty and offered here as a sacrifice. In other words, no one knows Lucian is imperial royalty.]

At a loss for words, Kaiser froze with a bizarre expression.

“What kind of bullshit is that.”

[Haa…… yeah, it is bullshit.]

If you don’t know what’s going on, Kaiser’s reaction isn’t unreasonable. Ria slowly explained everything that had happened so far to Kaiser.

After hearing it all, he folded his arms with a serious expression and asked,

“Is he a bastard child?”

[He isn’t. He’s the Empress’s son.]

“Then why?”

[I don’t know. But what’s even funnier is, Lucian has one older brother. He’s also the Empress’s son, and everyone except Lucian is living in luxury.]

Kaiser’s eyelid twitched.

[At least I took care of him for three months so he put on weight and grew taller. At first he was so skinny it looked like he’d collapse if you flicked him. From what I hear, it doesn’t seem like he lived properly in the palace either.]

“Hm…….”

Kaiser kept frowning, arms crossed. He kept grabbing at his own head like he was trying to recall something.

“You said Lucian is a prince?”

[Yeah. Lucian told me himself.]

“Strange. As far as I know, there is no prince in this empire.”

At the unfamiliar words, Ria stiffened her face. It was only natural—Kaiser was her only source of outside news.

“I don’t know the details either. There’s a dragon I know who plays at being a noble, so I sometimes hear about the empire. But no matter how I think about it, I’ve never once heard that there’s a prince.”

[Then what is it about Lucian having an older brother?]

“It’d be the Crown Prince. It’s not that there’s no Crown Prince—there just isn’t a prince.”

If what Kaiser says is true, does that mean Lucian has been living hidden away all this time, never revealed to the outside?

[…Could that be the reason they’re pretending Lucian is an orphan?]

Not only that, thinking about Lucian so far, it felt like they couldn’t kill him, so they left him alive with no choice.

The words that he should have died, the knowledge they deliberately never told him, and even abandoning him in this mansion under the pretext of a spirit marriage ceremony.

The gears began to find their place, clicking in little by little.

“Right before I came here, what did that ill-mannered bastard say again……!”

Kaiser groaned as he clutched his head.

Right before coming to this mansion, he had been in the frigid northern regions. A place covered in snow for over 200 days out of the year.

A place where a certain ill-mannered bastard made a lair and played a strange kind of revelry, acting as a noble.

When Kaiser was lazing around in that bastard’s lair, there was something the bastard grumbled about.

‘Hah, what a pain. They’re holding a birth banquet again this time?’

‘For what?’

‘That emperor bastard is ordering me to come and go.’

The bastard froze solid a letter stamped with the imperial seal, then shattered it to pieces.

‘Then why did you become a noble? Why live so annoyingly?’

‘Do you think you’d be living comfortably in this empire without me? Honestly, if it weren’t for me, what dragon would take care of freeloaders like you?’

That bastard always said it’s thanks to him that even if dragons cause trouble in the empire, they can still live well.

Kaiser wanted to argue, but since it was partly true, he stayed quiet.

‘Haaam…… then just go. And on your way back, hunt some orcs too.’

‘Hey. You’ve got exactly five years left. Once you become an adult dragon, don’t you dare even come near my lair again.’

‘Yeees, yeees.’

At Kaiser’s unbearably obnoxious self, the lair’s owner trembled with rage.

The bastard took a deep sigh, repeating patience to himself.

‘Why does that emperor bastard throw such a grand banquet for his son every time? He’s only eight, at best.’

Then, the bastard said it clearly.

Birth banquet, the emperor’s son, and eight years old.

The scattered puzzle snapped into place all at once.

Hearing Kaiser’s recollection, Ria met his eyes. After a brief silence, both Ria and Kaiser widened their eyes in shock.