Ahahahaha~”

“Princess, it’s almost time for your studies.”

Krielov was running after the self-moving car prototype that Violet was thoroughly enjoying, riding it in circles around the knight corps training grounds. When the motor arrived the previous day, Yuusuke immediately a.s.sembled the wooden frame for the car and installed the engine. This was the car that Violet was test-driving right now.

As of yet, Yuusuke was still not used to producing motor vehicles, so the actual “car” was just a downscaled copy of the carriage that the corps used.

“It would not be impossible to think about using Gimmick power to improve the currently used carriages after all…”

“Yuusuke-dono! Please help me with her.”

Yuusuke stood with his arms crossed, looking at Violet enjoying the trial model of the self-moving carriage, and thinking about the future direction of his development. Krielov brought him out of his thoughts as he called him while being completely out of breath himself. Meanwhile Violet was amusing herself by constantly avoiding Krielov and looked to be pretty hard to catch.

The current model exceeded Yuusuke’s expectations and moved faster than a human during a jog, instead it was able to move at a speed equivalent to  a human running with all his might. Although it was still possible to catch up with it, it was reasonably difficult to force the carriage to stop.

Since the frame is little, one had to bend their back forward to get hold of it. To do that at this speed would involve a huge risk of falling down. Moreover, even if someone managed to miraculously get ahold of it, they still had to preserve their balance and keep themselves from losing their footing. Or rather, this hypothetical scene was happening in front of Yuusuke’s eyes.

“… Should I implement an emergency brake that would work from outside of the vehicle in the next model?”

Yuusuke noted this as he glanced at a teary eyed Violet, who was suffering under a storm of admonishments from a stain of mud that was once Krielov. As he did that he went towards his prototype vehicle and picked a part from the rear of the frame that was damaged during the chase.

“By the way, your holiday is starting soon, Yuusuke. What are you going to do about this year’s dance festival?”

“Ah that’s right. You had that kind of event here.”

Yuusuke was escorting Violet to her education room instead of Krielov who had to change his clothes. Violet’s question reminded him of the time at the harvest festival at the Rufk village.

In a few days the earth calendar would end and the wind calendar would begin. The harvest festival was celebrated during the beginning of the earth calendar. The beginning of the wind calendar was celebrated with a dance festival. The Harvest festival was tinged with a shade of looking for a partner of expressing your feelings to your loved one, the Dance festival, on the other hand had a deep underlying tradition of marriage and betrothal.

“Remembering the atmosphere during the harvest festival, maybe I should stay in the city this time…”

“Aaahm… I am happy for the thought, but it would be bad tact for me to go to the dance festival with a consort.”

This was the time of the year that the pressure from the Fiancé candidate’s group was the strongest. Just in case, should the princess choose one of them as her future husband, she had to partner up with all of them (T.N. one by one) to get a grasp of each of their dispositions.  

“Sounds like a bother.”

“It’s the worst…”

Violet sighed melancholically, leaving Yuusuke thinking for words that could console her. Like that, once again it became evident to him that the girl in front of him with her red hair bound into two swaying twintails is actually a princess that, in time, will have to choose a new king for this country.

When Yuusuke finished escorting Violet to her room, he went to a different training area that was located outdoors. Sun was giving her all, training to use her bow there along with the soldiers that were practicing their long ranged divine arts.

“Sun.”

“Ah, Yuusuke-san.”

Sun, who was wearing her white servant’s clothes and a slightly larger bow (compared to her usual one), looked at Yuusuke.

“It’s a huge bow.”

“Yes, but by wearing your ring I am able to draw it easily.”

The bow was also long but the white haired girl was able to effortlessly handle it. “That’s quite nice,” thought Yuusuke and, unknowingly, smiled a smile that made the girl fl.u.s.ter.

In preparation for the dance festival that was supposed to start in a few days, Razshia was secretly giving Sun some tips. That information suddenly sprang to girls mind and completely fl.u.s.tered her.

The girl was well aware of the meaning of the festival. An age that a girl was deemed suitable for marriage was sixteen in Kaltcio, and in the beginning of the last month Sun had turned eighteen and was now at the peak of her youth.

Girls tended to flock around Yuusuke for some reason. At the harvest festival, Sun too became aware of him as a member of the opposite s.e.x, as she was watching him being flocked around by the other village girls. However, her feelings became much stronger compared to that time.

[“I am not a beauty, nor am I cute. Neither do I have any special qualities. I am just a country girl with a huge scar over my belly…”]

Such a girl was able to meet this man, now hailed as a Hero of Fonclanc, by sheer luck at the shrine of the Evil G.o.d and happened to be able to spend her days together with him under one roof for a while.

If Rasanasha and Razshia would put in their utmost effort, there is no way that he would ever look at a girl like her. Even Isotta from the corps was way more fit to be standing by his side.

If it continues like this, doubtlessly other girls would take their chances and approach him. If she did not act quickly, she was sure to lose, that was what Razshia had a.s.sured her to be the unavoidable truth.

“Continue giving your best, Sun!”

Impressed with Sun’s effort, and feeling the air around her change, Yuusuke cheered her with a vigorous voice and turned to leave the training grounds as to avoid disturbing girls training even more.

“Well, see you again.”

“A!… yes, take care.”

Unable to voice her feelings and feeling slightly down, Sun took her posture again and resumed her training.

“I also have to try my best.”

Thought Yuusuke after leaving the open training grounds. He considered using the free time that he had now to go back to his room and practice on using his Evil G.o.d powers.

Since the talk with Sun in the carriage on their way back to Sanc Adiet he had relinquished his eagerness to become a swordsman like Shinha and instead strived to perfect his customization powers.

Thus he called the customization data made for battle to his customization screen. This was something that he did not have opportunities to improve on since he had first created it.

“Pitfalls and walls, only two of them – that isn’t very good…”

For indoors battles, he only had the field that he had used on his previous mission. Moreover, the map item data was limited only to what was in his direct line of sight and that held the limitations on the usefulness of his abilities.

The problem was that all of his current abilities was defensive and he had to wait for opponent to fall for them, thus he wanted to create something that could be used to counter this weakness.

“I have to think of something.”

Thus, in order to create himself a new “weapon”, Yuusuke started working on a method that would allow him to use the map item data as something that could be used offensively.

Zalnar’s month of wind, nineteenth day~

Everyone was in a festive mood already. Yuusuke was in the soldier’s resting room, sorting the presents that he intended to bring to everyone back at the village. He was waiting for Sun to show up and was having a pleasant chat with Fonke, who did not want to go out into the city just for the dance festival, and Shaheed, who was not going back home for the holiday, in the meantime.

“Captain is returning to the Rufk village together with Sun-chan?”

“Ah, it seems I would put Violet in a tough spot should I remain here. Also there are things that I want to discuss with the teacher.”

On the other hand, this was the end of year festival so it was best to enjoy it as much as one could.

“The things that you want to discuss with Zeshald-dono are related to those evil beasts, right?”

“That’s right.”

Servants at the Yuusuke’s mansion were also on a leave during this celebration and Razshia was left to watch over the empty building together with the steward and several of the older servants. Rashanasha, was also allowed to freely enter and leave the mansion because she was currently made responsible for cultivating the solar moss.

“Oh that reminds me, a lot of people are leaving for some other towns for the celebration. I heard that the carriage boarding place was pretty busy.”

“If we don’t hurry up, there might not be any comfortable carriages left for us.”

“May I reserve one?” as Vermeer raised his hand towards Yuusuke, knowing that he wasn’t going to use the carriage, he took his time to choose the rara fruit wine from amongst the other cheap wines. While Fonke, in a split second,  prepared a cup as a support, making everyone wonder where he took out the cup from.

[“Should I have reserved a carriage?”], thought Yuusuke as he waved back to Vermeer, who stood up from his seat and was motioning Yuusuke to come over to him. Having decided not to rush anymore, Yuusuke slowly approached his subordinates and presented them with a bottle high grade Rara wine, poured into a bottle that was used to contain cheap alcohol. Fonke, who was sitting with Vermeer pulled out a cup from somewhere and offered it to his captain.

Vermeer was about to ask Fonke on how could Yuusuke reach the village without a carriage, but Fonke just waved it off telling him that everything will work out because their captain will find a way.

“Sorry to have kept you waiting, Yuusuke-san.”

“Oh, you’re here. Well, let us go then.”

With Vermeer and the guys waving and wishing them a happy holiday, Yuusuke left the soldier’s resting room. Sun, who had changed her clothes to a simple dress, followed Yuusuke to the carriage boarding place, as they were planning to use a simple carriage to exit the city.

Yuusuke had bent his back under the weight of the bag full of various souvenirs, and looked to be more like an old woman than a captain of a palace knight’s corps.  He and Sun, who was carrying two somewhat long wooden planks, attracted attention of everyone they pa.s.sed in the corridor.

“Is this place really suitable for it?”

Yuusuke and Sun pa.s.sed the district gate, overlooking the tower plaza, and finally arrived at the city outskirts. There they disembarked from the carriage and thanked their driver. (Note: the carriage in previous paragraphs meant a palace carriage that they could use for themselves like rent-a-car while this carriage was more like a taxi)

“Well, let us walk until the highway.”

“Yes.”

When the two finally arrived at the road, leading to Rufk village, Sun finally put down the planks that she was holding until now at the side of the road so not to hinder any carriages that might be using it. Yuusuke approached the planks and used the movement type map item data and bound the two 2.5 meters long boards into a single object.

Standing up again he used the customization menu to create another thin, long plank that was around 10 meters long.

“I’ll hold the luggage, Yuusuke-san.”

“Oh, thanks.”

Yuusuke agreed with Sun and gave her all the luggage since all of his attention had to be diverted at the customization.   

Sun carelessly took all the luggage that seemed to be really heavy for Yuusuke. Although she was not wearing the ring that increased her strength, her arms were still way stronger than Yuusuke’s.

“Our trip might be a little b.u.mpy so make sure to hold your footing.”

“Okay, don’t worry.”

“Good, then let’s try using this thing.”

This was the same type of customization that Yuusuke had used at the battle of the main Paula fortress. If it was used in a city like Sanc Adiet, Yuusuke could simply switch two parts of stone pavement around. It could be said that this power was a consecutive teleportation.

This time he changed a portion of the ground below the planks that he was standing on with a portion of the ground farther away. The board had instantly moved similar distance. Yuusuke called this power Map Shift. This time, he moved forward by around 10 meters.

Then he moved the small part of the foothold for the plank at the rear of his contraption forward. By doing that he returned the planks to their former length, moving around 10 meters forward in the process. Yuusuke planned to reach the Rufk village by continuously repeating this customization.

Since the original game did not have any convenient macro functions for map item customization, Yuusuke had to do continuously repeat the shifting of his makeshift scaffold and execution of the customization action. If he did not make any mistakes, he could do it once per second.

Sun was holding onto Yuusuke, standing closely behind his back white the youth was continuously performing his customization and moving them closer to the village.

[“Move, execute, move, execute, move, execute, move, execute… ah I made a mistake.”]

[“He looks very busy, I think it’s better for me to remain silent and not interrupt him.”]

The hilly and uneven terrain made his trip slightly difficult, requiring him to think of a specific way to pa.s.s it, however skillful use of this technique allowed him to significantly reduce the travelling time. Standing still also meant that there was no inertia force involved thus this way of travelling was completely safe.

There was only one fault to this way of travelling – each customization involved the flickering phenomenon, making them tremendously stand out.

“Hey! I can see it. Over there!”

“Whoa! What is that?!”

“Isn’t it the Hero of Deernook?”

“That light, what in the h.e.l.l…”

[“Captain of the darkness G.o.d Corps and his Artless attendant, were pa.s.sing through the eastern highway at a great speed, surrounded by particles of light that were fluttering in the wind.”]

Hearing the rumor that had started to spread since that day, Violet shouted “He created another type of carriage, I want to ride in it!” in the upper floor of the palace.