Master’s Smile

As she entered the dining room, Ritter was greeted by the adorable sarcasm of Laladi, a little girl with fluffy green hair.

It would have been better if she could also make a sarcastic smile, but unfortunately, she was not mature enough in her mental age, thus her face was contorted due to her emotions.

In other words, her jealousy and anger.

“That’s right! You! Aren’t you the one who has spent the longest time with Master!?”

It was Vampir, the girl with long and silky blonde hair, who also jumped on the bandwagon to express her anger.

Though, it was already expected for her to complain easily, so it wasn’t particularly a surprise for the others.

“Hey, you guys! Don’t aim your bloodlust at Ritter.”

“OUCH!! Desu!!”

“That hurts!”

Reese, who had already become “Yelquchira”’s conscience, sent a helping hand to Ritter.

She dropped a light blow on both of their heads to calm their anger.

But for Laladi and Vampir, who fell to the ground quivering, the so-called light blow from Reese was too much to bear.

“Here you go, Ritter-san.”

“Unn.”

Ritter sat down on the chair that had been given to her and Schwald, the tanned-skinned maid, offered her a cup of tea.

Ritter then took it and quenched her thirst by drinking the tea.

Unfortunately, the poison inside the tea did not work on her, as she had the power of a demon.

When there was clearly no effect on Ritter, she heard a small tongue click, but it might just be her imagination.

One would wonder if there were any “Yelquchira” members who would simply die after consuming poison, yet Schwarz would still keep using poison without any hesitation.

“Sigh…you guys….”

Reese knew that Schwarz had poisoned the tea and sighed in exasperation.

“I don’t really care, just get on with why you’ve gathered us here. I’m tired from all the hard work I did for Master today, unlike those loafers there.”

“What did you say!?! Desu!!”

“What did you just say to meee!?!”

Laladi and Vampir immediately snapped after hearing what they were called by Kuhling, who was resting her chin in her hands.

“…Well, we couldn’t say anything to Ritter-dono, yes.”

Sorglos, the pony-tailed ninja who had been quiet, followed suit.

Ritter, however, knew that Sorglos had thrown several kunais at her while she was hugging her master.

“R-R-R-Really, what a rowdy bunch….”

The gray-haired Krankheit looked annoyed at the noisy members of the group.

Though, everyone tried not to look at the stack of papers she had been holding in her hands.

The reason was that it was overflowing with quite an amount of miasma that was hard to handle even for the demon-possessing Ritter.

“It’s as noooisy as ever when we all get togetheeer….”

Then Anat, who was supposed to be “Yelquchira”’s manager, appeared and finally brought a pause to the commotion.

Due to this kind of situation, where bloodlust and weapons were thrown everywhere, there were very few opportunities for everyone to get together.

“Now then, I wooouldn’t say the kingdom is entirely ours now, buuut our influence has grown to a great exteeent and that should be enough for now.”

“My role is done, then.”

“Waaait a moment, Ritteeer.”

Ritter was about to leave the cafeteria as soon as she heard Anat’s words.

But Anat managed to grab her by the shoulders to restrain her.

Although her smile and tone of voice were gentle, her grip was so strong that it dug into Ritter’s shoulder.

Ritter naturally knew that she was surrounded by enemies on all sides, hence she quietly returned to her seat.

“In the first place, Lala and the others already have new jobs, so there’s no way you will be scott free after this, desu.”

“We concur, yes.”

Laladi and Sorglos, who had already completed the work they were in charge of, began to argue, as they were forced to take on new tasks soon after.

If Ritter had been the only one free to go, they would start a rampage to their utmost abilities.

“At any rate, we don’t have to deal with the kingdom now, right? Then what’s next?”

Kuhling asked in an extremely tiresome manner.

She had consumed a bit too much mana controlling a lot of monsters during the chaos in the royal capital.

Hence, she was incredibly sleepy right now.

“We’ve been crushing those who have tried to oppose Master, but there are no such fools lately.”

Longmann of the hero party. Rousseld, the guildmaster of “Iron Queen (Inicken)”. And Lintz, the first prince of Evans Kingdom.

“Yelquchira” had been crushing those who had tried to target their master in some way.

They had eliminated all of them in order, and so far, as Reese said, no one had shown a clear hostile intent toward Master.

“Hmm~…I wonder what to dooo? The plan is already underwaaay….”

Even Anat pondered what Ritter should do.

Though, Laladi, Schwarz, and the rest…only thought of having to simply use brute force their way as long as they could present the world to their master as soon as possible.

“…Ah, now that I recall, I have some things to do. I’ll take my leave for now then.”

Vampir suddenly stood up and caused a stir for the other members by saying so.

“I wonder…? It’s not something to do with…going to Master’s place, is it?”

“*Gikkuu*!!” (sfx: Shocked)

“…….”

Vampir, who quickly froze under Schwarz’s interrogation, received blank stares from the rest of the members.

“Y-You’re mistaken! W-Well, I have indeed planned to meet Master, but I truly have something to do!”

“W-W-W-What’s with that excuse…?”

Vampir waved her hands frantically, which made Krankheit and the others take a stance of at least listening to what she had to say first.

Drenching in cold sweat, Vampir knew that if she said anything bad, weapons and magic would soon come flying at her.

“There’s an “Assembly of the True Ancestors” in the vampire territory! And I have to be there as well!!”

“Lies, desu!”

“It’s true!!”

Laladi snapped at Vampir as she did not trust the other members at all as far as her master was concerned.

Vampir, too, was not smart enough to be able to persuade anyone with words, so they argued with each other.

“…So? Is it true what Vampir said about this “Assembly of True Ancestors”?”

“It’s true, yes. We have received a report not too long ago that there will be a meeting of true ancestor vampires that are usually scattered throughout their territory.”

Reese asked the intel gatherer of “Yelquchira”, Sorglos, and she got her confirmation.

“Hmm~…. Theeen, let’s make that the next one~”

Anat clapped her hands and said it like it was nothing.

All eyes were on her.

“Our next target will be the vampires~”

The vampire faction did not launch any means of attack on any side of “Yelquchira” at all.

They were just unlucky.

With such a trifling idea, the vampires were forced to accept their unreasonable changes.

(TN: Rest in peace, they won’t be missed.)

Author’s Note:

Volume 5, Kingdom Arc, is over!

Please read the next volume.