.｡.:✧ Chapter 20 ✧:.｡.

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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: FusionX
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Blonde hair.

Tanned skin.

And an undeniably flippant manner of speech and swaggering attitude.

Aside from the roots of her hair not being dark due to being a natural blonde, she was the epitome of a typical “Golden Sun” – a so-called blonde, tanned delinquent.

She was like a character straight out of the thin books I had often relied on in my previous life. Usually, such characters were male in those books, but anyway.

“Lassiel Reppert, Admiral. Why is Your Grace, who should be wiping out pirates, here again?”

“Well, after sweeping them away last time, they’ve been quiet for a while. I had nothing to do, so I came to the capital to hang out. Oh, what brings everyone here?”

It seemed that the sudden appearance of an unexpected individual caught everyone off guard, as Princess Elena asked with a visibly flustered expression.

Of course, the Golden Sun admiral, called Lassiel Reppert, responded nonchalantly as if asking if there was any problem.

No, I had only seen her name in the newspapers.

Since they couldn’t print photos in the newspapers of this era, I had just vaguely imagined a female pirate wearing a pirate hat and a coat, not expecting a Golden Sun to show up.

…Anyway, having decided to refer to Admiral Lassiel as “Golden Sun” in my mind from now on, I quietly stepped back.

Perhaps that had the opposite effect, as the gazes of the three women fixated on me again.

The clichéd gathering of the Northern Grand Duchess and the Southern Admiral in one place. And with the addition of the empire’s princess…

The three of them, who had their eyes fixed on me, soon exchanged glances with each other again.

As if they understood the situation just by looking at each other’s eyes, without anyone needing to speak first.

“Ah~ What do we have here? So it wasn’t just me.”

Admiral Lassiel chuckled with a subtle look in her eyes.

Let’s recap.

The regressors currently in the Imperial Palace were four.

Excluding Sylphia, who wasn’t present, a whopping three of them had gathered in one place, and their identities were all remarkable.

And upon further reflection, those three were in a competitive relationship, fighting over me.

‘What kind of nonsense is this?’

Although it’s the fate of a romance novel protagonist to be surrounded by handsome men, I swear on the gods that not once had I ever wished for the position of a romance novel protagonist in a world where gender roles were strangely reversed.

I just wanted to live a long and peaceful life, not be surrounded by pretty and successful women, shedding tears like a tragic protagonist, saying things like, “No, we can’t…”

Even in our industry, this is unacceptable.

‘I’m sure even the puppy next door would hate that.’

Ugh.

The thought of me being surrounded by the five of them, acting like a tragic protagonist in a romance novel, made my face scrunch up involuntarily.

Fortunately, the three of them seemed to be lost in their own thoughts and didn’t pay attention to my reaction.

The one who broke the prolonged silence was Grand Duchess Eileen.

“This isn’t the place to have this conversation. Let’s move somewhere else to continue.”

“Hmm, I agree. It’s not a discussion to have where there are too many ears listening.”

“…Your opinions are valid.”

The three women reached a consensus.

The meaning behind the gazes directed at me was clear. They probably assumed I was unaware of the fact that they were regressors and wanted me to give them some space to discuss that matter.

I wasn’t clueless, so I understood that I needed to give them privacy.

I just wanted to blurt out, “I know you’re all regressors, you know?” but I held back.

In fact, there was no reason for me to say that. There was no particular reason not to say it either, though.

So it was better not to speak.

“Then I’ll take my leave. I just came because I heard the sound of arguing.”

“My apologies for showing you such an unsightly scene.”

Perhaps sensing my discomfort, Princess Elena smiled.

“You may go now, Rudrick. We won’t be arguing anymore.”

I’m the cause of that argument though.

No, to be more precise, it was because the princess in front of me had scammed me into this job, but…

Anyway, avoiding the eyes of Princess Elena and Admiral Lassiel, Grand Duchess Eileen winked at me again, as if to say, “I did what you asked.”

…Well, with another regressor in the mix, they probably won’t act their age and start fighting again.

Although I had my doubts, I closed the door and left for now.

There was still research to be done, and Sylphia would be doing it alone by now, so I should go and help her out today. If I had a conscience.

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After Rudrick closed the door with a puzzled expression and disappeared, leaving only the three of them…

The first to speak was Lassiel.

“Wow, this is quite peculiar, isn’t it? Don’t you think? At first, I wondered if this was really a return to the past, but it seems it is, indeed.”

“…Admiral Reppert.”

“Ah, Your Highness, you should speak too. I’m a bit disappointed to find out that I wasn’t the only one who regressed to the past, but we should think positively that we’ve returned at all. Hahaha.”

Elena frowned upon hearing Lassiel’s response.

That aspect of her had always bothered Elena. The admiral, who oversaw the empire’s navy, was excessively frivolous and flippant.

She knew there was no one more capable than her, but if it weren’t for that, Elena herself would have purged her long ago after ascending the throne.

“Then, shall we all have an open discussion about this situation?”

“Hmm?”

While Elena furrowed her brow, Eileen, who had been listening silently, slowly opened her mouth.

“It seems we all realized that we had regressed at the same time and point. And Admiral, there’s one more fact you’re unaware of.”

“If it’s a fact that I’m unaware of…?”

“A dragon has coiled up in the Imperial Palace.”

“A dragon… Ah, so that woman is already here too. She moves fast. Am I the last one?”

Lassiel, who seemed to be pondering for a moment, clapped her hands as she recalled someone’s face, and Eileen shook her head, denying her question.

“If my memory serves me correctly, there’s still one more left.”

“It seems that true vampire hasn’t arrived yet. Well, it would take quite some time for her to fly here from some absurd remote area. It’s funny to think of that unpleasant woman transforming into a bat and flapping her wings, working hard to get here.”

“…Admiral Reppert, you’re probably the only one who could say such things to a true vampire.”

“Even if she’s a vampire, doesn’t she die when exposed to sunlight?”

“Would a true vampire die just from a bit of sunlight exposure?”

“…Oh, is that so?”

Upon hearing Lassiel’s dumbfounded response, Elena finally held her forehead.

It had been like this even before the regression.

After ascending the throne, their statuses had become vastly different, so they rarely engaged in such conversations. But now, it was a conversation between the commander-in-chief who held military authority over the entire navy and the princess.

In fact, if rumors spread that the Nord Grand Duchess, the Second Princess, and the Naval Admiral were having a secret meeting with just the three of them, nothing good would come of it.

But right now, resolving the pressing matters at hand was more important than being suspected of plotting treason.

“…I trust you all haven’t forgotten the ‘rule’?”

“Of course. How could we forget that?”

Lassiel immediately chimed in, agreeing with Elena’s softly spoken words. Eileen quietly nodded in response.

Given the remarkable lineup of individuals gathered, no one had stepped up to establish the rules, but they had all reached a tacit agreement.

The rule was simple: since Rudrick held the final choice, they would patiently abide by his will and accept the outcome.

The Second Princess, the Northern Grand Duchess, the Southern Admiral, a dragon, and a true vampire.

Even excluding the two transcendent beings with extraordinary individual strength, the remaining three were already formidable.

As Sylphia had already threatened Elena once, if a dragon in its true form were to rampage and a true vampire joined in, it wouldn’t be surprising if the capital of the empire, with hundreds of years of history, were to be engulfed in flames and disappear overnight.

All five of them wanted to avoid that future.

After going through the procedure of reconfirming what they already knew, Lassiel shrugged her shoulders and crossed her arms.

“Tsk.”

Upon seeing her chest becoming more prominent, Elena clicked her tongue.

Right, that was definitely one of the reasons she had disliked her even more – she thought to herself.

And regardless of Elena’s thoughts, Lassiel, with her arms crossed, spoke up.

“So, what are you all going to do about Ric’s curse? Have you found any promising solutions?”

“I’m searching for one.”

Eileen replied in her characteristically quiet and gentle voice.

Having already grasped the rough cause of the curse when she had returned to her estate, she had been seeking ways to resolve it in every possible way.

The cause of the curse was the excessive accumulation of mana in his body, which caused mutations in his mana circuits, enhancing his talent for magic but shortening his lifespan in exchange.

If the cause was the excessive accumulation of mana due to his constitution from birth, then finding a way to deal with that accumulated mana could prevent the future of his premature death.

Of course, it wasn’t an easy solution.

Once the mana circuits began to mutate, even dragons, who were more adept at magic than any mage on the continent, couldn’t do anything about it, as they had experienced in the past before the regression.

And…

Elena proposed a plausible hypothesis to solve that problem.

“…If the issue is too much mana accumulating in the body, wouldn’t it be possible to absorb that mana in reverse? What do you think?”

“I’d like to know how to absorb it.”

“If there are people with a constitution that accumulates mana in the world, wouldn’t there be at least one person with a constitution that absorbs it if we look for them? If not… We can just absorb the mana in the conventional way.”

As soon as Elena finished her answer, tilting her head…

More precisely, as soon as her last words were uttered…

Lassiel covered her mouth and gestured with her finger.

“Your Highness, do you perhaps have such tastes? Getting excited when someone else embraces your man…”

It was a look of contempt.

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