Reality is often heartless. No matter how much of a strong determination you bring up to try to fight against it, there are times when you can’t do anything about it. Right now, the men that got beaten up without any chance of victory surely must feel that very fact.

“Don’t worry about it. You guys are just fine, I’m just far too strong.” Seran clapped his hands together, as he called out to the men that had collapsed to the ground.

That was simply a fact, and he wasn’t blaming them. At the same time, the young boy who had been saved in such a turbulent way, he didn’t fully understand what just happened.

“So strong..”

Those were the first words that came to his mind. The young boy couldn’t even fully trace Seran’s movement, as the next thing he knew, the men had collapsed to the ground.

“He doesn’t look that strong..”

“I can hear you. Also, you were attempting to run away midway, right?” Seran glanced at the boy.

Whenever it looked that Seran could possibly lose, he was ready to run.

“Eh, no, um..thank you very much for saving me.” The boy let out a flustered laugh, showing his awfully cheeky and brazen personality.

“My name is Gou, I am a magic engineer.”

“Magic engineer? So you’re a specialist in creating magic items?” Seran tilted his head, and started thinking.

Normally, the ones to create these magic items are people ranking as a [Wizard] or higher, but there are people who walk a path of specialization in that, possessing high talent in that field, which you would call magic engineer. They succeeded in creating magic items with great accuracy, living a profession that could even bring forth magic items imbued with rare magic. Additionally, with the support of a major nation, they are attempting to rebuild magic weapons that had existed during the time of the Ancient Magic Kingdom Zaales, or so Seran had heard.

“Without knowledge in Ancient Language Magic, as well as passionate talent in smithing, you shouldn’t be able to reach that profession, right?”

“Yes. Luckily, I have a bit of talent in magic, and my father is a blacksmith, so he has been helping me ever since I was a young child.” Gou spoke, sounding quite proud of that.

In fact, becoming a magic engineer at such an age gives him all the right to brag, as that requires a lot of talent and genius.

“Hmmm..So, who are these people? Why’d they attack you?” Seran looked at the men on the ground, and asked.

“Um..they are so-called debt collectors.” Gou scratched his cheek, and answered with a bashful tone.

“Debt collectors?”

Of course, Seran knew of that idea, but he was quite shocked to see debt collectors coming after Gou, who looked to be barely twelve years old.

“I see, so your parents are drunkards or addicted to gambling, and pushed the debt onto you..” Seran showed sympathy for Gou, assuming that something like that must have been the circumstances.

“No, this is my debt.”

“..S-So then, one of your parents is sick, and you’re trying to get the costs for the medical treatment together?”

“That is wrong as well..The leader of these people brought an investment to me, which involved the recovery of an old magic weapon. However, it was much more complicated than I thought, and when I saw that it would take at least ten years for any success, he got angry at me..So, I was trying to evade them in order to buy time, but they found me..” Gou said.

“I see, you can be a pretty nasty guy with such a cute face.”

This wasn’t any ill fate befalling Gou, he deserved all of that for his own actions. Seran started regretting meddling with all of this, but it was already too late.

“Tehe~” Gou stuck out his tongue, gently tapping his fist on his head.

That gesture in itself was quite adorable, but Seran was only more agitated thanks to that.

“Well, at least those guys learned their lesson for now..But, enough about that, I’ll stop thinking about it. Now, take me to your home, I need to introduce myself to your big sister. That’s the least I need to do and take from this situation.” Seran grumbled.

“Um..my sister is married, and lives in another town, so she isn’t here.”

“I figured that would be the case, god damn it!” Seran roared in anger. “Also, why did you not tell me about this right away!?”

“You never asked me..Plus, if I did, you definitely wouldn’t have saved me, right..”

“Of course! Who’d save such a nasty bastard like you!”

“I’m sorry..But, can you stop screaming, please..”

Although they stood in a back alley with no other people around, making this much noise would eventually attract people.

“Gaaah, I can’t take this anymore!” Seran walked away, only to be followed by Gou.

“Ah, please wait for me!”

***

At the same time, back at the embassy.

“Now then, I need to head out somewhere. You can take a rest here, everyone.” Miranda told Kyle and his group.

“Where are you going?”

“In regards to the potential election of a new mayor, I have an individual I would like to recommend, so I planned on meeting them right now.”

“Huh, who is it?” Kyle asked, simply on a whim.

“He is a member of the blacksmith guild, possessing a lot of skill, and probably the most talented blacksmith in Callan. He may be a bit thick-headed and easy to misunderstand, but he often takes care of others, and a lot of people follow him. However, he is a bit of a workaholic, so he probably won’t participate much when it comes to practical business.” Miranda gave a detailed explanation.

“I see, that sounds convenient.”

For Zilgus, that is—Kyle added in his mind. If it’s someone who has Callan origin, then people won’t disagree with him as much, and if he isn’t interested in politics, he probably doesn’t belong to any faction either. In other words, he’s easy to control, easy to make a puppet. Miranda probably had her eyes set on him for a while as a result of that.

“If that’s the case, do you mind if I tag along?”

“Eh? That..I don’t mind, but..why?”

Kyle felt like he wasn’t particularly welcome.

“..Since this seems to be a talented and highly skilled blacksmith, I would love to meet him. Is there any problem with that?”

One of their goals in Callan was to find a blacksmith they could frequent for alchemy magic.

“Well, he can be..a bit difficult to deal with. Also..” Miranda glanced over at Urza. “Gazas-san is a dwarf, see.”

The moment Urza heard the word ‘dwarf’, her face grew tense.

“Well, he doesn’t hold any particular grudges towards elves, so Urza-san should be fine.”

“Hmmm.” Kyle listened to Miranda’s words, and started thinking.

Maybe it would be better to not take her with them, but there’s a good chance he could help with Urza’s equipment. If so, it might be best to reveal her identity right away.

“..I don’t mind, and I don’t particularly think bad of dwarves either. As long as the opposite side doesn’t do anything either.” Urza said, but she was clearly displeased.

“Well, if Urza is fine with it, then I don’t mind, I guess..” Kyle simply wished that she wasn’t forcing herself too much.

“Then, let me get the guards. Please wait a brief moment.” Miranda said and left the room, when Lieze quietly called out to Kyle.

“I’m surprised she has to get guards. Maybe there’s some danger to this?”

As her position of an ambassador, she most likely would always need protection, but even inside the city made it seem a bit excessive.

“She might just be trying to be considerate towards us..And since she doesn’t explain it to us, it’s hard to ask.” Kyle said, but felt the urge to ask despite that.

***

“So, why are you here?”

“I could ask you the same, alright.”

Having run into each other in front of Gazas’ house, these were the first words Kyle and Seran threw at each other.

“I’ve gotten involved with this guy. Said he wanted to thank me no matter what, so he dragged me here for some tea.” Seran said, while looking at Gou. “So, what about you?”

“Miranda-san had some business here, so we tagged along. Seems to be the home of a dwarf called Gazas, who’s a skilled blacksmith. Though his personality seems to be a bit complicated at times, we should probably be able to get some conversation going since we have the ambassador of Zilgus with us. If things work out, we might even have him work on the mythril, as well as a new sword for you.”

“Ahhh..now that you mention it, we have the materials, we might as well make the sword ourselves. I never even thought about that,” said Seran.

Thinking about it, Miranda was one of the rulers here in Callan, so if they were looking for anything, she would be the best starting point.

“What..so you were thinking about me? I thought it was only Lieze or Urza-chan.” Seran felt a tingling feeling all over his body.

Since Kyle had a bigger goal, he thought he was depending only on himself.

“Of course, you’re my irreplaceable friend and partner.” Kyle laughed, questioning what Seran was even talking about.

And then, with a serious expression that he rarely showed towards him, he continued.

“I’ll be abusing you from now on as well, so of course I gotta take good care of you.”

“Ahh, rather than sweetening up words, you’re the guy who’s honest about everything. I completely forgot.” Seran sighed in relief.

“Gou-kun, is Gazas-san present?” Miranda asked Gou, who clearly knew him.

“Eh? ..Ah, yes, I think he should be here, but what brings you here today?”

Right at that moment, the front door swung with great momentum.

“Shut up already! What is this ruckus in front of someone else’s home!?”

There, a small but compact dwarf appeared, probably about 40 years old in human years, seeming quite hot-headed from that entrance alone.

“What, Gou, are you back....Ah.” The second this dwarf spotted Miranda, his eyes opened wide in shock, as he opened his mouth to speak.

However, Miranda got ahead of him.

“Hello there, Gazas-san, I came here as an ambassador of Zilgus, with something very important to talk about.”

Gazas looked at Miranda and Kyle’s group behind her, as well as the guards lingering in the back, and clicked his tongue.

“Could we bother you for a moment?”

“Tsk..It’s not the most clean place, but if you’re fine with that, then come in.” Gazas said, turned his back towards them, and walked back inside.

Miranda ordered the guards to stay on stand-by around the house, and followed after him. Just as Gazas stated, the inside of the house was quite the mess, reminding you that it was a single man living here with his son. Miranda observed this with a raised eyebrow, but immediately moved on to the main topic.

“Are you serious? You want me to become the mayor!? Absolute nonsense.” Gazas immediately shook his head.

“That just means you have enough followers, qualifications, and ability.”

“Don’t be ridiculous! I’m not interested in that kind of nonsense!”

“Please! I..We wish for you to become a strength of Zilgus. Surely, that will be helpful for Callan..as we’d like to resolve the problems here in Callan.”

“Why don’t you folks just do it then!? I’m a blacksmith! Don’t plan on changing jobs this late!”

“Please, won’t you consider it!”

Their opinions were clear parallel lines. As Kyle and his group could only watch this unfold in silence, Gou spoke to them.

“This will probably continue for a while, so let us move to a different location.”

He took Kyle’s group to a workshop-like room beneath the ground. It was equipped with construction tools and other magic items, as well as a large amount of documents on the desk.

“I’m sorry about this, all the other rooms are as much of a mess, so this is the only one..” Gou had prepared tea for the group, now showing a bitter smile.

“Huh, you have a lot of weird stuff here.” Seran’s curiosity had been piqued, as he moved to grab a small bottle with liquid inside.

“Ah, that’s a powerful adhesive. If you get two things glued together with that, you might never be able to remove them, so please be careful.”

“..Tell me about that sooner, alright.” Seran frantically pulled back his hand.

“We have other objects that melt your skin, or poisonous gas lying around, so please try not to touch anything.” Gou said with a faint smile, but Kyle and his group immediately stiffened up, moving like robots.

“Dwarves sure are thick-headed beyond their own good.” Remembering the previous exchange, Urza threw out a complaint, only to receive an elbow to the rib by Lieze.

In shock, Urza looked at Gou, but he continued to smile innocently.

“Haha, my father is quite famous for being stubborn, and it’s a fact.”

“A-Apologies..Though, if your father is a dwarf, then what are you?”

Even if they are of the same humanfolk, when two individuals from different races come together, they can’t bear any children. However, the only exceptions are a human and elf couple, as well as a human and dwarf one. As a result of that, they may be small in number, but marriages between different races exist. The resulting children are either half-elves or half-dwarves, inheriting the peculiar traits of both races, but Gou simply looked like any other human boy.

“Yes, both me and my older sister had been born during my mother’s previous relationship. Two years ago, she passed away, and one year ago, my sister got married herself, which is why this house is such a mess....So, if I may ask, did you come here from Zilgus?”

“Yeah, and we’re....Hm!?”

Here to talk with Gazas-san—is what Kyle was about to say, but the second he spotted a certain object, his entire thought process came to a halt. Atop the desk with its many papers, he spotted something that resembled a blueprint. Drawn on there were figures Kyle remembered all too well. During the severe war he had fought, he saw figures of silver-white running through the battlefield. They offered immense power to human folk during its darkest times, shining bright like the ray of hope.

“Ah, that’s the blueprint of a magic weapon that had been developed during the time of the Ancient Magic Kingdom.” Gou caught on to Kyle’s gaze, and delivered an explanation, to which Kyle’s gaze shot towards him.

“I see! So you are the manufacturer!”

“Eh? ..Ah, are you interested in the restoration of this magic weapon? If so, then we can talk about an investment..Fueh!?”

“I’ll pay! As much as you need! That’s why, recreate it! And mass-produce them!” Kyle looked like he had completely lost himself, simply grabbing onto Gou’s shoulders.

“T-Thank you very mush?”

Lieze and the others observed this dubious exchange with confused expressions.