It was so large to the point of overwhelming.

That was what Rei thought when he saw the sight in front of him.

It was 10-20 times bigger than the largest cities Rei had seen, such as Gilm, the only frontier city, Emosion, the Mireana Kingdom’s largest port city, and Exil, the Labyrinth City. This was the capital city of the Bestir Empire.

The gigantic city was surrounded by massive walls, Rei couldn’t imagine how much labour would have been required just to build them.

Even though the Imperial Capital was still quite a distance away, its size seemed to stretch across the horizon.

For the first time, Rei was unable to close his mouth.

「This is……amazing.」

Next to Rei, one of Daska’s knights reacted in a similar way.

Some of the knights had accompanied Daska to the Mireana Kingdom’s capital before, but this knight had no such experience.

「Well, it’s the capital of the Bestir Empire after all. It’s the only capital, so it was never given a name other than the Imperial Capital. They have a lot of confidence in it.」

The other knights around him nodded in a agreement.

Quite a few of them knew about the Mireana Kingdom’s capital, but even compared to that, the Imperial Capital could only be called huge.

Seeing such a scene, it was easy to understand why the Imperial Capital was the only capital and why there was no need to call it anything else.

Other carriages, merchants, adventurers passed them by as Rei and the others stared blankly at the capital.

It wasn’t like they didn’t pause either, but a lot of them seemed to want to enter the Imperial Capital as soon as possible.

The reason for this soon became clear as they got closer to the Imperial Capital.

There was quite a line in front of the main gate.

That’s right, a line of close to a 1000 people.

「……Hey, I don’t really want to know, but do tell me. Is that the queue for entering the capital?」

He didn’t want to know. But, tell me anyway. The knight nodded with a wry smile at Rei’s words as he replied with a complicated expression.

「Probably. It’s my first coming to the Imperial Capital of the Bestir Empire, so there’s not much I can comment on, but there are probably a lot of people attending the fighting tournament.」

「Well, it is like a festival for the Bestir Empire. Of course, tourists from all over the Bestir Empire have been looking forward to attending. There are also many other guests, like Daska, who have been invited from neighbouring countries.」

「No, but……it would still be impossible for this many people to pass the checks to enter the city today, right?」

Just as Rei said, even now, the line of 1000 people was growing as people lined up one after another.

It might have been different if it were a random village in the countryside, but this was the capital of the Bestir Empire. Checks when entering the city were stricter and, as a result, the procedures would naturally take longer to complete.

With all that mind, Rei didn’t think that the people currently lining up would be able to complete the procedures to enter the city before the end of the day.

However, the knight just nodded back at Rei’s words.

「That’s right. So, you see, some of them have prepared for this situation.」

Ahead of the knight’s line of sight was a person setting up a tent.

「So, you mean that we’re going to stand here until tomorrow? ……It’s something that would never work on the frontier.」

A wide variety of monsters would run rampant around Gilm at night.

Such a sight was only possible here because the surroundings of the Imperial Capital were safe.

That said, it wasn’t completely safe. There would still be the occasional attack by monsters like Goblins.

The knight continued his explanation as Rei’s expression changed into one of admiration and astonishment in equal measure.

「The capital of the Mireana Kingdom is similar, but since the entry checks are handled by multiple groups of guards, the number of people that can be checked at once is quite large. There are also lines dividing adventurers, merchants, and travelers.」

「……What about us?」

The knight mentioned adventurers, merchants, and travelers, but there was no mention of nobles.

When asked about their own group, the knight replied with a smile.

「Nobles are a completely different matter. See, over there.」

The knight motioned towards a gate one size larger than the one people were lining up at to enter the Imperial Capital.

There were also guards there, but they only exchanged a few words with carriage drivers before letting them pass through.

Compared to the other gate, the number of people passing through was vastly less because it was the gate for nobles.

「……Well, that’s quite a big difference, isn’t there? No, I should have expected this.」

On one side, you had to spend several days camping outside, on the other side, there was barely anyone passing through.

Rei muttered in amazement at the difference in treatment, but the knight nodded as if it were only natural.

「Nobles and commoners. That’s only natural. Besides, are you going to make the nobles you invited wait outside the capital for days? If they did something like that the Bestir Empire would definitely lose face.」

「I see, that’s true. ……Well, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want to see such a scene.」

The sight of extravagantly dress nobles sleeping in tents suddenly crossed his mind as Rei spoke without thinking.

The knight seemed to have imagined something similar to Rei. He forced his cheeks to stifle a smile.

One of the knights further ahead called out to Rei and the other knight.

「Hey, let’s go! We might have some time, but we still want to enter the Imperial Capital as soon as possible!」

「R-Right. Understood……we’ll be right over……」

The knight responded while suppressing a fit of laughter.

Rei thought there was no point in the knight holding his stomach over his armour, but the knight seemed to have no choice but to do that after being struck by his fit of laughter.

「……Set, let’s go.」

「Guru~?」

Rei stroke Set’s neck to tell him it was fine as Set tilted his head questioningly.

He had a lot of thoughts in his mind, but if he didn’t hurry up, there was no guarantee he wouldn’t be reprimanded later.

For that reason, Rei easily abandoned the other knight, who was still struggling with laughter, as he caught up with the rest of Daska’s group ahead.

「What’s wrong with him?」

The knight who had called out earlier asked Rei as he caught up.

His gaze was directed towards the knight behind them, who seemed like he was doing some sort of strange dance.

Naturally, he wasn’t really dancing but trying to hold back his laughter.

「It seems like various things have accumulated over time.」

「……I see. However, once we enter the capital, we will be seen as representatives of the Mireana Kingdom, so it would be better not to go to any brothels.」

「Do you have that kind of free time in the first place? Aren’t you on escort duty?」

「It’s not like everyone will be on guard duty all the time. It will probably be a three shift system. ……And, there’s always Elk standing guard.」

There’s also Elk. The knight said that to indicate there was little to worry about when it came to the escort.

An A rank adventurer had that level of ability and reputation.

Moreover, in this case, not only was Elk the representative of Axe of the Thunder God, his wife, Min, was also an A rank mage, so it wasn’t an unreasonable thought to have in various ways.

(I hope they don’t get caught off guard.)

As Rei thought of that, he spoke something completely different.

「So, what are our plans after entering the Imperial Capital.」

「First is the inn. We’ll be staying in the capital for a while……until the tournament is over at least, so the inn is important.」

「……Can we get an inn with this crowd?」

In front of Rei’s eyes, he saw countless people going through the formalities to enter the Imperial Capital.

This number of people couldn’t have gathered in a single day, so it was only natural that there were already a large number of tourists, merchants, and adventurers in the capital, including the people lining up. Unless they had special circumstances, such as an acquaintance who lived in the capital that they could stay with, all these people would be staying at an inn.

Inn’s are probably fully booked already. The knight’s eye’s widened slightly at Rei’s implied words, but immediately nodded in understanding before speaking.

「You don’t have to worry about that. In the first place, we……or Daska-sama to be exact, is the one who received an invitation to come here. Since that is the case, they will naturally have prepared accommodation.」

「……Is that so?」

「Of course. If they invited us and then asked us to pay for our own accommodation, it would be a complete loss of face for the Empire. Besides……」

Rei tilted his head at the knight’s vague words.

At the same time, Set also tilted his head, as if imitating Rei.

However, the knight didn’t answer as he shook his head.

(If they did that to Daska-sama, who is a guest of honour from the victorious Mireana Kingdom from the previous war, it would become a diplomatic problem. ……However, Daska-sama aside, there’s also Rei. There’s no doubt there will be people who try to cause some sort of trouble for him. Especially since Rei and Set have already been eyed like that a lot before they even arrived here.)

「Anyway. First of all, after entering the Imperial Capital, we should receive a guide from the castle. Following their directions, we will be brought to an inn. ……Rest assured, we’ll be staying in a luxury inn. It won’t be like the village where we stopped for shelter from the rain before without stables for Set to stay.」

「Guru~!」

Set gave a happy cry at the knight’s words.

Luckily, they were some distance away from the line of ordinary people, so they didn’t draw any particular attention. If they had been closer, they would have been showered by countless stares.

……No, there had already been many eyes on them the moment Rei was seen riding on a Griffon.

However, Rei was already used to this kind of gaze after entering the Bestir Empire.

It was a different story if they tried to mess with him, but he couldn’t do anything if all they did was stare.

For that reason, although it felt somewhat uncomfortable, Rei and the knight headed over to the gate reserved for nobles.

In addition, the other knight had finally managed to calm himself down as he urged his horse into a run to catch up with Rei and the others.

After that, they arrived at the gate without any particular issues as the guards approached their carriages.

「Pardon me, which noble are you?」

Of course, the tone of their question was polite.

As long as they were dealing with nobles, if they showed any rudeness……there was always the chance of being cut down on teh spot.

That said, since the guards could see Rei and Set before they asked, they had a rough guess as to who it was.

「It is Margrave Daska Rowlocks of the Mireana Kingdom. We have been invited to the tournament.」

The carriage driver replied to the guard as he handed over some documents.

It was an invitation letter issued by the Bestire Empire stating that the carriage belong to Margrave Daska Rowlocks and where he was from, a standard for nobles from other countries entering the Imperial Capital at this time of the year.

The guard quickly read through the documents.

They couldn’t make nobles wait too long here, as they never knew what they would say about them, but they also had to check the invitations carefully, because there was no guarantee that no criminals would attempt to forge such documents.

These guards were required to have the contradictory ability to rush while making strict checks. But fortunately, in addition to the guard’s excellent skills, seeing Rei and Set meant that he only took a minute to confirm the invitation.

「Yes, I have confirmed the invitation. It seems you have a tamed monster with you, so please wear this.」

Saying that, the guard took out a familiar necklace.

Rei got off from Set and went over to the guards to collect it.

「Do you need an explanation for this?」

「No, it’s not like this is different between countries, right?」

「Yes, there’s no difference. ……So, um……right, it seems your guide has arrived, so please direct any questions to them after you enter the Imperial Capital.」

The guard looked over to an elderly man in his fifties, who bowed politely from inside the gate.

「Then, Margrave Rowlocks, welcome to the capital of the Bestir Empire. I hope you enjoy your stay.」

Thus, Daska’s group finally set foot in the capital of the Bestir Empire.

[Previous Chapter] [Table of Contents] [Next Chapter]