The Traveling Hero Won’t Let the Innkeeper’s Son Escape

Jio complimented Marianne’s appearance as they were walking, which made her even happier. Then, they abruptly stopped in front of the village chief’s room and Marianne smiled while she looked up at Ruth.

“Hey Ruth, before you go to talk to Papa, listen to this!”

“Hm?”

“I received a letter from Alec! Ta-da!”

After Marianne said that, she proudly took out a letter from her pocket. However, while Ruth noticed that the letter was addressed not to Marianne herself, but her family name, he just smiled for the time being.

“That’s good to hear, Marianne.”

“Mhm! I didn’t think that Alec would send a letter to me, but I was sooo happy he did!”

A helpless smile appeared on Ruth’s face when he saw Marianne laughing in embarrassment as if she had received a love letter. As he thought, a girl’s smile sure is cute.

“Haha, and? What was written in there?”

“Well get this, it was so awful. He only wrote about things like ‘How is the village?’ or ‘How is the crops?’, he didn’t write anything about himself! He only told me to take care of my body at the end of the letter and didn’t write about anything else other than stuff about Papa...like at least write a little more about other things!? Don’t you think Alec is terrible at writing letters!?”

“I-Is that so…?”

“I mean, even though it’s already been a month since he headed to the Royal Capital, I finally got one letter from him. Not only that, but there was only one piece of paper in the envelope! He definitely must’ve thought it to be too troublesome!”

“...”

While maintaining his smile, Ruth broke out in cold sweat seeing Marianne getting so riled up from Alec’s letter.

(Alec...terrible at writing letters…? Huh…?)

It was then, Ruth realized the overwhelming difference between his position and Marianne’s situation. And so, Ruth was at a loss on how he should reply when the conversation flowed out and Marianne asked, “Did you also received a letter? What sorta things did he write about to you?”.

However, Jio, who was behind them, changed the topic of the conversation.

“My bad, young lady, but could you let us meet the village chief soon? My back hurts…”

“Ah, I’m sorry! Papa! Ruth wants to talk to you!”

The village chief replied to Marianne from the inside of his room. After they got permission to enter, Marianne left the two of them alone and returned to the hallway. She tightly held onto the letter in her hands as if it was her most important thing in the world.

“What an energetic girl.”

“Isn’t Marianne cute?”

Seeing Ruth let out a light-hearted laugh, Jio replied with an “Indeed”, in a slightly amazed voice as he had a distant look in his eyes.

“What’s wrong, Ruth? Did your father send you on an errand?”

When they entered the room, behind the large desk was that sly fox--no, a short forty-year-old man with an impressive set of round eyes. He’s about the same height as his daughter, Marianne, and his physique is exceedingly normal. However, he may seem like an intellectual at first glance because of his round glasses, but all Ruth sees is just a slightly nervous normal old man. He is the chief of the village, Bartolo Lylesse.

“Rather than Dad's request, I guess it’s more so for the inn.”

“What is it?”

Ruth walked towards Bartolo and stood in front of his desk.

“Because our inn has been overbooked with guests, I have come here to ask if you would allow Jio over there to stay here for one night.”

“Jio?”

As he said that under his breath, Bartolo slightly turned his gaze away from Ruth and looked at Jio. He stared at the old man as if he was evaluating him, and soon lost interest before turning back to the documents he was holding in his hands.

“What will I gain from letting him stay here?”

“It’s not about gaining anything, but just helping out someone in a troubling situation...”

“Any other houses are fine, yes? I have no obligation to let him stay here.”

Ruth let out a small sigh.

While Ruth thought that Bartolo was just a regular old man, he also knew that he’s quite troublesome. He has a slightly warped personality and is a difficult person to deal with. It’s enough to question just how an honest girl like Marianne can be his daughter.

(It can’t be helped…)

Ruth took out a bag from the luggage he was carrying. While being slightly on guard, Bartolo looked towards Ruth.

“I wouldn’t offer this for free… but to be frank, I have something quite excellent…”

“T-This…”

Ruth pulled it out in a way where Jio couldn’t see it and what he took out was the bottled object that he and Celine were mulling over in the afternoon.

“Yes, it is the testicles of a male boroa.”

“A boroa’s--!”

Bartolo leaned forward and brought his face closer.

A male boroa’s testicles are said to be a vitality-boosting panacea that restores one’s energy and also serves as a nourishment tonic, seemingly advertised like it’s the catchphrase of a drink somewhere. The nobles in the Royal Capital also use it for vitality drugs and other expensive restoration medicine as well. However, a boroa’s testicle spoils easily and it immediately becomes unusable if it’s not precisely removed from the boroa. Not to mention that it’s not guaranteed it can be extracted even if one hunts a male boroa. And so, Clark gets immensely happy to be able to sell it because it reaches a fairly high price in the Royal Capital. It’s just that since the skilled hunters in the Brau family can easily obtain it, they don’t think it’s that valuable.

“It’s from our hunt today, but we were conflicted whether we should hand it over to my big brother or not.”

“Ooh…”

“If the oh, so, kind village chief would let Jio stay for the night, I would gladly give this as a sign of my gratitude.”

“I see…”

Bartolo forcefully cleared his throat with an “Ahem” and sat back down on his chair. A kindhearted smile appeared on his face as he turned towards Jio.

“I have heard about your situation from Ruth. I suppose you are quite troubled. By all means, please use our guest room. It’s simply a spare room that hasn’t been used. We shall also quickly bring out your meal.”

“Really now, thank you so much…”

Amazed at Bartolo’s complete 180-degree change in attitude from earlier, Ruth quietly watched over the two of them.

Bartolo rang a bell and Fanny from earlier came out to lead Jio away. While he was leaving, Jio gave Ruth a thumbs up and Ruth gave a bitter smile as he also gave him a thumbs up. Perhaps Jio also heard the conversation between Ruth and Bartolo.

After Ruth handed over the bottle to the village chief and started heading home, instead of approaching the inn, he made a beeline to his room located in the main building without going through the main entrance. He entered his room from the window and opened up a chest he pulled out from the side of his desk.

“...The person who sent this was Alec, right?”

Ruth’s line of sight was directed towards what he pulled out: a thick stack of letters with multiple pieces of paper in each one. Thinking about the amount numerically, it seems like Alec wrote two letters per day in a week. Because letters from the Royal Capital are only delivered here once a month, when this thick stack of letters arrived, Ruth was surprised and wondered what on earth happened. As a result, Ruth has barely opened the first three letters.

Ruth opened up the first unopened letter on the top of the stack, and nearly 5 sheets of paper were sealed in there.

Dear Ruth,

Are you doing well? It’s starting to get colder, so be careful to not catch a cold.

In my case, it’s been four days since I’ve arrived at the Royal Capital and I met with the Royal Knights face-to-face yesterday. I was just completely surrounded by huge-looking guys all day. They also all looked the same. I wanted to show it to you too. Not only that, but there are only a few people that know what they’re doing. Even if they’re called the Royal Knights, they’ve got both the best and the worsts. You’re way stronger than them. Ah, I want to quickly see you and go hunting together again. This year’s boroas are fatter--”

The letter was filled with such rambles. He wrote to Ruth about anything new that happened each day around him. Sometimes he’ll also bitterly write, I can’t write anymore...I’ll tell you when I return. Just by reading it, it’s the type of letter where Ruth knows exactly what sorts of hardships and troubles Alec has gone through every day. It seems like the first letter was written while he was on the way to the Royal Capital in the carriage as Alec included a wonderful drawing of the scenery he saw. Never would’ve thought that he was in any way terrible at writing letters.

“If you had written like this to Marianne too… then, she probably would’ve been even more overjoyed.”

Despite muttering such words under his breath, knowing that Alec wrote letters meant specifically for him didn’t feel that bad. He also felt bad for Marianne, but more than that, he felt this ticklish feeling inside of him. Though, there was also this feeling as if his chest was being painfully squeezed. Ruth didn’t really know what this meant.

Ruth laid down on his bed and stared at the letter he held up.

“It’s surely because I know about Alec’s situation, so that’s probably why he’s writing a lot to me, right?”

There’s no way he could write about what happens in his everyday life to someone who doesn’t know about him being a hero. People who think that he’s just going to the Royal Capital to study will surely think it’s strange if he tells them things like noticing the king’s mole when they met or that he ran away from the princess asking him for a dance. And so, he can’t tell anything. That’s why Ruth thought that Alec must’ve sent the letters as some form of diary-keeping.

(Ah… But, I wonder if he also sends these to the person he was going to propose to?)

When he realized that, he felt a small shroud of haze envelope the depths of his chest.

MARY: Yayy!! Thank you for waiting and please support the author here! Let me know if you see any mistakes ^^

Ohh my goodness Ruth you are soooo dense *sigh* also after reading this chapter I can't help but wonder what Alec's drawing looked like ><!! Anyway I'll see you guys in the next update //it's going to be another good one (*๓´╰╯`๓)