Published: March 21, 2026
They glanced at each other and sighed in unison.
"Well, it's not surprising you two want to stick with Oda," one said.
"My dislike of Oda-kun is just a personal opinion. I'm not going to sulk like a kid — I'll go with everyone," the other replied.
Ueno muttered that it would leave a bad taste to bail now.
True enough, Akira and the others likely had a fighting style suited to nights of combat, and if those two left, the party balance would be ruined.
Besides, it would only cause trouble for them to split off here.
Sato let out a relieved breath at their answers.
"Then all that's left is persuading the princess," Nanase said, nodding.
Since none of them knew Princess Amelia personally, convincing her would be harder than persuading Kazuki and Ueno.
It was the biggest hurdle, they thought.
"The timeframe is probably until Akira and the others leave the Beastmen territory. Fighting the Demon Clan drained Akira and his familiar, so recovery will take time," Sato said.
They weren't in an emergency, but they couldn't afford to be too leisurely either.
"By the way, I heard there's going to be a festival in Uruk soon. A girl we met on the ship said so," Ueno added.
That rang a bell. Stray cats in this world were warier than those in Japan and rarely let people touch them, but cats trained by handlers were different — they became very affectionate toward humans.
Because of that, Kazuki's cat was very popular with women and often surrounded by girls at every opportunity.
Even on the ship from the Human territory, girls surrounded Kazuki's cat wanting to pet it.
"A festival... Want to invite everyone as a change of pace?"
At Sato's suggestion, the two girls' eyes lit up.
Hosoyama aside, Ueno seemed to like festivals.
"But what kind of festival is it?"
"No idea. The girl said it's a day when girls shine or something," Sato shrugged.
A day when girls shine?
Maybe some sort of contest.
"What the heck is that... Also, I wonder what festivals are like in this world," Nanase murmured.
True — in Japan festivals meant yukata and food stalls, but other countries had parades and such. "Festival" was too abstract.
"Um, the old men at the Adventurer Guild were talking about it," Tsuda said timidly.
Because he looked like a girl, Tsuda often got fussed over by adventurers at the guild. Retired old adventurers doted on him like a pet, which drew other adventurers' interest... Somehow it had become that way, and although no one knew exactly how it started, if anything happened to Tsuda, the adventurers of Uru would likely leap to his defense.
"They said they pick the most beautiful woman of the Beastmen and Human races. It's held every year, and this time it's in Uruk, in the Beastmen territory," Tsuda continued.
So it was a festival all right — like a beauty contest. Maybe such things existed in every world, or maybe summoned people had spread the idea. In any case, holding a contest to pick the best seemed universal.
"There’s supposedly a men's division too, but the women's division is the main attraction. And also..." Tsuda's voice trailed off; he looked pale.
"And also?" Nanase pressed.
"The contest winners disappear every year... some say their organs might be sold..." he stammered.
Organ trafficking? The unfamiliar, violent phrase made the otherworldliness of this place hit home.
"Why only the winners?" Hosoyama asked, rubbing Tsuda's back. If it was about organs, it shouldn't matter whether the woman was beautiful or ugly.
"The old men said young, pretty women's organs fetch high prices on the black market," Tsuda said.
This world lacked a police force. In Yamato, people like the shinsengumi patrolled and maintained order, but they weren't organized by a state — they were volunteers. The nation only moved when the state itself was threatened; it didn't act for theft, murder, or kidnapping. With monsters and wars, that was perhaps inevitable, but it still made you wish something could be done.
Assassination and revenge jobs sometimes came into the Adventurer Guild, but most didn't take them. Killing was taboo here too; people rarely stained their hands with others' blood unless desperate.