Published: March 21, 2026
“Are you Lady Amelia and Lord Akira?”
A man dressed like a butler stood roughly where Ria had been by the central fountain that morning.
When that timid-looking man called our names, Amelia and I accidentally glanced at each other.
“Yeah, that’s us.”
He let out a relieved expression and bowed on the spot.
“By Lord Crow’s orders, I will escort you to your lodgings. I am Emile.”
Emile bowed again and I relaxed.
I’d felt wary without realizing it when some stranger suddenly called my name.
“We’ll be walking from here. The ground can be slippery, so please be careful.”
Although it’s called the water town, of course there are walkways and bridges in many places, so you can get around on foot.
But it’s very convoluted, and most of the buildings have similar shapes and colors, so walking around without someone who knows the paths is dangerous.
Apparently once, an adventurer tried to map this maze-like town, but gave up after a little over a year because of how complicated it was.
Still, thanks to him a rough map of the main streets was created and tourists increased — not a bad contribution, really.
Emile, who claimed to be that adventurer’s grandson, told us that as we walked.
“My grandfather used to say, ‘There’s nothing you can’t do if you try hard enough, but that town is the exception.’ Please be careful when moving on foot.”
After about twenty minutes on foot from the central fountain, Emile stopped in what looked like a high-class hotel district.
The top floors were so far up they made your neck ache to look at.
“Welcome to the Caesar Hotel. It is an honor to receive the Elf race princess and the hero summoner.”
Seeing the staff lined up like some ryokan to bow, I almost turned around and left.
Between this and Hotel Raven the other day, as someone from a common background I felt painfully out of place.
“Aren’t you going, Akira?”
“Ah, yeah, I’m coming.”
But since this is the hotel Crow chose, security should be reliable enough.
If so, Crow must have a lot of connections.
We were shown to a room on the top floor.
I was too afraid to ask the price.
“Ah, you finally came.”
In an obviously oversized room not meant for just three people, Crow was leisurely drinking tea.
“The hotels you pick, like that one for Mari, are always high-class. We don’t have that kind of money.”
I set down our luggage and Amelia nodded emphatically.
Well, our main reason for being broke is mostly Amelia’s food expenses.
“Don’t worry. This place owes me a favor.”
He seemed to be collecting debts by moving through establishments.
Come to think of it, doesn’t he lend money to hotel staff a lot?
“There was the thing about dealing with drunk troublemakers at the hotel. If I remember right, a rival company, jealous of this hotel’s success, tried to set a rampaging horse loose here.”
So they didn’t bother with petty harassment — they went straight for physical damage.
I wondered how something like that would be handled here.
In Japan it’d be vandalism or assault charges, but this place has no constitution or penal code, and no police-like organization.
Even murderers have lived here without a court or codified law to judge them.
What is it like to live without the concept of legal guilt?
It’s been a while since I came to this world, but maybe because I haven’t settled anywhere, I’m not used to the unspoken rules and customs here.
“How did you stop it?”
“I restrained the horse and someone nearby had animal sedatives, so they gave it a shot.”
Am I the only one who thinks holding down a rampaging horse would take a lot of strength?
Crow already gives off an image of being very strong — how powerful was he at his peak?
Also, what kind of situation has someone with animal sedatives nearby?
“And what happened to that rival company?”
“Their reputation took a hit, but they’re still operating in the building across the way.”
We talked about such trivial things when Amelia started nodding off.
It was indeed past her usual bedtime.