My Status as an Assassin Obviously Exceeds the Hero's

"Hey, you're stepping on my foot."

"Aw, really? Sorryyy, I didn't notice you were there because you're so short~"

"You're the taller one, but it's not that big a difference. Or maybe it's not just your head that's bad, but your eyes too? If so, sorry about that. I should've been more considerate."

"Don't you know? When you look up at someone taller from below, the difference doesn't feel that big. But when you look down from above, they look veeery tiny~"

"Well, if you get that big in both height and width, of course everything looks small."

"Huh?"

"Hm?"

We traded insults in low voices, quiet enough that no one else could hear, and glared at each other.

Behind us, Amelia followed along with Night on her shoulder.

'Ah, Miss Amelia, is that really all right?'

"What is?"

'W-well, it definitely looks like their relationship is getting worse, or rather, like they really don't get along...'

"Do they? Morganaite and Akira both look like they're having lots of fun to me."

'Well... if Miss Amelia is fine with it, I suppose it's fine. I had vaguely suspected this for a while, but your sense of things is a little off from mine, Miss Amelia. Yes.'

Because Morganaite said he wanted to show Amelia around the Tsukimi Family estate and the castle town, we were walking side by side like we were on a casual stroll. But Morganaite kept picking fights with me at every opportunity, which was pretty annoying.

As a bodyguard, I wasn't sure about making the protected person walk behind us, but Amelia insisted, so I grudgingly walked in front alongside Morganaite. Well, what we were doing was really just bickering anyway, and when Amelia couldn't see, it escalated to hands and feet. Of course, both of us held back enough not to injure the other, so at this point it was basically just roughhousing.

Then, after we left the Tsukimi Family grounds and reached a place that opened up like a park, on a slightly raised hill, Morganaite suddenly looked up and turned back toward Amelia.

The sharp glare he'd been giving me vanished, and his face changed into something like a maiden in love. I couldn't help taking a step back.

That speed of expression change was still hard for me to get used to.

"A-ah, Lady Amelia! What you see over there is one of this country's specialties, the 'Eternal Cherry Blossom.' In this country, there are many plants that, through mutation or some such, keep blooming like this forever. The most famous are the Eternal Wisteria, Eternal Plum Blossom, and Eternal Camellia, among others."

"So none of them have ever withered even once, and they've been blooming all year round for years?"

"Yes, exactly. Since the era of the first generation divine child, there has never once been a record of the flowers on that tree withering."

On top of the hill stood a magnificent cherry blossom tree. Though it stood there all by itself, it spread its branches wide to left and right like a huge umbrella, scattering pink petals.

"It's beautiful."

"Indeed. It is a splendid tree. A cherry blossom of this quality must surely be a grave of the Tsukimi Family. The Tsukimi Family may be a newcomer among the Three Great Houses, but as a merchant family, they've existed for a very long time."

"Hm?"

Was it just my imagination? Did Morganaite just say grave?

"A grave?"

Amelia tilted her head, seeming to notice the same thing I had.

"Oh? You didn't know? In this country, the deceased are cremated, and their ashes are either buried under cherry blossom trees or crushed and scattered around them. So there should be a corpse buried under that tree as well. In the past, it seems they used to bury bodies as they were instead of cremating them."

I couldn't help but hold my head.

Right, this was the country built by the hero who loved Japan so much.

"'Beneath the cherry blossom tree, a corpse is buried,' huh."

"Akira?"

Just where had it gone wrong? Or had the fourth generation hero actually wished for that?

What I knew was that, in my world, that line was metaphorical. There weren't really corpses buried there. Though apparently, in this world, they actually are. Maybe that's why they ended up with Eternal Cherry Blossoms.