My Status as an Assassin Obviously Exceeds the Hero's

There aren’t many.

Like with the dragon, this is planned to continue a little.

The bustling noise and the sight of many people walking along a wide avenue is nothing unusual in a city. Where we used to live was more on the urban side too — I’ve walked through crowds denser than what’s spread out before us. Still, we froze in the middle of the road, mouths open like fools.

It wasn’t the number of people that surprised us. What startled us was how they were dressed.

“Wasn’t there a theme park like this somewhere? The place where you can try shuriken and archery and stuff.”

“Jidai-mura?”

“Yeah, that.”

Beside me, Asahina-kun and Rintaro Nanase, the wind mage who was close with Akira in class, were having that conversation; I listened to it out of the corner of my ear.

The men wore formal montsuki hakama or kimono worn loosely, a sword at their hips; the women wore kimono or miko (shrine maiden) outfits with kanzashi in their hair. It looked like a period drama from the Edo era, the kind you often see on TV in the evenings.

It felt odd to see so many people in miko dress on a roadside that wasn’t a shrine, but the women in those outfits were all heading toward a certain building they seemed determined not to look at, so maybe miko attire was just formal wear for women here.

“And over there has got to be Himeji Castle, no question.”

“I wasn’t supposed to look at it…”

Asahina-kun muttered the exact thing I didn’t want to hear — as if on purpose — and I looked up at it.

In size it was probably like Japan’s Himeji Castle after its recent renovations. The shape wasn’t similar at all, but the castle walls were white plastered, which made it feel like Himeji Castle.

Even from where we stood, far away, the big castle wasn’t as lavish and ornate as a royal castle, but it had a presence that imposed itself on whoever looked at it.

Also, for some reason, looking at that castle made the back of my neck tingle. Maybe it was just my imagination.

“Ah, sorry.”

“Hey, you lot, don’t just stand in the middle of the street gawking.”

While I was blankly staring at the castle, I bumped into a man coming from the other direction. I apologized on reflex; the man smiled and hurried past.

“……”

“Asahina-kun?”

Asahina-kun, however, seemed unsettled and kept staring at the man’s retreating back. He glanced at me, then took off after the man.

“Wait a second. Hey, somebody stop that guy. He’s a pickpocket!”

“Huh?”

I frantically checked whether my wallet was still there.

“…It’s gone.”

The wallet that had been there when we entered Yamato was no longer there. Now that I thought about it, the way the man bumped me had been blatantly odd. He’d been walking straight ahead; there was no reason to run into someone standing still.

“Shi-kun? What happened?”

Ms. Ueno and Mr. Hosoyama approached. The others around us were gradually noticing something was wrong, too.

“My wallet was stolen. Asahina-kun is chasing him. Are yours okay?”

They all immediately checked their own wallets at my question, and relief washed over their faces moments later. Apparently it was only mine.

“Luckily there was no money in that wallet anyway, but it was something I’d been using here.”

“Did someone give it to you?”

“Yeah. My brother gave it to me for my birthday.”

We argued all the time, but even so, it was important to me. A little while later Asahina-kun returned.

“This country seems to have a lot of good people.”

“!!”

He said that and handed my wallet back to me. I took it with a relieved breath.

“Thanks. Still, how did you catch up with him so fast?”

“After I shouted, people around joined in like a game of telephone — shouting the same thing — and at the end some folks dressed like the shinsengumi caught him.”

So there’s an organization that keeps the peace here, too. Some past hero must have liked the Bakumatsu era.

“Aoi-colored haori?”

“Yeah. They even wore forehead protectors, so at first I thought they were cosplayers.”