The Seven-Year-Old Village Chief in Exile - Chapter 85

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————

Chapter 85
Of course, if I wanted to forge a real alliance with those three promising candidates, I needed to satisfy them as well.
‘Know your enemy and know yourself, and you’ll win a hundred battles—no, win a hundred times over!’
After parting ways with Frelia, I went looking for Ian first.
Finding Ian is simple enough.
“Dalis, have you seen Ian?”
“He’s at the Training Ground. He passed by a little while ago.”
“Hello, sister!”
“Thank you for telling me. Hello to you too, Flora!”
“Hebenia, are you going to see Ian?”
Flora, covered in dirt, asked the question, a small seedling shovel clutched in her hands. She’d been tending the front yard flower beds with her mother.
“Yeah. Want to come with me?”
“I do!”
“Is that alright with you?”
“I hope we won’t be in the way.”
“You won’t be. Flora, go grab the Shing-Shing Car!”
“Okay!”
Flora untied her apron and hauled out the pink Shing-Shing Car parked in front of the entrance.
‘Good grief, she’s adorable.’
My lips refused to turn down while watching Flora.
‘Children really should be spirited like this.’
When I first arrived here, Flora could barely speak her own thoughts aloud.
I learned later that she had nightmares frequently and often wet the bed at night.
She was especially wary and afraid of adult men—a result of the abuse she’d suffered at the hands of Deste, her biological father.
“Mom, I’m heading out!”
“Listen to your sister. Drive carefully.”
“Got it! Ugh, so much nagging!”
“Your mother worries because she cares.”
But now she could speak her mind clearly and confidently, and had grown spirited enough to greet people first, just as she had a moment ago.
“You take care too, dear.”
“Yes!”
“Drive safely, both of you.”
The two Shing-Shing Cars moved swiftly, sent off with warm farewells.
“Sister, sister.”
Once we’d gone some distance from the house.
“You know, Mom and Ian are friends, right?”
“Yeah.”
“But lately, doesn’t he look a little… different to her?”
I hit the brakes hard, the tires squealing.
Flora, jolted to a stop alongside me, grabbed my wrist and dragged me into a deep alleyway.
I was pulled along and heard something absolutely astounding.
“It’s a secret, but Mom likes Ian.”
“What?!”
“But not like a friend. I know.”
With more friends now and having learned much at the temporary school, Flora had come to understand that there were different kinds of “liking.”
“Ian likes Mom too. Not like a friend.”
“My goodness!”
I was genuinely shocked.
‘And Flora’s been keeping this delicious secret all to herself!’
This was like the Exilium Village edition of a classic love triangle.
“So I asked Mom—do you want to marry Ian?”
“Oh my.”
Kids these days mature so fast, but Flora really took the cake!
I listened with absolute seriousness. I needed the details so I could relay them to Libi later at home.
“But Mom lied.”
“What do you mean?”
“She said Ian is just a friend who lives next door.”
“Well, well.”
“But I know, right? That’s a lie.”
“Wow, Flora, you’re really smart. How did you catch that so fast?”
“By five years old, they understand everything.”
Flora lifted her chin just slightly, affecting such an air of superiority that I wanted to pinch her cheeks—she was impossibly adorable.
But since she was deadly serious about it, I swallowed my laughter and kept my expression grave.
“Mom acts like she’d love to marry Ian. I wish Ian could be my dad instead. Our real dad is really scary, and I don’t like him.”
“Ian also…….”
I held back the urge to say he was dying to be her father.
I teased Ian often enough in daily life, but even I knew better than to meddle in something like this.
So I helped him strike a balance.
“Ian cares about you and your mom very much.”
“Okay.”
“But let’s keep this a secret from Ian, all right?”
“He likes our mom anyway.”
“…….”
The kid had caught on to everything.
Still, I told her it was good to keep secrets, and Flora considered for a moment before nodding and making a show of zipping her lips.
“Love quarrels are when swords, uh, um, cut through the neck.”
“Water.”
“Right, water. So you’re not supposed to get in the middle, I read it in a book.”
“…….”
What book was she reading?
I wanted to read it too.
* * *
After parking the Shing-Shing Car in the lot, Flora and I headed straight into the Training Ground.
The moment we stepped inside, I felt the air itself turn sharp and stinging. An earsplitting roar echoed ceaselessly throughout the space.
I quickly threw up a Protective Barrier to shield Flora.
“Are you all right?”
“Yeah.”
Flora seemed unbothered.
‘Right, she’s a Demon too.’
Flora was technically a Half-Human Half-Demon, after all. As the daughter of one.
‘Come to think of it, didn’t Dalis say her father’s side was Demon? If I ask Verity, I might be able to find out. Of course, I should only ask when she wants me to.’
Stepping deeper into the Training Ground, I spotted Ian learning Swordsmanship from Verity.
Ian was soaked through with sweat.
Dark droplets had stained the ground where he stood as if rain had just fallen.
Verity, by contrast, showed little change save for a slight flush creeping into her cheeks.
“Your waist is wide open!”
“Ugh!”
“If this were me, the moment I started chattering about an opening like that, I’d thrust straight for the throat without hesitation. Why so slow? Look, even now you’re prattling on and creating more gaps for me…….”
“Hyah!”
“What good is a loud shout when you’re moving like that?”
Ian swung his sword with the force of a crushing blow, but Verity pivoted her body to the side with such ease that she evaded it effortlessly.
Then she tapped him lightly on the jaw with the wooden sword she held.
“Normally I would’ve hit harder…….”
Verity made a soft clicking sound and glanced down at us from the Training Platform.
“We have small and adorable guests.”
“Huh, hah……?”
Ian, breathing too hard to answer, watched as Verity pointed at us once more with her finger.
“Ian!”
“Ian!”
Only then noticing us, Ian broke into a bright, delighted smile.
While Ian caught his breath, I stood transfixed by the crescent-shaped sword marks scattered across the ground.
“Nearly all of these are from me…….”
Verity approached without a sound and pointed to one spot in particular.
The largest and deepest gash—carved into the ceiling behind where the Training Platform had been.
“That one is your handiwork, Ian.”
“Has the time finally come when I shouldn’t be disrespectful to Ian?”
“Don’t just talk about it—actually improve.”
“By the way, you’re sweating? There’s a bead forming right here.”
“It’s the heat. Just the heat.”
I imagined the elation Ian must have felt leaving that enormous mark.
Ian was growing at a truly remarkable pace.
‘Could I transmit again like before?’
The question gnawed at me. I decided to ask him next time he trained whether I could join him in a joint session.
‘Joint training wouldn’t be so bad, would it?’
Just then, Ian came downstairs.
“What brings you two down here together?”
“Just wanted to ask you something. Today, Flora is my special secretary.”
“Your secretary, sir!”
Flora’s spirited introduction left Ian and Verity wearing the kind of helpless, delighted smiles that only something genuinely adorable could inspire.
I was certainly no exception.
“Have you ever met the Crown Prince?”
“Yes.”
“What’s your impression of him? His character, that sort of thing?”
“Hmm……”
Ian pressed his lips together and moved them from side to side, lost in memory of years past.
Ian is the most serious and courteous person I know, so he’s naturally careful with his words. He rarely even curses.
“If he were my son, I would’ve beaten it into him at least once.”
“Ouch.”
Given that, those words amounted to the harshest possible judgment.
“Of course, beating isn’t the answer to everything.”
But still……
Ian went back and forth several times, retracting what he’d said and restating it differently.
“I understand his circumstances. Lost his mother the moment he was born, and his father—that man—and then there’s his stepmother, a woman born from adultery. How could anyone grow up sane under that?”
Even possessing such an enormous shield against blame, Ian’s judgment of the Crown Prince was remarkable.
Yet when I thought of the Crown Prince anecdote I’d heard recently, the level of criticism he deserved was actually worse.
“I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t hold that against him. I’m in a terrible mood today.”
“The Duchess’s sixty-third birthday will be a mournful one again this year.”
“She’ll be mourning my deceased mother.”
Couldn’t the legitimate son say even that much to the illegitimate one?
“But when a fire broke out in the residence where his sister stayed……”
The moment I was about to sympathize with the Crown Prince, Ian quickly seized hold of my thoughts and steered me back on course.
“Surely he didn’t set that fire?”
Verity clicked his tongue with a disapproving sound.
“A child committing arson already? He’ll grow into something truly destructive. Did he ever kill insects or small animals like mice?”
“No conclusive evidence emerged that he set the fire. I only remember being summoned to the Emperor about it at the time. The reason was never disclosed, but apparently he received a tremendous scolding.”
“The residence where his sister stayed—you mean, the Prince?”
“No, the Princess.”
What Ian said next was shocking.
“When word came that a fire had broken out in his sister’s residence, all available knights were mobilized to suppress it. I was at the scene myself.”
Once we’d barely contained the blaze, the Crown Prince appeared.
“I remember it vividly.”
Pale smoke rose from the smoldering ashes, and light rain began falling at that very moment.
An attendant unfurled a Blue Umbrella over the Crown Prince’s head.
And beneath it,
the Crown Prince said, “Tsk. What a shame.”
Those words alone—cast out like nothing.
* * *
‘Right. I don’t understand a damn thing.’
It seems I’ve always had a good eye for people, even as a child.
‘Good instinct on my part for hating the Crown Prince!’
I gave myself a light pat on the rear in self-congratulation.
‘Chilling as it was, that was crucial information.’
Now I had a sense of how to conduct myself when the Crown Prince arrived with the Duchess of Stria.
Then Flora, who had been sitting quietly, asked me a question.
“What’s a Crown Prince?”
Only then did I realize that the conversation we’d just had was hardly appropriate for a child to hear.
Ian and Verity both let out belated ‘oh no’ expressions, showing signs of tardy remorse.
“It means the son of the Emperor. The Emperor is the ruler, and the Crown Prince becomes the Emperor when he grows up.”
“Is the Crown Prince a bad person?”
“That’s what we’re going to find out.”
I issued Flora an order.
“Flora!”
“Yes!”
“What we just discussed is a very important secret, so you mustn’t tell your mother. Understood?”
“Yes!”
“Good. For being such a well-behaved secretary, I’ll give you a Strawberry Milk Flavored Candy.”
The hush money worked remarkably well.

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————