Young Master, Please Put Some Pants On! - Chapter 2

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

Chapter 2

“Ouch!”

Thud, Mellis fell from midair and landed hard on her bottom. Rubbing her sore tailbone as she got up, she saw that dense, unfamiliar trees filled the area around her.

She had saved the scroll as a last resort due to the margin of error side effects, but fortunately she had successfully landed on the mountain at the edge of the village as planned.

“I-I did it.”

Confirming that she was completely away from the manor, Mellis couldn’t contain her joy and jumped up and down in place. To finally escape that detestable house! When what she had dreamed of for so long became reality, she was utterly dumbfounded.

But her celebration was brief, as she roughly brushed the dirt off her dress hem and calmly began walking.

“Vivian definitely said it was around here somewhere…”

She had been wandering for a while in the deep forest looking for the meeting place when she heard faint crying sounds from somewhere.

“What’s that?”

“…da. …guna!”

When she listened quietly, she could hear what sounded like a child’s crying coming from far away in fragments. Unable to contain her curiosity, she followed the sound as if entranced.

“Gasp!”

Mellis, who had found the source of the crying, urgently covered her mouth with both hands. A young child was trapped in a net trap hanging from a tree.

“Waaaah! Kerman! When are you coming!”

She was so startled that she tried to stand up, but then the child’s appearance caught her eye. A short, stocky build with brown fur covering his entire body, and a long tail sticking out through the net. No matter how she looked at it, he was definitely a monkey beastkin.

“Why is a beastkin here…?”

Confused, Mellis furrowed her brow deeply. The Physis Continent was a land where beastkin and humans coexisted, but that was merely superficial.

Beastkin and humans had been in conflict for a long time, threatening each other, refusing to acknowledge the other’s existence and causing unnecessary friction.

Of course, now that hundreds of years had passed, the two races had made a peace agreement and lived together in harmony. On the surface, that is. There were still unspoken rules between the two races, and an atmosphere of mutual contempt remained.

The Tarin Kingdom where she had been born and raised her entire life was what was commonly called human territory. In the twenty-odd years she had lived here, she could count on her fingers the number of times she had met beastkin, and suddenly a young monkey beastkin appeared before her eyes!

After briefly pondering, Mellis shook her head. Even without knowing the exact circumstances, getting involved would obviously complicate things. If it were any other time it might be different, but she had just escaped from home herself. Her mother was probably searching for her with fire in her eyes right now, so it would be troublesome if things got tangled up for no reason.

‘If I get caught because of this…’

Her mother would definitely beat her to death. Mellis, who had steeled her heart, was quietly turning around to leave when—

“Huuung, Kerman! I was wrong. It’s, it’s too scary!”

However, seeing the young child crying his heart out made her feel very uncomfortable. When she glanced over, the child was desperately grabbing and shaking the net.

“Ah, I don’t know anymore!”

Unfortunately, Mellis wasn’t the type who could coldly leave a crying child behind. In the end, her soft heart won out and she pushed through the grass to reveal herself in front of the child.

“Hic!”

“Um…”

“Kyaaaah! A human! A human appeared!”

However, when the child’s eyes met Mellis’s, he had a fit and struggled frantically. Flustered, she deliberately approached slowly to try to calm the child, but his thrashing only became more violent.

“Save me! I’m still just a baby monkey!”

“Wait…”

“Kerman! Please save me! A strange human came here to eat me!”

“No!”

“Kyaaah! I’m going to be eaten by a human!”

“I-I’m not going to eat you, so calm down!”

Eventually, the child only stopped screaming after Mellis stomped her foot forcefully to draw attention. The child who had stopped crying blinked his large eyes and stared blankly at Mellis. A large snot bubble inflated several times before slowly deflating.

“A-are you really not going to eat me?”

“No. Why would a human eat a beastkin? I wouldn’t even eat a regular monkey, let alone a beastkin!”

“…Then are you going to put a collar on me and torment me like a pet?”

“No. What kind of…!”

What on earth did he think humans were? After pondering briefly, Mellis soothed the child with the lowest and gentlest voice she could manage.

“I really just came to help you. Don’t you need my help?”

Finally calming down, the child sniffled and spoke with pursed lips.

“I-I need it. Please, I beg you. Please get me out of here.”

“Alright. I’ll find a way to help you, so wait a moment.”

“Okay…”

After confirming the child had calmed down, Mellis looked around. Sure enough, there was a thick rope tied to the tree trunk where the net was hanging. Seeing that the knot wasn’t very tight, it seemed like it was probably set up to catch small animals like rabbits.

Just by Mellis concentrating and struggling for a moment, the knot came undone quickly. When she grabbed the rope and carefully released the tension, the child smoothly descended to the ground.

“There! Are you hurt anywhere…”

“Waaah! Human, thank you! You saved my life!”

Before Mellis could continue speaking, the child rushed into her arms and burst into tears. The fear of being trapped high up for so long must have been considerable. Mellis felt deep regret for having considered leaving the child behind, even briefly.

“It’s all okay now, so stop crying. Stop!”

“Sniff… I’ll stop.”

When she bent her knees to match his eye level, the child rubbed his eyes vigorously with both arms. Soon the child stopped crying as promised and barely opened his mouth, his lips trembling as if holding back tears.

“M-my name is Garulus Rokan. Thank you for saving me.”

“I’m Mellis Portier.”

When she extended her hand, Garulus responded with his tiny hand as well. It was quite a brave and polite greeting for someone who had been crying so hard with large snot bubbles. Though his way of speaking was quite peculiar.

But looking closely, there was something strange about the child’s appearance. Even though it was March, the weather was still quite chilly, yet he was wearing only a loose short-sleeved shirt with no bottoms. Moreover, no matter how she thought about it, it didn’t make sense for a young beastkin to be alone and isolated within the kingdom.

‘Could it be…’

An ominous feeling spread through Mellis’s mind. Mellis frowned slightly and asked in a rather serious voice.

“Garulus, how did you end up trapped here?”

“Hmph, I don’t know either. Kerman told me not to touch it, but I touched it anyway… When I opened my eyes, I was up in that tree, and when I got hungry and tried to grab some fruit, suddenly this happened and I was dangling around.”

Garulus pointed to a large tree nearby as he spoke. Because he was rambling in a mumbling voice, Mellis couldn’t understand even half of what he said, but from the atmosphere, it didn’t seem like he had been abandoned.

“Where is your home?”

“I don’t know. But Kerman gave me this in case something like this happened.”

A smooth silver bracelet was jingling on Garulus’s wrist. It was an anti-lost pendant.

“Here, he said to show this to other people if I got lost.”

Relieved, she quickly flipped over the pendant, but she couldn’t help but be disappointed. She had naturally expected an address or contact information to be written on it, but the pendant only had seven characters engraved on it: ‘Severus Duchy.’

“What is this…”

“What’s wrong? From what I can read, it says Severus Duchy, right? That’s our home.”

Garulus tilted his head curiously while jingling his bracelet. No matter how she looked at it, it was the reaction of a young child who didn’t yet understand the concept of addresses properly.

‘Did they deliberately engrave it like that? To prevent the child from finding his way home?’

But if that were the case, they probably would have removed the bracelet entirely. Mellis fell into deep thought again, stroking her chin with one hand. Actually, that wasn’t what was important right now.

Severus Duchy! That was a territory belonging to the Aizen Empire. She hadn’t expected Garulus to be from the Tarin Kingdom, but of all places, he was from the Empire, and specifically from a duchy at that.

Although humans and beastkin were said to live in separate areas, this wasn’t legally designated. Rather, according to the continental peace agreement, there were even laws about ‘coexistence’ that required the Imperial Family and government agencies to employ a certain percentage or more of other races.

However, not a single human resides in the Duchy. The reason is simple: Duke Severus, the owner of the Duchy, is an extreme human-hater. Despising humans, he has mercilessly executed any humans who dared to invade his territory on numerous occasions.

After this happened several times, naturally, human footsteps ceased to enter the Duchy entirely. Because of this, Mellis felt overwhelmed just thinking about how she should get Garulus back home.

“Things have gotten quite complicated…”

“Why are you like that? Tell me too— Achoo!”

Just then, Garulus sneezed and shivered. It seemed he was catching a cold from being outside in thin clothing for so long. Somehow, more time had passed than expected.

Though an unexpected variable had occurred, she decided to proceed with her original plan. First, she needed to change into the clothes she had hidden nearby in advance.

“Garulus, would you like to come with me for now?”

“Hmm…”

Garulus looked her up and down with suspicious eyes, then nodded firmly as if he had made a big decision.

“Fine, Mellis. You look very strange, but since you saved me, I’ll trust you.”

She saved his life, yet he said she looked strange. Come to think of it, Garulus had also shouted at her earlier, calling her a weird human. Feeling slightly hurt, Mellis pulled her hand away and placed it on her hip as she asked.

“But why do you keep calling me a strange person? I saved you, didn’t I?”

At her sharp question, Garulus raised one eyebrow and asked back as if puzzled.

“So among humans, is it common to wander around the mountains in a wedding dress in broad daylight? That’s even stranger.”

“Ah…”

Only then did Mellis realize she was still wearing a pure white dress and let out a small sigh. And with a veil on her head too. The first human he’d ever seen was in a wedding dress. She could fully understand why Garulus found her strange.

“Th-there are circumstances.”

“Circumstances?”

“I was supposed to get married today.”

With a quiet sigh, she tried to take his hand again, but Garulus’s body stiffened.

A few seconds later, Mellis, reading his thoughts, blushed with embarrassment and muttered.

“I’m not trying to make you my groom, so don’t worry…”

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