kscans

Chapter 184 - Scribbles. Dorfen's Ordeal

"What? Sasha was taken away by soldiers?"

The knight, not understanding what had happened, rushed home in a panic. But the house was empty. His beloved wife was nowhere to be seen.

"Sashaaaaa!!"

The knight charged towards the soldiers' garrison with the reckless momentum of a wild boar. His name was Dorfen. A member of the Royal Knight Order, he was a quasi-noble who held the rank of knight. Originally the son of a marquis, he had been opposed in his marriage because his chosen love was a beast-human. He promptly left the marquis's house, became a commoner for his beloved, and married her.

There were many twists and turns after that, but their marriage was a happy one. They were blessed with children, and his lovely wife was in her final month of pregnancy. Dorfen, anxious about when she would give birth, checked on Sasha whenever he had the time.

Do you need anything? How are you feeling? Make sure you rest.

Sasha would smile wryly at her husband, who fussed over her with meticulous and anxious care.

That peaceful daily life was suddenly shattered.

According to what Dorfen heard from those around, soldiers had come in a carriage and taken his heavily pregnant wife away.

With a loud bang, the knight kicked down the door and burst inside, causing the soldiers in the garrison to tremble in fear. Huffing and puffing, Dorfen scanned the soldiers inside. Terrified by his ferocious gaze, the soldiers trembled and froze, unable to move a muscle, like frogs stared down by a snake. Looking at them, Dorfen muttered in a low voice that seemed to bore into the ground.

"Where is Sasha?"

"Huh?"

At the knight's menacing mutter, the soldiers couldn't help but let out a foolish sound.

"I asked you where Sasha is!!"

""""Hiiieeee!""""

As Dorfen roared, his fury laid bare, he grabbed one of them by the collar. The garrison became a scene of catastrophe, echoing with the soldiers' agonized screams.

A prayer for the innocent soldiers.

"You were just asked to escort her?"

"Yeeees, she said she was going back to her family's village since she was in her last month of pregnancyyyy."

Apparently, an order had come from the royal palace, and they had taken Sasha with them. Upon seeing the letter they delivered, Sasha had followed them with a beaming smile.

Going back to her village...? To her mother's village, perhaps?

After various twists and turns, Sasha's mother, Mārya, was in a village quite far from the royal capital where Dorfen lived. It was a two-week journey by carriage, a distance that would still take five days even if they drove the horses day and night. And then, a certain carriage crossed his mind. This was a world of swords and magic. There was magic power, magic, and monsters. Among those monsters were some who possessed intelligence and did not harm people. People affectionately called such monsters 'Mononoke-sama' in general. One type of these Mononoke-sama were giant honeybees. These bees, the size of a human child, operated carriages that flew through the sky. Using a Honeybee Carriage, one could reach Mārya's village in a single flight.

Dorfen immediately sent a letter to the royal palace to request permission to use the Honeybee Carriage. The palace managed the carriages in question. However, the reply that arrived a short while later was 'No.' With his jaw dropping in disbelief, he sent letters to the palace again and again, explaining his reasons, but all the replies were written with a denial of permission.

"Whyyyy!!"

Dorfen cried out, his face on the verge of tears. Unaware of his plight, Sasha was on her way to Mārya's village, swaying in the Honeybee Carriage.

"I haven't told him anything, I wonder if that was alright?"

Her large fox ears and fluffy tail twitched pikopiko. The woman with coral pink hair and red eyes furrowed her brow slightly as if troubled. Her name was Sasha. She was the beloved wife Dorfen was searching for with bloodshot eyes.

"Nn, that's what he gets. It's his own fault, nyon. Sasha, you just need to think about giving birth to a healthy baby."

A young girl with green eyes and black hair, around twelve or thirteen years old, declared nonchalantly.

"If it comes to it, you can just leave him. This is good medicine for that blockhead."

Sasha sighed a little at the girl's scathing, narrowed-eyed mutter, but she looked happy nonetheless. He was kind and would do anything for her, but that was what felt heavy to her. Dorfen didn't know about beast-humans. He would surely doubt his eyes when their child was born. She couldn't give birth by his side while harboring such anxiety. Seeing Sasha worrying gloomily, Little One had proposed she return to her family home to give birth. Sasha had never even thought of going home. Normally, a married daughter considers her husband's house her home and gives birth there. But Sasha, whose mental state was unstable, clung to the suggestion. Her love for Dorfen felt heavy. She thought it was a selfish worry, to be afraid that their children would be scorned, but when Little One told her that Sasha was more important than Dorfen, she resolved to give birth at her family home.

It's Dorfen's fault for making a pregnant woman so anxious, nyo. It's not good for the baby's prenatal development. In the first place, he's so clingy.

This also applied to the Bear Father and Chihaya, but Little One unconsciously put that on the shelf.

And so began the desperate pursuit of Dorfen, whose wife had run away.

"Out... of my wayyy!!"

Dorfen, having been hit with a barrage of denials for the Honeybee Carriage, saw it was getting him nowhere and decided to go by horse. He prepared for his journey and then announced his leave to the knight order. But a problem arose here. He was stopped by his flustered colleagues. The knight order was also caught off guard and, pulling Dorfen from his horse, they asked him what was going on.

"Sasha is...! Sasha is...!!"

The muscle-headed knight could only say Sasha's name over and over. The Knight Commander, Harold, struck him hard on the head. Even the formidable Dorfen was rendered speechless by the full-force blow from the brawny man.

"~~~~!!"

Dorfen crumpled to the ground from the sheer pain. After he finally seemed to have come to his senses, Harold listened to the detailed story and his eyes widened in exasperation.

"And for that, you're abandoning your post? Well, considering your past achievements, you probably won't be dismissed. But a demotion is possible, you know?"

Harold subtly advised him that he might lose his chance to earn a knighthood.

"Even so, I will go! My child is about to be born, you know? I have heard that childbirth is a life-threatening event. If a husband does not support his wife at such an important time, can he call himself a father to the child that is born?!"

Dorfen's passionate speech seemed like the model of a husband and father. But, most of the knights had not done such a thing. Dorfen's colleagues exchanged bewildered glances.

This world was not Earth. It was the otherworld, Arcadia.

In Arcadia, a world of swords and magic, the development of modern civilization was delayed, making it a world full of what one might call a medieval feel on Earth. Naturally, old-fashioned customs were also rampant. There was a structure where men earned a living outside and supported the family, while women protected the home and raised the children. Using this as a pretext, the men, whose ears were stung by Dorfen's passionate speech, left most of the troublesome matters to their wives. It wasn't that they didn't understand. But when it came to actually doing it, it was incredibly difficult. Childbirth, child-rearing, housework, and so on. The more a child grew, the more troubles came with them. They couldn't help with all of it, and in fact, to compensate for that, the men worked and earned money to hire wet nurses and housekeepers. That was the value system held by the men of Arcadia.

Neither Dorfen's passionate speech nor the value system of the men who grimaced and made excuses for themselves was wrong. A wife postpartum would probably be more helped by an experienced woman's hand than a clumsy man's. If that was possible, then that was one way to do it.

But there were also those with low salaries who couldn't afford that.

To such men, Dorfen was too dazzling, and the words that came from his mouth, 'my wife, my wife's, my wife,' pierced them deeply.

It's not like I'm slacking off... I'm earning properly, and I do housework too.

When I try to help, she tells me I'm in the way... My wife is scary.

Attending a birth... that's a woman's castle, you know? I could get killed, you know? I'd be told 'men get out,' you know? At least, I was.

Each with their own thoughts in mind, the members of the knight order grimaced. Dorfen had a lot of work piled up. Much of it was work that could be switched with someone else, but doing so could become Dorfen's blunder. The village he mentioned was about a ten-day journey by horse one way. If he were to stay for the birth, he would be unable to return to work for at least a month. That would surely not be overlooked. With no solution in sight, a young knight surveyed the deadlocked people and, as if remembering something, raised his hand.

"Um! Could he not use his paid leave?"

The knights exchanged glances, startled.

Paid leave. It was a system that had been introduced in recent years.

Knights who worked diligently every six months were given three days of holiday as a reward from the country. It could be used at any time and was invaluable for when a sudden day off was needed for things like funerals or celebrations. After all, they would receive their wages even while on leave. Though only three days, it was a very blessed and popular system. The paid leave received every six months could be saved up, and Dorfen hadn't used it for anything other than his wedding and honeymoon. It had been a good six years since this system was introduced. His paid leave had accumulated significantly.

"Calculate it immediately! If it's paid leave, it won't be treated as an absence, so it shouldn't matter if we change the work assignments!"

The knights moved at once, rushing to coordinate with the general affairs and accounting departments, and succeeded in getting all of Dorfen's paid leave approved starting from the next day. As it turned out, the man had nearly forty days of accumulated paid leave. While everyone else used theirs bit by bit, Dorfen had truly not used any at all. It was a moment where his extreme diligence had triumphed.

"Well, be careful. My regards to your wife."

Seen off by the members of the knight order, who were grinning with wry smiles, Dorfen cleared the first hurdle.

"Hmph. Paid leave, huh. That was unexpected."

Sipping tea with Sasha, Little One looked over the report that had arrived by honeybee mail. The work of the knight order was demanding. She had been complacent, thinking there was no way he could just cast it aside and come, but it was an unexpected situation.

"Was introducing paid leave a mistake? Hmm, I didn't think it would turn out like this."

That's right. The one who had introduced the paid leave system within the royal palace was this very girl. Dorfen belonged to the knight order. She was the princess of the royal palace. Sasha, who had been with her since before she was born, was like a sister to the princess. To ensure that she could face childbirth with peace of mind, she had come to Sasha's mother's home without Dorfen's knowledge.

But Dorfen was proving to be unexpectedly tough.

"It means he hasn't been traveling the world with me for nothing. The nerve, bending reason to his will, honestly."

The man pushed through the impossible as a matter of course. The fact that luck was likely a major factor made him someone not to be underestimated. To make her next move, Little One summoned the honeybees.

"What is this...?!"

Dorfen, who had been riding his horse day and night without stopping, held his breath at the sight spread before him. A vast, desolate landscape. Lying across it was a large crevasse, perhaps more than ten meters wide. If such a fissure had formed, there was no way it wouldn't have been reported by the border guards. This meant it had been created yesterday or today. In Arcadia, where magic and monsters were rampant, strange phenomena sometimes occurred. This was likely one of them. Looking left and right, he couldn't see the end of it. A deep crevasse, as if the star itself had split.

"At a time like this... dammit!!"

Dorfen, who had been riding for two days without food or sleep, couldn't gather his thoughts and reluctantly began to set up camp for the night. His exhausted body was craving rest.

Even so, the one who came to mind was his beloved woman.

"Sasha..."

What could she be doing right now? Was she crying, feeling helpless? Was she eating? Was she tired from carrying her heavy belly?

If he were by her side, he would hold her, give her a massage, put her to sleep, he would do anything for her.

This is what he was thinking with a serious face. His perspective was like that of a father protecting a young child. Unbeknownst to him, Sasha was suffocating from being doted on like a worried father.

Gritting his back teeth, Dorfen washed down his rations with water into his stomach. But his fatigue must have been accumulating. The moment he lay down, he surrendered himself to the invitation of sleep.

And the next morning.

Whether thanks to the rest, his mind was clear and refreshed, and he came up with a decidedly simple-minded solution. As mentioned before, Arcadia was a world of swords and magic. The former son of a marquis possessed magical power second only to the royal family, and what's more, he specialized in one art. When it came to water magic, he possessed a power that was not inferior to a specialized magician. Faced with the giant crevasse, he used all his magic power to summon water. Then he unceremoniously created a bridge of water over the crevasse and galloped across it on his horse. Water is a mass with considerable hardness, and if compressed, it is possible to cross over it. Dorfen had learned various things like this on his adventurous journey around the world.

Thus, he overcame the next challenge and made his way towards the village where Sasha was likely to be.

"He's usually so muscle-headed, so why does he use his brain only at times like this?!"

Little One crumpled the report in her hand.

She bit her lip in frustration, her trap designed to stall him, created with the help of the Mononoke, having been overcome. There was no longer any way to stop that muscle-headed knight.

Just as she had predicted, he reached the beast-humans' village in just five days.

"Sashaaa!"

Dorfen spurred his horse and rushed into the beast-humans' village.

Ignoring the startled people, he galloped on and dismounted from his horse in front of Mārya's house as if flying. Then, after taking a deep breath, he suppressed his impatient heart and deliberately knocked quietly. And the person who appeared from the door left him speechless.

"You really came. Good grief."

Looking up at him menacingly was Little One. Her cheeks were puffed out, her arms were crossed, and she stood there like a guardian statue.

"Eh? Ah? Sasha is...?"

Into Dorfen's flustered and confused ears came a faint voice from somewhere. A round of crying, fyaaa... naaa...

"Huh?" Dorfen raised his head and pleaded with the statue-like Chihiro as if in prayer.

"Chihiro-sama! Sasha...! Is Sasha here?!"

As Chihiro flinched back from the handsome man's bloodshot face, the door behind the living room opened. Mārya came out from the back. Looking at Dorfen with an exasperated expression, she couldn't help but burst out laughing.

"Just as Sasha said. You really came. Oh well. Sasha is in the back."

Ignoring Mārya who was stifling her laughter, Dorfen rushed into the room. And what entered his vision as he went deeper was Sasha lying on the bed and three fox cubs. Dorfen doubted his own eyes at the sight of his children, who looked just like foxes. Though their forms were those of fox cubs, their cries were close to those of humans. While giving her breast to the fox cubs, who were small enough to be held in both hands, Sasha looked down slightly and muttered.

"You were surprised, weren't you? Lycans are in their beast form at first. From here, they will change into human or beast forms."

Normal beast-humans are born in a form that is either more beast-like or more human-like from the start, but Sasha said that only Lycans are born as beasts themselves. Feeling multiple children moving in her belly, Sasha had realized that her children were Lycans. That's why she didn't want to surprise Dorfen, and after entering her final month of pregnancy, she had asked Chihiro to let her stay at her family home. In about three months, Lycans naturally learn to take human form. Unless they are greatly surprised, they won't change into their beast form. She had wanted to raise them quietly until then.

But she also had a feeling that Dorfen would come rushing over, out of breath. Chihiro had been optimistic, thinking that with his work in the knight order, the serious-minded Dorfen wouldn't be able to come so easily, but she had underestimated him. Dorfen had learned from Little One the brute force technique of turning the impossible into the possible with a single-arm shoulder throw.

If you try, you can do it! As expected, he came flying over.

Sasha peeked at her beloved husband. Dorfen scooped her up, children and all, and let out a big sigh.

"I was worried. As long as you're safe, that's all that matters. Are these our children? One, two... there are three of them. You've done well, Sasha."

Dorfen praised her for her hard work.

At his beaming smile, Sasha knew her worries had been for nothing.

Oh, what was I thinking...

She had been demeaning herself, thinking she was a beast-human, a Lycan. Dorfen hadn't cared at all. Even seeing the babies, who were as hairy as puppies, there wasn't a trace of revulsion in his eyes. He was rejoicing in the birth of his children from the bottom of his heart.

"...I was the foolish one. I'm sorry, Dorfen."

"Why are you apologizing? This is a joyous occasion. Smile."

Dorfen gently stroked the head of his wife, whom he held in his arms.

Thus, the crisis of the couple, who had been creating a subtle dissonance, passed, and the cheerful voices of children were added to Dorfen's home.

Little One grinned broadly.

It's just a charming quirk that Dorfen later becomes a doting father on par with Drago, blessed with a daughter as well.

Little One's world is still a maelstrom of joy and sorrow, but in a country where the happiness of kind people is guaranteed, nothing but happy endings exist.

Frontier was a place overflowing with 'happily ever after' everywhere you looked♪