Chapter 133: The Night Before
Frontier arrived at the capital. After he arrived, a dark landscape embraced him.
After putting on his mask in advance, he went straight to Lili, Arald, and Selena.
The three who received the call were guided to the accommodation they had previously booked in the capital, and they were able to meet each other right away.
“Good. “Everyone wore masks.”
Everyone nodded at Frondier’s words.
I recognized him by his hair style and physique, but his face was completely different.
“This is a high-end product. “Even if you look at it fairly close, you can’t tell it from the real thing.”
Arald said.
I guess the Colin she did business with means she is a proper merchant.
“Now that I think about it, Colin is a member of an organization called ‘Nine’?”
Frondier asked, looking at the crow.
But the crow, which always responded, suddenly became silent.
Food Duck—
Finally, the crow suddenly flew up next to Frondier. She left without looking back.
“… What?”
“That’s right. “A member of the nine.”
And the answer came from somewhere else.
When Frontier looked back, there was,
“… Gregory!”
There was Gregory.
Gregory, a human, not a crow.
Gregory smiled awkwardly as Frondier approached him happily.
“It’s been a while, Frontier.”
Gregory himself, not the crow, encounters Frondier.
This is the first time this has happened since the business card incident a while ago.
“How did you get here? “No, is it natural?”
“Okay. Because I have eyes everywhere. “I just followed you after seeing that your colleagues had taken up this lodging.”
“So you’re saying we already met each other before you met me?”
Everyone nodded at Frondier’s words.
Frondier let out a laugh.
“I can’t believe I met my colleagues first. The liver is also big. Especially Selena.”
“It really is.”
Selena nodded her head in full agreement.
She still looked at Gregory with cold eyes.
“I almost put a needle in every knuckle of my finger.”
“You sound scary.”
“I don’t trust you yet. How dare you bring up the topic that put Frontier in danger at Constell?”
“Okay. “I will do my best to earn your trust.”
Gregory raised both his hands as if in complete surrender.
Since he is not a combatant, he would never even think about fighting Selena.
Gregory spoke to Frondier to change the subject.
“Frondier, you inadvertently said my name in front of Elodie. After that, I decided it was better to be together than to move alone. “This capital may soon be in shambles.”
“… “Yes, that’s right.”
Fron Deer nodded his head.
The very next day, voting begins. And the results of the vote will be revealed on the same day.
“But how can we tell you the voting results right away? “It will take time to count.”
“That’s just the thing. “It doesn’t seem like people are doing the counting.”
“… Then, magic deduction?”
Arald nodded.
“They said the reader would calculate the tally on its own. So, in theory, it would be possible to check who got how many votes in real time, but this time, they say they will not show real-time voting and only the results will be revealed.”
“… “That’s right.”
Frondier frowned at that method.
Arald had the same thought.
“I don’t think there is anything like a beautiful society that accepts the outcome.”
“That’s true.”
In Frontier’s experience, people are less likely to trust machines when it comes to important issues.
In particular, when it comes to voting on such important decisions, we want to resolve them by human hands as much as possible.
Machines don’t make mistakes, but people who operate machines can make mistakes.
If people tally by hand, even if they make a mistake, the difference is only a few votes, but if the machine is handled incorrectly, the result can be completely overturned.
Moreover, it is good to suspect that it was intentional rather than a mistake.
It is a vote that is difficult to avoid suspicion even if everything is done by human hands, but they suddenly impose a magic deduction system.
“It’s almost like they’re hoping for a backlash.”
It seems that the result of the vote is not important, but rather the aftermath that will occur as a result.
Gregory nodded his head.
“That’s probably true. “I heard that the person who suggested it was Rufina, who received Aphrodite’s divine powers.”
“In other words, it is Aphrodite’s suggestion. Come to think of it, did you pass on that information to everyone?”
Information that Aphrodite is not a devil but the real Aphrodite. Gregory nodded his head.
Lili said, tilting her head.
“But it’s really hard to believe. Is there really Aphrodite? “In this capital?”
“It’s hard for me to believe it, but Poseidon, who knows nothing about the situation, said that.”
Poseidon may have lied, but I don’t see any reason yet. Moreover, if she suffered the same wounds as Poseidon, Aphrodite would not be able to leave the capital even if she wanted to.
“I’d like to see it sometime. Aphrodite is the goddess of beauty, right? What does it look like? “How pretty she is and what her body is like.”
Lily said in a somewhat flushed tone.
She was quite confident in her appearance and liked men, so she seemed to be very interested in Aphrodite, the goddess of beauty.
After hearing those words, Frondier thought for a moment.
He said as if he suddenly realized something.
“… Okay. “Aphrodite must be incredibly pretty, right?”
Then Selena saw Frontier.
“Frondier, are you interested too?”
“For some reason, the way you looked at Gregory a while ago is similar to the way you look at me.”
“That can’t be right. So, are you interested?”
It was a very one-sided conversation.
Fron Deer spoke as if to advance his thoughts.
“If she were so beautiful, there would be no way that woman named Rufina would have caught Aphrodite’s eye, right?”
Although Frondier did not actually see Rufina, he saw a huge statue of her on her way, and even in the capital, her picture was circulated all over the streets like a promotional flyer. She already knows what she looks like. The same goes for Bruna, another voting subject.
They both had pretty looks, but that was about it.
Arald said.
“As expected, Aphrodite’s selection of a beautiful woman was nothing more than an excuse. After all, war is the goal.”
“Huh. “There is that too.”
Fron Deer nodded his head but had a puzzled look on his face.
“If he found her really incredibly pretty, would Aphrodite push her around?”
“… Uh…”
Lily tried to answer with an ambiguous expression on her face.
Honestly, I don’t know.
Originally a golden apple that covered the most beautiful goddess. However, in this capital, the most beautiful ‘human being’ is determined. And that’s limited to the capital.
I understood that this was a move to somehow proceed with a stalled story. I also understood that since the gods could not descend, they chose humans instead. God follows fate.
But that aside, can Aphrodite really accept it?
A woman so beautiful that she threatens her beauty, the goddess of beauty?
‘Aphrodite is such a famous goddess that she appears in all kinds of stories in Greek mythology.’
Many people, even those who are not native to Aphrodite, know the story about Aphrodite.
Frondier had similar thoughts every time he read a story involving Aphrodite in the previous world.
‘Hey, she’s not the goddess of beauty, she’s the goddess of jealousy.’
Aphrodite hates gods or people who are more beautiful than her, or who she considers more beautiful. She doesn’t just hate it, she hates it a lot. She almost wonders if the reason Aphrodite is the goddess of beauty is because she took away everything that was more beautiful than she was.
Arald asked in response to Frondier’s doubts.
“If Aphrodite couldn’t stand it, then maybe she chose the right woman and not the most beautiful woman in the capital?”
“No, that won’t be it. Anyway, people have to accept it. She must have picked the most beautiful woman in the capital, or something of that reputation. And she probably never had the choice to choose the right woman in the first place. “She is admitting that she is the most beautiful woman in the capital, that she is more beautiful than she is.”
Aphrodite is the goddess of beauty. She must be much more beautiful than Bruna or Rufina.
What Frontier focused on could be said to be the opposite.
“… “Aphrodite is a god bound to this earth like Poseidon.”
“That’s right.”
“So she’s never met a woman like you two.”
Frondier said, looking at Lili and Selena.
The two subtly avoided eye contact, not knowing what expression to make.
“She has never met Elodie, and she has probably never even seen Carla.”
Hera and Aphrodite each selected the most beautiful woman.
And the people split into two factions and fought over which one was more beautiful.
Among them, no one doubted whether the woman chosen by the two goddesses was truly the most beautiful.
Then.
“Didn’t Aphrodite feel relieved in her own way during that process?”
“Are you safe?”
“She is reassured that she is definitely the most beautiful.”
At Frondier’s words, the others looked at each other.
Gregory said with a wry smile.
“Frondier. After all, you are a god, you shouldn’t think like that.”
They find out that other people are uglier than them and feel reassured by their own beauty.
Some humans might think that way, but isn’t that too petty for something that a god would do?
Frondier heard that and smiled in agreement.
“Is that so too?”
“And since we all wear masks, that assumption makes no sense.”
That too.
Charon is currently looking for Frontier and his party. There is no need to take off your mask unless it is a really difficult situation.
“In the end, what’s important is preventing war. “We have to see how Aphrodite will come out and respond then.”
“Yes, I had such useless thoughts.”
Frondier nodded his head, admitting that he was overthinking himself.
He then spoke as if he were putting things back together.
“Poseidon will first block the gods coming from the Palind Continent, and this will be passed on to Gregory from the birds flying nearby, and then to me.”
Selena said to him.
“Voting takes place in the capital square. Bruna and Rufina will appear in the square. Citizens can see them in person and decide which side to vote for on the day. It may feel like a spectacle, but with God behind you in the first place, it won’t be that bad.”
This time Lili said, crossing her arms.
“So me and Arald have to check on those two. “Is Rufina really possessed by Aphrodite, and is it certain that it is the devil, not Hera, who possesses Bruna?”
There Arald put his eyes to the side.
“Of course, Aphrodite will not appear in the square. The same goes for the devil impersonating Hera and the fake Poseidon attached to Charon. In other words, our goal is to find out where they are hiding. If that is possible, the heated atmosphere after the vote can be corrected. “It would be an ideal solution if we could just let the citizens know that what is attached to Charon or Hera is not a god but a devil.”
Then Frondier looked at Gregory.
“Now that I think about it, what is the situation with the ‘nine’ that Colin is said to belong to? “Are they not going to move?”
“Hmm, I’m trying to talk to the crow there.”
Gregory frowned as he touched his temple.
“Honestly, this woman, the content of her words is so bold, but her tone is so suspicious that it’s hard to believe anything she says. “I guess that’s what they’re aiming for.”
“What about the content itself?”
“Since he threatened Colin, Paladin Charon is the enemy of the Nine. The Nine will turn the capital into a sea of fire on the day of the vote. Whether God or the Devil comes, the Nine will kill them all. We’ll solve it, so you don’t have to worry about anything. What kind of words are these? “He’s saying that in a suspicious voice.”
“… “I just can’t trust it.”
In that case, it would be better not to expect the Nine to help.
Frondier placed his hands on his waist and exhaled lightly.
“Anyway, leave Charon to me. “This guy will have no choice but to show up in the capital.”
“Of course, there will be quite a few paladins there as well. Charon will know that Frontier will be targeting him.”
“In the words of nine.”
Fron Deer nodded his head and said.”
“Charon is my enemy.”
His voice changed.
“No need to worry.”
Plain words. Content that seems to reassure Selena, who expressed her concerns.
However, Selena ends up feeling creepy.