The Princess

Translation: SupremeTentacle

Editing: Exkalamity

“Next time I will surely win! You wait and see!”

“Kyuuiii!”

With those parting words we separated from Mare and Kuina and made our way towards the town of Roserraccoon . We asked them to come with us but they declined . For some reason the two of them wanted to avoid the town . Maybe they were involved in some sort of incident? Regardless we decided to let matters be and head towards the town ourselves .

“They were surely a lively pair . ”

“Nn . Will win next time . ”

“Woof!”

“Nn . Both of us . ”

Our encounter was definitely a fruitful one . I got to see a hella gorgeous maid and Fran met Mare, the first person in her age group capable of putting up a good fight . We won the spar, and Mare didn’t seem like the type of fighter to pull her punches, but I wasn’t certain we would have won a serious death match . She was clearly holding onto some final trump card at the end . This fight will definitely encourage Fran’s growth as a warrior down the future . My only worry is that she may become too much of a battle junkie .

After walking for a distance, we spotted walls rising out of the horizon .

“Master, town spotted . ”

“Yeah and it’s pretty big too . The walls are impressive . This is probably Roserraccoon . ”

“Nn . ”

As we approached the town we noticed a commotion outside the walls . Although it wasn’t strange for a town as large as this to be noisy, it was strange to see so many people milling around outside the walls . As we approached we saw that all the people were adventurers . There were about thirty of them, all trying to board the same horned carriage . Fran called out to one of the adventurers .

“Something happen?”

“Hah? The hell do ya want ki– WHOA HOLY SHIT!”

The man took a glance at Fran and cut himself short . He froze, one foot on the horned carriage, the other still on the ground, his eyes bulging out of their sockets .

“Well?”

“My ba-” he coughed . “My apologies . ”

He clearly cleaned up his act the moment he saw Fran . He probably realized she evolved .

“Okay?” asked Fran .

“Yes,” he said . “We’re currently tasked with escorting a noble . Our destination is a town down south . ”

“Adventurers for guards? Not soldiers?”

“Yeah . All the knights and soldiers are headed to the border . There aren’t any to spare . ”

“Understood . ”

It seems there were some extenuating circumstances in this case . Normally a noble will be escorted by knights and soldiers unless they wanted to travel incognito . In that case they would hire adventurers as escorts, but having a full entourage of thirty people was antithetical to staying under the radar . I urged Fran to continue questioning .

“So many people, cause trouble?” asked Fran .

“Well this amount is to be expected given we are escorting the princess herself,” he said .

“Princess, here?”

“Yeah . The guildmaster decided to go over the top with this escort commission . ”

It seemed the guildmaster was trying to please the royal family by sending the princess a large group of guards .

“In fact you can see her over there,” the adventurer said .

We looked over towards the direction he indicated . There stood a girl in a very ostentatious, out of place dress .

Maybe we should go talk to her… We are pretty heavily indebted to the Beast Lord, after all .

That said her entourage was giving the surroundings quite the stink-eye .

“What do?” asked Fran telepathically .

“We might as well get closer and check things out . ”I said .

“Nn . ”

Fran thanked the adventurer and we headed towards the princess . As we approached we suddenly felt something terribly wrong . A chill ran down our spines . It felt similar to when we were made subject to Coerced Camaraderie in Ulmutt . But maybe not that specifically . Were we appraised by the princess’ guards? Probably not since the sensation was very brief .

“Fran back off a bit . ”

“Nn . ”

We backed away about twenty meters and the offputting sensation disappeared . I then used magic perception and found some sort of active skill covering the entirety of the princess’ surroundings . I decided to try appraising the situation . I had to be very careful in case one of the guards had appraisal detection, I didn’t want Fran to be accused of a serious breach of privacy . It’s best to stay out of trouble .

I first made a copy of myself while still hiding behind Fran . I switched places with that copy so it looked like I was still on Fran’s back . Then I shrunk all the way down to about the size of a ping pong ball . Finally I teleported to right above the princess . Making myself smaller was harder than making myself larger, so I probably couldn’t keep this form for long . I recalled what Kuina did and made an illusion to blend into the sky behind me . I was able to get an appraisal but what I saw was really odd .

***

General Information

Name: Nemea Narasimha

Age: 16

Species: Red Catkin/Golden Lionkin

Class: Swordsman

Status Level: 45/99

HP: 198

MP: 129

STR: 181

VIT: 188

AGI: 202

INT: 147

MGC: 189

DEX: 110

Skills

(Acting: Lv 7)

Singing: Lv 5

Court Etiquette: Lv 6

Presence Detection: Lv 5

Sword Techniques: Lv 5

Sword Arts: Lv 5

Shield Techniques: Lv 2

Shield Arts: Lv 4

Poison Perception: Lv 4

Fire Magic: Lv 5

Dancing: Lv 5

Innate Skills

Awakening

Titles

Princess (Royal Guard)

Equipment

Divine Silk Dress

Appraisal Disguise Ring

Bracelet of Substitution

***

Why the hell is there some stuff in parenthesis? There’s a bunch of notable stuff like acting, royal guard, and even an appraisal disguise ring . Is the stuff in parenthesis things that are disguised that my max appraisal and Eye of Empyrea can see through? I can’t be certain since there might be stuff hidden behind an even stronger layer of disguise . Another confusing part is the “Princess (Royal Guard)” . I can’t tell if it means a guard of royal blood or a guard that specifically attends a person of royalty . I wanted to investigate further but appraisal disguise obscured any further details .

Either way, the princess looked really weak considering she wasthatBeast Lord’s daughter . Though, I guess it’s a bit unfair to compare her to someone that’s S ranked . Besides, she’s actually pretty good for a sixteen year old . The only real issue I saw was that her skill levels were low compared to her status level . Maybe someone carried the hell out of her? I highly doubted that the Beast Lord would powerlevel his daughter but that was the only way to explain the discrepancy .

Wait! Wasn’t she supposed to be fifteen?Did her birthday just pass?

I concluded that the source of my malaise was the appraisal disguise ring . She probably was not someone too suspicious given that the guildmaster was showing her out . Appraising some people around her, I found them to be court ladies and attendants so that made things seem even more legitimate . There likely wasn’t any danger in approaching her .

I slowly made my way back to Fran .

“Looks like we’re in the clear . We can go greet her”

“Nn . Got it”she replied .

Since there currently was only one evolved black catkin and it was well known that it was a little girl, they should instead realize she was Fran . The Black Lightning Princess nickname was a good as identification and provided us a decent social standing in these parts .

We approached the princess and this time got close enough for her to notice us .

“Oh . Are you perhaps the Black Lightning Princess?” she asked .

“Nn . ”

“Oi watch your mouth!” a guard shouted . “You are to address Her Highness with respect!”

Apparently he didn’t like how curtly Fran responded . But the princess reproached her guard .

“Stand down!” she said . “Do you recall that my father specifically ordered us to receive her graciously?”

Apparently the Beast Lord already arranged for stuff ahead of time . Shiet, thanks dude .