“Everyone, let’s clean up together!”
“Huh? What’s this about?”
“Hey, isn’t that the young master?”
“Cleaning? What does he mean by that?”
Kent-chan’s sudden shout from the stage caused everyone gathered in the square to turn toward him at once. In truth, this was all part of the plan. I had figured that, compared to the Margrave, Kent-chan would attract far more attention.
Once all eyes were on him, Emilia-sama stepped forward with a magic tool that functioned like a loudspeaker and began to speak.
“Today we’ll be enjoying the performances before the joint wedding ceremony begins, but as you can see, there’s simply too much trash lying around. So, until the ceremony starts, I thought we could all work together and clean up the square.”
“She does have a point. There sure is a lot of garbage.”
“Well, everyone got a little too carried away this year.”
“The one who got carried away was you, wasn’t it?”
“W-what did you say?!”
“““Hahaha!”””
Laughter rippled through the square.
The townspeople are talking like it’s a comedy sketch, but at least they understand the objective. There’s trash scattered everywhere, so we’re asking the townspeople for their cooperation. And while we’re at it, we’ll collect any suspicious items too.
“Just picking up trash wouldn’t be fun, so I’ll give participants a free coupon for round bakes made by a super-talented chef.”
“Whoa!”
O-oi, Emilia-sama, what are you talking about?!
That would mean I’d be the one doing most of the work. Even though I gave Emilia-sama a protesting look, she just elegantly ignored me. The townspeople are also quite enthusiastic after hearing Emilia-sama’s explanation.
“Alright then—begin!”
“Begin!”
“Wait—seriously?!”
My cry of protest fell on deaf ears as the cleanup operation got underway, so I resigned myself to making round bakes as fast as I could. There was only one griddle with the special round molds, so I had no choice but to do my best.
If I didn’t make as many as possible now, things would become a nightmare later.
“Looking at it now, there really is trash everywhere.”
“There sure is. That young cook’s food is just too good, so everyone keeps buying more.”
“Yeah, I know what you mean. The lady at the diner tried copying his recipes, but the taste just isn’t the same.”
Uhm… could the townspeople please stop acting like all this garbage is somehow my fault? I was slumping in defeat at the thought when one of the traps I’d set suddenly activated.
“Hey! Where do you think you’re going with that trash in your hands?”
“There’s another one over here!”
“Tch!”
“Damn it…. how did you know?”
A human carrying a bag of garbage had tried to slip away from the square, only to be seized by the guards who had been keeping watch over the area. Ao immediately rushed over to the suspicious individuals and did something to the items they were carrying.
A moment later, the two suspects were bound and brought before Emilia-sama by the guards.
“Emilia-sama, these individuals were carrying explosive magic devices disguised as garbage. The magic stones have already been removed by the Champion Slime.”
In truth, I’d suspected that if everyone in the square suddenly started moving around at once, someone might try to retrieve the explosive devices they had hidden. The enemy had used the old hide a tree in the forest tactic.
So our strategy had been simple: if the tree was hidden in the forest, then get rid of the entire forest.
The guards, perhaps because some of their comrades had previously been attacked by members of the shadowy organization and the Human Supremacy Cult, were especially fired up about the whole operation.
“Well done. Please continue with the security patrols. Fufu, now then, I wonder what they’ll be willing to tell us.”
“Hmm. I’ll join you. There happen to be two of them, after all. I’d very much like to have a long talk with them.”
“A-Awaawaawa…””
The two captured suspects were then dragged backstage by Emilia-sama and the former margrave. To be perfectly honest, it would be in their own best interests to spill everything as quickly as possible.
“Here you go!”
“Thanks, young master.”
Meanwhile, the vouchers for the round bakes featured a little drawing of the snack that Kent-chan had made himself. With something like that, there was no need to worry about anyone forging the voucher. And with Maria-san staying right beside Kent-chan, they were prepared for anything that might happen.
“Oh, this is another explosive magic device. Ao, remove the magic stone. But what are they trying to do by planting so many magic devices?”
And when they checked the collected trash, they found three explosive magic devices hidden amongst it. Even the Marqrave was astonished, but that means there were six explosive magic devices planted in total—one Ao found and two the suspicious person tried to take.
This is the strongest evidence that the dark organization and the Human Supremacy cult were determined to ruin the wedding.
“Damn it, no matter how much we burn, it never ends!”
As for me, I was so engrossed in making round roasts that I didn’t have time to think about anything else. Since I was the one who devised this plan, I think the Margave’s family should be a little more considerate of me.
This is translated by Yume Neiji. Kindly read at yumeneijiworks.com
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