Side Story: Rutile and Finn
After staying in the Imperial Nation for several years, Rutile had returned to the Nation of the Dragon King. Many women had wept in delight at the news, but despite boasting overwhelming support from the ladies of the land, Rutile had a fiancé named Finn.
Various rumors were floating around about their relationship. Some said Finn, a straitlaced and extremely earnest man, fell in love with Rutile’s valor and wooed her. Others said that Rutile fell in love with Finn at first sight and went after him herself. Some said that Quartz had orchestrated the meeting behind the scenes, and some said that the two were merely pretending to be engaged because they were mutually fed up with people asking them for their hands in marriage.
Both Rutile and Finn understood that the rumor mill was turning because of their extended engagement, but they had no plans of getting married just yet. They had a fine relationship, though, contrary to what the rumors insisted.
“Hold on just a moment. You’re not going on a date dressed like that, are you?” Euclase called with a look of disbelief.
Although they worked in different departments, Rutile and Euclase were close friends, having started working for the kingdom at the same time. At a glance, Rutile’s candid personality and Euclase’s more reserved feminine mindset seemed like polar opposites, but they got along surprisingly well. Despite seemingly having nothing in common aside from the fact that they started their jobs at the same time, the two would often go out drinking together.
Because of that, Euclase knew that Rutile had date plans with Finn today for the first time in years, but Euclase looked at Rutile’s choice in outfit with extreme displeasure.
“Is it bad?” Rutile asked.
“Of course it is! Your first date in years and you’re not dressed with some style?!” Euclase spat back.
Rutile looked down at her own outfit. She was in slacks, something she was comfortable in from wearing her uniform on a daily basis, and a striped shirt. The maids had said it was a good fit for Rutile’s tall, slender body, so she’d worn it in hopes that it would be okay, but it seemed as though it wasn’t. Honestly, being “stylish” was not something that Rutile excelled at.
“It’s Finn. He doesn’t pay attention to things like that,” Rutile noted.
“What are you talking about? No man would be unhappy to see their fiancée all dressed up. I was right to come here to assess the situation. Bring yourself over here for a second!”
“Wait a second. It’s almost time for my date and...”
Euclase then flagged down a nearby soldier. “Hey, you there. Go tell Finn that she is going to be late!”
“R-Right away!” yelped the soldier, intimidated by Euclase so much that he fled as fast as he could. Did he even know where Finn was in the first place?
Assuming that the soldier would figure it out, Euclase took Rutile by the hand. She went along quietly; having known Euclase for a long time, Rutile knew that it was best to follow Euclase’s orders when they were in this mood.
After Euclase dragged her to their quarters, Rutile took a seat and quietly waited as Euclase carefully selected outfits for her.
“Perhaps this one? No, this one.”
“Chancellor Euclase, we will be doing Lady Rutile’s hair, yes?” asked a maid.
“Indeed,” Euclase confirmed.
“Eek! No, I’ll do it!” interjected one maid.
“No fair. I want to!” another chimed in.
Rutile debated telling the growing pack of maids, who had slipped away from their scheduled tasks, to get back to work, but she decided against it. After all, even if she ordered them to leave, they seemed far too enamored with the goings-on to do so.
“Euclase, could you please make sure the clothes are at least comfortable to wear?” requested Rutile.
“You sometimes have to sacrifice comfort for style,” Euclase declared, pulling out a pair of hard-to-run-in high heels.
At that point, Rutile gave up on being comfortable on this date.
“And to match these shoes, you’ll need this one-piece dress,” Euclase said, holding the dress up to show it off to the maids as well. The dress’s design was rare in the Nation of the Dragon King. It was a clean and graceful-looking number—definitely something worth showing off with confidence as Euclase did.
“Oh my, that dress is simply divine. Your taste is superb, Chancellor Euclase.”
“Yes, indeed. It would be a perfect fit on Lady Rutile’s tall frame.”
The maids’ eyes were glued to the outfit. Euclase snickered in delight at all of their praise.
“It would, wouldn’t it? I had it custom-made by Lady Riccia. This time we’ll hit him with the clean and pretty look.”
“That sounds fine, but Lady Riccia is Ruri’s mother, isn’t she?” asked Rutile.
“That’s right,” Euclase replied. “She apparently worked in the fashion industry in her world. She designs new, never-before-seen outfits, so I’ve been frequenting her boutique. The only problem is that we wind up losing track of time during our clothing chats. Perhaps I should foist the job of chancellor on someone else and have Lady Riccia hire me at her establishment.”
“I’m sure that Claus and the others would have something to say against that,” Rutile said with an awkward smile.
Euclase was so capable as a chancellor that Jade and the entire court viewed them as an invaluable asset. They would most likely combine their forces to stop Euclase from quitting.
“Anyhow, now that I’ve picked an outfit, try it on,” Euclase suggested.
“Do I have to? Right now?”
“Silence! Just wear it!”
Realizing that there was no escape, Rutile reluctantly borrowed the room next door and put on the outfit.
“Okay, I have it on,” she said, stepping back into the room.
“Oh my, it looks fantastic on you. It looks good size-wise as well,” Euclase commented.
“Yes. But these shoes seem hard to run in.”
Thanks to her and Euclase having similar shoe sizes, the heels slipped right on. There was a slight discrepancy in size, but the ever-sturdy dragonkin weren’t subject to blisters from ill-fitting footwear like humans were.
“Oh, come now. You’re always putting too much emphasis on comfort. You’re hardly going to be running on a date. I swear, your mind is stuck in the military! Bring it back to being dainty every once in a while. Like yours truly.”
“I don’t think I can be like you, Euclase... I have a feeling Finn would hate it.”
“What do you mean by that, pray tell?” Euclase asked, giving her a death glare.
Rutile swept it under the rug with a slight chuckle. “Okay, now that I’m done prepping, it’s time to go.”
Just as she tried to exit the room, the maids grabbed her by the arms.
“Not yet, Lady Rutile.”
“Yes! There’s still the matter of your hair.”
“Don’t be difficult and let us play with your locks.”
Euclase watched the eager maids hold down Rutile, then let out a smug chuckle and ordered the mob, “Do it.”
“Right away!”
“Very well, Chancellor Euclase!”
The maids all happily inched toward Rutile with combs. Rutile mentally apologized to Finn, knowing that this would be a very time-consuming process.
After they thoroughly primed and prepped Rutile, the maids looked content, and Rutile’s hair was nicely and elegantly set.
“What do you think, Chancellor Euclase?” one of them asked.
“Looking nice. This will knock Finn dead,” Euclase remarked.
Rutile looked at all of the faces, brimming with a sense of accomplishment, and gave them a wry grin as she prepared to leave the room—and actually leave it this time.
“Thank you. I’ll be going now,” she said.
Euclase nodded. “Yes, tell me about your date later over drinks.”
“Of course.”
Rutile then parted ways and hurried to the meeting spot. The unscheduled makeover had eaten up a ton of time, so when she spotted Finn, she ran up to him as fast as she could in the uncomfortable heels and apologized the second she opened her mouth.
“I’m sorry, Finn. I didn’t mean to make you wait so long.”
“No, that’s fine. I heard Euclase nabbed you. You were bound to be indisposed, right?”
“Well, yes. More or less,” Rutile said with an ambiguous smile, and Finn sighed in exasperation.
Rutile knew that Euclase had sent someone to inform Finn, and Finn wasn’t the type to get mad over someone being late in the first place, but she was relieved to see that this hadn’t ruined his mood.
“You seem quite different today,” Finn said, intrigued by her aura. He had expected Rutile to be gussied up since he’d experienced Euclase’s strange enthusiasm when it came to dates on more than one occasion.
“They said they would hit you with the ‘clean and pretty look.’”
“I see. Yes, quite clean and pretty, indeed,” Finn said, nodding in agreement.
“Doesn’t really suit me, though,” Rutile shot back.
“No, I think it looks great on you,” Finn insisted as his face relaxed. He gave a tender smile, and Rutile’s lips curled into a smile as well. “Now, let’s be off,” he said, holding out his hand.
“Yes, let’s,” Rutile urged, taking it without a second’s hesitation.
◆ ◆ ◆ ◆
The capital was abuzz with excitement over the fourier. The first wave had already passed, and there was more yet to come. Because of that, droves of people wandered the capital—much more than usual. Rutile gripped Finn’s hand firmly, wanting to avoid the struggle of finding one another if they were to get lost in the crowd.
“Always a slew of people every time, isn’t it?” she commented.
“Makes sense considering it only happens once every fifty years. In a way, you couldn’t have come back from the Imperial Nation at a better time, Rutile.”
“Yes, that’s true,” Rutile concurred, noting that she would’ve had to wait another fifty years if she missed this chance. “Still, it seems a lot has happened in the years I’ve been away.”
“True. The biggest difference is probably Ruri, right?”
“I’d say so,” she said with a chuckle as she looked around her. There was a ton of fourier merchandise, but there was just as much merchandise with the Beloved’s name plastered on it—a true sign that the people of the capital had accepted Ruri. “I never would have dreamed that I would lay eyes on a supreme-level spirit in my lifetime.”
Finn’s conflicted expression gave Rutile the impression that he had mixed feelings on that subject. “They gather around Ruri for some reason. It has caused His Majesty a lot of grief. Supreme-level spirits need to be treated with even more care than Beloveds.”
Supreme-level spirits were practically legendary, and because they operated with a different sense of values than mortals, interacting with them required extreme caution.
“Still,” Finn continued, “Ruri has Lord Kotaro and Lady Rin subjugated, and Lady Riccia has the Spirit of Fire by the reins, so there have thankfully been no major issues.”
“I’m surprised that she has supreme-level spirits subjugated.”
“All I can say is that’s Ruri for you. It’s even more reason for us to guard her too. In that respect, it’s a great thing that you’ve come back home, Rutile.”
“Were you her bodyguard this entire time, Finn?”
“At first I was, but it’s mostly Ewan or Joshua taking guard duty nowadays.”
“I can see Joshua doing that, but Ewan? He must have grown considerably if he’s allowed to escort a Beloved.”
To Rutile, Ewan was still just the cute little brother with a lot of growing up to do, so she was honestly impressed that he had been filling such a big role. At the same time, she wondered if Ewan could handle guarding a Beloved considering he still barked at people like a tiny, overprotective dog.
“At first, it was mostly me on guard detail, but he got confrontational with Ruri. It was a terrifying thing to witness back then, but they ended up getting along surprisingly well, and nowadays they’re pretty much friends.”
“Aah, so he did butt heads, then,” Rutile said. She figured there was no way that Ewan, with his huge brother complex, wouldn’t react poorly to a woman being next to Finn. After all, he had barked at her so many times in the past, but each time, she had made sure to teach him who he could and couldn’t bark at—the hard way. “Is Ewan as infatuated with you as always?”
“Yes, same as he ever was. I still don’t know why he’s so attached to me,” Finn said, sounding like he found it somewhat endearing. Finn had a soft spot for Ewan, although he himself was oblivious to it.
“Personally, I was able to focus on my work in the Imperial Nation with peace of mind knowing he was over here acting as my guard dog while I was away. You’re popular among women and men,” Rutile said, causing Finn to look slightly astonished. “What is that look for?”
“I just didn’t expect that to come out of your mouth.”
“And what do you mean by that?”
“I’m talking about when word got around that we were engaged. Spears and arrows came flying at me. Magic attacks were launched at me the moment I ran into you. My food became extremely spicy. I faced so much harassment that I simply lost count.”
“That did happen, didn’t it?”
Finn was recalling when they first got engaged. Most people hadn’t even known that they were dating, and everyone thought that they were often together because they were good friends. Neither of them had shown any inklings of romance.
However, quite a lot of people had their eyes on Rutile, so the announcement had triggered sheer pandemonium. Jade was right in saying that she was a natural flirt, because she was even more popular than Finn. The news that they would be wed sent the brunt of everyone’s resentment right at Finn. If he weren’t the second strongest dragonkin after Jade, then he would have long since died from the perils he’d faced every day back then.
On the flip side, Rutile hadn’t received any harassment whatsoever, so she had remained carefree throughout the whole ordeal. She had even laughed while Finn was in the middle of a sneak attack, walking off and jokingly remarking to him to “have fun.” Sure, she’d only done so because she was confident that Finn wouldn’t be harmed, but it wouldn’t have hurt her to help just a little.
“Oh well, that is ancient history. I’m glad you’re safe and sound, Finn,” Rutile said with a sweet smile.
Finn heaved a sigh. “You weren’t flirting over in the Imperial Nation too, now were you?”
“I swear, with His Majesty and you—what do you both take me for? Admittedly, I did receive flowers from a lot of the maids there,” she said with a delighted smile.
“I knew it...” Finn muttered.
“I didn’t have the best time being around all of those stuffy nobles, but everyone else treated me just fine.”
“The Imperial Nation’s nobles, eh? I’m guessing you’re the only one who could deal with those types smoothly.”
“That isn’t true,” Rutile protested.
“Even so, no one would willingly volunteer. Dealing with them is even harder because the Nation of the Dragon King doesn’t have anything resembling ‘nobles’ or ‘aristocrats.’ Ever since Ruri cropped up here, they have been throwing around a lot of baseless accusations.”
“Yes, they are the only nation of the allied four that doesn’t have a Beloved.”
For the already haughty nobles of the Imperial Nation, they must have felt it was a disgrace that only their nation was devoid of a Beloved. They probably hadn’t cared all of this time because the Nation of the Dragon King had also been without a Beloved for years until Ruri showed up, but now that Ruri was here, the Imperial Nation was the only one of the allied four that could not receive the spirits’ blessings. The fact that the nation was primarily humans and lacked people with mana was also one of their shortcomings.
The Imperial Nation’s nobles had an inferiority complex that stemmed from their lack of power compared to other nations, which was due to their having very few magic-users to their name. Despite that, they claimed to be superior to others, so their mindset was taxing, to say the least. The slightest remark could send them into a frenzy. Adularia was a fantastic emperor for keeping the nobles in line in spite of their temperament—that was Rutile’s honest opinion.
“All we can do is hope that a Beloved shows up in the nation just as Ruri showed up in ours,” Rutile said.
“Yes. That aside, didn’t you say you wanted to go out because there was somewhere you wanted to visit?” asked Finn.
“Yes, there was.”
With that, Rutile led the way to the perfect little spot for weapons and armor. Not a very good place to have a date, but it was one of Rutile’s favorite shops. Finn looked rightfully ambivalent. He’d expected somewhere that couples would frequent when he was told this was a date.
“Is this really the place?” Finn asked.
“Yes, I wanted to buy a new sword,” Rutile answered, giddily skipping into the establishment first.
After letting out a reluctant sigh, Finn also headed inside, looking as though he wanted to point out that this wasn’t very romantic, but it was very Rutile.
The weapon shop had absolutely nothing to do with fourier amidst the fourier fever that had overtaken the capital, but a surprising number of people were taking the opportunity to visit the Nation of the Dragon King’s weapon shops.
In the capital, weapons and armor not only contained rare minerals from other lands, but they were made from dragonkin claws and scales as well, both tougher and sturdier than metal. Weapons made from these materials were not available elsewhere, so they were special items that could only be obtained in the royal capital. Many tourists took the opportunity while visiting the Nation of the Dragon King to purchase them.
Among the capital’s weapon shops, this shop in particular had the best reputation for making sturdy products that could withstand a dragonkin’s use. It was Rutile’s favorite stop, but it was also the go-to destination for many dragonkin. Incidentally, Finn’s sword was also from this establishment.
Being regulars, the shopkeeper knew them both by face. When he saw Rutile, he called out to her in a friendly manner, “Ooh. Well, if it isn’t you, Lady Rutile. You’ve made your return from the Imperial Nation, I see.”
“Yes, I arrived back not too long ago,” Rutile replied.
“Then am I to assume that you and Master Finn are on a date right now?”
“Yes, you would be correct,” Rutile said without a moment’s hesitation.
“Ho ho ho ho,” chuckled the shopkeeper in delight. “If this is a date, then you should be somewhere with more ambience. However, as owner of this establishment, I welcome you with open arms.”
The shopkeeper scuttled over to Rutile with a big smile still on his face and whispered, “Thing is, I have some extra-special merchandise that I was going to show to you whenever you dropped by. Interested? All of my selections are good enough to present to His Majesty the Dragon King himself.”
“Then please show me!” Rutile exclaimed.
“Okay, but it’s quite expensive,” added the shopkeeper.
“Put it on Finn’s tab.”
“Rutile...” Finn grumbled, but Rutile paid him no mind and disappeared into the back of the shop with the shopkeeper. Not long after, she returned with a new longsword in hand, a satisfied smile across her face.
“Finn, he had some incredible swords. I’m getting this one!”
“I see...”
Rutile looked at the sword in her hands with such joy that she was liable to hum a ditty at any second. It warmed Finn’s heart to see her so delighted, but as soon as the shopkeeper slipped Finn the bill and Finn looked at the total, he felt his head spin for a second.
“Is this the right amount?” he asked, incredulous.
“Yes, sir,” the shopkeeper confirmed.
“You don’t have a digit wrong?”
“No, sir. It’s right as rain.”
Finn was left speechless.
“A small price to pay considering it’s a present for your dear fiancée after reuniting for the first time in years,” the shopkeeper insisted in a devilish whisper.
Admitting defeat, Finn pulled out his wallet.
With her newly acquired, high-quality sword in hand, Rutile thanked Finn for footing the bill.
“Thank you very much, Finn.”
“Think nothing of it.”
While it hurt to part with so much money in one go, Finn decided to put it out of mind because it made Rutile happy—though he noted he might need to cut back on his spending for a while.
Afterward, the two walked around the bustling town and enjoyed their date like a regular couple.
Once Rutile returned to the castle, she joyfully showed Euclase her spoils for the day, the brand-new sword, but Euclase scolded her in return.
“You should be asking for jewelry or accessories on a date, dummy!”
“But don’t you think a sword is better than jewels?” Rutile asked.
“Yes, it simply screams you, but I think I can see why you two haven’t made any progress toward actually marrying,” Euclase remarked.
“I don’t think those two things correlate.”
“I personally wanted to hear something a little more scandalous from you, but I don’t see that happening for quite some time. Finn truly is the only one who can handle you.”
“Um, thank you very much?”
“That is not a compliment!” Euclase snapped, fiercely correcting Rutile’s naivety.
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