17 Chapter 17

"Haaa~ seriously?.... There is no need to follow me, guys."  I said, releasing a somewhat defeated sigh.

"No! Young lord! You are to be escorted whenever you are outside. It is for the sake of both you and your servants," said the captain of guards respectfully, with a hint of sternness in his voice. 

I looked at him and 4 other guards behind him, who were silently nodding their heads at the guard captain's words. 

Among those four, there was a young guard, who was acting timidly. It was Cloud, who stopped me from entering the mansion the other day.

Our eyes met and he hastily moved his gaze downwards.

'Hmm?..… Guess he is feeling guilty for the other day.' I thought in my heart. Seeing this I chose to ignore him.

Currently, I am out of the mansion for a stroll across the town. It's already been two days since I returned from that bizarre adventure. I have to say, it was a pain to explain what happened to Joseph and the other servants.

At first, some of them refused to believe that I had encountered some opportunity to awaken my talent in element magic. They argued that there was no proof of something like this happening to someone before. And specifically, they didn't understand the cause of my physical changes at all.

Well, who can blame them? It is not a daily thing you see someone completely changing their appearance. Including their shades of hair and eye colour.

And most importantly, the power which I acquired wasn't as simple as using magic by awakening a specific element. 

From all the information about laws that were blended into my soul, I understood that I can willingly control the element of ice itself instead of just using the power of ice to use magic. Elements are a precise part of nature and a normal awakened person can mold their mana and borrow the power of their awakened element. For me, there is no need to follow that law. Rather I can literally use the element itself accordingly, without borrowing its power.

Of course, I didn't disclose everything about what happened at that mysterious place or about the existence of the orb, that teleported me back.

I only mentioned that I was curious about the area outside our territory and wanted to go check it out and coincidently stumbled across a cave and afterward I found a herb that helped me awaken the element. And as I was lost and couldn't find a way out so it took me a long time to get back.

Well, this was not the end of the questions. After that, they began asking what I did, where did I sleep, how could I have been so well after eating nothing for three days, etc. 

Honestly, it was a pain to explain everything to them in detail, and I couldn't speak the truth, so I had to make up a lot of lies to sound more convincing.

But I gradually dismissed everyone by making them believe that everything went well and I was fine. And as a result, it was decided that whenever I go out, I had to be escorted by guards.

I was planning to take a stroll around our town today. Though it's been more than two weeks since I came to this world, I had not really come out of the mansion. The only time I practically came out was when I did my little adventure.

So here I am, strolling the roads of the town with the 5 of the guards accompanying me. We have no carriage and such and it's really hard to move on a horse on the snowy roads. So I decided to go on foot.

I have no idea why this is called a town though. I mean shouldn't a town be something prosperous? But this place is nowhere close to my imagination of a town.

Getting out of the mansion compound I have only seen a few shed-like houses. The roads were covered with snow, and most importantly there was no sign of a single citizen today.

I turned to the guard captain and asked,

"Why are the roads so empty, why is nobody coming out of their homes?"

To which the guard captain gave me a confused look, and answered,

"Young Lord, you don't know? Most of the houses here are empty. Many of the town residents have migrated out of the territory since last year."

'What?' now it was my time to be confused,

"Why did they? Wasn't this their home?"

Hearing my question all the other guards behind the captain looked down, seemingly hiding their faces.

"Young lord….." the guard captain spoke up.

"Young lord since last year, after the death of the previous lord…the administration of the territory has fallen into mayhem, without proper control and contracts, the merchants and other businessmen have stopped coming to the territory,...and even after being requested by the head butler, they refused." 

he stopped and after glancing at me, he continued,

"And some months ago you…..you asked to raise the taxes on the territory. With no means of stable income, most of the residents couldn't do that, and so...so many of them left their homes and moved out of the territory." 

After completing it he stood there in silence, looking at me. And the other guards were shaking lightly, were they crying? Or…. were they angry?

'Oh shit! Seriously? Well, who knew this guy would be such a fool…..destroying his own territory? On second thought he is a fool or else who would ask the hand of a famously vanished villainess in marriage?' I facepalmed myself in my mind.

I looked at the surrounding houses and looked at the guards. 

*haaaa~ I sighed.

"Okay, let's go back… I am tired of the day."

The captain slightly widened his eyes, "Hmm? You are going back already? It's been only about half an hour." 

"Yeah. Let's go back."

"Alright…"

Saying so we turned back only to stop in my tracks.

"Hmm?" I looked at the ground and saw an otherworldly pair of eyes staring at me.

'What's this….' I wondered.

"A cat.?" I muttered out loud. 'No cat doesn't look like that….or is it some type of cat of this world?

In front of me was a small creature on the ground, on its four legs. Snow white fur, beautiful round eyes radiating a mysterious glint. It had two pairs of horn-like things on either side of the temple and a fluffy tail, much like a snow fox.

I looked back at the guards who were also staring at the creature with confused eyes.

"Guard Captain", I called  "What is this creature?"

The guard captain looked at me and gave me a confused look.

"Young lord, I have no idea… I have never seen such an animal around here before." 

saying so he asked the other guards. 

"Oii, Have you lads ever seen this animal before?" To which the guards shook their heads, indicating they had not.

While we are conversing the creature neared me and started rubbing itself with my body.

I looked at it intrigued. For some reason, I was feeling a strange connection with it.

I picked it up from the ground and looked at its eyes. The eyes staring at me had an intriguing glint as if it was interested in me.

"Do you want to come with me?" I asked it out of nowhere.

In response, it just stared at me. But I could feel it was affirming my offer.

I smiled, "Alright, let's go."

"Young lord, are you taking that to the mansion." the guard captain asked me.

"Yes. I feel it will be a good partner."

"Alright…."

We started walking back, I couldn't see the light smirk on the face of the little creature which was in my hands.

At that time I had no idea that I was bringing one of the greatest sources of chaos with me back home.