The carriage stopped near the square, not far from the Grand Duke's residence.
I got out of the wagon, and immediately four soldiers surrounded me.
Even though I entered the crowded square, they didn't leave me.
I called Walter, who had followed me to lead the soldiers, and said.
"Please follow me a little farther away. It's frustrating to be so close. I need time to explore on my own."
"But..."
"Kishian must have done that. Stick to me as much as you can."
"..."
"I know, but there's no point in this. It feels more stuffy than when I was in the mansion."
Walter brushed his hair as if he were worried.
It seemed that he had decided to take care of my situation a lot unlike before, so he immediately motioned to the soldiers and made them take a few steps back.
"I will escort you as far away as possible. I want you to be satisfied with this now."
"Thank you. I don't want to wander around too much, so don't worry."
Seeing that the soldiers were quite far away, I crossed the square.
It was a place I had visited once during a festival, so it was not very strange.
I went to a nice cafe with Kishian and ordered tea and dessert.
It was not yet the time I had agreed with Rodrick, so I needed to delay the time.
I sat down by the window and looked out, and saw the soldiers watching around.
They look like they have been ordered by the Kishian to keep a close eye on me.
I felt like I had to make them a little tired.
I left the tea and dessert that I couldn't finish and went back outside.
Later, to confuse the soldiers, I began to choose and visit shops that were crowded with people.
Crowded restaurants, bustling bookstores, bustling jewelers, and so on.
As I tried to kill time and mainly visited a crowded place, Walter finally stopped me.
"Your Highness. Why don't you rest in a secluded place rather than a crowded place?"
"Are you tired of following me?"
"It's not that I'm tired, it's that it's hard to escort. There might be some dangerous seed."
Nervousness hung over Walter's face.
I replied with my usual smile.
"I'm sorry. It must have been a long time since I was too excited to breathe the outside air."
"..."
"Don't worry, I'm going to look around that shop for the last time and go back to the mansion."
I pointed to a nearby dressing room.
It didn't look like there were many people.
Walter wrinkled his eyes suspiciously.
"Are you sure you're going to go back to the mansion for the last time?"
"Yes. It's been a while, anyway."
The sun had set a little because I had been walking around and dragging out my time.
The soldiers' faces showed signs of fatigue.
Sensing that the time had come, I waited for Walter's answer
Walter let out a shallow sigh and replied.
"I see. Then take your time and come out. I'll be waiting for you outside."
I nodded and walked into the dressing room with a leisurely gait so I didn't look too nervous.
A young woman standing at the counter greeted me with a fresh smile.
"Welcome, Guest! Are you looking for something?"
Did Rodrick prepare properly?
I felt a little uneasy and opened my mouth.
"I'm looking for black shoes."
The staff member who heard me looked at me blankly, a little surprised.
Then she asked as if she had come to her senses.
"Where are you going to wear them?"
"I think I'm going to wear them when I go on a long journey."
When I told her the password I had set with Rodrick the day before, the clerk nodded.
"This is the person who decided to visit today. I'm ready, so follow me."
The clerk led me to a small room that seemed to be used as a dressing room.
When I entered, I was greeted by four mercenaries who seemed to have come and waited for me.
There were three men and one woman.
"Elona, I've been waiting for you. You've arrived faster than I expected."
"It was a difficult situation to drag out any longer. Are you ready?"
"Yes, first of all, change your clothes."
One of them handed me plain neutral clothes, shoes, and a hooded robe that covered my face.
If I moved in the same clothes I was wearing now, I would be found out quickly, so it seemed that they had prepared my clothes in advance.
I hurriedly changed my clothes in the curtain-covered space in the corner of the dressing room.
I covered my brightly colored hair with a hood that drew too much attention, and when I came out of the dressing room, the mercenaries led me straight away.
"There is a back door. You will go out there and ride out of the city on the horse I have prepared in the back streets."
"What is the gateway? If you don't have a pass, you won't be able to get through."
"I thought about forging a pass, but there are still a lot of people waiting to leave the city, so it would definitely take too long to get there. So I'll take a different path."
"What if it's a different path?"
"We are going over the mountains east of the city, where there is no gateway."
As the mercenary said, there was no gateway in the mountains east of the city.
It was so rugged that no one thought to cross the mountain and enter the city.
Can I go over the mountain?
The mercenary reassured me, wondering if my face showed such concern.
"We will serve you as comfortably as possible. There is no other way, so please understand."
"...I see. Let's go out first. It's dangerous to stay here for too long."
The mercenaries nodded and quickly led me to the back door.
Feeling my heart pounding like it was going to explode, I hurried to follow them.
***
Last night, Kishian had summoned Walter aside and given him orders.
He told him to pay much more attention to the Grand Duchess than usual.
Walter had been watching the Grand Duchess from the moment she entered the dressing room until now, without taking his eyes off her for a moment.
There was virtually no possibility that the Grand Duchess, who was wandering alone without a maid, could escape on her own.
There would be no way she would suddenly be attacked by a gangster in the dressing room.
Still, Kishian had asked him to do so, so he could not be relieved.
'...It's late'
It had already been thirty minutes since she entered the store.
It was a clothing store, so it might take a long time to look around, but it felt strange.
'...I can check it out.'
Ignoring the Grand Duchess' order to follow her as far away as possible, Walter stepped directly into the dressing room.
The interior of the store was not very spacious.
So much so that he can see it at a glance. However, there was no sign of the Grand Duchess anywhere.
"..."
Feeling as if the blood was draining from his body, he hurriedly began to search the store.
He pushed all the dress forms that obscured his view and opened the door to the dressing room in the corner of the store.
As he made a fuss, the clerk at the counter rushed over.
"Ah, customer! What... now!"
"Grand Duchess, where is the blonde woman who came in earlier?"
"What? No one in our store..."
Just as the clerk, who had been bribed by the mercenaries earlier, was about to ignore it, Walter drew his sword.
Aiming at the neck of the clerk who was screaming in a flash, he replied in a hurried voice.
"Answer me. I came under the orders of His Highness the Grand Duke. I asked you where she was."
The clerk, pale and tired of the sword aimed at her neck, replied in a trembling voice
"There's a back door over there, but I'm good at it..."
Walter immediately ran in the direction the clerk pointed and opened the back door.
He could see the road that led to the dirty back alleys.
In an unexpected situation, he cursed low and called the soldiers who were waiting for him.
"The Grand Duchess is gone! You two should each block the checkpoint and go to the Grand Duke's residence to report the situation! The rest will follow me!"
After hearing the order, the soldiers rushed to Hornbi Mountain to do their job.
Walter led the remaining soldiers out the back door of the clothing store and began to chase the Grand Duchess's trail.
***
I rode my horse and ran frantically.
Walter would quickly notice that I was gone.
Or maybe he's already noticed.
So we rode without looking back and arrived at the eastern mouth of the mountain.
Because of the steep slope of the mountain, I had no choice but to abandon my horse and get off and start moving.
At that moment, heavy bells rang one after another in the direction of the city we had left behind.
'I've already been caught.'
When there was an emergency, it was supposed to sound the alarm like that.
It meant that Walter had noticed that I was gone.
'The checkpoint should have been sealed off by now. It was a good choice to come to the mountain.'
As soon as the bell rings, the checkpoint is sealed.
If I had gone there, I would have been caught before I could try anything.
Fortunately, the situation was avoided, but it was still too early to be relieved.
When we had climbed the mountain for a while, we saw three torches chasing us from behind.
"We got a pursuer. It doesn't seem like there are many heads. I think it's better to deal with it first and move on."
The mercenary leading me in front of me stopped walking as he said that.
He was a little suspicious because he was covering his entire face except for his eyes.
His voice was thick and harsh, as if he had been bruised, and he felt a little reluctant, but now he would be right.
I asked him with a little anxiety.
"Can you do it?"
"Of course."
"..."
"You are a good customer, and I have to take you safely no matter what."
Is it because of my mood? The mercenary's tone felt familiar.
The smile in his eyes when he looked at me was strangely familiar
But I didn't have time to think long about where I saw him.
This is because the pursuers arrived in front of us much faster than we thought.
"Your Highness!"
Walter, who had been chasing after me with two soldiers, called out to me.
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