Outaishihi ni Nante Naritakunai!! 472

She and the Watchdog 5

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“Your Highness! Princess Consort!”

The door knocked urgently.
After leaving Grau to Moore, I woke up early to the soldiers’ voices, which sounded different from usual.

“Uu… What?”

The bedroom was further inside than the living room, yet the voices were so loud I could hear them even here, which roused my body from bed.
By the way, I wasn’t wearing anything, and I’d only slept around two hours, so I was incredibly sleepy. I looked at the clock. It was only six in the morning; if I had the option, I’d sleep for another five hours.

“Freed.”
“Yeah, it looks like something happened.”

I looked to my side. Freed had already awoken and sat up.
Then he closed his eyes like he was checking something beyond us.

“There don’t seem to be any problems with the barrier…”

That barrier was a magical art Freed spread out over our room.
With the barrier up, nobody could intrude inside the room. Even approaching it was impossible without alerting Freed.
Even Cain seriously shook his head, “Impossible. There’s no way around that barrier.”
That is to say, nobody suspicious approached it. However, the sounds of the soldiers’ voices and their knocking showed no signs of stopping. They were still calling out to us loudly.
As to why we could hear them, Freed set up the barrier to allow that.
It was made so that they couldn’t hear us, but we could hear voices through the door as necessary.
Usually, it was Clara’s voice.
I thought it was necessary, but Freed was as overpowered as ever.
Normally, it was impossible to fine-tune it like that.

“I wonder if something happened outside… Lidi, I’m sorry, but could you put on some clothes?”
“Sure.”

I nodded to Freed’s words. The knocking continued and the voices were growing more desperate.
It was absolutely impossible to fall back asleep in a situation like this.
I hurriedly got out of bed and opened the bedroom closet. I took a suitable dress out. There were some of Freed’s clothes there as well, so I passed a set of those to him.
We had a full dressing room, but we also had a few sets of clothes in the closet for emergencies like this.
Thanks to Freed, my body wasn’t particularly sticky, and all evidence of last night’s lovemaking was removed. I rapidly looked over my body once more and hurriedly put on clothes. As for the back buttons of my dress, I had Freed do them up. I checked myself in the mirror and quickly fixed my hair to be suitable for a public appearance. Meanwhile, Freed put on a shirt, wore trousers, tied his cravat, and adorned his coat.
No matter how urgent it was, we couldn’t show the soldiers anything less than this. That was the bare minimum of decorum.

“Lidi, are you ready?”
“Yup, I’m all good.”
“Just to be safe, stay behind me.”
“Got it.”

He wanted to protect me, so I obediently nodded and stepped back.
We left the bedroom and went through the living room. Then he opened the door to the hallway, which had been knocked on all morning.

“What is it? It’s still early. What happened?”
“Y-Your Highness!”

As soon as he opened the door, two soldiers rushed inside.

“Hyah!”

I was startled. Neither soldier was his usual self.
Just what had happened? While I was in shock, I heard the word, “Princess.”

“Cain! What’s going on?”

Behind the soldiers stood Cain. Due to being widely known as my bodyguard, he was able to walk around freely. He looked at me awkwardly and pointed behind him.

“Well, look.”
“Okay.”

For the time being, Cain’s appearance relieved my worries, so I peeked from behind Freed’s back in the direction Cain was pointing at.

“Eh?”
“Woof!”

Right there was Grau, whom we’d brought in yesterday.

“Grau!?”

Grau was pinning down an adult man with his forefoot. The man was wearing black clothes from top to bottom, and I didn’t recognize him at all.
He was obviously not wearing a uniform of ours, nor was he a soldier of this castle.

“Eh, eh? What kind of situation is this?”
“… He’s probably the assassin whose target was either the Crown Prince or Princess.”
“Huh.”

I blinked in surprise after hearing Cain’s answer.

“He was targeting us?”

The story Cain told me next was astonishing.
It seemed the man snuck inside the castle early in the morning.
Then Grau, who had a good sense for these things, apparently rushed out of the stables and chased after the man.
Cain noticed Grau chasing the assassin through the royal castle, so he went to see what was happening. The combination of a wolf running through a castle and a suspicious man sent the royal castle into a huge commotion.
Even at this time, there were soldiers finishing their night watch and early-rising court ladies.
It was natural they’d scream upon seeing a wolf running through the hallways and an assassin desperately running away from it.
Perhaps while trying to accomplish his goal while running away, the assassin reached close to our room. However, Grau caught up to him there and pounced.
I felt particularly sorry for the soldiers guarding our room.
They were surprised by the sudden wolf’s appearance, but that wolf attacked a man who was clearly an intruder. Without knowing anything, they could only watch in a daze as the wolf attacked the man. When they finally came to their senses, they immediately began knocking on the door to our room.
They called out to us because Cain appeared in front of them and explained Grau was my wolf.
Moreover, I had the King’s permission to keep him.
With that information in hand, they couldn’t capture Grau without leave. After much deliberation, they chose to wake us up.
I see, so that was what had led to this chaotic situation.
I understood but I was still wondering why it happened.

“Grau, did you capture the suspicious person?”
“Woof!”

Grau cheerfully barked while still holding the man down with his forefoot.
His eyes were asking for praise.
Before I realized, soldiers and the court ladies, who were able to enter the royal quarters freely, gathered by.
It probably took some time for word to reach her as Clara rushed in, visibly panicking.

“Your Highness! Princess Consort! Ah, I’m happy you’re safe!”
“We’re all right. It seems that Lidi’s wolf caught the threat before anything could happen.”
“Indeed. We’re fine, Clara.”

I smiled to reassure Clara, who was out of breath from running here.
Clara pressed down on her chest and kept repeating, “What a relief.” Then she noticed Grau and shrieked, “Eek!”

“W-W-Wolf!”
“I thought we sent out a notice yesterday. He’s Lidi’s wolf.”

When Freed explained that, Clara nodded, “I-I did hear that indeed…” while shivering.

“A-And that wolf caught a suspicious person?”
“Yes, so it seems. Grau, thanks. You did well.”
“Woof!”

When I praised him, Grau happily wagged his tail and cheerfully barked.
Meanwhile, Freed ordered the gathered soldiers.

“What are you doing? Seize the suspicious person Grau captured.”
“Y-Yes!”

Soldiers began moving as if they snapped out of a trance. When they approached Grau, he lifted his foot to release the assassin.
We then watched the soldiers take the assassin away.
It was still early in the morning, so Freed dispersed other onlookers.
Clara looked worried, but she bowed her head and went back. The only ones left were Grau, the two room guards, myself, Freed, and Cain.
Cain pointed at Grau with a wry smile.

“This guy is amazing. He noticed the assassin before I did.”
“You can’t underestimate a beast, after all.”

Freed nodded in admiration, but that’s not what was on my mind.
I recalled what I heard yesterday. I turned pale and tugged on Freed’s clothes in panic.

“Freed, hey, hey.”
“Hm?”
“That child won’t be kicked out, right?”
“What do you mean?”
“Didn’t you say that if he causes an uproar, he’ll be kicked out…?”

He ran around the castle early in the morning chasing an assassin. No matter how you looked at it, that was a huge uproar. However, I personally hoped Freed would take extenuating circumstances into consideration.
I rushed to Grau’s side, got on my knees, and hugged him. Then I looked up at Freed with teary eyes.

“Lidi.”
“I hate this. Grau was only protecting us. He didn’t do anything wrong.”

Breaking out of the stables certainly wasn’t commendable. However, his motive was only to protect us, so I thought it’d be all right to overlook it a little.

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Editors: Alexis, CoastalService

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