“Wait a moment. Sir Rodrick. I’ll explain everything. The truth is—”
Rowen blocked the door with his back even as he broke out in a cold sweat.
—”Explain?”
Sir Rodrick’s voice turned cold from outside the door.
—”Give your explanation after you open this door. Right now, I’m showing leniency because of our past acquaintance.”
Rowen knew that much. He quickly made excuses while gripping the door handle.
“The thing is… if I open the door, you’ll take the frog, so I can’t open it! This creature is just an ordinary frog. It has nothing to do with Nigel’s disappearance.”
—”We of the knightly order will determine whether it’s an ordinary frog or not. Hand it over first.”
Sir Rodrick’s voice was resolute.
—”I came after hearing the maid’s testimony. Young Master Rowen could be in danger too. What you’re holding right now could be an artifact that summons curses or a dangerous magical beast sent from another country.”
“It’s absolutely not that!”
Rowen shouted loud enough for Sir Rodrick outside the door to hear.
—”That’s exactly why we need to verify whether it really isn’t. If it is something like that, we need to dispose of it immediately.”
“Dispose of it! I’m telling you it’s just an ordinary frog!”
Just as he thought. They were planning to kill this frog. Rowen gripped the doorknob even harder.
It wasn’t simply out of sympathy. This creature had been sitting obediently on Nigel’s bed on the day he went missing. It hadn’t run away even upon seeing Rowen.
‘What if… Nigel had been raising it in secret?’
This could be a pet that the prickly Nigel had been cherishing without anyone knowing.
But if the knights burst in as soon as its owner disappeared and killed the life Nigel treasured under the pretext of securing evidence? What would he say when Nigel returned later?
‘Because you were gone, the knights killed your frog’?
‘Absolutely not.’
To Rowen, anything related to Nigel was sacred territory that couldn’t be neglected in the slightest. Even if it was just a single frog.
“No matter if you’re the Imperial Knights, you have no right to harm my possession—no, something that might be Nigel’s!”
Sir Rodrick let out a hollow laugh from outside the door as if dumbfounded. Here they were with the Empire’s Crown Prince missing, and he was going on about an ordinary frog. His voice grew even colder.
—”Young Master. Are you saying the life of a mere beast is more important than finding His Highness right now?”
—”Killing this creature won’t bring back the missing Nigel.”
It was then.
While still gripping the doorknob, Rowen glanced back. On the bed, between the messy blankets, the small frog’s body was sticking out.
He’d told it to run away and hide. But instead of hiding, the creature was staring intently at Rowen’s back as he blocked the door.
“……”
“……”
For a brief moment, their gazes locked in midair.
Behind him, the captain of the knights was threatening to break down the door, but strangely, just for that moment, the world seemed to stop, silent and still. Rowen’s eyes wavered. Seeing the creature frozen in tension, a strange sense of relief passed through him.
‘That… fool.’
Nigel swallowed dry saliva without realizing it. Rowen Ashfield didn’t even know he was Nigel. With just the speculation that this ‘might be something Nigel cherished,’ with trembling hands gripping the doorknob, he was standing up to none other than the captain of the Imperial Knights.
‘Why would he go so far for me…’
Rowen’s back was soaked with cold sweat, but he wasn’t backing down an inch. That foolish yet upright back made something in Nigel’s chest tingle sharply.
‘…Right. He’s been like this since long ago.’
Always silently from behind, stubbornly loyal to the point of stupidity, staying by his side.
Nigel blinked on the bed, staring intently at Rowen as if sending him a wordless signal. Eyes that were both resolute and tender, as if saying “It’ll be okay, I’ll protect you.”
At that gaze, Rowen’s lips curved up faintly as he turned his head back toward the door. It was a face filled with conviction, fear gone.
But reality was cruel.
“…Two.”
Rowen broke out in a cold sweat while gripping the doorknob. Though he was a student learning swordsmanship, he couldn’t beat an elderly knight who had spent decades in the knightly order. But he couldn’t just let them take the creature…!
The countdown was nearing its end. Rowen squeezed his eyes shut. The door behind him rattled as if hit by a siege ram.
He could only hold them off for a few more seconds at most. Still, he intended to hold out until the end.
It was then.
Bzzzz—
The air twisted. No, it wasn’t the air but space itself that was twisting. A heavy, sticky pressure of magic filled the room, as if some part of the void itself was being forcibly clawed open like tearing paper.
Rowen didn’t notice, focused as he was on the door behind him, but goosebumps spread all over Nigel’s body, sensitive to mana as he was. This overwhelming, utterly arrogant pressure. It was Silvanus.
The air in front of Nigel on the blanket rippled like a heat haze, and then something plopped down. It was a transparent glass bottle.
But the contents weren’t something sweet like candy. Inside the bottle were pieces the size of fingernails, silver-white fragments glinting cold as frost, clinking against each other.
What is… that?
Ugh, Nigel clutched his head with both front feet.
A low, irritated voice that seemed to crush his brain echoed simultaneously inside Nigel’s head.
[These Kaiserions are all so bothersome.]
Nigel stopped breathing. This wasn’t a sound heard through ears. It was a dragon’s word of power, directly hammering the voice into the other’s mind.
[Nigel, I don’t understand why I’m being held responsible for you. You look much better now than before. Anyway, the Emperor doesn’t seem to think so. She’s been making noise for days, so I have no choice but to intervene.]
Silvanus’s pure magic hummed as it enveloped Nigel. Though a standoff was clearly happening in front of Rowen’s dormitory door, time flowed ten times slower, giving the feeling that only Silvanus and Nigel himself existed in this space.
[These are my scales. If you dissolve them under your tongue, you should be able to roughly sort things out. I’d prefer you not bother me anymore with this… though I wonder if that will actually happen.]
Silvanus’s word of power ended there.
There was no explanation about why this had happened to Nigel, whether his physical condition was okay, or what effect the scales would have.
The silver scale fragments inside the glass bottle that had appeared before Nigel were glinting with a cold light.
“……”
Even in his frog state, Nigel was too dumbfounded to say anything. If being infuriating even while helping was a dragon ability, then it was indeed an ability. And right now, Nigel didn’t even have time to complain.
—”Three! We’re breaking down the door!”
Sir Rodrick’s shout came from outside. It was as if time truly hadn’t passed while he’d been listening to Silvanus’s word of power.
Nigel quickly grabbed the glass bottle with both front feet and bit down on the cork stopper with his mouth, tearing it off.
Pop! As soon as the stopper flew off, he tilted the bottle and poured out the scales. Then he swallowed one cold silver scale fragment into his mouth.
“…!”
The scale melted as soon as it touched Nigel’s tongue. Simultaneously, a terrible cold penetrated his entire body, as if he’d swallowed ice that wouldn’t melt, freezing his tongue and esophagus. Nngh, Nigel writhed, his lips trembling in pain.
CRASH—!!!
With a tremendous explosive sound, the dormitory door shattered. The knights outside had finally broken down the door. Rowen, who had been blocking it, raised one arm to shield himself from the debris.
It was at that moment.
Sssssss—
“Uh, urgh? What is this…”
Nigel made a sound from inside the blanket.
Hm? Could I speak like a person like this?
The flat blanket on Rowen’s bed rose up like a giant mountain range in an instant. Simultaneously, the springs screamed and sank deep as if something heavy had been thrown onto the bed.
He felt the texture of the Academy dormitory blanket on his bare skin. And.
“…Hah, hah.”
Rough breathing.
As he moved his body, the blanket covering him slipped down with a swoosh. Slightly sweat-dampened black hair and a sharp jawline were revealed, along with a naked body without a single thread on it.
Nigel looked down at his two large hands gripping the blanket with an expression that couldn’t comprehend the current situation.
What? Did I return? To my original body? His violet eyes examined his own body on Rowen’s bed with disbelief.
Nigel wasn’t the only one shocked.
Sir Rodrick, who had entered Rowen’s room raising dust, shouted while gripping his sword hilt.
“Come out now!”
But the moment he witnessed the scene inside, the old knight’s eyes went wide.
There sat the Crown Prince on the bed with a blank face. He had barely covered his lower body with the pure white blanket.
“…Your Highness?”
