A Merchant With Zero Combat Power Who Was A Baggage Handler In A Hero Party (Me), Was Finally Banished And Wants To Be A Steady Merchant. - Chapter 103

‘Princess of the Cliff’.

This story is 200 years old now.

At that time, on this continent, there was a violent war between the land of humans and the land of elves.

One day.

An elf princess fell in love with a knight from a human country.

However, as the princess was an elf princess, she could never be united with a human knight.

The elf princess was so distressed that she consulted her stepmother, who told her that she could not marry a human knight.

“Mother, I have something to discuss with you. Actually…”

But her stepmother was actually a wicked witch.

And she was planning to destroy the elven kingdom one day.

However, she showed no such pretence and her stepmother was always kind to the princess as well, so she was completely deceived.

Then her stepmother said.

“Kihihi…, then I have a very good way. You can use this forbidden magic and become human. But when you become human, you will no longer be able to use the magical powers of the elves. If you do, your body will turn to stone and shatter. Is that still good enough for you?”

The elf princess was lost.

Once the elf princess refused to do so.

Eventually, when a boy was born to her stepmother and the Elven king, the king stopped caring about the princess so much.

Finally, the princess makes up her mind.

“Mother, please make me human.”

“All right. There you go!”

And the elf princess, now human, went to the knight.

“Me… make me, your wife!”

The knight was immediately smitten by the beautiful elf princess, whose beauty was out of this world.

The two were united and began to live together, quietly… but happily, in a corner of the human kingdom.

However.

Such a happy life did not last long.

A large army of elves invaded the land of humans where they lived.

In fact, the wicked witch had lied to the king.

“The princess was kidnapped by the humans. I was watching it happen.”

Believing the words of the wicked witch, the elf king led his entire army into the human country to get the princess back.

One after another, humans and elves kill each other and fall in a pool of blood.

“Stop it already!”

The princess cries out, but the all-out war that has begun will not stop.

The Wicked Witch, watching from afar, was smiling.

The knight and the king then engage in single combat.

“Give me back my daughter!”

“She is my wife. I will not give her to anyone!”

To his surprise, the human knight had realised that his wife was an elf princess.

“Please stop, no more!”

The princess can no longer bear the thought of her loved ones hurting each other and finally releases her supposedly lost magic powers.

The Princess’s earth magic power then tears the battlefield in half with a crack in the earth.

In the middle of the crack of the torn earth, the Elven Princess cries out.

“Please, no more. I don’t want to see any more people I care about hurting each other.”

Immediately after she shouted this.

The princess, who had broken her promise to the wicked witch and used magic, became stone, just as the witch had said.

She then fell headlong into the cracks of the torn earth.

On either side of the torn earth, humans and elves stopped fighting.

The fissure. It is the Great Cliff of Biriola, which still remains on the western continent today, and this is an event that actually happened 200 years ago.

Even today, it is said that on the other side of the torn land lies the land of the elves.

→→→→→

Amaranthia’s poetry, sometimes sung lightly, sometimes gravely. They were firmly in the hearts of the small audience.

Shortly after the start of Amaranthia’s songs.

I had found Mitra standing at the entrance to the mansion.

“Shall I take you somewhere where you can hear better?”

When I called out to her, Mitra shook her head.

“I’m fine here. I can hear it well enough.”

“Then at least sit down.”

I said and took out one of the extra chairs in the warehouse. I urged Mitra to sit down.

‘Thank you.”

Groping for the position of the chair, Mitra sat down in it.

“It seems a little different from the poem I remember.”

“Well… Even well-known renditions get a bit of colour from one singer to another.”

I wouldn’t say this performance is that famous, though.

“The stepmother witch… was, I think, a ‘human’ wicked witch disguised as an elf.”

“That’s because… bards sing the poetry they want the audience to hear, I suppose.”

“I see. So that’s what it is.”

I wonder if Mitra, who answered in that way, really understood what I meant.

This performance is a story about a tragic heroine, the ‘Elven Princess’, who weeps in sympathy with her love and sad fate.

So naturally, the biggest object of hatred for the audience is the ‘Wicked Witch’.

And all the audience present are, of course, human.

So the part about the witch being a ‘human’ witch disguised as an elf was deliberately blurred out by Amaranthia in her singing.

The skill of Amaranthia as a singer can be seen from the fact that she makes such elaborate and detailed corrections.

Perhaps if the audience were all nobles or something like that. Perhaps the story of the human witches’ dark destruction of the elven lands might be told as a shadowy heroic tale in this poem.

Mitra’s expression was as unreadable as ever.

She seemed to be listening intently to Amaranthia’s song.

Then suddenly…

“Master Albus, do you consider slaves and elves to be people?”

She asked.

I honestly don’t know what the intention of that question was.

Is the story related to Mitra and Clarice’s mother, who was a slave?

Whatever it was, I had my answer.

“People, I suppose. Definitely. I don’t see why it should be otherwise.”

“I see.”

Mitra never spoke again.

She listened intently to Amaranthia’s singing.

→→→→→

At the end of the song, Amaranthia takes a big bow and steps off the stage.

Then, in turn, I went up on stage again.

And, as we had discussed, I gave a publicity speech with the closing remarks.

“The shop sells four types of wooden dolls made by the alchemically skilled woodworker Mitra: ‘The Elven Princess’, ‘The Elven King’, ‘The Human Knight’ and ‘The Wicked Witch’. Please take a peek when you return.”

But in the end.

The wooden dolls did not sell at the first show.

However, I did get some response around the area where all ten people who heard Amaranthia’s performance looked into the shop.

“Next time! We’ll sell it at the second show!”

And the second performance.

Not a single guest showed up there.

“Seriously…”

So we had to call it a day as it was.

The wooden dolls, which had been our original aim, did not sell at all and we could not even attract visitors.

As a start for the first day of the theatre’s opening, the content was quite harsh.