Although it was a completely different part of the kingdom, and normally traversing such distance in a carriage just like the one the black-haired boy traveled in would take ten days at a minimum – and only if they would exchange horses for rested ones along the way – it didn’t take even a fraction of that time for him to get there.

The truth was, Zoemi and his corpse puppets departed merely a few minutes before crossing the inner border.

The reason was simple – the black-haired boy simply teleported himself, his puppets, as well as horses and the carriage when he decided it was time to go – and he didn’t even break a sweat while doing so.

It was already a feat that he would not even dreamed about only a few weeks earlier, but now it became an easy task – the rate of his growth was simply stunning.

Funnily enough, Zoemi originally intended to arrive a few days in advance, but he had to spend most of that time convincing Benevirau that he would go alone – as his corpse puppets, couldn’t really count as completely separate beings.

In truth, the black-haired boy wanted the dark-blue-haired young-looking butler to go with him, but unfortunately, he was also aware that leaving the territory without anyone in charge would not be a very good idea.

Benevirau’s reaction was rather surprising – if looked at from the perspective of the water sage being the guardian of the Banemor territory for many centuries…

Benevirau was adamant about going with Zoemi, actually, it looked as if he was horrified at the thought of letting him leave the territory for the entire week that the tournament was supposed to take place.

Things got a lot clearer if somebody decided to look at it from the perspective of the young-looking butler being extremely worried about the safety of the one remaining heir to the Banemor family, and especially since the boy was insistent on treating him like family.

The dark-blue-haired man might have tried to keep the relationship strictly master-servant like, but it wasn’t working out at all with Zoemi finding every single reason to hang out with him while calling him grandpa – not in a teasing way too, the black-haired boy was absolutely honest and genuine while calling him that.

…and it wasn’t as if Benevirau didn’t love every single member of the Banemor family as if they were his own children…

Oh, and there was the thing about Benevirau wanting to help Zoemi out and participate in the tournament too – for which the black-haired boy was grateful, but also didn’t like the idea the most.

After all, if the water sage would join in, he would definitely be able to defeat even the most skilled magicians, but that would end up cutting into Zoemi’s training curve.

The black-haired boy was going to use the tournament to its fullest, acquiring as many interesting spells as possible, while sipping on the mana of his opponents.

Zoemi was thinking about the sulking Benevirauwho waved him goodbye, as the carriage entered the capital city of the Victureo territory, Merarara.

First and foremost, even at glance, there were far more magicians living there than in the Banemor territory.

Interestingly enough, the most common attribute amongst them seemed to be fire as the red-haired and red-eyed magicians in the streets seemed to be outnumbering all the other ones at least three to one.

”Sticking with the theme, I see.”

Zoemi smirked to himself before leaning back in his seat, letting the improved corpse puppets and sentinels keep an eye on the situation and all the possible traces of danger, or more importantly, Ghosts of Bellcephora.

As for finding the Victureo’s mansion, it wasn’t all that difficult – the biggest clue was that Ehmi herself was a sage, so her shadow towered over the entire city in the first place.

Still, Zoemi couldn’t help but stare at it from the window as his puppets were doing their best to navigate the city based on the general location of the supposed origin point of the massive shadow phoenix.

It felt very surreal, after all, the black-haired boy had clearly remembered the unique shadow that he was associating with Ehmi – a giant face of the clock with its hands moving around as if actually counting down time.

From the clock to the phoenix, one could say that it was an upgrade – or not, still, it sure was bothersome.

After far more time than it took Zoemi’s carriage to appear in the Victureo territory, they managed to arrive at the gate to the Victureo mansion – just as the guard standing n front of them had announced.

”Good day. My lord, are you another participant in the tournament for young lady’s hand? The registration process takes place in the building near the arena. You can’t miss it, both the registration building and the arena were constructed especially for the event with the help of the most skilled earth magicians in the kingdom. You don’t have to hurry, the official sign-ins end only at midnight.”

The guard turned out to be more friendly than expected, considering that he must have been repeating the same phrase to a noble after a noble that arrived for most likely two weeks, he still sounded just a little bit fed up.

”Hello, I was asked by lady Ehmi to be one of her representatives, do I still have to show up and sign in, or was that already handled?”

Zoemi peeked through the window and responded cheerfully while showing the additional note that Ehmi sent him together with the letter, instructing him to show it at the gate.

”…? Oh…? OH! You are lord Zoemi…?! My lord, please, enter… Hey, you lot! Open the gates! Lord Zoemi is here!”

”…”

The reaction of the guard was quite interesting – seeing the slip his eye’s widened and he immediately turned around and shouted towards his coworkers who were on the other side, all while looking almost shockingly happy.

”My lord, if you please…!”

The guard even bowed down as the gates opened and the carriage was able to pass him, leaving Zoemi slightly confused.

|They seem to be awfully happy to see me… like, me, Zoemi, not the representative that will fight for helping out their young lady…|

Zoemi furrowed his brows, thinking to himself – well, not exactly himself…

True… say, did you ever do some great favor to the Victureo estate? That might shed some light on this question.

Ludier’s unique shadow woke up and asked curiously, causing Zoemi to ponder the situation once more.

|Ehmi thinks about me as a friend… and that’s it. Grazio did give me awful burn marks all over my body and especially my face though. Do you think that it counts?|

…no, that doesn’t sound like it does…

The black-haired boy snickered, but Ludier’s shadow didn’t seem to find that particularly funny.

|He seemed to want to apologize, he even spent what must have been a fortune on the novelty mana potions and ended up leaving them for me under my door in the Academy each day. Apparently, he is a tsundere.|

Zoemi added as the carriage was closing in on the mansion.

Am… Am I supposed to know what a tsun de re is…?

|Nope, don’t worry, don’t worry~|

Ludier’s shadow asked in confusion but Zoemi dismissed him with a lighthearted expression without answering the question.