Chapter 7 - Please Marry Me

The Seven Dragons Society. Its roots reached back past the Age of Heroes, when Sword Masters had flourished, all the way to the Bronze Age.

At the end of the Silver Age, when gods and magic were at their height, indiscriminate witch hunts and religious wars plunged the world into chaos. Countless innocent people suffered, and before long the gods had become objects of resentment rather than worship.

Then the seven dragons appeared. Ancient beings who had slept through the calamity awoke. Wielding the mysterious power known as psionics, they devoured the divine incarnations with their overwhelming strength. Those who had been persecuted were so moved by the feat that they became the dragons' followers.

The seven dragons did not turn them away. On the contrary, they even taught their followers psionics. Their ranks swelled explosively into a vast organization: the Seven Dragons Society. It was a religion that worshipped the seven dragons as gods and saviors, and a force that had once conquered and ruled the world.

But that was in the Bronze Age. After the first Sword Master, the Sword Emperor, cut down the seven dragons and ushered in the Age of Heroes, the Seven Dragons Society lost its supremacy and fell into decline.

But how did the saying go? Even a ruined fortune lasts three generations. The Seven Dragons Society may have fallen, but it had not vanished. Drawing on the immense wealth it had amassed and the power of psionics, it rebuilt its shattered organization and sought to rise again.

Every attempt ended in failure. Whenever it tried to reclaim dominion over the world, there were people who fought tooth and nail to stop it. At their forefront stood Limon Aspelder, the Sword Master known as humanity's guardian deity.

In short? Limon and the Seven Dragons Society were mortal enemies. The times had changed, and the Society no longer had reason to fight him, but an ancient grudge did not fade easily. There had even been a time when its assassins came after him as routinely as mealtimes.

"This is lovely tea."

"It's cheap tea from a supermarket teabag."

"To find tea with such a rich flavor at such a low price... You really do have a way with people, Sword Lord."

"..." Limon gave the girl admiring her tea a dubious look. She was Li Qingyu, after all.

'Never thought I'd live to hear a princess of the Black Dragon Clan say I had a way with people.' He had heard plenty of other things, of course. A bastard due for divine punishment. A son of a bitch who deserved to be eaten by a dragon. The Seven Dragons Society had given him new nicknames and assessments whenever it felt like it. It was nothing short of a miracle that Sword Lord was among them—a relatively mild title.

And now a princess of the Black Dragon Clan, which bore him the deepest grudge of all seven clans, was praising him like this. If he told anyone, they would have him committed.

"Still, this is a little unexpected."

"What is?"

"I'd heard you lived modestly, Sword Lord, but I didn't realize you lived somewhere so shabby."

Yellowed wallpaper, worn furniture, an old TV that even a junk dealer wouldn't buy... Li Qingyu looked around the studio apartment with fascination. It didn't merely look lived-in; it was overflowing with signs of poverty. Limon answered flatly.

"Modest, my ass. I'm just a broke old man who can't afford to live anywhere else."

"Broke...? You, Sword Lord?"

"Yep."

Li Qingyu looked puzzled, as though she'd heard an absurd joke.

"I thought you had considerable wealth."

"It all got donated years ago."

"Ah, I see." She smiled, apparently understanding at last.

"Donating your entire fortune was a wonderful decision."

Limon gave her a crooked answer. "I didn't make that decision."

"...???" Question marks might as well have appeared above Li Qingyu's head. She couldn't make sense of how he could have donated his money without deciding to. Limon chuckled at her expression.

"I told you. I didn't donate it. It got donated."

"Can that happen?"

"Amazing, isn't it? Those lawmakers got together and changed the law, and somehow it did." Limon snickered. It amused him to see the Black Dragon Clan's princess so bewildered by the state of his finances.

'Well, I can't blame her for being surprised.' Limon had once been quite wealthy. In the Age of Heroes, when Sword Masters were regarded as absolute powers, there had always been people willing to spend any amount to get on his good side. And Limon wasn't the sort to refuse money freely offered. The gold, silver, and jewels he received had filled dozens of warehouses, with enough left over to require new ones.

But after the Iron Age began, the tax exemptions the state had granted him disappeared, and his fortune melted away like a mirage. Special taxes, patriotism laws, the Superhuman Donation Act... One law after another appeared, and an unexpected avalanche of taxes wiped out most of his wealth within a few years. Even the Sword Tower, the sacred site of Sword Masters, went bankrupt because he could no longer afford to run it.

After that, every time he left someone half-dead or damaged property, he paid compensation as freely as water. There was no way he had anything left.

'Maybe I should've stashed some money away while I had the chance.' Back when he'd seen wealthy people burying gold here and there, he'd thought they were acting like squirrels. In hindsight, they had been remarkably farsighted. Granted, most of them had died without leaving anyone the locations of their hidden gold. For a while, hunting down ownerless gold had even been one of Limon's hobbies.

But regret always came too late. Rather than dwell on a fortune he had no use for anyway, Limon turned his attention to a more practical question.

"Anyway, it's about time you explained yourself."

"Explained... what?"

"That request you made earlier."

"Oh, that?" Perhaps because of the abrupt change of subject, Li Qingyu took a moment to understand him. Then she nodded, drew a short, deep breath, and spoke with a serious expression.

"You don't have to give me a child."

"... What?"

"Please become my husband, even if only in name. The Black Dragon Clan will do everything it can to serve you."

"Uh, hello?"

"I won't ask you to do any work, either. As long as you stay put, I'll give you anything you want. If I'm not enough, you can have other women too..."

"Hold it! Stop!!!" After gaping like a fish for a good while, Limon raised a hand to cut her off. His face was a mixture of disbelief and exasperation.

"That's not the explanation I meant."

"It isn't?"

"No. I don't want to hear the terms of the marriage. I want to know why you came to me." Limon folded his arms and fixed her with a steady gaze before adding,

"I don't know why a princess of the Black Dragon Clan would take a washed-up relic like me as a live-in son-in-law just to make use of me."

"... How did you know?"

"I'd have to be an idiot not to, after hearing all that." He didn't have to give her a child. He only had to be her husband in name and stay put. She would grant his every wish and wouldn't mind if he took other women? Those weren't marriage terms. They were employment terms. Li Qingyu wasn't proposing to him. She was offering herself in exchange for his power.

"It's... complicated."

"I bet." Limon's reply was flat. Even for a princess of the Black Dragon Clan, marrying him was not something people would let pass. If the other princesses of the Seven Dragons Society, or even the Black Dragon Clan's own members, rose up against her, she would have no grounds to complain. If she was prepared to risk all that to make this request, her circumstances couldn't be ordinary.

"You don't need to tell me what those complications are. I'm not interested anyway."

Once, he might have wanted to know—enough to capture a few of their officers and torture the answers out of them. But times had changed. The Society had come out into the open, and he could no longer kill its members on a whim. He had no interest in its affairs now.

"What I want to know is why you're asking me."

"Because even if you married me, you'd never covet the Black Dragon Clan's power or wealth."

"True enough." Covet the Black Dragon Clan's wealth? He would sooner covet dog shit. And the clan would sooner turn its money into bombs and blow itself up than hand its fortune over to Limon. Relations between them were that bad.

"But I can't be the only person like that."

"You're not. But no one else will do."

"Why?" If all she needed was a reasonably useful live-in son-in-law, she could find any number of suitable men. She was the Black Dragon Princess, after all, a girl descended from the most exalted bloodline. Yet she had sought out Limon in particular. Li Qingyu hesitated before explaining why.

"Because you're the only one who wouldn't die after marrying me, Sword Lord."

"... You're saying anyone else who married you would die?"

"Yes. Almost certainly."

"Why?"

"Because anyone who marries me is likely to become the target of a terrifying enemy."

"And who is this enemy?"

"That... I can't tell you right now."

"Hmm." Limon's expression turned curious. 'This really is something serious.' Then again, a princess of the Seven Dragons Society looking for a fake husband was serious in itself. Its princesses would sooner topple a country to get the husband they wanted than submit to a political marriage. And if fear of an enemy she couldn't name had driven her to choose Limon as a husband, even in name, that said plenty.

"Just curious: what do you think the chances are that I'll die if I marry you?" He asked about his own risk as calmly as if it were nothing. Li Qingyu answered at once.

"None."

"I was asking for an answer, not flattery."

"I'm not flattering you." She shook her head, then looked at him with somber eyes. "There couldn't be anyone in the world besides us who could kill you, Sword Lord. Could there?"

Limon blinked at her blankly. After a long moment, he burst out laughing. "Pahaha! Now that's what I call knowing your stuff!" He chuckled for a good while longer.

When he finally got his laughter under control, he poured himself more tea, took a sip, and continued quietly. "Well, it's not a bad offer. It's not as if I have any reputation left to lose by becoming a live-in son-in-law. And I could live pretty comfortably."

Him, the fake husband of the Black Dragon Clan's princess. Once, it would have been unthinkable. But times had changed. He was no longer an absolute power. Now that Limon was nothing more than a low-ranking civil servant, no one would care whom he married. There was no particular reason for him to refuse her offer.

"I almost feel bad turning it down."

"... So you don't like me after all?"

"I'd deserve divine punishment if I said I didn't like a beauty like you."

"Then why refuse?"

"Because I'm a civil servant." Limon shrugged and set down his cup. "For all I know, I might have to go after the Seven Dragons Society again for my country's sake. If we were married, that would be awkward for both of us, wouldn't it?"

He knew it was foolish. These days, politicians backed by the Seven Dragons Society were everywhere, and its martial artists enjoyed celebrity as movie stars and the like. Limon had no reason to fight it. Even if the worst happened, people would turn to the Monarchs for help now, not him. Still, he couldn't help it. However much the times had changed, he belonged to an older age, when he had fought the Seven Dragons Society to protect the world.

"... So you're still humanity's guardian deity, Sword Lord."

"Just the stubbornness of an old man who's lived too long." Limon shrugged, then said with a hint of regret, "Sorry I made you come all this way for nothing."

"No, it's all right." Though Limon's gaze was not merely indifferent but cold, Li Qingyu showed no disappointment. She only gave him a bittersweet smile. "Getting to meet you in person, Sword Lord, is already more than I hoped for."