Welcome home, Luke!
'Oh my God!　I've got a really pretty girl with me!
Is it true what they say about your great career?
'Finally the star of the show. Now we can finally get our drinks open.
What are you doing here, son? I want to see you first, Luke.

　Starting with my mom who came out to pick me up at the front door, old faces for the first time in fifteen years were making a lot of noise.

　My parents' siblings and cousins.
　And then there are my parents' cousins and their children - so many of them that I can't even begin to count my own relationships with them.

　There are more than 20 people gathered in the large living room that doubles as a gathering place.

　In the foreground are adults who have direct contact with me.
　In the back are people who were still young when I left the village, and children who were born afterwards.

　In contrast to the adults who spoke to them one after another, the children were more interested in the food at the table than I was, and they seemed to be looking forward to the signal to start eating.

　It makes me strangely nostalgic for the old days when I was in their position.

'...... It's been a while, guys. Too many things have happened before I've been gone for a while and I don't know which one to start talking about.
'Don't be in a hurry. Come on, sit down, sit down.

　Mom urged me to sit down in a chair with Garnett, and I realized that a certain person was not here.

'I knew Dad wasn't here. I had a feeling he was.
I'm sorry, Luke. I asked Wally to call you to the next village, but that guy has some work left to do so he can't make it in time. ......
You didn't have to worry about it. I knew I wouldn't be welcome at all by my dad.

　It's not self-deprecation or condemnation, it's really what I think.

　I left the village over my father's objections, who assured me it was impossible for you to do so, and in the end, as he said, I couldn't get out of the bottom rung of the ladder of adventurers, and I didn't even give him a survival report for fifteen years because of my awkwardness and low self-esteem.

　Considering the fact that I had been worrying about my mother all that time, I couldn't complain about being beaten up by the head of the encounter or being turned away from her to welcome her.

Well, let's start with ......

　In front of everyone who couldn't wait to hear his story, he began to talk about his memories of the last 15 years.




　--The first is the many memorable events he experienced as an adventurer.
　There are so many stories to tell, and if I had to tell them all, I wouldn't be able to finish in one night, so I'll just pick out the best ones.

　It was the children, rather than the adults, who were most receptive to this topic.

　I was far from the main character in my own adventure stories; they were all about incidents I saw or heard about in the adventurer's world, or memories of my adventures with other adventurers, but they still had a sparkle in their eyes.

　I'm sure you'll be able to find out what I'm talking about by looking at the ...... adventurer's saga of His Majesty's former self as a child, and I can't help but admire the saga of His Majesty when I was an adventurer.

　I'm not going to be able to say that I'm in awe of equating myself with His Majesty.




　--And when it's time to rest the children, this time I'll talk about the events that have taken place since I took a leave of absence from adventuring.

　The Brave Falcon and the end of the story regarding The Thousand Year Corridor of the Abyss.
　The topic of the weapon shop that opened in Green Hollow Town.

　I told them about getting permission to handle mithril, getting an audience with His Majesty the King, and assisting in the war between the Golden Fang Knights and the Demon King's Army, but at first they were skeptical and didn't seem to believe me.

　If I were in everyone's shoes, I'm sure I would have reacted the same way.

　They believed me when I showed them a sealed letter I had with me and proof that Garnett was a member of the Agentia family of the Silver Wing Knights, but that was the cause of a lot of excitement.

　The talk of being the best in the village and whatnot was getting louder and louder, and I'm afraid I no longer know what the banquet was for.

　I'm sure you'll be happy to hear that, especially when it comes to your mother's joy, and I'm really sorry that I didn't teach her anything until today.




　--But of course, I didn't reveal everything honestly.

　Even if it's a family member, he or she properly hides things that shouldn't be revealed lightly, and chooses only the things that can be told.

　The same is true of the establishment of the new knight's order, to be specific.

　This is a matter that is still being considered and coordinated in the royal palace, so it needs to be kept secret until an official announcement is made.

　Unless you're discussing this matter with someone who already knows about it, you won't be able to confide in the people back home, including Mom, until a little later.




　-- or should I say, I'm not the only one who's told you what's happened so far.

　I've also been told of every single incident that occurred in the village in the 15 years I was away.

　As we lived in the countryside, where changes were few, most of the topics of conversation were related to the residents.

　Who married who, or who left for the city?
　Who's child is whose, or that some grandparents have died.

　Some of them talked about my brothers and sisters, and I was told that for various reasons, they were all away from the village now, so they couldn't attend tonight's banquet.

　Of course, it wasn't a forced reason like mine, but a decent reason, like studying or training for work, which my dad and mom agreed with.

　I'm not going to be able to get to the bottom of it.




　--I was in a lot of trouble with Garnett too, while I was discussing fifteen years' worth of stories with old faces.

　The women, who are more interested in the beautiful girl I brought with me than in what I have to say, are doing their best to adore and question Garnett, who is dressed as a girl and calls herself 'Alma Argentia'.

　I have described them as a group of women in a roundabout way, but more than half of them are the so-called 'country ladies'.

　Garnett was overwhelmed by their lack of restraint and caring nature, and she kept trying her best to respond to them while almost rolling her eyes.

　I mean, don't ask them how far they've come with me.
　No comment on that question either way.




　Eventually the party came to an end around the end of the night, and after most of the relatives had left, Mom and some of the relatives finished cleaning up.

　Me and Garnett were told to take a good rest as we were treated as guests and were advised to take a bath that I had boiled up to relieve our fatigue.

'Are you sure?　I'm the first one in.
I thought customers were supposed to be the first to do these things.
Well, be my guest.

　I sent Garnett off to the bathroom where only one person could enter, and I casually walked into the living room to drink some water to expel any remaining alcohol in my body.

　The living room was unoccupied after the party and cleanup, or perhaps the meeting place.
　There, a man was sitting in a chair at a large table.

　A man with the appearance of a man who has aged me by about twenty years, and whose expression exudes rigor.

''--Dad,''
It's been a while, Luke.

　His voice sounded the same as it did fifteen years ago, with a deliberate restraint of emotion.