There was a kingdom on the brink of ruin.

The Aarl Kingdom, which had once flourished as the hegemon of the continent, was now in a dire predicament.

The newly enthroned queen, [Enora Frau Flauro], was a princess of great beauty, with blonde hair and blue eyes.

Only seventeen years old, she had been raised with great care by her parents and those around her.

However, her parents had fallen ill, and her brothers had lost their lives in the war.

The Aarl Kingdom was in a situation where it had no choice but to enthrone Enora as queen.

This was all because a Demon Lord had been born.

The Demon Lord, who appeared leading an army of monsters, destroyed the nations of the continent one after another.

The Aarl Kingdom fought back, but after a string of defeats, it no longer had any decent military power left.

Ruin was right before their eyes.

In the audience chamber, there were only old men and young knights.

Those who could fight had been sent to the battlefield, and even children under the age of fifteen were being knighted.

The scene itself told the story of how desperate their situation was.

Enora sat on the throne, holding the scepter that symbolized her royal authority.

"I wonder just how much more of this painful ordeal the gods will force upon us."

Hearing the report from her subordinate, Enora cast her eyes downward.

The enemy was already closing in on the capital.

They had almost no troops left, and no reliable generals.

They were in the process of scraping together retired generals, knights, and soldiers.

Everything was just too hopeless.

An elderly minister offered his counsel to Enora.

"Your Majesty, there is nothing more we can do. In that case..."

"I understand. We will summon a Hero."

It was a forbidden art passed down in the Aarl Kingdom.

They would summon a Hero from another world to fight the Demon Lord.

The one they would summon was an existence capable of defeating the Demon Lord.

However, the summoning was a one-way trip.

Once a Hero was summoned, the kingdom would have to take care of them.

It was a double-edged sword.

They would be saddled with an existence that could even defeat the Demon Lord.

If the Hero were to rebel, it was uncertain if the kingdom could stand against them.

Furthermore, as the royalty entrusted with the land, they felt conflicted about entrusting the fate of their nation to someone from another world.

"We have not a moment to spare. Begin the Hero Summoning!"

When Enora stood and declared this, her vassals replied with a sharp "Yes, Your Majesty!"

Enora headed for the room where the summoning ritual would be performed.

◇

The scene shifts to another world.

A planet called Earth.

There, a high school girl was returning to her apartment.

She had worked her part-time job after school, so it was already night.

When she opened the door to her old, cheap apartment, it made a strange noise due to its poor construction.

It was the usual.

"I'm home."

She announced her return to her mother, who seemed to be asleep with the TV still on.

Even though it was the season to be getting warmer, she hadn't even tried to put away the kotatsu, a low, heated table.

Her mother, who had once been beautiful, was now a shadow of her former self.

She took out the discounted side dishes she'd bought at the supermarket on her way home and started preparing dinner.

As she made noise in the kitchen, her mother woke up.

"Oh, welcome home. More importantly, today's payday, isn't it? How much did you make?"

The high school girl—[Yasui Kanami]—handed her mother thirty thousand yen.

Her mother took the thirty thousand yen, happy at first, but her mood quickly soured.

"Is this all?"

"Don't expect so much from a student's part-time job."

"Kanami, a school education is meaningless these days. Why don't you get a job that pays more? You're cute, just like me. I'm sure you'd be popular."

Kanami showed her disgust at her mother, who was implicitly suggesting she work at a nightclub.

"Why don't you get a job!"

Kanami didn't have the money to dye her hair, so with her black hair, she looked prim and proper at first glance.

However, her life was poor, and the constant arguments with her mother had made her sharp-tongued.

She used to be much more ladylike.

"Don't say such impossible things! I have no work experience, you know. I even got fired from my part-time job right away."

"Don't talk about something that happened years ago. Just get a job already."

"You're saying that too, Kanami? Even though you know how much I've suffered."

"Isn't it your own fault?"

Irritated, Kanami left the room to go for a walk.

She couldn't relax at home with her mother there.

Walking down the street at night, Kanami wore a tired smile.

"Aah, I'm so tired."

She used to have a much better life.

But because of her mother's own doing, she had lost her father.

He wasn't her biological father, but her first father was the only one who had ever loved her.

He was gone now.

Besides, she had hurt her father when she was a child.

She had said she wanted a new daddy.

After that, the new daddy abandoned both her and her mother.

"I don't care anymore."

Dropping out of high school and working didn't sound so bad.

Just as she was thinking about leaving home and living on her own, the ground suddenly began to glow.

"Huh?"

A magic circle appeared, and Kanami's body was sucked into it.

"W-Wait!"

Just like that, Kanami was summoned to another world.

◇

When she opened her eyes, Kanami was in an unfamiliar place.

Before her stood a woman with blonde hair and blue eyes.

She held a staff and wore a crown.

"Wh-What is this!?"

As Kanami stood there bewildered, the woman greeted her respectfully.

"It is a pleasure to meet you, Lady Hero. I am Enora Frau Flauro—the queen of this Aarl Kingdom."

"Queen? Huh? Hero?"

Feeling a sense of urgency, Enora explained the situation to the confused Kanami, who couldn't process what was happening.

"Lady Hero from another world, please forgive our rudeness. However, we had no other choice but to summon you."

"Summon?"

What on earth was she talking about?

Kanami looked around and saw that she was not in a familiar place.

She was on an altar, the kind used for suspicious rituals, and around her were old men in robes who looked just like wizards.

The old men looked pleased.

"It's a success. It's a success!"

"The great wizard Lord Shitasan's Hero Summoning was a success!"

"Uhyahya, with this, our rise to prominence is assured!"

The wrinkled old men's mouths were missing teeth.

Around them were the apprentices of these old men, also looking at Kanami with joy.

As Kanami found this frightening, Queen Enora frowned.

She wasn't irritated with Kanami, but angry at the old men.

"Shitasan, be quiet. You are frightening the Lady Hero."

The leader of the wizards, called Shitasan, was impudent even to the queen.

"I will not stand for that, Your Majesty! Without our clan of summoning mages, the Hero could not have been summoned. Without us, this kingdom—"

They seemed to have started arguing about something.

Kanami couldn't keep up with the situation and was only growing more confused.

(W-What in the world is—huh?)

Just then, the magic circle began to discharge electricity.

With a crackling sound, a black-haired man emerged from the magic circle.

He had purple eyes and looked to be in his late teens.

However, he was cloaked in a strange aura.

Upon emerging from the magic circle, he glanced around with a look of displeasure.

Unlike Kanami, he showed no signs of panic.

And Enora, along with everyone else, was flustered by this unprecedented event.

"Shitasan!?"

Enora called his name, demanding an explanation for what had happened.

However, Shitasan could only panic.

"N-No, there is no record of such a thing. I have no idea what is happening."

His earlier bravado had vanished.

Kanami could somehow understand that the appearance of another person—a man—from the magic circle was an anomaly.

But, looking at the man's attire, she thought.

(Aren't those clothes quite expensive?)

He was dressed casually.

On the bottom, he wore black trousers and leather shoes.

On top was a white shirt, but all of it looked to be of high quality.

He wore precious metals, and Kanami vaguely wondered what kind of rich person he was.

And, she felt a somewhat nostalgic presence from him.

The man was looking at the magic circle with dissatisfaction.

He crouched down and began to find fault with it.

"What is this shoddy magic circle? To think I was summoned by a circle of this level... it's pathetic."

Shitasan, having had his work called shoddy, turned bright red and retorted.

"H-H-How dare you say such a thing! This magic circle was created by our ancestors three hundred years ago! It is a great and unique Hero Summoning circle, the only one of its kind in this world!"

It just looked like a complex pattern, but it must have some meaning.

But the man just scoffed.

"You've been using the same old magic circle for three hundred years? What a bunch of stagnating fools."

Such an audacious attitude.

The man was completely composed.

Unlike Kanami, who could only be confused, his attitude was as if he knew exactly what was about to happen.

"Well, you didn't try to enslave me immediately after summoning, so I'll at least hear you out. You there, the woman, you're the representative, right? Spit out the details, quickly."

Without being told, the man had seen that Enora was the queen and made her explain the situation.

Those around them were angered by his rude attitude, but Enora silenced them.

"My apologies. I never expected two Heroes to arrive, and I lost my composure."

"Unplanned, huh. You really are incompetent."

Shitasan shot him a frustrated look, but when the man heard the situation from Enora, he started laughing.

"I don't know how to apologize. But, Lord Hero, please, save our country."

"Save your country, you say? Ahahaha, are you people sane?"

The laughing man announced his name.

"You're asking me, Liam Sera Banfield, for help? Of all people, me!"

The reaction of those around him was strange.

Apparently, they were concerned that he had a middle name.

Enora asked fearfully.

"U-Um, could you possibly be a nobleman from another world?"

"You probably wouldn't understand even if I told you, but that's about the gist of it. Well, whatever. I'll help you out to kill some time. Now, hurry up and show me the way."

Even though there were armed knights all around, the man—Liam—was yawning.

◇

Meanwhile.

At Liam's mansion, a large number of people were moving about frantically.

A group of mages in Liam's service, their faces pale, were investigating the room from which Liam had disappeared.

Watching over the mages was an enraged Marie.

"You lot, what in the world were you doing!"

A weapon was clenched in her hand, and the mages were trembling.

"W-We are terribly sorry! H-However, this mansion is equipped with multiple layers of security to interfere with summoning magic. To think it was breached means it must have been a considerable—eek!"

Marie pressed the blade of her sword against the mage's neck.

"We know from the video footage that Lord Liam was summoned by someone in this room. In other words, this is your mistake. Am I wrong?"

"N-No, you are not!"

"It's a shame I can't cut you all down. I can't dispose of you while Lord Liam is absent. Don't you forget that. Find a trace of him, no matter what!"

The mages under Liam were not incompetent.

He had hired them with excellent treatment, and they were a group of outstanding individuals.

For the magical security prepared by such people to be breached so easily was something that should never have happened.

The head of the person in charge would certainly roll, as would the heads of anyone involved, physically.

However, if she did that, it would become difficult to find any clues.

She wanted to hire new mages, but it would be bad if anyone found out that Liam had disappeared.

"If word gets out that Lord Liam has vanished, what will happen to the faction that has finally come together?"

Approaching the irritated Marie was Rosetta.

She looked terribly pale.

"Marie."

"Lady Rosetta!? Someone, take Lady Rosetta back to her room at once! Lady Rosetta, you must not leave your room. You just collapsed."

Upon hearing that Liam had been summoned, Rosetta had fainted.

Because of this, maids and a doctor were standing by behind Rosetta.

"I'm sorry, Marie. I insisted on leaving my room. More importantly, does it look like you can find Darling? You can find him, right?"

"—Of course. Now, please return to your room."

A full day had passed since the summoning, but no decent clues had emerged.

According to the mages who analyzed the footage, "We can't understand how such a primitive magic circle could have broken through this security!?"

An enraged Tia was supervising them, forcing them to continue their analysis even now.

After Rosetta left, Marie stomped her foot hard on the floor.

Kukuri emerged.

"You summon me rather violently."

When his face appeared from the floor, the mages were startled.

Marie threatened the mages, "I'll kill you if you stop working," then brought her face close to Kukuri's.

"Kukuri, I must have misunderstood you. To think you're still alive after letting Lord Liam be taken away... do you have no shame?"

"I'd rather not hear that from you~"

The two exuded a dangerous atmosphere, but Kukuri backed down.

"Well, I'll admit it was our fault. However, one of my subordinates has also gone missing along with Lord Liam."

"Did you assign a useless subordinate to Lord Liam?"

Kukuri laughed at Marie's provocation.

"Kuhahaha—he was one of our most skilled, you know. Still young, but he possessed sufficient skill. That's why, like this..."

Kukuri's subordinate, who had been lurking in Liam's shadow, had instantly left a memo.

Marie took the memo.

"A code?"

"He attempted to cancel the summoning magic, but it seems he failed. This was despite the summoning magic being of a primitive type. There's something more to this."

It's too simple.

The structure of the summoning magic was so simple that they couldn't determine the purpose of the summoning.

Marie threw the memo aside.

"You people, search for Lord Liam as well."

"You don't have to tell us. However, if I may say one thing—do not forget that you have no right to command us. Our master is Lord Liam."

Laughing eerily, Kukuri disappeared as if being sucked into the floor, deliberately directing his killing intent at Marie.

Marie gave a cold smile, showing she was unfazed by Kukuri's provocation.

"Do you really think you can take me on?"

Without Liam, the unity of the Banfield family was already beginning to crumble.

Wakagi-chan (Sapling-chan) ( ゜д゜): "......Why is everyone so hopeful about the World Tree that hasn't even appeared yet? Can't you imagine a pattern worse than me? Compared to that thing, I'm practically cute."

Brian (´；ω；｀): "It's painful to have the afterword hijacked."