The Villainess Is An SS+ Rank Adventurer

The hat merchant sat casually as darkness thronged above.

No differently than were he watching the passing townspeople brushing by in the streets of Reitzlake, he wore a modest smile as he found his first customer of the day. He would be as disappointed now as he was when last we met, those many days ago upon my arrival in the royal capital.

He was one and the same. 

The face was already forgotten. But the pink cloche hat was not. 

It peeked from atop his crate of wares with so much garishness I was shocked it wasn’t already being haggled with coin and blood between all the noble ladies of my kingdom.

I kept my sword raised. Just as I returned the smile.

“My, isn’t this a quaint sight? … A common hat merchant. You appear to have lost the road.”

He casually gestured above without turning his gaze.

“I heard this was the end of the world, Your Highness,” he answered with lively candour. “What better road is there for business than this?”

“Quite a few, I imagine. My magnanimity may be bottomless, but sadly my personal funds are not. I’ve a particularly gluttonous horse to feed, to say nothing of my loyal handmaiden. And I’m unaccustomed to them stiffening to anything other than my suggestions that we purchase fewer premium apples.” 

“A temporary respite for your hard working staff. And when their eyes next blink, I hope through my strenuous efforts that they may do so hale and hearty. Them and all the people of this fine kingdom.”

I raised an eyebrow.

“A hope you have little say in. I confess I cannot recall the last time my tutors whacked a history book upon my head which contained any pages on the great deeds of hat merchants.”

“Nor will you ever. Great deeds result in great gratitude. But gratitude is cheap and the memories of those who offer them cheapest of all. My duty is to my livelihood. I come when night is bleakest, for that is when crowns shimmer as brightly as the stars. And I see it is very dark right now.”

To this declaration, he offered a smile neither cold nor merry. It simply was, like an impression of a smile crafted long ago and never changed. 

All I saw was the opportunism, shovelled from the ground for all the world to see.

“My, how wondrous. To be chased by a vulture of coin across the length and breadth of my kingdom.”

“What can I say, Your Highness? I’ve an eye for hats and an eye for who might fit them. And I do believe I’ve just the right one for you.”

“There is adamancy. And then there is foolery. I regret that point is automatically reached the moment you suggest anything you sell is anything I can wear.”

“I suggest nothing. As a merchant, I speak only in truths, lest a claim against my good name be sought against me.”

The hat merchant dipped his palm into his crate, delving past the cloche hats, berets and straw hats. 

What he retrieved was a crown of glimmering stardust. 

“The Last Night, this is called,” he said, twirling it like a quill. “Presented to the Elven Crown Princess on the evening her realm was burned by the Summer Fae. It was forged by the fires raging in her palace. The final work by the mastersmiths of her realm. Untarnishable silver, imbued with both starlight and flames, the form changing with the seasons, the day, even the hour.”

“A fine crown to be tossed through my window. And yet my point still stands. How it glitters matters less than the exchange of coins, for that act alone will dull any thing of starlight beyond use. I cannot wear anything one can purchase or barter like a sack of grain.”

The hat merchant laughed. 

Not bellowing and loud like a drunkard in a bar or a lich lost amidst his schemes. But short and jovial, like a friend across a table. He was no such thing, of course. This man did not have friends. Only customers. And I already knew how poorly their reviews of his wares went. 

“Well said, Your Highness.” He nodded in a show of respect. “I meant no insult. And so I do not offer this as a trade for any crowns you possess. It is yours. A gift for your time. As a matter of courtesy.”

The hat merchant clapped his hands together. 

The elven crown vanished from his palms at once, appearing instead hanging upon the tip of my sword. 

I flicked it away. 

“Courtesy is a name,” I said simply. “And to speak with me at a level where I do not need to raise my neck any further than beneath eye level.” 

The hat merchant raised his fingers.

Click.

And then he was before me, offering a bow angled to minute perfection beneath the tip of my sword. 

As he slowly rose, I studied his features, few as they were.

A short crop of hair the colour of hay. Pale eyes boasting just the hint of tiredness. A face shaven enough that a decade of years had been booted away. And the attire of a merchant struggling to make ends meet. 

A common tradesman, through and through, matched only in forgetability as the bread vendors, the shoe cobblers and the thin air he competed with.

“The name you have is already correct,” he answered, his palms open. “A hat merchant is what I am. And a hat merchant is what I’m called. I’ve other names, of course. But all are less impressive, and most considerably longer. Occasionally, however, my customers give me a name of their own, to fit my role in their lives. Here upon this continent, I am sometimes known as … the Benefactor.”

Despite the sword veered towards his nose, he neither looked at it, nor acknowledged its existence.

A wise choice. My narrowed eyes were far more cutting.

“A name which suggests altruism, and yet I wonder if the benefits are not solely yours, hat merchant.”

“I would dare not suggest otherwise. All I do is with the purpose of evading the dread of that bottom line approaching. Red is a frightful colour, Your Highness. Particularly where I’m from.”

“And where are you from, which gives rise to hat merchants who can calm the swaying grass?”

He gestured downwards.

“The very deepest corner. Mine is between Maleficarum and Erebus. The only source of light amidst the dark. And I dare say that light is what you need right now.”

I offered a curt smile.

Maleficarum and Erebus. 

There was the abyss with all its floors. Some as black as a child’s nightmare. Some as wild as a prophet’s madness. Some as unyielding as an endless solstice. This hat merchant lived at the very bottom. At the abyss within the abyss.

Otherwise known as the hells.

“Devil,” I said simply.

“A devil,” he replied, with a single tap at the air. “I would never claim the singular, or else I shall have all my brethren angrily exchanging words and hellfire with me. That is what infernal wars are fought over. And I’ve little interest in that. I am a devil. But I am also a merchant. And that is why I sell hats.” 

I raised an eyebrow.

Competition in the hells must be truly dire, if he believed my peasants had greater coin than his imps. 

“Hats,” I mused. “Why hats?”

“Why not? … To sell hats is to sell kingdoms. Whether a crown of flames or crown of straw, the headpiece is the most distinctive part of one’s attire. I can raise peasants into soldiers, soldiers into knights, knights into rulers. And all it takes is iron over linen, steel over iron, silver over steel. A hat is the foremost marker of identity. Or would your father still be king without the crown laid upon his brow?”

“He would, for a crown is merely decoration compared to his royal bearing. That is the true headpiece he wears. Gifting a crown does not make a king, nor does taking one away.”

“Perhaps so, perhaps not. But I can also gift an army with obsidian bascinets enchanted to repel fire and arrows. And I would very much rate their chances to make a king.”

“I hope that’s not an insinuation against the longevity of my father, hat merchant. I hope for him to be as steely as my grandmother.”

A genial chuckle met my heartfelt desire.

“I’ve no doubt he will. Your family line is known for being the stones which never erode. And as a merchant who admires long term stability, I wish to ensure that remains the case.”

He stopped there, as though it was all the context I required. And he would be right.

Thus, I offered a response in the same vein.

“No,” I said easily. 

The devil smiled, just like any merchant who spied a customer whose chinks he’d seen through. 

“The most common answer, although I do appreciate you giving it before I made my offer. Most would be wary of rejecting a devil outright.”

“Most are not princesses. So you may take your hats of linen, iron and silver, and offer them to what peasants and lords you wish, as you doubtless have. Only those who climb the ladder can be aided by a hat against the blinding light as they seek the next rungs. But that is a light cast by me.” 

“A light which you exhibit like a starflower in the dark, Your Highness. But even the brightest candle can only fade against the deepest shadow. And the one which comes makes even the cold shudder. The darkness approaches. And neither the light of your righteousness nor the glimmer of your sword can hope to outshine it.”

“So says the lich, if without the earnest compliment. And why should I believe either, when both undead and devils share the trait of deceit?”

The hat merchant placed his palm to his chest.

Whether or not an infernal heart beated there, I would never know. 

“Were it possible for me to forget my smile, I would do so now. To be compared to a lich is to compare a maggot with a butterfly.”

“And which is which, may I ask?”

The devil graciously feigned being shocked.

“Naturally, the undead are the maggots. In time, the best of them may become flies which spread pestilence and disease, destroying all they touch with the gait of a drunkard freshly filled at a bar. Devils, on the other hand, do not destroy. We nurture.”

I rolled my eyes.

“Please. I shipped a sister off to be imprisoned on a remote island. Blasphemy is wasted on me.”

“It’s wasted on the Holy Church as well. They prove poor collaborators when it comes to official definitions. And so I give you ours. Devils are the great balancing force. We ensure light and darkness, good and evil, life and death. Others will see it differently, as is their right. But the fact remains that if we wanted to purge this world and all who hold it dear in swathes of eternal hellfire, we could do it … just like that.”

He suddenly leaned forwards and clicked his fingers.

Snap.

A heartbeat passed. 

And then … silence, filled by the smile of the hat merchant before me.

“Instead, we are paragons of law,” he said smartly, straightening once again. “Trust not in the words of angels, for we are the custodians of order. We keep the peace so that we can reap the rewards.”

“So not only vultures. But profiteers. You make fine merchants indeed.”

The devil gestured in all directions, pointing to all his kind lurking just beneath the shadows.

“Precisely, Your Highness. We are not undead. We are not pests, seeking ever to consume until we become as bloated as the abominations they’ve become. We value balance in all things. And that includes lending a helping hand should the Mistress of Shadows seek to threaten it.”

“... Oh? Is that why you’re here then? To offer the flames of the hells as light?”

“Indeed I am. For know that while you’re correct to mistrust my intentions, know that I speak the truth when I say that Lady Umbra is a deeply unpleasant woman. She will claim ignorance as a sliver of her elbow brushes your kingdom. And that merest contact will see all you hold dear swept away like cold salade de chèvre chaudupon upon your dining table … but I can stop it.”

I flicked my wrist towards the black silhouette, frozen amidst the swirling darkness.

“Does a devil claim to be above even a goddess, then?”

“It would be a bolder one than I to claim such a thing. No … I will risk her personal ire, but not through blocking her path. Merely closing it.”

The hat merchant motioned towards himself, for all the world like he was the grandest ware he sold.

“I will do away with the spell the lich has cast, preventing Lady Umbra’s imminent arrival. I will remove the lich in question, doing away with the tiresome need for you to locate his phylactery. I will even guarantee the next harvest will be so golden your grain houses will be bursting at the seams. I will do all this and more, and all for significantly less than what you offered the Queens of Spring and Winter. An evening you offered the lady of snow. A day you promised the maiden of green. Myself? … I ask for only 11 minutes and 6 seconds of your time.”

He held out his palms, laying all he had on the table. 

Including a smile brimming with a merchant’s candour.

“This, my dear customer, is a bargain offer.”