Chapter 01: The Marriage of the General
The “Vibrant Season” was the equivalent to Fall and Winter in Japan. This season covered half of the year and like its name implied, it was the most vibrant season of the year.
The previous war had also mainly been waged during the six months of the “Vibrant Season”. There had been a few skirmishes in the “Hottest Season” and “Rainy Season”, but otherwise it had generally been a ceasefire during these two seasons.
Of course some merchants considered it a good opportunity to do business, when everyone else was not working, and natural disasters or dragon attacks paid no mind to the circumstances of humans, so the activities during the “Hottest Season” and “Rainy Season” never really came to a dead stop.
The best example for such an activity was a “Marriage Ceremony”.
Especially for weddings, where the family business was inherited, be it nobility or commoners. All related parties gathered from all over the country, celebrated the marriage and familiarized themselves with the new family members.
Going by that logic, the marriage of Zenjirou and Aura had been an exception, since it had been held during the “Hottest Season”.
And it was not really irrelevant to Queen Aura, when a marriage ceremony was held.
In most cases, her secretary prepared the necessary documents and Aura just put her sign on it, but even that could get tedious, when there were a lot of documents to sign. Moreover, she personally had to write up something like a “Wedding Wish” for when it concerned important nobles.
Nevertheless, that minutely treatment was still better than the worst case, whereof two existed.
The other being a marriage between nobility so influential that it could not be permitted so easily.
And right now, Aura was looking at the worst possible request for a marriage that combined both of the above mentioned conditions.
The request concerned Puyol Guillén, the current head of the Guillén Family, and the eldest daughter of the Guzzle Family.
The men in question were Puyol Guillén and Xavier Guzzle.
That height difference was not the only contrast between them. General Puyol was assuming an air of confidence to the point of calling him “brazen”, whereas Xavier next to him was straining every nerve, so that his tension was recognizable at a glance.
“Welcome, General Puyol, Sir Xavier. Let us get straight to the point.
“Yes.”
The general answered Aura with a composed tone. Following that, Xavier also answered, but with a tone that did not conceal all of his tension.
“Okay. Very well.
“Thank you for your understanding, Your Majesty.”
But even so, the giant soldier only gave off the impression that he was “brazen”.
“And your partner will be Lady Lucinda from the Guzzle Family. Seeing as Sir Xavier is here, I guess it is related to the earlier Pack Dragon Subjugation?”
“Indeed. During this incident, I had the chance to acquaint myself with Sir Xavier here. Since he went to the Capital for a report later on, I took it upon myself to bring his men home to the March of Guzzle.”
After General Puyol explained so without ruffle or excitement, Xavier expressed his gratitude to him with a tone so vivid it could be called ingenious.
Xavier Guzzle had originally been put in charge, but due to turns and twists, he had to leave his troops for a different mission, so General Puyol took it upon himself to lead the troops from Xavier back to the March of Guzzle.
His responsibilities entailed that he led them all the way to the mansion of the feudal lord (in case of the border region, it was more like a fortress than a mansion), consigned the command to the person in charge there and waited for the troops of the domain to disarm.
Aura equally looked at both men sitting across from her while she once more recalled the information about Lucinda Guzzle she had looked into beforehand, in her head.
But in exchange, she wasted her prime time and is still unmarried. I can relate a bit.)
since they were calculating the age differently here.
She was already twenty-five years old, so she had long passed her golden age and counted as a middle-aged woman. Her age made it almost impossible to find a suitable family to marry into, even with the powerful backing of her family.
So just in case, Aura asked that, but she more or less knew what they were going to say.
“B- Brother-in-law! You are not supposed to mention that in front of Her Majesty!”
Aura heaved a sigh at heart in response to that.
After all, his daughter missed out on her chance to marry, because he went to war and abandoned his domain. Her younger brother Xavier must have felt guilty, too, since she had assume the mother role during that time.
Xavier was still too young and innocent to understand it, but Marquis Guzzle should be well aware of the intentions the general had.
No marriage would ever be achieved, if every single ambition like that was cut off.
(For that reason, I would normally never allow such a marriage, though.)
In the future, that marriage might bring out an even more influential power within the Kingdom than the Royal Family.
“Hahaha, now that is what I call rushing your fences. But Lady Lucinda was raised in the borderland. She might not be able to accustom to the life in the Capital.”
“Bro— I mean, General Puyol, you honour the efforts of my sister so far by saying this.”
The Queen kept smiling, but her cheek twitched.
It was nothing but a playful “pickoff attempt”, but a certain young man was too tense in body and soul to catch that obvious nuance.
“Y- Your Majesty! Please take my latest achievement as the price for your permission then!”
In response to the reckless utterance from the overhasty young man, the giant general displayed a bitter expression that seemed to say “Oh no” for a moment. It goes without saying that it was quite difficult to talk your way out of something you had claimed in front of the Queen.
For the first time today, the Queen registered a weak spot and intensified her smile a bit.
She followed up on it with a threatening remark.
Xavier agreed knee-jerk, but her question could not really be denied now anyway.
The problem this time round was that it meant that the supposed reward for his military achievement would not have to be paid.
Normally all these expenses could be added on to the “reward” paid by the Royal Family.
That kind of money admittedly meant no financial ruin for a wealthy family like the Guzzle Family, but it was still a burden, when they had to pay the whole sum all at once.
If she were to forcefully crush this marriage, she would not only get on bad terms with General Puyol, but also with the Guzzle Family.
In that case, she ought to make the best of allowing this marriage for the Royal Family. After Aura had asked him again, she heaved an affected sigh with a stern face, then proclaimed to the giant general and young successor to the March.
In light of Sir Xavier’s consideration for his sister, I will allow the marriage between Puyol Guillén and Lucinda Guzzle by way of exemption.”
Xavier almost jumped off the couch in his effusive delight, whereupon Aura gave him a blank look for a moment, but then she shifted her gaze back to General Puyol.
She casually added that.
By emphasizing on the fact that it was an exception to the exception, she was indirectly saying that she “compensated him for leaving him in abeyance all these years, by allowing this marriage, and that they were even with each other now“.
By doing so, she could squeeze at least a little profit for the Royal Family from the marriage between two prominent families, since it was difficult to prevent it altogether.
“Yes, I am most grateful for your exceeding kindness, Your Majesty. Following this, I would like to issue the invitation to our marriage ceremony in the March of Guzzle.
Aura raised an eyebrow in response to the words of General Puyol.
Xavier failed to noticed the subtle change in Aura and burst out happily.
In the Carpa Kingdom, it was the custom to hold the marriage ceremony at the home area of the family the marriage partner effectively left. Meaning: At the home of the wife, when she married into the man’s family, or at the home of the husband, when he married into the woman’s family.
Having said this, it was nothing but a general principle and there were plenty of exceptions.
On second thought, the Capital was certainly a better place to accommodate the guests than a domain in the borderland, and the Guzzle Family could use the ceremony as an excuse to go sight-seeing in the Capital, so it would be by no means a bad idea.
And Aura immediately discerned his reasoning.
General Puyol was a former marriage candidate for Aura. If she were to respond to the marriage of her former marriage candidate with only the bare necessities, it was more than likely that a rumour would spread, saying that she was still “emotionally attached” to him.
Aura knew that and General Puyol knew that, too, of course, so he had chosen the March for the marriage ceremony.
It made no difference whether Aura herself went there and gave them her blessing or she sent Zenjirou there to give the blessing in her stead, when she wanted to avoid a scandal. In short, they just needed to give the appearance that Aura and Zenjirou congratulated the general on his marriage from the bottom of their hearts. Either royalty would go all the way to the borderland especially for his marriage ceremony. That fact gave General Puyol the perfect “prestige”.
Aura had two choices. But in effect, she could not afford to leave the Capital for long as the Queen. So she basically only had one choice left.
She grew desperate at heart, because she kept breaking her promises to him lately, but replied to General Puyol in order to squeeze even the tiniest bit of profit from this matter.
Unfortunately, both my husband and I are extremely busy. As you may know, we are currently hosting three members of the Royal Families from two countries in our Kingdom.”
Aura had wanted to keep her in Valentia and finalize the intercontinental trade negotiations for just the Royal Family, but that turned out to be impossible. After all, the female warrior under the command of Princess Freya had defeated the leading Huge Pack Dragon in the earlier Pack Dragon Subjugation.
With so much publicity, Aura could not afford not to invite them to the Capital for a reward in her role as the Queen of the Carpa Kingdom.
“For that reason, we both have no time to spare. It would be a different matter, though, if the next ‘budget meeting’ comes to an end early.”
This time it was General Puyol’s turn to fall silent with a stern expression.
She was saying that he ought to “approve her budget proposal in the next meeting, when he wanted either royalty to attend his weeding”.
The finances of the Carpa Kingdom were hardly in any shape to have something to spare, even less when you took the previous war into consideration. So whenever unexpected expenses arose, one department would have to absorb the losses and that very department would strongly object to it.
To put it bluntly: She proposed that General Puyol should take the blame she was originally supposed to take.
He never really concealed his strong ambitions, so he had a lot of enemies. It would make no real difference, when he earned a bit of resentment on top of it now. On the contrary, he might actually rise in the esteem of the military, if word got around that he was willing to “earn the resentment from other nobles in order to secure the budget for the Royal Army”.
“Understood. If that is the case, I am more than willing to lend a hand.”
he gave his consent.
After Puyol Guillén and Xavier Guzzle had left her office, the Queen called out to her trusted retainer, who had silently stood at attention behind her so far.
The middle-aged secretary put his right hand against his small chin and spoke to the Queen after a moment of thinking.
“Exactly.”
“Seems alright to me. It was pretty much a given that General Puyol would get his way in one way or another, since the Royal Family was at a clear disadvantage in regards to his marriage to begin with. Taking that into consideration, you still managed to clear the debt to General Puyol and averted the outstanding reward for the Guzzle Family from the previous Pack Dragon Subjugation, by allowing the marriage.
“I see.”
“Well, Master Zenjirou is coming out on the short end, though. But that should prove to be no problem, either. He would never refuse such a well thought out deal.
“!?”
“…Are you saying I am treating my husband like a convenient chess piece?”
“If I may be frank: Yes, I cannot see it any other way, when I look at your recent treatment of him.”
Aura heaved another deep sigh in response to the words from Secretary Fabio.
Leaning back in her chair, Aura shut her eyes tightly and shook her head unruly a few times.
Lately, she had taken it for granted that she could entrust trivial matters to Zenjirou without a problem.
But the slender-faced secretary added indifferently, when he saw his master like this.
“You are as blunt as ever…”
To begin with, this man was her trusted retainer precisely because he could give tongue to painful fact like this.
After rolling shoulders extensively and taking a deep breath, the Queen objected with a resolute face.
“A praiseworthy mindset, indeed. But you two are a married couple. I dare to say it is also unnatural, when the wife does not rely on her husband at all. Right now, you are constricting yourself a bit too much, which makes the whole situation unnatural instead.”
Being told that, Aura was at a loss for words. It certainly was not good for the relationship of a married couple, when they only made allowances for each other all the time.
The middle-aged secretary kept an inexpressive mask on his slender face while he warned the pondering Queen.
After all he will need to take a different partner, when he attends the marriage ceremony without you.”
The Queen contorted her face, when the pointer of her retainer hit the bullseye.
A married man would just take his wife with him and all was well, and when his wife was tied up with matters, he would ask a female relative. On the other hand, it was generally considered a confession of love, when an unmarried man asked someone to be his partner for the wedding ceremony.
As a consequence, Zenjirou needed to ask a different woman to be his partner. The chosen woman would then be seen as the leading candidate for a concubine without doubt.
“Oh well. I will be pushing my luck, but I guess I will ask Beldam Pascuala to accompany him.”
If an married old woman were to be his partner, she would hardly been seen as a future concubine candidate.
“Probably not. We will have to push it through with some kind of specious story. And if that should fail… he really will get a concubine this time round. I just hope my husband will somehow accept it.”
The slender-faced secretary spoke a bit amused, when he saw his master depressed.
“Silence!”
But as a matter of fact, she herself acknowledged that she acted like a coward, when it involved Zenjirou. He was giving her a pure and completely untarnished love, so she unconsciously felt a strong aversion to taint that love even a little bit.
“…Still, I have no other option, but to send my husband as my representative. I guess I will have to have a heart to heart talk with him.”
“Oh, right.”
That something to lift his spirits was nothing else but the ‘goats’ from Princess Freya.
After all, they were the first mammal livestock in the Carpa Kingdom.
All of this required a not insignificant amount of money.
By way of comparison: It was like asking a Modern Japanese milk farmer to raise iguanas now.
It was a troublesome undertaking that took time and money. Moreover, it was actually superfluous. Frankly speaking, Zenjirou was “having his way” with this project.
Mentioning how much of a pain all this was, Aura was showing an unbefitting smile despite all that. After all, her husband had been selfish for the first time after never breathing a wish all this time. She could not help but feel extremely happy about granting him that wish.
Her secretary said a bit sarcastic, when he saw his master like that.
“You look like an overly doting grandmother that gets all excited about choosing a present for her first grandchild.”
“…Can you not say mother at least?”
“A mother would be a little bit stricter with her love.”
The brusque objection from her secretary rendered the Queen speechless and she puckered her lips.
At night of the same day.
The four LED floor lamps, positioned in a circle around the two couches with a wooden table in-between, glittery illuminated the red and blue Kiriko glasses from Zenjirou and Aura.
The construction of a distiller was not all that complicated and the craftsmen of the Carpa Kingdom had been able to reproduce it, since they were relative adept at crafting copper ware.
That very distilled liquor from the distiller that the people of this world had built, was filling the glasses of Aura and Zenjirou right now.
“Yep, tastes nice. It’s as good as mine. Well, that doesn’t mean much coming from me, though. To begin with, I don’t know if I should call the taste ’nice’, when it tastes just like my amateurish try.”
“Yes, I liked it as well. Good. Looks like we can proceed with a large-scale production.”
Zenjirou claimed that from a rather negative viewpoint, but Aura kept her smile up.
The Carpa Kingdom was still recovering from the previous great war at the present moment. There was a lack of personnel everywhere, so it would be quite difficult to reallocate people for a new business, even for the Monarch.
“Well, it is no use discussing the distilled liquor any further now. Instead, Zenjirou.”
Zenjirou felt a cold shiver run down his spine, when his wife wiped the smile off her face and looked him straight into his eyes from beside him, and tilted his head puzzled.
“Okay.”
He gave his short okay and in order to underline his words, he put the blue Kiriko glass with the distilled liquor back onto the table and stood up from the couch to sit down on the other couch across from the Queen.
“First off, I have to tell you that Puyol Guillén and Lucinda Guzzle, the eldest daughter of the Guzzle Family, will soon get married.
“Mm, okay.”
“….Eh? That is all you have to say?”
Aura on the other hand heaved a small sigh at the sight of the poor reaction of her husband, and assumed a bitter smiling expression.
“Wrong?”
“Be it the matter of sending you to Valentia before or the matter of sending you to the March of Guzzle now, I am always deciding on matters without consulting with you in advance. Fabio said I am treating you like a ’convenient pawn’. And to be honest, I cannot deny it.”
Seeing his wife look down dejected, Zenjirou clapped his hands together as he finally understood.
“Now that you mention it, that really seems to happen a lot lately. But I know that politics sometimes call for a prompt decision, so I’m fine as long as you give me a convincing explanation afterwards.”
‘Master Zenjirou is not really offended by your one-sided distribution of work.’
Zenjirou was not the least bit offended, even when she claimed to “treat him like a pawn”.
Aura bluntly asked him that.
But if they were to be “treated like a pawn” by their peers, they would surely be up in arms against it, too. The reason Aura could treat them like pawns without a problem was because of the clear hierarchy between the Queen and the Knights.
His wife was being honest with him, but her husband from a different world kept his head cocked to the somewhat vague question from her. Still, he answered to the best of his abilities.
In his mind, he was not really seeing Aura treating him like a “pawn”. On the contrary, he often cursed his own inability to help his wife, who was having a hard time with her duties.
Still not convinced by the answer of her husband, Aura breathed an anxious sound.
Zenjirou simply considered it “situation-dependent” to “obey the orders from a peer”.
Zenjirou only knew the Japanese way of thinking and amidst that, the moral concept that everyone was equal was not contradictory to the fact that there needed to be two kind of people, namely one giving orders and one following orders, in order to effectively and smoothly run an organisation.
“…I see. Well, as long as you are fine with it. But we have already diverged from initially promised outlook quite a bit by now. Thus, I deemed it necessary to have a proper talk with you.”
“Yes. When I summoned you, I told you that I would ask you for nothing but your cooperation in making a child, right?”
Zenjirou clasped his hand understanding in response to the reply from Aura.
“Huh!?”
For the first time since they had met, the Queen looked hurt from the bottom of her heart, so her husband quickly corrected himself.
As the fruit of his earnest explanation, Aura’s expression took a change for the better.
“So I might be late in saying this, but I completely agree with your idea to discuss everything in honesty. We should forget all about ‘what is currently right’ and about being ’considerate’ or ’reserved’. Let’s just lay bare our genuine wishes.”
With her intent finally coming across, the Queen leaned forward while remaining seated on the couch, in response to the answer from Zenjirou.
The serious question from his wife prompted a slightly overwhelmed Zenjirou to clear his throat affected once before he slowly framed an answer.
Here I go: I want more time with you. I want to live together with Zenkichi. I want all three of us to sleep together in the same bed. But sometimes it would be good, when it’s just us two in the bed. We wouldn’t be sleeping then, though.
What else… Oh right, I’m starting to miss the food from Japan. And I want to do something about the shampoo that’s almost used up.
And I’m bored to death in the afternoon, so I want to do something productive. Making the distilled liquor was fun, for instance.
As expected, even Zenjirou had some pent-up frustrations. In the beginning, he had made some petty demands, but over time, his wishes started to get more and more selfish, finally escalating into voicing his grievance.
(I was right to bring up the subject. It seems he really has bottled up quite the frustration without knowing it.)
Because of his nature, Zenjirou himself tended to misunderstand it, but he in fact piled up the dissatisfaction about not doing what he wanted to do, and the frustration about being made to do something against his will.
Fortunately enough, Zenjirou was relatively broad-minded, so these symptoms had not surfaced yet, but listening to him made it clear how much frustration he had built up.
Zenjirou went red in the face, as he became embarrassed about having thrown a demanding tantrum like a child, but he also looked somewhat relieved.
But for now, she showed no reaction in particular to his words and voiced her own wishes like they had agreed on in advance.
The first category is unproblematic. As a woman, I want to monopolize you as well. Likewise, I want us to spend more time with Carlos. In that point, our wishes coincide.
“Mm, okay.”
He could put himself in Aura’s shoes for a bit now, since she always tried to make him say embarrassing stuff like “I love you”. Even if you could be sure of the feelings of your partner, it was still something special, when it was put it into words like this. His whole body was stricken by a pleasantly prickling bashfulness.
“As the Queen, the first thing I want you do is take a concubine.
The power balance on the continent will shift, when we manage to make magical tools with the glass pearls in the future. And for that, I would like to establish a new court noble family without its own territory that inherits the ’Bestowal Magic’ in our Kingdom.
Needless to say, I want you to continue your work as my representative, because we two are the only grown-up royalties in our country.
“Oh god…”
It was as expected, but the wishes from Zenjirou and the wishes from Queen Aura beautifully contradicted each other. They only barely agreed on the manufacture stuff like glass or liquor, but everything else was something Queen Aura wanted him to do as much as Zenjirou wanted to avoid it.
“But the thing I am most afraid of is that we seriously will grow apart. So you have nothing to worry about, nor do you need to be reserved. I will generally prioritize your feelings over the wishes I just mentioned.
Zenjirou could not conceal his surprise towards the words from the Queen.
The Queen shook her head with a stern face in response to his question.
Besides, I have quite the strong powerbase, if I may say so myself, because I led the country to victory in the previous war, where everything was in chaos from having lost four rulers, my uncle, my father, my little and older brothers, in succession.
However, that no longer applies to you. For better or worse, you are intelligent enough to handle foreign negotiations and have an extremely understanding personality. Everyone knows that now.”
Zenjirou screwed up his face all too late, but Aura shook her head.
The reason for that must have been her pregnancy.
The only one with enough status to act as her representative was Zenjirou and he was competent enough to accomplish the duties as her representative appropriately. In a way, it was an unfortunate combination.
The decisive blow had been the earlier ruckus with the Pack Dragons attacking Valentia.
In other words, he proved that he was more than capable to hold his own in the court and showed everyone that he was ready to stand on the battlefield himself, when it called for it.
Hearing that explanation from his wife, Zenjirou was a bit troubled over the unnecessarily high evaluation he got, but he understood the situation he was in and nodded with a serious expression.
“Yes, please do.”
(Not good. I was supposed to listen to his wishes today, but at some point, I started to push my conveniences onto him again. If I am not careful, the bad habit to rely on the patience of my husband gets out again.)
“Well, I can only ask for your understanding in that matter, but for everything else, I intend to grant as many of your wishes as possible.
“Yeah, I want to complete a magnet first of all. Once the goats arrive here, I want to make cheese and butter, but I heard the Uppsala Kingdom has these, too, so instead of trying on my own, it might be faster to ask Princess Freya for help.”
“Oh, I can’t wait.”
The mood started to relax from the merry topic, but Aura addressed another complicated matter.
“To be honest, yes. But I know it’s part of my job as royalty, so I’ll do it with gritted teeth, even if I don’t like it.”
It was his job or his obligation as royalty, to be precise.
When the Queen asked him that, Zenjirou brooded over it, then shook his head.
Of course it would be great, if there’s no work to begin with, but when there’s work to do, I don’t really want to run away from it.”
The Queen cocked her head puzzled, whereupon Zenjirou pondered for a moment and then explained it while cocking his head thoughtfully as well.
Put another way: It was the same difference as between “playing truant” and “having a day off school” for a student.
A reasonable amount of diligence, a reasonable amount of seriousness and a reasonable amount of reluctance. That kind of mentality was not all that rare for a Modern Japanese.
“I see. You mean that you would feel guilty about abandoning your obligations, even if you hate them. And that it would be a lesser burden on your mind, when you reluctantly do your work, instead of experiencing that guilty conscience.”
“Hmm, you are right. Forgive me. I will be more careful from now on.”
“Yeah, please. Ah, but you don’t have to worry about emergencies like the wedding now or the trip to Valentia before that.”
Aura summarized the conclusion they had reached just now inside her head.
Foreign affairs could involve people like Prince Francesco and Princess Bona or the soon arriving Princess Freya, whom Zenjirou had to entertain at all costs, but everyone else like foreign diplomats or national nobles did not necessarily require the hospitality from a royalty. It just meant that things would proceed more smoothly, when a royalty was present.
It was kind of unfortunate that she could only make minimum use of her pawn known as the Prince Consort now, but the Queen concluded that it was her turn to give ground here.
When Aura told him that money and effort were not an issue, Zenjirou cast his gaze to the ceiling and mused.
Listening to any new songs is impossible, too. Or at least I can’t think of how it would be possible.
As for the shampoo, I already started to work on a replacement. I was ready to make the bath supplies here from the very beginning, so I put some instructions on my computer.
“Indeed. The soap shampoo does concern me as well. It should be no problem to acquire the ingredients for it at least.”
She was using the same soap shampoo as him. After all, they were usually sleeping in the same bed. There would be no point if only Zenjirou cleaned himself up, but Aura refrained from doing so.
The Carpa Kingdom had a climate of high temperatures and high humidity, so the custom of taking baths was relatively widespread, but not even royalty or nobility took one every day. Moreover, it was common practice to apply a lot of perfumed oil to erase the smell on the body or hair, but Zenjirou hated the scent and sensation of the perfumed oil to no end, so Aura refrained from using it inside the Inner Palace out of consideration for him.
Thus Aura was thoroughly washing off the perfumed oil she had applied to her hair and skin in the Royal Palace every day in the Inner Palace, sometimes repeating that pattern numerous times a day.
Whether he knew about the devotion of his wife or not, Zenjirou nodded with a smile.
He said that was a slightly troubled expression, since he realized that he was being selfish.
The Queen was the most important figure in the Kingdom, but she was adjusting her lifestyle to his.
Despite that, Aura adopted herself to Zenjirou’s common sense and kept the waiting maids out of their private space as much as possible. That meant that she had to fetch anything in the room by herself and change simple sets of clothing by herself. There was no way that it left her unaffected.
Zenjirou gave thanks to her from the bottom of his heart, when the devoted love of his wife was brought to his mind once again.
(I need to remember that at all times. Otherwise, I might get the illusion that I’m the only one that has to soft-pedal. And that would be arrogant.)
“You are welcome. It was not worth mentioning, though. So, anything else?”
“The internet, I guess. You told me it’s impossible before, but I think it would be feasible with some specialized magical tools to connect to the internet in this world.
The ‘Summoning Magic’ is dependant on the star constellation. So if we bring a small space in line with the correct constellation through &l