It's funny that the author thinks he needs MC to explain to the reader what is happening in this scene. How stupid does he think we are?
The author is trying to make sure ALL the young readers are caught up. The old hands like us don't care for the heavy handed method the author is using, but Iris's situation of being very valuable and under unofficial "house arrest" by the rulers needed to be shown.
It's clearly a world that embraces Strong Arm Tactics everywhere as we haven't yet seen or heard of any country that does otherwise. If you are a valuable person for your knowledge, ability, or skills that cannot be taken from you, then powerful people will want your services. If you are too weak to defend yourself (or have no Patron to defend you), then you would be kept "prisoner" by that government or noble or church or merchant or whoever else has enough staff to detain you. Iris is such a case and the rulers don't want Iris to feel rebellious from meeting other unapproved people.
Other stories and anime have touched upon similar issues. For example, in the story, manga, and anime for Tondemo Skill de Isekai Hourou Meshi (Campfire Cooking in Another World), the MC was worried that powerful people would take him prisoner and then put magical slave collar contracts upon him in order to both monopolize and benefit from his unique skill. That world's story, just like this story, also allows slavery that is under magical contract control. In fact, in that other world, powerful people do put unwilling people into magically controlled slavery. Amusingly, the Netsuper Aeon featured in the Tondemo Skill de Isekai Hourou Meshi story does exist to take your orders. I suppose they were onboard the production committee as one of the sponsors for the anime. It explains why the anime had plenty of money to have good production values and detailed backgrounds and textures.