Ch.171Short Break (1)

*

Night had fallen once again.

Another day of walking at a frightening pace toward our destination had come to an end.

As I lit the campfire with Pia’s help, I suddenly realized that this was the seventh time I had seen this campfire.

It had already been a week since we left the cabin and began making our way through the forest.

I raised both hands to my face in a dry gesture and let out a short sigh.

“Hah, already…”

Looking back on the past week, it was honestly very different from what I had expected.

I thought there would be many dangers on a journey toward the Demon Lord, but surprisingly, there weren’t any major threats.

I could now defeat bears like the one that nearly killed me long ago, and I didn’t even need to step up most of the time because Silvia and Sister Alice were so powerful.

Especially after Silvia started going ahead to clear the path, I saw far more magical beasts that had already become corpses than living ones.

However, there was a problem I hadn’t anticipated—the limits of physical endurance.

No matter how thoroughly Silvia eliminated magical beasts or how well Sister Alice protected us from magical contamination, the journey through the forest was itself a continuous series of exhausting and painful hardships.

The blisters on my feet repeatedly formed and burst, and a dull ache throbbed in every joint from the top of my head to the tips of my toes.

Sister Alice would silently watch me gasping for breath and treat the blisters and abrasions on my feet without a word, but she absolutely refused to slow down her hurried pace, as if urging me on.

If I hadn’t built up my stamina through special training with Silvia, I would have certainly collapsed long ago.

I plopped down on the ground and muttered, “Ah, I’m dying.”

There was no response.

Despite how hard we had walked today, we still couldn’t catch up to the distance Silvia had covered.

Sister Alice had gone to scout the surroundings as usual, checking for any potential dangers.

As I sat alone by the campfire, I suddenly found my current situation strange and let out a hollow laugh.

“Look at me, just a few months ago I was so afraid of the night, and now I’m waiting for nightfall every day.”

The person I am now wouldn’t have been chased so desperately by a bear.

No, I probably wouldn’t have been injured so severely in the carriage accident in the first place.

I slowly nodded and whispered softly.

“I’ve changed so much in just a few months… what would I be like after a few years…”

Honestly, I still hadn’t adjusted to Sister Alice’s transformed appearance.

The Sister Alice in my memories was a stern but shy little lady, completely different from how she is now.

But even I had changed significantly from when I first entered this forest.

People change as they experience events.

The bigger the event, the greater the change, naturally.

And in this world heading toward destruction, there would clearly be no small events anymore.

I blankly looked up.

“Ash,”

Pia was standing in front of me, her face close to mine.

I spoke calmly.

“You startled me, Pia.”

“You don’t look very startled.”

“I don’t have the energy to be startled.”

“You must be really tired. What should I do…”

Pia looked at me with a restless expression.

I already knew what she wanted.

It was something we had been repeating for the past few days.

I naturally spread my arms and said, “It’s okay.”

“…Really?”

“Yes.”

Pia carefully embraced me.

She sat on my lap as I leaned against a tree, fitting against my body like a puzzle piece and resting her face against my neck.

I gritted my teeth in preparation for the coming pain.

Chomp.

Pia bit my neck and slowly began to suck my blood.

It was familiar now, having repeated this for the past three days.

“So you’re not a fox but a vampire.”

“I’m neither a fox nor a vampire, I’m a spirit.”

“A blood-sucking spirit? That’s not a fairy tale you could tell children.”

“I can’t help it. You keep using my power, but you have nothing to give me in return.”

As Pia said, I had been using spirit arts for the past few days.

To be honest, I still don’t quite understand how I did it.

Like when I teleported to the mansion in Goldfield where I lived as a child a few weeks ago, I had simply asked Pia if various things were possible.

Pia had lightened my footsteps, made the worn soles of my shoes soft again, and even used the wind to lift my armor slightly off my body to reduce its weight.

And of course, she had been invaluable during the few battles we’d faced.

Though the techniques were unfamiliar, being completely different from magic, spirit arts were undoubtedly useful skills when properly employed.

Of course, there were limitations—she said it was impossible to teleport me to the Demon Lord’s castle or to where Silvia was.

What was the criteria for what could be substituted and what was impossible?

It would be nice to know everything that was possible from the start, but there was no way to find out except by asking Pia, “Is this possible?”

And I couldn’t even ask too many questions because Pia would get angry, accusing me of treating her like a wish-granting machine.

“The absence of a master is so painfully felt,”

“Hm?”

“If the Green Lady hadn’t taught me even that little bit, I wouldn’t have been able to do anything with this my entire life.”

“Mmph-“

Pia mumbled with her teeth still embedded in my neck.

As a result, my blood smeared all over my neck in the shape of Pia’s mouth.

I sighed and patted Pia’s back gently, as if helping a child digest.

After sucking a bit more blood, Pia slowly pulled away and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand.

“Satisfied?”

“Yes, this is enough.”

Despite being fed on for quite some time, I didn’t feel anemic.

True to her claim of not being a vampire, the amount of blood Pia consumed was surprisingly small compared to the time spent.

In fact, Pia’s meal was closer to sucking up the magical power circulating in my blood rather than the blood itself.

Even this was something I learned through experience, not because Pia told me.

“I wonder if other spirit artists also fed their spirits blood.”

“Don’t know. Never seen other spirit artists.”

“How do other spirit artists learn spirit arts in the first place?”

“From spirits?”

I stared steadily at the brazen Pia.

Pia tilted her head grumpily as if asking why I was looking at her like that.

“What?”

“…You’re a spirit, but you don’t know spirit arts.”

“Well, I might not know much, but what can I do? You only have me as your spirit, Ash.”

“…”

“What, are you dissatisfied?”

Pia said, puffing her cheeks.

I shook my head and stroked her hair.

“No, I’m fortunate to have you, at least.”

“At least?”

“I’m really glad you’re here, Pia.”

“That’s right.”

Pia nodded and giggled.

After moistening my lips with water from my flask and resting briefly, I still couldn’t sense Sister Alice’s presence.

I carefully unbuttoned the pouch tied to my waist and reached inside.

Then I slowly pulled out the object that was safely stored inside.

“I wonder how to use this.”

It was Malice’s necklace, which Sister Alice had given me before we departed from the cabin.

“Sister Alice said it has the power to save people, but I have no idea how to use it. Do you know anything about it, Pia? It seems like it might be related to spirit arts.”

“Spirits can’t bring back the dead either.”

“Maybe it’s just you who can’t?”

“Whether it’s people, animals, trees, plants, or spirits—once they’re dead, they can’t be revived.”

“You’re so definitive.”

The image of Layla flashed through my mind.

I’ve become so numb that I don’t even feel sadness anymore, but the sight of burning Layla with my own hands after she awakened as an undead will probably never be erased from my memory.

I murmured quietly.

“I know that.”

Bringing back the dead—

That belongs to the realm of necromancy or magical contamination.

But the undead are never human.

They can never become human again.

“I do see traces of some other spirit, though…”

Pia perked up her ears and sniffed at the necklace, her nose close to it.

For a moment, Pia’s appearance reminded me of Layla.

I suddenly recalled Silvia telling me about Sister Maria’s theory that magical power follows the shape of a person’s soul.

Perhaps Pia’s transformation from a fox form to a girl was influenced by my longing for Layla.

Come to think of it, Pia’s appearance had remained fixed as a girl about Layla’s age.

She hadn’t grown any larger despite being fed blood for the past few days.

Ah,

I thought I had overcome it significantly, but when neither Silvia nor Sister Alice is around, I still find myself dwelling on thoughts of Layla.

Looking at Pia, who was concentrating with her tail gently swaying, I barely resisted the urge to pet her.

Then I slowly asked Pia.

“Re…ally?”

“Yes, but it’s different somehow. It’s definitely an object connected to spirits, but it doesn’t smell like a spirit.”

“…Well, if you can sense something like that from Malice’s possession, then at least the fact that he was a spirit artist must be true.”

“Of course it’s true. The Green Lady said so. Spirits don’t lie, Ash.”

“You denied throwing a rock at sleeping Silvia when I caught you last time.”

“That wasn’t a rock, it was a pebble of justice.”

“What does that even mean?”

I sighed and put the necklace back into my pouch.

Pia muttered as she watched the necklace disappear into the pouch.

“Somehow… that thing seems less like a tool for saving people and more like…”

“Hm?”

“It seems more like a tool for imprisoning spirits…”

“…Huh?”

.