Ch.221The Road to Peledias (6)

“Haaah….”

I got up, wiping my drool.

Today was February 4th.

The day right after my birthday.

“…What on earth happened last night..?”

I tried to recall the memories of the previous night while cleaning up the bed full of the byproducts of a man and woman.

Yesterday…

Um… yesterday….

Drinking, and more drinking… continuously drinking…

“Damn it! All I remember is alcohol consumption!”

Endless glasses and bottles… and among them, pointed ears and bushy beards laughing hysterically….

“The dwarves and elves were determined to send me off…”

I grabbed my churning stomach, sat down in a chair, and began to settle my bloated insides.

As I practiced breath control while accelerating my mana circulation through meridians, at least the hangover disappeared, and when I turned on the ventilation fan, the intense fragrance that men and women could create together began to gradually fade away.

“Ugh. My stomach burns.”

However, despite the breath control, there was nothing I could do about the physical burning in my stomach. It was fortunate that my body wasn’t completely ruined, considering there was more digested alcohol than stomach acid.

Fortunately, a mess attendant brought breakfast shortly after, and I began to eat slowly while shoving clam chowder (soup made from clams) into the mouth of my wife, who still hadn’t come to her senses.

“Ah… my stomach feels better…”

I finished my meal while inwardly shedding tears.

I never dreamed I would one day be saying the same things that sailors and middle-aged men in inns would mutter while picking their teeth with toothpicks.

I thought I would stay young forever, but now half the world considers me an adult, and by next year, the other half will think of me as an adult too.

Ah! How quickly time passes! But this is also because I’ve grown… uh… grown…

I suddenly remembered that I had stretched my growth plates to become 220cm tall.

A perfect 220cm that doesn’t allow for decimal points, as if measured with a ruler.

Then all that remains is mental growth… but that doesn’t really matter whether you’re an adult or a child.

How can that not matter, you ask? If it mattered, I couldn’t have killed off all the criminal organizations in Parcifal before I was even 10 years old.

The mind is truly profound and strange.

Seeing how I, who painfully and shamefully killed 50,000 people, am now whining about just 2,500 deaths, reinforces that conviction.

I know it’s a matter of emotional connection, but the fact that it doesn’t resonate with me means I must be different from others.

I don’t particularly have any issues with that. After all, aren’t we all strangers to one another?

Is there anything more foolish than asking how someone can be so nonchalant after killing ‘the same’ people? There are no ‘same people’ in this world.

Even identical twins who are genetically identical are ultimately just strangers to each other, so how can one describe different people as the same?

Of course, if it means ‘fellow humans’ in contrast to monsters, elves, or dwarves, I could certainly nod in agreement.

*

“We’ve been delayed longer than expected. When do you think we’ll arrive?”

“I believe we’ll get there in about three more days, sir.”

“Good. We should be able to properly repair the airship there.”

Although the engineers had worked hard on repairs, naturally, firing artillery and heavy machine guns from inside would have seriously affected the frame and structure. This was an issue that required proper materials, technicians, and a maintenance dock for a complete overhaul, and indeed, the airship’s condition was not good at all.

Compared to before, when there was almost no shaking, now it wobbled so severely that teacups would fall when the wind blew, and something seemed wrong with the frame—the gas bags couldn’t inflate properly as they were blocked by the frame, so we could only reach two-thirds of our original altitude.

“Please hold together… There are 1 million gold coins on board…”

I muttered while looking at the pile of boxes filled with 1 million gold coins occupying a corner of the captain’s quarters.

As far as I know, these coins have been magically treated to be very light and resistant to bending or breaking, but even so, the weight created by the enormous sum of 1 million coins was no joke.

Even dust becomes a mountain when gathered, and small specks accumulate to form a carpet.

“Lord Victor. The engineers have completed their work.”

In the midst of my sighing, there was a knock at the door of the captain’s quarters, and soon a soldier entered to report that the engineers had finished their inspection of the hull.

“Ah… yes. What did they say?”

“They say the frame is bent and difficult to repair. Some parts are warped… some are twisted, and some have holes. They could patch it up, but the structure itself has collapsed, so it needs proper maintenance…”

“Haah… Yes. I figured as much. Just make it hold somehow. Three days… just three more days and we’ll reach Peredias. It needs to stay airborne until we’re moored to the docking tower.”

“I’ll relay that message, sir.”

The soldier closed the door and left.

The frame is bent! Whether it’s an airship or a ship, that’s a symptom you never want to see.

Now I could understand why the branch director personally listened to my war history.

With such severe aftereffects from just one battle, if the fight had been a little longer or a bit more intense, the frame would have broken, and we all would have plummeted vertically from the high sky to the ground below.

Creak… creak…

“Urgh…”

I heard the frame above the captain’s quarters twisting and screaming, and I scratched my goosebump-covered arms.

But now that my skin has hardened, I can’t even calm my goosebumps when they rise. Is this why people who become too mechanized suffer from madness?

Come to think of it, I can’t even scratch my back when it itches now! Even a back scratcher wouldn’t feel satisfying!

As I thought about this, my back suddenly started to itch, and thus my wife, upon waking up, had to witness the sight of her halberd being used as a back scratcher for the first time.

*

“You could have wrapped aura around your hand to scratch! Why damage your skin by scratching with a halberd?”

“There’s such an ingenious method?”

Scritch-scratch!

I murmured while feeling the pleasure of my wife scratching my back plates with aura wrapped around her fingernails.

Come to think of it, there was such a solution.

Aura can cut through chunks of iron, so why didn’t I think of wrapping it around my hands? Maintain is essentially wrapping aura inside the body, so if it works internally, why not externally?

“Aura seems to be as versatile as magic.”

“You didn’t think of that, so you scratched your back with my halberd?”

“…Yes.”

But when it itches, you can’t scratch your back with the spine of a blade.

I closed my eyes, feeling my wife’s delicate hands cooling my heated back with a final touch.

We need to reach Peredias first, whether for repairs or pilgrimage, but sitting here in the sky, not knowing when the airship might break down, was really not to my taste.

Since it’s a city that launches rockets, they should be able to repair an airship floating in the sky. If they can build spaceships, surely they can fix one airship.

But what if they really can’t? Should I buy a spaceship instead of an airship for the pilgrimage?

Lying quietly with my wife, all sorts of random thoughts come to mind.

Having been caught scratching my back with a halberd, I had nothing to say and just lay still. Then my wife slowly straddled me and began to undress.

I pulled her close and kissed her, afraid someone might see, and she pressed her bare chest against my hardened one, letting out a small moan.

“I don’t remember yesterday because I drank too much.”

“Me neither. Damn… I wonder how many bottles we emptied…”

My wife blushed and brought her lips to my neck, making a kissing sound.

“So… we should make proper memories today, shouldn’t we?”

“We haven’t even had lunch yet?”

“Which do you prefer? The mess attendant’s meal or my body?”

“…”

How… how can one compare those?

I mean, I could have both… but that’s not quite the right expression, it’s more of an idiomatic…

“I’m happiest when I’m in my master’s arms.”

While I was awkwardly pondering, Raisha kissed me again.

Damn… how could a man like me resist such temptation?

I made full use of my 220cm height to flip Raisha over, and we made love until evening, well past lunchtime.

Lately, I feel like I’m becoming a living dildo… but truly, there was nothing else to do for entertainment up here in the sky.

If I hadn’t been chosen by the Sun, would I have received Medina’s blessing instead?

As we embraced, sharing body heat against the darkening sky, the Sun’s divine voice began to echo in my mind.

[If my children were like you, the imperial family’s prestige would have stood tall! It’s frustrating how lukewarm the legitimate imperial heirs are about producing successors!]

O Sun, perhaps it’s because their wives aren’t as voluptuous as mine.

[What.]