Ch.766License Revocation Declaration

After a grand feast comes an enormous pile of dishes to wash, and similarly, the end of a battle doesn’t mean one can rest easily. The aftermath is always left to those who remain.

“Wounded over here! Priests of Saulite, administer emergency treatment, and the rest of you, build fires to maintain body temperature!”

“Priests with remaining strength, perform the miracle of purification! We must erase the dark mana scattered by Nidhogg!”

“Gather the dragon’s remains in one place! They are Lady Astraea’s spoils!”

The holy knights were working twice as busily as when they were fighting, focusing on the cleanup.

Whether it was due to religious devotion or simply wanting to finish quickly so they could leave this freezing mountain, I couldn’t tell.

Meanwhile, we retreated to rest around a campfire. Since proper firewood was hard to find, we had to get some help from the fairies.

“I’m not sure if this is okay…”

Lena, who had recovered some strength, muttered while glancing at the fairies who had willingly become firewood without any objection.

“It’s fine, it’s fine. They’re going to gather and cremate everything for purification anyway, so what’s the problem with cremating a few in advance?”

I patted Lena’s shoulder and smiled.

While puffing on my usual cigarette, I had wrapped it with a leaf from the World Tree that I’d found in Eirnesia’s embrace.

“Haaah…”

This is in-credible.

Throughout my previous life and current one, this was by far the most delicious drag I’d ever taken.

How unfair that only fairies had exclusive access to something this good. The sensation was so euphoric that I was hallucinating dinosaurs flying across the sky.

…Wait a minute. Why are they flying?

“Um… is that a World Tree leaf?”

Ophelia, who was resting by the fire, tilted her head suspiciously as she noticed me staring blankly at the sky.

“Yeah, it is… why?”

“…That’s basically a hallucinogenic drug for humans, though fairies might handle it differently. Are you sure you’re okay?”

“Oh shit.”

This was a drug?

“What? Really? Sister, spit it out! Quick, ptooey!”

I threw the half-burned cigarette to the ground and shook my head.

Lena, startled and making a fuss, quickly stomped out the cigarette as soon as I discarded the World Tree leaf.

“Haa, haa…”

The flying dinosaurs in the sky disappeared like a mirage. I wiped away the cold sweat trickling down my forehead and sighed in relief.

“What the hell are these pointy-eared bastards carrying drugs around for?”

I almost became a drug offender.

I thought it had a stamina recovery effect in the original work, so I tried smoking it, but it felt way too euphoric.

—-

While I was resting and doing such foolish things, the other companions were also gathered around the campfire taking a break.

Demian, who had fainted from exhaustion after cutting off Nidhogg’s head, was now a crimson-colored human covered in healing priests’ holy light, fast asleep. Millia was snuggled up next to him, sharing body heat.

Ophelia was busy rummaging through fairy corpses, collecting something that looked like leaves, while Nigel and Jahan were…

“So, as, I, said. It was thanks to my lightning that we could defeat the guardian. If my lightning hadn’t paralyzed them, would your flames have worked? They would have obviously dodged everything.”

“Ha, without the firepower of Adrin-do, could you have annihilated them? At best, you might have taken down just one.”

They were engaged in an argument that seemed to be about either claiming credit or comparing their weapons’ performance.

They’re really getting along well. They were fighting over the exact same thing earlier too. At this rate, they’ll become quite attached to each other.

[Why does that knight wench keep trying to best Jahan? Anyone can see Jahan is several times superior.]

‘That’s just your opinion.’

I shook my head in response to Hersella’s complaints, who had quickly started whining as soon as her karma power recovered a bit. Then I turned my gaze toward the field of corpses on the hill.

More specifically, toward Asha, who was…

“Remove this, cut this out…! Great, with this much harvest, I’ll have more than enough capital to rebuild my workshop!”

She was moving between corpses, cutting off fairy hair and carefully skinning the scales from the few dragonborn who hadn’t been completely devoured by Nidhogg.

She looked ten times happier than when she blasted the dragon’s foreleg with her pile bunker.

When I asked what she planned to do with all that, she explained that fairy hair is incredibly soft yet as tough as troll tendons, making it perfect for bowstrings, clothing linings, or underwear.

“I’ll make a few sets for you too, Haschal!”

“Um… thanks.”

I could only nod hesitantly, unable to find the right words to respond to Asha’s bright smile.

I wanted to say it was crazy to wear clothing made from other species’ corpses, but… the armor I was wearing was made from Rurik’s fur.

Ah, how warm it is.

He was truly a man with a warm heart. Rurik was.

—-

Ceylon, who had been commanding the holy knights and focusing on the cleanup, finally finished gathering and burning all the corpses scattered throughout the mud. He then approached me, knelt on one knee, and greeted me.

“The situation is finally under control. It’s been a while, Lady Astraea. I hope you’ve been well.”

“I’m always fine. How about you? Have you been well?”

Ceylon smiled and nodded.

“Yes. Thanks to you revealing your stigmata, the misunderstandings… the misunderstandings have been somewhat dispelled. I can say things are peaceful now.”

…His smile doesn’t look like a real smile.

It seems that even after I left the Holy State, the honorific or perhaps infamous nickname “Ceylon the Well-Endowed” continued to spread enthusiastically.

“Oh… well, that’s good.”

Um… I feel a bit sorry about that.

Still, I guess a rumor about being large is better than one about being small or quick…?

“There were some devout believers who challenged me to duels, claiming I had defiled the Saint… but fortunately, they all resolved their misunderstandings after duels followed by conversation.”

“……”

Faced with Ceylon, who was laughing with a face of enlightenment while telling stories about the Holy State, I could only remain silent and wipe away my cold sweat.

So this is what it feels like to have nothing to say even with ten mouths.

—-

After raising Ceylon from his kneeling position and seating him across from me, I spent about twenty minutes chatting and hearing about the current state of the Holy State.

Finally, the purification of Nidhogg’s scattered remains was completed.

“Wow…”

Unlike the fairies’ ugly appearances that matched their ugly hearts, the dragon’s remains, stripped of all flesh, displayed an overwhelming magnificence just in their form.

Even I, who had expected it to be no different from dinosaur fossils at best, found it somewhat impressive. How must it have appeared to others?

“How are we going to move this?”

Surprisingly, they don’t seem that impressed…?

“We’ll have to dismantle it and load it onto the airship. I’m not sure if it will all fit.”

“Didn’t we send the airship to Faelrun territory? You said if we landed it nearby, it might be attacked and destroyed.”

Asha, who was packing up a bundle full of fairy and dragonborn remains, tilted her head and asked.

As she said, the airship should currently be near Faelrun territory. We had to send it far away out of concern for attacks from dragonborn or fairies.

“Yes, so we need to send a messenger to call it back. Until then, we’ll have to guard this place.”

“Camping in this cold place, what a hardship…”

Ophelia sighed and exhaled mana herb smoke.

“Would you like to go down and come back instead? I think it would take about four days of non-stop flying.”

“…Camping sounds better.”

Yeah, I knew you’d refuse. Enduring in a makeshift shelter is far more comfortable than flying through the biting wind.

“Who do you plan to send as the messenger?”

“Well… the holy knights need to return to the Holy State, and I can’t leave here in case of a possible attack… Demian is in that condition, so someone will have to ride a horse there and back, which means…”

I stroked my chin, pondering for a moment.

I had jokingly suggested Ophelia go, but such a forced march would be impossible with a mage’s stamina, so there was only one option left.

“Nigel, you’ll have to go. I’ll lend you Cascador, so ride him to find the airship docked at Faelrun Castle and relay our situation.”

“What? M-me?”

Nigel shook her head slightly in shock. Her eyes trembled as if an earthquake had struck, scanning left and right repeatedly.

Wait, why is she suddenly acting like this?

Her reaction was so uncharacteristic that the other companions also looked at her with puzzled expressions.

Except for Jahan, who seemed uninterested as he turned his head to gaze at a distant mountain peak.

“What, do you think it’ll be too difficult because of your injuries?”

“No, I, uh, ah. Th-that’s not it. Um, well. I mean. Hick.”

Nigel’s face turned bright red as her shoulders trembled.

Her gaze wandered aimlessly, her interlocked fingers squirmed, and her stuttering speech. It was an extremely strange reaction.

“Um… are you sure you’re not hurt somewhere? The healing should be complete…”

Did she hit her head? She looks fine on the outside, but maybe she’s suffering from internal bleeding…

I looked at Nigel with concern and tried to place my hand on her forehead.

“That’s, no, it’s not that…! I, um…”

Nigel, who had been rambling incoherently, closed her eyes tightly and lowered her head as if trying to avoid my touch. Then, in a tiny voice that was almost crawling, she answered.

“I, that is… I can no longer ride Cascador.”

“…What?”

My mouth fell open.

“Wait, what?”

“Huh?”

Ophelia and Millia’s mouths fell open too.

[What did she say…?]

Hersella would have had her mouth open too if she had one.

A bombshell statement that might have caused a new avalanche in the Sky Mountains if words had physical power.

“…?”

While everyone else was silently doubting their ears, only Lena tilted her head with a face that showed she didn’t understand what this meant.