Ch.913Reunion with the Party

Reunions always come with surprises.

Like the old saying about how people change beyond recognition even after being apart for just a few days, humans are beings who frequently transform dramatically in short periods.

There’s no need to dig up centuries-old proverbs; this is commonplace even in modern society.

‘I couldn’t recognize anything of her former self when we met again.’

‘The reunion with Chiiko was the worst.’

‘Brother, do I look any different?’

Haven’t we all heard these clichéd statements dozens or hundreds of times throughout our lives?

They clearly prove that regardless of era or circumstance, reunions invariably bring unfamiliarity and surprise.

…And that was exactly my situation right now.

The acquaintances who visited my private room to welcome me back were utterly shocked by how dramatically I had changed.

Not only the members of the Knight of Seals who were resting in the palace, but also Imara and Jahan who had come to report on the situation at the Ka’har refugee camp.

“U-unnie…?”

“Haschal…? Something, something’s different?”

Imara gaped with a face more shocked than when she’d learned her mother was a sorceress, while Millia stared at me blankly, at a loss for words.

“Praise Astraea…!”

Lena let out a cheer that would have earned her a smack on the head from Saulite had she been present.

“…Ahem.”

“Hmm… we’ll need to get new armor fitted.”

Jahan and Nigel cleared their throats and averted their gazes, deliberately looking away from me.

The two of them standing so close together made them look like long-distance lovers reuniting after a long separation.

“This is… Astraea’s holy power…? No, it seems somewhat different…”

“Different? I can’t tell the difference…”

Bethania and Adamante expressed shock not at my changed appearance but at the goddess’s energy that had completely merged with my body. Just as Cardinal Ernlitter had.

Though their voices were calm, their dilated pupils trembled as if an earthquake had struck, suggesting they were more than a little surprised.

If I were to turn on my halo, they might completely lose it.

Of course, not everyone gathered in my room showed such surprise.

“You’ve grown taller…? Don’t tell me you were still in your growth period…?”

“Lady Perneisia, please put down that bottle. You’ll spill it again.”

Perneisia had returned to her drunken state, perhaps due to the shock of not getting her toy Eirnesia, while Hush was too busy taking care of her to pay attention to my appearance.

“You said you’d be fine going alone, but when you cause trouble, you really go all out, don’t you?”

Frider snickered with a face that said he’d expected me to cause trouble, and Leonore shook her head beside him.

“And why are your breasts even bigger now? What’s with that size? Are you pregnant or something?”

“Women who were already well-endowed don’t show much change when pregnant. Flat chest.”

I picked up Frider, who was snickering while pointing at my chest, and dumped him onto the sofa cushion, then sat down heavily in front of him, pressing against his back.

“Urgh…!”

Frider, who had suddenly become a human backrest, groaned as he flailed his arms and legs.

“Should I call you madame instead of mademoiselle now?”

Leonore, apparently not learning from Frider’s predicament, also teased me with a smirk…

“Come to think of it, Leopold has been desperately looking for a royal family member to take the emperor’s place.”

“…”

But silencing her wasn’t difficult.

“Shall we behave?”

“…Yes, my lady.”

Unlike with Frider, whom I had to pin to the sofa, a simple smile and a joking threat about not wanting to go bald was enough for her.

“Keck, keck… This is discrimination, discrimination!”

Having finally escaped from being a backrest, Frider grumbled that I was treating him and Leonore differently.

He complained that while he was pinned to the sofa and subjected to squishing, Leonore got off with just a word.

Honestly, he’s not a child anymore.

“Discrimination? Of course not.”

I laid her back on the sofa and shook my head with a bright smile.

“This isn’t discrimination, it’s distinction.”

I’m simply distinguishing between people who can be dealt with through words and those who cannot.

You just happen to be the latter.

—-

Anyway, I explained to my gathered acquaintances everything I had experienced in the Dragonic Kingdom of Jin and the outlook for the future.

Except for the part about hearing Astraea’s voice.

Just explaining that I was able to defeat the dragon thanks to the goddess’s blessing was enough to send the two clergy into a state of rapturous prayer.

If I had mentioned hearing the goddess’s voice, it wouldn’t have been surprising if they had fainted from shock.

“—You understand what I’m trying to say, right?”

After finishing my story, I tapped my cigarette ash into the ashtray and looked over each of them.

A hero who had reached maturity through experience.

One who had just crossed the wall.

A drunkard.

Those who hadn’t yet crossed the wall.

Non-combatants.

Not overwhelming, but not pathetic either—truly mediocre forces.

I couldn’t help but sigh at how far we still had to go.

Of course, not all of Hestella’s high-ranking forces were gathered here.

Demian and Joshua were absent after the recent battle, and Ophelia was nowhere to be seen, probably holed up in her research lab.

The Sword of Landenburg was also absent.

Except for Nigel, the masters of Landenburg wouldn’t come to my private room just to greet me upon my return.

They regarded me not as a friend or someone to show goodwill to, but as a lord to whom they owed loyalty.

…That’s probably normal, right?

If I had issued a direct summons, that would be different, but these people barging into the queen’s private quarters without one was abnormally informal.

…Well, I did allow it.

I had asked them to treat me as usual in private settings.

I might accept formal treatment in official settings, but I didn’t want to be treated like a queen in private.

Imagine if acquaintances who used to joke casually with you suddenly became your subordinates overnight, speaking formally and treating you with rigid etiquette.

That would be somewhat… no, extremely burdensome.

A reality where our Lena or Millia address me as “Your Majesty” and kneel before me should never exist.

“So… you were running away with your tail between your legs because you thought you couldn’t win, and barely managed to win thanks to the goddess?”

“…”

I wish Frider would show some decorum.

“Good thing there were no witnesses. What a humiliation… Wait, don’t pick me up! Don’t pick me—gack!”

After planting Frider, who was snickering at having found new material to tease me with, back on the sofa, I exhaled a smoke-filled sigh toward the ceiling and continued.

“…It’s become an era where even heroes who have crossed the wall, let alone masters, struggle to preserve their lives. Just like eight hundred years ago.”

“Not even worth mentioning, huh…”

Leonore clicked her tongue while gently rubbing her neck with her fingertips.

As if embarrassed that despite her zealous training since becoming a master, she still hadn’t crossed the wall.

Well… that couldn’t be helped.

Though it’s become somewhat common now, becoming a hero originally required at least a decade or more of arduous training even after becoming a master.

Or being born with enough talent and opportunity to compress those ten-plus years into just about one.

What happens if you have neither talent nor opportunity?

Well, that goes without saying. We’ve met someone like that before.

An incompetent and unlucky old man who trained for nearly fifty years but never crossed the wall—Imperial Mediocre Sword Valenstein.

Anyway, Leonore had no reason to blame herself for insufficient effort.

Among all humans in the Empire, Kingdom, and Holy State, there were only about six prodigies who had crossed the wall at Leonore’s age.

And if you excluded clergy, who could advance more easily, there were only four left.

Me, Demian, Millia, and Nigel.

As far as I knew, no other human had reached hero status before the age of thirty besides us four.

It was only natural.

To cross the wall and reach hero status around the age of twenty required literally transcendent levels of talent, like us.

A saint with the bloodline of the Great’s Twelve Knights enhanced by divine blood, combined with a soul from another world.

The protagonist of the original game and the destined owner of the holy sword, a hero-in-waiting.

The youngest master of Landenburg. A training addict whose work is training and whose rest is also training.

The childhood friend of the hero.

…Somehow the genius factor seems to diminish as we go down the list.

Anyway, crossing the wall wasn’t simple unless you were such a being.

While Leonore, with her royal bloodline and witch’s heritage, was certainly more talented than most… she simply wasn’t at our level.

To begin with, being Isabella’s bloodline wasn’t even particularly advantageous.

All Isabella had passed down to Leonore was magical aptitude and beautiful appearance, neither of which had any real use in swordsmanship.

If she had chosen to become a magic swordsman who could use both magic and swords, it might have been different, but she disliked that idea.

Having directly witnessed the atrocities her mother committed, she seemed to have developed a strong aversion to magic.

While she didn’t mind her companions using magic, she herself didn’t want to set foot on the path of magic at all.

So what could I do? I could only support her desire to become stronger as a pure knight, even if it took more time.

“Don’t be so discouraged. They say if you keep knocking, eventually it will open, right?”

Therefore, I gave Leonore a smile and offered warm words of encouragement.

“If you haven’t crossed the wall yet, just keep pounding on it until you do.”

Subtly hinting at the fate she would have to endure.

“…Shouldn’t it be ‘knocking’?”

Frider, who had been pinned to the sofa, pulled his head up and asked.

Perhaps sensing the ominous nuance in my words, his eye corners twitched slightly.

“No. ‘Pounding’ is correct.”

I shook my head and replied.

Conveying that the ominous imagination in his head would soon become reality.

Yes.

The time to knock… no, to pound had come.

For all those who had not crossed the wall, and those who had.

Until they reached the minimum level required to engage in battle against dragons.