Ch.969A Brief Respite, Unwelcome Truth

After killing the black dragon, relatively peaceful days followed.

Except for the occasional attacks by flying monsters on our airship, truly nothing happened.

Actually, it’s embarrassing to even call them attacks. Unlike with the dragon, they weren’t even at a level where I needed to step in.

It’s not that there weren’t strong monsters, but they weren’t strong enough to defeat Demian wielding his holy sword.

Thanks to that, we were able to spend our time so leisurely it was almost like we were on vacation.

Of course, there wasn’t much to do on an airship, so calling it a vacation would be a bit of an exaggeration—it was rather boring.

I wasn’t the only one feeling the boredom. Instead of sprawling out and relaxing, everyone became obsessively focused on whatever activities they could do here.

Ophelia locked herself in her room mass-producing mana stones containing spirit mana, while Perneisia swept up all the alcohol stored in the cabin and drank it all.

Then she lined up the empty bottles on the deck and shot at them with her revolver while drunkenly rambling. Something about dwarven guns having a surprisingly good feel to them.

It was so damn noisy that I smacked the back of her head and locked her in the cabin.

Frider was always sticking close to Demian. Not to do anything that would horrify Millia, but to use Demian as an all-purpose antidote.

She would stuff all kinds of poisons into her stomach, trusting in the miracle of purification. That girl really has a toxic personality in many ways.

Even though he can detoxify anything as long as it doesn’t kill her instantly…

“Ugh, urgh…! My stomach, my stomach feels like it’s melting… purification, hurry, purify me…!”

Until the poison is completely eliminated, she has to endure its effects throughout her body, yet she keeps consuming them anyway.

When she drank paralysis poison, I jokingly ordered Demian not to purify her, and it was quite amusing to see her lying motionless for an entire hour.

After an hour, when he finally purified the paralysis poison, she immediately jumped up and lunged at me. She was so enraged that she even used the power of Karma.

“Oh my dear Frider, that’s why I told you not to eat just anything. Didn’t I say you’d get a stomachache?”

“You’re dead!”

Of course, she had no chance. As if I’d let her catch me.

“You’re slow, even when charging.”

“You really…!”

Unlike before, I could get poisoned if I came into contact with Frider, so I escaped beyond the deck and flew through the sky, teasing her.

A ground dog can never defeat an air force. Since Frider couldn’t fly, she could only look up with her head raised, fuming like a dog that had failed to catch a chicken.

In a real battle, she might have thrown her chain axe or spear to hit me, but that would be an excessive response for what was merely a joke.

Frider had enough discernment to know that. In the first place, she was just momentarily upset, not genuinely enraged.

However, revenge did come that night.

She snuck in while I was sleeping and lightly touched me before leaving. She even eliminated her presence with magic, probably with Ophelia’s help.

If I had been awake, I would have noticed, but unfortunately I was in a deep sleep, so I only realized what had happened after the poison had completely settled in my body.

“No… ha, seriously, are you crazy…!”

Thanks to her, I woke up startled in the middle of the night and had to sigh deeply as I threw my bedding and pajamas into the laundry basket.

[Hmm, hmm! Is this what they call karma? Justice has finally been served in this land!]

Hersella burst into laughter like someone in a manic episode at the sight of me doing laundry naked from the waist down.

She even clapped by slapping together the tentacles of murder karma like they were palms.

‘Hey, be honest. You knew and just stayed quiet, didn’t you?’

I questioned Hersella while scrubbing the bedsheet with a cigarette in my mouth.

It had already been proven before that her consciousness could be awake even when I was sleeping.

In other words, there was a high possibility that Hersella had watched Frider plant a diuretic on me and leave, pretending not to know.

[Hmm? I don’t know what you’re talking about.]

No, this isn’t just a possibility—it’s 100%. Though she’s denying it verbally, her tone of voice is clearly mocking me.

[How could I—pfft, how could I understand the babbling of a child who can’t even—haha—control his bladder? If you wish to speak to me, come back after you’re out of diapers.]

‘You really…’

I let out a sigh that was close to a lament.

I feel like I need to discipline her sometime, but I have no idea what to do to achieve that.

She’s become so shameless that she doesn’t care if the body that was originally hers ends up in this state as long as she can mock me, so ordinary shock tactics wouldn’t work.

A few methods did come to mind, but they all crossed the line too extremely or would shock me more than her, so I didn’t dare try them.

Touching Imelia’s remains or Jahan because I was mocked a bit would be the fastest way to not only ruin our relationship but become mortal enemies who would have to fight to the death.

So what could I do? Like a civilized person, I had to be generous and merciful and let it go just this once.

“Haah…”

A sigh escaped my lips involuntarily.

– Chiiik!

…along with the cigarette I had in my mouth.

“Ah.”

[Pfft, you’ve really become a child. Wetting your bedding at night, drooling what’s in your mouth. You’d make a great friend with that red-haired witch’s sister.]

Hersella burst into laughter once more, unleashing a splendid mockery. She pointed at the cigarette butt I had carelessly dropped with her murder karma tentacle.

In the laundry basin where my pajamas, blanket, and bedsheet were soaking, the extinguished cigarette ash was spreading like a swarm of ants among the floating soap bubbles.

…Fuck, really.

The next day, I tied up Frider’s hands, feet, and mouth and hung her from the mast. Without telling anyone the reason.

The only person who knew the reason well, Frider, seemed convinced that her revenge had succeeded based on my reaction, as she burst into laughter for quite a while even while hanging from the mast.

After four hours, she started sweating a little.

Of course, unlike Frider, I was a civilized person of the 21st century with humanity and culture, so I mercifully loosened the chains just before her bladder was about to burst.

Her expression suggested she would rather commit suicide than wet herself in front of everyone and lose her dignity as a grand duchess, which made my heart soften without me realizing it.

“Nngh… how many hours are you going to keep me tied up? You’re so vicious…”

Frider frowned as soon as I loosened the chains and she came down, but she didn’t dare lunge at me.

Seeing how she was trembling with her legs pressed together, she seemed certain that attacking me in her current state would result in social death.

“Wrong. You should be thanking me now.”

“What? What nonsense is that…”

“I just saved your life. So you should say thank you.”

I showed her the chains I had used to tie her up until just now and smirked. With a face suggesting I could tie her up again if she complained.

Frider spun around and dashed into the cabin. At a speed that made me wonder if she had also awakened to Defying Fate. That’s how urgent it was for her.

‘Ah, I should have locked the bathroom door. That would have been quite a sight.’

[You truly are a demon.]

When I muttered this sudden thought in a somewhat regretful tone, Hersella suddenly introduced herself in a trembling voice as if shuddering.

They say that even when good offers kindness, evil does not thank it but rather responds with criticism and mockery. Indeed, the scriptures contain no falsehoods.

—-

Continuing to tease each other and chat cheerfully like this, we crossed the imperial airspace and entered the territory of the Holy State.

“We should land soon. We need to replenish the supplies we’ve used on the way… and I should meet up with those we sent ahead.”

In the sky above the Holy State of Elphirem, I instructed the mages operating the airship to lower the altitude and prepare for landing.

While seriously staring at the horizon stained by the sunset, turning my head toward the setting sun.

Vermilion flames as vivid as the sunset. Smoke rising thickly. Broken walls and collapsed cathedrals. And giant trees writhing like tentacles while engulfed in flames.

The cities in the western part of the Holy State, which had been shining magnificently with holy light, were now burning fiercely, shattered by a tsunami of giant trees.

It seemed the border areas had all fallen and were now in the hands of the elves.

From the looks of it, they were counterattacking, but they were barely maintaining the front line and couldn’t even dream of reclaiming their territory yet.

Well, that’s to be expected. The opponent they’re facing isn’t just pointy-eared creatures, but the god they serve.

[This is serious. It cannot be ignored.]

A woman’s voice filled with static echoed in my head.

Astraea, who had been silent since the subjugation of Amitamar, spoke to me again. As if she had been waiting for me to come to the Holy State.

Well, this is perfect timing. There was something I wanted to ask.

As soon as I heard her voice, I asked the question I had been most eager to ask all this time.

‘What did you do to my chest? Why did it get so big? You said you’d help me kill the dragon, but breast size has nothing to do with that, does it?’

I’m grateful that she gave me part of her divinity to help my body evolve to the next level, but why did my breasts also evolve to the next—no, two levels?

[I did not interfere. It was merely your potential blooming.]

Astraea answered.

It wasn’t her doing; it was just the manifestation of potential that had always been latent in my body.

…So she was saying that even without gaining divinity, I was destined to grow this large eventually. The process was just accelerated.

I was speechless.

I had definitely thought it was some divine trick, but it turns out I was destined to grow this large from the beginning. What kind of body is this?

I was basically a dairy cow from birth, a dairy cow.

It was so absurd that I couldn’t help but laugh.