Chapter 46
Having barely dealt with the attack by the Blood Kin in black masks, I left the banquet hall with Jeras, Selenia, and her maid, Lumiell.
When I carefully opened the banquet hall door to check for any other enemies, I found about six Blood Kin corpses there, along with Rana and another maid, both breathing heavily.
The dignified-looking maid was holding a spear, and the moment she saw us, she ran over without bothering to hide her joy.
“Lord Jeras! Are you safe!!”
“I’m fine.”
“Thank goodness. If you had been hurt, Lord Jeras, I would have…”
“That is what I should be saying. Ain, are you hurt anywhere?”
“Thanks to Rana’s help, I wasn’t seriously hurt anywhere.”
That maid must have been Ain.
The two ignored us and started acting like a married couple.
At that moment, Rana ran over to me.
“I’m glad you’re safe, my lord.”
“I’m glad you’re safe too, Rana.”
Rana’s clothes were slightly torn, and she had a few minor wounds, but she did not appear to be seriously injured.
Just as I was relieved that she was all right, Rana looked into my eyes and spoke.
“I would like to receive your praise, my lord, but this is an emergency, so please praise me all at once later.”
“Ah…all right.”
Rana asked for praise with a blank expression, yet she gave off the air of a puppy that would wag its tail if it could.
Once this situation is over, I should praise her all at once.
At that moment, Selenia shouted from behind me.
“Wait! Rana! Are you ignoring me?”
“…Lady Selenia, Lady Lumiell is here too. I didn’t notice you at all.”
Only then did Rana notice the two of them and speak to them.
From Rana’s perspective, it was certainly a surprising situation.
Her former superior, the Imperial Princess, and Lumiell had suddenly appeared.
“I wasn’t told that either of you would be coming. What brings you here?”
Selenia had apparently come here through Jeras without telling Rana either.
As if recalling what we had been discussing in the banquet hall until a moment ago, Selenia’s face flushed and she shouted.
“Th-There’s something important that’s difficult to explain!”
“Understood. I’ll assume I know nothing.”
Rana coolly accepted that explanation and moved on.
As expected, it was a response worthy of a perfect maid.
After the brief small talk ended, I asked about the situation.
“More importantly, where’s Azel? And the other soldiers?”
“Azel seems to be outside, stopping the Blood Kin assassins. The other soldiers seem to have either gone up onto the castle walls to stop the monsters or begun fighting the Blood Kin assassins like we did.”
I had a rough idea of what was happening.
The current situation resembled the ‘Imperial Princess Route—The Blood Kin’s Assault’ episode of World Archive, which I had briefly played in my previous life.
Even then, the Blood Kin had used some kind of magic barrier to prevent people from using magic before launching their attack.
The reason magic had been disabled was probably those two.
”It’s strange, Jeras…Mana hasn’t listened to me since earlier.“
”Is it the same for you, Lady Selenia? It’s the same for me!“
Mages inevitably became drastically weaker when they could no longer use magic.
I couldn’t remember the details because I hadn’t paid close attention, but the Blood Kin had clearly used a barrier spell at an enormous cost to prevent magic from being used while attempting to assassinate the Imperial Princess.
The principle was that the Blood Kin’s barrier corrupted mana and prevented magic from being used, and the Tower Master who appeared there had said that it should be possible to use magic again with some kind of item.
That item must have been…
“Lord Jeras, by any chance, is there a mana amplifier like the ‘Philosopher’s Stone’ here?”
“The Philosopher’s Stone? I have one in my workshop.”
Yes, it was definitely the top-grade mana amplifier item 『Philosopher’s Stone』.
One of the ways to clear that stage was to obtain the Philosopher’s Stone, use magic again, and win.
Once I thought of a solution, I acted quickly.
“Then let’s go there. I know a little about this. If we have it inside this barrier, we should be able to use magic again.”
“How do you know that, Lord Calix…? Ah! The red mage must have told you.”
“Yes, something like that.”
Sharen, the heir to the Red Magic Tower and a red mage who had once wandered throughout the Empire, could reasonably be expected to know about something like this, and Lord Jeras seemed to accept that explanation.
We hurried toward Lord Jeras’s workshop so that we could use magic again and resolve the situation.
It seemed that everything would be over easily if we reached the workshop without incident…but once again, this world did not seem inclined to let me off easily.
“Rana…”
“Step back, my lord… This is a dangerous enemy.”
In the final corridor leading to Lord Jeras’s workshop, a chilling presence spread that even I could feel.
A Blood Kin wearing red earrings walked out of the darkness.
He was unmasked and had an appearance similar to a dark elf, and he looked at us with cold eyes.
“How surprising. Not only a lord of the Empire, but even a member of the imperial family has gathered here. Our comrades’ sacrifices were not in vain.”
“You bastard! Do you even know who this person is?!”
Lumiell stepped to the very front to protect Selenia, sword in hand.
Seeing Lumiell, the man who appeared to be the Blood Kin’s captain gave a lurid smile.
“Of course. You’re the ones interfering with our sacred mission.”
As he spoke, he drew a dagger twice as large as the ones used by the Blood Kin we had seen so far.
At the same time, five black-masked figures appeared behind him.
I couldn’t sense anything like mana, but the combat maid’s expression alone told me that they were formidable.
These opponents were more skilled than the Blood Kin assassins we had defeated so far.
If we fought them like this, our entire party might be wiped out.
What should I do…? How could I resolve this situation…?
I desperately racked my limited memories of World Archive, and one event came to mind.
I looked at the Imperial Princess, Selenia, and spoke to Rana.
“Rana…”
“Yes, my lord…”
“How long do you think you could hold out if you and your sisters fought them?”
Rana stared at them without expression.
After assessing the Blood Kin and comparing them with herself, Ain, and Lumiell, she calmly calculated and answered.
“…I think I could hold out for about three minutes.”
“Then…hold them off for just three minutes. After that, I’ll somehow take care of the rest.”
“Yes…I understand.”
Three minutes… It was incredibly close, but this was no time to worry about such details.
Just as I was about to act, Jeras, who had brought a spear from the banquet hall earlier, boldly stepped forward.
Ain was startled by his action and stopped him.
”Lord Jeras, it’s dangerous! Please stay behind me.“
”Ain, I don’t want to become a weak man who hides behind his wife.“
”Lord Jeras…“
Jeras swung the spear and took up a stance.
He was no master, but his movements looked sufficient for a warrior.
So this was what he had meant when he said he had trained in martial arts after nearly being killed by the Blood Kin assassins last time.
”Come! You attackers! I’ll make you pay for thinking that I, Jeras Sila, could be killed just by taking away my magic!!“
Looking at him, Rana spoke.
“…I think I can hold out for about four minutes.”
“Then…that’s a relief.”
Before the battle began, I spoke to Rana.
“Rana…this is an order. Don’t die…understand?”
Rana smiled as if my words had startled her.
”You needn’t worry.“
And, true to Rana’s nature, she answered,
”Because I am a perfect maid.“
At Rana’s words, the Blood Kin charged.
The Blood Kin, the maids, and Jeras with his spear collided in the middle of the corridor and began a desperate battle, leaving no room for me, who had never learned any martial arts, to intervene.
I hurried over to Selenia, who was standing behind us, unsure what to do.
“Lady Selenia! I’m about to do something extremely rude, so please forgive me in advance.”
“What! Wh-What are you trying to do!?”
Selenia had not yet awakened her blessing.
I would awaken her blessing now.
Since I had to trigger the awakening event within three minutes—no, four minutes, I went all in.
“Lily!! This is an emergency, so focus on what I’m saying!!”
“I…I understand…”
I grabbed her by the shoulders.
Then I looked straight at her and spoke.
“As you already know, Lily, a great power is hidden inside you.”
“A great power?”
“Yes, your magical ability is like a fragment of that power.”
Her awakening event was supposed to be handled by her teacher, not me.
But this was an emergency.
Recalling the event, I spoke to her.
“Close your eyes and focus on what’s inside you. Don’t sense the world’s mana as you would when using magic; focus on what’s inside you…”
“Focus on what’s inside me…”
Normally, using magic began with sensing the mana in the world.
But she was an exception.
At least in her case, she had to sense mana within herself, not in the world.
“It’s only that you failed to realize it because it was so natural that you had always felt it. Now, focus on the sound of your heartbeat and follow the mana inward from there.”
“Follow the mana inward…”
Golden light began to seep out little by little along her veins.
The scene I had seen in the event was being recreated, so I continued speaking.
“Follow your veins, then your muscles, and enter your heart. From there, look for the sun.”
To mages, the sun was the source and beginning of all energy.
They said that the sun contained the strongest mana in nature, and that sensing and utilizing the sun’s mana was the foundation of magic.
But Selenia did not need that.
Because…
“You don’t need the sun, because the sun has been inside you from the very beginning.”
“The sun is inside me…?”
Selenia found this moment truly astonishing.
Calix, whom she had met for the first time today, seemed to know her better than she knew herself.
He should have seemed like a swindler, but strangely, his words didn’t feel that way.
It truly seemed as if he was speaking earnestly for her sake.
Following his words, she focused on what she had always felt and went deeper and deeper inside, until she sensed a huge, golden light.
Although she did not say anything, she knew at a glance.
That was the power hidden within her that her teacher and Calix had spoken of…
Selenia reached out toward that power.
* * *
In the midst of a life-and-death battle, everyone suddenly stopped moving.
Then both the Blood Kin and the humans looked toward the Imperial Princess, Selenia.
Golden light was radiating from her.
The Blood Kin’s barrier seemed to struggle desperately to block her mana, and the black mana attempted to curse it, but all its efforts were in vain.
Just as a barehanded human cannot stop an elephant and an ant cannot stop a car, a barrier created from the lives of a few Blood Kin could never hope to stop the sun.
This was the blessing of 『Selenia Lily Novarens』: <The Sun Goddess>.
After awakening her blessing, she could always use the sun’s mana without being hindered by any curse or poison.
Bwoooong-
“………”
On this dark night, when even the moonlight was barely visible,
『The Sun Goddess』 descended here.