“Oh, Kia’s here, too! Come, look! Uhak can cook! Don’t you think bringing him back here was the right call?!”
“I don’t get that worked up over basic cooking, okay? Also, he’s just helping himself to our food supplies, isn’t he?”
“But you said before that you could gather however much you wanted, right?”
“That’s just because you always pass on eating anything…”
Tu was apparently a construct of some kind and hadn’t eaten a meal since they started traveling together. To Kia, it seemed like Tu had some unknown inferiority complex and actively strived not to eat.
While they would both clean and take baths together, meals were the only time that Kia would create whatever she wanted with Word Arts and eat by herself.
Whether it was the stir-fried wild vegetables Elea would make, or her mom’s signature potato pie, Kia could make anything she wanted with her Word Arts, even down to the tastiest baked goods she had bought from Aureatia’s street stalls.
Thus, she didn’t think anything about someone being able to do a bit of cooking.
“He’s making soup with mashed potatoes and butter. Wow, Uhak, you’re so handy.”
“That’s no better than the basic stuff we learned in cooking class at school, you know.”
Of course, in said classes, Kia’s cooking produced wretched results.
Compared to that, Uhak’s cooking was much better—not just better, the smooth and soft soup was finished with care.
“Looks like it’s done. Let’s eat together.”
“…Tu, too?”
“I’m all set, I think.”
“ Then I’m not having any, either.”
“…Let’s all have some. Uhak, too.”
“Well, in that case, sure, fine.”
They carried over the plates and soup. The dining tables sitting side by side in the dining hall were clean, as if they were brand-new.
The furniture they were using in their base were all left-behind pieces covered in mold, but Kia had used Life Arts and Craft Arts on the necessary items to restore them and allow them to live comfortably.
Kia took a bite of some bread, drank a spoonful of soup, and soaked the torn pieces of bread in the soup.
The mild sweetness of milk and salt spread through her mouth.
“…This is good.”
“It is, huh?”
“You can taste it, Tu?”
“Yeah… I was made like that. But it’s apparently just a function to help me pretend to be a minia, so it’s totally meaningless. It’s just a waste on me…”
“…It’s not meaningless at all.”
“You think so?
“It’s always better to eat meals together. You think so, too, don’t you?”
“…Yeah.”
With the three of them sitting down at the table for the first time, it was unexpectedly relaxed and quiet, creating a tranquil atmosphere.
Uhak didn’t say a single word and remained completely still like some kind of plant.
What a weird ogre.
“Hey, so. Would it be all right? For Uhak to stay with us, too?”
Kia didn’t really understand in the first place why Tu was so stubborn about getting Kia’s permission, but when she thought about it for a moment, since Kia was overseeing their living arrangements and food stores, Kia may have indeed become the master of this ruined home.
She thought of the days she spent living with Elea.
If she could come to enjoy these tranquil days without being impatient with fear, perhaps then she would be happy. She had been when living with Elea.
“…Sure, I guess.”
“All right! Isn’t that great, Uhak?!”
Looking at Tu wrapping her arms around Uhak, Kia couldn’t help but smile.
This ogre looked so dangerous and scary, and here he was with a smiling girl wrapped around him.
“Okay, Uhak. So, you’ll have to listen to what we say, got it? We’re all in it together now.”
If Kia was going to search for the correct answer, the more the companions she had, the better.
Hidow the Clamp listened to the report inside the radzio operator room that had been specifically allotted to him.
“The wait was killing me here. You get results?”
<The targets are in the sixth borough of the Northern Outer Ward.>
The voice on the other side of the radzio answered.
<At the foot of the mountain along the harbor, there’s an inn… The ruins of Dayflower of Clouds, I think? Sorry for the vague answer but seems like even the residents don’t remember the ruins’ old name. That’s where they’re hiding out.>
“That’s good enough. You’re positive all three of them are together? Kia the World Word, Tu the Magic, and Uhak the Silent.”
<Not unless I’ve got holes for eyes. Thing is, I’d rather not get stuck with any more of these errands. I’ll begin to forget why I even showed up in Aureatia.>
“Sorry about that. Though, if you’re wondering what you came to Aureatia for, then…those errands must feel worthwhile too, eh, Shalk the Sound Slicer?”
<I wonder about that.>
The matter of Tu the Magic’s coincidental discovery in the hyphal labyrinth was, strictly speaking, not under Hidow’s jurisdiction. The reason the report reached Hidow’s ears was because Tu herself testified that she was working together with Kia the World Word.
Kia the World Word was charged with attacking the royal palace. As one of the people handling the matter, this now necessitated Hidow’s attention.
However, by the time Hidow heard the full series of reports, Tu had already escaped from the scene. It had been decided on-site to send Uhak the Silent, just tasked with wiping out Nectegio, to trail her.
For Hidow, not being on the scene himself, the situation was all news to him, and he had a horrible time trying to sort out the necessary information.
Entrusting Uhak, with his Word-Arts negation powerful enough to eradicate Nectegio, to pursue the two targets that his Word-Arts negation would prove most effective against, Tu the Magic and Kia the World Word—Hidow’s gut reaction coming from his own heuristics intuitively told him that while this appeared to be a rational strategy at first glance, it was in fact a bad move.
Uhak the Silent couldn’t be reliably controlled, even when using Kuze the Passing Disaster as an intermediary. If he was tasked to independently dispose of Tu and Kia, then there wouldn’t be anyone who could tackle him going out of control, or if there was a harmful interplay with Kia’s omnipotence, in an emergency.
Lacking leeway both in time and manpower while facing a situation that required them to immediately take any action they could, Hidow the Clamp succeeded in selecting the best person for the job and dispatching them to take care of it. The request to Shalk to pursue them had been done under Hidow’s sole discretion.
Tu had neutralized and shaken off all the Aureatian soldiers tasked with apprehending her, but Shalk the Sound Slicer was able to use his unparalleled mobile speed to arrive on the scene, observe Uhak stealthily outside of Tu’s detection range, trail them both, and pin down their hideout.
Shalk the Sound Slicer would be the one to do it. I had the right idea.
When Hidow heard during the seventh match that Shalk the Sound Slicer had personally suggested fighting at the Mali Wastes, the only impression he had was that Shalk was a skeleton with a completely inscrutable way of thinking.
He had known how Shalk fought during the assault by Alus the Star Runner, too. He arrived at the battlefield before anyone else, to immediately serve as a frontline decoy in the most dangerous position of all.
Behind the seemingly insane judgments Shalk made was this vivid desire that seemed to overwhelm all others. Was it perhaps that Shalk the Sound Slicer wouldn’t ever allow himself to flee from a battle?
A man like Hidow needed to analyze and utilize this madness while remaining sane and level.
The possibility that Uhak would run away from the twelfth match was more than enough of a reason to deploy Shalk.
<All my effort was a waste of time, huh? While I was observing them just like you asked, Tu and Uhak met up with Kia the World Word. If I was going to end up standing guard like this, I should’ve stopped them before they gathered together, right? After this, it doesn’t appear there’s anything they can do but give up or die.>
“That’s fine. If we didn’t let them run free for a bit, then we wouldn’t have known where Kia was hidden, too. As long as we know where they are, we have plenty of ways to take care of it.”
<What’ll happen with the match? Wasn’t this whole thing to secure Uhak and make him appear in the twelfth match?>
“Now that he’s intentionally joined with Tu and fled to their hideout, doesn’t it mean that Uhak’s ended like this because he’s gone out of control, right? From our position, it’s clear that he’s chosen to run away. Uhak doesn’t have any will to keep fighting in the Sixways Exhibition.”
<…I see. Still, I want to bring him back, no matter what. If he really plans on running away from his match, it’ll leave me a match’s worth of extra work.>
“I’m surprised. I didn’t take you for a mercenary that worked for free.”
<I don’t want to let this guy run away for personal reasons, that’s all. I just think getting to live carefree without caring about heroes or demon kings…is way too selfish.>
“Don’t worry, then. We’ll collect Uhak the Silent. That’s a done deal. You’re going to help us do it, too.”
<Sure hope so.>
Even after hanging up the radzio, Hidow’s headache didn’t get any better.
Uhak the Silent had already been in Aureatia’s custody to begin with. All they had needed to do, after testing out his abilities to defeat Nectegio, was intern him like before and use him when the situation called for it.
However, they needed to destroy Kia and Tu without Uhak. Hidow was cleaning up the mess caused by the rushed decision-making on the ground. Identifying Kia’s location was the sole return from it all, but the card they had given up in exchange was far too great.
Everything’s a jumbled mess. Now with Rosclay gone and Jelky not at his best either, the control in Aureatia’s the frailest it’s ever been…
“Hidow.”
A dry voice came from behind him.
“I have an idea how to pull Kia the World Word out of hiding.”
“…Yaniegiz.”
“Let’s share the responsibility for this operation. Your main goal here is arranging to get Uhak back, right? For Kia…can you leave her to me?”
“I mean, I’d definitely appreciate it if I can leave that up to you, but…”
Hidow wasn’t the only one in charge of dealing with the attack on the royal palace.
That was the Ninth General, Yaniegiz the Chisel.
Considering the operational scale needed to match their foe’s might, Hidow would need this man to take charge of half the operation. In terms of authority, Yaniegiz was in a higher position than Hidow, since Hidow had only recently returned to his position.
However, was it really okay to do so? He felt like his heuristic-given intuition, and the madness that Haade instilled within him, had morphed into his present headache and continued to ring alarm bells inside his head.
“…Can you actually get her?”
“Huh? Get her?”
Yaniegiz flashed a small glimpse of his sharklike snaggletooth.
This man was filled with hatred. More than anyone else, he hated the girl who, on two occasions, in the fourth match and during the assault on the royal palace, had worked to send Rosclay to his death—Kia the World Word.
“I’ll kill her dead.”
Kia the World Word. Tu the Magic. Uhak the Silent.
The union of the three dropouts, who had now turned into the greatest threat to Aureatia and minian peace, were given an unofficial nickname—neither hero candidate nor self-proclaimed demon king.
A new demonic force threatening the monarchy—the New Demon King Army.
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