Chapter 7
THANKS TO SOLOMON, the orphans had a place to go.
Mira confidently declared that they’d be back soon, then ended the transmission. She then picked up the receiver once more, pulled out a notebook, and dialed a number that she’d written down.
“Hello, Alioth speaking,” she heard a voice say from over the receiver.
Alioth was an officer with the Isuzu Alliance. They’d registered each other’s numbers so that she might be able to contact Kagura in case of an emergency.
“It’s been a while. It’s me, Mira,” Mira said.
“Oh wow, Miss Mira. It certainly has been a long time,” a cheerful voice responded.
Whenever they spoke for the first time in a while, they ended up chatting about other things. This time, Mira was curious as to what was going on in Sentopoli and Roslein, so the conversation ended up veering off track.
“I see. I’m glad to hear everything’s going well.”
Alioth said a few small issues remained, but everything had more or less been taken care of. They were now working with Roslein, so the situation was getting better.
“On that note, is there anything else that you need?”
Relieved to hear that everything was going well, Mira finally remembered the reason she’d called and said, “Oh yeah, that’s right. I wanted to ask Ka—Uzume for help with something.”
She inquired if he could put her in contact with her and was asked to hold on for a moment.
There were still some familiars being kept at the base, so Kagura would be able to use a substitution technique to immediately return there if necessary. It was a very convenient technique. With that in mind, Mira asked that they call Uzume for her.
“Hey there, Gramps. What do you need help with?” she heard Kagura’s voice say over the receiver after a moment, sounding like she normally did.
“Oh ho, well, I might need—”
“Is that Kagura?! It’s been a while! It’s me, Artesia. I’m happy to hear that you sound well.”
Mira had wanted to cut right to the chase and let her know what they needed, but Artesia had other plans.
Then Lastrada added, “It’s been a while, Kagura!”
“Huh? What?! Artesia?! And…uh, from the vibe of the other voice, I’m guessing that’s Subaru Hoshizaki.”
“Bingo!”
Artesia was holding back a chuckle at the overly enthusiastic Lastrada.
Mira decided to quickly explain how it was that she’d reunited with them before getting back to what she needed from Kagura: She wanted to borrow the Isuzu Alliance’s spirit airship to transport the orphans.
That was the best plan she could come up with. Traveling by land only gave them so many options, but the only things she could currently fly on were the wagon she’d arrived in, Pegasus, Hippogriff, or other spirits like them. And while it was much faster than going by land, she’d only be able to transport around eight people at once. It would be a two- or three-day trip one way, so it’d likely take over a month to transport all the orphans.
It wouldn’t be easy to spend that long doing the exact same thing over and over, either. And honestly, having succeeded in finding Lastrada and Artesia, all Mira wanted was to take a little break.
She could probably transport more by using Eizenfald as well, but that would be sure to cause an international incident and would undoubtedly be more trouble than it was worth.
Then Kagura’s spirit airship popped into her head.
It was a state-of-the-art flying ship that only a select few countries, let alone the Kingdom of Alcait, possessed. If they used one of those, they could transport all the children at once.
“Yeah, no worries. If it’s for kids and Artesia, then I can let you use it,” Kagura said, not sounding particularly concerned about lending her the airship.
She was doing it for the children and Artesia…but she was likely doing it for the sake of the Kingdom of Alcait as well.
Having secured permission to borrow the airship, they set about talking logistics over the communications device. There was more to the whole airship business than there seemed at first glance.
“All right, talk to you later. But first, could you point me somewhere that’s easy to find?”
“Hrmm. Sure thing.”
Having concluded their meeting, Mira ended the transmission. While preparing the spirit airship for launch, they’d be sending Tweetsuke over to them. Wanting to secure a place where they could take off and land, Mira personally scouted the surrounding area, then sent the approximate coordinates to Kagura.
And with that, they were done. Tweetsuke was set to arrive nearby within two to three hours. They’d planned that Mira would wait atop Pegasus in the air to receive the familiar when they got close.
“Thanks, Mira. I’ll hurry and let everyone know.”
The children would have the opportunity to grow up in a bigger and better environment. Artesia must’ve been quite happy about this as she dashed toward the church in high spirits.
“All right, Chief. I’ll be heading back, too. I’ve got training with the senior class today, and if I keep them waiting much longer, they won’t be happy with me. We’ve prepared that house with the red roof for you, so feel free to use it as a command center,” Lastrada said, pointing to a house a few doors down from the church. As he left, he said, “We’ll get dinner together later!”
He did seem to genuinely enjoy taking care of the children, though not to the same extent as Artesia.
“Hrmm… Guess I’ll wait for Tweetsuke first.”
She figured she might as well take it easy while she still could.
Parting with the seemingly very busy duo, Mira put the notepad with the contact number of the Isuzu Alliance into her pocket and made for the house that Lastrada had mentioned.
With her Guardian Ash pulling the wagon, they arrived at the house. As she got closer, she realized that what she thought was a roof was a carpet of beautiful red flowers. Taking another look, she noticed that all the nearby houses had colorful roofs. The array of vivid tree houses in the village made her feel as if she was looking at a scene out of a fairy tale.
“This place isn’t half bad.”
The green of the leaves and the color of the flowers harmonized well, creating a vivid scene that gave off a wondrous sense of peace and tranquility. Dismissing her guardian ash, Mira examined the flowers as she entered the house.
She was soon greeted with the warm scent of wood filling her nostrils. Surrounded by the beauty of nature, she pulled out her skill encyclopedia and leisurely waited for Tweetsuke to arrive.
Shortly before the time when she was to meet up with the familiar, she took off on Pegasus and surveyed the surrounding area.
“There really aren’t any settlements nearby, huh?”
The treetop village sat in the middle of the forest. Besides being well hidden, no one had stumbled across it due to the lack of any real roads. If one were to come looking for the village based on rumor alone, they would likely just get lost.
Mira thought once again that it’d been the right move to set her eyes on Fuzzy Dice.
“On that note, I wonder who the big boss of the syndicate is?”
Lastrada had said that he’d figured out a way of bringing down the huge human trafficking syndicate, and if someone who always made sure justice was served said that, then she probably didn’t need to worry about it. However, there were other syndicates lurking in the shadows. Remembering one such organization she’d faced—Chimera Clausen—Mira wondered when another such organization would emerge.
Then there were the idiosyncratic Nine Wise Men. It wasn’t certain that they’d all work alongside each other. What happened twice was sure to happen a third time, so Mira was a bit anxious about her search for the remaining Wise Men.
Tweetsuke arrived right about on schedule. Once they’d met up in the air, they proceeded to look around for a place where the spirit airship could land.
“I think over there will work.”
Kagura had already seen the area, and a large lake located slightly north of the village seemed to be a good candidate. Approaching the area and taking a closer look, Mira saw that it was about six hundred fifty feet long and was very deep.
The spirit airship could be brought down on land, but it was also a ship and could land on water as well. Deep in the forest and surrounded by trees, the lake had an open view of the sky above and was an ideal place to land.
Having finished checking it out, Mira put Tweetsuke—who’d shrunk itself down—onto her head and went back to the village. Due to how well-camouflaged the village was, she’d lost sight of where it was. But disaster was averted thanks to Lastrada, who’d grown worried and gone out to find them.
They returned to a room in the church where Artesia was waiting. Kagura swapped places with Tweetsuke, and with her arrival, four of the Nine Wise Men were now gathered in the same room. For Mira, it was her first time seeing them in only a couple of months. But how many years must it have been for Kagura, Artesia, and Lastrada?
Before diving into discussing their plans for transporting the orphans, they had a lot of catching up to do. Reunited, they chatted about the Isuzu Alliance, Fuzzy Dice, the orphanage, and Mira’s search for the Nine Wise Men. Once they finished talking about what had happened and their current situations, they finally began to come up with a plan to transport the children.
They had already discussed most of this over the communication device, so there wasn’t too much left to talk about. About all that remained was at what time and date the spirit airship would arrive and how they’d get everyone to the lake where the airship would land and take off from.
“That lake, huh? We’ll have to cut straight through the forest.”
“I don’t think any monsters will emerge nearby…but just to be safe, we should go in four groups.”
There was no direct route from the village to the lake. They’d have to take over a hundred children through the untamed forest. With everyone agreeing that this was rather dangerous, Mira stepped forward to say she’d take care of it.
“I’ll ask the Korpokkur sisters to clear a path for us to the lake.”
The Korpokkur sisters were masters at traversing the forest. With their assistance, anyone could traverse any forest as if they were walking down a paved road, no matter how dangerous it was.
Everyone immediately agreed to Mira’s plan, so she and Lastrada would take the lead on the big day.
And with that, their meeting came to an end.
Kagura went back to help get the spirit airship ready, swapping with Tweetsuke once more. The small bird returned to stand by. Since it was just about time for dinner, Mira and her companions made their way to the cafeteria inside the church.
“Hey, Big Sis, are you an adventurer? Are you strong?”
“Who’s stronger? You or big bro?”
The bustling cafeteria was filled with children from all over the village, and after giving a quick introduction, Mira soon found herself surrounded by young boys and girls pelting her with questions.
“Me, of course,” Mira answered, puffing her chest out immaturely, much to the children’s delight.
There were others who were interested in Mira. The teachers were seemingly quite interested in her abilities, considering she was an A-rank adventurer with a well-known nickname, despite looking like a young girl. However, they weren’t interested in this because of any macho desire to fight tough opponents. Rather, their interest was academic, and they were curious if a mage like her might make a good teacher.
And just like that, the convivial dinner was over in the blink of an eye.
Mira relocated to the bathhouse beside the church. Lastrada had tasked her with looking after about twenty children from the junior class.
“It’s justice time! Justice Dive!”
“Hey now, be careful!” Mira said.
She had a good idea of who and what it was he was copying, but Mira nevertheless issued a warning to the boy who’d leaped into the bathtub. A lone girl approached her from behind.
“Your hair sure is pretty, Big Sis.”
“Come on, don’t pull it!”
Mira grabbed the naughty boys and girls and made them sit down to wash their hair. She did this with one after another. After that was done, she had them soak in the tub and massage her shoulders.
The children all sang nursery rhymes as they massaged her shoulders. While there weren’t nearly as many of them, they were quite a bit more rambunctious during bathtime than they were during dinnertime.
“Jeez, don’t start playing games until you’ve got your clothes on.”
Things didn’t get any easier for Mira. After they got out of the bath, many of the children began running around while still naked.
She chased them around, grabbed hold of them, toweled them off, and then made them put on their clothes. Mira didn’t even notice how much she resembled the children as she ran around in nothing but her panties.
When night came, Mira put the children to bed and then had some drinks with Lastrada.
“I see… So that’s when you heard what we’d be doing.”
They’d already discussed several topics but were now in the middle of talking about what’d happened in Haxthausen. Because they’d been on opposite sides, their conversation was more like a Q&A session. Just as she expected, Lastrada confirmed that he’d overheard the discussion between Mira and the chief detective. He’d disguised himself as an ordinary person passing by and had listened in on their strategy meeting.
“But the trouble was that he’d accounted for me doing that.”
The plans that the chief detective had come up with for Mira were all diversions, and the true plan was known only to the chief detective himself.
Lastrada had managed to make a dashing escape, but having had his disguise seen through, he lamented with a sigh and a bitter smile that the chief detective’s plans were getting so ingenious they were becoming a problem.
“On that note, you said you’d accomplish your goal with your next move. So once that’s all done, will your phantom thieving days be over?”
Lastrada’s whole reason for becoming Phantom Thief Fuzzy Dice was to bring down the huge human trafficking syndicate. And with this past job, he’d gotten intel on the group’s boss, and they’d next be able to finish them off.
“No… Strictly speaking, they’re already over,” Lastrada said, answering Mira’s query.
The phantom thief was known for sending a calling card to his targets and then dashingly executing his heists. The previous incident had been the last time he needed to do this.
He planned to take care of his final target without sending a calling card. The leader of the syndicate was such a big shot that if they clamped down security, then he’d lose any chance of getting to him.
“So that’s the kind of person you’re up against? Who are they?” Mira asked, curious to know.
It certainly sounded as if they were someone powerful enough to give Lastrada a run for his money. The answer she got surprised her.
“It’s the duke of Grimdart.”
“Whoa…”
Grimdart was one of the three major nations on the continent, and so, the duke of such a kingdom wielded enough power to easily remove even the king of a small country.
Even for Lastrada—or rather, Phantom Thief Fuzzy Dice—going up against such a powerful foe would be no easy task.
Mira once again offered Lastrada her assistance.
He turned down her offer yet again, this time with a fearless smile. This time, he wouldn’t be going about things directly but rather be acting behind the scenes. It would be even easier this time around.
Most importantly, he’d be calling in assistance from all of his collaborators on his final job. And given how long it’d all been in the works, he seemed to be pretty confident about how things would turn out.
“I’m pretty sure it’ll be big news across the continent. I hope you’ll look forward to hearing about it,” he proclaimed, his face aglow with righteousness.
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