The Power of the Saint is All Around (LN) - Volume 7 - Chapter 4

Act 4:

After the Festival

TWO WEEKS AFTER the successful party, Grand Magus Yuri Drewes showed up at the institute’s dining hall. He was after a meal served with rice.

I had invited all manner of people to my event, but unfortunately, the grand magus had been unable to attend. He had been too busy taking care of a monster in a domain that was far from the capital.

Naturally, he knew I had held this party. That said, he hadn’t thought that I would be serving dishes with rice at the event, which made sense, as rice was a precious ingredient. Even after Yuri had claimed he wanted it for his research, I hadn’t given that much of my stock to him. I would have doubted I could serve it as part of a lavish feast too.

In addition to all this, I had served new rice-based recipes at the party. As obsessed with the grain as Yuri was, it came as no surprise that he had thrown a tantrum when he heard. No surprise at all. However, what I hadn’t expected was him kicking up a huge fuss at the Royal Magi Assembly and then charging straight to the institute to demand a chance to try the food in question. I had assumed that he would be much calmer about it and that we would discuss the new recipes during my magic classes.

Oh, I learned about that huge fuss from the mages who followed him. I could only assume that Lord Smarty-Glasses had told them not to let Yuri out of their sights. I apologized as they relayed the events of the day.

Ultimately, I wound up promising the grand magus that he could eat a rice dish at the institute’s dining hall. I had a feeling that, otherwise, he would never leave.

And so, I planned an unveiling of my newest dishes at the dining hall. After all, Yuri wasn’t the only one who had missed the party. Starting with Johan, everyone at our research institute had been unable to attend. Thus I decided that if we were going to make these foods again, everyone should be able to partake.

Usually, when we came to the cafeteria, we picked out a particular meal we wanted, but that day we had a buffet just like the party. Not only were we serving the same food as I had at the event, but there were also some additional recipes as well. Notably, most of them used rice.

When he charged into the institute, Yuri had asked what other kinds of rice-based meals there were. That was why I had decided to make other recipes for which we had the relevant ingredients. In exchange, I had Yuri help out with the arrangements. The biggest thing he gave me was a familiar square-shaped container that retained heat—the sort you commonly see at buffets.

A multitude of chefs handled everything for the party, but we didn’t have them work at the institute. This was why I needed to put the food in containers that would retain the heat—you know, so the food wouldn’t get cold.

At first, I had asked Yuri for a stone enchanted with magic for the same purpose, but the grand magus was magnanimous indeed. He gave me not a stone but the actual thing I’d really hoped for. I felt a bit guilty that he had gone so out of his way, but I gratefully accepted the container all the same. It was likely his way of repaying me for inviting him whenever I hosted similar meals.

On the day of the unveiling, just before noon, more people than usual were gathered in the institute’s dining hall. Since we were serving the same sort of unusual food as had been served at the party, all of the people who would have ordinarily come in at different times were present for the start of lunch.

I was explaining the new food to Johan, Jude, and some others when Yuri arrived. I was certain he would bring a whole squad of mages with him, but contrary to my expectations, he was alone. “Thank you for having me today. I’ve been looking forward to this a great deal.”

“And thank you for helping me with the arrangements. Are you here by yourself today?”

“Yes. Will that be a problem?”

“No, I just thought that you might be bringing some of your colleagues.”

“There were some who showed interest in coming, but I heard this would be a private unveiling, so I came alone. Besides, it is not like we have a limitless supply of rice.”

“I see. Well, please take whichever dishes catch your fancy and enjoy.”

For myself, I was pretty much certain I knew the real reason Yuri had come without anyone else: he’d left them behind so he could eat as much rice as possible.

Yuri had such a happy smile on his face that he was practically humming as we spoke. As soon as I gave the go-ahead, he made a beeline for the dishes made with rice.

I wasn’t the only one wearing a crooked smile as we watched him; the other researchers who also knew of Yuri’s rice fixation were wearing the same look.

The grand magus chose a place to sit closest to the rice dishes and brought every single one of them back to his seat. Starting with paella, he took at least one of everything: rice balls, mixed sushi, omurice, fried rice, and so on. It was as if he were saying he had no interest in any other kind of food—at least not if it didn’t have that special ingredient.

I thought he would immediately dig in, but the first thing he did was Appraise the food. This was a kind of magic that only a few people could cast, and here he was deploying it liberally to investigate the effects of one new dish after another. Then he’d mm-hmm to himself with a nod and write down the results on a notepad he had produced seemingly out of nowhere. Whenever he identified a dish with an unusual effect, he let out a little cheer.

Yup. He never changed.

Although I was mostly referring to Yuri, our researchers were of a pretty similar mindset. Several of them engaged him, curious to learn his findings. Yuri shared his notepad, and a few brave souls even asked him to Appraise the other new dishes too, making it a “well, while you’re at it” kind of thing.

And so, only once he was done Appraising everything did Yuri finally commence with the eating.

“Phew. Oh, Lady Sei.” Yuri beamed at me as I brought him some tea after he was done. “This is quite delicious. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome. Did you make any new discoveries?” I was also curious about his results.

“Did I ever! Did you make this omurice with different ingredients than you did before?”

“Hmm… I might have used different ingredients for the chicken and rice stir-fry that the omelet contains.”

“That must be it! As it happens, this dish has a higher MP recovery rate than it did the last time I checked, and—” Yuri energetically told me all about his findings, one of which being that depending on the ingredients used, effects might not change but increase.

It made sense, since the same thing happened with potions. However, it sounded like a brand-new discovery to him, based on the overly excited and passionate way he spoke of his plans for future experiments.

After we wrapped up our food talk, we moved on to recent events. I mentioned seeing someone from House Drewes at the party, and Yuri replied with a disinterested “oh.” That brought the topic to a screeching halt.

Meanwhile, Yuri had been diligently at work slaying monsters. Expeditions were an important part of the responsibilities of the Royal Magi Assembly, but Yuri was so diligent about taking part in them because he was trying to raise his base level. Unfortunately for him, his base level was already so high that he no longer gained much from dealing with the monsters around the capital. That was why he went around seeking out fights with strong monsters in regions far away from the palace. It had paid off too, because he had reached Level 49—four levels higher than he had been when we first met.

“Just one more until Level 50. Then I just need five more to close the gap between us,” he said cheerfully.

Just what did he mean by that? “The gap?”

When I asked him to explain, he clarified that he meant for his Appraisal Magic to work. This fact was supposedly the reason why, at present, I reflected this magic back at him.

Appraisal Magic didn’t work on someone who had a higher base level than that of the caster. Consequently, I had repelled his spell before. Also consequently, he was grinding for levels, all in the hopes that his Appraisal would work the next time he cast it on me.

“The next time? But I thought we agreed you didn’t need to Appraise me.”

“Well…”

“Well?”

“I want to. Because I want to know all there is to know about you.”

“Please don’t.”

I had a feeling that Yuri probably just wanted to see my stats. He was interested in my Saintly powers in the same way he had been interested in the food. Even so, I suspected there was another possible meaning underlying his words. I couldn’t help but dig further, even though I pretty much already knew, based on the way he was phrasing it.

“Ah, I hate to tell you this, but I’ve leveled up as well.”

“What?! You have?”

The grand magus looked flabbergasted, a rare sight on his face. Just as he thought he had caught up to me, he had learned he was still lagging behind.

I felt awful dashing his hopes like that, but it was true that my base level had increased. If it was difficult for Yuri to raise his levels, the same ran doubly so for me, but I believed that I had been able to level up so much because of all the purging I’d done of the miasma and so forth.

As you might expect from something that created monsters, the black swamps I purified granted me a ton of experience points. I hadn’t paid much attention to this though, so it was more of a hunch. I was sure I was pretty accurate when I guessed that while Yuri had gained four levels from all of the expeditions he had gone on, I had gained two.

Although there was possibly another factor as well. Namely, I was from another world. When you considered my current level and the degree of difficulty it took to raise your level, I leveled up so fast that the standard calculations didn’t really apply.

“How can this be?”

“Uh, well, we haven’t heard of there being any black swamps recently, so I’m sure you’ll catch up before long.”

Those words seemed kind of empty when I considered how hard he had already worked to gain a mere four levels.

Even if the black swamps yielded tons of experience points, at present, I was the only one who could do anything about them. It was possible that Yuri might be able to help if he tried hard enough, or if he somehow managed to come up with a purification spell that was similar to mine. But in that case, I suspected his strategy would differ.

Yuri wore an expression not too unlike one of despair, and I sympathized with him. I consoled him as I unpacked my hypothesis, and when I told him I couldn’t help these level increases, he seemed to perk back up a bit.

But after all this, if he actually did catch up to my level, then I couldn’t exactly refuse if he asked to Appraise me again. Indeed, he asked me if he could, a pout on his face. I could only smile weakly and agree.

***

With the party over and done with, I was back to leisurely working away at the institute, until one day I received yet another summons for an audience with the king and prime minister.

I thought everything went well with the party, but perhaps there was a problem? I wondered, curious. 

When I asked the messenger why I was being summoned, he said it was for an expedition. It had been a while since I had last been on one of those.

I haven’t heard about any new black swamps being discovered recently, but maybe they found one, I thought a bit anxiously as Johan and I entered the king’s office.

Inside the office, both the king and prime minister were waiting for us. I sat on one of the sofas at the king’s prompting. First, he thanked me for hosting the event the other day. I was relieved to hear that everyone had enjoyed themselves so much. After he briefly went over some of the reviews the guests had shared, we delved into the reason I had been summoned.

For this expedition, we would be heading to a domain adjacent to the capital. It wasn’t a domain known for being the largest supply center of alchemical supplies, like Klausner’s Domain, or the country’s breadbasket or anything. Rather there was a relatively big highway that ran through it from the capital, and thus it was a strategic location along the road.

They wanted to send the Knights of the First Order into a forest near that very highway.

“The First Order?”

“Yes. Do you have a problem with that?”

“Not at all. It will just be my first journey with them.”

During past expeditions, I had always been with the Second and Third Orders. Knowing that this time, I’d be with the First, I couldn’t help asking aloud just to be sure. I felt a bit uneasy. I didn’t know anyone in that Order.

But I’ll probably have some people with me from the Royal Magi Assembly, right? I hope they’ll be people I know, I thought.

I was completely missing the unhappy look on Johan’s face.

The prime minister then explained why the First Order had been chosen. I had purified some black swamps already, so there were fewer monsters roaming about than before. But since there were monsters popping up in some places, they had already deployed the Third Order to deal with them, as they had the most experience fighting monsters. The Second Order was also otherwise occupied at the moment. That left only the First Order.

The First Order was normally in charge of maintaining public order in the capital. They rarely went out on expeditions, but they were ideal for this mission, as we would be heading somewhere close to the capital and didn’t expect to encounter any powerful monsters. From what they had heard, the situation wasn’t yet critical in this domain. Rather, just as when they had been deployed to take care of monsters in this area before, this was more of a political expedition.

“And, well, that’s what we’ll be saying officially.”

“Huh?”

Just as I was agreeing with this brief summary, the prime minister flipped the table. Not literally, of course.

“I feel awful for troubling you after that wonderful party you hosted the other day…”

The prime minister began to tell us the true problem, leaving me stunned. Basically, this expedition was a front; it would be more like a matchmaking event. And this was all happening because of that same party.

According to the prime minister, the party guests had indeed been selected while keeping all of the political factions in balance. Regardless, that didn’t mean that there hadn’t been a modicum of bias.

Setting aside the question of the posts that people held, when you took a broad view of their day-to-day responsibilities, the majority of them qualified as officials and bureaucrats. For example, while some had belonged to an order of knights, they had been the ones who handled the accounting and administrative aspect of things rather than those who went out on expeditions.

Naturally, there had been reasons for this occupation-based bias.

The first was that I mostly associated with people from the Research Institute of Medicinal Flora as well as the knights and mages who accompanied me during expeditions. In other words, they had been trying to correct for the fact that I had inevitably wound up only really knowing people involved with the military. Thus the event had been meant to give people with whom I didn’t normally associate the chance to meet the Saint.

The second reason was that a lot of the knights and mages had been unable to attend anyway because they had been out on expeditions in distant regions. Both the knight commander of the Third Order and the grand magus of the Royal Magi Assembly had been absent for that same reason. Only their family members had gone in their stead.

However, no one had complained because most of the knights from the Second and Third Orders, as well as the mages, had been deployed. Some people had expressed their wish that they could have gotten a chance to taste the food, though.

Nevertheless, this didn’t apply to the Knights of the First Order. None of them had been invited to the party. So, they had requested the chance to go on an expedition with the Saint. Which brought us to our current situation.

“Oh? I thought you wanted me to go on this expedition for political reasons?” I asked, trying to better understand what he was getting at.

“That’s right,” the king replied with an apologetic look on his face. “And I beg your pardon for that.”

If the king had made this decision, then it would be best to just obey. I didn’t exactly consider him an ally in whom I had placed my complete trust, but he had been fairly considerate to me until now. So I did trust him, to an extent. I was sure that he had proposed this thinking it would be in my best interests.

When I said I would agree to go on the expedition, both the king and prime minister thanked me, looking relieved.

Then the day came for the expedition with the First Order. Just as the prime minister had said, the monsters were weak and our journey went smoothly. This was at least partly because there were hardly any monsters at all. I didn’t even have to wonder why that was.

All in all, it felt more like a picnic than an expedition, especially with all of the breaks we took. We ate and had drinks during these breaks, just as I did with the Second and Third Orders. We also chatted as we ate and got to know one another.

The only difference was in how these knights behaved. Many took turns coming to wait on me, and it was always multiple people at once.

When it was time for a break, two knights would escort me, one on either side, to a folding stool that had been placed down for my use. We would chat as we walked there, and honestly it felt like having two absolute dreamboats on either arm.

Then, after the attendants with us prepared food and drink, they would bring it over to us—but a knight nearby would take the refreshments before handing them over to me with a smile on his face. This was a third knight, other than the ones who had escorted me to my seat.

Our seats were arranged in a circle, and the knights who escorted me would usually sit at my sides. There would be four others besides those two, including the one who served me. Then I’d pass the time eating and drinking while chatting with the given bevy of knights. Also, the knights in my circle rotated out every single break, so we always had to begin with introductions. 

I did recognize a familiar face among the mages who were with us, but he never sat with me. During our very first rest, I made eye contact with him from afar and he gave me a look of sincere pity. It kind of made me feel like a calf on its way to be sold at market.

Come to think of it, I had felt similarly the first time I had to go on an expedition with the Second Order. Granted, I think the feeling had been way worse with them. Those guys regarded me, the Saint, as sacred, and had been assiduously waiting on me hand and foot. It had been incredibly awkward, and from the second time on, I’d had to persuade them to either let me do everything myself—like I did with the Third Order—or have an attendant do it all instead. If I remembered correctly, my request had paid off and it hadn’t been nearly so bad the third time around.

“Phew…” At the end of our third break, I had a brief moment alone and couldn’t help but sigh. 

I had thought no one would hear, but unfortunately someone did. “Are you tired?” a voice asked me from behind with a wry chuckle.

I turned around to discover it was the First Order’s commander.

Every single member of this order was top of the line—even their demeanors were elegant. Perhaps because of that, this already married commander had been placed with me as a supervisor of sorts, to ensure no one tried to aggressively make any moves on me.

“Just a little,” I confessed. “But we’ve already passed the turnaround point, so I’ll hold on for a bit longer.”

“You’re being pushed past your limits, aren’t you? I apologize for my men,” the commander said in a hushed tone.

He knew exactly what was exhausting me. We smiled awkwardly at one another.

“I feel bad too, though,” I said. “I’m just not used to being treated like this.”

“I heard as much from the knight commander. We warned them not to make any grand gestures, but you can see how well they listened.”

We started walking as we spoke quietly to one another. Because I had admitted to being tired of having to deal with the knights, the commander stayed with me for basically the whole journey back.

For some reason, the other knights didn’t approach as we spoke. Was it because they had been told not to in advance? 

Regardless, thanks to this, I felt a little less stressed out than before.

There wasn’t much longer left in our journey. We made a circle through the forest, after which we would take the same road home. I knew there wouldn’t be much left once we reached it, so I had the chance to do things besides be on the lookout for monsters.

From time to time, I would survey the forest for herbs while we walked. That was when I spotted a cave that I hadn’t noticed on our way in. It had a gaping wide entrance, and I wasn’t able to see all the way into the back. From where I stood, it was simply too dark.

As I gazed into the darkness, I suddenly remembered the video games I had played back in Japan. In those, there were always way more monsters in caves than in the forests and plains.

That was when I also remembered that miasma liked to collect in dark places, such as in the depths of forests. So what if…

“Is something the matter?” the commander called to me, concern clear in his voice. I had frozen in the midst of reaching for an herb.

“Oh, sorry.”

I had let my thoughts stray as I crouched to pick the herb and gotten lost gazing into the cave. It was a bad habit of mine, freezing in place when I got focused on thinking. I apologized to the commander and quickly stowed the herb away.

“I noticed there’s a cave over there.” I stood and pointed at it.

The commander looked in the direction I was pointing. “Oh, yes, you’re right. There is. I heard about it during our preliminary investigation.”

“I heard that miasma likes to collect in places like that. Are we going to investigate it?”

“No, that cave is shallow. It isn’t much different from the rest of the forest.”

The cave had been deemed not a threat, so we were giving it a miss, at least for now. The commander encouraged me to keep going, so I started walking away from it.

But for some reason, a reluctant feeling tugged at me.

The commander said the cave was safe, but what about caves in other places? Worry pricked at my heart, ever so slightly.

It wasn’t until after my return to the capital that I learned my fears were right on the money.

***

After the expedition, which had been more mentally than physically draining, I had three days off.

Despite it being free time, I didn’t spend those days doing anything different from usual. The only thing I definitely didn’t do was make potions, since Johan forbade me from working on them when I was supposed to be on break.

And so, I was doing my daily watering of my herb gardens and seeing how my plants were doing when Knight Commander Albert Hawke arrived.

“Sei.”

“Hello, Lord Hawke.”

It felt like it had been ages since we last saw each other. I mentioned this to him, and he told me that he had just returned from his expedition the day before. Considering he had left before the party I hosted, he must have gone pretty far away. Because of that, he too had three days off.

For some reason, we were in the same boat.

“So you just got back?” I asked. “Good job out there.”

“Thank you,” he said. “I’m sure you’ve had a lot going on too, with the party and all. Congratulations on getting through it.”

“Yeah, it was a lot. Thanks.”

“Was Prince Rayne your escort for the event?”

“He was. He’s in charge of things related to the Saint, so he helped me a bunch with the prep work for the party too.”

“Is that so? He’s good at what he does, so I’m guessing everything went off without a hitch.”

“Yes! He was a huge help.”

“I only wish I could have been there to assist you as well.”

“Don’t worry about it. You had a job to do, after all.”

“I know. I just wish I could have been your escort.”

O-oh my God! I really wish he would stop dropping surprise bombs on me like that.

Albert smiled with faint regret, which filled me with a tremendous sense of guilt even though I knew I had done nothing wrong. I tried to say something to make him feel better, but that just made him burst out laughing—as if he hadn’t been able to hold back any longer.

Wait, was that a joke just now? Was he teasing me?! Arrrgh!

“I do wish you wouldn’t tease me,” I pouted.

“I’m sorry. But I really do wish that I could have been your escort.” Albert said this with such a disappointed face that it felt like a direct blow to the sternum.

Oh. Okay. He really wishes that… For some reason, I was overcome with shyness and could no longer look him in the eye. “Oh… Well, hopefully next time then,” I said, still averting my gaze.

“Yes. I’ll be glad to be your escort upon the next opportunity.” I had a feeling he was grinning broadly as he spoke. “By the way, I heard that you served a whole spread of new foods at your party.”

“That’s correct. More than half the dishes were ones I hadn’t made before.”

“I would have come if not for the expedition. I wish I could have tasted them.”

“Our dining hall has started serving some of the new dishes, though not all of them.”

“Really?”

“Yup. Oh! And I’m pretty sure we’re serving some of them today! Would you like to join me for lunch?”

Albert agreed to my invitation without a second’s hesitation.

It wasn’t yet midday, but it seemed late enough for lunch. The two of us immediately headed to the dining hall.

“What a pretty color. What is this?” he asked.

“This is a rice dish called paella.”

“So this is paella… I heard there was a rice dish with a striking color.”

“That would be this one, yup.”

Lunch today was paella accompanied by chicken stewed in tomato sauce, with salad and vegetable soup. With the yellow of the paella, the red of the tomato sauce, and the green of the salad, it made for a truly vibrant meal.

Transportation could be an issue with this food, so the paella had been made with pork instead of seafood. This particular meal was especially meat forward, what with the pork and chicken. But I think Albert welcomed it, because his eyes were sparkling as he gazed at the food.

While I was glad that everyone had liked the food at the party, getting Albert’s approval was an entirely different matter. I was worried that he might not like it. He didn’t regularly eat rice, and it moreover used saffron for seasoning, which he also wasn’t used to.

However, it seemed I didn’t need to worry so much. I supposed it helped that it was a Western dish. In any case, Albert told me it was delicious and even had seconds.

“By the way, I heard that you just got back from an expedition yesterday as well?” he said.

“That I did. Although we didn’t travel too far in the first place.”

“How did it go?”

“Hmm, well, there weren’t many monsters, so it didn’t really feel like an expedition, per se.”

“Really?”

“Yeah… It was more like that time we went to the southern forest.”

After we were done and cleared our plates, we didn’t really have anything on our to-do lists, so we stayed put and had some afternoon tea. Albert went on asking me about the expedition I had gone on. When I alluded to our time in the southern forest, he seemed to grasp what had happened.

He put a hand to his lips, but from the look in his eye, it was obvious that he was trying not to laugh. He was probably remembering that little field trip too.

I mean, we all knew that weak monsters didn’t turn up when I was around. There was a long-standing theory that the very presence of the Saint weakened the miasma in a given area and prevented monsters from spawning.

I pouted without saying a word, but judging from how he burst out laughing, no longer able to contain himself, he knew what I was sulking about.

After recovering himself, Albert took on a slightly more serious expression as he changed the subject. “I heard that you were with the First Order for this trip.”

He must have known I was—it wasn’t like he could avoid knowing, as the knight commander of the Third Order.

“Yeah. It was my first time going out with them…”

“Did something happen?”

To be honest, it had been extremely taxing, if mainly in a mental sense. But I was a bit unsure of whether I should share that with him. Be that as it may, my hesitation caused Albert’s expression to cloud over with worry.

“Oh, nothing. Nothing really happened, it’s just that there were so many shiny people there.” I panicked, trying to find a way to smooth things over, but my words only led to Albert’s expression growing confused. I supposed that had been pretty abstract.

“‘Shiny’ people?”

“Like how the Second Order treats me? Or maybe it was more like they were treating me like a princess?” Though I tried, I only got less coherent as I described my exchanges with the First Order. It was just difficult, trying to figure out how exactly to explain.

But when I thought about it, given the way Salutanian gentlemen were expected to behave, there wasn’t really a problem with them treating me like royalty. I generally kept away from high society, so I probably just didn’t know any better. Perhaps this was normal for nobles.

When I was done, I asked Albert to confirm as much, but his vague answer left me at a loss. He didn’t confirm or deny this hypothesis. Perhaps he was trying to say that it depended on the person?

In a bid to change the mood, I asked him about the expedition he’d gone on. My plan worked! His regular expression returned as he began regaling me with the tale.

Because I had purged black swamps all over the kingdom, there were fewer monsters turning up nationwide. However, one region had seen an increase in monsters, and Albert had gone to investigate the cause.

The region was quite remote from the capital, and the farther you got from the capital, the stronger the monsters that appeared. This was why Albert had gone along with the knights, as these monsters had been so much more powerful.

“So did you figure out where they were all coming from?” I asked.

“We haven’t, not yet. We searched the more likely areas, though.”

“Do you usually find them in a certain sort of place? Like ones that share a common feature?”

“We’ve considered that as well, but we couldn’t find a connection.”

An increase in monsters was serious enough to shake a country, so I was sure that they had multiple people on this investigation, all working to figure out the cause. I was equally sure that they had to be very good at their jobs, seeing as they worked for the palace.

Could the reason they haven’t found the cause be because multiple factors are complicating the rise in appearances? Or maybe… As I thought, I suddenly remembered what I had seen the other day. “What kind of places qualify as ‘more likely areas’?”

“First, the forests. Next, the prairies. After that, any large bodies of water, such as a lake.”

“Did you search inside the caves and caverns as well?”

“We did search some during our investigation, but there are a number that we haven’t checked yet.”

According to Albert, they didn’t have enough people to explore every single possible area of interest all at once. Therefore they focused on efficiency and investigated the most probable and easily reached locations first.

I had brought it up only because of what I remembered, but setting aside the question of caverns, it seemed likely that there were a number of small caves that they simply had yet to discover. I could understand how it would be impossible to search for caves that they didn’t even know how to find, let alone to explore them with a limited number of available searchers.

“I just think there could be a black swamp inside one of them,” I said.

“It’s certainly possible…”

Then the following day, I was yet again summoned to the palace. Speak of the devil—you know the drill.

In a certain domain, a black swamp had been discovered within a cave.