CH 84

Chapter 84

When Peaceful Times Cease To Exist : Attack On Church Of Arnelia, Part 12 — After The Battle

Translated by KaiesV

Edited by KaiesV

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The scene returned to the Palace of the Deep Green. After the attackers retreated, Miliazar immediately returned to overall command and quickly took care of business, including reporting the dead and wounded, reassigning people, restoration work, and dealing with the city’s foreign affairs. Even Miliazar, who is indeed a slacker, shows her leadership skills and talents to the fullest at times like these.

Since she never showed her face to anyone other than the archbishop and her appointed kinsmen, her instructions were passed on roughly through Albert, Manadil, and Dryd. Jake, who was watching the event, was puzzled by the unusual Miliazar. Jake’s perception of Miliazar was that she was someone to whom he owed a debt of gratitude, but at the same time, she was nothing more than a plaything to be teased with.

Rafferty slipped out of work and came to visit his wife, Beliace. Roxanne, who was lying next to her, was seriously ill, so the sisters attended to her and used recovery magic on her, and her condition has now calmed down.

On the other hand, Beliace, who had a relatively mild illness, was to continue to be monitored. In the Arnelian religion, unnecessary recovery magic is not to be used. This is because the Restorative Magic that forcibly enhances the body’s healing function has been proven over many years of actual battle to be poisonous to the body if practiced in excess. Anyway, Beliace said that it was just a simple recovery spell, and that after a few days of rest, she would be back to normal.

Well, the point is not so important, but Rafferty is famous for his loving wife, and to tell the truth, he didn’t care about Beliace’s condition, he just wanted to see his own wife’s face.

「Dear… I’m glad to see you’re alive.」

「You too. I’m glad you’re okay.」

「Well, of course. I am the wife of Rafferty, the second son of the Lazaar family, remember? I don’t work out that hard!」

「Quite frankly, you’ve always been this way. I thought you would mature a bit once we had children, but you’re getting stronger and stronger, aren’t you?」

「Of course I am.『The Mother is strong,』you know? Although…」

「Although?」

「In your presence… let me be just a woman.」

「Beliace…」

「Rafferty…」

The two hold hands tightly and look at each other. There was a sister next to them who was nursing them, but she couldn’t stand it and ran away blushing and flapping her arms. However, the two flirt with each other regardless of the sisters’ behavior.

「Dear… I have a favor to ask you.」

「Anything you ask.」

「Well! Then, what if I want the Orneca flower, which is said to grow only on the peak of Pirevos mountain?」

「I’ll go get it right now and put it on your head.」

「Fufufu, I’m flattered. But it’s not that hard a request… I want another child.」

「Justin was just born, though, right?」

「That’s why. I was looking at Justin and I wanted another… Can I?」

「It’s not a no-brainer. Actually, I was thinking the same thing. It seems we were born under such a star. We are always destined to spend our days together, in good fellowship, until we die.」

「Ahhh, dear…」

「My darling…」

「『What’s with the darling thing』Then! Do your job!」

With a pow! And the pleasant sound of Rafferty’s head being hit with a pair of sandals echoes through the room as Rafferty is dragged away by Miliazar.

「You stupid couple! Have you forgotten the oath you swore when you became my Elite Guard?」

「I guess…」

「『I’ve never been in love, I’ve devoted my whole life to the sword.』Remember? I’m sure you’ll be flirting with Beliace within a year before your tongue is dry again… It’s embarrassing to watch!」

「That too is fate.」

「What a cool way to sum it up, if you had done your job first, I wouldn’t have said so much! Have you forgotten what you said to each other when you first met and got into a fight? With words like,『This fish!』and『What do you want, dickhead!』Get it!?」

「Such things are trivial in the face of our love.」

「Hiii… You natural playboy, you’re giving me strange some warts! You go outside the Palace of the Deep Green and listen to the reports of the battalion commanders!!」

Kicking Rafferty outside, Miliazar returns to her private room in the Palace of the Deep Green. Having lived through the Great War, she is accustomed to dealing with war, and if she really gets down to business, it can be done in an instant. So, less than half an hour after the attack, they had done everything they needed to do and were just waiting for the report.

Sitting deep in her chair, Miliazar is seemingly relaxed. But her eyes are tense, and she abruptly turned her head to the side and speaks to the empty space.

「You are there, aren’t you, Minar? Let’s hear your report.」

「Yes…」

A man emerges from the empty space. It was Mynar, the last of the three Archbishops. He is a small, thin man, not flattering, rather featureless and mediocre looking. He was not particularly dignified, and even the atmosphere he wears is no different from that of ordinary citizens. But rather he strives to be, and that is what he wants to be.

Unlike Manadil and Dryd, he preferred to be in the shadows. Sometimes he dresses up as a citizen or a low-ranking monk and go into hiding in order to hear the real voices of those below him. His job is so-called “covert work,” but it was Miliazar who selected him for the archbishopric, and by giving him a certain level of authority, he made Mynar’s job easier. However, in terms of intelligence, Mynar is well ahead of the other two, and in fact, his magic examinations have been near the best of all time. In addition, his thirst for knowledge is not limited to the Church of Arnelia, but also extends to the Magic Association, where he also governs some magic. This would be an act of treachery in the Arnerian religion, but knowing this, Miliazar tacitly agreed to it. There was no one who could take his place.

Giving power to such a miner was also dangerous, but at the same time, his work allowed them to detect extra trouble in advance more than once. If Albert was Miliazar’s right-hand man of arms, then Mynar was her right-hand man of information gathering. Few knew about it, though, and many did not understand why Mynar was the archbishop.

「You, don’t just go invisible and come into my private room. What if I’m in the middle of changing my clothes?」

「Don’t worry. I am not interested in you as a woman.」

「I’m not so sure about that… Fine, then. You must have planted something, didn’t you? It’s not like you didn’t play a counterattack card after they had their way with you so much.」

Miliazar grins, but Mynar remains quite calm and expressionless.

「Yes. I’ve set up some traps for them to follow. Now we’re going to raid their stronghold.」

「I see. But how do we track them? They’re gone because of the transporter spell.」

「Don’t worry. I have my own people who specialize in tracking. There’s no way they could have gotten away with that.」

「All right, I’ll leave it to you. And I’d like to hear your opinion… how did you see them?」

「How, what do you mean?」

Mynar returns the question to probe Miliazar’s belly.

「In strength, numbers, and purpose.」

「Let’s start with strength. Aside from the first boy, the other two are clearly stronger than you. The strength of that girl in particular is extraordinary. If she had gone all out, this city would have been destroyed for sure. I am probably the only archbishop who will survive. The others are you, Albert, Kuchinashi, Kyojō Shino, and at most a few of the Elite Guards including Rafferty. I rather think that you took those humiliating conditions because you decided so.」

「That’s right. If we had fought there, we would have been almost wiped out. Of course, there is the advantage of being able to go underground afterwards, but it’s too much of a sacrifice and it’s not a good move.」

「Agreed. Next is the number, but it is hard to say without looking into them. It’s just that that girl clearly wanted to fight you, but she held back. It means that there is someone in a position to give her some orders. If those three were acting as scouts, there would be at least twice as many with similar strength. If you refer to the distribution of forces in the book of military strategy when observing the situation.」

「A being stronger than that… I don’t even want to think about it. It’s amazing enough that there are so many of them. I’m going to say this clearly because it’s for you, but that thing is probably stronger than the Great Archfiends that existed in the past. Well, I haven’t seen all of the Great Archfiends, but they are at least stronger than the ones I’ve had to deal with. I have to be honest and admit that I was very wrong in my assumptions about the war effort.」

「…Lastly, the objective, at least, would not be the total annihilation of this church. If they wanted to annihilate it, they could have done it differently. For example, they could go on a rampage in the city and disperse the knights. The reason why they went to the trouble of raiding only this headquarters is that they don’t want to publicize their existence yet, anticipating the point where we would block the information.」

「For the sake of what?」

「For one, their forces are not yet in place. Also, there are more effective ways and places to go public. That would be the way to go.」

Miliazar snorted skeptically at Mynar’s guess.

「Sounds plausible, but I don’t see any evidence of it.」

「But there are grounds to consider. One is that the areas where the Archfiends appears are extremely common in the west and outside the sphere of influence of the Arnelian religion. At this stage, they don’t want us to perceive as much as possible. However, since the Duchy of Krummus and Zamwed entered into an unnatural state of war in the Midlands, we can expect to see more suspicious activities in the Eastern Region. We are going to increase the number of secret police in each country, but it might be a good idea to gather as many of those on pilgrimage as possible in the eastern part of the country.」

「I see… We could get busy from now on. I should confirm the peace agreement with the representatives of each country on the occasion of the commemoration ceremony. By the way, where do you think is the best place for fireworks?」

「Let me think… I think it would be in the great northern country of Romansland.」

「Romansland, you say… We are less powerful there, and more importantly, if that country collapses, the northern part of the country will be devastated. That’s a big possibility.」

「…Anyway, I’ll try to move things around in the shadows, then I’ll let you know if I hear anything else.」

「Yes, please.」

Mynar takes a bow and disappears again. Kuchinashi appears in its place.

「Kuchinashi, they will look into this on their own. Let them gather information from the mouthless ones. Any recent unrest in countries, cities, villages… Let them raise whatever information they want. In particular, make gathering information on Romansland a top priority.」

「At your will.」

「So, now that things are quiet, how is Kyojō’s princess doing?」

「She slipped and fell in the middle of nowhere, got stuck in a pond, and am now changing clothes with the help of her two attendants.」

「She’s still a natural ditz. I must meet later to discuss alliances. Tell her that.」

「At your will.」

And Kuchinashi’s presence disappeared as well. Miliazar had a headache from the pile of problems she was about to face, and she couldn’t help but press her brow.