The next day.
As the dawn sun hung over the horizon, beginning to color the desolate forest in vibrant hues, we woke up, packed our things, and headed back towards the ruins.
Taking a slightly bypassing route to where the corpse giant lay.
“Looks like there’s another body here. Maybe they were killed while trying to escape?”
“That seems likely. Judging by the arrows stuck in their knees.”
The path was scattered with the remains of adventurers, serving almost like signposts. There weren’t many, but enough to bring in some decent pocket change.
We rummaged through the adventurers’ belongings, collecting coins and picking up swords or axes that seemed of decent quality to stuff into our backpacks.
I wanted to strip everything valuable off them, but unfortunately, that wasn’t an option.
Since our cart contract was broken, we had to walk back to the city, and having too heavy a load would be quite the nuisance.
Thus, we had no choice but to carefully select items that weren’t too heavy but could definitely sell for a good price.
“H-Hilde, do you need this helmet…?”
“Oh, thank you, Friede.”
I took the metal helmet that Friede handed me, wiped the inside with a cloth, and plopped it on my head.
It was the kind of Northern helmet that only covered the head and eyes, leaving the lower face wide open, but hey, it was better than nothing.
After all, it’s hard to recognize someone when only half their face is hidden, so I figured it would be enough to conceal my identity.
◆◆
The area around the ruins we returned to felt reminiscent of a bombed field hospital. The atmosphere was filled with ominous anger and the sadness of a funeral.
Some paladins were listening to the adventurers who returned, while others were busy digging out the debris that blocked the entrance to the dungeon.
I approached a paladin in charge of the inquiries to report what we had experienced.
The emergence of the ‘real’ Abyss Priest, the betrayal of some adventurers, the appearance of the corpse giant, and our desperate escape afterward.
Except for the part where we defeated the Abyss Priest and the corpse giant.
It didn’t take long.
While other parties needed thorough interrogations to verify betrayals, our party didn’t have to go through such a process.
“Oh, this young lady isn’t a traitor.”
Among the adventurers who returned to the ruins, some recognized my voice.
Though it was midnight and I couldn’t see their faces, I was the only armored woman wandering around with a kid in tow, so they picked up on it from my voice and silhouette.
“Uh, you know the new Abyss Priest, right? This lady was the first one to fight him. Although she lost him pretty quickly.”
“Hmm, is that so…? My apologies for the oversight. Thank you for your cooperation.”
Thanks to them confirming that I had fought the Abyss Priest, I could acknowledge that I wasn’t a traitor without going through any complicated verification procedures.
Perhaps because I mentioned I had a brief battle with the Abyss Priest, they asked if I knew who had defeated the corpse giant…
“Huh…? Wasn’t it the paladins who took care of it?”
“…If you don’t know, that’s fine.”
Once I played dumb, they didn’t press further. It seemed they couldn’t even begin to imagine that I was the one who had killed it.
Anyway, after finishing my report, I asked the paladin if he could treat my return to the city as the completion of the request.
I reasoned that if the corpse giant and Abyss Priest were indeed dead, there wouldn’t be any more adventurers needed.
“Umm….”
The paladin hesitated a bit, stroking his beard, but eventually said it was alright and signed the completion on the request form.
In truth, we had failed to guard the ruins, and the priests had been massacred, so it wouldn’t have been strange to handle it as a failure…
“This incident occurred partly because we carelessly abandoned our post, so we’ll mark it as completed.”
Since they had their share of responsibility too, they generously decided to overlook it.
The request would be recognized as complete under the condition that they wouldn’t spill the beans about the paladins’ blunder.
There was no reason for me to decline.
The church would avoid losing face, and we would receive a reward we normally wouldn’t have gotten.
It was a classic win-win situation.
I gladly agreed, and in return, I secured the request completion signature. It was a meager reward considering the trouble we went through.
======[ Friede, Amy ]======
While Hilde was talking with the paladin, Friede and Amy waited some distance away for her to finish and return.
“…….”
“…….”
A suffocatingly silent atmosphere.
Friede had planted her great sword into the ground and was resting her chin on the hilt, gazing intently at Amy.
With a blank expression that made it hard to know what she was thinking.
“What’s with the stare? Got something to say?”
After staring at Hilde’s back for a while, Amy turned to look at Friede, frowning in annoyance.
“Are you not tired?”
Friede replied.
“…What?”
“I mean, aren’t you tired?”
“No, why are you asking that out of the blue….”
Are you tired? It was a question Amy found hard to grasp.
“You didn’t sleep last night, right?”
Just before the sharp golden eyes pierced through her.
“What… did you just say?”
Meeting Amy’s gaze head-on, Friede’s voice dropped slightly as she continued with almost an interrogative tone.
“Did you think I wouldn’t know?”
Friede was already convinced. Unlike Brunhilde, who had likely fallen asleep around dawn, Amy had been awake the entire night.
“You were trying hard to pretend to sleep, but did you not realize? The reactions while waking up and pretending to sleep are entirely different.”
She had gained this conviction from the morning.
There’s a fine line between waking up from sleep and opening available eyes, and Friede could sense it.
She too had kept watch over Amy all night.
“That….”
Amy clicked her tongue and looked down at Friede. A rush of tension surged in her. A single droplet of cold sweat trickled down her cheek.
“Trying to act… act like I was sleeping… what could be the reason? Tension? Anxiety? With me and Hilde next to you, what could be making you so uneasy…?”
Friede droned on, trailing her words in a low tone as if interrogating Amy.
“Oh, are you worried about me and Hilde…?”
“…….”
“You heard everything, didn’t you?”
Rather than a question, it was close to a confirmation.
That sharp voice, so definitive, left Amy with the assurance that trying to deny it would be useless.
“…Yeah, I did.”
Thus, Amy nodded while grimacing as if biting into something sour.
She reluctantly acknowledged that she had overheard Hilde’s identity, or rather, that she had been listening to Gerda.
“Good girl. Keep answering so honestly from now on.”
With an expression that seemed to say she knew this would happen, Friede narrowed her eyes at Amy while subtly gripping the hilt of her great sword.
“Why did you lie so calmly even after realizing Hilde’s identity?”
The first question.
What was the reason for acting in front of Hilde?
“…If I had made it obvious that I noticed the situation, I might end up buried next to Gerda, right?”
Amy answered, saying she didn’t want to die.
The ‘Hilde’ she knew wouldn’t kill her teammate just for being discovered, but there was always a chance.
“What’s the reason you’re quiet now?”
The second question.
If now was the moment to expose Hilde’s identity, why stay silent and do nothing?
“…For the same reason as you.”
“What?”
Friede replied a bit flustered.
Finding it amusing, Amy involuntarily let out a chuckle despite a bit of cold sweat forming.
“I mean, even though she’s a fugitive in the Kingdom of Rhine, she’s not from my country, and her face and personality are exactly my type. It’d be a shame if I exposed her and she got caught, right?”
She hadn’t reported Hilde merely because she found her intriguing. This was an overt display of her different motivations.
Friede’s wariness shot through the roof. In a different direction than before.
“Don’t you think the same as me? You’ve also been pretending not to know, right?”
“…It’s not the same reason.”
Friede frowned as she responded.
Unlike Friede, who had a shallow and trivial interest in Brunhilde’s appearance, she held her feelings as a pure and noble love.
“Is that so? If that’s what you think, fine.”
Amy shrugged her shoulders and chuckled. It was as if she could see through Friede’s thoughts.
Though in terms of age, Friede was two years older, the air of maturity was all around Amy.
“By the way, do you speak well? Was the stuttering an act?”
“…It wasn’t an act. Just shut up and answer properly.”
Friede snapped back, clicking her tongue.
“Are you just scared that Hilde will ‘silence’ you, so you were acting? But in reality, you like Hilde and didn’t say anything? The logic’s all jumbled.”
If she were afraid of being silenced, she would have exposed Hilde’s identity as soon as she met the paladins.
If she wanted to hide Hilde’s identity because she liked her, then there would be no reason to claim she was terrified of being silenced.
Friede concluded that way. She believed that fear and affection could not coexist.
“Um… actually, there’s one more reason I was acting….”
Amy trailed off, scratching her cheek with her fingertips. It was a slightly embarrassing reason for her to state herself.
“What is it?”
Friede slightly shook the hilt of her sword and asked. Her tone urged for a prompt answer without any nonsense.
“Well… I thought that after getting closer, I could share the truth later, like, much later, and score some points.”
Amy revealed her final reason, shyly averting her gaze.
“…….”
Friede fell into silence without a word.
Because the reason she too had kept quiet about Brunhilde’s identity was precisely that.
She didn’t want to admit that her line of thought was at the same level as this girl.
======[ Hilde ]======
After confirming the completion of the request, I left the forest and headed back to the city.
“…….”
“…….”
The usual liveliness had vanished, with Amy and Friede maintaining a suffocating silence. They didn’t even dare look at each other.
“What’s going on? Did you two have a quarrel while I was gone?”
“Oh, no.”
“That’s not it…!”
What the heck is it?
Like they made a pact, the two shook their heads simultaneously, denying it.
Their reaction was so synchronized it was almost eerie.
