It had been quite a while since they left the abandoned village. The memory of last night's treatment in the ruined house still lingered. The warmth of Lilia's fingertips touching the wound on his back. That strange sense of solidarity when Aira had cut in from the side with "I require a report." Raid confirmed the weight of the black short sword inside his coat while treading through the grass. Aira stood ahead. Her lustrous reddish-brown long hair was tied back, and her green eyes were narrowed as she gazed toward the eastern woods. Her dignified posture remained unchanged. But just slightly—the tension in her shoulders was harder than last night. "There are presences in three directions," Aira said. Her voice was low and precise. The voice of a report with emotion suppressed. Raid felt it too. Imperial Army scouts—likely an advance squad sent ahead to secure the route via the Yetori Pass through the Sekihou Mountain Range. The way their center of gravity moved bore the distinctive rhythm of those trained by the knight order. Aira silently changed direction. Toward the southeast of the abandoned village, toward the slope with many rocky outcrops. Raid gestured with his eyes to Lilia behind him. Lilia nodded slightly. Her silver short bob swayed, and her odd eyes—one pale violet, one pale amber—turned forward. The three slipped soundlessly into the shadow of the rocks. For a while, no one moved. The scout's footsteps grew gradually louder. The sound of treading on stone. The sound of armor rattling. Raid squeezed out his remaining magical power, feeling the faint heat in the scar on his left arm—the pale blue mark from using magical power fusion—and created "sound" directed toward the empty houses on the eastern side of the abandoned village. The sound of creaking wood. A sound like wind striking a door, but containing just a hint of human presence. Just three seconds' worth. The scout's footsteps stopped. Their direction changed. Moving away toward the eastern side of the abandoned village. Lilia saw this and started to make a small sound. "That was amaz—" Aira's hand moved without a sound. Her palm came to rest against Lilia's cheek. Stillness. The three remained frozen until the footsteps completely faded. Eventually Aira withdrew her hand. Facing forward, expressionless. Lilia spoke in a hushed voice. "That was a reflex, wasn't it? I understand?" Aira's eyebrows moved slightly. Just one millimeter—her eyebrow rose. That was all. Facing forward, mouth closed. But she didn't deny it. Raid saw this and exhaled quietly. He swallowed down a laugh. Despite the fact that their lives were on the line, why were these two like this? When the presence of pursuers had completely faded, the three began walking again. Skirting around the rocky outcrops, heading toward the ridge of the Sekihou Mountain Range. It would still take time to reach the base. Lilia continued her whisper toward Aira's back as she walked quickly ahead. "By the way, that stray cat from the abandoned house yesterday—you gave up at three hundred meters, didn't you?" Lilia said. "I reported as much," Aira replied. She answered immediately without turning around. It was emotionless, a confirmation of fact. "It was a cat quick to give up," Lilia said. "It stopped at exactly three hundred meters," Aira said. "Did you measure it?" Lilia asked. "It was an estimate," Aira said. Raid watched the backs of the two women and quietly confirmed that their back-and-forth was creating the first decent atmosphere of this day. ──── They reached the base of the Sekihou Mountain Range as the sun began to set. The three sat down in the shadow of the rocks and built a fire with gathered twigs. One day had passed since leaving the imperial capital of Verga. There was no longer any sign of pursuers. At least in this moment, they might be safe—that kind of relaxation began to drift along with the smoke from the fire. Lilia moved right after the fire settled. "Show me your back," she said. Raid turned around. "Last night was enough," he said. "I can't know if it's enough without looking," Lilia said. Lilia's expression was serious. There was no playfulness in it. Her odd eyes—pale violet and amber—looked at Raid without wavering. They held the same color as the eyes she had shown in the abandoned house last night—eyes that wouldn't back down. "Let me count the scars," she said. "There's no need to count them," Raid said. "I'll count them properly," Lilia said. Lilia turned toward Aira, who had been silent as if standing watch. "Aira, please agree as well," she said. Aira kept her eyes on the fire and paused for just one beat. "I also require a report of the same count," she said. It was two against one. A complete encirclement. A perfect pincer attack dressed up as tactically precise coordination. Raid looked at both their faces in turn for a moment. "...Understood," he said. He yielded. He slipped his coat from his shoulders and opened the back of his shirt. The firelight illuminated the overlap of old and new scars. The marks left by the burning of magical circuits from forbidden techniques spread faintly across a wide area of his back. Above them, two gashes from stone fragments. They had closed more than last night, but were still red. Lilia advanced on her knees from beside the fire. Her fingertips gently traced the edge of an old scar on his back. Moving along the boundary of the wound at a distance where touch was barely perceptible. A faint amount of healing magic unique to the demon race flowed through those fingers—the ability to directly transfer living magical essence, something no human practitioner could possess. A warmth of a different quality transmitted to the depleted magical circuits. It was less hot than it was a sensation that seeped toward the core of his body. Raid accepted it in silence. Aira's gaze remained on the fire, but her eyes stopped for just one beat. The proximity between Lilia's fingertips and Raid's back. That distance. It felt as though something dwelled in that space—Aira noticed that she had stopped and pretended not to notice, quickly returning her eyes to the fire. After the treatment ended, a quiet silence fell. The fire swayed. There was no wind. The fire simply swayed as if breathing, casting the silhouettes of the three onto the shadows of the rocks. Lilia opened her mouth in that silence. "I want to go back to the Demon Continent," she said. Her voice was as quiet as the sound of the fire. "I was thinking about it the whole time in the stone cell. I was afraid of execution—but it wasn't just that. I was afraid of dying without knowing who I am. But it's different now. Not because I'm afraid, but because I want to know. The meaning of my bloodline. Where I came from," she said. Lilia's gaze was directed beyond the flames. Not the eyes of a girl who had received a death sentence in a stone cell, but the eyes of one who had set her own direction on her own feet. The fire swayed as if accepting the weight of those words. Raid quietly took in Lilia's words. He searched for what to say, but before finding words, he reached inside his coat. ──── He held the black short sword up to the firelight. Fine patterns were carved into the hilt, which was about as long as the blade. The way the light fell made those patterns seem to sway faintly. Information that Min and Gen had brought when they transferred here—the short sword they had called the "summoning wedge." A weapon of unknown purpose said to have the property of drawing in the caster when a specific magical power was channeled through it. Raid channeled magical power through it. Just a little. The scar on his left arm grew warm. The short sword vibrated faintly. There was a direction. East. Beyond the Sekihou Mountain Range, further still—toward the forbidden domain called the Great Demon Realm, the Ash-Covered Abyss, a compass-like reaction appeared. It moved as if it "knew" a specific location. "If it's being drawn toward the Ash-Covered Abyss, then the answer is there," Lilia said quietly. She spoke with certainty. The girl who had trembled alone in the stone cell now spoke her destination into being across the flames. Aira opened her mouth after a brief pause. "Do you not intend to question the true identity of the title 'Your Majesty'?" she asked. It was a calm question, but precise. A question that wouldn't let him escape. Raid withdrew the short sword from the fire. "I will ask when the time comes to ask," he said. He answered briefly. It was an answer that wasn't really an answer. Aira accepted it with a beat of silence and didn't pursue it further. It was a choice not to pursue. Where that choice came from—whether it was a judgment based on duty, or something else—Aira herself couldn't determine. Yet she felt that the man sitting across the fire was now in a place that couldn't be contained by the word "duty." She didn't yet give a name to that sensation. ──── The three began moving before dawn. Raid spread out a map to confirm the route via the Yetori Pass—one of seven crossable passes through the Sekihou Mountain Range, the most easterly one, a difficult passage at an elevation of 1,940 meters. Aira leaned in from beside him. Her reddish-brown long hair caught on the edge of the map. Her fingertip traced the position of the pass. "If we cross the Yetori Pass, we should detour east here and then—we would avoid the scouts' eyes better by using this ridge," she said. Then she stopped. It was just an instant. The first-person plural "we" had come from Aira's own mouth. That word echoed once, quietly, within her. (We) She was accompanying them as a duty. That hadn't changed. But the word "we" had come from a place slightly outside the logic of duty. Vector's voice—"go and come back"—overlapped in her ears. That moment of being sent off sincerely seemed to attach itself behind the single word "we." Aira kept her gaze on the map and held her expression still. "We would avoid the scouts' eyes better by using this ridge," she repeated. Omitting the first half. Raid, confirming the map, asked: "Aira, are you familiar with the gradient of the rocky outcrops here?" He called her by name alone. No honorific, no title. "I am familiar with them," she answered. She replied without hesitation. The name called alone for the first time in the previous conversation was now dissolving into practical matters. Aira understood that was a change. She pretended not to notice while noticing. Knowing full well, she placed her finger on the rocky outcrops on the map. ──── When they reached the entrance to the mountain path leading to the Yetori Pass, fog descended. The field of vision slowly narrowed into white. As the elevation increased, the fog grew thicker. The distance between the three naturally closed. Lilia gently gripped the edge of Raid's coat. It wasn't the extension of her fingertips from the treatment in the abandoned house, nor was it a remnant of the fear from the stone cell. It was a gesture of confirmation—that she was in the place she had chosen. That was all. Raid noticed and said nothing. He felt the weight of the coat's edge being pulled and continued forward. Aira, keeping her gaze ahead, said: "Visibility is poor. Maintain your spacing." As she spoke, she suddenly realized something. She was naturally determining her position among the three. Forward reconnaissance. Rear confirmation. The safety of Lilia in the center. She had accepted this role without being told, without being asked. The phrase "accompanying them as a duty" had taken this form without her noticing. Only now did Aira realize it. Raid confirmed the short sword inside his coat while walking through the fog. He quietly recounted the questions so far. The origin of the men who called him "Your Majesty." The meaning of Lilia's bloodline. The identity of the blac