To be clear, I had no feelings for those two. They harassed me in many ways, but I couldn’t be bothered to think about anything I had to say about those two.

They were already out of power, and the title of nobility, which was the only thing on which they relied, disappeared when I took over Arceides.  There were many people in Arceides today who held grudges against the father, so it would be better for him not to go out in public.

Well, this time, what was supposed to be an infiltration mission turned into a surprise raid. At this rate, it would probably be easy to take over other areas as well, but I didn’t want to do anything that would lead Alice out of the royal capital by letting her know of our presence.

Even now, the number of Spirits in the surroundings had been decreasing, and if Alice moved from place to place again, many areas would seriously start to become a desert.

Alice, were you a Goddess of Poverty?

And what brought me to Arceides. I was looking for a base, and Celia, my grandmother, told me to head for Arceides.

She didn’t say that this place was suitable for a base. Maybe something…something that originated from Nym? With that way of speaking, perhaps grandmother gave up on collecting in the land of the humans.

If so, would it be in the castle of the Arceides family? I had lived in that castle until I was three years old, and I was under house arrest in my room all the time, so I never even walked around the castle, which meant anything was possible.

*** 

With the sound of my heels on the stone floor echoing, I walked alone in the castle, which was no longer bustling with the crowd.

Most of the servants who were in the castle were either captured or sent out on leave, so now there were only menial workers who maintained and cleaned the garden.

“…Nn?”

I was walking around the corridor, heading to the back of the castle, but before I knew it, I ended up in the courtyard. I didn’t know that the castle was this intricate. I went down a different path again and somehow ended at the entrance of the corridor.

I was suspicious…. I tried to go back in, but stopped halfway and looked around.

(Illusion Defense)

Ah~ I see. Illusion Defense. It was the kind of thing that made things that were in a maze look like they weren’t there, or things that weren’t there seem like they were. When I paid close attention, the [System] which had reported it to me displayed a simplified map of the castle as more detailed data.

The light spots that appear in some places would have an illusion effect. But when I stared at it, it looked as if those light spots were moving.

…This was troublesome. It wasn’t just an illusion, but once I passed through it, I couldn’t go back, and it was like a puzzle game.

This advanced magic must have been done by the elves, not the humans. But no matter how troublesome the trick was, if I took my time and didn’t give up as I could see the map, I would surely be able to solve this puzzle and find the place I was looking for.

“Ei!”

*Dogon!! 

However, it was too much trouble, so I decided to break the wall in a straight line and proceed, and the light spots on the map blinked and all the light spots had now disappeared.

“…It’s broken.”

I was going to fix the wall later, but even the illusion magic was broken…. Would my grandmother scold me later for this? 

Well, since it had already been done, it could not be helped. I learned from Flare and Alice that I had no regrets about what I did.