He paused. “But would the empire believe me?”
I shifted my gaze from Lionel to Ketty, and she gave me a nod.
“Even if they don’t, I’d expect the Lionel I know to just laugh it off and say he could settle things on his favorite playground—the battlefield. Am I mistaken?”
Oh, crap, had I gone too far by comparing a battlefield to a playground? Lionel was shaking.
“Sorry, did I go too fa—” I started, but he suddenly burst into laughter.
“Ha ha! How exciting!”
“Guess not, huh? Glad to see my little comment motivated you.”
My master and Lionel were the only two people in the world who would consider a battlefield a “playground,” but hey, if it lifted his spirits, I wasn’t going to question it.
“I will face any threat with all my power if you command me to do so, sir. So, my goal is to defeat the fake me and deal with the imperial soldiers. Is that right?”
“Yup. But I also need you to prepare for the worst-case scenario,” I said.
“And what might that be?”
“If the emperor chases you out of Illumasia and insists on pursuing his demonization plan, you’ll most likely end up having to turn your blade against him.” Of course, if it turned out that the fake Lionel was manipulating the emperor and pushing for the demonization experiments, the situation would be different.
Lionel stayed silent for a moment before saying, “If the emperor is the one behind the demonization plan, I will kill him myself.”
I could feel both his sorrow and his determination in his tone. I turned to the rest of our group and announced my plan. “Just as I said before, I’m not sure if we’ll be going to Illumasia first. But if we are, our goal is to destroy all of their research on demonization as well as their experimentation facilities without any of us dying in the process. Remember that no matter how badly wounded you are, I can always heal you. So do everything you can not to get one-shotted. All right?”
“Yes!” they all replied in unison, except for Rina and Nanya.
“Um, Mister Luciel, I’m not really sure what’s going on, but would Nanya and I come with you?” Rina asked me, visibly confused.
I...hadn’t thought about them at all, actually. I should probably have them sit this one out.
“You can come if you want, but there is a possibility we’ll need to fight, so I think it might be better if you stayed back. I’ll be taking Lionel, Ketty, and Kefin along, but it doesn’t mean there’s no risk of something going wrong,” I explained.
“I see,” Rina replied, exchanging relieved glances with Nanya.
“We don’t really need any more people, do we?” I asked.
“Guess not,” Dhoran chimed in. “But I’m surprised by the lasses’ lack o’ curiosity and inquisitive spirit.”
“There must be all sorts of interesting things in the empire,” Pola added.
“I’d love to play around with wyvern magic stones!” Lycian exclaimed.
Rina and Nanya seemed a bit flustered by their comments.
“As for you three, you can wait for us back in Saint Shurule after dropping us off with the airship,” I said.
“We could,” Dhoran said, “but we won’t.”
“Huh?!” I was taken aback by his refusal. Dhoran had never refused to do anything I’d asked of him before.
“I’ve ’ad a bitter experience with Illumasia before. I want ta settle things with ’em meself,” he explained.
I had been wondering what kind of reason he had for being so insistent on tagging along, but I’d never expected revenge to be his motive.
“Um...you’ll be putting Pola and Lycian in danger too,” I remarked.
“They won’t die as long as yer here. Plus, we’ll be able to give you more time with the golems.”
Pola nodded. “We’ve been preparing for this.”
“I still haven’t forgiven the empire for driving me to the brink of starvation!”
Huh. So it wasn’t just Dhoran; Pola and Lycian were raring to accompany us as well.
“We’re not going there to fight, though, Dhoran,” I pointed out.
“Aye, I understand. But those bastards tried to destroy our kingdom. I won’t be satisfied until they’ve paid for their crimes.”
Yeah, so he didn’t understand. I’d heard before that dwarves never went back on their decisions. But I couldn’t just call him stubborn to his face...
Guess I have no choice but to try to distract him with what he loves.
“Dhoran, not everyone in the empire is your enemy. Besides, don’t you have machines and stuff to work on?” I asked.
“I can just finish ’em after,” he replied.
“See, I wouldn’t mind if we were sure there was going to be an after, but you never know. I can’t just ignore the possibility of something going terribly wrong. Besides, we’ll need the airship if we have to run away, and I don’t want to risk it getting shot down by a wyvern.”
A bitter look appeared on his face and he crossed his arms. I decided one more push should do it.
“We need you to install that magic artillery on the airship if we want to escape Illumasia alive, as well as a mana radar. Could you prioritize those?”
“Ye went straight for the throat, huh? Fine. If you insist, I’ll focus on the machines rather than come with ye.”
“Thank you,” I said with a relieved sigh.
Lionel then chimed in, “So, when are we headed for Illumasia?”
“As I said earlier, we’ll only decide if and when we’ll go once Dongahar wakes up and answers our questions. I need to discuss it with the pope too. Plus, we have to take master and Galba back to Merratoni anyway, so we won’t be leaving for a week at the very least.”
“Perfect. That gives us more than enough time to come up with a rock-solid plan of action,” he said excitedly. He seemed to be looking forward to our struggle with the empire.
“With everything out of the way, we can finally dig in. Actually, let’s make today a welcome party for Rina and Nanya,” I said.
“Yeah!” my companions cheered as they dug into their meals.
I turned back to Lionel and bowed. “I’m sorry for putting you in such a difficult position.”
“Please raise your head, sir. What you are trying to do is not something just anyone can accomplish. Besides, by going with you, I’ll be able to cure the empire’s ills.”
Not only had he told me to raise my head, he’d even reassured me that he was doing it for himself.
“Sir Lionel’s right,” Ketty interjected. “Back then, we didn’t have the luxury of doing anything but running away, but now we’ll finally have the chance to clear the darkness that has plagued Illumasia.”
Just like Lionel, she wanted to take her revenge on those who had enslaved her. As for Kefin... Well...
“It’ll be a great opportunity to add yet another achievement to your legend, sir!”
I felt like his focus wasn’t entirely aligned with ours. But with that, we began preparing for the journey ahead, all of us united by a common purpose.
Well, almost all of us.