“Oh, and Catria?” said Lithisia.
“Yes?!” The lady knight trembled when the princess called her name.
“There seems to be a battle taking place near the fortress you used to be stationed at in the southwest.”
“A battle?”
“The wind told my shovel,” said Lithisia. “Please go save them.”
“Hoooold on a second.”
Everything about that sentence was weird. And anyway, there was no need for Catria to hurry when Alan could basically just warp to the fortress using the ground and fire off his Wave Motion Shovel Blast. The fight would be over in a second.
But Lithisia smiled. “Go show the captain just how much you’ve grown.”
“Huh?”
“Show your old comrades, the people who looked down on you, how strong you’ve become.” Lithisia raised her red shovel into the wind. “Show them the true strength of Rostir’s most powerful knight!”
I’m…the most powerful knight?
As Catria stood dumbfounded, Alan made his move. He tapped his shovel on the ground and checked the vibrations. “Hrm, there does in fact appear to be a battle taking place to the southwest. Hundreds of people have taken to the field.”
“Hundreds? Th-that’s no mere scuffle. That’s all-out war! How could I change anything?”
“You would change everything,” said Alan definitively.
“Eh?!”
“Catria, go become the hero you’re destined to be. You already have the power you require.”
Alan of all people told Catria this. That Alan.
Could she really do it?
Can I actually stop a massive battle like some kind of hero of legend? Sure, I pulled off something similar in the Light Nation, but that was in the tunnels beneath the ground, where Shovel Power is strongest. Plus, the enemy were demons, who are weak to holy power. That’s completely different from doing battle in a field under the open sky.
But for some reason, a mysterious sense of courage bubbled up inside Catria as she gripped her Holy Knight Blade. The sword sheathed within the Sacred Scabbard Arcadia told her she could do it.
Can I really? No, that’s not right… I’m the only one who can do it! At last, I’m going to be the most powerful knight in all the land!
“A-all right, I understand. I’ll—huagh?!”
Suddenly Arcadia’s alarm began to ring, causing Catria to freeze in place. She mechanically turned around. It was the warning alerting her that she was in need of a daily Anti-Shovel Power recharge.
“Catria,” said Alan.
“Ah! Alan, n-no, please. Stay away!”
Catria held her hands over her ears and backed up. This was bad. She couldn’t handle an action so delightful on top of this wonderful hilltop. Plus, they were right in front of the princess. How could she let Alan dig her ears while she rested her head on his lap under these circumstances? If she let him do that, she knew without a doubt that something deep inside of her would be completely corrupted by the shovel.
But her heart beat a mile a minute, and her cheeks remained bright red.
This is bad, bad, bad, bad!
“Oh gosh, my ears. My ears are—no!” Catria raised her voice like a child, but she couldn’t resist. Just imagining the sensation in her ears being shoveled put her over the edge.
Swoosh, swoosh. Poking away at the insides of her ears.
“Don’t worry,” said Alan. “Since I cleaned your ears yesterday, we’re doing something different today.”
“Wha?” Catria relaxed for a moment, though a creeping disappointment began to—
Fwoop!
Something plunged up her nose.
“?!”
“Stay still. You’ve been crying so much that you’re all plugged up in there.”
Alan used a soft, twisted-up tissue shaped like a shovel to dig deep into Catria’s nose. He moved the Tissue Shovel around her mucous membrane, cleaning away the filth within Catria. There was a lot to clean away, considering all she’d done as of late was cry.
Fwoop, fwoop.
Alan held her tightly from behind to make sure she didn’t freak out while he cleaned away.
“Ah, eee, nngh!”
Fwoop, fwoop, fwoop.
Alan is having his way with the dirtiest part of my face. What’s going on? What’s happening? This is way worse than what he did to my ears!
“Perfect, recharge complete.”
“Nnnnngh!”
And so Alan pulled out the Tissue Shovel while Catria held down her nose and breathed heavily.
This is bad. Completely bad. That shoveling just now was—
“Ah, ahhh, uuuuugh.”
Even more embarrassing than when he cleaned my ears!
“Now then, back to business.” Alan patted Catria on the shoulders as she shook with shame. “Get out there and be a hero.”
As if I could right now?! You big dummy! Catria thought to herself.
She’d been embraced by a man, had her nose picked, and now the culprit himself was telling her to go be a hero all willy-nilly? Seriously? But Catria couldn’t voice her complaints. All she could do was sniffle up her remaining snot as she cried.
“Uuuuugh.”
“You have a handkerchief, yeah?”
It was plain as day that he was treating her like a child. This sucked. As for what specifically sucked, it was the fact that his treatment and care made her even a little bit happy.
She had just decided to go and be a hero, too.
Uuugh, I’m not going down like this! Catria gripped her Holy Knight Blade and once again steeled her resolve. She wasn’t going to the battlefield in order to show her old comrades how much stronger she’d become. She needed to show Alan.
Alan, when this is all over, the first thing I’m gonna do is pick your nose with all my might!
“Wait, what the hell am I thinking?!”
“Hurry up and get going.”
Three minutes later, Lithisia secretly started blowing her nose. It stung like crazy, but she kept it secret from Alan. If he found out about her uncouth behavior and unbecoming desires, it would cause all kinds of trouble for him.
“I’m so jeavel (jealous + shovel)…”
However, she was immediately found out.
“Lithisia, get over here.”
“Shovel?!”
On top of that breezy hill near the Rostir capital city, a happy little princess had all sorts of things picked and cleaned.
This was the scene three days before Rostir was wiped from the face of the continent.