Part 60:
The Princess Uses the Orbs to Grant Her Wish
(Part B)
“I DON’T NEED Alice Veknarl for this. Come, Legendary Despair-Eating Dragon of the Desert, Itangast!”
KABOOM!
A giant bronzed statue fell from the sky. Yes, a copper statue, one that had been built in the Rahal Tribe’s village when Lithisia first began her religious crusade in the Desert Nation. It took the form of Alan piercing the heart of the dragon with his Wave Motion Shovel Blast. This statue had been built using the fangs of the real legendary dragon, which was why the statue had been summoned.
For several seconds, Zeleburg gazed at the colossal piece of art.
“No… actually, uh, this was the prologue.” He was surprisingly resilient to the irrational. Zeleburg waved his hand again and the statue vanished. “Heed my call, Emperor of the Skies, Pazuzu!”
Silence. Nothing at all happened. As you recall, Alan had utterly annihilated both Pazuzu and the floating city of Rahzelfo.
At this point, sweat finally started to drizzle down Zeleburg’s forehead. He was at last starting to understand his predicament. “Wh-what’s going on?!”
“I’ve already defeated your four archfiends or whatever.”
“Impossible! Madness! Heed my call, Lord of the Seas, Lernia Hydra!”
Silence. Nothing happened this time as well, or at least so everyone present thought until a girl suddenly appeared. She had wavy hair that stretched down to her hips, and she wore pajamas. A big pillow was stuffed between her legs as well.
“Alan… When are you gonna…come back…” She seemed out of breath.
Lucrezia lay on her bed, moving about. She appeared to be having quite the restless dream.
“Huh?” The young woman blinked rapidly.
Catria couldn’t put together why she’d been summoned.
Frankly, this one probably happened because Lucrezia had eaten the greatest amount of Lernia Hydra-tentacle sashimi at the banquet on their day of celebration after defeating it. Of course, none of that actually mattered. All that mattered was her absurd position.
It was suggestive, to say the least.
“EEEEEEEK?! Alan?! Why, why, why?!” Lucrezia’s face was bright red as she screamed.
Zeleburg snapped his fingers and Lucrezia vanished. The prime minister no longer wore a smile. Instead, sweat poured down his face in a waterfall. “What’s the meaning of this?!?!”
Catria was relieved to discover that even a greater demon couldn’t fully understand the shovel.
“That’s how we got the orbs back. We defeated your Tetrad Archfiends.”
“Impossible!”
“Lithisia, show him.”
There was no reason to keep them hidden anymore, as Lithisia had the orbs in her possession. She took out her red shovel and showed it to the prime minister. Lining its handle were seven glowing orbs reflecting the light of the sun.
“Er, were they always that size?” Alan asked.
The orbs were supposed to be about as large as the palm of one’s hand, yet these were about the size of a diamond one might find in a ring.
Lithisia smiled. “We modified them so that they’d fit in Sir Miner’s shovel.”
They modified a national treasure? Catria thought.
Zeleburg’s expression was that of pure astonishment. “NNNGH?!”
Yup. Catria sighed. This war and this journey are over. Though I suppose we could’ve just brought Alan here and that would’ve been more than enough to end things—
However, for some reason, Zeleburg began to smugly laugh. “Mwa ha ha… Mwa ha ha ha ha.”
“Hrm?”
“Shovel?”
“You’ve collected all seven orbs, have you?” The laughter soon morphed into something of a cackle as Zeleburg’s voice echoed through the heavens. “Ha ha ha ha ha ha! As expected from the princess herself! You’ve surpassed my wildest expectations!”
“Shovel? Zeleburg, have you finally lost your mind?”
She’s the last person I’d wanna hear that from, thought Catria.
But Zeleburg wasn’t looking at Alan anymore. He was staring at Lithisia. “Your Highness, do you know why I scattered the orbs to the various nations you fled to?”
“Scoopey! (No clue!)”
“Scoopey?! Er, anyway, I made you collect the orbs on purpose.”
“Scoopey! (That’s a lie! I did this all of my own free will!)”
“…”
Despite Zeleburg’s high resilience to the unreasonable, even he couldn’t help but go silent. But he soon shook his head and regained his composure. “The power of the orbs… You see, they don’t just seal away monsters and demons, they do something much more incredible.”
“Shoop.”
“Shoop?!”
What the hell does that even mean?! This was the translation of the silent scream in Catria’s heart.
“She probably combined ‘shovel’ and ‘scoop,’ ultimately meaning ‘I don’t understand,’” said Alan.
“I…see. Looks like yet another unnecessary word has been introduced into humanity’s lexicon…”
Meanwhile, Zeleburg continued. “Th-the orbs have the power to grant wishes. But Your Highness, your wish was not granted. That’s because I cast a spell on the first orb, the Yellow Orb, so you wouldn’t be able to make your wish as you are now.”
“Hm?” Alan’s eyebrows twitched. “I knew I sensed something odd.”
That would explain why Lithisia’s wish hadn’t been granted.
“Exactly! I scattered the orbs across the land so they could absorb the wishing power of people all around the world, thus making it possible to create an even more powerful miracle! Now, at last, all seven orbs have returned to me! Thanks to your hard work, Your Highness!” Zeleburg cackled. “Ha ha ha ha ha! Your Highness, you’ve been dancing in the palm of my hand this entire time!”
I’d personally call it shoveling, not dancing, thought Catria.
“The orbs had that kind of shovel?” Lithisia looked down at the gems in the handle of her shovel with great curiosity. As she did—
SHIIIIIIIIIINE!
A beam of seven colors erupted from the red shovel she held.
“EEEK!”
“It’s begun. The orbs are responding to my wish.” Zeleburg proceeded to make some kind of complex hand motion, causing the orbs to shine even more radiantly. An overwhelming amount of light now projected from Lithisia’s red shovel. “As they are now, thanks to my spell, the orbs can only grant a wish of extreme desire and greed. Too much greed for any single human.”
“A greed too great for a human?” Catria felt a chill race down her spine.
“Precisely! In other words, it can only be used by one such as myself—a demon of true power!”
But Catria had stopped listening. A level of desire and greed no human could hold. Wait, no. That means… Isn’t this like, super bad?
RUUUUUMBBBBBLLLLEEEEE!
The multicolored beam of light being fired from the orbs surrounded and engulfed not Zeleburg, but Lithisia.
“Wha?” Zeleburg couldn’t keep himself from sounding like a total fool.
This wasn’t his fault, considering he had no idea what was happening. The only people who did were Alan and Catria.
“Alan!”
“I know.”
The miner had moved before the knight’s warning. He gripped his shovel, aimed for Lithisia’s red one, and thrust. The fierce clang of metal colliding with metal rang through the air as Lithisia’s shovel was slammed to the ground.
Except it wasn’t. Lithisia continued to grip her shovel as if nothing had happened.
“?!”
Catria was stunned. Alan’s shovel wasn’t strong enough to stop her?!
Meanwhile, the princess continued to gaze at her shovel, entranced.
“Lithisia!!!” Alan yelled out to her.
She twitched ever so slightly in response. “Sh…”
For but a moment, it appeared as though Lithisia had regained composure. Her eyes moist, she looked like she wanted to say something. Then it was done. Lithisia clutched her red shovel close to her chest.
“…”
Catria couldn’t hear what her mistress had to say. The light coming from the orbs embedded in Lithisia’s shovel began to swallow her expression and then her entire body, soon enveloping the entire area. It wasn’t any kind of normal light; Catria sensed an overwhelming pressure pushing down on her from within it.
This light was washing over the world.
What is this?
Then they heard something within the light—something like a hymn. It sort of sounded like Lithisia’s voice, but not quite. This mysterious voice rang out from within the radiance.
“Sho-vel! A-lan! Sho-vel! A-lan!”
“Seriously?! We’re still dealing with shovels even now?!” Catria only managed to maintain her sense of self by playing the straight woman.
The situation remained unchanged. Something tremendous was going down, but Catria had no clue what that something was beyond it being extremely shovel. She stabbed her Holy Knight Blade into the ground and shouted, “Alan, do something!”
The miner didn’t move when faced with Lithisia’s light. He held his shovel above his head.
“This is ‘World Modification.’ I don’t know if this is gonna work or not, but…FILL!” cried Alan.
KA-CHOOOOOOOOM!
Giant brown walls jutted up from the ground surrounding Lithisia, Alan, and Catria, piercing the heavens themselves. It looked as though Lithisia’s light was being sealed within said walls—but the strange voice and white light continued to erupt from the princess.
Alan turned back to Catria with shovel in hand and an extremely grave expression on his face. “Catria, I can’t do this alone. I need your help.”
“Wha?!”
“The Lithisia before us is on a different level. She’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before.” Alan said. Catria swallowed her breath as Alan made his grim declaration: “She’s a scoop.”
Seconds passed and the light appeared to have ceased.
Catria finally resumed her role as the straight woman. “Could you at least try and explain yourself for once?!”
Exhausted, she drooped. She figured that the next time she opened her eyes, everything would probably have become shoops or something. Whatever the hell that meant.