Part 62:
The Princess Has the Miner Tend to Her Every Need
IT WAS IN THE Great Shovel Temple, in the Hall of Prayer—formerly known as Rostir Castle’s throne room—where the self-proclaimed scoop (Princess Lithisia), lost to Alan in two seconds flat.
“Shovel?!”
“What did you even want to do with all this, Your Highness?” Catria sighed.
Truth be told, it wasn’t even a fight. If one were to precisely lay out what Catria witnessed: Lithisia attempted to assault Alan but tripped and ended up in a princess carry, which was, surprise surprise, the end of her attack. The second Alan touched Lithisia, all the power to resist seemed to evacuate her body.
At the end of the day, she just loved that miner way too much. Yet she had still tried to attack him. Why?
“Haaaaaauuuuuhhh, you’re too kind, Sir Miner…” Lithisia cried as she looked up at him. “Sir Miner, pl-please… Defeat me with your shovel.”
“Come now. I’m going to protect you.”
“Huh?”
“From the beginning to the very end, I’ll always be on your side.”
“Ah…” Lithisia turned bright red with joy despite wanting to protest that this wasn’t the point.
But Alan continued to hold her in his arms and looked her straight in the eyes. “So please, tell me. Why did you do something as scoopy as this?”
“Scoopy” apparently meant “messed up” or “wrong.” You know, like the Shovel Hell they were currently trapped in.
Despite a profound headache, Catria understood it all. She had to painstakingly translate each bit of their conversation, and at this point she was ready to consider that their conversation might be way more messed up than the world’s present situation.
“Mmf…”
For a moment, Lithisia’s lids lowered as she avoided Alan’s gaze. Her lips began to part. Then she balled up in his arms. She couldn’t say it. This was the one thing she couldn’t reveal. Her resolve was rock solid.
But we have to hurry… On Alan’s end, he couldn’t afford to retreat. The Shovel Hellification of the world was still in motion. Even as they spoke in this former-palace, there was no telling when the Sun God’s retaliation would rain down upon them. He wasn’t worried about himself, but Catria and Lithisia would be in real danger.
Alan held up his adamantine shovel and spoke with great intent. “There’s no time to waste. Lithisia, I’m going to dig up your true intentions.”
“Sho?!?!?!” The princess panicked as a scoop or shovel might. No, anything but that! He’ll know how I feel!
She could try and resist, but that was always a pointless endeavor in the face of Alan. He would uncover it all. Tears emerged from her eyes, shovel-shaped tears.
He’ll find out! Sir Miner will find out the feelings in my scoopy heart and soul…
“Is having your heart uncovered embarrassing, Lithisia?”
“Sh…” Lithisia tearfully nodded.
Alan nodded in return and thought for a moment. “Then how about you dig up my true intentions too?” the miner declared shovelly.
Lithisia couldn’t mask her surprise.
Meanwhile, Catria stared blankly into the distance. Can I stop interjecting now?
“We’ll reveal our hearts to one another. No one-sided digging. Just as I uncover your true feelings, you uncover mine. We’ll unearth them together. Maybe that way…” Alan handed Lithisia her red shovel and smiled. “You won’t have to be so embarrassed.”
That logic makes no sense. A few seconds passed during which Catria really seriously considered interjecting. But when she saw how Lithisia gazed at Alan like a girl falling in love for the second time, she decided to hold her tongue. A relationship in which the two would uncover each other’s hearts… Wasn’t that even deeper than just being lovers?
No, seriously. Just get married already, what the hell!
Catria still kept her opinion to herself. She was a good girl who could read the room.
“Then let’s begin. Shoveling Heart!”
When Alan gripped his shovel, a sandpit appeared in the room, in the middle of which rose a single sand mountain, the likes of which a child might make. Lithisia and Alan sat on opposite sides of it. On the side of the mountain in front of Alan was the name “Lithisia.” In front of Lithisia was “Alan.”
Ah… Lithisia trembled and closed her eyes, but she would resist no more. She would do as Alan said. It was clear that she had come to terms with her fate.
Catria, meanwhile, had entirely abandoned her role as the straight woman.
At last, Alan began to dig into Lithisia’s sand mountain. From it bellowed smoke in the form of a human: a transparent Lithisia holding a shovel like a baby.
The form spoke. “I’ve committed a horrible scoop…”
“?!?!?!”
Er, what? Catria had already lost the thread. But judging by Lithisia’s terrified expression, she must’ve meant “committed a horrible sin.”
The voice continued. “I thought I tried my best. I really, really did. I know I’m no shovel. I’m just a regular human. But…I practiced shoveling and tried my hardest to become a shovel. I did it all…I did it all so I could have Sir Miner shovel (verb) me.”
Catria thought to look for earplugs but resisted the urge. These were undeniably Lithisia’s true feelings. This is my mistress. I have to understand her true intentions.
The voice continued. “And because I worked really hard, Sir Miner praised me. He said that I was a very shovelly girl. I was so happy. So very, very happy. An ordinary human like me could be a shovel if I tried my hardest. But—”
The voice stopped for a moment.
“I was wrong. I was mistaken from the very beginning. After all, Sir Miner…”
The voice stopped again.
“He didn’t want a shovelly girl, he wanted a normal girl.”
Catria instinctively looked at Alan, who regarded Lithisia with utmost seriousness. In contrast, tears cascaded down Lithisia’s cheeks.
You’re really calling Kuronono normal? She’s way too shovel for that, Catria interjected in her heart, but the voice continued anyway.
“I can never be normal again. Sir Miner acknowledged that both my body and mind are shovels now. That’s why I was just so jealous of Kuronono for being a normal girl. So jealous. I didn’t know what to do with myself. But at that moment, I learned the orbs might grant my selfish wish—the sort of wish a human might never make, but that I, a shovel… And if everyone were to become shovels too, I would be normal again. So I wished for it.”
Both the projected Lithisia and the real one sobbed like a small child.