It was the day after Seigrat’s training.
“That’s weird; I can’t find Geldorf anywhere.”
He hadn’t shown up for lunch. Homura began searching the house for him.
“Geldorf?”
She called his name, but there was no answer.
Ever since School Village, Homura hadn’t been able to shake that feeling in her chest. The feeling that something was wrong. Now that Geldorf was missing, her worries were only multiplying.
There was no mission today, so the girls were focusing on their individual training and work. When Homura returned to their room, Tsutsumi was the only one there. She was sprawled out on the bed, reading the forbidden grimoire they had borrowed from Carlila.
Homura broke out in a cold sweat, remembering the perilous mission she had been given to smuggle out the grimoire for Tsutsumi.
“So what is that book all about?”
Homura took a peek at the open page.
“You can’t look…!” Tsutsumi immediately clutched the book to her chest.
“Tsutsumi, when we said you can’t let anyone else see, we only meant other people. I already know about the book, so I don’t count.”
Eventually, though reluctantly, Tsutsumi let Homura look. Homura could see that the page was scrawled over with all sorts of dangerous-sounding curses such as a “curse of severe and prolonged pain,” a “curse to transmute the body,” and a “curse to gnaw at the soul.” No wonder this thing was so forbidden.
But Homura was more intrigued by the way Tsutsumi was blushing right now than she was by the contents of the book.
“You’re acting just like a teenager trying to hide a dirty magazine…and I like it!”
A wolfish expression appeared on Homura’s face as she stretched out a hand toward the bashful girl.
“So those are your last words…”
At some point Jin had entered the room. She was standing directly behind Homura!
“Eek!”
Homura was so surprised that she dove under the bed.
“This is no time to fool around. Something is going on outside.”
Homura crawled out from under the bed and peeked out the window.
“You’re right…”
There was some sort of commotion outside. Everyone in the street looked tense. They were all in a hurry to get wherever they were going.
—A bell began to toll in the distance.
“Wait, isn’t that…?”
“The bell to signal danger.”
It was the same sound they had heard when the dragon attacked, soon after arriving in this world. And again in Aurerich, when the monstrous beasts had invaded…
Galdorssia was facing another crisis. The last time this happened, the people hadn’t seemed worried. Seigrat had slain that dragon with a single blow. But something in the air was different. The townspeople didn’t look as confident.
“That must mean…”
“Everyone, we’ve got trouble!”
It was Psycho. She was supposed to be at the church right now but had suddenly arrived home. There were deep furrows between her brows.
“You need to get ready to fight. Right this minute.”
Hearing the urgency in her voice, Homura and the others began to change.
“They’re going to have us fight, too…?”
“Only if the worst happens.”
As they finished changing, a knock came at the door.
“I’m coming in.”
Geldorf’s maid opened the door. The fact that she didn’t wait for a response, as she normally would, proved just how serious a predicament they were in. Proto, who usually spent her free time helping the maid with chores around the house, was standing by the maid’s side.
“Everyone…I see you’re already prepared. Master Geldorf is asking for you.”
“Wait, I haven’t changed yet.”
Proto quickly began removing her maid uniform.