Quick Battle

After being bestowed the name 'Alma', the skeleton gave its report. Once it finished its report, the meeting was basically finished but there was still something else that I needed to hear about. I locked on to Lia who had a polite smile on her face.

"Lia, don't you think it's time you explained about that?"

"Oh? Could you be more specific?"

I was certain that she knew what I was talking about, but she cocked her head and played dumb. She surely knew that there was no point in doing so, but doing it just to mess with me was a likely enough of a motive for her. Still, I couldn't bother to fight her, so I played along.

"Fine then. I want you to explain who, or what, Lily is."

From the moment Jeanne told me that Lily was a grimoire, I was suspicious of Lia's intentions. I believed it without a second thought as I always knew that the girl was strange, but something didn't add up. Based on the fact that Lily was still in the castle, Lia didn't mind letting her take a new master, but that didn't make sense. Although every grimoire held different knowledge and had different effects, all of them possessed the secrets of magic that could make anyone lust after them. Therefore, I couldn't understand why a cunning woman like her would provide such a thing to us without any strings attached.

Once I directly stated my question, Lia shrugged her shoulders and looked back at me with a smug face.

"You already know, don't you? She's a grimoire."

"You know what I mean. She was the girl that One rescued and the one you asked me to let stay here even though we predicted that there would be an assault. You should have known that Kaili would become her master, so why did you allow it to happen?"

"You know, you're asking a lot of questions but, is that any of your business? She's not your grimoire, remember?"

"Huh? Of course she's-"

Midway through my rebuttal, I figured out what Lia was hinting at and shut my mouth. If Lily had chosen one of my familiars then I could use that as a reason to get more information about her, but Kaili was my student. I didn't have the right to decide her life and death.

I didn't think she would betray me, but I couldn't expect her to fully believe in me either. Therefore, there was nothing wrong if she wanted to hold on to a few secrets.

After thinking it over my curiosity was suppressed, but I still needed a few drops of information to be truly satisfied.

"I see your point, but could you at least tell me her title. It seems you plan on leaving her here after all."

Lia stared at me for a few seconds in contemplation before eventually giving me an answer.

"Very well, but I'll only say it once. Lily's grimoire title is 'Knowledge and Freedom'."

The title of a grimoire was related to the type of information it possessed as well as its abilities. Additionally, as no two grimoires had the same abilities a grimoire's title could serve as a way to identify it. That was why we all knew the history of this grimoire.

There was a strange tension in the room once we heard that title, and that was because all of us were aware of the previous and most famous user of the 'Book of Knowledge and Freedom''.

"Wait, so that's really...?"

"That's right. She is the grimoire that was once used by my ancestor, Demon Queen Lilith."

Of course I tried to drag some more information from Lia after she dropped such a bombshell, but she was hellbent on keeping her mouth shut. Eventually, I gave up and called Kaili and Lily so that we could have a meal together. The thought to get details from Kaili did cross my mind, but only for a brief moment since I didn't want her to feel like I was forcing her.

I felt even more strongly about this, when I was reunited with Kaili.

"Mister!"

Unlike what I expected considering her personality, Kaili rushed into the dining room and pounced into my arms, while Lily trailed behind. I knew that Jeanne sighed at the fact that she reverted to her old way of calling me, but she didn't say anything. Although Kaili didn't start crying, I could feel her joy from her trembling arms.

This was quite the surprise event but I quickly regained my composure and stroked Kaili's head while looking fondly at her.

"It's okay, I'm here."

My guess was that she still had trauma due to losing her family, and that trauma boosted her anxiety, which would explain why she was so glad to see me.

After about a minute of clinging to me, Kaili slowly separated with a blush.

"Thanks."

"You're welcome."

She could likely feel the warm gazes she was getting from anyone but all she could do was endure them. However, in the midst of her embarrassment, she spotted the child that was behind me. At the same time, Lily walked forward and asked, "Who is this cute girl?"

You wouldn't think much of it if you weren't there, but when I saw her 'eager' smile, I was even more certain that this couldn't be a normal kid.

'Did her previous master teach her or is this a more recent influence?'

I felt sorry for Aishie, but I had no choice but to offer her up.

"Aishie, introduce yourself."

Unaware of Lily's true nature, Aishie gave a simple answer.

"I'm Aishie. Nice to meet you."

She started getting the hang of it, so it also sounded natural this time.

Lily replied with, "My name is Lily. I look forward to us getting closer."

'I'm sorry Aishie.'

I didn't know what sort of troubles Aishie would face in the future, but it was now out of my hands. Even the duty of a parent that was forced onto me, couldn't make me interfere in a battle between 'children'.

However, while I was focused on Lily, I didn't know how excited Kaili had gotten.

"My, my name is Kaili. Bu, but, you can call be big sis," Kaili stuttered.

"Big sis?" Aishie said in a confused manner.

In response, Kaili suddenly wrapped her arms around Aishie and exclaimed, "So cute!"

'Kaili...when did you become so far gone?'

A bad apple really did spoil the bunch.

While secretly lamenting the fact that Kaili had been influenced by Lily, we ate lunch together. Aishie seemed a little awkward when Kaili stuck to her, but when food was put on the table she wasn't bothered by her anymore. Her immunity grew so high that she even accepted the food that Kaili would feed her.

"Say, ahh~"

"Ahh~"

Still, considering that she had starved for so long it wasn't too surprising that she acted like this. With Aishie asking for seconds, Kaili feeding her and Lily looking at Kaili in approval, that was how the lunch went.

Once lunch was over I would usually send Lia home, but due to her suggestion I let her stay. Her suggestion was for me to personally test the power of Kaili and Alma so that I could keep it in mind for the future. Part of me was reluctant to reveal such information to her, but I figured that it would be fine if I stopped the fights before anyone had to reveal their trump card. Besides, she likely had a good idea of how strong they were from the battle to defend my castle.

Since the construction was done by the undead there was no need for a supervisor, so after leaving behind instructions, all of us went into the wasteland and stopped close enough for the castle to be in sight, but not be affected by our fight. As the fruit of my labours, I was eager to test Alma's abilities, but I didn't want to tease the one who'd been staring at me for much longer.

I looked at the nervous Kaili and asked, "You can show yourself, can't you?"

Everyone seemed a little confused at first, but once they sensed that stream of mana, looks of realisation appeared on their faces. Shortly after, that stream of mana gained colour and formed a muscular, light-green man that proudly floated above Kaili.

"I'm impressed, strange one. Few have ever been able to detect me in my hidden state."

The green man had a carefree tone and maintained an air of mystery. I didn't like being called strange, especially since he might know something about my origin, but I knew that he wasn't lying about how hard it was to sense him in his hidden state. My Dragon Eyes of Truth weren't able to help, it was my sensitivity to souls that had gone up since reaching level 7 in Soul Magic. It didn't react to ordinary dead souls since I suppressed it, but the quality of his presence still stood out to me. Maybe calling him a soul wouldn't be right, but he was definitely an existence that my sixth sense could pick up.

"Well, I have my ways. Do you have a name you want me to call you by, spirit?"

It was usually dangerous to reveal the identity of one's spirit, but in his case I doubted that was the case.

"Wind Spirit King, Ryzen."