8.2.3

"From the look of things, it would appear you return with fair tidings."

With a modest, composed smile, Julius greeted Subaru and the others, who were rejoining the rest of the group after taking Petelgeuse down.

They were stationed at an expeditionary-force field camp, constructed outside the forest and somewhat far off from the highway. With the Witch Cultists lurking in the forest, they were avoiding prying eyes from there and the highway to not give away their presence.

That said, now that Petelgeuse, their top dog, was dead, it was unlikely the remaining fingers would fail to notice for long. Their future movements required not just caution, but audacious haste.

"What about the fingers' base spotted along the way?"

"One detachment is still keeping it under watch. They will surely contact us if anything occurs. But the other detachment made inopportune contact and engaged the Witch Cultists in combat."

"Serious?! So what happened, then?! Did we lose anyone…?"

Having thought this a routine report, Subaru was stricken with nervousness when he heard it had come to a fight. However, when Subaru pressed closer, Julius gave a strained smile. Hand-combing his slightly disheveled forelocks, he gave his cavalry saber a slight tilt with his hand.

"You may rest easy. Several among the Witch Cultists were formidable, but all were dispatched without difficulty. The base in question was mopped up, so there should be nine fingers left."

"…There's no wounded? Also, none of the enemies got away?"

"Rest easy. We have thoroughly addressed all of your concerns."

Julius was too classy to conceal his own failures. Hearing there had been neither casualties nor failures, Subaru sighed a breath of relief. Julius gave a slightly pained smile at his reaction as he said, "And you were not followed? All went according to plan against the Archbishop of the Seven Deadly Sins?"

"Wilhelm cut off his head, and magic blew his corpse into teeny bits, so that should be it… It should be it, right? Any normal way of thinking, there's no way he'd come back from that, right?"

"You witnessed it for yourself, so I am uncertain why you look so uneasy."

Julius skeptically knit his brows at Subaru's lingering suspicions. Then he continued to grimace when he looked at Ferris, standing at Subaru's side.

"…Besides, though I understand the urge to be certain, destruction of remains lacks elegance. And you were with him, Ferris."

"Sowwy, Ferri desperately tried to stop them, but Subawu just wouldn't…"

"Don't say it like it's some tragedy caused by my violent nature!! What's with all the excess theatrics?! I'll have you know, it was the big sis of those kitty siblings that did it!"

When Julius scolded them for violating the dead, Ferris sold Subaru out with a tear in the corner of his eye. Subaru objected to his statement and pointed to the real culprit—Mimi, who'd returned along with them.

Incidentally, Mimi was sulking from having been scolded for her excess by everyone on the way back. Currently, she was curled over TB's back out of spite, sulking to the point of refusing to walk under her own power.

"I see, Mimi, was it? Then it cannot be helped. She had her reasons, I'm sure."

"Her little brothers do it, too, but don't you and Anastasia spoil her a little too much…?"

"That is neither our intent nor fact. Incidentally, it was Master Wilhelm who struck down the archbishop…?"

Evading Subaru's stare, Julius addressed Wilhelm, looking in the latter's direction. Wilhelm reciprocated, pulling back his shoulders as he said, "I cut off his head, and without doubt severed the thread of his life. I know of no living creature able to live through that."

"I am relieved. If Master Wilhelm speaks such a thing, there can be no mistake—so this time we have greatly impeded the future activities of the Witch Cult led by Sloth."

"What, you didn't believe it when I said it?! I'm not playing around here, so I checked the corpse with my own eyes! Two or three times at that!"

"I would like you to take my not checking with Ferris as a sign of my sincerity toward you."

"Sincerity is based on the word sincere. You knew that, right?"

A vein bulged on Subaru's forehead as he rebuffed the unapologetic Julius. But Julius did not reply to Subaru as he raised an expectant hand toward the other knights and mercenaries. At his signal, conversing voices died out, and with all eyes on Julius, he motioned to Subaru.

"They, too, await your report. It should come from your own mouth. Am I wrong?"

"You're not wrong, but it annoys me to have you set the stage."

"Petty stubbornness, meow…"

Ferris sent an exasperated expression toward Subaru and Julius, arguing regardless of the situation.

"Boys really can be so stupid. And Subawu, especially stupid."

"Seen from the outside, a man's pride might often be seen as trivial. Does this ring any bells with you, Ferris?"

"…Who knows? There might have been someone stubborn like that once upon a time…"

Somehow, Ferris's reply to Wilhelm's words sounded awkward. Turning his face away, seemingly to avoid the aged swordsman's gaze, Ferris made a heavy sigh.

With that exchange taking place off behind Subaru, he reported the good news to everyone focused on him.

"So things went pretty much as expected. We took down the Archbishop of the Seven Deadly Sins!"

"Ohhh—"

Narrating with poses and gestures, Subaru made his explanation as vivid as possible, conveying the high points of the success of their operation against the archbishop, bringing joy to the faces of those stewing at having to wait.

"W-wait, wait! No loud voices! They'll hear you!"

"—!"

And they came to the brink of breaking into shouts of joy, which would have made their having camped outside the forest meaningless. No doubt was left that the result was optimal for them all.

"With that done, that leaves moppin' up the stragglers, pretty simple stuff. If we don't hurry, the lady'll be the granny by the time we're done… Ah, that's just a stock joke o' mine."

"Somehow, I don't feel like laughing at that one… Well, that's fine, though."

Setting aside Ricardo's sense of humor, the fact remained that it was best to move nimbly from that point forward. Unfortunately, it was also a fact that the remaining job wasn't as simple as Ricardo made it out to be.

"Just 'cause we beat Petelgeuse doesn't mean everything's wrapped up with a bow, after all."

"Won't do any good to be drunk on victory and trip over our own feet, meow. And if they know the Archbishop of the Seven Deadly Sins died, the rest of the Witch Cultists won't be lured out so easily, huh…?"

"Hey, these are Witch Cultists. Best to stop expecting 'em to have sane, rational thoughts."

Ferris and Ricardo picked up where Subaru left off, apparently sharing his concerns. The faces of the others seemed to indicate agreement; not a single one seemed slacker at the news of their first victory.

"First off, smashing the fingers under his command is our top priority. Besides that, there's no one here extreme enough to slaughter all the Witch Cultists, right? I'd like us to capture any of them we can…"

"I have a feeling they'll just kill themselves, though… That's what they've always done to date, after all."

With Subaru plotting to capture some alive, Ferris's lips thinned in dismay. This was not a rebuttal of the idea, but rather an expression of his disgust toward Witch Cultists who would kill themselves to seal their own lips.

To a healer such as him, such craftiness from the Witch Cult was probably a hard thing to take.

"I understand your skepticism, Ferris. But if we can refrain from taking their lives, it is incumbent upon us to do so. I agree that we should prioritize capture when we confront the remaining Witch Cultists. Having said that, we must not lose sight of the fact that our own well-being comes first, to avoid any sudden reversal of fortune."

With Ferris sullen, Julius was considerate toward him while agreeing with Subaru's opinion.

"—And while locating the fingers does come first, we should not neglect that the dragon carriages you arranged should reach us soon enough."

"That so? There's that, too, yeah."

At Julius's declaration, Subaru clapped his hands together, recalling the detachment heading to rendezvous with the expeditionary force.

The dragon carriages, which they'd recruited by gathering traveling merchants together from neighboring parts, were for evacuating Emilia and the rest. That said, with Petelgeuse struck down and nothing left of the Witch Cult but remnants, it seemed highly likely that there would be no need for a wholesale evacuation, making all that extra effort for nothing.

"Though that is as planned, it would surely be difficult for the expeditionary force to act in concert with the merchants concerned. We should order them either to remain at the camp, or to go into the village to proceed with the evacuation as agreed. In that case, we should take care not to cause a panic from the arrival of a large force. What do you think?"

"Think? …About what?"

"If there is someone familiar to both the village and the mansion, I believe unnecessary panic can be avoided."

"…"

Having blithely followed Julius's lead, Subaru now bit his lips, holding his emotions back. The implicit message was exceedingly simple: now Subaru could return to the mansion in the name of a just cause.

Considering that someone had to explain everything, sending Subaru to the mansion as an envoy made even more sense.

But—

"Don't make me mix public and private business. I still have things to do out here."

"Surely you too are in high spirits. None here would call it mixing the public and private."

"I volunteered to be bait against the Witch Cult, and I'm still the best guy for the job… Besides, I don't deserve to go back to the mansion yet."

Shaking his head at Julius's suggestion, Subaru looked toward the forest—and the mansion that lay beyond.

The proposal was Julius being considerate in his own way. Even Subaru wasn't suspicious enough to view it as an act of malice. But neither was Subaru dishonest about believing he couldn't show his face there yet.

"You still think so, after all this?"

Subaru's moment of reflection made Ferris's eyes go round as he spoke with a look of disbelief. Ferris spoke the words because he knew all that Subaru had done to that point.

He'd formed an alliance with Crusch and her people and cooperated in subjugating the White Whale and crushing the Archbishop of Sloth. Lined up in a row, these successes were more than enough to earn words of admiration.

But inside Subaru, their combined weight was not sufficient to wipe away his own stupidity.

"No matter what you do, you can't change the past—when you make a mistake, you have to clean it up."

"…"

"That's what Anastasia said to me before. It's harsh, but…I think that way, too. Over in the mountain of things I've piled up to date is a big blob of stupidity. That's why I can't let myself stop halfway."

In reality, those words had been spoken to him the last time around. Accordingly, Anastasia had never scolded him so sternly in this world. But it was not so inside Subaru.

Even if no one else remembered, Subaru would not forget, nor was it something he ought to.

"So I finally can go back when the problem—taking care of all of the Witch Cult in the forest—is done."

"If that is what you say, it shall be so. To begin with, it is a fact that having you is an advantage."

When Subaru declined to return to the mansion, Julius honored his choice. Almost all those around Subaru displayed an understanding for his assertion.

Ferris, the only one with a dissatisfied look to the bitter end, said, "I'm a little worried you're that hung up about it… I really can't understand why you'd invent so many reasons not to meet the person you really, really, really like. You can just quit if you want to, meow…"

"Don't harp on people like that. And it's not that I don't want to. You understand, right?"

"I do not. Ferri's never had a breakup with Lady Crusch like that, meow. Don't blame me if you have regrets for not meeting her when you had the chance."

"…Don't harp, geez."

Perhaps Ferris's anger was that of a healer who'd experienced so much human life and death. His words carried great weight indeed.

"Sir Subaru, there is no need to be overly concerned. When people are young, they are emotional, and their feelings lead them astray. However, these things are not irreparable."

"Muuu, Old Man Wil, you spoil Subawu too much."

"If I must say so, you are somewhat excessively strict with Sir Subaru—though I do appreciate the reason why."

"…Don't go talking like you understand it."

Wilhelm's words made Ferris fall silent with a guilty look. The conversation between the longtime acquaintances conveyed sentiments that only they could understand, flying well over Subaru's head.

Though he didn't know the details, Subaru gave Wilhelm a light wave and said, "Thanks for the follow-up. I feel a little better about it now… It's not like it didn't bother me at all."

"At least you seem more at ease. After all, if all it took to solve misunderstandings between men and women were one piece of advice from an old man, far fewer human beings would need worry about such things."

"Wilhelm, you felt bad when you argued with your wife, too, huh?"

The way Wilhelm seemed to speak from personal experience made Subaru inquire with renewed interest. When he did so, Wilhelm closed his eyes, seemingly reminiscing about days long past.

"Of course. In my case, my wife was physically invincible when brought to anger. She pounded me into the floor quite a few times."

"Sword Saints don't do half measures, geez!!"

"Afterward, I forced my arms around her, holding her close until her anger abated."

"That's like an Easter egg for married life?!"

Somehow, Wilhelm's face looked brighter as he related the tale from life with his beloved.

The Sword Devil had plainly come to terms with events in his own past. Subaru, seized by envy, slapped his own cheeks. Awkward as it was, Wilhelm was being considerate to him. He'd be ashamed to call himself a man if he didn't respond to those sentiments.

"I think this is still you thinking too much, Subawu."

"Errr, it's not like I made him just spill stuff out about his wife like that…right?"

"—Now then, it would seem we are prepared to depart."

When Subaru timidly posed the question, Wilhelm pretended not to hear as he looked at the people standing by. Just as the Sword Devil had said, everyone was fully prepared for the next sortie.

That Wilhelm's expression was, in a good sense, without tension was the result of the consideration they all showed for him. In a rather banal sense, the large number of adults had bailed Subaru out.

"Man, I sure come off as young and foolish, don't I…?"

It was doubtless small of him to worry about looking that way in the eyes of adults. Even so, it wasn't in Subaru Natsuki not to dwell on it.

"Well, anyway, that's how it is, so…everyone, please and thank you for your cooperation so I can reunite with Emilia-tan on good terms."

"It is mildly deflating to think of that as our objective."

Subaru spoke flippantly to gloss over his blush, and Julius responded in kind. Instantly, the faces of all those lined up broke into broad smiles, and that served as their opportunity to head off.

—To annihilate what was left of the Witch Cult and claim victory with all members safe.

In that moment, Subaru believed without a doubt that they could pull it off.