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“Hey everyone, good job out there!”

As everyone took a well deserved break, Kirisu Sakura approached them with a cheerful voice, after singing continuously for a long time to keep up Idol Order.

“Thanks, thou too didst render us great service. ’Twas only by thy aid that we were able to press through the battle.”
“Ahahah, everyone did their best.”

Her voice was a bit crackly after being on stage for so long. As Crim expressed her gratitude to her…someone else arrived.

“Everyone, thank you so much for your help… And that’s you Crim, isn’t it?”

He was clearly confused seeing Crim’s shrunken appearance, but did not linger on it as he thanked everyone there. That was Sven, the leader of the elven unit.

“Ohh Sven, I must ask, were there any casualties amongst the elves?”
“Thankfully no. The forest might have been ravaged, but my men were essentially untouched.”

Hearing the response from the elven prince let Crim breathe easy.
Meanwhile, there was someone who still looked worried, Lycoris, who hesitantly raised her hand.

“Umm, Sven, sir, is the Queen…”
“And let’s not forget about Lawran who also held up the barrier. That must not have been an easy task…”

After Lycoris mentioned that, Crim also chimed in, and Sven replied with a reassuring smile.

“They are fine, all thanks to you as well. But they’re considerably tired, so they went to rest. That’s why we haven’t heard from them again, rest easy.”
“I see…that’s good then.”

It seemed like there really were no casualties. The only exception were the players who had fallen in battle, but they would respawn soon enough, so there was no real loss there.

“Still…what a desolate sight, is there anything we can do?”

The northern area of Weisswald, which had been the main battlefield, no longer resembled a forest whatsoever, and it was hard to tell whether even grass would grow on that scorched soil.

At least the area directly around Floria still looked like a proper forest, but it would take decades before the rest started to look green again.

“There’s nothing much we could’ve done. We’ll just have to plant new seeds and wait…”
“Ah, in that case I might be of help. After all, this could be considered my fault.”

Suddenly a young girl’s voice interrupted their conversation.
It was the main villain of the entire affair, Ba‘al Zəbûl Aery.

“Help? How so?”
“Did you forget already? I’m the Lord of the High Place. Just watch, you’ll soon see.”

Saying that, Aery joined her hands in prayer and looked up to the sky.
Some moments later…a drop fell on Crim’s cheek.

“…Hmm, is this rain?”

It seemed like it started raining, but it was not cold, it was pleasantly warm. In a way, it could be perfectly described as a blessed rain to wash away their exhaustion.

“Crim, look here…”
“Is that…grass growing?”

Hearing Freya, Crim looked around the burnt down forest in shock.
As the raindrops were absorbed into the ground, small green sprouts began to appear, soon covering the entire ground.

“…And that should be good enough I guess?”

She stopped praying, and the rain let up as well… By then, the surroundings were a lush green, with various tree saplings growing, but it was still not quite a forest.

“…Oh right, Ba‘al Zəbûl was originally the fertility god of storms and rain, and one of the major deities too.”
“And since Qliph2i is dormant, she’s regained her powers from before she became a devil. That’s quite impressive.”

Frey and Crim recalled the original stories of Beelzebub, on which Aery was based. In response, Suzaku just shook his head in disbelief as he muttered, “You’re always talking about the most random things…” and everyone else nodded in agreement with him.

Only Aery had her chest puffed up, despite her deadpan, and everyone had no choice but to applaud what she had done.

“Well… Anyway, this takes care of things here. Once things settle down a bit, I’m sure my sister will want to do this herself, but allow me to say this… Thank you so much for everything.”

As Sven bowed to them, it finally hit home that they were done, so everyone became more relaxed.
Crim’s group would also love to just lay down and sleep their exhaustion away, but they still had work to do.

They had been forced to take a considerable detour…but their way forward was finally cleared away, so they could move forward to check the state of the Fairy Village.

“Alright, we’ve solved the issues here, so we should have access to the next area…”

Crim said that as she hopped onto her stubby feet when…

*”…Crim, can you hear me? Things are getting ugly here.”*
“Hm… Ryunosuke? What happened?”

All of a sudden, a call came from Ryunosuke.
His voice rang like he was under a lot of pressure, showing that something had gone awry. Everyone turned to look at Crim as she urged him to continue.

*”…The guilds controlling the areas around Wyndham have joined forces with a bunch of players that transferred from the second server, and they’ve established a Union. Apparently they’re planning on declaring war against our United Kingdoms.”*

No one there had been expecting those news, so things became tense again once they heard Ryunosuke’s report…