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Author’s note: Please note, we’ll be rewinding time a bit.

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As it turned into late-night, Maria, Lyell, and Cortina returned.

They did not look tense, so their questioning probably ended smoothly.

I had heard from Cloud that they caught one of the culprits, which is why I realized that, but normally I would’ve only thought they just returned in a good mood.

Maria only told me that they got the information out of them, and then asked me to sleep early.

“Nicole, you should sleep early today. You should be tired after heading out when your injury has only just healed, right?”
“But I still managed to save the Pope by doing it.”
“Harming her in this city would have been pointless anyway.”
“Huh?”

Maria seemed to be unconcerned no matter what happened to her, making me tilt my head in doubt. Seeing that, she responded with an impish smile.

“You know that the World Tree Religion bans Resurrection, yes?”
“Yeah.”
“Then, the only way to find out whether that spell can actually resurrect someone would be to confirm it yourself, right? In other words, the World Tree Religion knows the spell. And they can use it as long as they have people to cast it.”

According to her, you could cast the resurrection magic by overlapping four types of spells.

One to bring back the soul, one to regenerate the flesh, one to fix the recalled soul to the body, and one to restart their life functions.

But it was not that hard to gather four people to cast them at the same time. Naturally, you needed first-class magicians, and they had to match their timings exactly, so it still remained an extremely difficult spell, but Ashella should be able to cast it herself. And other than her, there were apparently practitioners who could cast it with four people…

“So you’re saying that she could be revived even if killed? The World Tree Religion’s Pope?”
“Everyone has double standards for everything. They did not cooperate during Reid’s time at all, though.”

Maria said with a pout, but there was a clear reason back then.

The northern village was too far from Berith. By the time I was transported to this city, my soul would probably already be absorbed by the World Tree.

If my corpse was preserved, maybe it could just have barely been avoided, but the next problem was Reid’s race and occupation. He was a half-demon. He was an assassin, and even various important people feared him. There were probably few who’d willingly allow the resurrection of someone like that.

Naturally, Ashella herself would have cooperated, but the authorities around her probably would not have let her revive a half-demon and an assassin like Reid. Because of that, Maria had completely cut her ties with this city.

“Also I already defeated Kufar, so you can feel at ease on that front too.”
“Huh, you, Cortina?”
“Yes, this girl took the best part for herself while keeping it a secret from me!”

According to Maria, Cortina had read Kufar’s movements, but only let Lyell and others know about his followers’ locations. Then she went and borrowed the magic corps of the chivalric order and ambushed Kufar.

Apparently, there were many ways to deal with him as long as she knew in advance that he was a Slime and could control his body separated from his core.

“I was planning to take him down myself… I’m left in imperfect combustion.”
“Dad, that was a weird way of putting it.”
“That’s just how pent-up I feel.”
“More importantly, sleep early today, Nicole. Even though that person has healed you, you still must be feeling the fatigue, right?”

I pretended to obediently nod at her request and headed to my room.

But I could not just do as she asked me to. I made a big debt towards the God of Destruction and her party this time around. I had to at least say a word of thanks.

Deciding to slip out of the room, I put a hand on the door. But that’s where I stopped moving. Because I sensed someone in the room. There was no hostility. They should have noticed me but showed no signs of reacting.

Still, I didn’t ease my vigilance and slightly loosened the sword from the scabbard on my waist. I remained ready to react at any time, and slowly opened the door. The one inside turned out to be…

“Oh, it’s you Baa?”
“I really hate that nickname though…”
“Weren’t you the one who named yourself as such?”
“I mean that couldn’t be helped—Wait, not that. I came here to give you some information.”
“Information?”

I should have heard everything I needed to know from Maria and others. I couldn’t help but feel sorry for that Scudo guy who still held on to his sanity.

Maria was cold-hearted when it counted.

Anyway, setting that aside, did he have some information that Maria failed to obtain?

“Yeah. About Kufar… He’s still alive.”
“What did you say?!”

Cortina lacked when it came to fighting strength, but she made up for her cleverness when it came to seeing the battle situation. I couldn’t believe that she would overlook the enemy.

No, maybe Kufar had some other means at his disposal.

“It seems that he hid his core inside his luggage and escaped the predicament. I have to admit, that’s quite a clever Slime.”
“Just his core? I see, he could control the rest of his body as long as his core remained intact…”
“Yes. He put a dummy core inside his body and manipulated it from the outside.”
“To think he’d deceive Cortina.”
“She met this kind of enemy for the first time, right? So I think that was unavoidable. So, what will you do?”
“What?”
“He’s still alive and in this city. But if you leave him be, he will escape.”

So he’s asking me to choose between chasing him and putting him down and overlooking, huh?

Hearing all that, the option to overlook him did not exist for me. Or well, I had the option to tell Lyell and others and leave it to them but…

“…That wouldn’t be so fun.”

I got duped by him. He even deceived Cortina.

This was the first time someone has played me for a fool to this extent. I did not feel like I would be able to leave repaying that to someone else.

“Still, Maria is worried about me quite a bit. She might come to check on me.”
“You can leave that part to that one.”

Baa moved his gaze to the side with those words. At the end of his gaze was a white girl.

“God of Destruction… no, not her, huh?”
“Right. She’s both my and her dependent. You should have met her too, right?”
“Have I?”

My only god acquaintances were Whitey and Hastur, and this guy… No, wait.

“Could it be Kabby?!”
“No, Demonic Dragon Fafnir! You should have met her at the hot spring town.”
“Oh, that huge…back one?”
“Polymorph can do whatever one wants about the size. You should know about it too. When she takes on a human form, she often imitates her master.”
“So you mean, her official master is Whitey?”
“Yes. I’ll have her act as your body double. It shouldn’t get found out during sleep.”

If she crawled under the blanket and pretended to sleep, even Maria should be unable to see through it with just that.

“Sorry, but can I leave it for you?”

I asked the girl, and she nodded back and her form blurred. And the next instant, she transformed into my spitting image.

Without saying a word, she slipped inside the bed, and started to raise the sleeping breaths… or pretended to.

“Well then, let’s go. We can’t leave him alone for too long.”
“Yeah. And I need to make some preparations too.”

He was someone that cornered me once. It would be unsatisfactory to simply defeat him. I had to properly pay him back here.

Deciding that, Baa and I vanished from the room.

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