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When the Carbuncle arrived at the pioneer village, Maria was at the church healing injured people.

It was forenoon, thirty minutes after Lyell encountered the Devils, when villagers carrying the Carbuncle barged inside.

“Lady Maria! Where is Lady Maria?!”

Hearing the desperate yell, Maria stopped healing and headed to the church’s entrance.

“What’s the matter? Is anyone hurt?”

The ones who had rushed there were a few villagers and Troy. And he held the Carbuncle in his hands.

Seeing their state, Maria realized the gravity of the situation and decided to hear them on the spot.

“Devils holding two swords appeared… Lord Lyell remained behind to let us escape…”
“Lyell… That idiot!”

Maria grit her teeth and cursed with an unusually grim expression.

The men backed away at her unusual behavior, but Troy continued to speak.

“Lord Lyell’s behavior suggested it would be a hard fight. Lady Maria, please go save him!”
“Yes, I know. You went to the northern mountain for herb collection, right?”
“Yes, it was around sixty percent up on the hillside. In the middle of a mountain road there.”
“It’s not too far away from the usual harvesting route. Okay, you go and tell Cortina.”
“Y-Yes!”

The moment she gave instructions to the men, Maria immediately proceeded to construct the teleportation magic circle.

Normally it would’ve been better to join up with Cortina first, but this was a race against time, so she decided to go on ahead alone.

With Maria’s support and Lyell’s attack power, most enemies could be handled without problems.

Physical type enemies in particular could be handled with ease.

The magic circle activated, and the surroundings got dyed by the magic light.

Teleportation magic could only reach places where one had already been to, but Maria had been to the area to collect herbs before, so it wasn’t a problem now.

Being the head healer of the village, she had frequently gone to collect herbs there. It wasn’t difficult to set the destination.

Her vision warped, and the next moment she teleported to the mountain road she was familiar with.

Normally, birds and bugs could be heard chirping and buzzing, but everything was silent now, except the violent sounds of sword clashes.

“Lyell!”

The sounds were spreading all around, but she still understood the rough location. It was coming from slightly above where she was.

Jones and Zell should’ve also been nearby here, but she decided to put that off for now. If Lyell got defeated, there would be no one else who could take on the Twin-bladed Devils. And above all, he was someone dear to Maria.

She kicked up the hem of her habit and ran to the source of the sound.

After going around several boulders and following the mountain road up, she arrived at the scene where Lyell was facing off against two Devils.

He had already lost a lot of blood, but he still stood strong and continued swinging his sword.

However, two of his fingers holding that sword were already broken, so he had to support it with both hands to hold it in place.

His left shoulder had also been cut, and the blood flowing from the wound reached the hilt of the blade from where it had ticked down to form a puddle.

Even his back had traces of clashes, some of them being so deep it was a surprise he was still alive.

“Is that you Maria?!”

Realizing the person behind was Maria, a smile full of hope appeared on Lyell’s face.

And it was warranted—his shoulder and back wounds disappeared instantly, and his broken finger bones also relocated themselves, making it possible to hold the sword with one hand again.

“Sorry, you saved me!”
“Just focus on what’s ahead!”

Now that he could hold the sword with one hand, Lyell used the empty hand to pull out the scabbard and held it as if it was another blade.

Lyell’s evasion ability wasn’t as good as Reid’s so he couldn’t keep on avoiding the attacks.

Instead, his style was to hold the front line with his inexhaustible stamina.

But keeping that up against the attack power of these Devils was hard.

He managed to defeat them in Berith with minimal damage thanks to Reid’s support.

“They really are strong foes. Be careful, Maria.”
“Don’t worry. They are more suited for me, in fact.”

The Devil attacking Lyell stopped attacking once Lyell used his iron-made scabbard as a shield.

Seeing that, the other Devil went around him and tried to head for Maria.

“Holy Jail.”

But then, Maria used the strongest defensive spell in her arsenal.

It was a barrier magic that could block all physical and magical attacks. However, it consumed a lot of magic power, so it couldn’t be used frequently.

Moreover, Maria couldn’t move at all while it was active.

But with this, Lyell could now fully focus on the remaining Devil.

He was using the iron scabbard as a shield to block, repel and push back the Devil.

“Finish it up fast. I can’t hold it for too long.”
“Got it. Sorry, Devil, looks like I can’t play with you any longer!”

The Devil swung down its sword as if responding to his words. But it was easily repelled by Lyell’s single attack.

Had Reid witnessed it, his inferiority complex would’ve been stimulated.

That was just how heavy the Devil’s attack was, and how abnormal Lyell was for repelling it.

Having repelled the attack in the opposite direction, the Devil ended up bending backward. Lyell, on the other hand, had swung his sword upward, so he was in a posture to swing it back down.

“Yaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh!!”

Along with that shout, he swung it down. His attack slammed into the Devil’s chest and continued to cleave downward starting from its solar plexus.

Even a Devil couldn’t survive having its stomach bisected.

It fell to its knee, but it still raised its arm, determined to counterattack.

Lyell, however, did not allow that and slammed the scabbard into its face.

The Devil’s goat face deformed after tasting the blow of the scabbard that Lyell used like an iron club.

The Devil did a spin and fell to the ground, this time to never rise back up again.

“Phew…”

Lyell heaved a sigh and wiped the sweat off his forehead.

“Sorry, but if you’re done there, hurry up here.”
“Ah, okay okay.”
“No need to say twice.”
“Okay. Haven’t you become stricter since Fina was born?”

Lyell raised his sword again as he spoke. At the same time, Maria’s Holy Jail was dispelled.

Finally free, the Devil raised an angry yell and tried to rush at Maria, but Lyell stood to block its way.

He was now back to full health, with Maria supporting him on top.

With two of them together, a single Devil was no opponent.

Thus, it wouldn’t take long for the remaining Devil to draw its last breath.

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