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As we regrouped with the rest of the students while getting scolded by Cortina, we surprisingly managed to rejoin their ranks without anyone making a fuss. Perhaps Cortina intentionally scolded us in the open to stop other teachers from butting in.

There was no teacher with a skin so tough that they’d start scolding students that Cortina, one of the Six Heroes, had already let go of.

The students were gathered near the teleport location, along with some ordinary people. With the Mountain Serpent as the threat, there were few places that would be considered completely safe. Hence these people chose to evacuate to where the chivalric order of Raum would arrive at.

A few dozen villagers from around these parts, and students of Magic and Adventurer’s academies, around 300 in total. This place was quite open, but with that many people gathered there it still gave off a cramped, oppressive feeling.

As the three of us joined the stand by, Priscila approached me. Apparently, Cortina asked her to check in on us.

“So, how did it go?”
“Meaning?”
“The Mountain Serpent! You took advantage of Ms. Cortina’s strategy and went to subjugate it, right? It must’ve been a tough foe to beat even for you, Lady Nicole.”
“Yeahhh…”

It would’ve probably been tough for me alone. But this time, I had huge firepower by the name of Michelle with me. We even had support personnel, Letina and Kabby. With Cortina’s plan on the table, there was no way we’d have failed.

“Well, we defeated it I guess?”
“Figured. This time, even you woul-… Huuuuhhh!?”
“It’s dead.”

Seemed like she misheard it so I said it once more. She was leaning back with an astonished face, as if she was looking at something unbelievable.

“Um, you’re joking, right? Three ten year old kids defeating a Mountain Serpent is just…”
“Not just three, we had Kabby with us too.”
“I mean, adding a Carbuncle doesn’t make much difference…”

I then went on to explain my strategy to Priscilla. And also the result. Hearing it, her face turned pale.

“It’s almost impossible to escape from a Mountain Serpent… Please don’t be so reckless. If something happened to you, Lord Elliot would yell at me.”
“I’m confident in my mobility. If it’s in the forest, I won’t lose.”

In fact, the forest that had many places to grab onto with my threads was environmentally similar to that lumberyard in the capital. I was used to moving around at high speeds in these kinds of places.

I rushed into the valley and we immediately went on to contain it there. However, I had plenty of ways to get away from it if the situation required it.

“Moreover, how could a child fire off the Firebolt strong enough to collapse a cliff…”
“Letina is the daughter of the marquis, so she’s receiving special education. Besides, that cliff was weathered and was quite easy to collapse. Didn’t it suffer from a serious attack in the past?”
“I have heard some idle gossips about a Giant Zombie appearing here some hundreds of years ago, but that’s it?”
“That… Might’ve actually happened.”

After all, even Letina shouldn’t have been able to collapse a cliff with one shot. It was possible that it had previously been damaged by something. The story about the Hero that cleared out this land might actually be true. In that sense, luck was on our side this time.

“Moreover, even if that attack landed, how could it finish off a Mountain Serpent…”
“Michelle had a Mythical longbow, and the skill to make full use of it. You’ve heard of it, right?”
“Well, yes… It was only at the level of a brilliant hunter being born in the Hero’s village.”
“That’s her. As for how strong she is… Well, how about you go and confirm the corpse?”

The corpse of the Mountain Serpent with the pulverized head should’ve still been below that cliff. It could yield a lot of meat, so there was no need to worry about food for a good while.

Moreover, its tough skin and strong bones were also remaining, so selling all those would fetch a huge sum. It should be quite a delicious casual income from the Kevin domain. After all, there was no significant damage this time.

“It’s below the cliff, right? I’ll go once I get Lady Cortina’s permission.”

Cortina was letting her move surprisingly freely. It was proof of the Raglan family’s intentions regarding her.

Besides, she had enough physical ability to match me. The strengthened me, to be accurate.

She quickly went to discuss it with Cortina and Elliot, and then left the evacuation place. We planned to move a bit farther from the villages to not get in the way of the arriving troops, but hearing Priscilla’s report, they decided to stand by for the time being.

Cortina and Elliot did it so Priscilla could join up with us on her way back.

“Nicole, I heard you defeated the Mountain Serpent. Is it true?”
“Yeah, Michelle did.”

Elliot came to ask that while looking to be at his wit’s end. I answered him plainly, but hearing it perplexed him even more.

“Good grief… You kids are something else.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Oh, beautiful princess, how I wish to keep you away from the filth of the royal court, but…”

His following words weren’t pleasant news for me at all.

It seemed that news about Michelle reached the royal court of the United Alliance. There were naturally people trying to usher her into the ranks of the army, but some of them wanted to put her in the elite bodyguards of Elliot himself.

Lyell’s authority managed to suppress all of that.

Since she was close to me, she was reported to the royal court as my bodyguard, and it managed to win her some freedom. In other words, she belonged to me, so trying to put their hands on her meant going against Lyell’s will.

They couldn’t afford to take that risk, so her freedom was safe until now. However, she managed to defeat a Mountain Serpent now. As a mere ten-year-old kid.

Of course, that achievement was based on various factors like Cortina’s plan, but it was still something that couldn’t be overlooked. Elliot explained as such.

“Well… that doesn’t make me happy.”
“I have no intention to pull your friend away from you, but…”
“Right. The achievement this time is too big… Sorry, Nicole, but can you give it up this time?”
“Give it up?”

Cortina arrived at that conclusion after some thought. She had a rarely-seen serious expression on her face.

“Yes. At this rate, there’s a chance that Michelle would get rolled up in a power struggle. So how about we pass it off as Priscilla’s achievement that she achieved through my directions?”
“Hmm…?”

If we did that, no one would know about her deed and everything would go as it has until now. That would instead put Cortina and Priscilla at the center of attention, but one of them was a Hero and another a secret agent. There was hardly anything they could do to them.

I didn’t want to stand out from the start, so I agreed to that suggestion. Later, I had to tell Michelle and Letina to hold their tongue about this matter.