Among the information Mimir had brought back, there was reportedly one Elven woman allowed entry into the Sanctuary. Earl Hordia’s persistence was considerable as he had tied that Elf to Sophia. He immediately dispatched a scouting party comprising of 20 subordinates.
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「Haa, I’m an Alchemist and Blacksmith though.」
Diligently working on the waterway and moat of the Sanctuary, it felt like I changed job to construction worker.
「What’s wrong? Alchemists and construction worker are no different.」
「It’s easy to live in the Sanctuary because of Takumi-chan, so keep at it.」
Undine and Dryas worked me hard. Sylph selfishly made Lulu-chan her playmate, and Gnome makes Marne massage his shoulders. Salamander confined Laeva to the Smithing Workshop. I’m sorry for Sophia and Maria, but they had to take care of the Spirit Tree. The question “Does the Spirit Tree need assistance?” still stands though.
Akane is taking lessons on sewing from Kaede. This place is rich in plant based materials, and combining that with Kaede’s threads, they weaved and dyed various textures of cloth.
「Don’t say you’re worn out. It’s thanks to Takumi that the Sanctuary has extended considerably.」
「About that, it’s good that the land has spread out, but will the barrier be alright?」
The remark Undine made about the widening of the Sanctuary made me question if the barrier would be alright. As to why, the size of the barrier I put up with magic devices at the start and the current size of the Sanctuary is over 4 times larger than before.
「It’s alright, even though we may appear this way, we are the Great Spirits.」
「She’s right, Takumi-chan. If the Spirit Tree grows to the same level of the World Tree, it would be easy to cover a country of that size with a barrier~」
Undine and Dryas laughed away my worries. It’s good if it’ll be alright, but that and me working hard every day on civil engineering work are unrelated.
These days, we’ve been living 50-50 in our house in Volton and our house here.
「Takumi, you are the apostle of Norn-sama, aren’t you? We are similar to Norn-sama’s subordinates so aren’t we comrades? I think cooperating is only natural though.」
「Eh! I am Norn-sama’s apostle?! Sure I’ve received various good things to the point that it’s overprotective but………… ah, crap!」
Saying that much, starting from Sophia and Maria, everyone aside from Kaede and Titan looked at me with surprised expressions.
「Oh, was everyone unaware? Someone like Takumi who’s reached the strongest class while saying he’s an artisan couldn’t be normal. He has the strong divine protection of Norn-sama.」
Undine said so, but everyone’s train of thoughts were shorting out from too much shock.
「Haa, this chance is just right, so I’ll explain my circumstances to everyone.」
I talked about reincarnating when we were protecting Akane, but I had shared my life story with Sophia and the girls obliquely. It seems they had a hard time believing it.
Well, the Great Spirits’ words have more credibility than my words.
Even then, I don’t know if I’m an apostle or not, but I knew I was not normal.
Sophia and Maria seemed to have always thought it was strange that their growth capabilities were abnormally high. They had taken it as the divine protection of Goddess Norn I had extends to even my companions.
「I know that Takumi had to reincarnate because of us, but I couldn’t have imagined that Norn-sama’s divine protection would affect us that strongly.」
「I apologize to Takumi-sama, however, about the absurd magic formula for the Hero Summoning Magic, it is thanks to that that we are where we are now, so for that matter alone, I am thankful to Sydnia.」
「That’s really true. Had Takumi-sama not bought both Sophia-san and I, I don’t know what would have happened to us.」
Sophia and Maria were thankful to Norn-sama for reincarnating me at that time. If the timing had been off by a couple of years, both Sophia and Maria likely wouldn’t have become companions.
「It seems that girl has come back to that place again. What will we do?」
Undine informed us that the Elf Princess-sama she that had been invited inside the barrier the other day had come again. Since there would be no harm if it’s just her, I’ll requested that she be let in.
「Wouldn’t it be alright if we let her pass?」
「Very well. She has escort knights too, though we will only let the girl pass.」
We had arranged tables and chairs in our mansion’s garden, and there, we drank tea while waiting.
About Undine and Great Spirits, they can eat and drink even though they’re Spirits. It had been a long time since they last manifested, so they seem to look forward to the food.
A short while after Undine said that, and the girl we met a few days ago came.
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Mimir immediately understood that she was being beckoned over to the Spirit Tree of the Sanctuary. The escorts were obstructed by the barrier, unable to advance, and only she could walk forward.
The scenery changed completely when she passed through the barrier.
From outside the barrier, only a dreary scenery where not even a blade of grass could grow could be seen. The moment she entered the barrier, the large Spirit Tree had leapt into her view. There was a spring filled with clear water, a carpet of greenery blooming with various flowers, and a thicket with all sorts of vegetation behind the spring.
On the table and chairs in the garden of the stone house creeping with green ivy, she was able to confirm that the Great Spirits and a human young man were drinking tea.
Mimir gulped in tension, and resolved herself to walk.
At that time, in a place far from Mimir’s escort knights, there was a group attempting to invade the Sanctuary.
「Tch, the Spirits are useless.」
「The visible scenery is probably an illusion, but can this strong, complex barrier be destroyed?」
Hiding their faces using masks and uniformly wearing black clothes, the group was the clandestine task force of Earl Hordia, instructed to abduct Sophia through sheer strength.
When the unit does work behind the scenes, it seems they understand that Earl Hordia house is up to no good, but no one could complain about the rough use of force with Earl Hordia’s bribe this time.
「Everyone launch attack magic!」
At the male leader’s command, various attack magic were fired at the barrier.
There were only Elves with high aptitude with magic, and a multitude of fairly high-powered magic had hit the barrier, but all of it had disappeared before the barrier.
「Tch, Spirit Magic won’t activate!」
The impatient ruffians were a unit that had performed plenty of Earl Hordia’s dirty jobs, but as one would expect, they were unable to do anything against the barrier formed by the Great Spirits no matter how much time had passed.
Immediately afterwards, a phenomenon occurred where the people of Earl Hordia’s household had all lost the use of Spirit Magic. Flustered by the losing their hearing for the spirits’ voices, the people had begged Earl Hordia in tears, but Earl Hordia himself had long since not cared even if he couldn’t hear the Spirits’ voice, and had responded with “What of it?”.
Having lost the ability to hear voice of the Spirits, Earl Hordia would be ridiculed as an Orc hiding in the skin of an Elf.
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