The knights gathered around the Nun. When they saw the catgirl’s eyelids twitch, the clouds of worry in their hearts began to clear.

“Thank you, Lady Meda, God of Redemption and Hymns, for pulling this Nun back from the shadow of misfortune.”

“Nun, how are you feeling?”

The cat-eared Nun felt weak all over, and her stomach growled. With the female knight’s help, she slowly sat up. Memories of the mine flashed through her mind, and she hurriedly said:

“Lady Kashalia is in danger! She...!”

Kashalia came over from beside the door with a bitter smile and reassured her:

“It’s all right now. Don’t worry about me. How are you feeling? Is anything bothering you?”

“I think I’m fine. I feel great. But my wounds... Why are they all gone?” The Nun stared at herself in amazement. Those wounds hadn’t even responded to specialized healing magic. Had she been unconscious for so long that they’d healed on their own?

The other knights explained what had happened. Then Deputy Captain Eva asked Kashalia:

“Lady Kashalia, how on earth did this happen? Does that coffin shop really have such an incredible alchemist?”

She’d seen Kashalia carry the Nun out with her own eyes. And how long had it been? The Church had alchemists too, but when a case could only be handled by one, the whole process—diagnosis, preparing the medicine, everything—took a long time. If the patient couldn’t hold on until the medicine was ready, then it was all for nothing.

So when Eva saw Kashalia return with the Nun after such a short time, she’d thought the Nun was beyond saving. The captain had just gone to reserve a coffin for her...

And now she was completely healed?! It felt a little like she was cursing her teammate, but Eva just couldn’t make sense of it!

Kashalia fell silent for a moment. Remembering the embarrassing scene she’d just made, she put on a serious expression and said:

“The alchemist inside really does live up to the innkeeper’s praise and recommendation. He’s very capable. As for the medicine, he must have gone deep into the mining district and studied the conditions firsthand before trying to make it. It was an experimental potion, and the Nun was lucky enough to benefit from it.”

“I see. That explains it. Then let’s go thank him now.” Eva was straightforward, and though she had a bit of a temper, she never skimped on praise when someone deserved thanks.

Kashalia quickly stopped Eva. She didn’t want Eva’s recklessness to anger that brat and make him spill everything that had happened in the coffin shop earlier. That would be a disaster!

“Let’s not. It’s already very late, so the people at the coffin shop must be resting. If we go over now, we’ll ruin our heartfelt thanks by disturbing them.”

The deputy captain thought that made sense. She usually didn’t think things through that much, but if Captain Kashalia said so, they could go thank him tomorrow instead.

“There’s one more thing, Captain. If nothing goes wrong, reinforcements should arrive here tomorrow afternoon or the morning after. They’ll be led by the child of the red-robed cardinal from the Diocese of Redemption.” Eva quickly hid the flash of displeasure that crossed her face, then continued, “We’ll probably reorganize the team and head back into the mine soon after they arrive. Your weapon won’t be repaired that quickly, so it’d be better to find some time tomorrow to buy a temporary replacement.”

For all her fiery temper, Eva was very meticulous when it came to handling business. Kashalia remembered something Eva had done once. Before an exam, Eva had downed two bottles of vodka to work up her courage. Fired up and ready for anything, she’d marched into the exam room and loudly cursed the teacher for setting such unfair questions. Her curses had echoed through the whole room, but she’d still answered every question carefully—and earned a top score.

“Maybe I won’t need to buy a replacement after all. My greatsword, *Evil’s Bane*, has already been repaired,” Kashalia said.

“Oh, that’s great news... Hm?” Eva suddenly sensed something was off. “Wait, it’s repaired? You mean the spirit runes have been fixed???”

Yes, yes, that’s exactly the look of shock I wanted. Getting the spirit runes fixed this quickly really is strange! Clearly, I’m not just making a fuss over nothing.

Kashalia took out her sword for Eva to inspect. Eva had one of her own, though its spirit runes weren’t particularly effective. She glanced at the runic inscription on the blade and noticed something seemed different.

“Did he change your spirit runes?!”

“Yeah. And they’re stronger now.”

*

The next morning, a crowd had gathered outside the House of Ten Thousand Departures. Most were blacksmiths from town and onlookers who’d come to see what was going on. The most striking among them were the female knights in their holy-looking light armor.

Fenmu was woken by the commotion outside. He reached out beside him, but when his hand found no sign of his master, he froze. Then he remembered Anastasia had left for a while, and his spirits sank.

Back when he was carrying corpses, he’d slept with his arms around Anastasia every night. At first he’d been a little embarrassed, but eventually he’d gotten used to it and simply followed his heart. After he sent her off with a water burial, he’d suffered from insomnia for over a month, unable to sleep at night.

He got up, got dressed, and drank some cooled boiled water to clear his head. Then he opened the door to see what was going on. But the moment he spotted a few sneering faces, Fenmu’s mood sank even further.

“What’s going on? Did something happen to your family last night? Is that why you’re all rushing over to buy coffins first thing in the morning?” he said with a scowl.

He wasn’t usually this unpleasant. It was mostly the grumpiness of being woken up, on top of not seeing his master... Ahem. Anyway, he was in a terrible mood!

But the blacksmiths standing around the coffin shop didn’t argue back. They simply assumed Fenmu was mouthing off because he knew he couldn’t repair the spirit runes. His pathetic, impotent rage didn’t annoy them at all. If anything, it filled them with satisfaction and delight, as if their whole day had brightened in that instant.

“Just wait. You’re about to embarrass yourself.”

“You said it. Go on, show us how ridiculous you can be. You really don’t know your place, taking on spirit-rune work like that.”

“Let’s see how you deliver the finished job.”

“Taking on a job and failing to finish it—you’re ruining our town’s reputation! People might start looking down on our town’s smithing work because of you! Oh, Goddess! I work so hard and do my job properly. Why should I have to suffer because of someone else’s ignorance?”

Fenmu ignored them. Curious, he looked at Kashalia and her fellow knights standing by the door and asked, “Didn’t I already return your sword? What are you back for? Just so we’re clear, I’m not doing business today. The weather’s bad, and so’s my mood.”

“It’s not bad at all,” Eva said, glancing up at the bright sunshine. “I prefer blizzards.”

Kashalia cleared her throat and brought the catgirl Nun forward. Then they bowed and said, “We came to thank you—for saving the Nun’s life and repairing the weapon passed down through my family.”

The female knight’s pleasant voice rang out clearly. She’d even raised it on purpose, and the blacksmiths waiting nearby to watch the show were dumbfounded. This wasn’t how things were supposed to go!

The lean blacksmith Beck stepped forward, risking the offense of interrupting the knights’ conversation, and asked in disbelief, “Radiant Knight, what did you mean by that just now?”