19-2 The Spirit Forest Again

This time, I intended to bring the princesses along, and also bring confectionery artisans with me to reward the spirits for their efforts.

If I had ended up fighting Balan directly last time, I might have been taken down easily.

That guy was a super-special-class assassin.

In the end, I was an amateur at combat.

I was merely rampaging with brute force, so once again, I owed everything to the spirits.

Since I was only working hard in underhanded ways with hidden tricks and last resorts, I wanted to stay on good terms with the spirits from now on too.

At close range, the most I could manage would be mowing down goblins and the like.

S-rank adventurers were completely different from monsters.

They were too much even for adventurers who could easily defeat dragons.

That was why high-rank adventurer exams took the form of person-to-person combat.

And the members going to the Spirit Forest were the confectionery artisan Eri and her extras Paul and Mary, Fal and Remi, Yamamoto-san and Aoi-chan, Mari, and Ars.

This time, there was also the matter with Ars, and the princesses were coming too, so I had the other children from the Beast-Ear Garden refrain.

Remi came as a distinguished service award for saving me.

That made eleven people.

If that child had not been there, there was a high possibility I would have died just like that.

That curse had been intense.

I could not even send a single telepathic message.

It was no time to use God Discurse.

Even if I had used it, I was not confident it would have had any effect.

Today, I teleported directly from the Beast-Ear Garden to the royal palace with the bus.

They were waiting at the designated square in front of the royal palace.

There were the princesses, the duke’s daughter, His Highness Emilio, and their attendants.

Old man Ruba came as my tea-drinking-friend slot and royal caretaker.

With four royals, two guards for each of them, and three elves, there were thirty-one people in total.

This time, since there were royals, and girls at that, we went easily to the Spirit Forest by teleportation magic.

However, the children were very displeased with that.

They asked what the bus was for, then.

Good grief, everyone was so selfish.

Normally, royalty does not go on excursions by bus, you know.

I had asked the spirits to prepare another welcoming performance.

As usual, the all-star cast appeared and showed us a wild dance of spirits.

It was especially well received by the princesses, who were seeing it for the first time.

After that, the familiar spirit attraction was held too.

The attendants nervously watched the spirits carrying the princesses and racing around the sky.

The elves, who were a spirit race, also watched it with deep emotion.

Since they had played thoroughly right after arriving, we made it snack time before long.

Of course, I had also called Rain.

“Oh my, there are so many cute girls today.”

Rain was smiling too, and the princesses were excited by the adult Rainbow Fals they were seeing for the first time.

Rain spread her wings out with a soft flutter.

They were thin wings, almost like an insect’s, but they did not feel like chitin.

How should I put it? They were like the image of a heavenly robe.

They were light and fluffy like clouds, but their strength was probably terrifying.

I felt that just by looking at them.

They were probably strong enough to slice cleanly through the neck of a giant dragon.

Rain was currently about ten meters in size too, but perhaps it should be called a spirit-like body.

I felt that as long as her mana remained intact, she could change the size of her body.

Ah, come to think of it, Fals were beings that swelled.

At any rate, she was beautiful.

The surface of her body also had an indescribable visual effect.

Long ago, I had once seen a great formation of UFOs.

Their surfaces glittered in rainbow colors, and they had a texture clearly different from aircraft.

A jumbo jet that encountered them made a tremendous sudden turn to avoid them.

Watching from below, I thought airplanes could turn that sharply in midair.

It gave an impression almost like a proper canard-wing aircraft.

Rain had a vivid, living biological feeling that was different from that, but the fantastical feeling I sensed at the same time was indescribable.

In terms of having a texture different from ordinary things, she was already a UFO-level existence.

How should I put it? A transparent, fluffy, sparkling rainbow feeling?

It was a strange way to phrase it, but I could only express it that way.

Fal was perched neatly on Rain’s head, sitting there in her Rainbow Fals form.

Seeing that, the elves shed tears and knelt.

“I heard your story. Elves, I am sorry. My power was not enough. But my mother and I did all we could.”

“Not at all! Simply being able to meet you is enough. Such words are far too much for people like us. That you lived… that you survived is already enough.”

Rain narrowed her eyes as she looked at the elves, then sang that song.

A true blessing, incomparable to Fal’s clumsy version.

The elves opened their eyes wide and simply gazed at her figure.

Then Fal joined in over it.

As if learning the song from her mother.

Fal was better than usual today too.

This was an event that would later be called “the Duet of Sacred Elion.”

Humans and spirits alike trembled with emotion.

All the spirits manifested and danced wildly.

The song ended, and Rain looked happy with Fal still on her head.

“Kyuuiii—”

However, there was someone who ignored the mood and demanded snacks.

Then Yamamoto-san laughed and “brought out” sweets.

This was!

A whole surface of Japanese sweets, a whole surface of Japanese sweets, a whole surface of Japanese sweets…?

What a bizarre skill this was.

The entire area had become a sea of Japanese sweets.

“Yamamoto-san, what is this?”

“Yes, I have a special talent that lets me bring out as many Japanese sweets as I want, as long as they are sweets I can make myself.”

That… was not a special talent. It was a skill.

It seemed he was directly transforming mana particles into large quantities of sweets without going through mana.

Was something like that possible?

That was a trick even I could not do.

Was thinking nothing through really this powerful?

I was a stubborn and logic-heavy person, so I could only hold concepts like physical energy called mana and matter converting back and forth.

But in reality, did it differ depending on the concepts held by the person using magic or skills?

How should I put it? It was like the software itself was different.

The spirits bit into them without even saying “thank you for the food.”

Apparently, he could freely adjust the size of the sweets he brought out too.

And for now, it seemed to be a Japanese-sweets-only skill.

What a waste.

Depending on the settings, this could be an absurd cheat…

Depending on the case, might this be an ability that could even make the “creation of a world” possible?

That should be a power in the realm of God.

Even among Earth’s scientists, there were people who advocated such things if speaking only conceptually.

To Yamamoto-san, such matters were probably irrelevant, though.

Well, if the person himself looked that satisfied, then perhaps it was fine.