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“I thought you were surprisingly dexterous…”

Number Six-san murmured that while looking at the small light glowing at the tip of my index finger.

After some time had passed, she came again, and when I asked her to teach me a light spell, she accepted just as easily as expected.

The learning process was: first she demonstrated creating a light sphere on her fingertip, then gave a simple explanation, and finally I attempted it while she held my finger.

The result succeeded on the third try.

Her hand had already left my finger, yet the light floating at the tip maintained its shape and drifted gently.

“You might actually have aptitude.”

Number Six-san smiled as she said that.

She truly was beautiful.

I almost blanked out, captivated by the smile.

To hide it, I pulled out a notepad and pen from my backpack and wrote, “The result of daily training.”

“Yes. Still, I never imagined you would be able to do this much.”

She praised me sincerely, saying it was amazing.

Being praised directly was somehow embarrassing.

Perhaps because my mother and older sister had strict personalities, I had surprisingly few memories of being praised.

And since my family had been too outstanding, in an environment where I was always compared, objectively there had never been anything worth praising.

I had wished at least for one thing to match them, yet that effort had never borne fruit.

I admired myself for not turning delinquent.

Not because I knew I would be subdued by violence if I did.

In any case, since my steady effort had borne fruit and I learned a new spell so easily, it was natural to think:

“Maybe I can get one more?” While maintaining the light sphere at my fingertip, I began calculating debts and favors.

But fundamentally, who would approve of a person of status giving power to someone like me, who from an outsider’s view was nothing but a threat?

As I thought about that, the light went out.

Perhaps because it was a spell I had just begun using, maintaining it while thinking about something else was premature.

“You still need a little more practice.”

Number Six-san laughed as she said that.

After some trivial exchanges, she returned to the mansion.

As for the information I had heard last night about jointly subjugating me with the Kingdom of Canaan, apparently it would be formally rejected at a gathering of the elves’ parliamentary body called the Council of Sages.

The value of this information was unexpectedly large, bringing the balance of debts and favors closer to even again.

In short, learning another spell would be for next time.

I would save it as future enjoyment.

After that, nothing special happened, and before noon I decided to leave the village.

Staying long seemed problematic: the number of people watching me kept increasing over time, and the gazes from everyone except Number Six-san were extremely uncomfortable.

Incidentally, Dame Oppai, who had become a member of the Forshna clan, was apparently in training to become a proper elf, so she would not be allowed to meet me yet.

I had wanted to enjoy those breasts again after a while, but they seemed wary I would revert her if we met—on what basis exactly?

Anyway, after saying farewell to Number Six-san who came to see me off, I crossed the river and moved leisurely through the forest.

All because I now knew the elves as a whole were not heading toward subjugating me and had no intention of joining a joint operation with the Kingdom of Canaan.

I could honestly rejoice that one troublesome issue had been crushed before being born.

I could go straight back to my base… but since I had come this far, I would also stop by the old base.

The reason was that things I could not carry had likely remained almost as they were, so if anything useful remained I could take it back.

Thus, following the path created by my many comings and goings—my own trail rather than a beast path—I arrived at the above-ground portion of the collapsed research facility.

Beyond what deserved to be called a mountain of rubble lay a pile of filthy bedding that was probably unusable.

‘This is definitely unusable.’

I searched for anything else but, as expected, found nothing usable.

However, one point caught my attention.

I approached the spot and sniffed.

‘…I came closer because there seemed to be bloodstains, but this was unexpected.’

There was no doubt it was blood.

Dry, but not very old.

I could not know whose blood it was, but I found something else.

‘The same smell as the elf village. Someone has been here. And trying to do something with this rubble?’

Was I detecting what had adhered then?

In any case, there was no doubt someone was doing something here.

I sensed no presence nearby.

No trace of someone currently there.

“I don’t get it…”

There was too little information to determine anything.

Was this something I could ignore?

After standing still and thinking for a while, I changed my plans.

“Alright, let’s go to the shopping mall.”