Volume 4 Chapter 13.2

Volume 4 Chapter 13.2

Editor: Weasalopes

The area around them entirely cleansed, Hiroshi’s group realized they needed to keep their voices going a bit longer. First, in order to approach the temple, they ensured everything was back to normal.

Although the miasma was now gone without a trace, there was probably someone sending a stream of miasma in to cause such a shift, so they couldn’t move carelessly. As per usual, Mio checked the situation.

「……Not really any problems」

「……Wonder what’s up. Nearly all the miasma’s gone, ‘n we established there ain’t any traps, so why do I feel uneasy about this?」

Hiroshi actually increased caution when he heard Mio. He just didn’t like this. There was no way the situation would just end like this without repercussions. It was beyond weird.

「……Mio, any enemies within range？」

「I do sense something living」

「Are they watching us？」

「……Can’t really say」

Mio answered without changing her expressions at Hiroshi’s volley of questions. Sure, several gazes were aimed at their group, but it didn’t feel like they were staring or anything.

「……Nothing ventured nothing gained, I suppose」

Really, this didn’t feel good. Sure, they had been through similar situations, but it really felt like it was time to go. At this rate they would get themselves into something dreadful. However, even if they did turn back, the condition would only worsen when they returned. In that case, Hiroshi figured it was time to quickly finish things, proceeding with careful steps.

Mio walked about two paces in front of Hiroshi, followed by Haruna two paces behind him. Tatsuya followed after that, and Makoto took the rear guard. The older two also had a bad premonition, not scolding Hiroshi and not walking particularly. They didn’t feel it as clearly as Hiroshi did, but ultimately no one felt they could reach the temple without complications.

Mio made periodic checks, and as they proceeded ever so carefully, until it happened.

「！　Haruna-san！　Mio！」

Something cold raced through his spine, and Hiroshi called them over. Unsure what was happening, the girls darted their eyes about. Once Hiroshi had them covered, a sudden darkness began spreading out from where the three of them were standing.

「……」

Artiem tried to put the teacup in her hand to her mouth before putting it back on the table with a sigh. Douga saw her repeat this and attempted to say something, but ended up not knowing what to say and closing his mouth again.

It would seem that Stiren’s Elza Temple branch had more than enough leisure to stare at Artiem and her dark demeanor.

「Artiem-sama」

「I know. I really do, but I just……」

Seeing that this behavior would not be changing anytime soon, Douga called her name only to receive the same kind of dejected response and another sigh. Artiem really wasn’t feeling it right now.

「Aearis-sama, what in the world has happened？」

「Nothing all that major Just that our power was insufficient to turn the forest back to normal. That’s all.」

「……I see」

Douga felt he got the situation from what Aearis said. No doubt this was a shock for Artiem, the elf. Although sometimes paving paths through forests and undergoing large-scale farming, elves generally kept away from meddling too much with forests, instead coexisting. In addition, she was the priestess of the forest god, Aranwen. It was only natural for her to lament her own lack of power to alter this twisted miasma reality.

「I am a true failure as an elf……」

「That isn’t true at all.」

「Elle-sama, it’s th undeniable truth that I am a bad elf…because I haven’t been useful one bit thus far……」

Artiem seemed to currently be in full-on self-denial mode. You really couldn’t change the minds of anyone when they got in this mood. Honestly, it would be quite a hassle to get her back on her feet, but it wouldn’t be good to have a priestess of the gods depressed to such a degree.

At times like these, all you could do was let people spill out all of their grievances. Aearis was led to feel that way from prior experience and had decided to first try listening all the way.

「My work in the fields, harvesting, bow and arrow skill, they’re all half-baked and there’s not a single thing I’m good at……」

Aearis appeared to be quite taken aback by the first thing that came out of Artiem’s mouth. Honestly, no one at the top of the organization could carelessly admit that Artiem was acting masochistic. After all, society cannot function if everyone does the same exact work as one another. If one person falls, everyone is in the same boat, so this made sense.

Anything other than the number one spot or the “outstanding” job position was regarded harshly. Still, it wasn’t like people who take lower-end jobs were of no value. In a sense, if there was no cognition of inferiority or superiority with the crucial jobs that only a few people could do well, then you might even say they were better than maybe a lower-end “number one” job.

And even if things were not that extreme, most jobs can be accomplished by anyone with enough training. Mocking people for working any of these jobs would just cause everyone to stop working these essential jobs. Once you got to that point it was all over. In that sense, you might say that human resources working jobs below “number 2 jobs” were far more valuable. So, to make an extreme conclusion, other than the leaders of businesses or organizations, society would function fine without the outstanding or number 1 jobs.

But even before that, even if she were still immature, Artiem was th only priestess of Aranwen. It was clear to everyone she was one of the people with crucial, outstanding jobs. No one but Artiem could do her work. It was quite troubling that she had no self-awareness in this regard, but normally she wouldn’t even pretend to be Aearis’s lady-in-waiting, but rather treated as a VIP guest.

So in two ways, Artiem’s self-deprecating words were not correct. From Aearis’ point of view, working as the priestess princess for over half a year, she had enough experience to confirm this. Still, this probably couldn’t be transmitted to Artiem as of now.

「And my chest is big so Hiroshi-san got angry at me, saying『Apologize to Tolkien Sensei！』……」

「Tolkien Sensei, you say……？」

Aearis wasn’t able to hide her perplexion at the sudden reference she didn’t understand. Of course none of them would have knowledge of the founder of modern fantasy novels from Hiroshi’s world.

Still, no one besides Aearis would let Artiem say that she was only good for her oversized breasts, since from the point of view of voluptuous women, her body line was slightly less in shape than Haruna’s, and that actually in many ways was more appealing to men.

「I got all excited about helping Hiroshi-san, yet ended up not contributing whenever it counted……」

「Artiem-sama, I’m the same in that regard……」

Aearis let out her thoughts in response to what was probably Artiem’s most grievous point. Neither of them had been of help to the man they loved when it counted.

「If my hand at archery were better, I could have at least tagged along with dragging them down……」

Artiem had brought an unchoosable choice in front of Aearis. Then again, it wasn’t as if simply being good at archery would mean you wouldn’t drag your team down, she figured.

Still, it might be better to at least have a method of self-defense. After all, Aearis had fallen into the hands of the enemy three times before this. The second time was right in front of Hiroshi and the others so she escaped soon after, but the first and third time, they really had their work cut out for them.

In that line of reasoning, Aearis wanted herself to at least be able to resist enough to make an escape. Getting kidnapped time after time would make anyone doubt one’s crisis management or defensive cognition.

Digressing a bit, when she had let out these thoughts to everyone at teatime, Mio had replied by saying Aearis getting kidnapped was “to be expected as a trope” or had the “power of being captured: ∞” so it was ok, or something weird like that.

「I have someone I like, yet I have no opportunity to appeal to them (not that I had any in the first place), plus there are plenty of people better suited to be by his side with high specs……」

Everyone left in the room slowly began feeling unsure about Artiem’s words getting more and more strange. This was still better than her depression from earlier, but out of context they really wanted to ask Artiem if she was joking about not having any appeal points with her body.

「Chem-chan’s appeal point～」

「Hyan！？」

「Coming through loud and clear～」

Now that the grumbling had shifted its course, the octogals who had previously been behaving by not commenting came out of the jar, reading the mood of the room yet again.

「Strip～」

「Watch～」

「Touch～」

「Fondle～」

The octogals who had been kneading Artiem’s bust from above her clothing began mercilessly stripping her. And yes, this was them reading the mood. At most they would just strip her to where you may or may not catch a glimpse of her undergarments.

「Ah, wha, no, stripping in this situation is really not……」

Artiem resisted as best she could against the octogals’ strippping attack. And as per usual, the more she resisted the more some strange power caused her to become more uncovered. And no, not even the octogals had th power to cause this phenomenon. You just felt sorry for the young priests doing their best to resist the sucking urge to look at her slowly exposed cleavage.