「……Phew.」
After confirming that all the corpses of the horses and people had disappeared, Rei let out a deep sigh.
Rei’s specialty was fire magic. Using magic that contained purifying elements……such as holy magic, increased his magic power consumption greatly.
This was even more so as it was his second time using such magic after meeting with Widele.
Even with his enormous magic power, he was feeling quite tired. It was a similar state to after using Overlord’s Armour.
「Gurururu~」
Perhaps seeing Rei’s condition, Set, who had been watching from a short distance away, rushed over to Rei and rubbed his face against him to give some encouragement.
Seeing Set’s adorable behaviour, Rei gave a small smile with his tired face as he gently reached out to Set.
「I’ll recover quickly, so there’s no need to worry. Besides, we’ll be heading back to camp.」
「Guru~……」
Set looked at Rei with worry as he gave a cry.
Noticing the situation, Widele, who had been immersed in memories of her beloved horse, went over to Rei with surprise.
「Rei-sama, what’s wrong?」
Rei shook his head in response to the worried voice.
「I just used a spell I’m not used to, so it used up a lot of magic power. I’ll recover soon.」
「……I see. Thanks for hearing out my request.」
「There’s no need to worry about it. Anyway, this is a route the rebel army will eventually pass through. It would be troublesome if they became undead after what happened.」
After saying that, Rei glanced towards the men.
「I’ll say this now, don’t think you can escape. Well, you can, but if you do, we’ll treat you as enemies and not prisoners. Set, if anyone among them acts strangely, I’ll let you deal with them.」
「Gururu~!」
Leave it to me! Set seemed to say with an energetic cry.
Set turned to look and the men, as if to say he would keep watch in place of the tired Rei.
A few of the men stiffened up and averted their eyes as Set stared at them.
It was clear at a glance what they had been thinking.
「Well, we can’t just sit here forever. Let’s head to the rebel camp. It’s already night, so if we waste time here, it will just make it take longer to arrive. If we’re not careful, we might not even meet with Mercurio tomorrow.」
「T-That would be a problem. I would like to meet with Prince Mercurio as soon as possible.」
The other female knights all nodded in agreement at Widele’s words.
Since they had come all this way, she wanted to meet with Mercurio before the next day if possible. Rei responded with a somewhat malicious tone.
「That’s right, then we should hurry to the rebel camp. As for the prisoners, I’m sorry, but you’ll have to take responsibility for bringing them back.」
「Wait-! Isn’t that too harsh? I’d like to leave the prisoners to you, Rei-sama.」
Bringing prisoners along would slow down their movement speed. Worried about that, Widele tried to push the prisoners to Rei, but Rei replied with a smile.
「Are you sure? If I don’t go to the camp and tell them that the White Rose Knights are coming as Frizione’s messengers, there will definitely be a fight when you get to the camp, won’t there?」
「T-That’s……」
That was certainly true. As Rei sai, right now, they were still considered enemies of the rebel army. Since that was the case, would anyone believe them if they just walked up to the enemy’s main camp?
The answer was no.
Some would undoubtedly consider it to be a hostile action and it would become a troublesome situation.
In the worst case, a battle against the rebel army might even break out in front of the camp.
If they wanted to avoid that, it would be best for Rei, whose face and name were well known among the rebel army, to go ahead and let them know in advance, so Widele couldn’t reject his decision.
「……I understand. Then I’ll leave the message to Rei-sama. I’ll bring these people along ourselves.」
Widele glanced over at the captured men and Rei nodded in response.
「Please do that. However, we don’t know if these guys have any important information. We took them prisoners just to be on the safe side, or rather, because it was convenient. So, if they try to escape, you can dispose of them.」
Hearing Rei’s words, the men all held their breaths, as if ice had been put down their spines.
It wasn’t because they hadn’t expected the possibility of their lives being simply cut short……
It was because Rei’s gaze as he looked at them was like he wasn’t looking at humans.
It was as if he were looking at rocks lying on the side of the road, a gaze that didn’t acknowledge them as living beings.
The men were used to doing shady things, but they had never been looked at like this.
「Y-Yeah. I understand. But I’ll try to hand them all over to you as much much as possible.」
Widele was also momentarily intimidated by Rei’s gaze, but quickly regained her composure as she replied.
Seeing that, Rei was convinced that they were the White Rose Knights under Frizione’s direct command.
「All good then? I’ll leave them to you. I’ll head back to the camp first, so follow me. If you head straight south from here, you should be able to arrive without getting lost. ……All you have to do is to go in a straight line across the grassland, so you won’t get lost, right?」
Rei said that jokingly, but if everyone knew that Rei himself had gotten lost many times in the past, their fear of him from several second ago would probably have diminished greatly.
Who knew if it was a good or bad thing that it didn’t happen.
In any case, after saying that, Rei got onto Set’s back.
「Set, I’m counting on you.」
「Gurururururu~!」
With a high pitched cry in response to Rei’s words, Set soared into the sky after a short run up.
Widele, who watched as Rei and Set faded into the distance in an instant, shortly came back to her senses.
「We can’t stay here. We need to meet Prince Mercurio as soon as possible, so we have to hurry. ……Also, listen up you guys. We’ve got permission from Rei-sama. Don’t forget that if you do anything strange, you’ll have to pay with your lives.」
「We know. We’re not stupid enough to do anything strange in this situation.」
The leader of the men nodded as he spoke.
In truth, the man didn’t have the slightest intention of running away.
He had a feeling that if they did try to run away now, Widele would use her blade to take their lives, just as she said. And, more than anything else, he was certain that even if he managed to escape, he would surely die if Rei found him later.
Since that was the case, they might as well cooperate with the rebels to survive. If he did that, at least he wouldn’t have to fight the monster that was Rei again.
That was the conclusion he reached in his mind.
「……Well, whatever. Let’s go.」
Widele and the other knights felt the same fear towards Rei as the men did.
However, they managed to calm themselves down by thinking that they weren’t enemies of the rebels.
Widele needed to meet with Mercurio as soon as possible. With that in mind, she led everyone in the direction Rei had told them to go.
Flying through the sky, Set returned to the rebel camp after about five minutes.
Rei saw nothing particularly unusual about the camp that had been fully set up while he was away and signaled Set to land.
It would be impossible for even Rei to get lost on a five minutes trip in a straight line.
That said, considering that he didn’t think of himself as directionally challenged, he wasn’t aware of his own weakness.
「Gurururu~」
Set gave a cry as he descended to the ground and two soldiers guarding the camp noticed them.
The camp itself was surrounded by a wood and metal fence to protect against monster and bandit attacks at night. However, there were several places along the fence that were not closed to allow outside access.
Rei landed at one of those locations.
The two soldiers raised their spears for a moment, probably because they had heard a cry from above in the darkness.
Set landed at the entrance to the camp as the moon came into view above the cloudless sky.
Theorem had told him not to suddenly land in the camp directly unless there was an emergency.
Rei had judged the matter with the White Rose Knights not to be that urgent, so he just landed at the entrance.
As for the soldiers, as they were part of the rebel army, they had received training from Rei and knew his face well. For that reason, they immediately lowered their spears as one of the soldiers called out to Rei.
「Rei-sama, have you returned from scouting? It hasn’t been that long.」
「Yeah. I ran into a little trouble.」
「A little trouble?」
「I’m sorry, but this is something that needs to be reported directly to Theorem. Can you let me through?」
The soldier was a little puzzle at Rei’s words, but quickly judged that it wasn’t something he should become involved in. He nodded and made way for them to enter the camp.
「Do you need a guide? If necessary, one of us can go with you.」
「No, it’s at the center of the camp, isn’t it? Then is shouldn’t be a problem.」
After giving a brief reply to the soldiers, Rei and Set entered the camp.
The two soldiers both shrugged their soldiers and returned to their guard posts, stomachs growling as the smelled food coming from inside the camp.
「Let me through to Theorem. There is something I need him to decide on urgently.」
「Understood. Please wait a moment.」
As soon as the knights guarding the magic tent heard Rei’s words, one of them went inside.
It was a completely different response than before, probably because they now recognised Rei as an important figure in the rebel army.
(Though I don’t know if they fully accept me or not.)
He knew that the people of the Bestir Empire had mixed feelings about him. But he also knew that they were suppressing those feelings precisely because they knew it was for the sake of the rebel army.
「Permission had been granted. Please come in.」
One of the knights came out of the magic tent and spoke to Rei. Rei left Set outside before entering.
At first, the knights were troubled or scared of Set being so close ot the tent, but they had gotten used to it now and show any particular expression.
It was probably because they had come to the conclusion that Set wasn’t like an ordinary monster and wouldn’t randomly attack people.
Set himself lay down near the magic tent as usual to wait for Rei.
Inside the magic tent, the usual group of people who could be called the leaders of the rebel army were gathered.
There were a few faces that Rei hadn’t seen before, but they were probably people who had joined after they moved camp.
「Rei, you said it was urgent, did something happen? From the looks of it, it doesn’t seem like you spotted a new punitive force on your scouting trip……」
Theorem asked immediately and Rei nodded slightly as he spoke.
「While scouting, I found five women fighting a group of about 30 men. They were cornered and the men seemed to be the attackers, so I gave them a hand……」
「Bandits? Since we’ve set up camp in this area, we should proably clear out the bandits in the area.」
Theorem muttered and the others nodded in agreement, but Rei shook his head.
「No, they all wore matching armour. From what I heard, they are private soldiers under Kabajid.」
「……His Highness Kabajid?」
「Yeah. So, the women who were being attacked were part of the White Rose Knights, who are under Frizione’s direct command. Do you know them? ……Well, judging from your reactions, they seem to be quite famous.」
The White Rose Knights. The moment Rei said their name, almost all the nobles in the tent looked surprised.
「The White Rose Knights?! Are you saying they’ve come to this place?」
「But, why? The White Rose Knights are truly Princess Frizione’s secret weapon. If she sent them here……it doesn’t seem like an attack with just five people.」
「Maybe they were scouting?」
「That can’t be. Those who tried to infiltrate the camp have been neatly eliminated. They should know that.」
「No, that’s why they sent the White Rose Knights, right?」
Seeing them discussing their opinions before he could finish, Rei, who had been forgotten, sighed as he wondered what to do.