Chapter 122: Time to Meet the Other Six?!

Frelja’s face froze for an instant, struck with surprise.

That alone was enough to catch Arielle off guard. Even through the helm, she could see and feel what Frelja was feeling, and she understood at once that something was happening. Something that, this time, had nothing to do with the monsters Zoyra had just revealed.

Without a word, she activated a sound barrier around the two of them, undetectable to the youngsters.

Only then did Frelja speak.

"I’ve received an invitation."

"So they’re making their move. Or at least, one of them is."

"Looks like it."

~~

A few moments earlier, on the last floor, Freya was floating in the air.

She had been working for more than half a day to unlock [ Resonance of the Winds ], Zoyra’s spell, without success. But through sheer persistence, she had unlocked an entirely different spell along the way: [ Wind Control ].

It wasn’t the one she was after, but she wasn’t about to complain. Carried by the currents she could now command, she was slowly turning above the meadow, under the astonished eyes of the girls and a small earth doll standing obediently in the grass.

But along the way, she had understood something important about the System.

Once a spell was unlocked, as she had done with the fireball and then the Earth Doll, the System made things far easier for her. She no longer needed to trace the quantimanas’ path, or even sort out the ones she needed: everything became instinctive.

And that wasn’t all. Since she had mastered those two spells, she could clearly see that the quantimanas corresponding to them were more strongly drawn to her.

From all this, she had drawn several conclusions.

The first was that in this world, where the System usually granted only one affinity per person, apart from the rare cases who received several from birth, it was possible to create one artificially. Because ordinary people had the word wrong. What the System unlocked at their birth wasn’t an affinity for a type of mana, but a favorability toward that type of mana.

Anyway, I’m getting sidetracked...

Of course, for her, who could see quantimanas and control the flow, creating a spell, and therefore the favorability that came with it, was relatively "simple." But for ordinary people, who could neither see nor do any of that, artificially creating a spell and the favorability that went with it must have been nothing short of a miracle.

Or else a gift granted by a being like Freya. Or by the so-called gods.

Her thoughts drifted to Aldric’s so-called blessing.

Maybe that’s how it works, after all?

But what she took away from all this, above all, was that she could now grant the girls a favorability toward a type of mana far more easily. At that thought, her gaze went straight to Naïa, who had dreamed of having magic from the very beginning.

Freya drifted gently back down to the ground. She wasn’t the least bit tired: her mind was strong enough to withstand the flood of information from the winds, and her mana was nearly infinite. She headed toward Naïa, precisely to talk to her about it.

But.

Something appeared in her field of vision. Something she hadn’t anticipated, and whose possibility she had, truth be told, completely forgotten.

[ The right to convene the Summit of Dungeon Overlords has just been exercised by one of your own. ]

[ All Dungeon Overlords are summoned to join the assembly. ]

[ The Summit will be held outside the laws of this world: time will not flow there. You may join without fear. ]

[ Join the Summit of Dungeon Overlords? — Yes / No ]

Freya stopped dead in her tracks.

"What?!"

As usual, the word had slipped out on its own, and the girls in front of her understood at once, out of habit as well, that something was happening.

Freya brought a hand to her chin and started pacing in circles at a brisk step, thinking.

What do I do?

Of course, she wanted to click right away and join the Summit as quickly as possible, to finally find out who the other six were. But she knew nothing about this meeting. Maybe she’d be in danger there. Maybe one of the other six had an ability that could harm her, like Belzebuth’s control over flies.

Is going really a good idea?

But the opposite was bothering her just as much.

And is not going a good idea?

She knew it well: maybe she was being paranoid. Maybe skipping this meeting would cost her more, and she would lose ground to the other Dungeon Overlords if she stayed on the sidelines.

She finally stopped and sat down cross-legged in the grass, head bowed and both hands pressed to her skull, thinking as hard as she could. Around her, the girls waited patiently for her to work through her inner conflict, as they were used to doing.

She weighed the pros and cons, over and over, and she was finally about to—

Something tipped her over backward.

She didn’t even have time to understand what was happening. The next instant, her head was resting against something warm, soft, and very familiar.

On reflex, she raised her hand and prodded the two pillowy shapes there with her fingertips.

Once.

Then a second time, a little more firmly, just to be sure.

...Wait. I know this softness.

She pressed again, curious, frowning with the utmost seriousness, as if she were analyzing some unknown object. It was warm, supple, and it bounced gently beneath her fingers.

Yep. No doubt about it. I know this softness.

Of course, it was Kaguya’s chest.

The dragon girl didn’t seem the least bit embarrassed. Quite the opposite: she puffed out her chest, which pushed Freya’s head even deeper into said softness, and stood over her with an enormous grin, thumb pointed at herself, in a pose as extravagant as ever.

"Don’t worry, Big Sister! After all, I’m here!"

Freya, her cheek squished against Kaguya’s chest and her hand still resting on it, blinked as she looked up at that radiant grin.

Then she started to laugh.

At first, it was only a small, quiet laugh, just to herself. Then it grew, more and more, until it became a fit of laughter that shook her whole body, lying there in the grass, hands on her stomach.

Above her, Kaguya’s grin froze. She slowly lowered her thumb, then took a step back. Then another.

"B-Big Sister...? Are you okay...?"

Freya only laughed harder, and Kaguya backed away further, looking more and more worried.

Finally, Freya wiped the corner of her eye, where tears had welled up.

"What an idiot I am! What’s the point of tying myself in knots like this, when I have a dragon queen and a rank-SSS demon on my side?!"

She laughed a while longer, sprawled in the grass with her arms flung wide, until her laughter slowly died down. Then she took a long breath, sat up, and brushed off the blades of grass clinging to her kimono with the back of her hand.

All the anxiety that had been gripping her chest a few moments earlier was gone.

When she turned to Naïa, her face had regained all of its seriousness.

"I’m going to a meeting with the other Dungeon Overlords."

Naïa nodded without adding anything. She didn’t need any more explanation to understand what that meant.

Freya stood up, walked over to her, and held out her hand, palm open, without a word.

Naïa looked down at that hand. Then back up at Freya. Then down again.

Instinctively, her own hand slid to her hip, right where the holster was hidden beneath her outfit.

"What? Again? Really, my lady, you’re doing this to me?"

"..."

Freya didn’t answer. She simply kept her hand held out, with a small, patient smile.

Naïa held out for a moment. Then another. She looked away, pressed her lips together, tapped her foot in the grass...

"Haaah..."

She finally gave in with a long sigh, lifted the hem of her maid outfit, and drew the Beretta from the holster strapped to her hip. She held it between her fingers a moment longer, as if saying goodbye, before reluctantly setting it in Freya’s palm.

"You’d better give it back without a single scratch."

"Promise~"

Freya took it and slipped it inside her blue kimono. Then she turned to Kaguya.

And walked toward her. One step at a time.

Kaguya, for her part, backed away. One step at a time.

"B-Big Sister... why are you looking at me like that?"

Freya didn’t answer. She simply smiled, and kept coming.

Then, all of a sudden, the dragon girl dropped onto all fours, back arched, her hair practically standing on end.

"Grrrraaaawrr~!"

She let out that small, high-pitched roar, far too cute to frighten anyone, then bolted across the meadow.

"Catch her!" Freya shouted.

"LET’S GOOOOO!" Laïa yelled, arms in the air, already off at full speed.

As far as she was concerned, there was no doubt about it: this was a game, and she fully intended to win.

Naïa let out another sigh, still sulking over having to hand over her weapon, but she hitched up the hem of her maid outfit anyway and dashed off as well. Mei followed behind, shyly at first, then faster and faster, the ground trembling under each of her long strides.

And they all took off after Kaguya, laughing, through the meadow grass.

Kaguya zigzagged between the flowers, and every time they thought they had her, she slipped between two pairs of outstretched arms. Then she shot straight for the great tree, skirted the crystal hive at its foot close to the ground, to the indignant buzzing of the bees, and scrambled up the trunk in a few bounds.

"That’s not fair, Kaguya!" Laïa shouted from the foot of the tree, fists on her hips.

"Yes it is!" Kaguya called back from a branch, sticking her tongue out at her.

But she had forgotten one small detail.

Freya calmly lifted off the ground with her brand-new [ Wind Control ], and rose right up beside the branch, arms crossed, with a big smile on her face.

"Hiii~"

Kaguya shrieked, dropped from the branch, and landed in the grass with a roll, before immediately taking off again at full speed toward the lake.

"She’s heading for the water!" Naïa shouted.

"Mei, cut her off!" Freya called out, swooping down after her.

Mei, who was running along the side, took three long strides and planted herself right in front of Kaguya, arms spread wide.

Kaguya skidded to a stop on all fours in the grass, spun around, and found herself face to face with Laïa and Naïa coming the other way. She turned her head right, then left, looking for an opening...

And Freya landed right behind her and finally caught her by the wrist.

"Gotcha~"

"WE WON!" Laïa shouted, jumping up and down.

A few moments later, Kaguya was sitting in the grass, cheeks puffed out, sulking, muttering that it wasn’t fair, that it was four against one, and that flying was cheating. Freya, beside her, held her hand firmly.

"Alright, I’m off, girls. Wish me luck."

"Good luck, Big Sister!" Laïa called out.

Mei and Naïa smiled at her and waved goodbye, and Freya pressed the button.

[ Yes ]