Chapter 107: Respecting Your Decision?

Beside Ayanokoji, Miyuki finally found her voice.

Her knuckles were white around her wooden staff, but her posture straightened. She looked at Goddess Viona, and for the first time since the summoning seven months ago, there was no reverence in the girl’s eyes. There was only exhaustion and quiet defiance.

"Ayanokoji-kun is right, Lady Viona," Miyuki said, her voice growing stronger with every second. "I will not fight them either."

Viona turned her head, glaring at the girl. "You too, healer? You would defy me as well?"

"I am terrified of this war," Miyuki admitted openly, a tear slipping down her cheek, though her gaze never wavered. "When Captain Vance showed us the aircraft carrier... when we heard the roar of the jet engines and saw the missile launchers... I was shaking so badly I could barely walk. But do you know what scared me the most, Lady Viona?"

Viona didn’t answer. She only stared, her divine light flickering erratically.

"It wasn’t just the iron ships," Miyuki continued, her voice trembling with emotion. "It was the fact that they were familiar. The uniforms they wore, the English they spoke, the food they prepared for us... it was all from our world. It was a piece of our home."

She stepped up beside Ayanokoji, facing the goddess directly.

"Several months ago, you and the church elders have treated us like weapons," Miyuki said, her voice filled with quiet pain. "You had paladins drill us until we collapsed from exhaustion. You threw us into dungeon floors filled with blood, rotting corpses, and screaming monsters. Whenever one of the girls cried at night because she missed her parents, the priests told her that crying was a sin against Her Divinity. You told us to forget our old lives."

Belis furrowed his brow, stepping forward. "Hero Miyuki, those trials were necessary to forge you into divine champions! The holy training was for your own protection!"

"No, it was for your convenience," Miyuki fired back, turning her tearful eyes onto the Prime Minister. "You wanted us strong enough to kill your enemies so your holy knights wouldn’t have to die. And now, you want us to take up weapons and march out to kill people from our own world? Soldiers who eat the same food as us, who listen to the same music, who grew up under the same sky?!"

She shook her head violently, clutching her chest.

"I can’t do it," Miyuki wept softly. "I became a healer because I didn’t want anyone to die. I couldn’t bear to know Sato getting killed. If you send me to the front lines to face modern weapons, I won’t cast a single spell. I won’t heal your knights, and I won’t fight John’s soldiers. I would rather die right here on this marble floor than point a weapon at people from Earth."

The silence in the grand hall was absolute.

Lord Justin looked down at the floor, unable to meet the girl’s eyes. Even the high priests lowered their holy symbols, unsettled by the raw, unyielding truth in her voice.

Goddess Viona stood completely still on the marble floor.

Her divine pride felt as though it had been slapped in front of her entire court. Two mere mortal teenagers—children without divine blood, without ancient lineage—had stood before her throne and flatly rejected her will.

Under normal circumstances, she would have crushed them where they stood. She could call down divine lightning, burn their souls to ash, and summon a new batch of heroes from the void.

But she couldn’t.

Summoning forty souls across dimensions had drained nearly three decades of accumulated divine mana from her sacred network. Her mana reserves were already strained from maintaining the Aegisover Port Solis while it absorbed continuous explosive shockwaves. If she killed Ayanokoji and Miyuki, the other thirty-five students at the academy would find out. The entire summoned hero unit would shatter, mutiny, or collapse into useless panic.

And worse, she knew Ayanokoji’s cold calculation was entirely correct.

If she forced the heroes to the frontline, they wouldn’t fight. They would wave white flags, surrender to the first American reconnaissance vehicle they saw, and hand John Smith the keys to every magical secret in the empire.

She was completely trapped.

Viona’s breathing became heavy and ragged. The golden glow around her faded completely, leaving her looking remarkably small against the towering marble pillars of her own hall.

She turned her back to them and slowly walked back up the marble stairs, her silk robes dragging along the cracked stone. She climbed the dais and sat down heavily upon her white velvet throne.

She didn’t look at her broken treats. She didn’t look at her kneeling ministers.

She rested her chin on her hand, her golden eyes staring coldly into the distance.

"Fine," Viona whispered.

The word was barely audible, but in the dead silence of the hall, it carried to every corner.

Belis looked up, stunned. "Your Divinity...?"

"I said, fine," Viona repeated, her voice freezing and detached. "If you refuse to defend the empire that feeds you, then so be it. The Holy Solarian Empire does not need coward children to fight its battles."

She turned her sharp, hateful gaze down toward Ayanokoji and Miyuki.

"You want to focus on your sacred mandate? Then go," Viona sneered, waving her hand dismissively. "Return to the Royal Hero Academy. Take your classmates into the deep dungeon floors. Hunt the monsters. Raise your levels until you can slay the Demon Lord. But do not expect any imperial knights to escort you. Do not expect any healing potions or supplies from the royal treasury. From this day forward, you thirty-seven are entirely on your own."

"That is acceptable," Ayanokoji replied without hesitation. "We require access to the dungeon teleporters and nothing more."

Viona’s eyes twitched at his casual response. She had tried to punish him by withholding aid, but the boy didn’t even blink. He accepted the isolation as if it were precisely what he had planned all along.

"Get out of my sight," Viona hissed, turning her face away toward the high arched windows. "Before I change my mind."

"Thank you for your understanding, Lady Viona," Ayanokoji said with a brief, formal nod.

He reached out, lightly took Miyuki by the elbow, and turned her around. Miyuki wiped the tears from her cheeks, taking a deep, shuddering breath as they walked away from the throne.

Meanwhile, Viona sighed.

"It can’t be help, I might have to take drastic measures..."