Chapter 503

I widened my eyes, then suppressed a laugh. It wasn’t like I could tell him it was funny that he was scared, so I put on a suitably serious face and answered.

“Can you even get back if you do it here? No. Let’s go back and treat it there.”

Leo narrowed his eyes, apparently having noticed that I’d been holding back a laugh.

“I’m definitely glad I managed to convince you, but somehow I still feel pretty uneasy about it.”

I glanced away and shrugged. Leo paid no attention and continued trying to persuade me.

“Actually, there’s another reason I want to do it here. The Vatican mages are guarding the portal right now. They’ll want to see His Majesty and me off.”

“…Ah.”

If the three of us were going to leave together, there couldn’t be anyone watching us on the way to the portal. So I figured he wanted to come up with a reason to leave as quietly as possible—to say that since his condition wasn’t good, only the personnel from Bavaria would gather and return together, which was why he needed to get the injection now. In other words, he intended to make himself look haggard.

“I need a reason to make them leave.”

“Why not just say you’re sick and want to return home quietly? They’re not going to go so far as to check, are they?”

“I don’t like lying.”

“Ah, right…”

So if he actually made himself sick, then it wouldn’t be a lie. I knew all too well what it was like to be unable to say something unless there was some truth behind it, but I still didn’t see why we had to do it here. The biggest problem was that even if Leo had a bad reaction, I couldn’t call a doctor or do anything about it. I stood up, grinned, and patted Leo on the shoulder.

“Bear with it even if you’re scared. At least until we get back to the Crown Prince’s Palace.”

We used concealment magic and stopped by the Ancient Theater of Taormina, where we took in the Sicilian landscape at sunrise and Mount Etna. After enjoying the quiet respite for a while, we headed back to Germany as the portal’s closing time drew near. Breathing in the air of central Munich instead of the salty scent of the Sicilian sea and the smell of dust and earth made it really sink in that we were back in Germany.

“Thanks to you, I was on edge the entire way home.”

Leo said it quietly as soon as we emerged from the palace’s underground passage and reached the courtyard of his building. After hearing about our plans, Elias and Narke headed to Nymphenburg Palace instead of the Crown Prince’s Palace. I patted Leo on the back in encouragement.

“Yeah, I figured. You held out well. Where are Julia and Luise?”

“They’re probably painting.”

“Julia too? What about Theravada Buddhism?”

“Since you skipped art class yesterday, it just sort of happened. And Sir Eugène Lamour didn’t come either, so they’re painting by themselves. Besides, Julia and I had something to talk about, so he had to stay in Munich.”

“Hmm.”

Silence followed. Then Leo suddenly spoke up.

“I was thinking about it on the way here.”

“About what?”

“Once my arm is fixed, I’ll have to lie down all day. I think it’d be better to wait until the mana I put in has fully settled there. But then I won’t be able to fix your leg.”

Of course it had to turn out that way. I stayed silent for a moment before speaking, trying to talk him out of his plan.

“Replacing the mana in the bone with new mana isn’t going to make an immediate difference. This might not work the same way it did when you restored my hearing.”

“No. It’s about letting the healing mana and my mana settle into the muscles around the bone without dispersing. If I let the healing mana pool inside instead of flowing it in from the outside, it can help the bone heal much faster. I’ll use my mana first, so help me afterward.”

He sure has an explanation for everything. I barely had time to be moved by the familiar window and sunlight in Leo’s room before I dropped onto the sofa in resignation. I sprawled there with one arm draped over the backrest, and Leo tapped the toe of my boot with the tip of his shoe.

“Take your shoes off. Let’s get that bone healed.”

“Ugh…”

He looks like he’s sold his soul for the sake of healing bones. I sprang to my feet, left the room, and got into the bath one more time. After toweling my hair dry, I returned to the sofa with a refreshed look on my face. Leo had moved down onto the carpet and tilted his head as he asked, “You were in the hot spring a few hours ago too, weren’t you? Washing yourself in hot water too often isn’t good for you. Why don’t you cut back?”

“How did you know it was hot water?”

Leo pointed at my forearm with an expression that said, ‘Isn’t that obvious?’ My skin was practically cooked. I gave the reddened skin a few pats and nodded.

“You wouldn’t know since you haven’t had the experience of having every cell in your body completely rebuilt yet, but I have. I’m scalding myself from head to toe to prepare myself mentally.”

“You’re the one who doesn’t know anything. I’m scared too, you know. …Anyway, thanks to that, your blood is circulating, so the treatment should work faster. But I’ll need to make sure the healing mana settles properly in the bone.”

I hadn’t gone in there intending to improve my circulation, but since it apparently helped, I’d count that as something to be grateful for. When I remained silent, Leo counted under his breath before placing a hand on my leg.

“Quite swollen.”

“Can’t be helped. I’ve been running around on it before the bone had fully healed.”

Leo slowly nodded, then suddenly pressed his fingers down with force. Mana pushed in from my shin and spread along its length.

“…!”

I instinctively tried to kick Leo away, then quickly pulled my leg toward my stomach instead. Leo’s eyes widened in surprise.

“I haven’t even started yet.”

“…I know.”

Leo stepped back with a genuinely shocked look on his face. He spoke with the gravity of someone witnessing something completely unreasonable.

“I can’t do it when you act like that.”

“…….”

There he goes again. Every time Leo said he couldn’t bring himself to treat me, he had meant it. Not once had it been an empty threat. I considered using the opportunity to leave the room, but decided I should at least have a conscience and pulled out my wand.

After that, it felt like my shin was being destroyed and rebuilt from scratch. That was only natural, considering he was grinding away at the damaged bone once again. The mana in the bone that Leo had attacked and removed was presumably being replaced by his healing mana.

Everything was fine except that I couldn’t feel my leg, and more importantly, it was hot. Lying sprawled across the sofa, I fanned the collar of my dressing gown to let in some air. Leo had warned me not to bathe too often, but I was starting to think I might have to take another dip.

Looking at the curtains fluttering by the window, I said, “At least it’s cool out since it’s April.”

“…No, I’m hot.”

Leo, sitting on the carpet, buried his head against the bottom of the sofa and muttered. I sprinkled divine power over his head. Leo muttered again.

“Thanks.”

“Sure.”

Much later, still in that position, Leo spoke in a voice so muffled I could barely make out the words.

“You’ll write the diary, right?”

“I told you I would.”

“Tell me what you’re going to write.”

I looked down at him as if I had no idea what he was talking about. His eyes gleamed calmly.

“Tell me now what you’re going to write. I’m going to read it eventually anyway, aren’t I?”

“That’s true. But why make me do the same thing twice?”

“Do…”

“Not ‘do.’ I mean the action. The action.”

“Don’t want to?”

I shook my head and stood up from the sofa.

“Get up. Let’s start right now. I’ll tell you while I treat you.”

I stood up confidently, only for my leg to immediately remind me that it still couldn’t support me. I hurriedly changed my wand into a staff and planted it against the floor. Thankfully, all that training had made it easy enough to keep my balance.

Just as I was about to look for a room with its door open in the hallway, there was a knock at the door. When Leo asked what it was, a servant answered from outside.

“Your Highness, Sir Eugène Lamour has sent a letter. He says it’s urgent and asks whether he could meet with you sometime today. How shall I respond?”

Eugène Lamour? Did he have any reason to contact us? The most likely explanation that came to mind was the article titled ‘Shocking News About Eugène Lamour?’—the one where Daily Saxony claimed they had obtained some significant information from an anonymous source about Sir Eugène Lamour, France’s national painter. Perhaps he was asking to meet Leo because of it. Still, if that was what he wanted to discuss, I couldn’t understand why he hadn’t said anything yesterday and was instead calling it an urgent matter today.

I exchanged a look with Leo, and he calmly answered, “Tell him to come in two hours.”

Leo then went into the room with the refrigerator and brought out the medical kit. After washing my hands, putting on laboratory gloves, and washing my hands again, I sat down and tapped my fingers against the table.

“Sit down. If anything seems wrong, we’re going straight to the hospital.”

“We can just warp a doctor here.”

“Same difference.”

I gathered the medicines Leo had handed me and read through the instructions he had written. Perhaps my expression looked perfectly calm, because Leo asked with curiosity, “You’re not going to mentally prepare yourself?”

“I am. But let’s get one thing straight. What if I give you the injection and something goes wrong?”

“Then you’ll have no choice but to handle my duties for me.”

“For how long?”

“Until I’m fully recovered.”

“No, I mean what if something goes permanently wrong?”

“Then do it permanently.”

“Good grief… We really don’t speak the same language.”

Leo laughed. Perhaps he meant to reassure me that I had nothing to worry about, because he shook his head and said, “If the medicine were even slightly dangerous, I wouldn’t have volunteered to use it on myself first. Nothing will go wrong. We’ll administer one set now and monitor it for half a day. Once everything’s in, all you have to do is make sure I don’t move, so you don’t need to start worrying before we’ve even begun.”

I nodded and used divine power on his forearm, which he had unwrapped according to the instructions. Then I inserted the syringe into the vial, pushed all the solution in, and took a deep breath.

The more I looked at Leo’s skin, the less I wanted to do it. Just imagining a needle piercing that bloodless skin made my stomach turn, and I asked with a grimace, “Exactly where am I supposed to inject it?”

“Right here.”

“If I put the needle in wrong and you end up bruised, don’t blame me.”

“That’s nothing.”

Since Leo answered so confidently, I slowly pushed the needle into the spot he indicated with his fingernail. Watching his expression, I said, “You’re not crying.”

Leo gave me a puzzled look. I’d only said it to tease him, but his completely serious reaction somehow made me feel awkward instead. Of course, by now I was used to Leo’s dry reactions, so it didn’t really bother me.

I could see his forearm gradually tensing as the vitriol spread and the pain began to set in. I pushed in the rest of the medicine and pulled out the syringe.

“Vitriol is the result of amplified special mana. I don’t think it’s really capable of absorbing things.”

“Why not? Unless you force enough power into it to destroy the vitriol, it absorbs everything like mud.”

There was strain in Leo’s voice. I placed my hand over the forearm where I’d injected the vitriol and pushed my mana into it. Meanwhile, Leo pressed a hand over his eyes and continued speaking.

“The victim, too… Um, the core, uh…”

“You can’t even speak properly.”

The medicine must be starting to take effect. Or maybe the mana I was forcing in to destroy the mana contained in his bone and muscle cells was just excruciatingly painful. Either way, there was nothing I could do about it. Since the mana in his broken bone had to be replaced, I had to focus on destroying the mana around it first.

Leo stared at me with his mouth slightly open, then belatedly realized what I meant and snapped at me.

“You were like this too!”

“That’s right.”

He must have thought I was still teasing him. And he was right. I readily admitted it, but Leo didn’t seem to hear me. His hands were trembling, and cold sweat ran down his face. Since his shaking was getting in the way, I gripped his left wrist tightly with my left hand and held it down. Then I let divine power flow over his broken arm, removing the vitriol that had absorbed the damaged mana. I took out another vial and injected it into Leo’s arm. This one was vitriol too. The next one was mana as clear as water, though it had a faint bluish tint. It was obviously liquefied healing mana.

Every time another medicine entered his body, Leo would jerk his arm, but he still tried to speak in his usual tone.

“Vitriol that forms or invades a core craves mana from outside. Not that their abilities are as extraordinary as yours, of course. Those… vitriols seem to gradually become less effective at absorbing mana as time passes, but that could be dealt with by extracting the vitriol from the core of a corpse.”

“Breathe. I won’t tease you.”

I spoke quietly. The only way to keep his voice from shaking was to hold his breath and squeeze out the air in his lungs. There was no hiding how difficult it was for him to speak.

As soon as I finished speaking, Leo relaxed his shoulders and took a deep breath.

“Where should I start? Since this is going in the diary I’m giving you, I suppose I only need to talk about you, not me, right? We were on the boat, and it was rocking so violently that I thought of you. I was wondering what you’d do if all three of us died at the same time. You’d be all alone with nothing to do.”

“You’re not going to die. I’m the one who’ll die.”

Of course, look at him, suddenly speaking perfectly clearly when it’s something like this. I was at a loss for words. I stared at the ceiling, then pressed my palms over my eyes.

“Don’t say things like that…”

“I’m trying.”

“…Right. After that, Narke said he was going to look for a secret smuggling route for illuminated manuscripts on Reichenau Island—”

“What? What route?”

“There’s a secret passage in the building next to Reichenau Abbey. It’s not marked on any maps, and it’s possible people from the Papal See used it to come and go. We’ll have to investigate it thoroughly with the cooperation of the Grand Duchy of Baden.”

“…There’s really a secret passage? How?”

Leo’s tone—well, at least his tone—made it sound like he found the whole thing utterly ridiculous, but his large eyes were shining with poorly concealed curiosity. I think I finally understood a little of why he and Elias were friends.

“Yeah, tell me about it. Anyway, we went in through there, but there was a risk of being discovered, so we were in a hurry when we found the passage. And then water started pouring in.”

At the mention of water, Leo’s mouth twisted for a moment. It was amusing how his expression changed depending on what I was telling him. Perhaps the distraction had helped, because the pain in his forearm seemed to have eased a little. I continued.

“Water poured in, yeah. There was a floodgate in the passage. I don’t know if it was built to keep intruders out or to handle pressure. Either way, we ran like mad. All the way to where the Swiss border was. Even then, I thought, ‘Ah… I’m about to drown,’ and I thought of you. ‘Can he really live well without us…?’”

“You’re the one who shouldn’t say things like that.”

“Yeah, sorry. After we barely escaped with our lives and warped to Switzerland, Elias started beating me up.”

“What?”

“Of course, it was an act. We had to get through the checkpoint into Italy, so we pretended to be delinquent German kids living in Italy. It was difficult because Elias and I were so different in build, but the things I learned from you really helped. So I praised you in my head while cursing you.”

“Ha… Ever since you left, I kept sensing you getting surprised every now and then, and I couldn’t figure out what was going on. Now it all makes sense.”

“Why don’t you just write a whole chronicle based on my core reactions?”

Even though I was thoroughly sick of it, Leo kept snickering. He might have been a little delirious from the pain. His eyes were growing heavy with fatigue, so I looked over the remaining vials.

“After that, we went to Italy. The scenery I saw there was so beautiful that I wanted to show it to you, too. Julia, Luise, and Heike as well. But then you came. That’s all.”

“That’s it?”

“No. I’ll write more in the diary. How are you feeling now?”

“Bearable.”

“Yeah, right. It’s pretty incredible that you’re putting yourself through this just to replace the mana in your bones.”

“When it has to be done, it has to be done. I’m not backing down anymore. And I don’t want to stand behind you guys and leave everything to you.”

You’ve never stood behind us. I wanted to tell him that, but there was little point in simply denying something he firmly believed. I shook my head.

“Tell me what you’re planning to do from here on. That way, I can prepare too.”

“I want you to track down the Pleroma encampments within Bavaria. Like you did when you figured out how to enter the Archdiocese of Munich-Freising. Think you can do it again?”

At that, I raised an eyebrow before furrowing my brow.

“That’s quite a surprising thing to hear from you. You don’t want me investigating things in unpredictable ways.”

“And your investigations are always unpredictable anyway.”

Leo wiped the cold sweat from his face with his other hand and looked at me.

“Can you make it back safely?”

“Of course. I… I can’t give you an absolute guarantee, but I think there’s a high chance I’ll be fine. If we exclude variables I can’t predict, you can trust the safety of everything I’ve accounted for.”

“You’d better. Then I’ll be relieved.”

Leo didn’t ask anything more. He merely lowered his head, closed his eyes, and pressed his fingers against his temple. He almost looked half-asleep. Apparently, the strain from removing the mana that was already there had taken quite a toll on him.

I’d thought about getting revenge and all that, mostly as a joke, but seeing my friend retreat into sleep because of the pain wasn’t exactly pleasant. I think I understood now why Leo had looked like his soul had left his body whenever he treated me. After using up all the medicine, I helped him onto the bed and returned to Nikolaus’s desk, where I spread out the letters that had piled up in the warp mailbox.

Time passed quickly. Leo also recovered his strength after thirty minutes—thanks to his remarkable vitality—and watched me work. When it was time for our meeting with Eugène Lamour, we moved to another floor first.

A knock sounded at the door. I snapped my fingers and cast a concealment spell over myself, then stayed where I was. Sitting still and making sure not to move anything was a little difficult, but Eugène Lamour would be leaving soon anyway. Leaving someone who couldn’t defend himself at all in his current state and walking away on my own would be a poor choice, both as Lukas and as Nikolaus.

“Your Highness.”

Eugène Lamour entered after receiving permission, greeting Leo with his eyes half-lidded, just as he had on the day they first met. He looked even more exhausted than he had a few days ago. Perhaps it was because of the newspaper article we had seen in Rome. Clutching his hat in his hands, he hurried on.

“I intended to request an audience with His Majesty, but his office advised me that it would be better to speak to Your Highness about the matter concerning our contract, so I came here.”

“What did you wish to see me about?”

At Leo’s question, Eugène Lamour fixed him with slightly bloodshot eyes and said, “Could you grant me Bavarian citizenship?”

Leo and I could not hide our shock. Had we really just heard that correctly? Leo’s expression immediately turned sharp, but Lamour spoke in a flustered rush, like someone being driven into a corner.

“What do I have to do? I can offer all of my possessions to Bavaria. Is that enough?”

Leo answered his blunt, almost rude demand without hesitation.

“Are you asking me to trade you citizenship? Explain the circumstances so I can understand what you’re talking about.”

“I’m holding a press conference in an hour, Your Highness.”

Lamour spoke as though he were trapped in a world of his own, making little sense. Presumably, the press conference was about the newspaper article that had come out yesterday. He furrowed his brow as he rambled on.

“I never announced that I was staying in Bavaria, but somehow the news got out and an article was published. The whole world knows I’m in Bavaria now. So I thought, to hell with it, and booked a venue for a press conference here in Bavaria. The reporters are coming too. Bavarian reporters.”

What did that have to do with citizenship? Nothing. Eugène Lamour was clearly not thinking straight.

Perhaps Leo’s stern gaze helped bring him back to his senses, or perhaps it was simply because his next words shocked us so much. Either way, what he said came through much more clearly.

“When this is over, I won’t be able to stay in France.”

“Why do you think that?”

“I simply cannot. If I do, I will be walking straight into my own grave. I know it.”

Lamour wrinkled the bridge of his nose, his face filled with disgust and disillusionment. His eyes darted about restlessly, while his hands kept moving between his hair, his chest, and his hat. Leo was no longer shaken. Instead of letting his confusion show, he looked at Lamour with a cool, clear gaze and gestured for him to calm down.

“Sir Lamour. I am already well aware of your accomplishments and standing. Calm yourself and let us speak slowly. Not today, however. You may remain in Bavaria until your visa expires, so there is no need to worry. Let us discuss this on a more suitable day, when you have a clearer head.”

Despite Leo’s stiff manner, his answer was considerate enough that Lamour should have understood the concern behind it. Yet Lamour’s eyes crumpled and his shoulders sagged. It was not anger. I could tell it was more of an instinctive reaction born of frustration. Leo must have realized it too. Lamour thanked him, bowed once more, and then left the room.