Chapter 688: Standing Above the High Heavens

The moon hangs high in the night sky.

Amalia had once described her like that. If one were to dig into the reason, it was probably because Astrid Calliste had always offered them care at the moments they most needed someone’s concern.

Hearing the pink-haired knight in front of her speak such sweet words, Astrid lowered the long leg she’d had crossed, black stockings gleaming. Her cool red eyes reflected the girl’s slightly flushed cheeks as her pink lips parted and she spoke.

"Lyra saying that... is kind of cheating, you know..."

Especially when she was dressed in that entire set of holy adornments, less like a steadfast knight, more like a pure idol, while blushing, fingers lightly pinching the edge of her sleeve.

Not only did it perfectly match Astrid’s personal taste, even her reaction looked so easy to bully.

A little too cute.

.......

After who knew how long, Astrid looked at the pink-haired girl beside her and spoke first.

"Lyra."

Lyra, who had just been carefully satisfied by her lover and thoroughly messed up several times, blinked at the call and lifted her gaze to Astrid.

"Hm?"

Her pale thighs in white stockings tinged with faint pink pressed tightly together. Two white stockinged lotus feet tangled and clung to the person beside her. Lyra’s voice was light and soft, as though separated by a veil of water.

"Outfits are just external conditions in the end. Tomorrow’s speech really still depends on Lyra herself."

Moving people with emotion, making them willing to believe that the pink-haired knight hovering in midair was truly acting on Heaven’s behalf, that was what mattered most.

Turning slightly, Astrid gently wrapped an arm around Lyra’s. Her clothes a bit disheveled, she casually parted her slender, tender legs wrapped in sheer black stockings, lightly clamping Lyra’s knee; above, she did the same.

A milky softness like fine snow pressed against skin. With the obstructive fabric removed, the most direct silky contact bloomed on the skin. Beneath the thick barrier, accompanied by the woman’s clearly discernible heartbeat in her chest.

"Mm-hm?"

Noticing the person in her arms tremble, the curve of Astrid’s lips deepened as she murmured softly.

"...Do you need me to keep helping you relax, Lyra?"

Thinking of that electric feeling just now, Lyra’s heart-tip trembled reflexively. Her exquisite, agate-like pale toes stretched the tip of her white stockings until it turned faintly translucent, and desire, born naturally from tasting the marrow and wanting more, poked its head out again.

"..."

If she didn’t ask, everything that had just happened would’ve been enough. Yet Astrid still had to add that one extra line, stirring the lake of her heart that hadn’t fully calmed.

Biting her pink lips with pearly teeth, just as Astrid thought Lyra was about to say she was worried Astrid was tired and they should stop for today, the girl glanced at the wall clock and whispered.

"Astrid helped me write such a long speech... it must’ve taken a lot of energy and time..."

That low, gentle, winding voice fell into Astrid’s ears, and in response, the slender pale hand that had been drooping at her lower abdomen shifted from the back of the hand to the palm.

"So... Now let me help you."

Only caring about her own enjoyment and not at all about her lover’s feelings, that wasn’t what a real knight did!

Even if, as Astrid said, teasing her was already enough to make her happy, and she could also feel joy from intimate bodily contact, it still wasn’t nearly enough.

As girls, and having experienced it several times, Lyra knew how to make things more comfortable.

Hearing Lyra’s words, Astrid raised her brows. Before she could say anything, she saw the pink-haired girl, still lying down, turn to the side and offer her a fragrant kiss of her own initiative.

And... facing such a tempting imperial succubus, could she really hold herself back from making her just as messed up too...

First set a small goal: the number of times she made the other party happy had to be at least half of hers!

Sensing a warm, soft body pressing down on her, the silver-haired beauty kissed back, and in the midst of it she saw the girl’s round knees, white with a hint of pink, parting and fitting against the bed. Her two snow-white, delicate stockinged feet arched against the edge of the quilt, showing excellent flexibility while inadvertently displaying a marvelous curve. Astrid narrowed her red eyes, her legs rubbing slowly.

Smooth silk filled between palm and back of hand. Even though Lyra was the one taking the initiative, her cheeks were even redder, and she nearly embarrassed herself into going weak in the waist.

Princess Astrid... was a succubus through and through, no rebuttals accepted...

Very soon, the room overflowed with a tempting floral fragrance. Rising and falling, those pleasing voices adorned it, laying the ambiguous atmosphere to its peak.

And so, the two of them practiced their instruments together for a long, long time. When the second round ended and they returned to a tender state, Astrid and Lyra lay on the bed, discussing matters related to tomorrow’s speech.

Before the next fierce battle began, Lyra had also kept Astrid’s earlier words in mind. The Regent’s Highness was right: aside from outward image and the prepared speech, what mattered more in shaking the Church of Light’s believers’ outdated notions was her state at the time, and her ability to infect emotions while speaking.

Prepared lines could indeed stabilize the lower limit, but the true upper limit depended on on-the-spot performance, on how the speaker who uttered those words stirred emotion.

That was what mattered most.

"Believe in yourself. You can do it, Lyra." Astrid whispered by the pink-haired girl’s ear, her legs still not separating from Lyra’s knees.

"I’ll also keep watching you from behind."

Not only as a safety belt in case of unforeseen accidents, but also to support her own beloved knight.

Hearing Astrid, Lyra softly hummed in acknowledgment, quietly feeling her lover’s temperature and heartbeat. After a long while, she whispered again.

"Um... let’s go take a bath."

Hugging her lover really was comfortable and reassuring, but the feeling of wet socks wasn’t so pleasant. Lyra didn’t know what Astrid thought, but she truly preferred being drier.

Astrid tightened her legs slightly and answered in a gentle voice.

"Sure."

It just so happened she was a bit tired too.

Standing up, she found the slippers thrown crookedly by the bed. Looking at the sheer clothes scattered about, Astrid bent over, gathered them all up without missing a single piece, and handed them to Lyra.

"Eh?" The girl made a small sound at the sight.

Astrid explained softly, "The Light Sword’s capacity is bigger than my gloves’, so I’ll have to trouble Lyra."

"..."

That did seem to make sense. Hearing her lover, Lyra’s ears flushed faintly. She took the clothes Astrid handed over and blended them into points of light.

"...Let’s go wash now."

....................

The next day, in [Holy Radiant City], the Church’s knight order, still maintaining a surface-level stability, had its Knight Commander, Kales, seated in the recently piled-up military camp, feeling the glow emitted by the holy relic.

These days, rumors are flying through the camp. He kept hearing talk that various kingdoms were suffering from plague and that the outbreak was growing worse and worse.

Kales wanted to rectify discipline, but because many Light Knights present were, like him, Church elites transferred from the epidemic zones, they had personally gone deep into the grassroots to conduct quarantine and purification work. Naturally, they knew how dangerous these plagues were. With the Church’s macro-level coordination gone, further deterioration was entirely within expectations.

Facing such reality, refutation was useless, or to put it more directly, it couldn’t even be called refutation; it was merely a one-sided gag.

At this point, no one could say whether the pope was right or wrong to send them to the front lines to meet the enemy.

Only one thing was certain: last year’s religious frenzy, after more than half a year of settling, had begun to cool. With the plague ravaging the Kingdom of Velys on a large scale while not affecting the Valeria Empire, even the most devout believers began to doubt the correctness of their previous behavior.

Suddenly, a hurried set of footsteps interrupted Kales’ train of thought. An armored bodyguard entered the tent and reported in a low voice.

"Knight Commander Kales, there’s a new situation."

"What is it?"

"Scouts detected someone flying toward us from the direction of Coldwind City."

"What’s the scale?"

"Reporting to the commander, only one person."

"..."

One person?

Kales’ brows knit as he rose and walked out.

Could it be the long-missing Grand Duke Grant had broken free of his shackles, learned the Church of Light was besieging the city, and come here to seek their aid?

Rushing to the outskirts, Kales received an even more unexpected answer.

"The incoming party is suspected to be the traitor who usurped the Lord’s authority, the deputy commander of the Empire’s expeditionary army, Lyra Beckett."

Why would she come? Could it be that she couldn’t sit still anymore and intended to use her Arcanist-mage-tier power to strike at the Church?

Grant, though an early Arcanist mage, still hadn’t succeeded in breaking through the Valeria Empire’s blockade line. The only news circulating now was a letter of surrender, hard not to suspect something.

The Valeria Empire had most likely used a Arcanist mage; otherwise, it wouldn’t have been possible to capture Duke Grant.

Yet for self-preservation, and also to follow the enemy regent’s banner of "only punishing the ringleaders," most kingdom nobles turned a blind eye, pretending nothing had happened.

First, there was no clear intelligence that could prove it. Second, the vast majority of nobles had no Arcanist-mage-level strength. Since the higher nobles above weren’t urgently jumping out to point out the issue, why should they touch that bad luck and become the one easy to shoot, the bird that sticks its head out.

And just as Kales gathered many soldiers, preparing to join forces to resist, high in the sky, Lyra, feeling the cold wind tug at her clothes, spread the light wings on both sides and advanced toward the illusory city of light.

As an Arcanist mage specialized in the light attribute, Lyra’s personal safety was basically not threatened. Unless the Pope of Light, Hebrew, personally came, otherwise even a peak tier Arcanist mage alone could not keep her here.

Even so, to prevent the unforeseen among the unforeseen, Astrid still arranged three Arcanist mages, including herself, to keep watch over Lyra’s surroundings throughout, in case the Church of Light made any abnormal moves. Astrid could trust Monica, but no one could be sure whether the Pope of Light would be provoked by the voice in his dreams and act alone, bypassing her, the Saintess, to take action.

Just like the battle at White Maple Town back then, they had misjudged the Church of Light’s determination to fight, failing to consider that the enemy would open with a Pope of Light–level trump card. That was why the subsequent series of actions had become so perilous.

Rapidly closing in on Holy Radiant City, within Lyra’s field of view, magic arrays were lighting up one after another. Light-element clusters, rippling outward like waves, gathered before her eyes like a tide.

A single Magnus might not be able to threaten a low-tier Arcanist mage, but a destructive spell linked through a large-scale magic array had the ability to shatter an Arcanist mage’s external defenses, like the [Holy Radiant City] before her. Even Lyra would find it difficult to sustain solo casting for long.

Energy within the array was accumulating. Knowing that merely her arrival had made the Church of Light treat her as a dire enemy, Lyra halted in the air at several hundred meters and did not approach further.

Noticing Lyra’s slowing movement, until she stopped, Kales’ hand gripping the sword hilt still did not loosen. He stood atop the city wall, gazing at the visitor from afar.

She... hadn’t drawn her sword?

With arbiter-level keen senses, Kales instantly caught these details. The holy sword that had once bravely withstood a thousand troops now hung at Lyra’s waist, sheathed in a flower-carved silver scabbard.

Even so, he would not let down his guard. That several-hundred-meter spatial distance was but an instant for an Arcanist mage, let alone the act of drawing a sword.

Attempting a final standoff, Kales’ mental string stretched so tight it might snap at any moment. Before he could speak, Lyra spoke first instead.

"To all of the Church of Light... it’s been a long time..."

Her gentle, pleasing voice echoed through the frozen wasteland’s high sky, then, through wind she deliberately controlled, carried into the [Holy Radiant City].

The knights on the wall in heavy armor showed no change in expression, still maintaining the array defense, trying to keep themselves alive under any magical bombardment an Arcanist mage might unleash.

Gazing at the holy city, watched by countless eyes, Lyra no longer had the instinctive heart-pounding that used to come from shyness when she took the stage in the past. All that remained was the calm of one who had personally experienced several wars and been tempered by life and death a thousand times.

"No need to be nervous. I’m standing here not to take the initiative to start a war."

Her sky-blue pupils reflected the scene ahead. Lyra fully spread her wings of light, her tone earnest.

"I’m here to walk the path once trodden by the Church of Light of the Kingdom of Velys."

"With compassion and benevolence, save the world; with holy light and blazing fire as means, judge the guilty."