There was still about an hour until they returned to the future that belonged to himself and Ryuu-senpai.
From day into night.
Once again, everyone had spent an entire day in the small grove outside the city.
Only, beneath the cold winter night, today's little grove was an utter mess—craters big and small and trees strewn every which way littered the ground, looking as though it had been ravaged by some natural disaster. Isagi lit a campfire.
Under the glow of the Magic Stone lamp, he got ready to grill some fish to eat.
Cecil was making her final records. The girl had been nowhere to be seen all day—she'd been preparing the "plan" to upgrade the seniors' weapons.
Just a moment ago.
After confirming things with Alise and the others, she'd planned to head back and prepare the materials, then get to work the next time they traveled back.
Ryuu-senpai, meanwhile, intended to pull Alise and her own past self aside for what was, in a sense, some "special tutoring"—in other words, one-on-one instruction.
Isagi was thinking the same thing.
Except the one he planned to instruct was Kaguya.
Because it was right up his alley—so long as he switched to the "Land of Reeds" character card and drew on the skill of the [Sword Saint Secret Art], instructing the girl from the Far East was an effortless matter.
It came back to the same point.
At the end of the day, what the seniors of the Astrea Familia were playing was still a "star-player game"; so long as the three of them—Alise, Kaguya, and Ryuu—grew stronger, the battles would naturally become much easier.
"Let's go."
Handing out the grilled fish he'd prepared to the girls who'd been hungry all day, Isagi called over to the black-haired girl who at this moment was clutching her long sword, still mulling over something, and headed toward the darkness in the distance.
Kaguya looked especially worse for wear.
Mainly physically—today this girl had put too much force into it and broken her own hands.
Had he not treated her with Monkey Wine, then even after downing an [Elixir], she might well have had to rest at home for a good long while.
And now, though her physical injuries had mostly healed, the mental exhaustion still made it hard for the girl even to stand.
But even so.
She forced her body upright all the same.
That was just how stubborn types were—the girl gritted her teeth, propped herself up on the long sword in her hand, and in an awkward, limping posture followed crisply behind him.
The night sky was faintly cool.
A cold evening wind blew in from the distant darkness, and beyond that, there was the sound of a river flowing quietly.
Isagi was very familiar with the surroundings—after all, he came here often, so it was basically like his own home... ah, no, this was his home.
The Demeter Familia's farmstead nestled outside the city—from south to north, from west to east, where the fields were, where the houses were, where the rivers were, where the greenery was—he knew it all perfectly.
And so.
Before long, a dim river abruptly appeared before them.
Because there was neither star nor moon, in the darkness the water took on a kind of pale blue hue, and then, upon meeting the glow of the Magic Stone lamp Isagi carried, it turned a warm orange-yellow.
Isagi casually found a large rock exposed at the river's edge and sat down.
Then he watched the black-haired girl not far off sit down as well, limping all the way.
"Let me see your sword."
[Higanbana].
And—[Futaba].
The pair of small tachi once gifted to Ryuu-senpai were still on Kaguya's person now, but Isagi took only the long sword from her hands.
Light, sharp, and, like the girl herself, utterly pure.
This was a [Second-Tier Armament] that, apart from its ultimate attack power, carried no special abilities whatsoever.
After taking it, Isagi drew it out a little.
Along the ice-cold blade, a faint streak of deep crimson was truly eye-catching; were it to scatter fresh blood along with it, it would indeed be like a sea of blooming higanbana.
Isagi said nothing more, only looked at Kaguya beside him and found that she had indeed frozen.
Staring at his hand as it drew the blade.
As the saying goes, the expert watches for the finer points; as a swordsman of equally profound skill, it seemed to him he didn't actually need to swing the long sword in order to teach her anything.
On the contrary.
From the smallest details, this girl could learn more than enough.
At this moment.
Inwardly, however, Kaguya was quite astonished.
[A perfect draw].
Incomparably smooth, effortless, and able to flow at once into a slash beyond imagination.
For a swordsman of the Far East, the "draw" was the foundation of everything.
So—how had he done it?
Over and over, the girl replayed in her mind the offhand motion Isagi had just made.
Then.
She recalled, too, the single strike she'd loosed in an instant during today's battle.
The very strike that had fractured and broken both of her own hands outright.
At the time, she had frightened herself.
And so, in the instant of the swing, she'd tried to forcibly pull it back, and it was this momentary hesitation and tug that left her body utterly unable to bear it, so that she suffered the backlash.
"Be more natural."
Isagi gave the same admonition as he had back then.
As for "skill."
In truth, even he didn't quite know how to teach the girl before him, but perhaps simply "watching" would do—Ais and Ryuu-senpai were both like that; just by watching him swing his weapon, they gained a great deal.
So, Isagi believed Kaguya was the same.
He returned the long sword to her.
Kaguya tilted her head slightly, and only now did she show the kind of cute expression a girl her age ought to have.
She had actually thought he meant to draw his own long sword and spar with her—wasn't that what so-called instruction was all about?
But on closer thought, that really wouldn't work.
In her current state, never mind swinging a blade—even standing was extremely difficult.
And Isagi wasn't one to go on about any overly complicated theory either.
So he simply gave a demonstration.
Letting Kaguya see how he used the long sword—that alone was already enough.
And compared to the quiet between the two of them at this moment.
In the distance.
Things over at Ryuu's end were a good deal livelier.
When Alise and the others saw that the elf girl could actually use a magic called [Astrea Memoir], they all wore expressions of disbelief.
Inexplicably, the situation turned into Alise, of all people, instructing Ryuu on how to use her own [Crimson Blossom Tower].
And as she talked on, the red-haired girl seemed to have a sudden flash of realization.
She wore an "I get it!" expression.
No one knew just what she'd figured out, but the girl only hummed away, declaring that next time, when Ryuu and Isagi came over, she'd show them her "ultimate technique"!
"You only get one chance."
Before leaving.
Isagi's soft words echoed through the night sky.
The boy and girl from the future vanished, leaving behind only the exhausted members of the Justice Familia, there in the grove outside the city.
Everyone understood what that meant.
If they failed, Isagi wasn't sure he'd be able to return to an even earlier timeline to set it all right again.
"We'll do our best."
Alise's answer was the same as ever.
The optimistic girl smiled, seemingly not the least bit worried about it.
This was the "destiny" of an adventurer; having become a follower of the Goddess of Justice, she would not fear such things.
"Thank you."
After a brief reunion came a long parting.
But one day, the effort would bear fruit, and in the end bring about a perfect ending.
____
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