Jeanne was thoroughly taken aback by little Cecilia's parting gesture. She truly hadn't expected the child to pierce her concealment, leaving her to wonder just when and how her presence had been discovered.
Despite her confusion over how the girl had tracked her down so easily, Jeanne smiled and returned the wave, her figure dissolving entirely into the scenery a moment later.
Down below, Cecilia caught that final, fleeting sign of farewell. The little girl's already bright mood soared, her face lighting up with such pure delight that her parents exchanged bewildered glances.
Just minutes earlier, the child had been weeping over the painful separation from her Sarkaz father; now, she was practically beaming. It was an erratic shift in emotion that defied logic to the adults around her, but they ultimately chalked it up to the fleeting, unpredictable nature of a child's whims and let the matter drop.
Once they settled into the moving carriage, Feoria finally found a quiet moment to lean closer. She had been burning with curiosity ever since she saw her daughter's sudden burst of excitement, but the frantic rush of departure hadn't allowed for questions.
"Cecilia, what made you so incredibly happy back there? Did you see something special in the crowd?"
"I saw Big Sister Jeanne!" Cecilia chirped, her voice brimming with affection for the gentle savior who had watched over them. "She came to wave goodbye to me!"
"The Saint?" Feoria frowned, her skepticism immediate. "That can't be right, sweetheart. Word around the settlement was that she departed several days ago. Why would she suddenly appear just to see us off?"
"It's true! Sister Jeanne never actually left!" Desperate to prove her words, Cecilia nearly leaped from her seat. To counter her mother's doubt, she reached into her pockets and pulled out a small, roughly carved wooden cross.
It was a modest thing made from plain twigs. The craftsmanship was distinctly amateurish—the kind of crude work that would leave a street vendor starving if they tried to sell it on the steps of Laterano.
Yet, this specific cross carried a weight that defied its humble appearance. It was a personal gift from Jeanne, a token that rendered its material value entirely irrelevant. To Cecilia, it was a priceless treasure.
"Just a minute ago, the cross started glowing! It only shines like this when Sister Jeanne is close by. In fact, it's been glowing faintly for days..."
Cecilia held out the unassuming token, tilting it toward her mother as if presenting a grand prize.
Hearing this, Feoria felt a sudden shock rattle her composure. A chain of fragmented details instantly locked into place in her mind. She remembered her husband mentioning the distant, thundering roar they had mistaken for a Catastrophe—and how the town militia had discovered the scorched, half-melted remnants of weapons and bones on the perimeter the following morning. It had been obvious that a hostile force had attempted to raid the settlement, only to be systematically annihilated before they could even breach the outer limits.
Though she lacked concrete proof, the pieces fit together far too perfectly. Jeanne must have intercepted those raiders on the highway, neutralizing the threat to safeguard the town while remaining in the shadows to guarantee their collective safety.
Feoria found herself completely at a loss for words. A profound urge to repay this staggering debt of gratitude welled up within her, yet she was painfully aware that she possessed zero means to offer anything of equal value to a living Saint.
"I believe you, Cecilia," Feoria murmured softly, gently wrapping her hands around her daughter's. "Keep this memory locked tightly inside your heart, and promise me you won't speak of it to anyone else. If the day ever comes when we are capable, we must do everything in our power to return the Saintess's incredible kindness."
While the mother and daughter shared their quiet vow, Jeanne and little Fafnir had already resumed their drifting lifestyle. Their departure left the local tavern proprietor in a state of profound mourning, his grand dreams of sudden wealth vanishing right alongside his most legendary patrons.
After treating Fafnir to one final, gargantuan feast to sustain her for the road ahead, Jeanne set out toward an unmapped destination, content to simply wander the winding trails of the frontier.
Over the next few days, the pair traveled across vast stretches of territory on the back of their lumbering earth-wright beast. During her travels, Jeanne noticed a strange, pervasive quiet settling over the land. Whenever she paused to listen to the passing chatter of local travelers, the prevailing topic was how dramatically the localized skirmishes had dropped off.
Piecing together the fragments of their conversations, she deduced that the region's massive, independent mercenary coalitions had suddenly vanished from the grid. They had clearly been swept off the board, systematically consolidated under the banners of either Theresis or Theresa.
Yet, the civilian population harbored zero illusions about this sudden tranquility. They understood perfectly well that this brief reprieve was not the dawn of a lasting peace, but rather the heavy, suffocating silence that precedes a cataclysmic storm.
The total disappearance of the mercenary factions meant someone was amassing a terrifying amount of military capital. One look at the warring royal siblings who had already ground the nation into bleeding fragments was all it took to realize what was brewing on the horizon.
"So, you aren't a native of Kazdel, are you, little girl? If you value your life, you'll take advantage of this quiet window. The border isn't far from here—pack up your things and get out before the sky falls."
Jeanne was resting at a roadside outpost, conversing with a weathered Sarkaz native. He was a retired mercenary, his combat days cut short by an explosion that had claimed his leg, leaving him to scrape together a meager survival in the quiet settlement.
He had originally approached Jeanne out of sheer curiosity, drawn by her attentive listening as the locals gossiped around the hearth. But Jeanne suspected his warmth was truly triggered by the sight of Fafnir. More than once, the veteran's eyes had softened with a profound, aching nostalgia as he muttered that if his pregnant wife hadn't perished during the early years of the war, their own child would have been roughly the same size by now.
"Don't you have any desire to leave this place yourself?" Jeanne asked, the question slipping past her lips before she could fully filter its insensitivity. The moment the words hung in the air, she winced internally.
"And where exactly would a cripple like me run to?" The old soldier didn't take offense, nor did he perceive her question as a deliberate jab at his misfortune. He simply viewed her as an innocent child who failed to comprehend the brutal mechanics of the world. "A broken Sarkaz has zero prospects out there. My only choice is to rot in this corner and pray that some semblance of peace drops out of the sky onto our heads. Trying to cross the border in my condition is just a slower way to die."
He paused, running a rough hand over his face. He wasn't entirely sure why he was being so incredibly talkative today. Perhaps something about the sight of this young girl navigating the wastes with a small child had struck a forgotten chord deep within his soul.
"If the day comes when this endless struggle finally concludes... which of the two rulers do you hope to see standing?" Jeanne inquired, suddenly curious about how the civilian population truly viewed their sovereign leaders.
She knew that the historical prestige of the royal siblings was virtually legendary among the masses; traditional bedtime stories across Kazdel routinely painted the pair as the absolute guardians of the Sarkaz race.
But now, stripped of the ancient myths, did the people truly favor Theresa or Theresis? Throughout her journey, whenever Jeanne had carefully broached the topic, the locals had invariably offered vague, non-committal murmurs, deeply reluctant to invite trouble by picking a side.
The veteran, however, possessed zero reservations. He cast a swift, calculating glance around the immediate area, ensuring no prying eyes were anchored to their corner, before offering a blunt, icy assessment.
"To be completely honest with you... I couldn't care less who comes out on top. My entire life was systematically ruined by their grand ambitions a long time ago. What difference does a victor make to someone like me? If you want my honest opinion, I hope the two of them manage to wipe each other off the face of the earth entirely..."
His voice carried a raw, venomous strain of resentment. The brief spark of warmth that had sustained their conversation completely evaporated, replaced by a cold, hollow exhaustion. He shifted his weight onto his crutch, preparing to vacate the bench.
"Anyway, my advice remains unchanged: leave Kazdel as fast as your feet can carry you. A girl like you can forge a bright future in practically any other nation on Terra. There is absolutely zero reason to throw your life away in a graveyard like this."
With that final parting counsel, the middle-aged Sarkaz turned his back on the hearth, disappearing into the dim interiors of the outpost. Jeanne could feel the heavy shroud of misery that trailed in his wake.
She chose not to press him further. Reaching down, she gently stroked Fafnir's hair before quietly rising from her seat. The veteran's words carried a grim truth: the hour had indeed arrived for her to conclude her wanderings through the outer territories.
According to the latest strategic shifts, the internal powder keg surrounding Babel was rapidly approaching its absolute breaking point. If she managed her travel schedule properly, she would arrive just in time to witness the opening movements of the grand theater.