[Lifespan Remaining: 29 days, 7 hours, 45 minutes.]
Maybe goodwill fed the heart, but it certainly did not feed the body.
Noct had barely gotten any sleep, maybe around one to two hours of it.
The dark circles under his eyes were so obvious they looked like makeup.
Add to the fact that he could barely stand straight, well, it didn’t take a child to figure out.
Aurora took one look at his face to figure out as well.
“I take it you enjoyed your evening? I did hear soft whimpering during the night…Did you really—?”
“No,” Noct snapped before she could finish.
“Just…let me rest for the rest of the trip, will you?”
“Oh, my poor maiden heart is broken,” she lamented.
“How could my own fiancé be so daring…after refusing me, of all people?”
“Aurora!”
“Alright, alright!”
Laughing softly, Aurora raised both hands in surrender and leaned back in her seat, turning her attention toward the passing scenery.
Throughout the ride, even if he wanted to rest, the bumpy carriage made it so sleeping was impossible.
So all Noct could do, really, was to distract himself with other activities.
He sat cross-legged, closely examining his inner body and trying to figure out only one thing, how to advance his class to its second ascension: the Invoker.
Unlike Rosse who also started with the base class of Mage, his cousin decided to go into the Magic Swordsman line, which diverges and becomes its own branch.
Every advancement has its own requirement, which is usually categorized as three things: the user’s capacity, their mastery, and an ascension rite that is compatible with them.
Even with his genius, he could probably only finish the mastery portion.
He would still need to train his body and mana circuits to withstand the advancement, as well as procuring an ascension rite that was just suitable enough to not cause any future problems.
‘Yeah…that’ll have to wait.’
But as he was focusing, Aurora finally brought something back to his attention.
“Noct, are we still proceeding with the plan?”
“Of course,” he nodded.
“Given that our culprit seems to be a thorough one, there’s no way he would expect to be killing four people in Arcadia without any consequences.”
Aurora hesitated.
“But isn’t sending an inspector as a decoy too inhumane? We’re practically feeding him into the jaws of the beast.”
Noct looked outside the window, at the carriage in front of them.
Unlike their own, it was heavily decorated with Arcadia’s colors and insignia.
He had ascertained that whoever had silenced those four people would have anticipated an investigator from Arcadia.
Noct had therefore arranged for one to travel ahead of them…as bait.
As Aurora pointed out, it wasn’t the morally greatest thing to do, but—
“He agreed to it,” Noct shrugged.
“I can’t stop him if he wants to continue.”
Turning his attention back toward the carriage ahead, he noticed that the distance hadn’t changed much.
But just as he was about to get a closer look, a sudden gust blew into their own carriage, sending the curtain flapping against his face.
“Tch…” Noct pushed it aside and held it against the window frame.
“It’s quite windy around here, isn’t it?”
Now that he thought about it, the wind had been rather persistent when they set up camp yesterday as well.
At the time, he’d been too occupied with other things to give it much thought.
“Apparently, this region is home to fairies,” Aurora replied.
“Fairies?”
“It’s what people commonly call wind spirits.” She brushed a loose strand of hair away from her lips.
“The locals believe they live somewhere around here. Although, whether anyone has actually seen one is another matter.”
“I see…”
Noct glanced outside again.
The grass beside the road bent under another passing gust, while the banner ahead snapped loudly in the wind.
‘Wind spirits, huh?’
“Though, fairies aren’t the only things people say live around here,” Aurora added.
“My father’s been telling me that bandits have been especially active around here.”
Noct tilted his head in confusion.
“Nobody has dealt with them yet?”
“People have tried.” Aurora gestured toward the window.
“Apparently, the wind makes tracking them through mana rather difficult. By the time anyone comes looking, their trails are already scattered.”
He frowned, but now that she mentioned it, Noct realized that his mana sensitivity wasn’t as sharp as before.
He closed his eyes and tried to focus, only to feel mana drifting around with the wind in uneven streams.
‘So it wasn’t because I’m tired…’
Noelle’s voice suddenly rang out from the driver’s seat, snapping him out of his thoughts.
“Young Master, there are people approaching the inspector’s carriage from ahead.”
“Mmm.” Noct leaned forward.
“Be ready. Let’s see what they want first.”
“They appear to be knights from Altaire, Young Master.”
“Knights? How can you tell?”
“The insignia on their armor. And they’re wearing the city’s colors as well.”
From what Noct could see, several armored men had gathered around the carriage ahead.
One stood beside its window, speaking to the inspector, while another gestured toward a narrow road branching away from the main route.
Behind them, the carriages following Noct’s had begun slowing to a halt.
Someone farther back shouted a complaint, only to be answered by another voice telling them to wait their turn.
“Please remain in your carriages!” one of the knights called.
“We’re conducting advance inspections to reduce congestion at the city gates!”
A moment later, the Arcadia carriage began turning onto a smaller road.
“Where are they taking him?” Noct muttered.
But before either Noelle or Aurora could answer, another knight approached their carriage and requested to open the window.
He allowed it, and the man poked his head in.
“Good afternoon. My apologies for the delay,” he said, writing something on his notepad.
“We’ll only need a moment of your time.”
Noct ignored the greeting and pointed toward the departing carriage.
“Why is that one being taken somewhere else?”
“Ah, the Arcadia carriage? Official visitors are given are usually allowed to skip things here and there you see. Can’t have a representative of our landlord waiting in queue, can we?”
“How considerate,” Aurora remarked.
“It’s the least we can do, my lady.”
As per customs, the knight reached toward his belt and unfastened a small metal plaque before holding it before them.
It was Altaire’s plaque, only given to recognized officials and processes of the city.
If memories served him correctly, everything looked correct.
Noct glanced toward both Aurora and the driver’s seat, where Noelle had been inspecting the plaque as well.
After a moment, she nodded silently, finding nothing wrong with it either.
‘An official inspection…’
Attacking an investigator on the road was one thing.
Doing so after the city’s knights had openly taken custody of him, with this many witnesses around, was another.
“Everything appears to be in order,” the man said before heading off to check the carriages behind them.
The process only took a few minutes, but afterwards, they were on their way to Altaire.
Noct glanced at the carriages behind them, then at the road ahead, but a certain feeling continued to gnaw at him.
Noelle seemed to notice.
“Something the matter, Young Master?”
“Nothing, let’s continue onwards.”