Dayton was immediately filled with disbelief after hearing the circumstances from Yerna.
“What? This person was your superior when you were in your previous unit?”
“Right, you fool!”
“That’s ridiculous…!”
Upon hearing Yerna’s explanation, Dayton quickly looked at Gordon.
He was rubbing his jaw where he had been struck, and it started to approach him with overwhelming guilt.
“I’m really sorry! I think I misunderstood!”
“It’s alright, it’s fine. You’re quite strong for a young one. I can still feel a bit of a sting in my jaw.”
Gordon waved his other hand as if to say not to worry.
Dayton’s fist was indeed strong, but it wasn’t enough to cause him to completely unreact. Since it was an unexpected attack, he had been flustered and couldn’t entirely evade it, but he was able to turn his head slightly right before the punch made contact, reducing the force of the blow.
Even so, he momentarily lost his focus.
However, seeing him charge in without thinking because he believed his wife was in danger shows that he must really love her.
Gordon chuckled at this and said, “Yerna really does have a good husband, haha.”
“Ha, ha, ha…”
“Haha…”
After the awkward laughter subsided, Gordon suddenly asked Yerna, “Well, now that the misunderstanding is cleared up, what are you going to do now?”
Yerna hesitated, closing her mouth without an immediate response.
Dayton already had his concerns about getting involved in such matters.
He had a strong anxiety about things going wrong due to a mistake in situations like this.
Of course, his feelings were understandable.
However, he couldn’t just give up after coming this far.
“Of course, we have to go,” Yerna said.
Dayton, seeming to have been waiting for her confirmation, replied, “Are you really going? After all this?”
“Yes, I can’t just leave it like this. Don’t you remember what happened with Dylan?”
“That’s… a thing of the past.”
“But this isn’t finished yet.”
Yerna was resolute.
“There are plenty of others who can handle this without you risking your life, right?”
It was the same reasoning as before.
She could leave it to someone else, even if it wasn’t her.
Previously, she had accepted this logic.
But this time, Yerna shook her head.
“No, this is something I absolutely have to do.”
After all, it involved her child, Luke.
She couldn’t trust anyone else to handle it.
It couldn’t be left unattended.
If anything, because of her failure to take down Dylan before, Luke had almost been seriously hurt.
So, she thought that this time, she had to resolve things herself.
In case new problems arose again, she didn’t want to feel remorse later for having left it in someone else’s hands.
“……”
Seeing Yerna’s determination, Dayton could no longer try to dissuade her.
She was as tenacious as she was efficient as a Forest Keeper.
Even if he continued to hold her back here, she likely wouldn’t listen.
From that look in her eyes, it was probably clear that if he kept stopping her, she would just knock him out of the way.
Therefore, Dayton was left with only one choice.
With a sigh, he said, “Haah. Then I’ll help you. I can’t just let you go alone after coming this far. My abilities will be useful.”
Indeed, he had a special ability.
Magic Detection.
A sense that could perceive the subtle flow of magic that ordinary people couldn’t feel.
His keen sensitivity could easily find ambushes or traps that GPS might not detect.
If Dayton lent a hand, it would be a significant help.
“Thank you.”
Yerna smiled, finally seeming relieved at Dayton’s offer to help instead of stopping her.
She wasn’t exactly thrilled about needing to rely on family.
Meanwhile, Gordon, watching the scene, muttered as he tipped down his hat.
“That really is a perfect match.”
——
“Alpha area clear, no unusual occurrences… none so far.”
“Great, then we can move as planned.”
“Understood. Let’s move right away.”
Gordon wasn’t lying when he said he had prepared the location; it was going smoothly.
At this rate, they might be able to gather information and get out without any major issues.
At that moment, Dayton spoke up.
“By the way, doesn’t it seem strange that these guys are so heavily armed? Where did they get all that?”
“It is certainly unusual.”
They were heavily armed, even among Forest Keepers.
With robes and cloaks coated in powerful defensive magic, real-time communication devices, and various motion detection sensors along with traps and alarms.
Moreover, the facility’s security personnel were holding staves roughly the size of small children, made for casting powerful magic instead of the usual combat-type canes.
It seemed as if they were preparing for war.
This raised a question.
“Wasn’t this just a storage facility for medical supplies? What reason could there be for such armor?”
“Could it be that the facility is that important? But with this level of armament, they would stand out even more…”
No matter how used to equipment smuggling a group might be, there is a significant cost difference between small canes and those large staves.
The cost to remove the limits on the staffs was substantial enough, and considering the expense of smuggling them, on average, a single large magic staff would be worth over thirty regular illegally modified canes.
Therefore, to assume that such armament was just to “protect unauthorized anesthetics” was far too naive.
No matter how criminal an organization might be, their funds and resources were not infinite.
That would mean that the importance of this facility was high enough to warrant that level of expenditure…
“Is it to adequately defend the facility from intrusions? Or is it…?”
At that moment.
“Yerna, hide!”
Detecting something, Dayton embraced the lost-in-thought Yerna and hid in the corner.
Then, urgently running personnel rushed down the hallway as a loud alarm blared.
—Beep, beep—.
“Damn it, it’s causing a commotion again.”
“Really, it’s always something serious.”
Surprised, Yerna whispered as she hid. “Could they have discovered us? We shouldn’t have made any mistakes until now…”
“No, upon closer inspection, it doesn’t seem like it’s because of us.”
They looked like they had a definitive goal rather than a search objective.
It seemed something else had occurred elsewhere.
Just then.
—Alpha to Owlgirl, we have several troops approaching the Alpha area. What’s going on?
Suddenly aware of troop movement, Gordon communicated telepathically.
At that, one of the personnel who had been moving stopped.
“……?”
He looked around with a puzzled expression.
Then someone next to him asked why he had stopped.
“What’s wrong?”
“No, I felt a subtle flow of magic.”
“What? Really?”
At his words, Yerna and Dayton silently screamed.
Coincidentally, he had the same ability as Dayton.
Gordon’s telepathy utilized encrypted magic wave pulses that generally couldn’t be overheard from outside, directly communicating into the brain.
Yet, since it was undoubtedly magic, it could not hide the subtle movements of magical energy.
So, someone with keen sensitivity could indeed catch on.
“Hmm…”
And then he slowly approached them.
But it was then.
“Hey! Are you pretending to detect magic just to slack off? Do you want to get scolded by the manager? Hurry up and come!”
“Ah, okay. I’m going now.”
—Tatatak—
After catching a glimpse of the backs of them peeking out from around the corner and disappearing, both Dayton and Yerna let out simultaneous sighs.
“Phew…”
“Huh…”
Then Dayton shot a resentful thought towards the telepathy.
“Old man, we were hidden and almost got discovered because of you!”
—Young man, don’t blame me. If you’re hidden, you should have cut off the signal…
“Yerna, does this make any sense to you?”
At Dayton’s question, Yerna tilted her head as if she didn’t understand.
“What? What did Gordon just say in telepathy? I couldn’t hear it since you said he cut it off while hiding.”
“……”
It was their side that failed to observe the common sense.
‘Well, at least we were lucky to be safe…’
—–
Meanwhile, Luke was…
“When you go out and come back, it’s common to wash up. Now, first, your hair is all dry, so try combing it yourself.”
“Okay!”
“Got it!”
The response was loud and energetic.
With a sigh, Luke thought that at 8 years old, they should be a bit more settled down.
It was difficult to bathe them with how playful kids always tended to be.
Right now, it was already stressful to think about whether he would be able to wash them properly in a hot spring.
Honestly, he was uncertain.
‘Hmm, I guess I’ll have to ask Yerna for help then.’
Thinking this, Luke began to comb his hair.
One noticeable change since transforming was that his hair was similar to that of an animal, causing the time spent combing it to double compared to before.
Especially under his ears where the hair tended to clump together easily, it had to be carefully combed before it did.
Luke was holding his ears while looking in the mirror and slowly grooming the fur.
While doing so, Diana hurriedly called out to him.
“Luke, Luke!”
“What is it, Diana?”
“Pyris is pulling out her hair with a comb!”
