Chapter 231, A Score Unsettled

So… why did Lylia even participate in the Familiar Chalice in the first place?

She’d never seemed to be the kind of person who would do that, and would rather show off her own power instead.

Like, isn’t she supposed to be fighting on the front-front lines at Sodom?

So why was she here? Considering how far Sodom is from here, Regalia isn’t a place she could just visit on a whim.

And then there’s Seki’teigyu — why did she not give it a unique name? Why did she forge a presumably forceful Familiar Contract?

“We’ll go on ahead. You’re a powerful asset to our ranks, Poer — don’t you dare run away. Now, let’s go!”

Lylia called out to the wounded Seki’teigyu, and with a tremendous leap, both of them disappeared out of the coliseum.

Why is the Devil King’s army here?

Wait, no, that’s not the issue.

What I should be asking is, how come Lylia is here, at the place where they would be invading, right before their invasion?

I thought about it, and it took me no time at all to connect the dots.

Could it be that… Lylia knew that the Devil King’s army would be coming…!?

“…! So that’s it!?”

“M-Master…?”

Okay, now everything makes sense.

Why did Lylia participate in the Familiar Chalice?　It was so that Crimson King Ox’s overwhelming power could end the Familiar Chalice as quickly as possible.

Then Pochi and I came into the equation — Lylia just said that that I was a ‘powerful asset’. We had competed against her as a finalist of the Familiar Chalice in order to see how much stronger we had become. Pochi was the only participant in this Familiar Chalice who fought hard and head-on against the Crimson King Ox. Lylia is the type of person who won’t acknowledge an opponent until she witnesses their power with her own eyes. I can totally understand her saying what she had said.

But this is Regalia, the Holy City. How did the Devil King’s army show up in a place like this?

…I know. I SHOULD have known. Doing this is possible as long as there is ONE connection between Regalia and Sodom’s south…

…The Teleportation spell.

That totally never crossed my mind.

The Teleportation spell could very easily connect this place and Sodom.

I must’ve even pointed this out to Giorno before, too…!

As long as there’s a magic user among the Devilkin, they’d be able to get in all at once from all the way out there.

Lylia was here because she is a wielder of the Mind’s Eye. If the Apostles of Despair were to invade Regalia, the place would collapse from within.

She’s been staying here to prevent that from happening.

That’s probably why I haven’t seen Giorno around, too. He’s likely on the lookout for approaching forces from the outside, splitting with Lylia to better determine the path of the Devil King’s army.

I don’t know if the Devil King’s army knew about it, but fortunately, the Familiar Chalice is taking place now.

There are many powerful people here, especially Polco and June.

The enemy must have given up on trying to destroy the Nation from within. That’s why they showed up, coming in from outside of Regalia.

Although it’s fortunate that there are a lot of powerful people here, that can also backfire on us. Them successfully wiping out Regalia would mean that all their obstacles being eliminated in one swoop.

And then there’s the chance of burying the overwhelmingly charismatic Holy Emperor.

Then there’s the thing about Seki’teigyu. Instead of criticizing Lylia for allegedly forcing her Familiar Contract on the Ox, I should have thought about why she had to do it that way.

She simply didn’t have the time. A Familiar would greatly add to her combat capabilities, but if getting one took too long for her to join the Familiar Chalice, she would need to find some other way to end the tournament quickly.

That’s why Lylia chose that method out of urgent need. She had no other quick choice.

Besides, despite her overbearing personality, she’s an Elf at heart. A race that has been taught to value magic and magecraft would never have done such a thing.

She definitely has the attitude of a Holy Warrior, that Elf.

And that’s way different from how I am.

“–ter! Master!”

“H-hey, Shiro. You good to go?”

“Don’t give me that ‘you good to go yet, slowpoke?’ sir!”

Strange, I don’t remember saying anything like that.

“This is bad, sir! Everyone’s panicking! And the thing Master Polco said just now isn’t making things any better!”

That’s… true, yeah.

But this is Regalia, the Holy City. A place quite far away from danger.

It was obvious that chaos would ensue, yet Polco still decided to shout that out.

That was to inform me as soon as possible, because he had seen the power in me to be greater than the chaos.

Right now, Polco and June are already on the Holy Emperor’s side.

They’ll probably be stuck guarding him. There’s no telling when the Devil King’s army will make their way in here, after all.

“Father! Mother!”

“Chappie!”

Chappie came down from the audience seats.

And at the same time, I could feel Leon moving in my shirt.

“Ooh?”

“Boy, what an incredible baby you are…”

“As-lee~!”

Leon is roughly shaking the knot of the baby carrier.

He couldn’t get it off, but with that, he managed to communicate to me what he wanted.

He’s suggesting me to ‘switch,’ so that I’d be able to fight to the fullest.

I obeyed his wishes, taking the baby carrier off me and putting it on Chappie instead.

“I’ll leave Leole– no, LEON to you, Chappie Mask!”

“But of course! I am the hero of justice, Chappie Mask!”

“Go to Master Polco and ask for instructions. The Holy Emperor will probably do something about the panic. Don’t take your eyes off Bright and Ferris.”

“Aye, aye, sir!”

Chappie dexterously saluted with his wing and flew up to the honored guests’ seats.

“All right, time to go!”

“Have fun, sir!”

“You’re not supposed to mess around NOW, damn it! Rise! All Up: Count 2 & Remote Control!”

“Ahahahaha, you’ve changed quite a lot, Master!”

“Huh? What’re you talking about?”

I asked while hopping on Pochi’s back.

“Do you remember what happened when we first set off on our journey, sir? And the thing you said when you first saw Reid and his sisters?”

…Huh, what’d I say, again?

Thinking about it now, even though I’ve lived for practically an eternity, I feel like my life has been much more fulfilling these past few years since the day I started this journey.

It hasn’t even been a decade, but those days felt longer than the five thousand years before then — quite an interesting phenomenon.

What did I say when I first saw Reid, though? …Huh? Aha.

“Yeah, you’re right… But rather than changed, it’s more like I’ve grown up, I guess.”

“Ahahaha, so you remember it now?”

“Reid and the others were under attack, and when I saw them, I said ‘we gotta bail while we can,’ right?”

“You better thank me for stopping you from doing that, sir! If I hadn’t pushed you to do some work back then, those three wouldn’t be alive now!”

Okay, she’s right.

I do have a lot of stuff to thank Pochi for.

“Yeah, yeah, thank you very much, Shiro-doggo! Here, drink up!”

“Gulp–!”

I poured some Pochibitan D into Pochi’s skyward-facing mouth.

“Rise, Giving Magic & Remote Control!”

“…? Isn’t Giving Magic supposed to be a fixed-position type, sir?”

“And it still is a fixed-position type, yeah.”

“Hmm… so you’ve finally lost your mind, then?”

“I’ll explain it later! Just follow Lylia and get us out of this city!”

“Bah! You better remember to tell me about it, sir!”

How these “fixed-position” spells work is that upon casting, an invisible layer is formed over the target surface with arcane energy, and then the Spell Circle is placed onto it.

Using Remote Control to position that layer under Pochi’s feet, she can regenerate arcane energy while on the move.

Pochi, motivated by her desire to know that secret, leaped super high — probably as high as Lylia could, landing on top of the Colosseum’s outer wall in a single bound.

“By the way, Pochi…”

“Yes, sir?”

“Congrats on winning the Familiar Chalice.”

“………Huh? What are you talking about, sir?”

“Lylia, your opponent’s Master, called a surrender at the end of the round. That means you won.”

“………Huh!?”

“Hey!　You can’t just stand up like this!　I haven’t trained my abs to the Holy Warrior level yet!”

“WHAT!? REALLY!? HUH!? ME!? I WON!?”

“Hahahahaha, rejoice, Pochi-doggo!　The title of Strongest Familiar is yours… or at least an ancient version of it!”

“I… I… I…… I–”

…Is she smiling?

“IT’S SO HALF-ASSED!!”

Nope.

But despite her words, Pochi’s face is relaxed. She’s actually happy.

Besides, one look at her tail is enough to tell.

“Now! The future is in our hands, doggo! LET’S GOOOOOO!!”

“OOOHHHHHH! WE’RE GONNA WIN! AND WE’RE GONNA GO HOME!”

We both shouted to convince ourselves that we could do it.

But…

“I wanna go home!”

“Me too, sir!”

Faced with endless hordes of monsters, we shook like hell, cried a few rivers, and generally cowered in despair.