“What’s wrong with you guys?” Claud asked, looking at the others.

  Dia stared at him in silence. It was a given that he noticed the sudden change in everyone, given the fact that the others had all also froze over when they heard Lesser Half talk about the things Claud had seen in the Second Tutorial and the steps that he had taken to avert it.

  However, there was a very fundamental question that Dia needed an answer to.

  What qualifications did he have to see such a future?

  Lesser Half hummed for a moment, and then floated away from the table. “It would seem that there is an urgent need to confer between yourselves. I will abstain from listening into these very private conversations, so do air whatever issues you people have.”

  Dia looked at the surprisingly tactful divinity, and then kept silent as the little cube floated out of the room. The door closed behind them a moment later, and Nero made an audible sigh.

  The air thickened as he snapped a skillstick, and Nero folded his arms. “Alright. No one’s going to eavesdrop on us now. Dia, do you want to do it, or do you want us to do it?”

  Dia shook her head. “It’s my problem. I’ll speak.”

  She glanced at the two lovebirds, who now had contemplative expressions, and then cleared her throat. “Okay, I’ll put this upfront. Do the two of you know anything about the existence called the Frozen Emperor?”

  If she wasn’t watching them closely, if she didn’t know them that well, Dia was sure that she would have missed them jerk by a tiny bit. It was significant, in more ways than one — the jerk represented their surprise, and the fact that it was so muted meant that this was something that they actively tried to hide from Dia and the others.

  “…Looks like you know,” Schwarz muttered. “Right, Claud?”

  Claud looked at the bartender, and then folded his arms. “Yeah. What of it?”

  “Wise of you to not lie,” Schwarz replied. “So. You knew about this back then, during your Second Tutorial? Why didn’t you tell us about it?”

  “It wasn’t convenient,” Claud replied. “Anyway, how did you guys learn about it? I thought the Red God’s death would have made that future vanish.”

  “You seem awfully confident that we only got this knowledge recently,” Schwarz pointed out. “Why?”

  “You would have asked us back then,” Claud replied. “Duh? Anyway, I deemed it wise not to tell you guys. I was banking on Lesser Half to bail us out if anything bad really happened to us.”

  Dia frowned. “What exactly was the deal you made?”

  Claud thought for a moment. “Protection, basically.”

  He looked a little shifty as he said those words, and Dia sighed. It would seem that his preservation instincts had kicked in after he and Lily knew about the Frozen Emperor, so he went to do a trade with Lesser Half and succeeded. That said, while it was a rule not to pry into each other’s secrets, Dia — and the others, probably — felt that not telling them about this insane future was also a problem.

  “You should have told us from the start,” Nero replied.

  “Yeah, well, there was never a good time to,” Claud replied. “We only received this knowledge in the middle of our honeymoon, and the next time we reunited, there were a whole bunch of pressing things going on. At that moment, we decided not to burden you guys with even more bad news…anyway, I’m a bit curious, what did you see?”

  “Why are you looking at me?” Dia asked.

  “Are you not the one who learned all these things?” Claud asked, curious. “I mean, you brought it up first.”

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  “That I did, I suppose.” Dia folded her arms. “Still…well, it is indeed me.”

  Lily tilted her head. “Okay, so what happened? Claud saw it in his Second Tutorial, but since it happened recently, unless you’re a high-ranked folder now…”

  “Don’t even mention it.” Dia made a growl in her throat. The fact that she had seemingly lost a hundred years of life, not to mention the trauma that she had by dying in various horrible ways, still made her pissed. It was a wonder that she didn’t develop some post-death fear from dying so many times, to be honest…

  “Okay, looks like I stepped on a nerve here,” Claud muttered.

  Dia snorted, patted the stirring Beth to sleep again, and then said, “Around ten or so days ago, I abruptly got a quest from presumably the five grand skies, stating that the Omen had grown even stronger or something. This quest would have me live through a certain future that the Omen had gotten rid of, in an attempt to find the source of his strength.”

  “That’s fascinating.” Lily rubbed her hands. “Quests! So, uh, what happened next?”

  “I spent the next ten days dying in my dreams,” Dia replied. “Horribly, too.”

  She ran through a recount of what she had experienced, and the lovebirds grew contemplative. They, too, had their own thoughts about what was going on…in other words, they probably had their own understanding of the issue at hand. The only question was what they saw.

  “What did you guys see?” Dia asked.

  “Hmm.” Claud pondered for a moment. “I can’t quite describe it, but the things I saw during my Second Tutorial was a bit different from yours.”

  “I-is that so…”

  Claud pondered for a moment. “Well, what I saw was far inferior to what you saw, at least. The things I saw were quite limited, although…not everyone died, you know?”

  “Eh?” Dia blinked.

  “Eh? Some of us survived?” Farah looked at the lovebirds. “Who?”

  “Well…” Claud folded his arms, his eyes swimming with thoughts. Dia couldn’t help but wonder what she had in mind, although she also had a feeling that Lily would be the first person to stop her from prying…

  “Go on,” Nero prompted. “Who survived?”

  “…I am fairly certain that Kemata survived, at least,” Claud replied, his words slow and methodical. “The ending was quite inconclusive, and I only saw the whole thing for a few days before light filled the world and my Second Tutorial ended. I only learned that the Red God turned mad or something, which was apparently the trigger.”

  “I see.” Dia frowned. Was that it? True, she wouldn’t put it past the incarnation of paranoia himself to prepare on such a drastic scale, but…it still felt odd. This would explain the deal he had with Lesser Half, though.

  “That’s pretty much it,” Lily added. “So, uh, what happened on your side?”

  “My side?” Dia made a face. “Yeah, so I got this nifty thing called a Shard of Creation.”

  “You’re the new divinity?” Claud asked, visibly shocked.

  “Nope. I don’t know what the heck that is,” Dia replied, shaking her head. Of course, she was half-expecting this reaction from the two lovebirds who didn’t know anything, especially since the others were also equally mystified by Lesser Half’s explanation earlier. “But I do have a Shard of Creation…”

  “…That’s troublesome. We’ll not speak of this ever again,” Claud replied. “Besides, I think you got it wrong. It’s probably a Sliver of, uh, Life or something, see? Yeah, that’s what it is.”

  Dia blinked at that bald lie, and then nodded. “Yeah. A Sliver of Life, I suppose? Indeed, that makes a lot of sense. Lots and lots of sense.”

  After tacitly agreeing to rewrite the whole thing, Claud let out a sigh, and everyone else followed suit. Dia herself could see why Claud was so nervous; who was to say that Lesser Half wouldn’t attack everyone if the news that she was the one who got a Shard of Creation from nowhere leaked out?

  This was also proof that Claud and Lily probably didn’t trust the divinities too much, even the human-friendly Lesser Half…

  “Anyhow, it’s good that you guys are safe,” Claud muttered, before gesturing at the food. “We’ll be joining you guys at the front for some time, by the way. That was part of the deal we made with Emperor Grandis…and more importantly, don’t leave the food here hanging.”

  “That’s your focus?” Schwarz asked. “Really?”

  “You don’t sound that convincing with five different bottles of wine around you,” Claud shot back.

  Dia rolled her eyes as the two of them began to quibble with each other again, before reflecting on the conversation. While Claud had provided a perfectly good explanation for the whole thing, she couldn’t help but feel like that fellow was still lying to her.

  There wasn’t any evidence or things like that; it was purely her hunch. However, this explanation…sounded a bit odd. Why would Claud have a Second Tutorial that showed him such a future? True, there were recorded cases of such incidents — Dia knew that quite well — but this was quite the coincidence.

  “You doubt him,” a quiet voice murmured, and Dia turned around to see Kemata.

  “…Just my instincts,” Dia replied. “You?”

  “Mhm. Instincts, too.” Kemata gazed at the two of them. “Also, Lily is…a septa-folder, probably.”

  “Wait, what?” Dia narrowed her eyes.

  Kemata nodded. “You should ask them about that too. More…interactions are required to make a proper judgement on their usual behaviour. However, I cannot help but feel that Claud is hiding something.”

  Dia grunted. “Yeah…”

  Next to her, Beth gurgled.