“……!”

Contrary to the expectation that they would be happy, the faces of the Nox remained listless.

Nigel Ars saw resignation in their listlessness.

In the midst of unbearable pain day after day, hope was not something easily held. The sense of loss, emptiness, and futility when the only cherished hope was shattered could not be expressed in words.

Yes, they had given up on expecting anything. Just to endure and survive each day.

‘Just like……’

Unable to finish the thought, Nigel Ars clenched her fist tightly.

It was then.

Someone tugged on Nigel Ars’s sleeve.

Nigel Ars turned her head and then lowered it.

Below her gaze were innocent eyes, redder than the sunset or fire, that had not lost hope.

It was a young Nox who had not been visible in the cage. The child, collared like the other Nox, looked about the same age as Benny, the youngest at the orphanage.

Perhaps the adult Nox had hidden the child in their embrace, fearing the humans who came to this room might harm them. Some reached out desperately, unable to approach Nigel Ars.

The young Nox let go of Nigel Ars’s sleeve and took something out of their pocket to offer.

It was none other than a round egg about the size of a fist.

And then, slowly, the small mouth opened.

“……This.”

“……!”

To think a Nox could speak.

Wondering if she had heard wrong, Nigel Ars whipped her head around, and Noah Beselion’s reaction was not much different from hers.

Then a small, bony hand grasped Nigel Ars’s fingers.

“This…… I’ll give you. So please help our mother and family.”

The hand holding the sleeve trembled helplessly.

A Nox capable of human speech did not exist in any records. If this fact were revealed, this child’s fate would become doubly harsh.

The child seemed to know this too. Even so, the child risked their life to muster courage. Just to confirm the possibility that Nigel Ars and Noah were good people.

Nigel Ars saw herself in those eyes where the light had not yet gone out.

She had once guarded the front door of an empty house, hoping someone familiar would open it and enter with a bright smile.

……She did not want to take away this child’s hope, their light.

Nigel Ars slowly knelt down. And met the child’s gaze.

And carefully embraced the small but enormous body carrying so much.

At the warmth of direct contact, the child who had been standing firmly with both feet on the ground slowly collapsed into Nigel Ars’s arms.

As the shoulders began to heave up and down, Nigel Ars suddenly pulled the child away from her embrace.

When the child’s eyes, filled with emotions of confusion and hurt from hope, were about to slowly lose their light.

Swish.

Nigel Ars extended her hand to the child.

“……Guest, shall we make a deal?”

And she smiled brightly, using words the child must have heard most often.

The child’s eyes wavered, losing their way, then filled with moisture like a red sun.

People grasped each other’s hands and shook them up and down in front of them.

The child’s red eyes shone at this strange act they had never seen before.

But they came to know that this act was something that family members took away from them one by one, something absolutely forbidden between Nox and humans.

As more time passed, they learned that when humans talked among themselves, the conversations were long, but when humans spoke to Nox, the words became short.

And yet, before the child’s eyes appeared the hand of a human woman who had spoken at length to a Nox.

The human woman was different from others. Even when still, her undisguised warm energy put one at ease, and her embrace was warm.

Tap. The child’s small hand grasped Nigel Ars’s hand.

And shook it up and down. The child’s first-ever handshake did not make anyone disappear, and it was fun.

Nigel Ars tried to return the egg to the child but ultimately failed.

The adult Nox collectively softened their expressions when Nigel Ars accepted the egg, but conversely became expressionless when Nigel Ars tried to return it to the child.

And decisively.

“We made…… a deal.”

The child’s tearful voice instantly broke Nigel Ars’s firm resolve.

Nigel Ars put the mysterious egg that had ended up in her possession into her jacket pocket and approached Noah Beselion.

“Beselion, how do we escape from here with about twenty Nox without any trouble?”

“Uh……”

Noah’s eyes, which had moistened at the touching scene between Nigel Ars and the young child, instantly dried up.

Even thinking optimistically, ten people including the child was the limit.

“……Then let me change the question. Between escaping with the Nox and completely overturning the auction house. Which one has a higher possibility?”

“Honestly speaking, Allen’s group showing up here seems more likely.”

“I guess you’re right. Let’s start by looking for what we can do.”

Nigel Ars interlaced her fingers and stretched upwards.

“Then shall we start by aiming to remove those suspicious necklaces they’re wearing?”

“Good idea.”

Noah and Nigel Ars approached the Nox.

Contrary to worries about possible rejection, they made room for the pair to come closer.

Nigel Ars closed her eyes and focused on the flow of mana.

Their vast mana was blocked by the shackles on their necks, unable to come out.

Moreover, since traces of mana formulas could be faintly felt from the necklaces, they couldn’t be carelessly destroyed either.

“How is it?”

“Can’t just break them with brute force. These necklaces are blocking the flow of mana, and there’s some unknown mana formula cast on them.”

“……Then how about choosing to overturn the auction house?”

“If it were just you and me, we might somehow manage, but with so many people to protect, it seems difficult. Also, we don’t know when these people might be dragged away while we’re fighting.”

Haah.

Sighs escaped simultaneously.

The situation was difficult.

If only Allen, Sid, and Yenica had all come together, they might have been able to escape somehow, but with woefully insufficient information and limited combat-capable personnel, even planning had its limits.

‘No, instead of regretting what can’t be done, let’s think about what can be done and what we have.’

Nigel Ars coolly assessed the situation.

But all they had was Nigel Ars’s misfortune and Noah Beselion’s reputation as an unfilial son.

“Wait a minute……”

Suddenly, a good plan flashed through Nigel Ars’s mind.

“Right, this is just like chess. Even if I only have a knight and a pawn left, I win if I take down the opponent’s king.”

“Nigel……?”

Noah spoke, trying hard to hide his unease.

“We go for the head. Not capturing the numerous pawns.”

“That’s all well and good, but how do you explain this cage?”

Tchak.

Nigel Ars’s finger pointed at Noah.

“The people in the reception room should be waking up by now, so your image will solve everything. After all, you’re not some goody-two-shoes who takes Amoria because you don’t want to forcibly receive others’ mana, but Noah Beselion, the unfilial son who cut ties with his family.”

“……Somehow, it’s all disparaging content about me, isn’t it?”

“Oh! You caught the speaker’s intention.”

Nigel Ars regained her smile.

What did it matter if he was really a pushover or an unfilial son, when the real Nigel Ars was smiling playfully right in front of him.

Noah, happy just to have Nigel Ars by his side, smiled back and willingly followed behind her.

Nigel Ars and Noah, along with the young Nox dangling from Noah’s shoulder, thus came to participate in the resumed unfilial son project.

Nigel Ars’s misfortune didn’t go anywhere, and they encountered an employee as soon as they left the room.

Thanks to the Beselion name’s value, permission to meet Count Lumen was quickly granted, and the employee volunteered to act as a guide first.

As they followed the guide, as Nigel Ars had said, rumors seemed to have spread, and the number of people who were greatly surprised at seeing Noah decreased considerably.

“……That’s right, all of you feel relieved. I’ll catch you when you’re most off guard.”

Nigel Ars’s savage lines were heard intermittently, but even those were sweet whispers to Noah.

“It’s here.”

They finally arrived in front of Count Lumen’s room.

How Nigel Ars’s foul predictions never missed, Count Lumen’s door was exactly the same as Histon’s and the Nox’s.

Nigel Ars pushed aside her unpleasant feelings and approached the door.

She intended to see with her own eyes exactly what this Count Lumen, whom Sid and Allen had insisted couldn’t be such a good person, looked like.

Creeak.

The door opened.

At the same time, voices were heard through the gap in the door.

‘He had guests when he called for people?’

Nigel Ars’s brow was about to furrow at Lumen’s rudeness.

“Honestly speaking, Allen’s group showing up here seems more likely.” @italics

A weapon she had failed to remember, buried in her misfortune, came to mind.

For the first time, fortune had visited beyond the pure white door that had always been full of misfortune.

“Ah, you’re here?”

Three welcome faces were sitting comfortably, waiting for Nigel Ars and Noah.