Loren had no idea how things had ended up like this.
He was a foreign commander with a grudge against Transia, yet somehow, swept along by a dwarf's fiery temper, he'd become an enthusiastic supporter of the Transians in front of a group of dead people—and even bet the keepsake his wife had given him.
Once he'd cooled down, Loren deeply regretted it.
But at this point, there was no way he could back out of the bet. So the dwarf could only pray awkwardly to the Earth Mother in his heart, asking the merciful goddess to let the Transians salvage a little of his dignity on the battlefield.
Well, the fact that Loren had even thought those words was funny enough. The Earth Mother had probably heard his prayer and burst out laughing.
The stubborn Pharaoh of the Underworld didn't provoke him any further, either.
The dead were always quiet. Though it was still clear that he didn't believe Loren's assessment of the Transians, he was convinced that the living could never be more resilient than the dead, much less defeat them and win in ground combat, where courage and morale were tested even more severely.
That simply wasn't how things worked, all right?
He'd already decided that once he beat the dwarf, he'd return the pistol engraved with a young woman's name to the foul-mouthed dwarf with great magnanimity, delivering a double humiliation.
Well, the dead could hold grudges, too. At the very least, the dead of Sangha were a little petty and very vindictive.
Amid the tense, silent wait, the airship crossed the ruins of the third fortress two hours later and entered the central region of the Piligrand Oasis. It seemed the Goddess Gaia had truly heard Loren's prayer: right before their eyes, the Transians who