That was why Setsuna's gaze had never left the direction the blood arrow had come from.
Her nerves taut, she kept her hand on the weapon at her waist and warily scanned her surroundings, never letting her guard down for a moment.
Until-
A hand gently patted her shoulder.
"It's all right now."
It was Qiji.
At some point, he had come to Setsuna's side.
Setsuna stiffened slightly, but his words did not make her lower her guard completely. "Really? Why?"
An enemy capable of such a terrifying attack had to possess unfathomable strength.
If their opponent launched a few more attacks, even if Qiji could protect himself, the Class Eight "baggage" would surely suffer heavy casualties.
Why had that powerful enemy hiding in the shadows stopped attacking?
And what made Qiji so certain they were safe?
As if sensing Setsuna's confusion, Qiji smiled. "Haven't you noticed? Lao Yue... is gone."
At the mention of Yuejian, Setsuna was still full of anger. "I noticed ages ago! As soon as his shift ended, that guy-"
At that point, Setsuna suddenly understood what Qiji meant, and her eyes widened in disbelief.
"You mean... it was that unreliable bastard...?"
"Actually, he's not that unreliable." Qiji spoke casually.
"You can trust him once in a while. Of course, I did say 'once in a while'~~"
No sooner had Qiji finished speaking than a cool voice came from the side, interrupting his conversation with Setsuna.
"Qiji."
It was Liuli.
At some point, she had extricated herself from the group of girls and now stood gracefully a few steps away from them.
Moonlight outlined her slender figure, and her long, misty-purple hair stirred in the night breeze.
When Qiji saw Liuli, something occurred to him, and his expression changed.
Almost immediately, he moved the Sword of No Thought behind his back. He had only just retrieved it from the war eagle's corpse, and he had already grown attached to it.
Chapter 44: Women Like Her Are the Shrewdest
Liuli rolled her eyes at him in exasperation.
Thanks to the girl's maxed-out character model, even that gesture had a charm of its own.
Liuli held out her hand, palm up, directly in front of Qiji. "The sword."
"Sword? What sword?" Qiji tried to play dumb.
"The one you're hiding behind your back."
Playing dumb had failed.
Qiji immediately put on a look of realization. He brought the sword in front of him and stroked it, unable to bear letting it go.
"Oh! You mean this? This sword is amazing!
"I really have it to thank for what happened just now!
"It's incredibly sharp, and it feels great in my hand! It's practically tailor-made for me!
"That's right, tailor-made!
"It handles so perfectly! Ah, if only I had one too!"
As Qiji spoke, he gave the sword a deft flourish.
The bright silver blade traced a graceful arc through the air, drawing another round of suppressed "oohs" from several girls nearby who had been secretly sneaking glances at Qiji.
The barrage was delighted by the sight.
"Hahahaha! Here we go, here we go! Prisoner Ji's ultimate freeloading technique!"
"'Sword? What sword?' 'This sword is amazing.' 'Practically tailor-made for me.' 'If only I had one too'-the art of speaking, by Prisoner Ji!"
"Liuli: My native language is speechlessness."
"Hajiqi, if you really want it, you don't have to be so roundabout! Just beg Sister Liuli. Would she really refuse to give it to you once?"
"Prisoner Ji asks, and Liuli gives?"
"Previous commenter, I'm afraid she really won't. The bad woman's jealous right now! Why else do you think she came to ask for the sword right after Prisoner Ji hugged Lili?"
"I'm dying! So it's jealousy after all!"
If Liuli knew the barrage was judging her with such petty minds, she would surely be angry.
After all, she wasn't asking for the Sword of No Thought back because she was jealous!
Why would she be jealous?
What was there to be jealous of?
How could she possibly be jealous?
At the end of the day, Qiji wasn't anyone special to her. They were nothing more than ordinary classmates.
So the idea that she was jealous was ridiculous to begin with.
The main reason she had come to ask for the sword now was-
"Qiji, this sword needs to be refined through a special method to maintain its power.
"Whenever you need it, you can come to me. I won't refuse."
There was another reason Liuli hadn't mentioned: if anyone found out that Qiji had the sword, the Kamishiro Family would never let him off.
It would put him in danger.
Hearing that, Qiji knew Liuli wasn't lying to him.
The Echo inscribed on the Sword of No Thought diminished with each use, and its power could only be restored in the hands of a member of the Kamishiro Family.
When Liuli took the sword back from Qiji, the barrage began scrolling again.
"Come to me whenever you need it. I won't refuse! Guys, is this a confession? This has to be a confession, right?!"
"Liuli's love brainstorm battle!"
"Prisoner Ji! You've fallen for it! With something like a sword, lending it back and forth is how feelings develop!"
"I'm dying! Bad women really are the shrewdest!"
Although this mission had run into numerous complications along the way, including an unexpected incident far beyond their expectations, it could still be considered a successful completion.
Apart from a lucky few, almost everyone in Class Eight was injured.
Everyone was filthy and disheveled.
But fortunately, none of the students had died.
That was already an exceptionally rare outcome.
By comparison, the caravan they had escorted had suffered far worse.
Most of the caravan members were ordinary people who had not awakened an Echo, and they had been almost powerless to fight back against the ferocious Void Beasts.
After taking stock, they found that three had died and seven were seriously injured...
The caravan boss, on the other hand, had been lucky. He had only been affected by a little fly venom.
The venom's effects had been temporarily suppressed by a potion, and aside from some lingering numbness and stiffness, he was in no serious trouble.
He forced himself to thank Qiji and the Class Eight students, but there was little joy on his face. Instead, he looked as though he had aged more than ten years in an instant.
On this trip, not only had he lost most of his cargo, but more importantly, several of the men who had worked with him for years had died.
Leaving aside the emotional blow, the compensation alone was enough to make it difficult for his already low-margin caravan to keep operating.
He squatted to one side, staring blankly at his men's corpses and the wrecked wagons.
Seeing this, Qiji couldn't help recalling the line written in the plot summary-
"The potions were delivered safely. Ten caravan members died, and all cargo was lost."
In the original plot, although there had been no beast tide, the caravan's fate had been even more tragic than it was now.
Of course, those details had only been mentioned in passing in the story.
That was the state of the world.
Tragedies played out every moment, yet on the page, they were recorded in a single short line.
Qiji thought for a moment, then walked over.
"Boss, you might still be able to recover some of the cargo you left over by the canyon."
"?!"
At his words, the caravan boss looked up sharply, a glimmer of hope returning to his eyes.
"R-really? Is that possible? But aren't there still a lot of Void Beasts over there...?"
"It's fine, because I've already dealt with all the Void Beasts in the canyon."
"What?!" The caravan boss and the Class Eight students who had overheard him were all stunned.
He had dealt with all of them?
By himself?
In such a short time?
They had thought Qiji had withdrawn after delaying the beasts long enough.
But now he was saying that he hadn't covered their retreat-he had wiped them all out???
Did he have to be that outrageous?!
The caravan boss stared blankly at Qiji, his lips trembling. For a long time, he couldn't speak. At last, he said heavily, his voice thick with tears:
"...Thank goodness, thank goodness! This time, the one protecting us was you... Lord Qiji..."
He knew perfectly well that, under normal circumstances, the meager commission he had offered would only have been enough to hire a few half-baked Echoers at best.
They might even have been novices who had only recently awakened and come to try their luck in the rift.
If that had been the case, their caravan would probably have had no chance of surviving tonight's ordeal.
The masked young man before him had dragged them back from the gates of death and now given them a sliver of hope of recovering their losses.
Come to think of it, it was all his own fault. He had known perfectly well that the rift had been dangerous lately.
Almost every caravan traveling through had run into trouble, yet he had insisted on going anyway.
The group returned to the narrow canyon.
Although they had been mentally prepared, when they saw the devastation inside the canyon, as though a storm had plowed through it, they all couldn't help drawing a sharp breath.
They looked at Qiji with awe.
After taking some time to recover from their shock, the caravan members composed themselves and began searching for their cargo.
Seeing this, the Class Eight students stepped forward to help.
Qiji, meanwhile, immediately retrieved his trench coat, carefully brushed off the dust, and put it back on.
Then, looking at the Void Beast corpses as they turned transparent and irreversibly began to disappear, Qiji felt it was a pity.