-----Roxy POV-----
inaudible noises
Mn?
Did I pass out?
inaudible noises
As I pushed myself up from the mattress, my palms pressing into the worn fabric for leverage, a sting flared sharply across my forehead.
"Urgh... What happened..."
I pressed my hand against my forehead in response to the pain, and slowly, the last fragments of my memory surfaced.
"Oh... That's right... I saved the village..."
After the goblins scuffed back retreating, I cast Columbiums to pour out the fire ravaging the village.
"I must have overexerted myself and ended up passing out..."
I looked around the unfamiliar room, taking in the humble furniture, my eyes catching on a folded blanket and a basin of water left near the bedside before muffled voices from beyond the front door pulled my attention away.
I could barely make out what was being said, but I could grasp the underlying tone of the conversation was one of distress.
I swung my legs off the mattress and got up, only to notice I'd been changed into a set of clothes noticeably bigger than my size. I tugged at the collar, glancing down at the sleeves swallowing my hands. Showing myself to the people who'd cared for me dressed like that would be far too embarrassing, so... nothing bad would come of simply eavesdropping on the conversation a little first, right?
As I weighed whether to announce myself awake or not, I crept forward and realized I'd wandered as far as what seemed to be the living room. I pressed myself against the wall just outside it, peeking around the edge with one eye. There were four people conversing around the wooden table, all of them wearing tired looks, but the two men at opposite ends of the table carried deep, dark circles under their eyes, their haggard expressions showing they'd been dealing with a great deal of stress.
-----Narrator POV-----
"Paul... I understand your point but we are in the middle of fall! No merchants will be willing to negotiate a trade at a fair market price when we are at the edge of winter season!"
"Laws, you have to work with me! Half of our food reserves are gone and the village is still recovering from the raid! At this rate we won't even be able to harvest this year's haul!"
"That is precisely why we have to be prudent with the resources that we have, Paul! We are talking about a triple price increase at a time when our only source of income has now been cut off! What about the imported medicine and construction materials that we are supposed to pay for next week? We need those resources to restore some of what we lost—"
BAM!
Paul's fist came down against the table, scattering a few of the loose papers to the floor.
"ARE YOU TELLING ME THE VILLAGERS HAVE TO STARVE THIS WINTER?!"
"... Paul, though we lost half of our food supplies, the village can still survive throughout the winter with the rest of it."
"... I don't understand, Laws, for the past five years the village has always needed three-quarters of the food supply reserves to survive the winter."
"... You are correct, Paul, but today I counted the casualty numbers, and we lost twenty of the residents, with ten more injured."
Paul's jaw tightened at the number, his eyes dropping briefly to the table.
"... That is one third of our residency."
"... If we regulate the amount of food we give out to the people, then we might make it through."
The man with dirty blonde hair placed his hand on his chin as he looked at the table, where a pile of papers lay spread across the surface, his fingers drumming once against his jaw before stilling.
He closed his eyes and sighed.
"The weak will be culled..."
"... We are in hard times."
Laws picked up a paper from the desk, his eyes scanning down the page before he set it back down and looked up.
"Though we are in no condition to continue building the wall, I have a suggestion where we can spare both the manpower and the resources while still completing this project."
The man who had seemed utterly worn down perked up, lifting his head and raising his gaze toward the elf before him.
"We are halfway done. If we can get it finished before the winter, then we can spare our combat forces from patrolling through the snow. What suggestion do you have, Laws?"
"Let's have Roxy build it."
Roxy's chest dropped for a split second, and she caught herself before letting out any noise that might get her caught in this embarrassing outfit, her fingers curling tighter into the hem of the oversized shirt as she pressed herself flatter against the wall.
"Roxy... The demon-folk—no, I mean that magician?"
"Yes. She is a magician of high caliber. After she helped me clear the goblins from the stonesmith's, she went back to the residential area to fend off the goblin raid."
"Oh, yes, I remember. She helped put out the village fire as well."
"Yes, she is a capable mage. She mentioned she is intermediate-advanced in earth magic, so with her help we could speed up production considerably."
"Not a bad idea, Laws, but I won't allow it..." Paul shook his head firmly. "She is the only mage in the village we can count on to fend off any irregularities. Besides, mages tend to frown upon manual labor — the last thing we need is to upset her with a task like this."
Roxy thought that she would not mind helping the village with the wall construction, but even if she cast Wall Fortress for the next two weeks, it wouldn't cover even a quarter of the village's perimeter. She simply didn't have enough mana to cover that much ground.
"Don't worry, Paul. Roxy is not like the mages we've encountered before. I can tell through her eyes that she cares about the lives of others."
A faint heat rose in Roxy's cheeks, and she pressed her palm lightly against one, grateful the wall hid her from view.
"Anyway, enough of work..." Laws set down the paper in his hand and turned toward the blonde woman seated quietly nearby. "Zenith, Lilia... Thank you for taking care of Sylphie."
Zenith rose from her seat with a warm smile, smoothing her skirt as she straightened.
"Oh, I don't mind at all, Laws-san. She has been such a sweet girl and hasn't given us much trouble at all."
"Is... she handling it well?"
Zenith's smile faltered slightly, her hands folding together in front of her.
"She is quite healthy, but sometimes throughout the day she seems to space out for long periods. I'm sure she's still going through the recovery."
Laws's expression tightened further, the lines around his eyes deepening.
"Naturally... no child should go through something like that..."
The room fell into a dreadful, prolonged silence, no one quite meeting anyone else's eyes, before Laws spoke again.
"How is Rudeus, Paul?"
The knight flinched at the mention of the boy, clenching his fist tightly against the table's edge as he tilted his head toward the stairs of the house, a look of disdain crossing his face as he spat out the words.
"He still hasn't come out of his room."
Laws sighed and cast a sorrowful look toward the stairs as well.
"How long has it been... three months?"
"... The people of this village are going through an existential crisis while my son sits in his comfy warm bed—"
"Paul. Not now."
"Zenith! Don't you find it strange that a young boy his age has no desire to move around? Especially since, until three months ago, he was extremely active and moving around the house?"
The man abruptly shoved back and got up, rounding on the maid, who stood quietly in the corner with her hands folded in a formal maid's stance.
"Lilia! You've nursed children of nobles back in the capital — is Rudeus's behavior normal?"
The maid hesitated, a bead of sweat running across her face, her eyes darting briefly toward Zenith before settling back on Paul.
"... It is not uncommon for children to develop erratic behaviors after experiencing trauma."
Paul raised an eyebrow, his voice climbing.
"Trauma?! Rudeus just passed out from mana exhaustion! Everyone goes through that when learning magic!"
The knight's voice rose further, bitter anger cracking through it as he pushed himself half out of his seat.
"I will not raise a son who is a wimp! You know what? He will leave that room right now, and I will see to it myself—"
Paul shoved his chair back with a scrape against the floorboards, but Zenith was already moving, stepping in front of him and planting her hands firmly on his shoulders to hold him down.
"Calm down, Paul! You've been moving around nonstop for the past three days! You are not acting like yourself!"
The knight pushed against his wife's grip, straining forward, but surprisingly, he didn't have the strength to break free. Frustration welled up in his heart as his shoulders sagged back into the chair, the fight draining out of his arms even as his voice refused to follow. He realized she was right — that he was completely exhausted, both body and mind in need of rest. And as much as he wanted to yield to his beautiful wife, the mother of his son, his mouth ran wild against his will.
"Zenith! I am not wrong on this! It's strange for a child his age to show no interest in story time at night! It's concerning that a child his age doesn't play with any of the toys we bought him! And it is disturbing for a child his age to sit completely still for an entire day, for months now!"
Beneath the rage in her husband's voice, Zenith bit her lip, her hands still braced against his shoulders as they trembled faintly. She watched the desperate plea in his eyes — the same questions she asked herself every night before falling asleep, staring up at a dark ceiling with no answers.
Their situation was so unusual that even asking other villagers for help had proven fruitless. The strange behavior had turned their anxious feelings into deep, sustained stress, one that had even crept into and strained the intimacy of the newlywed couple.
Tack.
A small sound of bare feet padding against the cold stone floor drew the attention of the four people in the living room. Heads turned in near unison, Paul still half-risen from his seat, Zenith's hands still resting on his shoulders, as they saw the young mage standing at the edge of the room — her messy blue hair dishevelled from sleep, one strand falling across her face, wearing an oversized shirt that fell to the top of her knees and slipped loosely off one shoulder.
In contrast to her dishevelled appearance, the eyes that met the desperate, searching looks of the Greyrat couple held none of a child's uncertainty. There was a stillness in them, worn smooth by far more years than her small frame let on, the calm of someone who had already sat across from countless frightened parents and troubled children long before this village had ever needed her. Paul's mouth closed around whatever he'd meant to say next, the retort dying in his throat under that gaze. Zenith's grip on his shoulders loosened as something in her chest eased for the first time in months, as though whatever storm had been building in that room had, if only for a moment, found somewhere steady to rest.
After a brief moment of silent eye contact, the young girl bowed slightly, one hand smoothing the hem of her borrowed shirt as she straightened again, and spoke.
"I apologize for eavesdropping. My name is Roxy Mirgudia, A-rank Adventurer, village guard for Buena Village, and magic tutor for the son of Paul Greyrat and Zenith Greyrat. Could you please tell me more about... Rudeus?"