The Hole in the Inn
“What… what the hell was that just now…?”
Dain lowered his shield and touched the orc that hadn’t even collapsed before it burned. The creature crumbled at once, scattering into ash. Having seen his share of battles outside the village, Dain had witnessed prayers that called down lightning several times before. All of them had been on the same level as Ceres’s prayer yesterday. This one had been entirely different.
Ceres, her face flushed crimson, glanced down at Zarko.
“Z-Zarko…”
“S-sorry!”
Zarko snatched his hand away in a panic. He had gripped her so hard that red fingerprints stood out clearly on Ceres’s thigh.
Only then did the aftermath of her lightning strike fully register in Ceres’s eyes.
“This is…”
“Ceres! What happened? Did you do that?”
“I-I did recite the divine lightning, but…”
The sensation from moments earlier flickered through Ceres’s mind. She had focused exactly the same way. She had recited the prayer exactly the same way. Yet when Zarko’s hand had settled on her knee, the flinch that had run through her hadn’t come from the contact alone.
She had felt it clearly: the power surging inside her, amplifying, racing up her thighs and along her spine. Ceres murmured under her breath.
Could it be… because his hand was touching me?
Even as she marveled at the prayer’s overwhelming force, a quiet unease settled in Dain’s stomach. If this was the reinforcement of prayer beyond healing that Lilias had spoken of, it made sense. Still, a small, nameless anxiety began to take root inside him, slow and persistent.
After that, no more monsters appeared. Before long they left the forest path behind, and a sign for Siko Village stood at the entrance to the road ahead.
“Looks like we just follow the path from here.”
“Whew. At least the journey itself was a success!”
The road had not been easy, yet the knowledge that the party had reached their first destination filled Dain with a strange exhilaration. Ceres’s bright, happy face only deepened the feeling. He couldn’t read Zarko’s thoughts, but the man was surely pleased as well.
“Wow! Golden-scent flowers!”
Bright yellow blooms, famous for their beautiful glow, lined the roadside. Ceres crouched down in delight. Dain spat out the water he had been drinking.
With her in that position, her round backside and the thin underwear beneath were completely exposed. The cloth that should have covered her rear had snagged on her bag and lost all function.
It was pale. The soft, plump flesh that flared wider than her pelvis was so tempting that even a high priest might have reached out without thinking. The underwear curled inward, barely shielding the most vital area, as if it waged a daily war against the generous curves of her hips.
Dain turned his head at once, but the image of that pale peach refused to leave his mind. Had he really seen it correctly? In his memory the white fabric had been stretched taut, the outline plump and full. Was it real? Or had he imagined it?
While those useless thoughts spun, another man’s face rose in his mind. When he looked back, Zarko was already walking straight toward Ceres. The man tapped her shoulder.
“Ceres, your skirt… it’s ridden up.”
“Oh!”
Ceres shot upright, face burning, and yanked her skirt down. In doing so she revealed even more of her thighs than before, but she didn’t seem to notice.
“Ahaha, these clothes are different from what I usually wear… L-let’s go! To the village!”
“Y-yeah. Let’s go.”
Dain walked on with a stiff, ambiguous expression. When he glanced back, Zarko was staring at him. Unsure what face to make, Dain forced an awkward smile and kept moving. He couldn’t read the meaning behind that gaze, but the back of his neck prickled for no reason at all.
“We’re here. The Kingdom Army should have someone stationed in the village. Shall we ask at the Mayor’s house first?”
“Yes. They’ll probably tell us there.”
Siko Village was roughly the same size as Hero’s Village, yet the houses clustered tightly together in a way the highland settlement never did. The villagers’ clothing didn’t look strange to Dain’s eyes, either.
They asked a passing resident for directions, then knocked on the Mayor’s door. A middle-aged woman answered.
“Oh my, are you the Hero’s party by any chance?”
“Ah, um. Yes—”
Ceres jabbed Dain sharply in the back. When he looked at her in confusion, she silently pointed to Zarko behind them. Remembering how Zarko had appeared while they camped, Dain realized her judgment was correct.
The two of them waited in silence, watching Zarko. After a moment the man lifted his head, glanced around, and answered.
“…That’s correct.”
The perceptive Mayor didn’t ask any rustic follow-up questions. He simply continued with practiced ease, as though he had recognized Zarko at once.
“I thought as much. Please, come inside. The soldier is waiting for you.”
Following the Mayor in, they found a man in light armor seated with one leg jittering. At the sound of footsteps he turned. The man rose immediately and clasped Dain’s hand.
“Are you the Hero? You’ve finally arrived.”
“Ah, not me—this man here.”
When Dain indicated Zarko, the soldier cleared his throat and stepped in front of the true Hero.
“Forgive me. I am Dolan of the Kingdom Army. I’ve been monitoring demon activity in this village. If it’s acceptable, shall we sit and begin the briefing at once?”
The information Dolan provided did not stray far from what Lilias had hinted at. An underground cemetery lay a short distance from the village. Recently, undead had begun pouring out of it, causing several casualties.
“The local hunters were familiar with the undead. They had appeared from time to time in the past, and the hunters would either defeat them or avoid them. According to the survivors, however, this outbreak was different from ordinary undead.”
“Different?” Ceres asked.
“Yes. Even while hidden in darkness, the creatures detected them. And though they were skeletons, neither blades nor blunt weapons had any effect.”
“Skeletons? Even if the bones don’t break, impact should loosen the joints, shouldn’t it?”
“Exactly. Yet the survivors claimed the attacks did nothing. These skeletons had a dim blue flame burning between their eyes and joints… I’ve seen them myself.”
“Did your attacks really fail to connect?”
“Ah, the moment I saw them I ran away, so…”
Dolan cleared his throat again.
“They were unmistakably different from normal skeletons. That unidentified blue flame… I am convinced a demon lurks behind it.”
Night belonged to the undead, so the party agreed to set out for the underground cemetery the following morning. The village’s only inn, though modest in scale, had enough rooms for each of them to have one of their own.
Only after Dain removed his armor and set down his shield and pack did the fatigue in his shoulders truly hit him. He had not underestimated a day of camping, combat, and travel, but until the Hero and Saintess could wield their full power, he would have to carry the burden.
The thought of the Hero’s power immediately summoned the image of Zarko’s hand on Ceres’s thigh. What had that overwhelming lightning been? Just as a headache began to bloom, the innkeeper’s voice called up from below—dinner was ready.
After the meal, when the innkeeper announced that the bath was prepared, Ceres’s face lit with quiet excitement. Even a single day without washing had left them all sweaty. Being the only woman traveling with two men made it all the more understandable. She entered the bathroom with a bright smile. While he waited, Dain looked around the room.
It was not quite shabby, simply an inn that suited the village. Clean and well-kept, yet bearing the quiet weight of years. He watched people through the small window, then rose to tend to his equipment one more time.
Splash.
The sound of a great deal of water falling. Without thinking, Dain moved toward the wall. Was the bathroom next door? The entrance had been farther down the hall, so he hadn’t noticed. Beyond this wall, Ceres was bathing.
“Ah…”
Why had it caught his eye? Near the meaningless painting in its frame on the wall, faint marks showed where the frame’s edge had been pulled aside. Slowly, with rising desire and anticipation, he slid the frame along those traces. A small hole appeared.
If he put his eye to it, would the other side be visible? The sound of water continued. Dain tried to hold himself back, yet his hand never lowered the frame. When Ceres’s soft humming drifted through the wall, all restraint vanished. He pressed his eye to the hole.
There was Ceres’s naked body, glistening with water.
She sat on a chair in the bathroom, humming as she washed herself. Her front was hidden, but below the long, wet strands of hair, the same backside that had burned itself into his memory among the golden-scent flowers now dripped water right before his eyes.
Dain’s legs seemed rooted to the floor. His mind screamed at him to lower the frame, yet his gaze refused to miss even an inch of her body.
When she turned to wash her side, he saw the pale hollow of her underarm and the elastic sway of her breast in profile. Could what he had imagined before even be called imagination? The slightly swollen pink areola and the cute, assertive nipple proved how pitiful his fantasies had been.
Even the light sweep of her arm across her front sent her breasts moving with vigorous life. Enormous to the point of violence, their motion was nevertheless so soft it carried a sense of maternal warmth. Unconsciously, Dain’s hand closed on empty air.
“Upsie daisy.”
He didn’t know why she said it. Ceres adjusted her seat on the bath chair, bending slightly at the waist—and for one brief moment the cleft between her buttocks was faintly revealed to his starving eyes.