“I blew it. Goldof is not on our side.” Adlet remembered what they had discussed three days before, at the Bud of Eternity. Fremy and Mora had told him that they suspected Goldof. He should have taken that more seriously. His naive beliefs about keeping faith in his allies were the root cause of this whole mess.
“There’s no point in stressing over it now,” said Fremy. “I never believed your decisions would be perfect in the first place.”
Cutting as ever, thought Adlet.
“B-but…it’s still possible that Goldof has been tricked,” said Rolonia.
“What do you mean?” asked Fremy.
“He told us that our enemy isn’t the princess, but you, right?”
When Fremy heard that, her eyebrows twitched. “You’re saying that I’m the enemy?”
“That’s not what I mean!” Rolonia insisted.
Adlet understood what she was trying to say, so he supplemented for her. “In other words, someone’s tricked Goldof. He’s being made to believe that you’re the enemy, Fremy, and he thinks that he has to kill you in order to save Chamo, and that’s why he came to try to stop us. That’s what you’re saying, right, Rolonia?”
Rolonia nodded vigorously.
But Adlet shook his head. “No way.” He rubbed his stomach. “He was fighting me like he didn’t care if I died. I could tell.”
“If Goldof believes that I’m the enemy, then why did he run right by me?” Fremy added.
“…W-well, um…” Rolonia couldn’t think of what to say.
“Anyway, we need to hurry.” Fremy cut off the conversation. “It’s already been almost an hour since Nashetania activated the blade gem. There’s just a little over two hours left, and Tgurneu could come to the lava zone with its whole army at any moment.”
She was right—they had no time. If Tgurneu attacked them at that very instant, it was over. They would have no options but to try to move Chamo, even if it was hopeless, and run for it.
“Now that Nashetania has Goldof protecting her, she’ll be harder to defeat,” Fremy continued. “But still, the three of us should be able to do it. First, we have to find where Nashetania ran off to. Once we’ve done that, then we can talk.”
Adlet and Rolonia nodded, and they began running over the rock hills.
“We are at a disadvantage,” Fremy said. “But identifying the seventh is a major victory for us. Now if we can just save Chamo, our victory will be in sight.”
Rolonia nodded. “You’re right—we know who the seventh is now.”
But Adlet didn’t reply.
“What’s wrong, Adlet?” asked Fremy.
He wasn’t fully convinced. A number of questions rose in his mind. If Goldof was the seventh, he could have done it another way. For example, back in the Phantasmal Barrier, he could have killed Mora or Fremy or something and then pinned the deed on Adlet. So why hadn’t he?
And there was another question: Why hadn’t Nashetania shown up during their fight in the Ravine of Spitten Blood? If the enemy had carried out their scheme for Mora and the blade gem trap at the same time, then the Braves would have been unable to manage it all. Why was the enemy executing only one plot at a time? Why hadn’t Goldof done anything so far, and why was he making his move now?
And not only that—there was another more important problem. What was Tgurneu up to? It should know by this point that the Six Braves were in the lava zone. So why hadn’t it come to attack? Something was fishy. Behind the scenes, something was happening, and he couldn’t even get a clue as to what was really going on.
“Rolonia,” said Fremy, “you go tell Mora and Hans what’s going on. Though I don’t think it’s likely, Goldof and Nashetania might attack them.”
“Yes, understood,” said Rolonia.
“We’re going to keep chasing down Nashetania. If you find her, set this off. We’ll come to you immediately,” Fremy said, handing her a signal flare. Rolonia nodded and ran back toward Chamo.
“Snap out of it, Adlet. You’re the leader, aren’t you? Give the orders,” said Fremy.
“O-oh…yeah. Sorry. I was thinking.”
“I see. Let’s go.”
Adlet followed her. His mind was still on Goldof. The young knight’s expression of shock when they had all found out that Nashetania was the seventh. His cast of despair as they’d progressed through the Howling Vilelands. That odd look on his face when he’d said he was going to go save Nashetania. Could someone really fake those things?
Adlet didn’t know. He didn’t understand Goldof. He was either an extraordinarily skilled actor or something else entirely.
In the rocky geothermal wasteland, there was no trail to track a person by. Adlet and Fremy decided to head for the spot where they’d seen that flash of light moments ago. Moving in a clockwise motion with Chamo at the center, they proceeded for about ninety degrees. Walking along, they searched carefully for Nashetania, overlooking no ditch or tiny pit or rock hill’s shadow. It took time, but they didn’t have much choice.
“I’m almost certain that Nashetania can’t move farther than a kilometer away from Chamo. The circle’s not terribly big. We’re bound to find her,” said Fremy.
They climbed a slightly more elevated rock hill to find a circular pit about twenty meters across. Smoke wafted from its center. “What’s that?” Adlet said, approaching the smoke. There, in the middle, were the corpses of two fiends. Both had turned to ash. One was a snake, and the other seemed to be a human type. When he touched one of them with his hand, it was hot enough to make him yelp. They must have been fried only a few minutes ago. There were no signs the finds had been drenched in oil
