“Feels like we should leave now or something,” an old man holding a mug muttered, before turning to the middle-aged man beside him. “How’s the caravan? Are the wheels fixed yet? Or do we need to suffer the fate of painful bums whenever the thing rolls on some stones? I don’t like to say this, but your mother will complain for three hours if her bum gets sore.”

“I know, dad. And the cart’s mostly fixed, but there’s some things we can’t fully repair. She’ll need to sit on cushions,” the man replied.

“I suppose that is for the best, boy.” The old man took one more swig from his cup. “Oi, Candle! When’s the inspection thing coming again?”

“In three days,” Mister Candle replied. “If you want to leave, better do it before that.”

Claud exchanged glances with Lily as the father-son pair continued to talk about avoiding the Moons. It would seem that someone had spread the rumour about lowered lifespans if people were inspected thoroughly by the Moons’ agents, prompting just about everyone here to start running away.

It was a rumour that was so convenient to him that Claud couldn’t help but think that there was someone who was actually friendly to him or something. Whatever the case, however, there was now a huge exodus of villagers from Monsville, which was why the tavern only had old people who didn’t have a family to bring them alone.

“Leaving?” Another voice shattered the silence, and an opulent round ball rolled into the tavern. “There’s nothing to fear about those inspections!”

“Baron Mons.” Mister Candle waved at him. “Here for a drink?”

“Here to persuade anyone who’s thinking of leaving otherwise…” The baron paused. “But it seems I’m too late. Where are all the usual drinkers? It’s nearing lunch, and there’s only a couple and a father-son pair here?”

Claud glanced at Lily. The two of them had spent the rest of the morning drinking and talking about random things, because time together was more valuable than time spent with the others. Of course, they would return soon, but since Baron Mons had abruptly showed up…

His hair shivered, and three little shapes slid down the back of his head and landed on his neck.

“They all left sometime ago,” Mister Candle replied. “Can’t really be helped.”

“Bah. Will they be coming back?” The baron asked, the shining bits of his courtly clothes rippling. “I’ll be the laughingstock of the other nobles if they really fled forever!”

“Who knows?” Mister Candle picked another cup and started to clean it. “But they should just be waiting out the inspection. In the first place, what’s with the inspections? Why were the Moons so alarmed? Do they not know that announcing inspections this loudly would just make everyone else worried and vulnerable to rumours like this?”

“You don’t believe the rumours?” Baron Mons asked.

“Inspections that cost lifespan? Yeah, sure…” The bartender set down the cup in his hand. “You do know we can see our lifespan, right? If it really took our lifespan, the first guy to do the inspection would cause a riot afterwards. The Moons will never be welcome here again.”

“Good point, but…” Baron Mons shook. “In that case, this rumour must have been spread by the real culprit. The perp must have made use of the fleeing populace to get away from the Moons too.”

“Yeah. The inspection is useless.”

No, not really…Claud and Lily exchanged glances once more, and Lily’s fingers danced on his right palm for a moment, conveying her amusement. Claud stuck his tongue out, rolled his eyes, and then played with her fingers for three seconds, before shrugging.

Lily rolled her eyes and made a small gesture at the bowl of tomato soup in front of Claud.

At the same time, the baron shifted his weight on the chair, forcing it to squeak.. “Right, I heard you had some new drinks, right? Let me try some.”

“Oh?” Mister Candle pulled out a bottle. “Baron Mons, I must remind you that this brew is for real men only. It’s a specific brew that has insane amounts of alcohol, yet remains drinkable and has its own taste. If you are too weak, drinking it will almost certainly knock you out.”

Lily froze, and then pulled him close. In a whisper, she said, “Doesn’t that sound eerily familiar?”

“Nah. Schwarz definitely didn’t make friends with Mister Candle…right?” Claud looked at Mister Candle, worried. While he wasn’t really old yet, from his middle-aged appearance, Claud could tell that his bodily functions probably weren’t at its best. If he took a swig of sure pure alcohol…

Schwarz would probably be an accessory to murder. And as for that ball-esque Baron Mons?

Before he could intervene, the baron slammed his hands on the table. “I’m a real man through and through! That drink is definitely made for yours truly! Bring it over and let your master savour it!”

“It’s quite expensive,” Mister Candle replied.

“How expensive can it be?” Baron Mons asked. “Don’t worry. I’m the master of this town. I buy things fairly! Name your price!”

“Three lifestones.”

“Hah! Three life— wait, what? Three what? Lifestones?” The baron looked at Mister Candle. “What did you brew your alcohol with? Lifestones?”

“Yes. It was a very recent invention, born out of an interaction with a true master at the craft,” Mister Candle replied. “It makes use of lifeforce to energise the metabolism of bodily cells to better the digestion of alcohol, and—”

“Alright, enough. I know that it’s awesome.” The baron paused. “And it’s just three lifestones, right? I’ll have you know that yours truly has three hundred low-ranked lifestones!”

“Mid-ranked ones,” Mister Candle clarified.

“Gah! Uh, I mean, no problem!” The baron patted his shoulders, before rifling through his clothes. “Men! Bring me three mid-ranked lifestones, on the double!”

Claud couldn’t bear to watch it anymore, and he focused on his soup with Lily as the baron started to court death. After forking the money over, the baron made a huge hoo-ha about drinking it — although there was only Claud, Lily and the father-son pair in the tavern — and then gulped down the whole thing.

The entire tavern shook as the round ball in nice clothes simply dropped, and the guards rushed in, alarm written all over their face. Their master, however, simply let out a satisfied snore, mumbled something under his breath, and then flipped over to kiss the ground.

“…It’s time to go, I think.” Claud and Lily got up. Skirting around the guards, who were now debating over the best way to bring Baron Mons back to his mansion, the two of them fled the small tavern and headed back to their little home.

“I suppose that’s it, then.” Lily looked behind. “We’re really going through with the plan, right?”

Claud bit his lips and checked the Looped Encryptor once more. Making sure that the edges were misaligned, he said, “We never had a choice anyway. The A-thing is approaching, and something’s definitely going to happen to me once that happens.”

Lily nodded. “Even without this, we would still need to leave.”

“I’m just worried,” Claud replied. “After all, some unknown party just spirited an entire camp away. If we leave now, this case…it’s possible that the Moons will get the others to investigate it. Without us.”

“They’ve done really well on their own, and there’s Nero and President Cadenza. They’ll be fine.” Lily clutched his hand.

“Your face doesn’t seem to agree with what you just said, though,” Claud pointed out. “You’re also worried.”

“We’re both worried, happy?” Lily poked his sides. “But I suppose this is the best we can do for them, at the very least. We’ve averted the future you saw to a great extent.”

“It’s more of the world doing that, though,” Claud muttered. “And the Da— D-thing. Not my credit.”

“Really?” Lily pursed her lips. “Seems like the same thing to me, though. You taking action, him taking action…we’ve done all we could, in a reasonable sense. If you ask me, there’s nothing else you could have done already. When it comes to saving this world from a bad future, you’ve worked very hard.”

“Sure feels like I slacked off, though.” Claud shrugged. “Alright. We need to rehearse our next words when we return. Let’s hope the others don’t do anything stupid either. There’s only a month left before the Trial of Aeons, and they’re not a part of it. We’ve already gotten them out from Licencia. If all goes well, they’ll be safe.”

“We still need to figure out why Licencia was attacked, though,” Lily muttered. “There’s a lot of things you never figured out during the Second Tutorial.”

“I’m sure even the me there was confused by the events that had transpired in his timeline,” Claud replied. “We’ll need to be more aware, more careful…”

“We’ve been doing that all this time, though…” Lily had a sad look on her face. “We still need to do more?”

“Even more, apparently.” The two of them approached their home, and Claud narrowed his eyes. “Alright, it’s time to act.”