I woke up that morning with more questions than I had answers to. Isis had revealed a lot in her warning last night, and I couldn't help but focus on one of the things she said,

"Any 2nd tier class, even at the highest levels, would be slaughtered instantly." Does that mean there is an even higher tier? What would it look like? And how strong would they be compared to us? I would've loved to think about these matters more, but my time was limited, so I quickly got up and headed to the door. Before opening it, I looked at Kathryn, who was still sleeping soundly, and wondered why the Empire was after her in the first place. Whatever the case, we'll protect her, I thought to myself before leaving the room.  

Apparently, Batti and I were the first to rise. The others must have been really tired, I thought to myself as I tried to avoid eye contact. Still remembering what I saw last night, I decided it'd be best for both of us to act like that never happened, but Batti seemed to have other ideas.

"It was for my daughter," He began with a somewhat embarrassed look on his face. "I'd love to visit my family after this war, and I picked out that gift for her not too long ago, but the hand tore, so I had to fix it." 

"I see. You must be a good father, then," I said to him with mixed emotions. At least very least, he's a lot better than my deadbeat dad, I thought while trying my best to suppress the rage that was bubbling up. 

"I try, but these circumstances keep getting in the way."

"Are you talking about the war?" I asked.

"Yeah, I was planning to return to my village for a while after killing the Cyclops, but now, who knows how long it'll be before I see my family again," He said with a slightly sad expression on his face. I could sense an undercurrent of fear in his voice, which felt unusual coming from him. 

"Don't worry. You'll get to see your family again. I won't let any of you die." I knew I was making a big promise, but I would try to the best of my ability to keep it. A part of me wanted to believe I was doing this out of goodwill, but another part of me was skeptical. At the end of the day, no tactician ever wanted to feel responsible for the deaths of their party members, and I was no exception to this. 

"Oh, Daphne, you're already up! It's good to see you back!" Kimmel said as he approached me with all the others in tow. Kathryn was still groggily rubbing her eyes, but I was glad to see that everyone was up!

"Of course! I am always early!" I boasted, but Phildina wasn't going to let that comment slide,

"Except when you're in a hot spring."

"P-Phildina! H-how could you?!" I felt betrayed. However, we could not continue our usual routine, as it was time for us to meet. We all sat around a white table, ready to discuss our plans for the upcoming battle. "We learned from our inquiry last night that a battalion is approaching us," I began. They were all silent at this, but I could see the worry in their expressions. "According to the fliers, it'll take them two days to get here, which could be today or tomorrow depending on the accuracy of their predictions. So, let's first review our weapon ranks before anything else." 

They all revealed their weapon ranks, and it ended up looking like this:

I had gained a great deal of weapon EXP from my promotion, too. My bow weapon rank had shot up to B, and I had access to E-rank swords now! Everything went as I expected it, but hearing about Lucia's tome rank came as a surprise to me. Dealing the finishing blow to the Cyclops must have given her more weapon EXP than I realized, I took a mental note before moving on to the next thing.