Elena’s eyes opened early in the morning. Everything she lived in that cave was present in her mind.

「Did I go back to Izana?」

However, the memories after returning from his mental confrontation with the Ajawab Canek were not so clear in her mind. The only thing clear about it was that she was so exhausted that she probably threw herself on the bed and fell fast asleep immediately. She had not even notified her father and the others of her return.

Looking at her body, Elena realized that she was now wearing a nightgown to sleep in, and her skin was clean. She preferred to sleep in her underwear, and upon returning from that cave her body was covered in blood and dust, evidently, Nia had taken care of cleaning it while she slept.

The thought about Nia caused Elena’s left hand to move toward her face, and the tips of her fingers caressed the edge of her lips. Elena had remembered a dream, a sweet dream in which she had stolen a kiss from Nia and then pushed her onto the bed.

Just remembering that dream caused Elena’s cheeks to flush. The warmth of Nia’s body, the softness of her chest, the taste of her lips, the scent of her neck and those sweet moans of pleasure that escaped from her throat, all seemed so real that Elena felt her belly shudder.

「I must make that dream come true…」

Elena continued to caress her own lips and the warmth that the memory of that dream guided her right hand towards her crotch.

Elena’s hand found the edge of her nightgown and she worked her way up to find the edge of her underwear.

Elena licked her own fingers, and her hand entered her forbidden zone. That dream was too stimulating for her to forget it.

「Uhm∼!」

A sweet moan of pleasure escaped Elena’s lips as her fingers caressed the edge of her secret valley.

A wet sound echoed between Elena’s legs, her back be arched slightly and her lips parted wide. It was the first time she did something like this, so her actions were brusque and instinctive.

「Uhg—!」

A moan of pleasure tried to escape Elena’s throat, however, two knocks on the door of the room made her jump with surprise breaking her moment of personal privacy.

Without waiting for a response from Elena, the door to the room opened.

「Good morning, Elena-sama」

The door to the room opened and Nia entered pushing a small service cart.

「G-good morning, Nia」

Elena could not hide her nervousness, she had touched herself thinking on Nia, and it was precisely Nia who had entered the room. It was uncomfortable, very uncomfortable.

Because of Elena’s strange response, Nia watched her closely.

Elena’s face was a little red, her breathing was a little uneven and a little perspiration make her skin glow.

Without saying a word, Nia approached the bed and leaned towards Elena. Elena’s heart pounded, and this did not improve once Nia touched her forehead.

「It seems like you have a bit fever, Elena-sama, you better stay in bed」

Elena was so nervous that she could not notice that Nia’s face had also turned slightly red.

「O-ok…」

Elena accepted without hesitation for a second, she wanted Nia to move away or she could not contain herself.

Nia was surprised that Elena accepted her request so easily, normally in these subjects, Elena was too stubborn. However, she didn’t have the mental space to think too much about it, seeing Elena look spasmodically at her lips Nia felt her face fill with heat and quickly drove away to return to the service cart.

Nia’s ears were red, but Elena didn’t notice this, she was dealing with her own discomfort and the frustration of being interrupted.

Nia placed Elena’s breakfast on the table across the room in complete silence, and she occasionally looks at Elena with curiosity and although it was strange and inexplicable, a part of her yearned for what happened the day before to be repeated.

Nia had spent the first seven years of her life surrounded by elven women and then lived surrounded by men who undressed her with their eyes. She knew little about love, her best reference regarding it was an old legend written in a book she read in the sanctuary as a child. This story told the tragic story of a maiden loved by the spirits and a humble shepherd, someone who jealous men killed, and this led to the suicide of the maiden, thus causing the wrath of the spirits over the world.

Therefore, Nia had trouble understanding her own feelings, but hearing those words from Elena the day before caused her immense happiness. So Nia was relieved that Elena was trying to act normal, she needed time to sort out her feelings.

Elena had breakfast and soon her father and Harlan came to ask for an explanation about what had happened.

There was no way Elena could tell the complete truth; ‘I almost died a few times and a powerful blood spell of an ancient demon that wishes to take control of my body is sealed within my body’, only half of this would fill her father and others with concern father.

What Elena did was once again use half-truths. On the other side of the supposed magic barrier, she found a powerful unknown creature, with which she had to sustain prolonged combat because the creature was very resistant. After defeating the creature, Elena explored the interior of the cavern and all this together left her exhausted.

Fortunately for Elena, Nia had not mentioned anything about her disastrous appearance upon returning from the cave, and in fact, Nia seemed somewhat reluctant to speak on the subject.

Later Elena ordered Necro to place many skeletons around that canyon. It was best to keep an eye on the place.

As the days went by, what had happened in Lutrel between the Valkyrie, Elena Izana, and the Lutrel house had spread like fire on dry grass over throughout the kingdom.

It was surprising to discover that the Valkyrie was the daughter of the Marquis Lutrel, and that her mother was not the Marquis’ wife, but an unknown woman.

Since Darrel Eir Lutrel took the title of Marquis the day after that incident, an interesting theory took shape about it.

Totally outraged at the inability of her siblings to protect her father, Elena Izana had used force to take him to her territory, which was now no longer a secret to anyone, Izana, a forgotten territory in the border with Sadora.

Since the new Marquis Lutrel declared that the old Marquis had retired and was at his younger sister’s side, that theory gained strength and the Valkyrie’s fame grew to one more, and ordinary people renamed Elena to Izana’s Valkyrie.

And additionally valuable and shocking information about the genius blacksmith Bela was leaked, this talented woman whom no one knew but who had rocked the entire kingdom with her high-quality mytril weapons, was a close friend of Elena Izana and was rumored to be living with her in Izana. That the Izana’s Valkyrie had a friendship with Bela, whom people now called Völundr Bela, stole breaths from the crowds. Even if no one had seen the Völundr Bela, there were already rumors that she was a woman of exceptional beauty, only a beautiful woman could be friends with another beautiful woman. This was the strange logic behind the rumors.

Hearing about those rumors from the lips of Harlan, who had traveled to Lendolf several times, caused Elena to show an awkward smile.

A few days later, they were all gathered in the dining room of the palace chatting after eating. The dining room already had the furniture to be as ostentatious as the palace itself.

「Master」

A grim figure emerged from Elena’s shadow.

「What’s up Necro?」

「A caravan has entered our territory from the Dur’s region, they will arrive near sunset」

Now that it was known where she was and with the rumors about Bela living next to her, Elena imagined that people would start coming to Izana. Even so, between imagining it and that it happens there is a sizeable difference.

「If they move so fast, they must use magic items」

Armand pointed that out. From Dur to Izana, the journey was approximately two days by cart, but using high-quality magic items, it could reduce the travel time to less than half.

「That's in my information.. It is two commercial carts guarded by ten riders, all their horses are equipped with magic items 」

Necro confirmed Armand’s assumption.

Just as Elena uses runic magic, wealthy people can use magic items to improve the stamina and speed of horses.

「Merchants? They probably come looking for mytril weapons」

Harlan pointed to that and Elena smiled bitterly. So, despite everything the first people to come to Izana did it to look for Bela, this was her thought.

「We will proceed as planned」

Everyone nodded at Armand’s words. Of course, Izana had already drawn up plans to deal with these kinds of situations.

No one was nervous, not only because they already had plans to deal with this, but because in the worst scenario, the visitors would be noble and not just merchants.

 ◇◈◇

On an old road that had practically disappeared under the brush, two carts and ten riders were advancing at the maximum speed. Both the riders’ horses and those who pulled the two carts wore beautiful necklaces, magical items that increased their strength and endurance.

Each of those items was marked with the engraving of a star, inside which two initials ‘L.L.’ were visible, the signature of the maker of the magic item.

「Miss Lynette, this is reckless ...」

A woman of about twenty-five years of age exclaimed this as she held the reins of one the carts.

「Olga... we are already within the territory of Izana, and you are still complaining?」

A young lady with black hair tied in two pigtails and brown eyes answered with those words in a mocking tone.

Olga could only let out a long breath. Her junior master was even more stubborn than her father.

「Beautiful and talented women we must be togheter」

The young lady added while playing with one of her two pigtails.

「Miss, you’re not even sure that Völundr Bela is in Izana」

「If she is not there, I will ask the Valkyrie to call her」

Olga rolled her eyes at that. No one could deny the exceptional talent that this young lady possessed in creating magical items. If this whimsical young lady intended it, she could even surpass her own father’s creations. And if you added to this exceptional talent her charming appearance, anyone could say that this talented craftswoman of magical items had every right to be presumptuous, except for Olga who had seen her grow up and knew her character well.

Despite her talent, this young lady rarely created magic items to sell, this whimsical girl used to create magic items mostly for her own use. However, if Olga could point a good of the personality of this vain young lady, this was that she was extremely determined. Once this young lady set a goal, she would not stop until it was she accomplished it.

But such amazing quality, it could easily turn into a double-edged sword, just as it was in the current situation.

Once this young lady heard about the Valkyrie, she wished to meet her to create magical items for her and make the Valkyrie as her friend. She decided the same when she heard about Völundr Bela, the talented blacksmith who could create mytril swords of a higher quality than swords created by the best blacksmith in the kingdom.

However, in both cases, this talented young lady was don't known about the location of either of those two talented women and she did not even know the name of the Valkyrie. In such circumstances, the selfish young woman was so restless and desperate like to promise her father that if he gets information about those two women, she would create one magic item per week to expose for sale.

Unfortunately for the father of this talented young lady, the information reached her daughter’s ears on its own. The Varest’s Valkyrie name was Elena Izana, although her location was unknown.

In the same way, this talented craftswoman listened to the story about what happened in Lutrel, and about the friendship that existed between those two women she wanted to meet so much. Following such rumors, this capricious young lady took her belongings, hired mercenaries to protect herself, and immediately left for Izana, all this without even consulting her parents.

As for how this young lady had reached Izana’s territory when the rumors were barely gathering steam, that was because of her deep founds and the continued use of the highest quality magical items she created.

In addition, the carts that this young lady used, and the horses that pulled them, were not the same as she used at she leaving the kingdom’s capital. She had continually changed carts and horses so as not to even stop to sleep in a city, as for the mercenaries, it was the same with these as with the carts; she hired new mercenaries in each city she arrived.

This journey that Olga could only describe as hellish, showed over the deep marks under her eyes. Behind Olga’s back her defeated husband, Raul, was lying back, he had already fallen victim to this madness.

As for the whimsical young lady, since she spent most of her travel time sleeping, she looked as fresh as a freshly picked vegetable.

「Olga, look!」

It was getting dark, and Olga, who was about to be defeated like her husband, she came out of her lethargic state because of the surprise-filled scream of her junior master.

What the bright eyes of the capricious young lady pointed out was the wall of a city.

Believing herself to see some illusion due to lack of sleep, Olga rubbed her eyes.

That wall seemed even more imposing than the one that protected the capital of the kingdom, a deep moat surrounded it, and on each tower of the wall, a white banner waved on which the figure of a violet butterfly stood out.

「It’s Izana!」

Olga rubbed her eyes again. According to what they had listened out about Izana during their trip, in this place there should only be ruins, and yet, that imposing wall was not an illusion.

「What’s going on?」

Raul woke up because of the young lady’s screams, and following the line of sight of his astonished wife, Raul discovered the reason for so much scandal.

Olga and Raul were not the only ones surprised, the mercenaries who escorted them were also speechless, they were from Dur, and they knew that in this place there should only be one city in ruins.

As the caravan closed in on Izana, everyone could notice many knights wearing full-body black armor standing on the wall. There was they were approaching the right place. According to rumors, the Valkyrie had trained a group of elite soldiers loyal to her, all of them wearing black or mytril full body armor.

The caravan gradually slowed down to a stop just in front of the city gate, which was impossible to access due to the existence of the great moat.

Everyone in the caravan observed the black-armored soldiers, who seemed to show no reaction to their arrival.

After taking a deep breath to calm his nerves, Raul got off of the cart and walked to the edge of the moat.

「What are you looking for in Izana, travelers?」

Fortunately for Raul, an old man dressed as a butler appeared on the wall and asked that question. Raul let out a slight sigh of relief at not having to interact with those intimidating soldiers.

「My master, Lynette Lilstar requests a formal meeting with Baroness Elena Izana」

「Lilstar? Lilstar from the magic item craftsmen family from the kingdom’s capital? 」

「That’s right」

Harlan was surprised, why would someone from a large family of magic item craftsmen come to Izana? What he and Armand and Elena both expected was that these visitors were merchants looking for mytril weapons.

Was this part of any royal court plan? For a second this thought crossed Harlan’s mind. However, he quickly dismissed the idea. The Lilstar’s influence in the kingdom’s capital was too great for the court to manipulate them in this way.

In fact, the kingdom depended to a great extent on the Lilstar family since they were the ones who made the magic weapons and magic items used by the Wyvern Knights and the Royal Knights, something that gave Varest a significant advantage over their neighboring kingdoms.

「Open the gate!」

In response to Harlan’s command, the massive drawbridge descended.

Although it surprised that the first visitors came from the kingdom’s capital, Harlan made no changes to the original plan. It had already been decided to allow these travelers to enter Izana.

Raul quickly returned to the cart where he could see his impatient junior master showing a dazzling smile full of anticipation.