After returning to Newfando, Erwin didn't immediately set off to Fort Lungpierce to check on the progress being made there. Instead, the first thing that he did was pay Lia a visit.

During these past few days, Erwin had almost fallen into a state of anxiety. The cause of his distress wasn't the fact that his army was far outnumbered by Sanfesa's forces. After all, even prior to traveling to Finklan, he had been roughly aware of the Delair Dukedom's military prowess, and he hadn't been anywhere near as distressed as he was now. Instead, the cause for his distress was his wariness of Sanfesa, and he was also very concerned about the support that Prince Xar was lending to Sanfesa.

"What's wrong? Your complexion is terrible?" Lia asked with a concerned expression as he cast his gaze toward Erwin. "Did something happen during your trip to Finklan?"

Erwin shook his head in response, merely staring at Lia in silence.

It seemed that he had something serious to say, but in reality, he was merely lost in his own thoughts again.

"We can't continue like this," Erwin said in an urgent voice. "We have to rally all of our people to propagate this war as a religious war. You have...