The next morning, Nienna, Haild, and Juan came out to the beach that was made up of the bones of dragons.

“Are you actually going to do it?”

“It’s not the first time anyway.”

Juan was sitting on the sandy beach with his back turned toward Haild, who was looking down at him nervously. Nienna chewed on her nails, feeling half worried and half nervous.

“I understand that we gotta do what we gotta do, but it makes me feel uncomfortable to see you get stabbed again by the weapon that killed you. There’s gotta be other ways to make you stronger, you know,” Nienna said.

“You’re the one who told me that I have to do more than just simply winning against Barth Baltic in a fight. You told me that I should step on him like he’s an ant and crush him.”

“...I guess I did.”

Juan looked back at Haild.

“You said I can gain strength by doing what you told me to do, right?”

“Yes, Your Majesty. To put it bluntly, you can regain your original strength,” Haild swallowed a gulp. “There’s a thing called the ‘crown’ inside Your Majesty, and that’s the thing you saw back in Durgal. I don’t know what it is exactly, but the Thornbush Priest Organization has been frantically searching for it. They thought that my father… I mean Gerard, had the crown with him until now, but it was confirmed...