I can't deny it—right now, their appearance alone could make anyone who saw them unable to look away.
The two of them looked incredibly cute and beautiful, just like I had said before, yet I couldn't stop repeating those words in my head.
W-well, what else could I do? Their appearance right now truly amazed me and made me even more drawn to them.
The clothes they had been wearing before hadn't been changed at all since the first time we met.
And now, for the first time, they were wearing new clothes… my wish right now was just one thing—I hoped they would start wearing the clothes they had just shown me.
If that happened, I would be able to see them every day in outfits that suited them so well, making me feel happy and relieved at the same time.
But even if they didn't wear them, I wouldn't mind either. In the end, it was all their choice.
"Yukito-sama, you should go outside first. Hime and I still have some business here. You should go get some fresh air."
Yuu-chan suddenly said that to me from inside the changing room.
If that was what she asked for, then fine—I would do it.
I stepped away from the front of the changing room and left the shop. I glanced at the signboard and, as expected, it really was a women's clothing store.
I looked around, wondering if Luke had already come back, but I couldn't find him anywhere.
There weren't any stalls around that caught my interest either, so I decided to wait until all four of us gathered again before having lunch.
I thought it would be better to go back together. For some reason, it felt more reassuring that way.
While waiting for them, I opened my status screen to check my current attributes.
Click.
Well… they hadn't increased that much since yesterday's battle. Maybe each stat had only gone up by one.
And the attribute I hadn't truly mastered yet was magic. What was up with that value?! My magic stat was only twelve?!
Whatever. I usually relied on my sword rather than magic anyway, so it wasn't a problem.
—
About three or four minutes later, Hime and Yuu-chan finally came out of the shop, each holding a bag in their hands.
It was the same bag I had seen earlier inside. So that meant it contained clothes, right? That meant they—
"Sorry, Yukito-san. We had to tidy up and pay for the clothes," Hime said.
I looked at them—and they were wearing the outfits they had shown me earlier.
"Huh? Didn't you take off your new clothes earlier? Then what's inside those bags?" I asked.
"Ah, we both felt that these new clothes suited us. It's obvious, isn't it? The bags contain our old clothes," Yuu-chan replied.
"Besides, Yukito-san said they suited us, right? So I think I'll be wearing these more often," Hime said with a smile, her cheeks slightly flushed.
Well… for today, my small wish had been fulfilled, and seeing them like this made me happy.
"I did say that…" I muttered quietly.
"By the way, where's Luke? Isn't it about time for lunch?" Yuu-chan asked.
Of course she would ask about Luke. What should I tell her—
"Hey, you guys!"
From a short distance behind me, someone called out. I turned around to see who it was.
Luke was jogging toward us, waving his hand.
When he reached us and stopped, he bent forward with his hands on his knees, looking a little out of breath after running.
"Sorry, sorry. I had some business with someone earlier. And you two—are those new clothes?" Luke said after noticing the change.
"Yukito, you look pretty happy right now. Don't tell me you picked out their clothes?" Luke whispered to me teasingly.
I whispered back to him.
"No way. They asked me to evaluate them," I replied.
——
Luke then stopped looking at me and turned his gaze toward Hime and Yuu-chan before speaking again.
The two of them were chatting about something, their expressions bright and happy.
Then Luke said something to me.
"No wonder they look like that. This is all because of you, Yukito," Luke said.
His voice was quieter than before, but I could still hear it.
"W-wait, what do you mean?" I asked, still unable to understand what he was talking about.
"You'll understand someday. Anyway, the reason they're like this—it's all your fault," Luke said again.
After that, we looked for a place to enjoy lunch with food that would satisfy us.
We also talked about Riruyo, which we would be visiting in a few days. Luke said his carriage would be ready in about two days.
In the end, we agreed that we would leave Vannis in two days and head toward the continent of Riruyo.
The distance was quite far—it would probably take about three days, or even longer if the weather wasn't favorable.
To get there, we decided to pass through the continent of Velmoria, meaning we would go through several cities we had already visited, such as Necvalion and Ulvur.
Since the roads were connected, the main road was the only route we could take.
Because Riruyo lay to the north of Velmoria, we would inevitably pass through those cities.
We planned to buy more supplies after leaving the restaurant. There were still plenty of places we needed to visit.
Ah, right—there was one more thing.
Last night, Hime said she had checked the magic orb to observe potential new invasion points from the Abyss.
She said there was no immediate emergency, so we could travel to Riruyo with more freedom.
And one more piece of information: if the Abyss forces attempted to conquer and attack a region but were defeated, they would never try to invade that place again.
Instead, they would choose to build greater strength on the island of Virosia and launch a much larger invasion someday.
——
(The next day—)
We stored the supplies we had bought yesterday inside Sikiyomi-san's inn first, since Luke and I hadn't yet retrieved the carriage and brought it here.
That was why Luke and I were now at the place where the carriage had been kept.
"If there are this many carriages here, does that mean they're all gathered in one place?" I asked.
"Could be. It certainly looks that way," Luke replied.
The two of us climbed onto the carriage and sat at the front.
"Yukito, you still remember how to do it, right?" Luke asked.
Ah—I was sure he meant how I made the horse move.
The horses here were guarded by soldiers on duty, so they were well-fed, given water, and provided with proper resting areas.
They were treated very well, weren't they?
"What do you mean? Something like this won't make me go back to how I was at the beginning," I replied.
The two of us brought the carriage back and parked it in front of the inn.
The road here was wide, so parking a carriage at the side wouldn't cause congestion.
Besides us, there were also several other people who had parked their carriages along the roadside.
We intentionally retrieved it now so that we wouldn't have to rush tomorrow. At this point, all that was left was to wait for the next day, right?