Noelle — Level: Lv.10.
Four levels gained at once.
She hadn't slept all night, and she'd pushed herself through a battle that drained her to the brink.
The moment Noelle finished the axe mitachurl, exhaustion flooded her—
And she fell to the ground.
Seeing it, Kaito lifted her into his arms and said, "We're resting today."
He carried her into the abandoned camp and laid her on a wooden platform.
Barbara hurried over and began healing Noelle's overdrawn body.
But Barbara herself looked uncomfortable too.
A little shyly, she said, "Kaito… my clothes are all wet."
She looked down at her soaked sleeves and stockings, then quickly looked away, embarrassed.
"They're drenched through…"
"Oh." Kaito finally realized what she meant.
Barbara wasn't like Lumine, a naturally gifted traveler.
And she was a caster—physically delicate. Catching a chill would be bad.
"Go change into something dry," Kaito said. "You'll catch a chill."
"Mmm…" Barbara answered, flustered.
So Kaito had no choice but to set up a tent for them.
Diluc seemed to realize what was happening.
"Tch."
With a cold expression, he turned around and walked out.
Only after the basin was out of sight did he finally let out a breath.
"Kaito… that guy. How does he know how to do everything?"
"And if he asked me to help…"
Wouldn't that expose the fact that he couldn't pitch a tent?
"…It's normally something maids and servants handle," Diluc muttered, making excuses for himself.
"If I were alone, I wouldn't even need a tent. It's a completely unnecessary skill."
As he rationalized, he scanned for a large tree with thick foliage—planning to catch up on sleep.
He wasn't worried about safety here.
He'd already scouted the area yesterday.
There were no other monster camps nearby.
Back in the basin—
Paimon came flying back from the pool, furious.
She looked like an elementary student running to complain to a parent.
"Kaito! That Mist Flower! The moment I got close, it sprayed me!"
In her hands was an arrowhead—loot from a hilichurl archer.
She'd wanted to cut the Mist Flower down.
But she couldn't believe even a flower was bullying her now!
It was infuriating—absolutely infuriating!
"Wait for Diluc to get back," Kaito said. "One Searing Onslaught slash, and the bud will drop."
"Oh…"
Paimon looked regretful for a moment, then—like a magician—pulled out a bright red berry.
"Then do you know what this is?"
"Valberry. A Windwail Highland specialty," Kaito said. "With merchants too scared to harvest lately, Mondstadt's been running short. Lisa's been craving these for a while."
"Where'd you get it?"
"Found it in the camp," Paimon said quickly. "Looks like the hilichurls picked it."
She immediately stuffed it away—afraid it would get taken from her.
Then she yawned.
Once the excitement of looting passed, the little creature instantly turned sluggish.
She cast one last reluctant look at the Mist Flower in the pool, then crawled into the tent to sleep.
By the time she woke up…
Master Diluc should be back, right?
A moment later, Lumine hopped down from the slope.
"Did you set up the warning traps?" Kaito asked.
Even if there were no monster camps nearby, they didn't want to make the same mistake the Abyss Mage and hilichurls had—getting sneaked up on without noticing.
The only place that could fully observe the basin was the slope above.
So setting warning traps there was enough.
"Set," Lumine answered.
She sat down beside Kaito, drawing her long legs in close.
Just sitting quietly like this made her feel secretly happy.
She couldn't help burying her face into her knees so no one would notice anything strange.
…
They rested in the basin for a full day.
Then they set off again, pushing deeper into Windwail Highland.
When they ran into slimes or Whopperflowers, Noelle would cover Barbara while Barbara dealt with them using elemental damage.
When they ran into hilichurls, the three of them handled it together.
As their levels rose, the danger of this high-risk region steadily declined.
As long as they didn't run into an enemy group on the scale of the basin's first day, Kaito and Diluc didn't need to step in at all.
After several days like this, even Noelle and Barbara began to sense something off.
This trip clearly had a concrete destination.
They weren't just wandering aimlessly and clearing monsters for training.
"Kaito," Barbara asked curiously, "do we have a specific goal? How much longer until we get there?"
This was her first time being out this long.
And her reliance on Kaito was only growing stronger.
"We're close," Kaito said. "Just ahead."
Up front, Diluc used his claymore to push aside a thick patch of brush.
The view opened suddenly—
And he froze for a moment.
A massive circular ruin lay deep within Windwail Highland, at the center of a small plain ahead.
It looked exactly like the ruin he had seen at Cape Oath half a year ago.
The only difference was the element flowing over it.
At Cape Oath, it had been Electro.
Here, there was no surprise—
Anemo.
At the center of the ruin, a huge elemental monster rested quietly—protected by a lazily rotating cubic shell that served both defense and offense.
Only those who had ever awakened one truly understood how terrifying these high-level elemental lifeforms were.
Diluc's palm started sweating again.
"Are you sure this is fine?" he asked, turning back to confirm.
"Relax," Kaito replied evenly. "I've provoked it before. I know how it fights."
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