Mark stepped out of the stream and began getting dressed while Alice was still in the water.
"I’ll head back to camp."
"Alright, my lord," Alice replied without turning to look at him. "I’ll finish cleaning my wounds properly and join you after."
Mark nodded and began walking back toward the camp.
The path between the stream and the clearing where they had made camp wasn’t long, just a few minutes walking through the trees, but it was enough for Mark to notice sothing different.
There was more noise than there should have been.
When he had left for the stream the camp was quiet, but now he could hear voices.
Mark picked up his pace, and when the trees opened up and the clearing appeared before him, the first thing he saw was that Rose was no longer alone.
Yuki was standing beside the extinguished campfire with her arms crossed, and around her, Alice’s five companions were sitting or standing in various positions around the clearing.
Mark felt imdiate relief at seeing them.
’They’re alright,’ Mark thought as a smile ford on his face. ’They’re all alright.’
Mark walked toward where Yuki was, and the assassin turned her head in his direction at the sound of his footsteps on the grass.
"Yuki," Mark said when he reached her. "Glad to see you’re back."
Yuki nodded slightly.
"Why did it take so long?" Mark asked directly. "I was starting to worry about you all."
"At first it was difficult to determine our location," Yuki said in her usual calm tone. "There were no visible roads or clear landmarks in the imdiate area, so we had to expand the scouting range."
Mark listened in silence as Yuki continued.
"But one of Alice’s companions managed to find a village during the search," Yuki said. "She recognized it, and thanks to that we were able to determine our position."
"Really?"
"Yes — and it turns out we’re not as far from our base as we thought."
"How far are we?" Mark asked.
"About two days from the dungeon."
"Two days?"
"That’s right, Master," Yuki confird.
Hearing that, Mark let out a heavy sigh and smiled.
Just two days of travel separated him from his dungeon and his subordinates.
"That’s good news," Mark said, unable to hide the relief in his voice. "Very good news, actually."
Mark thought for a mont and then made a decision.
"Alright... we’ll leave tomorrow morning," Mark said in a firm tone.
"Tomorrow?" Yuki asked. "Why not leave now? It’s still early and if we set out now we could use the rest of the day to make progress."
It was a reasonable question. The sun was still relatively low in the sky and there were many hours of daylight left.
From a practical standpoint, there was no reason to wait until tomorrow.
But he had a reason.
Mark turned his head toward where Alice’s five companions were.
So had their eyes closed, others were looking at the ground, but all of them looked tired, their bodies still showing unhealed wounds and a general exhaustion that was visible at a glance.
They weren’t in any condition to travel for two days straight.
"I found a way to heal their wounds," Mark said, nodding toward the five won.
Yuki was visibly surprised to hear that, to the point where her eyes opened wider than usual, which coming from Yuki was the equivalent of anyone else’s jaw dropping.
"How?" Yuki asked.
"The sa way as with Alice," Mark replied. "Using the mana Vorax absorbed from the demoness — if I transfer it to them the sa way I did with Alice, their bodies should be able to use that mana to recover."
"Alice?" Yuki asked in a tone that revealed her confusion. "She’s already recovered?"
"Yes," Mark replied with a nod. "Vorax spent all night transferring mana into her and this morning she was already able to get up on her own, she’s not at a hundred percent yet, but she’s much better than yesterday."
"Where is she now?" Yuki asked, looking around without finding her.
"At the stream," Mark replied. "Bathing."
Yuki looked at him for a second, then nodded without saying anything more.
Mark couldn’t tell if Yuki had thought anything about that, but decided not to dwell on it.
Mark turned toward Alice’s five companions, and all five won raised their eyes toward him as they noticed him approaching.
"Listen," Mark said, addressing the five of them. "I found a way to heal your wounds... it won’t be imdiate, but by tomorrow you should be considerably better."
The five looked at him with expressions ranging from surprise to hope.
"So don’t worry," Mark continued. "I’ll take care of it."
Mark paused, then added sothing he felt he should say.
"And I want to thank you," Mark said, looking at them directly. "For everything you’ve helped with up until now, I know none of this was easy, so thank you for your effort."
"You don’t have to thank us, my lord!" said the first of them, jumping to her feet with an energy that didn’t seem possible given her physical condition.
"Not at all!" added another from the ground, shaking her head exaggeratedly.
"It’s the least we can do!" said a third.
"You saved our lives!" said the fourth.
"We owe you everything!" completed the fifth.
Mark looked at all five of them and couldn’t help letting out a small laugh at the reaction.
’At least group morale is high.’
But then, while looking at them, sothing clicked in his head and he rembered he still didn’t know their nas.
Alice didn’t know because she had never asked them, and Mark hadn’t asked them directly either at any point since reviving them.
’I should have asked this a long ti ago,’ Mark thought, feeling a little foolish.
"By the way," Mark said, looking at them. "What are your nas?"
And then all five fell silent, their expressions gradually shifting from attentiveness to confusion.
The first frowned slightly, as if trying to rember sothing on the tip of her tongue.
The second tilted her head to one side with a distant look.
The third opened her mouth as if about to say sothing, then imdiately closed it.
The fourth brought a hand to her chin.
The fifth simply blinked several tis in a row.
And then, as if they had reached an agreent without saying a word, all five turned to look at each other.
"I don’t rember..." said the first with an embarrassed tone.
"Everything is very foggy in my mind," added the second.
"I rember so things, but my na isn’t one of them..." said the third.
"Sa for ," said the fourth.
"I don’t rember mine either," completed the fifth.
Hearing them, Mark was surprised, he hadn’t expected that answer, or at least not from all of them.
’...I suppose their mories were lost when I revived them.’
While that was a problem, it wasn’t a particularly serious one.
"Well," Mark said, letting out a sigh. "If you don’t rember your nas, then I’ll have to give you new ones."
Hearing that, all five turned to look at him with attention.
’Let’s see... I need five nas.’
Mark tried to think of nice nas that would do them justice, but to his surprise, thinking up a na for another human being was quite difficult, because...
What if they didn’t like it?
What if it sounded cringe-worthy?
What if it was too generic?
After several more seconds of frustration, Mark let out a long sigh.
’To hell with it. I’ll just go with the first thing that cos to mind.’
Mark straightened up.
"You’ll be Alpha," Mark said, pointing to the first.
"You’ll be Beta," Mark said, pointing to the second.
"You, Gamma," he pointed to the third.
"You, Delta," he pointed to the fourth.
"And you, Epsilon," he pointed to the fifth.
Upon hearing their new nas, all five fell silent.
Mark looked at them waiting for so kind of reaction, complaint, or dissatisfaction, but instead, Alpha brought both hands to her chest and smiled as if she had just been given the best gift of her life.
"Alpha!" she repeated with an enthusiasm that made no sense given how generic the na was. "I love it!"
"Beta!" said the second with the sa energy. "It sounds strong!"
"Gamma," repeated the third, nodding with a satisfied expression. "I like it."
"Delta," said the fourth, testing how the word sounded in her mouth. "It has a good sound."
"Epsilon!" said the fifth, pressing her hands together. "What a beautiful na!"
Seeing their reactions, Mark didn’t know whether to feel relieved that they accepted it so easily or concerned about how low the bar was.
"Now that that’s settled, it’s ti to heal you all," Mark said, gesturing for them to follow him. "So co with ."
"As you command, Master!" the five answered in unison with enthusiasm.
Mark turned around and began walking back toward where Rose and Vorax were, while behind him the five kept repeating their new nas as if they were new toys.
’We’ll be ho soon,’ Mark thought, raising his gaze toward the sky. ’Just a little longer.’
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