Nearly a week had passed since that particular farce came to its end.
As for how exactly the farce had been resolved, and what fate awaited the members of the Magical Special Operations Unit and the Shadow Warriors who had taken part in the operation — Miss Fíliya had absolutely no interest in any of it. At this moment, she stood once again before the grave of the Great Mage Flamme, this time with Serie beside her.
"Well, well. I had a feeling you'd be here. Your total mana reserves are simply too absurd — no matter how much you try to hide it, you'll never be able to disappear into the air the way Frieren does."
The instant Fíliya spotted Serie, she walked straight to her side and delivered that teasing remark.
"True enough. I once mocked Frieren for spending a lifetime practicing such a trivial, tedious skill... but I find I must now concede that her technique does have its value."
Serie answered without turning to face her, eyes fixed on the headstone carved with its many honors.
"Oh? How unusually candid of you today — actually admitting to a shortcoming."
Fíliya studied this orange-haired hermit of ten thousand years with mild surprise.
"You misunderstand me. I have never once claimed to be omniscient or omnipotent. Among my disciples alone, there are any number of geniuses who far surpass me. Compared to them, I am nothing more than someone who has simply lived long enough."
"Is that so..."
Fíliya gave a vague, noncommittal response and decided not to press any further on that particular topic.
"If you wanted to see her, you only had to say so, you know."
She was watching the side of Serie's face as she said it, her voice dropping just slightly — probing, careful.
"Haven't I already told you? You are not permitted to use that magic on me."
Serie's brow furrowed the moment the words left Fíliya's mouth.
"And besides... your magic can reproduce the image of someone missed with perfect fidelity, but it is still not truly her. Not one hundred percent. What would be the point?"
Serie added that last part quietly, almost to herself.
Ah... so because it wouldn't be complete, she doesn't want to see it at all.
Fíliya raised an eyebrow ever so slightly, then let her attention drift elsewhere.
Her gaze fell on the bouquet cradled in Serie's arms, and a thought occurred to her.
"Could I have a few?"
...Excuse me?
Serie finally turned her head. A flicker of surprise passed through her eyes.
"The flowers, I mean. I forgot to bring any."
Fíliya repeated herself with an expression of perfect, guileless innocence.
"...Tch."
Serie made a face — a rather undisguised look of distaste — but nonetheless reached into her own bouquet and pulled out a few stems, handing them to this insufferable person standing before her.
And so the two of them, one just slightly ahead of the other, laid their flowers at the foot of the grave.
"What is going on between you and Sense?"
Once the offering had been made, Serie asked the question without preamble.
?! Fíliya startled inwardly. How does she know about this too.
"When she was braiding my hair this morning, her expression was all wrong... I find it quite remarkable that the two of you could actually end up in a quarrel. That really is a rare thing."
Serie observed Fíliya's reaction with curious eyes.
"Mm... you're right, now that you mention it. This is actually the first time since we were children that Sense and I have ever been in a... cold war, so to speak. But even the closest relationships hit a rough patch eventually. It'll work itself out in time."
Fíliya said it with practiced lightness, as though it were nothing at all.
"Is that so."
Serie found something faintly off about it, but she was never particularly attuned to the nuances of human emotion — so she let it go without further inquiry.
"Speaking of which, you seem to be in quite a good mood. What exactly did that Emperor promise you?"
Fíliya had noticed the faint, involuntary smile at the corner of Serie's lips, and in the end, her curiosity got the better of her.
What in the world could possibly move the heart of a goddess this willful, this utterly detached from all earthly things?
"That young man asked me to treat this entire incident as though it never happened — he did not wish for it to damage the normal diplomatic relations between the Empire and the Continental Magic Association. He also requested that I not pursue any further charges against Captain Fres of the Magical Special Operations Unit... and as compensation, he offered to have Flamme's casket relocated to the City of Magic."
...What?!
The terms were enough to catch even Fíliya off guard.
But in the wake of that surprise came a cascade of questions.
"Mm... Flamme has already been buried for a thousand years. Moving the casket now, of all times... doesn't that seem a little... And beyond that, the Great Mage Flamme is one of the very cornerstones of the Empire's founding legitimacy — the Emperor actually agreed to something like this?"
"I was surprised as well, at first. I had no desire to disturb Flamme's rest... But then, that young man showed me this."
Serie said it quietly, and with a soft snap of her fingers, a yellowed sheet of letter paper materialized in the air before Fíliya.
Fíliya reached out and took it in her hands, studying it carefully.
"Hmm. It's been exceptionally well preserved, but this paper is from a thousand years ago."
She drew this conclusion from the paper itself before even reading a single word written on it.
"This is Flamme's last testament. She left behind quite a few instructions before she died — this particular document is her wishes regarding what should be done after her passing."
When she said this, Serie's voice was unnaturally, carefully calm.
"...She actually left something like this? And preserved this well... it seems this newborn Empire truly did have a certain... legitimacy to it."
Fíliya muttered a brief aside to herself and immediately turned her eyes to the contents.
If I cannot be buried beside my teacher, then anywhere within the Empire's borders will do.
Do not hold a state funeral for me. Keep all arrangements simple.
Those were the only two instructions the Great Mage Flamme had left regarding the handling of her own death — two lines, nothing more.
But the most important part of this last testament was undeniably the opening phrase: buried beside my teacher.
"...This genuinely surprises me. By the time Flamme was in the Empire, it had already been a very long time since she'd last seen you — and yet in her final moments, she was still thinking about whether she might be buried at your side... Though of course, at that point you hadn't yet founded the Continental Magic Association, had you? You were still living however you pleased, going wherever the wind took you. Even if the Empire had wanted to find you, they couldn't have."
Fíliya's words pricked lightly at something in Serie's chest, though her expression remained undisturbed.
"Naturally. The nature of my relationship with Flamme was, at the time, a secret known only to Frieren. The people of the Empire back then had no idea who the 'teacher' mentioned in Flamme's note was referring to."
As she spoke, Serie's thoughts drifted involuntarily back to a certain day a thousand years ago.
On that day, it had been Frieren who came to find her — carrying another of Flamme's final wishes.
That particular letter was a request for Serie to step onto the stage of history: to found the Continental Magic Association, to guide and lead human mages into a new era.
When she first heard that Flamme had died, Serie had shown no reaction whatsoever. She had taken that letter — Flamme's last words to her — and torn it apart as though it were a dull joke she couldn't be bothered to finish reading.
Well... Frieren was present, after all. She had to put on some kind of show. As for whether she quietly gathered up all those torn scraps afterward and pieced them back together — that, no one would ever know.
"Fíliya... Since you are also Flamme's disciple, shouldn't you perhaps reconsider how you address me?"
After brooding in private for quite a while, Serie finally composed herself and turned to Fíliya with that question. There was no way their conversation with Frieren had slipped past those sharp eyes — she had clearly known everything all along.
"Hmm?"
Fíliya blinked slowly, the picture of baffled innocence — an act, obviously.
"I have no idea what you mean. 'Serie' rolls off the tongue just fine."
"...Tch."
Serie's response to this performance was a single, deeply unimpressed click of her tongue.
It seemed that coaxing the words Master or Grand-Master out of this particular person was, in the end, a task harder than ascending to heaven itself.
____
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