Editing Seirei Tsukai no Blade Dance:Volume17 Chapter4 (section)

===Part 1===

"...Sheesh. No wonder this is called the Desert of Red Death."

"My goodness, Lady Rubia. She should have told us ahead of time."

"Don't blame my sister. Nee-sama might not know this kind of monster was living here."

Listening to Fianna grumbling while brushing off the sand stuck to her hair, Claire shrugged and replied.

After sundown, in the desert at night&mdash;

Kamito and company were sitting on the sand, looking up at the starry night sky.

Swallowed by the desert vortex, the ship had a huge crack, almost turning it into wreckage.

The exposed drive reactor's spirit crystal glowed with pale white phosphorescence, faintly illuminating the surroundings.

...This only happened because Kamito screwed up&mdash;Not.

While Rinslet was using Freezing Arrow to seal the monster's movements, Kamito had executed a special move from the Absolute Blade Arts, spectacularly defeating the giant jawed beast in one hit.

...However, what happened next was unexpected.

In the desert vortex, unbelievably, there were dozens of Antlions with even bigger jaws.

"Who could have thought that the center of the vortex was the beast's lair. Even I failed to discern that with my very own eyes."

"Yes, no one could have expected so many monstrous beasts like these to be gathered together, normally speaking..."

Seeing one of their own defeated, the enraged swarm of beasts crushed the sand ship with their jaws.

In the nick of time, Kamito and company escaped the ship and successfully defeated the beasts, but ended up stranded in the middle of the desert with no choice but to camp outside.

A survey of the surroundings revealed a graveyard of many sand ships buried in the sand apart from the one Kamito's team was riding. Most likely, numerous merchant ships heading into Ghul-a-val had been swept into that monster's lair after losing contact.

"...The sun has completely set."

"The drive reactor's spirit crystals are intact. Can't the ship be repaired?"

Claire asked.

"That would be far too difficult."

Glancing at the ship's broken remains, Ellis shook her head.

Even for Ellis, whose expertise in carpentry had allowed her to build a home for Kamito in three hours, with the aid of Simorgh's powers, repairing the ship here would be impossible.

"Looks like we have to camp here tonight."

"Yeah..."

Advancing through the desert blindly without any sense of direction would be tantamount to suicide. Having been dropped off in the wilderness during his Instructional School days, Kamito had poignant memories of such experiences.

Fortunately, the majority of their luggage had been given to Fianna to keep inside the alternate dimension inside Georgios and was thus safe. Had they lost their food and water too, everyone would most likely perish here, with the desert as their grave.

"O flames, dance&mdash;"

Claire ignited some broken timber embedded in the sand to serve as illumination.

"O eternal wind, grant us peace&mdash;Air Wall."

Ellis recited an incantation, using a wall of wind to cover the vicinity of their camp.

"What a disaster. I hope Princess Saladia is safe&mdash;"

Fianna sighed and murmured.

Indeed, there was no guarantee that Saladia Kahn could remain safe in this desert where monstrous beasts lurked. Even though the princess was reputedly a powerful elementalist herself, one would not expect her to last long defending against wave after wave of attacks from beasts.

"I heard Princess Saladia has a bodyguard."

"Yes, according to rumors, someone apparently took care of the Theocracy's royal guard."

Ellis nodded.

"Must be quite an amazing guy&mdash;"

Suddenly, Kamito looked at the ground by his feet, only to see the sand bulging slightly.

"...Hmm?"

Kamito deftly inserted his hand into the sand and grabbed the wriggling object under the sand.

He held it up for a look, only to see a sand-colored creature with large mandibles, resembling a lobster.

"What? Is this a young version of the Antlion just now?"

"Kamito, this is a sand scorpion."

Eyes brightening up, Rinslet stood up.

"Don't tell me, it's edible?"

"...The red color creeps me out. I'd rather not."

Making a subtle expression, Claire commented.

"Although there is some paralyzing poison, if you cut off the tail and drain out the poison, it will be fine."

"Really...?"

"Just leave it to me&mdash;Come, Fenrir!"

At the snap of Rinslet's' fingers, a demon ice spirit appeared out of thin air, surrounded by a blizzard. From his mouth that was connected to Astral Zero, kitchenware kept emerging one after another.

Particularly striking was a deep pot with metallic luster.

"What are you planning to make?"

Seeing that, Ellis asked.

"Special curry made with sand scorpions."

"Curry? What is that?"

"I suppose it is not common home cooking in Ordesia, after all. Curry first originated in the Balstan Kingdom but nowadays, it is more famous as food cooked by the Divine Ritual Institute's princess maidens."

"This was made by the Queen serving the Earth Elemental Lord, for princess maidens undergoing strict training. Not only does it nourish and strengthen the body, but also replenishes divine power. In the Divine Ritual Institute, they serve curry once every week."

Fianna, who used to live at the Divine Ritual Institute, raised an index finger and explained to the group.

"I see. Then I look forward to it."

"First, I need to cook some spices to make a roux. Claire, ready Miss Hell Cat spirit."

"Sheesh, Scarlet isn't a stove, okay?"

Despite complaining, Claire still summoned her hell cat spirit.

Crouching in a small ditch in the sand, Scarlet curled up into a ball. After putting the pot on Scarlet's back, Rinslet rhythmically added powdered herbs and spices into the pot one after another.

Soon after the pot was lidded, boiling sounds could be heard.

Everyone sat around the flames enveloping Scarlet, waiting to the curry to be done.

"...In any case, going after the Demon King's Tomb right now would be the worst idea."

Claire sighed and murmured to herself.

She was right. Now that they had lost the ship, their only choice was to retreat to a town with an oasis.

"Where in Ghul-a-val are we?"

"No idea. Spirit crystals for identifying direction do not work here."

"We should be approaching the central region of the desert, but we cannot even find a single sign of ruins."

"Besids, we do not even know what the Demon King's Tomb looks like."

Ellis and Rinslet shrugged together.

"...I really wanna find a place to purify myself. Too much dirt and the circulation of divine power gets affected."

Claire looked down at her uniform, all covered in sand. Indeed, putting aside Kamito, a boy, not being able to take a bath would be a matter of life and death for these young ladies of nobility.

"Are we going to find an oasis?"

"I do not think it will be so easy to stumble upon one. After all, this is the Desert of Red Death, forsaken by the spirits&mdash;"

"Fair enough."

"..."

At that moment&mdash;

Fianna, who had been lost in deep thought with her head down, saying not a word, suddenly lifted her head.

"Say, who wants to try a sand bath?"

"A sand bath?"

Claire and the rest of the girls raised their eyebrows with surprise on their faces.

"Yes, did you know that sand that has been purified by sunlight is as clean as pure water?"

"I-Is that true?"

"I have never heard of this."

"There is always a first time for everything, come&mdash;"

Confronted with questions from Claire and the others, Fianna nodded and replied with a confident look.