Editing Skill Tree Goddess:Volume1 Chapter2 (section)

===Part 13===

''Crash!!

Gilbezos felt a tug on his arm and then saw a flash of light. His weight seemed to vanish. His feet left the ground. Only the boy and the high elves were enveloped in something like a large aurora. Yes, an aurora. Wasn’t that the light said to be emitted by the Valkyries’ armor? But while they could fly, it wasn’t exactly fast. With the people, wagons, and huts floating there, it was actually kind of scary. Without so many others floating with him, the short boy might have screamed.

They passed by over the enemies’ heads. They slowly but surely moved further from the ground.

However, the enemy was still too close for comfort.

If any of the hunting party could use long-range magic, the high elves could still be shot down. So the elves used their sturdy floating wagons and huts as shields while firing arrows and magic down into the forest as if they were trying to use up their entire supply. Whether those above or those below had the upper hand goes without saying. Not giving the enemy a chance to attack would probably be safest. As long as they didn’t attack the village too, the short boy didn’t care.

After about an hour, the battle had completely ended. They were quite high up now.

The sunlight was bright up in the sky and it was chilly too.

Still, they arrived somewhere. The air was different, as were the temperature, humidity, scent, and weight. They were surrounded by forest, but it was red. Were those the sugar maples which maple syrup came from? That meant they were in a completely different “deep forest”.

The short boy’s feet touched down. However, it wasn’t quite accurate to say he was now on “the ground”.

“Is this land floating? I don’t believe it. We’re on a Sky Territory.”

“The elevation would explain this chilliness. Brr★”

The goddess stood by his side. Like she had never left it.

Only Gilbezos had been tugged back in that moment, but she must have also taken a step back to cross the boundary and float up with him. Did she have the devil’s luck, or had she seen through it from the beginning as a god? Whatever the case, he was glad she hadn’t been left behind.

But a Sky Territory, huh? That was perfect for losing pursuit, but getting back to the surface wasn’t going to be easy. The ad cranes made with thick chains and giant leather balloons were vehicles to entertain bored aristocrats, so they were quite expensive…

“You won this time,” said the goddess.

She pointed out that this had ended differently from the battles against Balsta and Brave Liar.

“You took on 5000 humans and pushed back every wave for a full hour. It was a close one, but you achieved the win condition. Gilbezos, check your LAW. You’ll find something quite interesting there.”

“Please don’t tell me I didn’t earn anything because I didn’t actually defeat any of them.”

“This is more interesting than that.”

He nervously checked the number in the corner of the Skill Tree and found he had in fact earned a lot.

…Some boss battles against humans would still give you LAW even if it ended in a draw, so was this like that?

If he returned all his current skills for the payback, he would have a total of around 6500.

That was technically enough to reach Rank 9 at the top.

This was the first step toward a rematch with Brave Liar. This was one of the conditions needed to keep his promise with the king.

''But.

''That wasn’t what mattered right now.

Someone approached him. It was Sayuran Cuchanbern, the high elf with her long blonde hair tied back.

“Are you alright? And…oh, I don’t recall inviting two?”

“You idiot!!” Gilbezos shouted back without thinking.

He had fought and won and made it through…''but so what?

“It had only been a day. There was something you should have protected over some day-old bond! If you high elves had that much courage, you could have taken that boy instead of me. You might have been able to free him from that village of pillagers…”

He was answered with silence. She didn’t even try to argue.

She hadn’t had the courage. Sismond had blamed himself the whole time, but maybe the high elves had as well. Maybe there could have been another path if they had made up their mind earlier.

But if the elves could look so bothered by it here, then that bond still lived.



So it would work out.

One day, they would surely smile and walk hand in hand.