“Of course,” Marie replied. “We made a promise, right? To bring everyone over to that shop. We’ll then toss money at the premises and drown the place in gold, silver and bronze, before turning all the waiters out to serve our people exclusively.”

Aziz blinked twice. “Did we really make that promise? I only recall the first bit about bringing people over, though.”

“Your memory was affected by the battle.” Marie’s earnest eyes were hard to look at, forcing Aziz to look away. “Besides, you were the one who said it, not me.”

“Me?” Aziz rubbed his eyes, before wincing. “The one who wanted to drown the place in money and act like an obnoxious prick was—”

“Yeap.”

Aziz opened and closed his mouth, uncertain of what to think. Did something happen to his memory during the fight? Given the state of his injuries, it was possible that he had suffered from memory loss, after all. Besides, he couldn’t quite remember everything from before the demon invasion; it was as if the demons’ attack was a boundary of clarity in his mind.

He was fairly certain that he wouldn’t come up with such a ridiculous promise, though. “Marshal, stop pulling my leg. Playing pranks on the injured isn’t really funny, okay?”

“Ah, curses. You found out.” Removing the helmet on her Exoskeleton, she stretched her neck and looked down at the armour around her body. Burn marks, chips and cracks could be seen everywhere, but Aziz knew that the only thing that truly mattered was the support structure fixed onto her backbone.

“Well, a certain marshal has quite the penchant for jokes,” Aziz replied. “It wasn’t hard to figure out what she was up to after some time, right?”

“Oh, come on.” She turned to the medics. “Thank you for keeping an eye out for my funny little subordinate.”

“Funny?” Aziz repeated. “Excuse me? I’m not funny.”

“You had a choice between funny and little, and you went with the former. Really? What happened to men being very sensitive about their size?” Marie asked.

“Why would I be sensitive about…” Aziz paused, and then turned his head back to the front. “I get the feeling that you are not talking about the size of my body. Never mind.”

“Boring. Alright then. Back to business.” The marshal’s words took on a steely quality. “You’re probably worried about the First Aerial, but we haven’t had any casualties. The kids did a good job in hanging back and providing support from afar. However, we’ve taken quite a lot of damage overall, but the brass doesn’t seem to like the idea of retreating. It seems like we’ll be pushing into the enemy territory without any heed of casualties.”

“Are they crazy?” Aziz asked.

“There’s no choice. Time is running out for us. Four months before the festival ends, at which point the world will be changed irrevocably. Either the great gods’ fears come to pass, and we’re all obliterated.” Marie lowered her voice. “Either that or we’re brought into this new utopia that is antithetical to the higher-ups’ current status.”

“To be honest, the concept of a utopia that has no limit or end…it sounds somewhat unbelievable. What kind of world has no end?” Aziz shook his head. “It just sounds unbelievable to me.”

“What kind of world has no end…yes, it does sound too good to be true.” Marie clicked her teeth. “If only we knew what awaited us at the end of the four months, though.”

“If it’s anything like the rumours, this expedition would collapse upon itself,” Aziz replied, before gesturing at the two medics. “Right? What do you two think?”

The two medics exchanged glances. “Well…”

“That response is good enough as an answer,” Marie replied, before rolling her eyes. “Don’t worry. We won’t say anything to your bosses. Your jobs are safe here, and you won’t need to undergo mandatory counselling.”

“T-thanks you, ma’am,” said the first medic.

“Right! Colonel, we need to remove the artefact on your back, before we delay your prognosis,” said the second medic. “We couldn’t do that earlier, since there’s no instructions for that, but it’s possible that your spine has been badly injured too.”

Aziz nodded, and then pointed at Marie. “Do the same to her too. If I’m this badly injured, she definitely can’t be in a better state either. She’s probably soldiering through this with the Exo-Skeleton too.”

“Hey.”

“What?” Aziz asked, without turning behind. “As the boss, you should really pay more attention to your own health and everything. As your underling, I am obligated to point out whenever you overdo things, especially when you have equipment that makes you think that you haven’t quite overdone it yet.”

He turned to the medics. “Well? What are you waiting for? Go give her a check-up or something.”

“She’s less injured than you, though,” the first medic noted. “We’ll deal with you first. Get those partitions up.”

“Alright.” With a professional gait, the second medic created a small room of sorts around his bed. Given that there were all kinds of people in the same area, and especially since everyone here were Knights, Aziz could understand why privacy was such a big deal. Failing to observe it could lead to rather…unpleasant outcomes, on a personal level.

Forcing him back down onto the bed, the two medics flipped him over like a fish, and then ushered Marie out of the room. “Alright. We’ll need your help for this bit.”

“Alright. After you two remove the central spine, pass it to Marie. She’ll know what to do with it,” said Aziz.

“Got it,” said the second medic. “Can we start?”

“Yeah. There are a bunch of buttons on the back, right? You just need to press it in a certain order…”