Now then, the monument construction is going smoothly, but I wonder how things are going over in the church district?

It’s already been more than a week since I last oversaw the work over there.

Right now, they’re digging deep all the way down to where the underground facility is, but considering the sheer size of that place…

How far along are they, I wonder?

There’s been some reports going up to Seriana, but they don’t go out of their way to give daily updates with full details, so I only have a general idea of what’s going on.

The First Unit is in charge of that project, and it’s kind of hard to approach them, so I don’t really know much more than Seriana does.

That’s why I decided to speak with Teresa, who’s handling communications with the Knight Order, to get more specific information.

Since digging up the entire area would produce a ridiculous amount of excavated soil, the first priority has been to completely destroy that room beneath the orphanage.

For that reason, they’re starting the excavation from the orphanage ruins rather than from the well, which is the original point of entry.

“The ground in this town is quite solid, so it took a bit of time, but just recently we managed to dig all the way down to the underground facility, and we’ve begun work on destroying the ceiling of that room. According to prior investigations, that room was built especially thick and sturdy. Even though the magical energy has mostly dispersed, it looks like it’ll still be a bit of a hassle. I believe it will take a little more time before it’s fully destroyed and cleared out.”

“I see… Well, it’d be a problem if there were an accident, and it’s not something that needs to be rushed… so there’s no issue.”

“Yes. However, once that area is destroyed, the dispersal of magical energy should accelerate again, and that might affect how quickly work progresses.”

“Really?”

When Seriana asked that in response to Teresa’s comment, she looked over at Fiora, who nodded and started to explain various things about the underground facility’s materials and how they interact with the magical energy in this city.

They can go ahead and talk about that on their own… So the ground in this town is firm, huh?

Did they figure that out during a recent investigation?

If that’s the case, it might be hard to dig through, but at least they don’t need to be overly worried about collapse in the surrounding area.

“Hm?”

Suddenly, a question popped into my mind.

I suppose they would’ve done some kind of investigation when constructing buildings, but since there aren’t any tall structures, maybe they didn’t look into it that deeply.

Still, what about the underground network that connects to the Adventurer Guild and this mansion? How did they handle that?

That thing is several times the scale of the underground area beneath the church district…

“Is something wrong?”

“Hm? …No, not really. It’s not very related, but I was just wondering how they managed when they built the passages connecting from beneath the mansion…”

I wasn’t involved in that project at all, so I don’t know the details, but I wonder if Seriana and the others were ever told anything about it?

“The First Unit was mainly in charge of that work as well, but the underground passage and the basement of the Adventurer Guild are sort of a town secret, right? They probably kept things under wraps. August might’ve known, but I never tried to dig into it either…”

“Ah… Yeah, I guess they wouldn’t bother reporting something like ‘the soil was hard’…”

“Exactly. …I wonder how many other things like that there are?”

Seriana tilted her head slightly as she answered my question.

This country has a pretty strict hierarchy, and there are also barriers between ranks.

What we’re discussing now isn’t particularly sensitive information, but there may be a lot of other information that never made it up the chain to someone like Seriana or Liesel and got stopped somewhere in the middle.

There’s also the matter of lateral communication.

“It might be good to gather everything while I’m still the only one responsible.”

Even Riana sees Liesel and Seriana as leaders of two separate factions.

Their relationship is good, and they cooperate when needed, but each faction operates independently and doesn’t often coordinate directly.

When it comes to monsters and such, the Adventurer Guild falls under the jurisdiction of the Knight Order, and since they provide information to both Liesel and Seriana, there’s no major concern there…

Still, even if they don’t see themselves that way, others might.

Like Seriana said, right now she has sole authority.

Sorting through the gathered information will be a lot of work, though…

“That’s a good idea. If we compile the information here, we can hand it over once the Lord returns.”

When I glanced at Teresa, she nodded in agreement with Seriana, her expression calm and collected.

Well… since Liesel and the others are away right now, the workload on the territory has been kept light.

Besides, work tends to slow down in winter anyway, so maybe they’ll manage.

Unlike the soldiers, the administrative staff have stayed behind in the city.

Even though Seriana has returned to work, she doesn’t seem to be too busy, so maybe this is just the right kind of distraction for her.

Watching Seriana, planning things out together with Teresa and Fiora, and even seeming to enjoy it a little, I found myself thinking that.

——————————————————————————————————————————————————————————–

Sera ・Blessing・【Hideout】 +1【Prayer】【Mira’s Blessing】【Water’s Garment】

Blessed Items ・【Floating Orb】 +1【Shadow Sword】 +1【Scarlet Bee Needle】【Fairy’s Eye】【Lesser Dragon’s Lung】【Amber Sword】【Danrem’s Thread】【Serpent’s Tail】【Ankle Bracelet】【Amber Shield】【Purple Wings】【Red Sword】【Monkey’s Arm】・8 cards

Seriana ・【Area Detection】・【】・0 cards

Elena ・【】・【Green Fang】【Amber Sword】・4 cards

Alec ・【Power Strike】・【Red Shield】【Fierce Horned Trumpet】・10 cards