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I turn my head in the direction of the familiar voice, where I see an equally familiar blond with sky-blue eyes, down on one knee beside me.

His white sleeves are rolled up. Hanging over his shoulder is a large, heavy-looking hammer, enough to make me stagger if it were to be placed in my grasp. “Alfred…”

After setting the large hammer on his shoulder aside, he takes a peek at me and breaks into a smile. He appears somewhat relieved. “Construction of the fence is over for the day. We’ve already used up all the materials we brought with us.”

“Ah…”

The fence.

I turn my head to take in my surroundings.

A verdant hill. Before me, a river with gentle waters. On the other side of the river, a dense forest. And behind the forest is a mountain range, its slopes slight.

I also feel the soft sensation of grass against my back. Its fresh scent drifts through the air around me.

The next thing that registers in my mind is the black jacket over my body.

It’s the coat of the Owen family. Embroidered on both the back yoke and the right shoulder is the Owen family’s emblem, a plump bird with a stalk of wheat, spun with silver thread.

It’s wide enough to envelop the full length of my shoulders, long enough to reach my ankles.

At that moment, I finally remember.

That’s right. I came to install fences in the village’s western border in order to fortify the defense line there. These fences will be used to repel the demons once they come charging on the day of the disaster.

Then, I seem to hear some faint voices, so I look to the side. There, I spot eight men up on the hill. They’re pretty far, but I can still discern their figures and facial expressions. They’re energetically waving at us, their smiling faces showing their satisfaction and accomplishment

Ahh.

Those are the four workers I hired, along with the other nearby villagers who came to help me.

Driven into the ground behind them are thick and sturdy wooden stakes, each reaching the chest of an adult and lined up in a row three to four meters away from one another. And connecting adjacent stakes are iron wires.

The fence stretches approximately two hundred meters from here. The plan is to extend it all the way to the riverside.

I also intend to install iron wires and waterproof stakes across the river in the following week.

My plans are progressing very smoothly. I feel very pleased.

It’s nice, but—

“Did I…”

Did I fall asleep?

And since when? How long have I been sleeping?

“After we had our lunch, you said that you’d lie down and take a short nap. You also told me to wake you up after a while, but you slept so soundly that I didn’t want to rouse you. So I just let you be.”

“Huuhh?! You idiot! You should’ve woken me up sooner!!”

“Well , you appeared very tired earlier, and you were having such a good sleep. Besides, everyone also agreed to let you keep sleeping.”

“Uhh….”

I take another look at the hilltop. Upon noticing my gaze, the men once again wave at us, smiles on their faces.

In the slight distance between us, I can hear them cheerfully drawl, “So Lian-sama has woken up,” “We did well making the fence,” “How’s the fence?”

“Uhh… Really, you should have woken me up…” I say before letting out a sigh.

How surprising.

It seems like everyone, not just Alfred, thinks that I feel tired, so they tried to be considerate to me.

I feel worthless. Useless. Ashamed. Embarrassed.

In the future, I have to focus and get my act together so that this won’t happen again.

However, even though I didn’t really supervise today’s construction, it was successfully completed without any accident.

There aren’t any delays either.

It’s great that everything’s going well, but I somehow feel… how should I say this… conflicted.

“So today’s work is done, huh…”

“Yeah. Earlier in the morning, you told me how to make the individual wooden stakes and set them up into a fence, so there wasn’t a problem in that regard. I also kept my eye on them as they worked.”

“Oh… thank you…”

I look up. The sky’s still blue, and the sun’s still high up in the sky, only midway between the zenith and horizon. There’s still a few hours before sunset.

Looks like we finished much earlier than scheduled.

And come to think of it, Alfred previously worked part-time at the construction site for a long time.

Maybe he’s more suited to supervise the operations than me.

But setting that aside…

I send a casual side-glance at Alfred, who’s squatting beside me, unable to make myself turn my head to him.

I think I was sleep-talking earlier.

And upon waking up, I said something like, “Wait for me, Goddess!”

Did he hear that?

What should I do?

After mentally preparing myself, I finally gain the courage to turn sideways. Where I see his clear blue eyes staring down at me.

“A-Al—”

“…Did you dream about the Goddess?”

I twitch with a start.

This is bad.

As I thought, he must have heard me.

I have to convince him otherwise somehow.

“T-that… uhh, well… yeah! I did dream of the Goddess, which must be a good omen! Though I don’t really remember what happened.”

“…I see.”

What an appropriate answer from Alfred. As usual. Really, words like that make it difficult to discern whether he’s actually listening or not. Or to gauge his thoughts and reaction

Does he accept my excuse?

I fix my gaze on him, but his eyes and expression remain inscrutable. I don’t know what to say next.

Alfred raises a hand, face still as unreadable as ever—

And strokes my cheek somewhat timidly.

I really don’t understand.

What’s going through his mind right now?

“…A-Alfred? Uhh… D-did I say something while asleep…?”

For a moment, Alfred looks away, before once again shifting his gaze to me.

“Nothing… I just heard you calling out to the Goddess in your sleep.”

“I-I see…”

Relief washes over me.

If it’s just that, then there’s nothing to worry about.

With how vague that is, I can make a ton of excuses about why I called out to the Goddess.

Ahh, Goddess! I’m being serious here! It’s great that you finally came to see me. I was able to ask the questions I’ve always wanted to ask you and express the words that I’ve always wanted to tell you. But I wish you came at a more appropriate time and place!!

My heart doesn’t have the strength to handle this situation!

But in any case, I hope she’ll return sooner or later.

And I still wish to ask what her plan of action is. After all, that Goddess is rather frivolous and leisurely, so I can’t predict what she intends to do. She’s scary in that respect.

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