ushernet Chapter 253 : Chapter 253
Chapter 253 : Chapter 253
“This is impossible. How could there be water…?”Ian Rau muttered with a vacant expression.
Forgetting that he had been charging at Geheram, he came to a dead stop.
“We did it! I knew today would be the day!”
“Me too! Ahhh!”
The Lizardman warriors embraced one another, overwhelmed with emotion.
“The dream was real! This is the blessing of God Nava!”
ROOOOSH!
And Geheram stood there, shovel in hand, witnessing it all.
Water.
The water he had waited for so desperately.
‘Did I not believe it would happen?’
He had believed.
Even so, he had never dared imagine that it would feel like this.
Geheram’s jaw trembled uncontrollably.
As the jet of water surged upward, droplets splashed across his face.
Drip.
‘Even so… I…’
He closed his eyes, feeling the water touch his skin.
‘I will never forget this sensation as long as I live.’
***
WHOOSH!
The torrent of water burst violently out of the pit.
The Lizardman warriors who had been fighting desperately to rescue the Kau tribe saw it as well.
CLATTER.
The weapons they were holding fell to the ground.
“God Nava…”
The name of their god slipped from the warriors’ lips.
They were so stunned that even the Academy students fighting them were taken aback.
“W, what is going on? Why are they like this?”
Inette, who had been preparing wind element magic, halted her chant.
She stared blankly as the Lizardman warriors discarded their weapons one by one.
Facing the water jet, they knelt with solemn reverence and pressed their foreheads to the ground.
Thud.
“…God Nava.”
In the desert, water was nothing less than a divine blessing to the Lizardmen.
“Did it work?”
Noticing the water surging up from the pit, Inette finally understood what had happened.
Looking at the powerful stream, she felt an inexplicable surge of emotion.
The third-year seniors felt much the same as the Lizardman warriors.
“So it really happened.”
“Am I… crying right now?”
“Sniff. Why am I getting emotional over this now…?”
Their noses stung, and they deliberately turned to face the opposite stretch of desert.
If they looked at the water any longer, they felt their tears would truly fall.
“Do not overreact. It is not like we dug it all ourselves.”
“Still, it is moving.”
“Those guys never gave up, and in the end, they pulled it off.”
The seniors had come to understand the Lizardmen’s circumstances while working alongside them.
Knowing how desperately the Lizardmen wished for even a single drop of water from the sand, the third-years’ eyes grew hot.
Since enrolling in the Academy, they had never felt anything like this.
“…Has God Nava truly not abandoned us?”
Shartea waited as the Lizardman warrior who had been crossing blades with her quietly withdrew.
After bowing his head to Shartea, the warrior slowly knelt toward the water.
Thump.
Watching him, Shartea finally understood why the captured Lizardmen had not fled and instead kept digging.
Their desperation for water.
A pure wish placed above even their identity as warriors.
The earnest longing that every Lizardman carried deep in their hearts stood plainly before her eyes.
And she thought of the one who had made all of this possible.
‘Radel Silvert Cretian.’
A boy who had made the Lizardmen kneel without fighting them.
That boy was now speaking with his spirit.
“You were right. There really was an underground water source.”
At Radel’s words, the Spirit of the Library snapped angrily.
“So you thought I was lying to you? You impudent brat!”
He had suddenly summoned it, and it had wondered what sort of trouble had arisen…
The Spirit of the Library grumbled, pages fluttering on Radel’s shoulder.
Still, it could not fail to understand why this clumsy contractor had summoned it at this moment.
Blue water rising from the red desert.
This was what the boy had wanted to show it.
The Spirit of the Library spoke, unable to tear its gaze away from the water.
“…Well, you have done it again.”
Radel answered with a gentle smile.
***
“I am pleased to finally meet you like this.”
The Great Chieftain of the Lizardmen, Ilin Rau, welcomed Radel’s group.
Standing before him were not only Radel’s party, but also Carlos, the commander of the Horizon Knights, and the vice commander beside him.
News that the Lizardmen had discovered water reached the Great Chieftain swiftly.
Guided by the Lizardmen, Radel’s group was brought before him.
“The honor is mine, to meet the Great Chieftain of the desert.”
Carlos spoke to Ilin Rau.
Considering his fearsome reputation, the commander of the Horizon Knights was surprisingly polite.
Ilin Rau’s gaze deepened.
“The Great Chieftain of the desert? That is too grand a title. I am merely the Great Chieftain of the Lizardmen.”
“Hah! You are too modest! Even I know what a Great Chieftain signifies.”
Carlos curled his lips in amusement.
Though he often joked that no one owned the desert, the red-haired man who led the Horizon Knights understood well what the title of Great Chieftain meant to the Lizardmen.
Great Chieftain.
A title granted to the strongest warrior among all chieftains.
But strength alone was not enough.
One whom all chieftains bowed to and acknowledged as wise.
One who ruled over all Lizardman tribes.
Until Ilin Rau appeared, the Lizardmen had been without a Great Chieftain for a very long time.
And when he finally emerged, the Lizardmen were united at last.
Just as God Nava’s prophecy foretold, that the Great Chieftain would gather the scattered tribes into one.
It was a legend known to all Lizardmen, and a story anyone who lived in the desert could not fail to know.
“It pleases me to hear that from the commander of the Horizon Knights. More importantly, our warriors have been in your care for quite some time.”
“In your care? Hardly.”
Carlos snorted.
He was well aware of what the Great Chieftain meant.
“We did not intend to take prisoners, but circumstances led us there this time.”
Carlos shrugged, and the Great Chieftain chuckled softly.
“Do you think I do not know the Horizon Knights? I heard you had a guest these past few days.”
Ilin Rau’s slit pupils turned toward Radel.
Sensing it was his cue, Radel stepped forward.
“It is an honor to meet you. I am Radel Silvert Cretian, the 8th Prince of the Cretian Empire.”
“A pleasure, imperial prince.”
The Great Chieftain examined the young royal who had stepped forward.
When Geheram had been captured and the shaman had barely escaped to explain everything, Ilin Rau had already seen through Radel’s identity.
A golden-eyed imperial riding a griffin.
The human lord who had resolved the conflict in Raviedel.
A boy who had not only persuaded Lizardmen, born warriors, to become farmers, but had also led them to mine and even beautify the land willingly.
“It was I who suggested capturing the Lizardman warriors.”
With calm composure, Radel began recounting everything that had happened.
How he had visited the Horizon Knights for major practical training.
How he had fought the Lizardman warriors in the desert.
How he learned why the Horizon Knights and the Kau tribe clashed, and that the root of it all was the desert’s lack of water.
It was exactly as he had heard from Ishan Rau, the Great Chieftain’s second son.
The prince had a way of making listeners lean in.
“And then, the spirit contracted to me informed me that water flowed beneath the desert. At that point, we needed manpower to dig.”
There was more.
Ishan Rau had said this as well.
The remarkable thing about that prince was how easily he unraveled difficult problems.
“So, imperial prince. Are you telling me that you know the location of the water source?”
When the Great Chieftain asked, Radel nodded.
“Yes.”
Ian Rau was momentarily speechless.
Did this prince truly understand what he was saying?
What those words meant to the Lizardmen, and to everyone in the desert.
The desert’s oases were drying up.
When small pools shrank, they quickly became polluted and undrinkable.
For now it was manageable, but in ten years there would not be a single sip of drinkable water left.
Who could live where there was no water?
The Lizardmen were slowly dying.
The reason the Great Chieftain had sent his second son, Ishan Rau, to the Imperial Academy despite opposition from other tribes was the faint hope that he might find a solution.
But it had been impossible.
Ilin Rau knew that.
He had simply not wanted to let go of that fragile hope.
He had searched to the very edges of the desert, only to be greeted by sand and stone.
Ilin Rau did not want to accept that this was the end of the Lizardmen’s fate.
He believed that someday a way would be found.
Even if it was nothing more than the empty dream of a Great Chieftain burdened with his people’s destiny.
“A water source… truly exists…?”
In Radel’s eyes, Ilin Rau saw the light of hope.
“Yes. If the Great Chieftain wishes, I will gladly tell you.”
It was the moment Ilin Rau had waited for his entire life.
***
Creak.
Radel stepped out of his temporary lodgings.
He wanted to clear his head with a short walk.
Radel’s group was currently staying as guests of the Great Chieftain.
“To think we would even be invited to a dinner banquet.”
Imperial royalty attending a Lizardman banquet.
It would likely be the first in continental history.
Though the Empire and the Lizardmen had relations, no imperial family member had ever participated in a tribal event.
That was why Shartea and Inette had been so startled when the Great Chieftain asked if they would attend.
Radel recalled the Great Chieftain’s smile afterward.
‘I heard something from my second son.’
When Radel offered to reveal the water source, the Great Chieftain spoke as if he had been waiting.
‘I have no intention of simply asking you to tell me its location.’
He added that Radel should think about what sort of reward he wanted.
It seemed Ishan Rau had spoken of Radel while staying as a guest in Raviedel.
Ishan Rau himself had once gifted Radel water purification pills and a griffin saddle in return for borrowing a laboratory.
‘I was planning to talk about compensation anyway, but…’
Now that he was told to think about it, nothing immediately came to mind.
Manticore fangs?
They felt insufficient as compensation.
Radel understood what revealing the water source meant to the Lizardmen.
An exchange should be balanced to feel right.
As Radel pondered what he should ask of them and continued walking, a voice called out.
“Hey.”
Radel turned toward the sound.
Ian Rau stood there, arms crossed, leaning against a wall.
“Were you calling me?”
“Yes, you. The owner of the griffin.”
Radel knew that the Lizardman warrior who had attacked the Horizon Knights was the Great Chieftain’s first son.
Wondering why he had been summoned, Radel waited, and Ian Rau spoke.
“Follow me. I will show you the northern desert.”