After disappearing from Duran’s view, Rio went toward southwest direction without using the main route. Right now is an emergency situation since Flora’s current condition was critical. Besides, he didn’t know whether he could move at ease if he follow the main route where the cities and villages were under the enemy’s territory. Having said so, returning to the village where he met Duran and the others was also out of the question since that’d make the situation even more complicated.

  After thinking this far, he decided to stop for the time being to administer medical treatment on Flora, rather then continuing on weighting the never ending pros and cons. As such, when he arrived at the rock filled area, he stopped and agreed with himself.

  This place seems to be alright

  Rio stood still, and then pour down his magic power to the ground through his feet, preparing the ground for use.

  「《Discharge》」


  Then he opened his item box that was equipped on his left hand and took out the rock house.

  「Yosh. 」


  While still holding on to Flora, he skillfully opened the door and entered his rock house.

  「Haa, haaa…」


  All the while, Flora was breathing hard, in great pain as she tried her best to cling onto her life.

  「First is medicine. Next is preparing a comfortable room and clean her body…」


  Rio muttered as he made a list of tasks he had to do first. Suddenly he realized something.

  While Elven-made medicine should be able to cure here…what do I do about cleaning her body? How do I do that neatly without causing an offense?

  Even though it’s an emergency situation, washing the naked body of an unconscious princess still made him feel awkward. On the other hand, her body might not be in hygienic condition after lying down for so many days without being cleaned.

  Rio frowned, hesitating over what he has to do in this situation. In the end, he concluded to himself.

  「Let’s feed her the medicine for the time being. 」


  So, he fed her the medicine first, before doing anything else. Then, perhaps because he had found a good solution to his dilemma, he brought her to the bathroom without removing anything, spread out a towel on top of the tiles, and put Flora above that towel.

  「《Discharge》 …………… Princess FLora, you must drink this medicine and water. So, please wake up for now. 」


  He took out a small bottle filled with water and another small bottle filled with the elven-made medicine, and called her out with slightly louder voice as he lifted her up to a sitting position.

  「Urgh………………….. 」


  Flora reacted with a groan, and when he saw that small reaction, he immediately acted.

  「Princess Flora, here your water and medicine. Open your mouth. 」


  After making sure that she can breathe, he made her to drink the water first.

  「……!!」


  Even though it was just a little amount, Rio saw that she seemed to be able to swallow the water, as such he decided to give her the medicine right after, lest she fall unconscious without drinking the medicine.

  「Splendid. Now you need to drink the medicine, please swallow it properly. Being slow is fine, just drink the medicine, okay. Here you go. 」


  Speaking up till that point, Rio opened the medicine bottle and put it on Flora’s lips so she could drink it directly.

  「……」


  At her current condition though, Flora was only able to swallow a little of the medicine.

  「Good, now take a breath for a while…now, please continue to drink the medicine. 」


  Thus, Rio spent quite some time to make her drink the necessary dosage of the medicine. It took her a few minutes to drink it though since she could only drink a little bit at a time.

  「Next I need to wash her clothes, and body. Flora, please do not feel surprised when you feel water, okay? I’m going to wash you with hot water and soap. 」


  This was his solution to Flora’s hygiene concern, he would wash her clothed body directly. That way, he wouldn’t offend a lady virtues too much. Besides, the medicine wouldn’t show it’s effect immediately. It would need some time to neutralize the poison that was raging on her body, though he was absolutely sure that Flora would be fine after ingesting that elven-made medicine. In the meantime though, he has no other choice but to cleanse her clothed body, since she wouldn’t be able to do so by herself. If this elven-made medicine wasn’t able to completely cure her, then he was going to use the last resort he had, the elixir.

  「AH……」


  To sooth himself, he took Flora’s hanging head as an agreement to his action.

  「Well then, let’s start from hot water. 」


  Rio said to himself, trying to alleviate the awkwardness he felt, and then conjured hot water to wrapped up Flora’s clothed body. Using that conjured hot water, he rinsed and washed both her clothes and body, at the same time ensuring that her body was kept warm.

  Luckily, she’s unconscious. This way, she won’t realize that I’m using spirit arts right now.

  Rio thought, distracting himself from his current action and situation.

  「Don’t worry, the water’s warm, and it will be only for a minute. 」


  After saying that, Flora’s head that was unwashed was wrapped in the warm water for a minute, cleaning it somewhat.

  One minute later, Rio let go of his control over the hot water, allowing it to splashed away on the floor. He conjured a new hot water and mixed it with soap. Controlling the soap-mixed water, he used it to gently and carefully washed her clothed body.

  After washing her body, he moved on to her hair, and then splashed some clean water on her face before wiping it dry.

  「Next is to dry her…………」


  In order to not let her getting chilled, he started to dry her body immediately. To be exact, he touched her clothes, and from there he proceeded to suck the moisture in her clothes with spirit arts. Honestly, this shouldn’t be used to light clothes since it’d damage the fabrics, but that is not a problem right now since the clothes she was wearing was the one lent out by the village chief.

  Finishing that, he created a warm wind to dry her hair. Thus, completing his task of cleaning her.

  「…And that was the end of it. 」


  Perhaps it was due to the delicate operation, but Rio took a deep breath once he finished that particular task, feeling relieved. Furthermore, perhaps because she had taken the medicine and had her body cleansed, but he thought that Flora’s complexion had become slightly better, increasing his relief.

  「Now I just need to let her to sleep…… Well, let’s just let her use the vacant room. 」


  While he didn’t know how long she is going to need to rest, but by his estimation, she needed to rest for a few days, at the very least. Therefore he decided to take her to the vacant room and let her rest there alone. If her condition stabilized before she woke up, then he was going to take her back to the city under her kingdom’s territory.

  Though, I’ll need to find some indirect way to ascertain whether she saw my appearance or my fight with Lucius…


  Whilst bringing her to the vacant bedroom, Rio was pondering over how to do such things. When he arrived there, he placed Flora’s body on the bed and saw that she seemed to be asleep already.

  Hence, he tucked her body with the blanket, looked over her before his gaze moved to her nape.

  「………It would be better if there’s no scar left on her skin. 」


  Rio muttered to the silent room.