“Pen!” Chris said.

“Raph!” Raph-chan greeted her. It was almost like a reunion between two old friends.

“Pen! Pen-pen!” Chris continued.

“Raph . . .” Raph-chan sympathized.

“Glass tried to attempt a rescue many times, even with everyone stopping her,” Raphtalia murmured quietly to me. “It wasn’t easy to stop her either.”

“I’m sure it wasn’t,” I replied. Kizuna was to Glass what Raphtalia was to me. Having someone around who understood her had helped Glass stay calm.

“In order to be reunited with you, Mr. Naofumi, I took on a number of waves, hoping to be able to return to the world I came from,” Raphtalia told me.

“They didn’t match up though, did they?” I said. The only wave in our world had been the recent one in Melromarc. That one hadn’t matched with Kizuna’s world, meaning Raphtalia had been without any way to get back.

“We just need to go and get Kizuna back, right?” L’Arc said. His voice was loud and high; he was hoping to ride this wave all the way to victory. “Great to have you helping out—you and your party, Naofumi—but what’s the plan once we save Kizuna?”

“Well . . . as for these vassal weapon holders with the power to steal weapons, if I’m reunited with Kizuna, together we can instantly weaken them,” I said.

“What?!” L’Arc exclaimed.

“I told you about Takt, the guy we faced in my world, right?” I confirmed.

“Yes, I heard you. But is it that simple?” L’Arc asked. I mean, I wasn’t sure it would be that easy, but in light of the situation, it was clear what we needed to prioritize.

“The seven star weapons in our world are the same as the vassal weapons here in yours. Which means the holders of the holy weapons outrank them. They should be able to easily strip anyone who isn’t fulfilling their duty as a vassal weapon holder of their right to hold the weapon,” I explained. The removal of authority I had levied on Takt would only work on a seven star weapon. I couldn’t, for example, use it on S’yne. I’d also tried it on Rishia, Trash, and Fohl, but it had no effect on those who were recognized to be using their weapon correctly. It looked like authority could only be stripped from those who had obtained the weapons in an unjust way or who had abandoned their duty.

But even if we could take them all back, we didn’t know the location of some of the seven star weapons.

“It sounds like you haven’t made much progress with sharing power-up methods here in this world. That’s why we’ve probably gotten a bit stronger than you. Anyway, once preparations are ready, should we perhaps hunt down the vassal weapon holders first?” I suggested. One priority was definitely to get back Ethnobalt’s vassal weapon. If the enemy started using that to get around, we would be in even more trouble.

That said, the movement skills found in the weapons here were fundamentally different from the skills we had—like Scroll of Return or Dragon Vein. If we were careful of teleportation interference, we could probably escape or come back without too much trouble.