“Well, she’s the younger sister of that drunkard over there and pretty much just as strong. She’s got good combat abilities, and her magic is basically off in a realm all of its own,” I explained. She was high spec, I had to admit, hearing it all again now. But these events had also revealed just how close in age she was to Raphtalia and that she still required my protection.

Shildina was practically puffing out her chest at my words. She still hadn’t returned to a normal body size, and in her child-like state, she had the same kind of cuteness as Filo. Maybe better than when she was an adult.

“She also has abilities as an oracle,” Raphtalia added.

“An oracle?” Glass asked.

“Well, to put it simply, she can trace the abilities of the owner of an object from the residual thoughts within it. Then she opens a hole in her soul and puts those thoughts into it,” I explained. Shildina raised her hand toward Glass without saying anything.

“That’s it. Can you stop doing . . . whatever that is, please? It feels like I’m facing a soul eater, and I just can’t calm down,” Glass said.

“Sure, okay,” Shildina replied.

“What did you do?” I asked. It seemed Shildina had worked out why Glass was on guard around her.

“There are people in this world called ‘spirits,’ right? They are similar to the thoughts that I can summon using my oracle powers. Because I can capture such thoughts, these spirits are instinctively afraid of my presence,” Shildina explained.

“Like you’re their natural enemy?” I asked.

“A little different. But a spirit may feel it that way,” she replied. An unexpected effect, for sure. But if I recalled correctly, the hole in Shildina’s soul had been blocked, considerably reducing her oracle powers.

“When it’s as clear as this, I can perform the summons even without having to force open a hole. That would make certain things much easier,” Shildina continued.

“Certain things? Like what? That sounds a bit unpleasant from where I’m sitting,” I said. I was getting worried about what Shildina might do to Glass. Could she eat her soul, like a soul eater? Sadeena, on the other hand, didn’t have any of these kinds of powers and wasn’t an oracle.

“Should I experiment a little?” Shildina asked.

“I would rather you didn’t. Human experiments only cause problems, in my experience,” Glass said. I had to give her that one. Even if we tried it with a spirit other than Glass, we had no idea what it might do to Shildina either.

“Getting back to the previous topic,” Glass said. “Ethnobalt knows a lot about ofuda.” I’d had a feeling he was knowledgeable on the topic. They had diverged a little now, but he was originally an intellectual type, just like Rishia.