No response.

She glanced down on his peaceful expression for a moment then tilted her face toward sky and sighed deeply. “If you sleep in a place like this, you’ll catch a cold, silly.”

She carefully held Iska in her arms as he leaned toward her and laid him down. She checked that he was still asleep.

“Excuse me.” Alice stopped a taxi driving by the road. “Please take him to the Empire, up to the capital’s entrance.”

“Come on.” The driver didn’t even try to hide his scowl behind the windowpane. “You can’t be serious. At this hour? It’ll take me six hours to get to Imperial territory, even if I step on it. Plus, the capital? I won’t make it till late into the night or early tomorrow morning. How much do you think that’ll cost? Add in the long distance and overtime, and it’s gonna make it stupid expensive.”

“I’ll pay the fare up front.”

“What? Up front? Do you even know how much—?”

“Please take this.” Alice pulled out a round bundle of bills and tossed it toward the driver before he could launch into another tirade.

It was a stack of the common currency used in this world. It was enough to buy a new taxi outright and then some, much less cover the fare.

“And keep the change.”

“…Thank you for your business.”

“Make sure you take care of him.”

“Yes, ma’am!” The driver dashed over to the fountain and hauled Iska onto his back before carrying him to the passenger seat. He gently laid Iska down. After he got into the driver’s seat, he peeled away toward the city walls.

“Don’t get the wrong idea. This is just to say thanks for taking me to the museum. That’s all.” Alice watched him leave until she couldn’t see the taxi anymore and then once again turned her back to the square.

Time to go home.

…But why would I fall asleep?

…I haven’t drifted off on any other day except today.

After all, she’d been awake since the day of their battle in the forest, unable to get a wink of sleep because Iska’s face had been burned into her mind.

According to Rin’s theory, the tension from the battle hadn’t completely dissipated yet. But if that was the case, there was no way she would have dozed off right next to Iska himself.

“Seriously! What’s going on?!”

The haze over her brain was far from disappearing; in fact, she felt as though it had gotten even denser.

Alice punted a pebble on the road with all her might.