With Fenrir patrolling around the broken fortress, Axel and the girls could focus on their task... or not.
Despite hearing her say it herself, the other witches still doubted the divine wolf. As such, only seven remained with Axel, while the other eight kept an eye on Fenrir down below. Axel could understand their choice, so he didn’t stop them.
In fact, if they didn’t volunteer, he might’ve sent so to watch over Fenrir himself. He, too, was still worried, after all.
Axel shook his head, slapping his cheeks lightly to get his thoughts straight.
"I’ve got to focus!"
His task was, after all, fixing a broken fortress.
Rather, it was a miracle that it still retained its basic shape, given how damaged the entire structure was. It was so dilapidated that they were worried about entering any building within, as it might collapse on top of them at any mont.
Axel knelt to the ground, touching it.
As soon as he did, a pop-up window appeared, showing the fortress’s details to him.
[
Na: Witcheria Frontline Fortress (Major) #606
Repairable: True
Estimated Cost: 31.6 billion Colts
Repair Cost: 27.8 billion Colts
Repair Duration: 1 hour, 9 minutes, 30 seconds
]
"One hour?!"
Axel gasped at how long the repair would take.
The minor fortresses he fixed before barely took him a minute at most. No, it was just about fifteen seconds, actually. But this ti, just this one fortress needed over a full hour to repair.
"Damn, this will take a while..." Axel grumbled. "And since the sun’s about to set, let’s make camp here first."
"Yes, Sir Axel." Nina nodded before waving her hand, commanding the other witches. "You heard him! Let’s begin setting up camp!"
"Yes, ma’am!"
Thankfully, they were well organized.
Each of the witches carried a magic pouch that could fit more items than it seed. Of course, since it had limited capacity, it only contained their necessities—food and water, along with so camping goods to make life easier.
For a temporary military camp, it was acceptable... but just being acceptable wouldn’t pass for Axel.
"Let set my own tent," he said.
And the next mont, he took out... a whole house.
It was the sa modular "room" they built for the tenent back in their camp, but this ti, he only built one set. This alone should be enough for him.
And since he used the Housing System’s auto-build function, it even ca fully furnished with necessities like beds, lights, and everything else.
"Whoa..."
"A... tent? That’s a house!"
"Sir Axel... amazing..."
The girls clamored, shocked by his display.
Of course, although they had seen him fix countless fortresses before, it was their first ti seeing him make a house out of thin air. Instead of sothing being repaired, it was literally made from scratch.
With Axel’s "tent" as the center, the girls began adjusting their tents as well.
After all, their task was to protect him. Thus, they needed to keep his position in the middle of everyone else as much as possible.
Axel casually built a central bonfire and set down a few wooden chairs to sit on, before watching the girls work.
Although they were setting up camp quite fast, it felt slow when compared to him.
As soon as he sat down, he also began the repair of the fortress.
It was a full hour, after all. The sooner he started, the sooner it would end. The mont he did, all the parts of the fortress began to release a faint white glow.
As if ti was reversing itself, all the broken pieces moved back to where they belonged.
During this process, when sothing "foreign" got in the way, it could end up being deleted, so the girls were extra careful. They wouldn’t want to lose their lives just because they got caught by a floating fragnt of the walls.
’The process looks absolutely the sa as when I fixed the smaller fortresses...’
Axel thought as he observed his surroundings.
However, there was one fatal difference.
’...The area is simply way too big.’
The "smaller" fortresses were already nearly half a kiloter on each side. But this one? It spanned several kiloters on each edge alone.
The area this fortress covered was at least a hundred tis bigger!
Furthermore, Axel realized that the "repair" wasn’t initiated in parallel or all at once, but rather, sequentially.
It started fixing everything close to Axel first, before slowly "moving" away from him, until it addressed the entire structure. And it could only fix an area of about a hundred square ters for each "sequence."
"So that’s why it’ll take longer..." he nodded, finally convinced.
During that ti, Axel had to stay in place. After all, the repair was centered on him as the anchor point. If he moved, then the repair would "miss" its target and could end up increasing the repair ti further... at least, that was his prediction.
Of course, he didn’t wish to try testing it out right now.
Instead, he took out a few tools from his bag and began doing his own thing.
About ten minutes later, when the girls were almost finished setting up their tents...
"W-What’s that sll...? It’s making my tummy rumble~!"
"The sll of spices... In the middle of the Red Zone?!"
"Damn, what a luxury!"
The witches noticed the thick scent coming from Axel’s campfire. A citrusy aroma mixed with charred fat, along with the scent of various spices and condints.
Even the sound of sizzling oil reached their ears.
Looking closer, they saw him set up a tal plate—a grill—over the campfire. On top of it, dozens of skewers of at were roasting. Each skewer was roughly a foot long. The sauce he used to brush the at dripped into the fire, releasing an even richer, hunger-inducing sll.
"Oh, you’re done?" Axel smiled as he noticed the girls staring at him. "Then you should rest up and eat while you can, too. Who knows when we’ll be in another skirmish?"
"Y-Yes!"
At his urging, the girls ran to the seats near Axel, staring at him with bright smiles and sparkling eyes. So were even drooling as they looked at the perfectly grilled at over the flas.
Axel didn’t mind them at all and continued with what he was doing.
And then, after judging it was ready...
"Alright, ti to eat!"
He gathered all the skewers and carefully placed them on a plate resting on his lap. He took one careful bite after another, enjoying the warmth and flavor of the at.
"..."
The girls stared at him enviously.
However, after seeing him enjoy the al without even looking at them, they realized one simple truth.
He... cooked for himself, with no intention of sharing!
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