Part 4: The Miner Saves Catria

Part 4:
The Miner Saves Catria

 

AFTER EXITING THE TUNNEL, the pair traveled across a field of green for a time before Lithisia alerted Alan of their location. “Sir Miner, we’ll be arriving in one of the border towns momentarily.”

Alan took another look at Lithisia. Despite the amount of time she spent in the tunnel, her white dress was as radiant as ever. It was as if it had a kind of dirt-dispelling magic applied to it. Her beautiful golden locks, refined mannerisms, and perfect figure announced to anyone looking that she was royalty. She’d stick out like a sore thumb. They would have to get her some kind of disguise.

“There’s a military fortress there, yeah?” Alan said. “We’ll have to make sure you don’t get spotted.”

“Um, Sir Miner? Wh-when you keep staring at me like that, I…” Lithisia squirmed and covered her breasts with her arms.

“My apologies.”

“No, no! It’s fine! I was just surprised is all! You can look as much as you want!” Lithisia quickly added. “Since we’ll be ‘shoveling’ together in the future, I-I’d rather have you look!”

What did shoveling and staring at her have to do with one another? Alan had questions, but opted to put them aside. The key to dealing with the princess was to not think too deeply about anything she said. “Anyway, you said there’s a fortress in the town we’re coming up on, yeah? What sort of numbers are we talking?”

“Um, there are a hundred and eight soldiers in the border squad of the Knights of Rostir.”

“Well, aren’t you a font of knowledge?”

“W-well, I am royalty.” Lithisia looked happy to receive the compliment. She scratched at her cheek, slightly embarrassed. “B-because I’m a princess, I have a friend in the Knights of Rostir. She’s a very talented knight with a bright future ahead of her. She even vowed to dedicate her life to me!”

“Huh. Sounds like a keeper.”

“She is! If you ignore her two problems, she’s the perfect knight.”

“Problems?”

“She’s…kind of lacking in ability.”

“Er, isn’t that usually fatal when it comes to being a knight?”

“Actually, it pales in comparison to the second problem she has.”

“Which is?”

“She wields a sword, not a shovel.”

Alan considered saying something, but opted to keep his mouth shut.

“But…” Lithisia visibly grew a bit sullen. “I’m most certain that she’ll see me as an enemy now.”

The Lithisia in the palace was fake, and the one here was real, but Alan was the only person who believed that. “Hrm…then for now, we should be careful not to draw the attention of these knights.”

“Understood.” Lithisia nodded her head.

Just then, the high-pitched sound of metal colliding with metal rang out.

Alan narrowed his eyes. “Looks like someone’s fighting.”

As the sun began to set on the grasslands, a fierce battle was taking place. It was still far in the distance, but miners had excellent vision—especially Alan. In fact, he could see the radiant shine of a jewel from over six miles away. This was a talent expected of all jewel miners.

It was with this exceptionally sharp sight that Alan made out three men and one woman in the distance. They all wore the same shining white armor.

“Knights. A red-haired female knight is being attacked by the others.”

“Huh…? Red hair? Could that be Catria?!”

“Your friend?”

“Yes! The very same knight I was telling you about earlier! Ah, Catria!”

Alan nodded in response and drew his shovel.

“Sir Miner, we must run! We have to save her!”

“There’s no need to run.”

“Huh? What do you mean?”

Instead of explaining, Alan rested his shovel on his shoulder and targeted the knights in the distance.

Alan’s shovel was the strongest close-range weapon imaginable. Alan had come to that conclusion when he conquered the Shrine of the Ancient Titan on Layer #555 of the mountain. The king of all titans wielded a giant axe, but the miner was able to split it in two with one slash of his shovel. It was then that he realized just how powerful his shovel was.

His thoughts on the matter were different now. Not only was the shovel an amazing close-range weapon…

“No worries. I can reach them from here.”

The shovel was also the most powerful long-range weapon in the world.

 

***

 

Catria was a knight because she’d had no other choice but to become one.

She had two older sisters, both of whom were tremendously beautiful. But her family, House Eugenohl, boasted a generations-old lineage of proud knights, and they couldn’t keep up that tradition with only daughters. Her father had prayed every day, rain or shine, to the Earth Goddess for a boy.

His prayers were answered with a firm “no” when Catria was born. When the young girl heard this tale from her nanny, she wept. She finally understood why her father looked upon her with such sad eyes. She sobbed, and sobbed, and when she had finally grown tired of the tears, Catria gripped a sword in her hands. “I will become a knight,” she vowed. A knight her father could be proud of: a Holy Knight, the highest-ranking knight of them all.

Ten years passed. Catria had practiced until her arms were swollen and her feet were blistered beyond belief, and somehow, she’d managed to get a shot at the entrance exam for the King’s Knights. In a one-on-one duel with a knight’s apprentice, she came out victorious. She was beyond excited. Maybe now her father would be proud of her!

But mere minutes later, Catria overheard something in the crowd she shouldn’t have, and her smile shattered.

“It must be so frustrating to lose on purpose. Just what is that Eugenohl girl thinking?”

Catria fled, her heart shattered once again upon overhearing those words. Of course the knights would lose on purpose to someone who outranked them. She wept and wept, knowing she would never truly be a knight on her own merits.

But as fate would have it, Princess Lithisia had been observing the Knights of Rostir on that day.

 

***

 

“I want her as my bodyguard.” Lithisia said upon seeing Catria. She had been inspecting the fortress when she made that declaration. Quite frankly, Catria had no idea why she’d been picked. If the princess simply wanted a woman by her side, there were other, better options. At first, she thought that maybe she was chosen because she was of House Eugenohl, but Princess Lithisia didn’t know what she looked like, and couldn’t have picked her out on sight. So, was it her ability as a knight? That couldn’t be it, either. She was the weakest of the knights.

Eventually, Catria asked Lithisia that very question.

“It’s because your eyes shone the most out of anyone’s!” Lithisia had told her. Catria didn’t know what to say to that. Her eyes had been glistening because she’d been crying.

“By the way, Catria,” the princess went on, dramatically, “it seems to me like you’re not very good at swordplay. But don’t worry! One day, you’ll be the greatest Holy Knight on the continent. “Why? Because I said so, and what the princess says, goes! That’s a fact!”

Catria was in shock, but Lithisia simply smiled. “Hee hee. Got it, Catria? Become an amazing Holy Knight and protect me, okay?”

Lithisia winked at her.

To Catria, she looked like a brilliant beam of light. This princess had what she didn’t, and yet she expected great things from her.

It was on that day that Catria swore absolute fealty to Princess Lithisia.

 

***

 

At present, the sun was setting over the grasslands as Catria found herself facing off against three knights.

“I WON’T LOSE!” she roared, even knowing her chances were slim. Those knights had been sent to retrieve a fugitive…namely, her.

When the king was assassinated, Catria just happened to be in the capital, taking her sick father’s place at the funeral. Concerned that she couldn’t find Lithisia, she made her way to the princess’ room. It was there that she overheard something she shouldn’t have: a conversation between Prime Minister Zeleburg and Lithisia’s body double. She’d gasped, and that had given her away.

“Who’s there?!” Zeleburg had shouted.

Catria had fled the palace, becoming a fugitive in the process. She could no longer return to the knights. She could no longer go anywhere. She had to find the princess.

“Aaaaaaah!” she shouted as she traded blows with the knights. Catria stood no chance of victory against even one of them, but nonetheless, she couldn’t afford to fall here. She was the only one who could save her beloved princess, or so she believed. That thought kept her standing, desperately swinging her sword.

“You’ll be the greatest Holy Knight on the continent.”

Lithisia’s words echoed in her head. For the sake of her beloved, radiant princess, Catria could not afford to lose.

“Come on!” Catria taunted. She thrust her sword forward with every ounce of power she had. Reach. Reach. REACH!!!

“As if!” laughed one of the knights.

“Wha—?!”

Clank! Catria’s sword was sent flying by one of the knights.

“You don’t even have the basics down, rookie.” The knight swept her legs out from under her, causing her to tumble to the ground. He pointed his sword at her. “Catria Eugenohl, for the sin of desertion, you will be executed here and now.”

Her sword was long gone. But that just meant she’d have to fight with her two hands. The moment she attempted to move, however, the knight’s white blade quickly moved to her neck. There was nothing she could do. It was over.

“If you have any last words, I’ll relay them to Lord Eugenohl.”

She began to sob in despair. “I… I….”

Why am I so weak? she cursed herself.

In order to live up to her father’s and Lithisia’s expectations, she’d thrown herself into her training. That sword thrust she attempted mere moments ago was the product of months of training, and yet, she was told she didn’t have the basics down.

It was as if her very heart had been cut from her chest.

“What the princess says, goes! That’s a fact!”

Catria recalled Princess Lithisia’s words, but they only made the pain worse, causing more tears to roll down her cheeks. She had to save the woman who gave her a reason to live, but she couldn’t. After all the hard work she put in, why was her goal so unattainable?

“Catria… As a knight and as a person…” the knight above her intoned, plunging her into the depths of despair. “You’re nothing but a weakling.”

She closed her eyes. The sword came swinging down.

KA-CHOOOOOOOOOM!

The knight was sent flying high into the air. His screams echoed throughout the grasslands.

Catria jerked her head up in surprise. “...Huh?”

KA-CHOOOOOOOOOM!

The slightly goofy roar rang out a second time, but despite the way it sounded, its power was tremendous. The knight had been hurled almost a thousand feet into the sky. He was in the air for several seconds before he came crashing down in front of Catria.

BA-BOOM!

The dent in the earth where the knight had once stood was the same shape as the head of a shovel.

Boom! Kerplow! Bam! One after the other, the rest of the knights were sent flying.

“What the heck…?” was all Catria could manage.

 

***

 

“Reloading.”

“Yaaay, hooray! You’re amazing, Sir Miner!”

Alan aimed at the knights from the top of the hill and pulled the “Shovtrigger,” which was what he called the shovel’s handle.

Ka-choom! A roughly triangular mass of blue, glimmering energy fired out of the end of the shovel. This was Alan’s trusty “Shovel Launcher.” By using the power contained within the shovel, he could convert earth into energy bullets. While this sounded impossible to anyone else, it made perfect sense to Alan. Since he could fire these energy bullets with pinpoint accuracy, it was a skill entirely suited to saving friends in need during combat.

Reloading the Shovel Launcher simply required scooping up some more dirt from the ground. “All right,” Alan said. “Reloading complete.”

The Shovel Launcher was handy in that it could fire off continuous shots. Much better suited for long term combat than the Wave Motion Shovel Blast.

“Beginning second wave. Fire!”

Ka-choom, ka-choom! With each shot, the knights in the distance went flying.

“Sir Miner, why are the knights flying through the air?!”

“A shovel taps into the power of the earth itself, and said knights are standing upon the earth, so it flings them upward,” he explained.

“I’m not sure I follow, but either way, that’s shoveltastic!”

“Last shovel.” Alan fired off the last shot from his Shovel Launcher.

“D-dat wash amwazing! I’m shovely moved!”

“Calm down, Lithisia. You’re talking all weird.”

“Sho what?!” Princess Lithisia was vibrating with excitement, her eyes shining. Her imagination was clearly starting to go in some weird directions.

Alan sighed. “Well, whatever. Let’s save this Catria of yours.”

“Oh, yes! That’s right! Catria!” Lithisia waved her hands over her head as she descended the hill. Alan followed soon after, passing her quickly and arriving at the young knight’s location a little before the princess.

Catria sat on the ground in silence, her fiery red hair tied into a ponytail. She looked to be a bit older than Lithisia, and while she was wearing white armor, her thighs were bare beneath her short skirt. She sat with her hands at her sides, like her legs had given out. She was so defenseless that Alan actually felt bad for her.

The miner extended a helping hand to the knight. “Sorry to keep you waiting,” he said. He gave her a once-over. “Hmm…you’re hurt.”

Crouching down, Alan began to wrap a bandage around Catria’s thigh.

“Wh-who are you…?” Catria asked shakily.

“The wound seems shallow. Not bad, considering you were facing off against three opponents.”

“Huh?” He had been watching her? He saw her failure? Tears began to form in her eyes.

“Why are you crying? Does it hurt?”

“N-no, that’s not it… I’m not crying…!”

It was clear as day that she was crying. She must’ve taken her earlier loss hard. After thinking for a moment, Alan spoke. “You’re Catria, yes? I watched your battle, and quite frankly, you have a long way to go.”

“I—”

“That was one helluva thrust. You have talent. What a waste.”

“...Huh?” Alan’s words were unexpected. “Wh-what did you just say?” Me? Talent? she thought. And who is this guy, anyway?

“Catria! Catria! Are you all right?!”

The knight’s expression changed the moment she saw the girl approaching them. She was beautiful and innocent, clad in a blindingly white dress. “What?! P-Princess Lithisia?!”

“That’s me!” giggled the princess as she took Catria’s hands in her own. “It’s been too long, Catria. I’m glad you’re safe.”

“Your Royal Highness… I… I’m so happy you’re all right!”

“I thought I’d never see you again,” Lithisia told her with a smile. “I’m shovely happy!”

A gust of wind blew through the grasslands. Catria thought for a moment that she’d misheard the princess. But Lithisia instead smiled as brightly as the sun and repeated herself.

“I’m shovely happy!” The second time she said it, she emphasized the “shovely.” There was no mistaking it.

“Your Royal Highness, could you…give me a second?”

“I’d be shovely pleased to wait!”

What is she saying? What’s wrong with my princess?! Catria thought. “Um, wh-what exactly do you mean by ‘shovely happy’?”

“In our great nation, ‘shovely’ means ‘extremely’! It’s a new rule I just made!”

Catria was completely and utterly lost. “Um…I…huh?!”

“Lithisia, stop,” Alan chided her. “Even I’m getting confused. ‘Shovely’ isn’t a word.”

“Now, now. Don’t be humble. The shovel is great and wise! It is the evolution of communication itself!”

“It really isn’t.”

This back-and-forth went on for a bit until Catria grew impatient and interrupted. “Wait, hold your horses! Who exactly are you? Why are you with Princess Lithisia?”

“I’m Alan, and I’m a miner. While the princess goes on her journey, I’m serving as her bodyguard.”

“A miner…? Why would a miner be tasked with guarding the princess? What have you done to her?” Catria cast her gaze upon the shovel that hung casually from Alan’s right hand. “And what’s with that shovel?”

“Catria, please calm down,” Lithisia said. “I simply promised to ‘shovel’ with him; that’s all.”

The knight turned blue in the face. “Your Royal Highness, please! Pull yourself together! You’re not making sense!”

“I’m feeling shovely fine!” She shovely was not.

Catria desperately tried to bring Lithisia back to reality. “Shovels are merely tools for digging up dirt! Please try to remember!”

“That’s not true, Catria. Shovels are divine.”

“Like God?!”

“Actually, they’re more than divine.”

“Above that?!” What was she talking about?

“Indeed. Just the other night, Sir Miner taught me the true greatness of the shovel!”

“I don’t ever recall that happening,” Alan added, but he was totally ignored. Lithisia was clearly on some kind of shovel high.

Catria turned her fury on the miner. “Grrr…you bastard! How dare you brainwash the princess?!”

“What? I didn’t brainwash her!”

Sadly, Catria didn’t appear to be in a listening mood. Her eyes burned with anger. “That’s it! Prepare yourself!”

She swung her blade, but she was slower than a regular knight. To the greatest miner on the planet, she was slower than a slug crawling its way along a tunnel. Alan dodged Catria’s attack and tapped his shovel against her neck.

“Gah!” The knight collapsed to the floor, unconscious.

“Catria?!” Lithisia cried.

“She’ll be fine,” Alan reassured her. “I just hit one of her pressure points. If anything, she’ll feel great when she wakes up.”

“Oh, okay! Thank goodness! Shovels are shovmazing.”

“Princess, please stop making up new words. Just say ‘so amazing’ like normal people.” Alan sighed. How was he going to explain this to Catria when she woke up?

Lithisia ignored him and knelt to stroke her friend’s hair. “Get a good shovrest, Catria.”

Alan sighed once more as he set his gaze upon Lithisia watching over Catria like some sort of saint. Maybe he was just screwed.