Life didn't get easier, even in another world.

Three were in Hainston while the rest were located in the neighboring countries.

They had visited two. One was left on Hainston, in the Frozen Ocean, while four were in the other countries.

The one in the Frozen Ocean was actually inaccessible. Now that it was winter, one couldn’t even dream about passing that land. Even with SMF’s equipment and agents, it was too dangerous of an act.

Especially now that the country was in a state of war, it was not wise to risk sending their men to a location where the chance of coming back alive was not even known.

That meant there were four temples left to visit. If they had to stop Philomns from doing whatever he wanted to do, they had to go there sooner than them.

There was the temple in Bordkly that they had recently got news about some strange activities seen in. They assumed that Philomns had already done what he wanted to do there, so they doubted they had to go there in this short time they had. They could use this time to visit the other temples.

Of the three remaining temples, one was on an island in their neighboring nation. That said neighboring nation, called Ongetion, was actually not on good terms with Hainston. The hostility they had towards Hainston was even more intense than Bordkly. And since a few years ago, the borders of Ongetion were closed to the people of Hainston.

And on top of that, according to the intelligence branch, there were far too many of Philomns’ suspicious activities on that island to assume that they didn’t have anything to do with that terrorist group. And if you thought about it more, if Philomns has already found their way into that island, then there was no way that they hadn’t visited the temple there and done whatever they wanted with it.

.....

That meant only two more temples were remaining.

One was in Bordkly, while the other one was in Kowendai, the other neighboring nation of Hainston.

Kowendai was neighbors with both Bordkly and Hainston with its other borders being the ocean and also being the closest nation to Ongetion islands. This one country, unlike the other two, didn’t have any hostile relations with Hainston. It actually didn’t have any bad relationship with any of its neighbors. Even in the time of war, it declared that it didn’t and wouldn’t support any of the sides and asked Hainston and Bordkly not to harm its borders.

Thus, if they, the agents of Hainston, asked Kowendai to let them go inside their country to investigate a temple that wasn’t too far away from Kowendai and Bordkly’s borders, wouldn’t that be violating the agreed terms of not involving Kowendai into their fight?

They had to visit that temple. It was a must. But it wasn’t possible at the moment. They had to talk and negotiate with Kowendai first and that would take a while for them to reach an agreement.

That left only one place that they could visit immediately.

The other temple in Bordkly.

The two countries were fighting each other. It has been weeks since the war started and neither side has achieved much in the meantime. Sure Hainston has the upper hand, but Hainston didn’t fight with all its might. Why? Because it couldn’t only focus on the fight that was going on within its borders and completely ignore the other things.

Philomns was still there and did whatever it wanted. If Hainston has focused all its forces on the battle with Bordkly, it would’ve long achieved victory.

But they simply couldn’t. Even if they had to drag the war, even if it took too long for them to achieve victory, they couldn’t use all of their power in this battle when a far more dangerous enemy was scheming another destructive plan.

But Bordkly was different. Why would they worry about Philomns? The only problem in their minds was the battle with Hainston and they did anything they could to win the war.

It was pathetic to some extent. They were the ones who started the war, yet they weren’t able to do shit even though Hainston didn’t even use all of its forces.

Bordkly was too focused on the war, so much that it called all of its forces to fight within the borders. While the war was going on, who would actually care about an old and abandoned temple?

Yeah.

No one.

At least no one in Bordkly.

That was why it was the easiest temple to visit. And that was why they had planned a trip, actually a secret infiltration to Bordkly in order to pay a visit to the temple.

And that trip would take place soon. Actually, they had to leave tomorrow morning.

‘Where should I go...’

But that didn’t matter now. Think about tomorrow’s matters tomorrow, Kairen had more urgent and more important things to do right now.

‘I didn’t come late, did I?’

Wondering if he was late or not, Kairen walked into the building where a lot of people were gathered.

“Please, move this way. Don’t rush, there are enough chairs for everyone.”

Kairen turned towards a woman who was standing in front of an opened door and guiding the people. He could see men and women entering the room she was pointing at.

‘Is it there?’

Kairen peeked inside the room.

Several rows of chairs were set side by side just like a cinema, and a high, big, and wide platform was on the other side of the room. All of the chairs were facing the flat platform that a huge part of it was hidden behind the closed curtains.

‘Ah, it’s here.’

The place where the kids would perform a show!

Kairen also walked into the large room and found an empty seat to sit on.

‘Can’t believe he didn’t tell me about it until the end!’

He had waited for Ariyan to talk to him about the performance. He acted oblivious as if he hadn’t seen the papers and kept quiet so that the kid would bring up the subject himself. But he didn’t! He didn’t even talk about them having a performance in kindergarten!

To tell the truth, Kairen was a little bit hurt. No. He was more than a little bit hurt!

Why did the kid do this?

‘Is it embarrassing that your uncle comes to watch you instead of your parents?’

Kairen didn’t know what the kid thought in that little head of his.

‘Maybe he is just embarrassed about having such an uncle.’

That made sense. That was a reasonable reason enough. After all, Kairen was truly such an embarrassing uncle he wouldn’t be surprised if the kid hid things from him because of that.

But in the end, he came here. He had to almost beg team leader Dains to let him leave work early for one day. He also had to do extra work for Glenn as he had a day off yesterday, went home soon today, and would be on a mission tomorrow.

‘I won’t make it known that I’m your uncle if you are so embarrassed about it!’

There was no one who knew Kairen in this kid’s kindergarten so if Kairen didn’t act obvious and show anything, no one would ever know. The kid would also be happy this way, right?

Kairen sighed as he leaned back in his seat. A few minutes passed as the parents of the kids came and sat on the different chairs one by one. The room was filled with people in no time.

And a few minutes after that, the curtains were finally lifted.

As the curtains went away and the light brightened the stage, a little girl of five, in a white dress, walked out from behind the stage and stood right in front of the microphone. The little kid stood in front of the microphone and looked up at it.

“Uh...”

She was too short. She couldn’t reach the microphone.

Standing there, the girl helplessly looked back at the place where she had just walked out from.

‘Ah, poor girl.’

Kairen felt sorry for the kid, but he still couldn’t stop thinking about how cute she was. Kids. Kairen didn’t like kids, but he still couldn’t deny that they were all sweet little cute creatures that made your heart feel like a small fluffy thing.

Ah, but of course, from far away.

Yeah.

Kids were nice only from far away. Really far away.

Just look at them from afar and feel softened. Don’t get close to them. Never.

The kid looked like she would burst into tears at any moment.

Right then, a woman came out from the spot the little girl was staring at and ran towards the microphone, adjusting its hights. She then smiled at the little girl, apologise bowed a little bit to the audience, and ran back to where she came out from.

“Uh...”

The kid talked to the microphone.

“Good... Um... Uh...”

She stuttered.

“Morning... Thank you e-everyone for c-coming here... today...”

The little girl was clasping her hands.

“We... Uh... Um umm... We will n-now s-start.”

She said, bowed, and ran away to the back.