Now that the dark energy concentration in the air had lightened up and the migration subsided, all those participating in the battle had a chance for rest.
“Whew!”
Boom—!
The Red Garnet Adventurers collapsed. Lia tapped the large canine of one of the beasts she had slain against her palm.
“This one’s thirty thousand!”
That was the thirty-thousandth one collected. Lia nodded, satisfied.
“Lia! I think I’ve gotten stronger!”
Leo was making a fuss next to her. He had never experienced such an incredible battle before.
“Leo, go and help clean up! Help the injured knights!”
“Lia, where are you going?”
Lia looked to the forest without saying anything. Dark energy was gathering there, plunging the trees into an impenetrable gloom but making it an appetizing place for gaining experience. Her characteristic [Adventurer] became stronger the more she explored the world and faced danger.
“I’ll go into the forest for a little while! I can sense something.”
Her intuition was pointing right at it, and Lia quickly followed.
*rustle*— *rustle*—
At some point, Lia, kicking off the ground and soaring through the branches like a flying squirrel, felt something off.
“…What is this?”
She prepared herself before coming, but there were no enemies, not even an ant.
“Is it over?”
Lia, disappointed, kicked a stone, sending it rolling.
Dururururu-
Until it stopped in something sticky.
“Huh?”
A dark red fluid stained the path down the mountain slope. Lia’s eyes widened.
“It’s monster blood.”
Lia decided to follow the drying creeks, but it didn’t take long until she saw a person’s silhouette off in the distance.
“Who…?”
She climbed up the gently sloping mountaintop for a better look.
“…”
In the middle of the forest were scattered monster and demon bodies, and in the middle of them all, a single spotless person. Lia’s eyes grew large as she watched him.
“Deculein…”
He wasn’t shaken even amid the fresh blood and scattered corpses. His robe and his suit held not even a speck of dust. But, his eyes remained closed, and his veins pulsed purple. Dark energy overload.
“Professor. Professor.”
Lia approached him carefully. She looked up at Deculein and grabbed the hem of his robe, her neck aching to angle up so high.
“Professor, are you okay? Professor.”
She tugged his robe a few times.
“…”
Deculein opened his eyes. Lia felt her chest tighten as his blue eyes regarded her.
“…Are you alright?”
“…”
Deculein said nothing as he stared at her with sunken eyes. Yet, somehow, Lia felt she knew the meaning of his gaze.
—At long last.
“…You.”
Lia smiled.
“Yes?”
At that moment, there was a small tremor in his eyes. His eyes were so deep and blue, like raindrops falling on a cold lake.
“…I don’t like you.”
His voice was chilly but sounded lonely and sad, somehow like a tree, with roots too sturdy to be shaken by the winter wind.
“Why? I didn’t even do anything.”
Then, Deculein reached out his hand. Lia closed her eyes in surprise.
“…”
But nothing happened, so she gently opened her eyes again. Deculein’s hand was still outstretched. But soon, he pulled it back with a small breath.
“You look like someone I know.”
His words made Lia’s heart flutter. She knew who he meant, but she still asked.
“…Who?”
Deculein tilted his head. He stared into the air like he was thinking about someone who wasn’t there, reminiscing. He answered quietly.
“The one stuck in my heart.”
His emotions wouldn’t flow through the memories he could not forget.
“…”
Lia looked down for a while, feeling a strange sense of guilt poking at her heart. Was the setting she added without much thought hurting Deculein this much?
“No, well.”
Deculein spoke again. Lia raised her head to meet his eyes.
“I might be the one who’s stuck.”
Then, he gave her a flat smile. Was it a genuine smile, or was he mocking her? It faded fast, dumbfounding Lia.
“I can’t forget about her, so foolishly.”
His eyes drew a line, and Lia felt her heart ringing. Then suddenly, she remembered a man she had left in a distant world. Her emotions rose, longing for the person she always loved.
“…I am hating the guy I don’t have to hate.”
However, Lia quickly calmed down. Deculein wasn’t Kim Woojin, and Yoo Ara wasn’t the person in his memories.
“…I don’t know what you mean.”
With that, Deculein let out a small breath. Lia grabbed his arm and dragged him away.
“Let’s go now, Professor. You don’t look so good-“
But, Deculein pushed her off.
“…Go away.”
“What?”
“Not yet-“
“There’s one more left.”
It was someone else who answered. Lia looked back, finding the knight Julie behind her.
“…I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to eavesdrop.”
She bowed her head and drew her sword, pointing the tip of the blade.
“…”
A strange man was standing there. She didn’t know how long he had been there, but he was heinous to behold. He was like a lump of flesh, his body, especially his stomach, swollen and still growing.
“…Scavenger.”
Lia knew what it was: a scavenger, a demon that absorbed monster corpses. It was no different from an earthworm crawling under the ground and was at the lowest level even among demons, slayable in a single blow. Rather, it was a trapped demon designed for that purpose; there were only ten seconds left before its body exploded.
“Ms. Knight! We have to run away!”
“I know.”
Julie ran like the wind and carried Deculein on her back. Even at that moment, the scavenger’s body swelled like it was about to burst, and in just three seconds, it would swallow the mountain.
Dadadada—
Julie dashed ahead with Deculein on her shoulder and Lia right behind her.
“Eek!”
But the explosion might come first, so when Lia looked back and unfolded her mana of Dismantle-
—!
The scavenger’s body exploded.
Schwa—! Schwaaaaaaa—!
A huge wave of dark energy and flesh exploded behind them. It swallowed up Lia’s mana and rushed past…
*****
…I opened my eyes. The first thing I saw was Epherene’s face, set right above mine with her dangling hair tickling my nose.
“Oh! He’s awake! Uhm, your eyeball reaction is normal-“
“Are you mad?”
She flashed a light in my eyes as I pushed her away. Epherene fell back and screamed.
“Ughh! What’s wrong with you!”
I stood and checked my physical condition. Mana exhaustion, misuse of dark energy, and circuit overload. The above three were the crucial injuries, but aside from that, there were no other problems.
“…What happened to the migration?”
But, I threw away my mission. Of course, I didn’t think anything big had happened, seeing that this kid was alive.
“What do you mean? It has only been three hours.”
Epherene stood and responded brusquely. She brushed off her butt and shook her head.
“I think it’s going to end soon. The amount of enemies rushing in has also dramatically decreased, and most of them can be dealt with using crossbows. Who knew that crossbows could be that good? It was even more helpful than most of the magic being thrown around.”
I straightened my clothes without answering. The wrinkles were straightened out with Cleanse, and I wiped off the dust.
“But…”
Epherene hesitated. I looked at her silently as if to tell her to hurry up and speak her mind.
“…That’s.”
Epherene was being wary of me. If it were before, she would have dragged it on longer, but recently, she began to speak before I grew more annoyed.
“Knight Julie is sick and confined to bed.”
I fiddled with my sleeves and acted as if nothing had happened.
“Because of?”
“…She was looking for the Professor.”
Tak—
I buttoned up my sleeves, then put on my overcoat with a frown.
“She always does unnecessary things.”
“…”
Epherene looked down, then began to scratch the back of her neck.
“She’s in the hospital bed right now. If you are going…”
“I still have a lot to do.”
“But still-“
“Aside from her.”
I cut in.
“There are many dead knights.”
*****
Reccordak’s hospital bed. There, equipped with state-of-the-art facilities and various medicinal herbs, Gwen was muttering, biting her nails.
“…Oh, this. It doesn’t look too serious.”
Not just her, but there were many knights, including Raphael, Syrio, and Delric, watching a woman lying in her bed.
Julie’s veins were pulsing purple. She was caught up in the scavenger’s explosion and hit by the dark energy without her gas mask.
“I hope she’s fine. But still, the dark energy hasn’t reached her stomach, right?”
Syrio spoke. Even though he was usually optimistic, it was hard to be so sure right now. Deculein easily recovered, but Julie, who was already injured…
Boom—!
The door slammed open, and Reylie rushed in.
“Oh really, I’m getting angry! Shit!”
All the knights looked to Reylie with surprise. Gwen stepped up.
“What’s wrong with you suddenly? Did you eat something bad?”
“No! Not that! I just came back from seeing Deculein. No, I saw him from afar. That guy is fine, like totally fine. So, I was going to bring him here. Do you know what he said?”
Reylie stomped and exhaled before continuing.
“He said she did something unnecessary. He said he’s not worried! That there are many dead knights aside from Julie! She tried to save him again, this time. He barely made it out alive because Julie carried him on her back!”
“…”
The knights closed their mouths. The moment the migration neared its end, there was a sudden outbreak of scavengers. Deculein, who was swept up in it, was not in good condition. Even if it were Deculein, with that amount of dark energy, he would’ve lost a limb or two at the least.
“…Professor Deculein is alright?”
Delric spoke, reading the mood of the room. Reylie replied with a deadly glare.
“Yeah! He is fine!”
“Hmm. That’s good to hear.”
“What did you say?”
Ehem.
Delric pretended to cough, then turned around and opened the door before he continued speaking.
“Anyway, Knight Julie is alive, and there are way more dead knights than her. On the contrary, Professor Deculein is not biased among all the knights-“
“Ah, just get out!”
“Ehem.”
Delric and the Imperial Knights rushed out, and Reylie pressed down on her temples as she felt a headache forming.
“Wow, I’m seriously going to kill him. I will kill Professor Deculein myself.”
—Don’t do that.
A heavy and dignified voice reached them from outside the window. Everyone in the hospital room looked out through the glass pane.
“…Huh!”
“Oh my!”
“Oh?!”
Their eyes went wide with surprise, and they knelt subconsciously. The man outside the window smiled brightly.
—Nice to see you.
A man who made even the knights shiver just with his presence, a knight among the knights. The King of Winter, the Head of Freyden, Zeit.
“Nice to see you, Lord Zeit!”
He opened the window amidst their shouts. He took a step inside the hospital room.
“My little sister must have done something unreasonable again.”
He looked down at Julie’s sickly complexion and muttered silently. Zeit raised a hand to stop Reylie from explaining, then gently glanced at each of the knights in the room one by one.
“Okay, tell me. What happened to her?”
At that moment, Reylie’s face split with a vengeful smile.
