Even after hearing the word abyss, Ruon’s expression didn’t change much. But that wasn’t because he wasn’t interested, but because he needed time to calmly sort out the questions that were boiling inside him.
He slowly opened his mouth.
“Do you want to become a great demon?”
At the short question, Tarwen looked at Ruon’s face without a word.
She quickly corrected her thought that he might be a paladin of the church, judging by how he inferred the great demon from the word abyss.
The emotion that swirled behind the eyes of the man who was quietly settled was not faith, but absolute confidence in himself.
Not representing someone else’s will, but only fighting for himself, she read the eyes of a warrior and spoke with her head nodding like a person who had made up her mind.
“The ones who want to rise as great demons are the witches of the cradle. I implanted the magic circle that they had painstakingly created in my body to stop their plan. And that’s why I’m being chased.”
She licked her lips as if her throat was burning.
“Of course, there was no heroic story in the process. It was just a personal revenge. A common and old revenge.”
Tapping the table with his finger, Ruon, who was staring at Tarwen’s face, asked.
“I’m not interested in your personal affairs. But there’s one thing I have to point out. Do you really want to call it revenge when you’re barely living while being chased by the witches?”
At that, Tarwen started to laugh out loud. But it wasn’t a happy face at all.
“You’re good at stabbing the sore spot, aren’t you, for someone who’s not a swordsman.”
As if she had been stabbed by an invisible sword, she clutched her left chest and wrinkled her face playfully, then sighed deeply and answered.
“…I’m ashamed, but that’s right. The only revenge I can do right now is to run away as hard as I can to make them stumble in their affairs.”
With a faint smile, Tarwen showed both her backs of her hands. The tattoo that covered her body extended to the tips of her fingers. He didn’t know if it was an illusion, but Ruon felt that the tattoo was wriggling. As if it were alive.
Tarwen said.
“Don’t look down on me too much. I had to sacrifice everything I had done to maintain this state.”
Ruon didn’t know what price she had paid. He didn’t want to know either. He just felt the yoke that he had covered up and left long ago came back to him.
He recalled.
The series of events that he had received a request from a nobleman in the city where he had stopped to collect the bounty of the banshee, killed the ghoul in the cemetery, and left the city right away because he didn’t want to get involved in complicated things.
It was a relief that he didn’t stay and make more trouble.
He realized belatedly that the decision he had made at that time was a huge turning point.
Because he left the city right away, he was able to solve the incident of the monastery, and as a result, he became entangled with Tivella, Belducias, and the tower of magic.
Well, whatever. That’s not the important thing.
He didn’t have a hobby of chewing on the past, so Ruon shook off his thoughts. And he looked at Tarwen with a determined face and opened his mouth.
“You don’t want to die running away like a coward, do you? Right?”
He didn’t expect an answer, so he continued without delay.
“So let’s end this runaway life that’s too embarrassing to call revenge.”
Tarwen glared at him with a scowl.
“Then what do you want me to do? Do you think I wanted to run away like this? I just chose the best option I could.”
Ruon shook his head.
“Maybe you did before you met me.”
“What?”
Tarwen, who was questioning with her eyes wide open, pressed her temple as if it was throbbing.
She muttered with difficulty.
“What do you want to say? Stop running away like a fool and go to the cradle with me and kill those damn witches? Do you think that makes sense?”
As she went on, she raised her voice without knowing it, but she lowered it again with a sigh.
“…I’m sorry. I got excited and blabbered nonsense.”
Ruon shrugged and retorted.
“That’s exactly what I was thinking.”
Tarwen was speechless at the confident answer, and his words continued.
“If you were going to keep running away, why did you bring up the cradle of the dead, the great demon, the abyss, and all that? Did you intend to complain about your situation?”
Tarwen opened her mouth slowly after taking a breath.
“My plan is not to run away aimlessly, but to get help from the church to permanently destroy this magic circle. I felt that it was not easy to get there by myself, so I asked you to escort me. I explained the details of the situation because of that. I thought I had to be honest if I was going to ask for help.”
Ruon, who was quietly listening to her story, asked.
“Is the church you mentioned the church of Gannacus?”
Tarwen nodded.
“Yes. Actually, it doesn’t matter where, but… the closest place here is the church of Gannacus. That’s the best option to go there. It might take a month or so, though.”
Ruon, who had a bad feeling about the church of Gannacus, shook his head.
“I don’t recommend it.”
“Why?”
***
“They have a history of overlooking a great demon born in their own temple. It’s not certain without a proper investigation, though,” Ruon explained, not allowing his explanation to become vague, as it would only diminish its credibility. Instead, he recounted the story of how he and his companions had repelled Belducias, without omitting any details.
Tarwen’s eyes widened in complete surprise at the unexpected revelation. “What do you mean a great demon from the temple of Ganax?”
As Ruon finished his detailed account, Tarwen murmured in disbelief, “Good heavens. You defeated the decaying madness, Belducias? That dreadful monster?”
Her mouth hung open so wide, one might worry her jaw would dislocate. “So that’s why you weren’t startled by the mention of a great demon. Not because you thought it was absurd, but because you’ve already faced such a being before…”
Ruon scratched his cheek with his hand, a bit taken aback by her ready acceptance. “You’re not one to doubt, I see?”
“If you concocted all those stories on the spot, then the person before me is not a warrior but perhaps the greatest liar in history,” Tarwen said with a faint smile.
“It seems I have no choice but to postpone my visit to the grand church of Ganax. I can’t risk going to such a foul-smelling place in this state,” she said, washing her face with her hands in a complicated gesture.
“Is it really possible? All the witches of the Cradle…”
Before she could finish, Ruon raised his palm to cut her off, sighing with annoyance. “I understand your anxiety, but it’s troublesome if you ask me about possibilities now. There’s only one thing you need to tell me.”
Leaning forward with his elbows on the table, Ruon said decisively, “Choose. Will you guide me to the witches’ stronghold, or not?”
After a moment’s hesitation, Tarwen nodded firmly. “Alright, I’ll guide you.”
Ruon smiled at her straightforward answer. “Finally, a clear response.”
A woman walked briskly down a damp, narrow corridor, her heels clicking with each step. At the end of the hallway, a pitch-black crow greeted her.
“Hella-Hella-”
Surprisingly, the crow spoke in a clear human tongue, not the expected cawing.
“Why are you late? Why are you late?”
Annoyed by the echoing voice, Hella frowned. “Don’t rush me. I was busy.”
“Who isn’t busy-! Who isn’t busy-!”
“If you squawk one more time, I’ll gouge out your eyes and stuff them with maggots.”
The crow quickly shut its beak, and Hella smiled, pleased. “I’m glad you have some sense, Sven.”
“Frightening-Frightening-”
As Sven turned his head toward a blocked wall, his eyes glowed red, and a dark oval portal shimmered into existence.
Without hesitation, Hella stepped through. Her vision blurred as thousands of thin lines collided and scattered before suddenly merging together.
She found herself in a vast cavern, the ceiling studded with glowing stalactites.
As Hella shook off a slight dizziness, a voice called out, “If you’ve made everyone wait, you might as well sit down quickly.”
Chilled by the voice, Hella moved toward the large circular table at the center of the cavern.
There were two empty seats. Choosing the nearer one, she sat down and said, “Sorry for the delay. I was busy.”
Though her tone didn’t sound apologetic, no one at the table bothered to point that out. They were not the sort to dwell on such trivialities.
Someone spoke up, “Belducias is dead.”
The news was shocking, yet no one seemed surprised; they all knew.
“The monster that accumulated karma for centuries— who killed it, we don’t know. But now we’re the ones in trouble.”
Another voice joined in, “It’s a pity we can’t reuse the corpses imbued with Belducias’s grudge, but we have more than enough decaying bodies. The real pity is something else, isn’t it?”
Hella, who had been quietly observing, finally spoke, her gaze fixed on the one empty seat. “I’ve said it time and again, haven’t I? We shouldn’t have trusted Tarwen. Those who voted to spare her for her talents should reflect. It’s your negligence that led to this mess. To think she’d stab us in the back? If I catch that wretch, she’ll pay dearly.”
A suppressed voice warned, “Keep it together. We didn’t gather here to say things we can’t take back.”
The sticky voice continued, and the meeting went on.
****
“One of the parties chasing Tarwen was wiped out by a curse.”
The curse meant that they had turned into ghouls, so Hella spoke up right away.
“What? Then you must have seen who killed them through the eyes of the ghouls. Was it Tarwen? Did she still have that much strength left?”
“No, it was someone else who took down the ghouls.”
The one who answered briefly was Nadia, who was sitting across from Hella.
“Nadia? You saw it?”
“Yeah. I was the one who cursed those human hunters.”
Nadia replied dryly and took out a round crystal ball from her sleeve. She placed it on the table and rolled it towards Hella.
Hella caught the rolling crystal ball and tilted her head.
“You said it wasn’t Tarwen? Then why are you showing me this?”
“Just look. You know him too.”
“Me?”
Hella frowned and put her hand over the crystal ball. Soon, a scene appeared over the crystal ball that had absorbed her evil power.
Someone was crushing the ghouls that were rushing at him from all sides. Hella looked down at the warrior who showed his fearsome strength by smashing the ghouls’ heads with his bare fists, and unknowingly widened her eyes.
“···What?”
“A familiar face, right?”
As Nadia said, the man moving inside the crystal ball was a familiar face to Hella.
How could she forget?
He was the one who ruined the two curses she had planted on the ground.
Then a suppressed voice came.
“Unfortunately, I couldn’t find Tarwen, but I did find the warrior who was a perfect fit for our new bodies, as you said.”
Hella smiled wickedly as she stared at the crystal ball.
“What did I say? I said he had a body and mind that surpassed hundreds of ordinary sacrifices, didn’t I?”
The others sitting around the table threw a word at her, snickering.
They were all disgusting words mixed with satisfaction and desire for finding such a splendid sacrifice.
Meanwhile, Hella gazed at Ruon in the crystal ball as if she was bewitched.
“Hey, warrior. You’ve been hiding well. We’ll be coming for you soon. So get ready and wait.”
Of course, she had no idea that he was walking towards her on his own.
