Chapter 49

At that moment, my body was suddenly lifted, and the ground where I had been standing collapsed with a loud, crumbling noise.

The sound of impact echoed far below, taking several moments to reach my ears.

The thought of how close I’d come to death sent chills down my spine.

Instinctively, I clutched the herbs in one hand while gripping Adam’s clothing as if it were my lifeline with the other.

It was a reflexive action.

But Adam, the injured one who was supposed to be resting in the cave, had come all the way out here.

Even I had gotten lost trying to find my way—so how had Adam managed to follow me so quickly?

“Hero, how did you get here?”

“I had a… feeling you’d be here,” he said.

A feeling? His instincts as a hero must have been remarkably sharp.

I nodded quickly in acknowledgment—then stopped myself.

‘No, wait!’

I had repeatedly told him to stay put and rest!

If we hadn’t found each other, and Adam had died out here, it would have been a senseless death.

This hero truly had no regard for his own life.

He treated it as if he had hundreds of spare lives to fall back on. Since he wouldn’t care for himself, it seemed like I was the only one who could knock some sense into him.

“You shouldn’t have come out here! It’s too dangerous!”

“If I hadn’t come, you might have fallen to your death. Are you blaming me for saving you?”

“We could’ve avoided a pointless death if you’d stayed put!”

I retorted sharply, unwilling to back down.

Sure, I might be expendable as an extra, but the hero? Absolutely not!

‘Even if I don’t believe the rumors about the Demon King being alive… what if they’re true?’

If the hero were to die now, it would spell disaster.

This time, the Demon King might truly consume the empire, leaving no survivors.

Everything alive would be drained of its life force, and the Demon King would command monstrous forces to destroy the living. Only his creatures would remain.

I fixed Adam with a sharp, wordless glare, silently demanding he understand.

With a small sigh, Adam finally relented.

“If you died, I think it would be… troublesome for me.”

“What?”

At first, I thought of how others might react if I died—Ben would be furious, Tommy would undoubtedly cry, and Violet would grieve quietly, comforting everyone else first before shedding her own tears in solitude.

But coming from Adam, this comment felt unexpected.

I thought he still didn’t trust me.

Adam continued calmly.

“I’ve grown used to other people dying—it doesn’t affect me much anymore. But… maybe it’s different with you, Eve.”

…That sounded almost like…

I blinked, staring at him as his gaze shifted away from mine.

“It’s hard to come across someone like you, Eve,” he muttered, his tone unclear, leaving me unsure whether it was praise or sarcasm.

Had he added that last part as an afterthought? Did I dare overthink it?

Adam still hadn’t put me down since he’d caught me, leaving me cradled in his arms.

Despite the cold rain drenching us both, his body radiated warmth.

It was so warm that, for a fleeting moment, I didn’t want to leave his embrace.

But something felt off—how could he feel this hot after standing in the rain?

“Wait… Hero, you have a fever!”

This was exactly why I had told him to stay in the cave! Why did he have to come out here?

Panicked, I pulled away to check his condition.

“Hero!”

Then his breathing grew labored, and he collapsed onto the ground with a heavy thud.

Adam collapsed so quickly, I barely had time to react.

I should have noticed earlier, from the moment his voice began to falter.

Now, I had to carry his unconscious body back to the cave—if I could even find it in this unfamiliar forest.

The once-thick canopy of trees, now shrouded in darkness, amplified my unease.

‘If we die out here before reinforcements find us…’

Would anyone even come?

I thought of the nobles who had sneered at Adam, mocking him, and the emperor who had sent a knight to kill him.

‘This isn’t the treatment a hero deserves.’

The unfairness and pity I felt threatened to spill over as tears.

But I couldn’t cry now.

Pressing my fingers firmly against my eyes, I steadied my breathing.

The rain was relentless, soaking through my clothes and making everything harder.

Adam’s body burned with fever, but it was only a matter of time before hypothermia set in.

If the cold didn’t kill him, the blood loss surely would.

Unable to discern the way forward, I had no idea which path would lead us back.

‘I don’t care what it takes—just stop the rain, please!’

Then, suddenly, my chest grew warm.

No, not my chest—the warmth emanated from the necklace holding the ring.

“…!”

The relic, which had been faintly glowing, quickly dimmed again.

But as the oppressive darkness lifted, I realized the clouds were parting.

Drip. Drip, drip.

The once-heavy rain began to ease, its force diminishing until it was almost gone.

‘Was that the relic’s power?’

Up until now, the relic had been little more than a tool for sensing Adam’s thoughts—useful, but far from life-saving.

Relief washed over me, but it only made the weight of my exhaustion feel heavier.

My vision blurred with drowsiness, and I shook my head fiercely to stay alert.

‘Not now.’

Even if the rain had stopped, this forest was no place for two stranded wanderers.

I turned to Adam and shook him lightly.

“Hero, wake up. You can’t sleep here—it’s too dangerous!”

“…”

“Hero!”

“…Yes, my god…”

His faint, fevered response wasn’t meant for me.

Was he dreaming of the past?

Though his incoherent answers worried me, I was relieved he wasn’t entirely unconscious.

Clutching his shoulder, I tried to hoist him onto my back.

His soaked body was far too heavy for me alone, and even after several tries, I could barely lift him.

‘I can’t do this…!’

After just two steps, my knees buckled, and I collapsed to the ground.

The effort had left me trembling, my legs refusing to cooperate.

‘If I were going to give up, I wouldn’t have picked up this cursed game in the first place!’

Drawing on every ounce of strength I had left, I started dragging him.

The weight of his body against the ground felt like double what it was, each step a monumental task.

“Hero, you’re still awake, right?”

“…Yes.”

I kept talking to him, desperate to keep him from slipping into unconsciousness.

Even though my hands were trembling from the cold, I refused to stop moving.

The contrast between his fevered heat and the icy dampness of the rain-soaked parts of his body chilled me to the bone.

But Adam’s responses grew weaker and weaker, and I ran out of things to say.

What could I talk about?

We had been inseparable in this game. Before coming here, I had spent endless hours playing it, so I had no new topics to bring up.

Instead, I blurted out whatever came to mind.

“Adam, you know you can’t lose consciousness now, right?”

When he didn’t reply, I bit my lip.

The pitch-black forest, the silence, and Adam’s lack of response made fear creep into every part of me.

I forced myself to ignore it, focusing instead on pulling him forward.

“It feels like we’ve got a long way to go. Should I tell you about myself?”

My voice trembled terribly, but I pressed on, words spilling from me like a confession.

“Honestly, Adam, you might not know this, but I’ve always admired you. In the game, you were the protagonist who never stopped challenging everything. You were who I wanted to be.”

A self-deprecating chuckle escaped me.

The words kept flowing, almost like a prayer.

“Once, I wanted to be the main character, too. But overcoming a broken family and getting a happy ending? Only special people can do that. I wasn’t one of them.”

I used to envy the character on my small monitor.

No matter the hardship or danger, the protagonist was guaranteed a happy ending.

For someone like me, an extra in my own story, that was an impossible dream.

‘Do I even want Adam to hear this? Does it matter?’

Of course I wanted Adam to survive.

But had that always been the case?

“Outside of this place, death felt so trivial…”

In the beginning, I had felt a pang of loss when Adam died during the game.

I’d spent hours trying to keep him alive, out of pure determination.

But after countless resets, my approach became more detached, more curious.

What would happen if I persuaded a reluctant companion to join him? How would the imperial palace react if I sent him there?

I even pushed through impossible conditions just to unlock hidden routes.

‘If I hadn’t aimed for the hidden route, if I’d just played normally, would things have turned out differently?’

Maybe Adam wouldn’t be disrespected as a hero, shot with an arrow, and left to die.

“If I’d known it would be like this, I wouldn’t have appeared in front of Adam. Maybe…”

Maybe I could have given him something better—like the companions he didn’t get to keep this time.

Adam always seemed harsh, but he was truly kind. Even when a stranger like me appeared in his world, he hadn’t treated me poorly.

“…Don’t leave me. Please, don’t leave me behind.”

 

 

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