Thank you EldritchSquiggles for the Ko-fi ♥
[Chapter 33]
“Lemony!”
In the distance, a man’s scream faintly echoed like a mist. Could it be Deon? I couldn’t be sure. There was no pain, but my mind became muddled. Suddenly, a wave of drowsiness washed over me, and my eyelids closed.
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The monsters continued to crawl up the riverbank relentlessly. Most of them were organisms that relied on gills for respiration, so they suffocated and died as soon as they emerged from the water. However, a few hardy species with strong vitality flapped their wings vigorously, toppling trees around them or engaging in skirmishes with each other.
“Princess!”
As Deon turned his head in response to the unfamiliar noise calling for the prison officer, his eyes widened.
“Damn it.”
The woman was shooting without fear. Fortunately, the watcher quickly picked her up and ran away, but the actions of the chasing creature were perilous. It wasn’t a big one, but it was enough to pose a threat to the two of them.
“Hey, what are you doing?!”
However, that interest was interrupted by Ian’s call. With calloused feet and hardened skin, he endured the rough cobblestone ground, igniting a faint glimmer of determination. Stepping onto a tree stump with the base severed, he swiftly pivoted his upper body with agile and swift movements and plunged the blade into the monster’s heart.
As the transformation into a monster progressed, thick, crimson blood splattered on the face. Amidst it, the gleaming eerie pupils awaited the opponent’s death without wavering. After extinguishing the urgent fire, when he turned my gaze back to the woman, she had already escaped from the watcher’s embrace and held a gun in her hand.
His eyes widened slightly at the absurd behavior.
If she had obediently stayed nestled against the watcher like earlier, even if she ended up getting hurt, it would have been the watcher who exposed his back that would have been bitten. If one of them had to die, Deon wished without hesitation for the watcher to be the one to die.
But that foolish woman….
Muttering curses under his breath, he entrusted the rest to Ian and rushed towards the woman. If there was one issue with this woman right now, it was that she couldn’t distinguish between pain and immortality.
The woman pulled the trigger without realizing that her wrist was bending. It felt like she had hit the monster’s arm. However, she soon realized with a pale face that even the bullets that barely grazed the monster were all gone. Just as the watcher, who had been observing everything, called for Lemony, Deon involuntarily stopped in his tracks, his mouth agape.
“Lemony!”
The woman’s throat was mercilessly ripped apart. Pinned under the massive hunchback, she blinked her dazed eyes slowly like a dying deer before losing consciousness. Unable to control the overwhelming emotions in that instant, Deon shouted and screamed her name.
He always thought she would be in his grasp. However, he could never have imagined that she would die at the hands of such a vile, monstrous being without any reason or humanity. With a gaze filled with despair and anger, he stared at Lemony and approached her as if possessed.
The monster that tore at the woman’s throat rushed towards him, but he swiftly struck its face with his arm, which felt like his veins were about to burst. He knelt beside the fallen woman, his knees trembling.
Surely she couldn’t be dead. She must still be alive.
His breath became even more ragged with the added anxiety. When he checked her pulse, he found that she was still breathing.
But what comes next? What should he do now? He took out a bandage from his bag and wrapped it around the white and red neck where the skin had been torn by the monster. However, as Deon regained his senses, he realized something and halted his actions.
Those bitten by the monster become infected.
“What about Lemony? Is she okay?”
Ian, who had come running out of breath, looked at Deon, who remained silent. He simply stared at the fallen woman with a half-dazed gaze.
It was strange. He held the woman’s wrist with one hand, as if waiting for something, and kneeled atop her. No matter how much he disliked her, taking advantage of a dead person wasn’t appropriate.
10 seconds. 30 seconds.
After waiting for a while with his hand on his waist, Ian finally tried to speak, but suddenly, with a sharp scream, Lemoni opened her eyes and kicked her legs. “Ki-eek! Ka-ak!” The teeth of a human without sharp canines were revealed. With her breathless voice, as if accusing Deon who was on top of her, she screamed while shaking her motionless arms.
A mysterious eye, once enchanting like an amethyst, now had a single horizontal line drawn across it.
Transformation into a monster.
“….”
Ian, his face hardened with horror, covered his mouth with his palm. The two men remained silent for a while, stunned by the shocking sight. As the watcher, who had been standing at a distance, hesitantly approached, Ian unexpectedly struck him across the cheek with a punch without any warning.
“Fuck, you should have been the one to die.”
The watcher collapsed like a helpless puppet. But Ian, who did not finish there, grabbed the fallen man by the collar.
“If you’re a man, shouldn’t you at least save one woman? Are you an idiot?”
The one-sided assault continued. Meanwhile, Deon was holding onto the struggling woman with an incredulous gaze.
It felt strange. She was always calm or fearful. But to see her in a state of lost sanity, causing a commotion, a deeper sense of despair weighed heavily on his shoulders.
“…Lemony.”
Deon called her name in a hoarse, trembling voice.
“Lemony, close your mouth and open your eyes.”
Perhaps he didn’t know.
Because this woman and him have a special relationship. A life-and-death relationship, so even in his subconscious, when he heard her voice, he would wake up.
“Shut your mouth.”
Trying to be more forceful in his words, he found that she still didn’t listen. Watching her struggle like a mad woman, he realized that Lemony was as good as dead.
“Why does it work for you and not for me?”
The belated surge of anger flickered in his red eyes. Bending his head down, he stared at Lemony for a while, his expression going vacant before suddenly contorting.
“…Did I seem that easy to handle? Weren’t you even a bit afraid?”
At least he thought he had a significant role in Lemony’s life. Even if not as responsive as a dog upon hearing her voice, he assumed he had a place in her subconscious.
“…If I become an adult, maybe I could go to meet you.”
His life revolved around her. Both happiness and anger, he had learned from her.
“If you make me like this, shouldn’t you take responsibility!”
“…..Lord Shinsu.”
At that moment, he slightly lost his rationality and shouted, his voice cracking. However, a calm voice calling his name beside him snapped him back to reality. Deon, who had been steadying his irregular breathing for a moment, stared at the owner of the voice with a slightly hardened expression.
“Can you hug the Princess without getting bitten? I think I can treat the Princess.”
His eyes and cheeks were swollen with blue marks, and he was covered in bloody spots.
“Move first. Can you avoid getting bitten by Lemony?”
Approaching behind the watcher, Ian glanced indifferently at Deon. While he couldn’t discern Ian’s expression in detail, it was clear that the usual playfulness was absent. Deon nodded his head, raising his upper body that had been bowing.
Ian approached silently and with a slightly softened expression, he secured Lemony’s wrist. Taking advantage of the opportunity, Deon tore a strip of cloth from his own sleeve with one hand. The tattered black fabric served as an excellent makeshift gag. After firmly binding her mouth and securing it to the back of her head, Lemony vehemently resisted, perhaps disliking the sensation.
Of course, even in her monstrous form, she was still Lemony. Deon easily lifted her up. After all, this woman was not dead. Deon decided to be satisfied with that.
◆
At that moment.
When I came to my senses, I found myself struggling to pack my belongings. Chocolates, candies, and even a compass. As I poured odds and ends into what seemed like a children’s backpack, a boy who had been watching me nearby asked.
“What are you doing?”
“Trying to escape.”
As expected, words didn’t come out as I wanted. It had been the same before. Those fingers, which looked like small maple leaves compared to my age, were moving diligently. Perhaps I was having another dream, and strangely, it felt like it was connected to my past dreams, leaving me in a perplexing mood.
The boy, who had been sitting in a crouched position, had his red pupils darken.
“You don’t want to be with me?”
“No. It’s not that. I’m going to escape from this world.”
“But that’s running away.”
Pausing momentarily at his response, which seemed to carry a slight hint of disappointment, I subtly picked up the bag studded with jewels and stood up.
‘What should I do? I didn’t mean to upset you.’
Oh, my God. You can also hear the inner thoughts of the main character of the dream. It was absurd, but all I could do was gaze at the boy from her perspective.
The breeze ruffled the silky black hair covering his forehead. As the wind revealed his eyebrows stubbornly furrowing, I awkwardly scratched the back of my head. The boy seemed annoyed, or rather, closer to being sulky.
“I’ll come back again next time. If I stay here any longer, my parents might scold me.”
‘Why is this dream so long even though it’s a dream? It’s getting scary since I can’t wake up.’
When I laughed to soothe the boy, who appeared different on the surface, the young boy staring at me broke into an unexpected smile and shook his head abruptly. However, he soon reverted to an angry expression.
“Then I’ll take you there.”
“While it’s nice of you to offer, what if you can’t find your way back home?”
“Do you think I’m that foolish? I can find my way just fine by following my instincts.”
Hmph. The boy, who had suddenly huffed, grabbed my hand and started walking. Despite his young age, there was a sense of responsibility or something akin to determination in his youthful face. Because of that, as I followed the boy, I glanced around my surroundings.
“This place is dangerous.”
“But you are safe.”
It was a place where the Earth reflected the night sky like a mirror. The world was so serene and calm that one might give up trying to find the boundary of the horizon. I wondered how it would feel to live alone in a place like this. As I watched the brave young boy leading the way, I unconsciously murmured.
“Do you have any friends?”
“What?”
Upon hearing that, the surprised boy came to a halt.
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Thank you for reading!
