I Picked Up an Abandoned Villain in the Polar Region

Episode 65

 

“A Bea… beaver?”

Kyle blinked.

The person walking towards him, holding a bowl, was a beaver-like creature that had not yet been fully humanized.

“Beaver?”

He frowned at Kyle’s words, then quickly ignored Kyle and approached Brody.

He took the towel off Brody’s forehead, touched her forehead with his funny paw, and nodded.

“The fever has gone down.”

Kyle stood there dumbfounded for a while before he came to his senses and grabbed Brody’s arm.

Unlike the last time he touched her, when she was boiling hot, only a slight fever remained in her body now.

Kyle checked that Brody’s breathing had stabilized then asked the beaver-like figure.

“Who are you?”

Then, he, who had been piling up the herbs in a bowl and crushing it with a small mallet, answered in a rather humble voice.

“You wouldn’t know even if I told you as someone who called me a beaver.”

“…”

“I am a groundhog.”

“?”

“See, you don’t know, right?”

After saying that, he jumped down from the chair and staggered towards the kitchen.

He then mixed some water in the bowl he was holding and spoke to Kyle.

“If you’re just going to stand there blankly, come and open this girl’s mouth. I need to give her some medicine.”

He was trying to feed Brody some unidentified liquid from a bowl. Kyle saw this and immediately became alert.

“Wait a minute. Tell me what kind of medicine that is first.”

It was a suspicious attitude that developed from a history of being stabbed in the back of the head by everyone he met while traveling.

So when he pressed the question, the groundhog sighed as if he was annoyed.

“It’s a medicine made from thistle that grows in the wilderness. It’s usually taken by strangers when they enter the wilderness to prevent rashes and hives.”

Kyle looked at the potion in the groundhog hand. The liquid was indeed the same color as the potion Shiloh had given Brody.

It was a medicine said to prevent the health problems that arise after entering the wilderness.

But Brody must have already taken the medicine. Kyle, who had been feeling uneasy for a while, asked the groundhog.

“If you take that medicine, does it have different effects for different people?”

“What does that mean?”

“This woman took the medicine before entering the wilderness. But she still felt unwell. While I, who didn’t take the medicine, was fine.”

“What?”

The groundhog listened to Kyle’s words and responded indifferently, flicking his ears with the claws on his front feet.

“You must be wrong. You took the medicine and this girl didn’t.”

“This woman took the medicine though?”

The groundhog gave Kyle a look of obvious annoyance and said.

“Look, in the wilderness, only the foreigners who don’t take medicine get sick. That’s because the witches of this wilderness have been playing tricks on them. If you hadn’t taken the medicine, you would have developed a rash like this girl. If you didn’t develop a rash, that means you took the medicine.”

But Kyle denied it even after hearing his explanation. He really didn’t take the medicine.

What if Brody secretly fed it to him…?

‘Wait, secretly?’

Kyle suddenly looked down at Brody as his thoughts raced.

Come to think of it, although Brody was the only one who received the medicine, was she the type to take it alone?

Was she the kind of person who would take medicine by herself even though she was told that something would go wrong if he didn’t take it?

Brody was someone who always tried to give food to Kyle first whenever there was food. She shared her dried carrots with him; because she couldn’t eat on her own, and always gave Kyle more crowberries.

Brody was that kind of person.

Given her personality, it was clear that she secretly fed him that drug. But when?

It was at that moment, as he was reminiscing about those days, that a memory suddenly flashed through Kyle’s mind.

It was the night after they left the forest of Ennea and were moving with the yaks.

At that time, Brody clearly did something she didn’t normally do.

There was snow everywhere that could be eaten instead of water, yet didn’t she specifically bring water to him and hand it over?

And the water had a strange taste.

Kyle opened his mouth as he recalled this memory. Could it be that she had given him the medicine back then?

“…”

He felt like he had been hit in the back of the head. Why on earth did she do that…?

Why did she treat him like that…?

It wasn’t touching or anything.

He just felt suffocated.

Why, when he hadn’t done anything for her? Was it really worth it giving everything to someone like him?

He couldn’t understand why and that made him feel so helpless.

Kyle was so shocked that he couldn’t say anything, and just stood there, staring blankly at Brody.

Seeing Kyle’s pensive appearance, the groundhog observed him and spoke carefully to comfort him.

“Don’t worry too much. This girl had been lacking in nutrition for a while, so her immune system was weak. She also got a rash and a cold, which made her condition worse. But she’s getting better now. And I gave her some medicine, so don’t despair.”

 

***

 

Kyle took great care of Brody during the two days she lay in bed.

He fed her, wiped her rash with a cool towel to keep it from itching, and stayed by her side without leaving her for even a moment.

Even the heavens must have thought his efforts were worth it, for after two days Brody’s physical aches and pains had all but disappeared.

And thanks to taking the medicine, the rash didn’t spread any further or get worse.

She also didn’t scratch her skin anymore, so the redness had gone down a lot.

The groundhog gave the strangers a comfortable stay for two days, with minimal attention, feeling no burden.

He grilled some salted fish and gave it to Kyle for breakfast today, and they ate together.

Kyle looked at the groundhog, who was eating the hot fish across from him, holding it in both hands.

At first, Kyle was also very wary of him. Having experienced getting stabbed by everyone he trusted.

So on the first day, when he gave him a fish like this, he ate it while looking at him with a sharp gaze.

However, ironically, despite this wariness, the groundhog never showed any suspicious behavior during their time together.

He usually went out with his fishing rod after breakfast in the morning, and came back in the evening.

He didn’t pay much attention to the guests he brought to his home. He never even asked their names.

Even when Kyle said, “I don’t have the money to repay you,” feeling slightly helpless. He just looked at Kyle’s expression and turned around with a snort as if he hadn’t expected it.

As the other person was only showing the minimum interest, Kyle became curious about him instead.

Moreover, most beast folk generally stayed in human form when at home.

Strangely enough, however, the groundhog waddled around in his animal form even at home.

Moreover, the house was built to fit the lifestyle of humans, so there were more than a few inconveniences for the groundhog’s body.

Of course, he was so skilled that he didn’t seem to have any discomfort.

After accompanying him for the last two days, his curiosity grew, so he studied the groundhog closely while eating the grilled fish he had been given.

Sensing this gaze, the groundhog asked bluntly, completely focused on eating his fish.

“What are you looking at?”

Kyle didn’t blush at being caught staring. He just looked at him with eyes that were still curious and asked him a question.

“Have you contracted a disease that prevents you from turning back into a human?”

All he wanted was to ask why he doesn’t just transform into a human.

But as expected, he didn’t know how to speak politely, so he asked a rude question and waited for an answer without knowing what was wrong, with a look of genuine curiosity.

Fortunately, the generous groundhog answered in a nonchalant voice without showing any sign of displeasure.

“It’s not a disease, it’s a curse.”

“?”

Kyle looked at him in confusion after hearing the unexpected answer.

He asked that with his own mouth, but he never thought it would be true.

However, the consistently indifferent groundhog told his story calmly as if there was nothing to hide.

“It was the curse of the black witch. Three years ago, when I was fishing in the river, the black witch suddenly appeared there. And when she saw me, she came over to me with a very tired look on her face, and asked for some of the fish I had caught.”

The groundhog chuckled as if the memory of that time was vividly coming back to him.

He continued speaking with a look of absurdity on his face.

“Of course I told her to get lost. Who cares if a witch who kills people starves to death? That’s when the poisonous woman put a curse on me. To live my entire life with a body that can never return to being human. I’ve been like this ever since.”

Even though it was not a pleasant story at all, the groundhog finished the story with a big laugh.

Then he started devouring the fish again.

After hearing the groundhog’s story, Kyle looked at him with a blank expression.

To Kyle’s eyes, the groundhog looked insane.

He was destined to live his whole life as an animal because you didn’t give her even one fish, so what’s so great about that? Yet he was laughing and talking like that.

He must have lost his mind.

Kyle asked him, not understanding at all.

“Don’t you regret it? It’s as if you’ve lost half your life.”

Clearly, he had been building a foundation for life in his human body until then.

But, because of the sin of not giving her even one fish, he was struck by a curse and had to live his entire life as a small animal.

Kyle couldn’t even imagine how frustrating it would be.

So he asked him if he regretted his choice back then, and the groundhog shook his head as if it were nothing.

“Our lord fell for the seduction of that dark witch, Amidal, and abandoned this wilderness for decades. As a result, the capital, Volcan, became a lawless zone.”

For a moment, the groundhog’s indifferent eyes had a flash of bitterness.

Kyle realized that the lord he was referring to was ‘Rubinus’, the lord of the wilderness.

The leader of the Red Fox tribe, who made a contract with the Black Witch decades ago to gain power.

The groundhog put down the fishbone after he had finished eating, wiped his mouth with a napkin, and continued speaking.

“How can I give fish to the black witch to fill her stomach when I know that fact so well? I have a conscience too.”

“…”

“You asked me if I regretted it? I would never do something so vile even if I was frozen to death.”

There was a straightforward strength to his voice.

The groundhog was truly not sorry.

He could tell just by looking at his face. That face that said that a witch’s curse could never bring him any despair or sadness.

That attitude that did not even resent one’s own fate.

The groundhog wiped his face neatly with a napkin, then shook off the soot from the fish from his forelegs and got down from the chair.

And then he spoke to Kyle.

“Leave my plate and clean up yours.”

He turned around coolly as if he had finished everything he wanted to say, and as usual, he went out to the front door right after finishing his meal.

He then pressed the straw hat hanging there firmly onto his head, picked up the prepared fishing rod and bucket, and left the house.

At the dining table, only Kyle was left sitting alone.

With a face deep in thought, he watched the marmot heading toward the river for a long time.¹A groundhog is a type of marmot, so it’s not wrong to refer to him either ways.