Chapter One Hundred and Twenty-Three: Intoxicated Step
“Karen—that child has ascended a step—?”
“Huh? She hasn’t defeated any monsters right now, has she…?”
Whether the explosion had scattered the Trent’s oil and magic stones, the apartment fire was extinguished. Amid the lingering smell of burning, someone whispered:
“The goddess has acknowledged that Karen was right.”
That whisper spread like ripples on water.
Karen was sure that the reason was something different.
She had been thinking about medicinal herbs. In that process, Karen realized something. She “understood” something about this world’s magic and alchemy.
The goddess had acknowledged that.
Even without defeating monsters, as proof that she had drawn closer to the goddess, she had granted Karen permission to ascend a step.
But such misunderstandings felt irrelevant to Karen now.
What dominated her entire body was an omnipotent sensation that everything would go well. The injured, the partially burned apartment, the people driven from their homes—all of it felt distant to Karen now. To do what she most wanted to do right now, Karen turned to face Julius.
“Mr. Julius, I apologize, but I will break my promise to you.”
“…Karen?”
“You told me to stay away from dangerous things. I nodded. I couldn’t resist your enchanting smile… and just as I feared from the start, when you’re around, I can’t focus on alchemy at all.”
Flushed with the elation brought by the heat of magical power filling her body, Karen spoke with her light blue eyes blazing brilliantly.
Julius frowned.
“But still, to do what I want to do, I’ll cross dangerous bridges if necessary. I’ll be reckless too. I’ll cause you worry as well.”
“So you’re saying you want to break up with me? Karen.”
“Huh? That’s not it at all.”
Karen looked puzzled at Julius’s words.
“I will absolutely never break up with you.”
“…Oh?”
“But I won’t unconditionally listen to what you say either. Even if you ask me to, I’ll do dangerous things, be reckless, and cause you worry. As an alchemist, I won’t give up on anything! But being worried about by you makes me very happy, so I want you to worry about selfish me much more from now on.”
“Karen, your true feelings are completely leaking out due to magic intoxication. You’ll regret this after the magic intoxication wears off.”
Ignoring Natalia’s warning as she approached, Karen pointed at Julius while intoxicated by the magical power overflowing in her body.
“Mr. Julius! If you hate selfish me and want to break up with me, then you should run away! Though I won’t let you escape! I’ll do everything in my power to hold you back and defend my position as your girlfriend!”
Looking down at Karen, who declared this with a dramatic pose, Julius chuckled.
“Your magic intoxication is adorable, Karen.”
“If you think I’m cute, then you could give me a kiss or something!”
“May I kiss you? I thought you’d refuse, saying your brain would melt and leak out your ears.”
Wrapping her arms around the neck of Julius as he narrowed his eyes and brought his face closer, Karen smiled boldly.
“No problem at all. …But if you don’t want to, Mr. Julius, please run away, okay?”
“As if I could dislike it. I feel like a monster whose targeted prey has fallen right into its hands. I feel sorry for taking advantage of you while you’re magic intoxicated. Won’t you regret this later?”
“Of course not. Thanks to being magic intoxicated, my true feelings are gushing out without a hint of compromise!”
“—That’s true. Either way, it’s your true feelings.”
Julius smiled broadly and placed his hand on Karen’s cheek.
As Karen closed her eyes, Julius’s smile deepened, and he pressed his lips to hers.
“I want to crawl into a hole and hide…!”
“For someone ascending a step for the first time, you’re actually on the cute side, Karen.”
Natalia comforted Karen, who was curled up holding her head, with a gentle smile.
The effects of the magical power that had filled her body subsided quickly.
Karen’s magical power vessel had grown larger after ascending the step, allowing all the magical power she had absorbed to settle within it.
What came next was the hell of unbearable embarrassment.
Fortunately or unfortunately, Karen began to regain her senses during Julius’s strangely long kiss, thinking ‘Wait? Isn’t this weird?’ and her face and entire body turned bright red. Julius’s golden eyes narrowed upon seeing Karen like this, and just as she thought that, he took the arm of Karen, who was trying to resist, changed the angle of the kiss, and completely blocked any opportunity for Karen to voice her protests.
“B-back then, Mr. Julius definitely noticed I was regaining my senses…! Why… why…!”
“Karen, pull yourself together. Someone wants to talk to you.”
When Natalia called out to her, Karen stopped writhing and looked up with a start. There stood a large woman and a man being supported by the woman.
The exhausted man was the person Karen had rescued from the smoky apartment earlier.
Karen, who had been crouching, hurriedly stood up.
“Do you have a moment?”
When the woman addressed her, Karen nodded vigorously.
“O-Of course.”
“I’m Urte. This here’s my husband, Aaron.”
“I’m sorry for getting you involved in this—”
“Hold on, I won’t let you say that.”
Urte clamped her large hand over Karen’s mouth to silence her, then gave a wry smile.
“Your house being burned wasn’t your fault. We understand that much. Right, Aaron?”
“Yes… Well, I was literally about to die, so… I do hold a tiny grudge.”
“What kind of thing to say after being rescued! If this girl hadn’t gone, I would have gone to save you, prepared to die together!?”
“P-Please don’t do that, Urte! Anyway… thank you, truly… Ms. Karen, was it?”
“Yes—we’re the ones who owe you thanks. Thank you, Karen.”
The thin man cleared his throat and smiled at Karen.
It seemed he had protected his body with magical power and had almost no burns, but he had trouble breathing until recently. However, now he had apparently recovered safely with the small recovery potions Tim and Harald were distributing.
If there had been someone with severe burns, small recovery potions wouldn’t have been sufficient, but fortunately, there wasn’t a single person like that.
Being told words of gratitude, Karen’s face crumpled.
“…But if I hadn’t caused trouble, this wouldn’t have happened.”
“But you can’t just say nothing, avoid conflict with everyone, and suppress your own desires, can you? When you move forward, you’re bound to clash with someone. I’m a C-rank adventurer myself. Before reaching this point, I clashed with all sorts of people and caused trouble for those around me. But nobody has the right to tell me not to move forward.”
Compromise, compromise, compromise.
If you lived that way, you could live without clashing with anyone. So no trouble would occur, and you wouldn’t cause anyone trouble like this. Karen was here because she had decided to stop living that way. But right now, that fact made her feel unbearably guilty.
“Don’t apologize, Karen. We’re adventurers who came from elsewhere, but my husband got badly hurt in a dungeon and couldn’t move anymore, so we decided to stop traveling and settle down in the royal capital. Then this apartment was recommended to us. We heard that the people here are soft-hearted and don’t harass families with useless members—it was you who made this apartment like that, wasn’t it, Karen?”
“No, I didn’t particularly—”
“Don’t be modest. This trouble happened because you’re standing firm for a child nobody pays attention to, right? …It’s like you’re working hard for my Aaron, too. And you, you hold some grudge just because you almost died!?”
“Yes, I’m sorry.”
Karen couldn’t help but laugh seeing Aaron wilt and apologize.
Tears came out as she laughed.
“Ahaha… ‘just because you almost died,’ you say… Sorry, I laughed. You must have been scared, too, Mr. Aaron.”
“I’m glad you laughed. I’m a pathetic man, and it’s nothing but embarrassing.”
“That’s right. Ever since his body weakened, this person’s spirit has weakened too. I’ll find a mega antidote potion or a panacea somehow, so don’t you dare turn into a rotten man.”
“Yes.”
“The man I fell in love with is brave. Right?”
“Yeah, the man that the woman I love fell in love with, though he’s occasionally pathetic, which is his one flaw, doesn’t do anything to disillusion the woman he loves.”
Averting her gaze from the couple entering their own world, Karen looked around.
There were no deaths. Still, despite suffering terribly, despite being caught up in this, everyone returned bright smiles when their eyes met Karen’s.
Karen returned smiles to everyone while crying and laughing.
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