Chapter One Hundred and Seventy-One: Nightmare
“I can’t believe that was Sir Julius…”
The one who spoke in a trembling voice was Therese, who had supposedly been carrying the wounded but apparently had been watching Julius’s battle from the front row instead.
Karen glared at her reflexively.
“Please don’t look at Mr. Julius like that, Lady Therese.”
“But… after seeing him like that…”
True, Julius’s laughing figure was eerie, but Karen didn’t think it was enough to make Therese turn pale. His fighting style must have been quite shocking, but Karen hadn’t seen it, so she couldn’t understand.
Feeling frustrated, Karen quickly surveyed her surroundings. Even the knights were looking taken aback, murmuring among themselves. Some of the adventurers had pale faces like the knights, but among them were those who casually remarked, "He’s drunk.”
In any case, it was clear Julius was exposing a side of himself he didn’t want others to see.
Karen broke through the crowd of people keeping their distance from the Elder Treant—or rather, from Julius now—and stood to shield him from their view, saying:
“Someone! Please prepare water!”
“The excitement from defeating the tenth-floor boss won’t calm down with just water!”
“But with my potion, I should be able to calm him down—!”
Karen’s words dissolved into her mouth as she was roughly pulled back by Julius, whom she’d been shielding. From behind, Julius restrained Karen in a bear hug. It was too forceful to be called an embrace, and Karen couldn’t breathe for a moment.
“Are you afraid of me?”
Julius asked at Karen’s ear.
At some point, his manic laughter had stopped.
“I-It hurts. Mr. Julius…!”
That’s not the issue right now, Karen tried to convey, patting Julius’s arm repeatedly.
Though the force squeezing her loosened somewhat, it was still painful.
Growing limp in Julius’s hold, Karen lifted her eyes toward Therese.
“Lady Therese, you can use water magic, right? Please pour water on us…”
“Is this really happening because of magical power intoxication?”
While pointing her hand toward them, Therese asked with a pale face.
Karen said with a blue face while hanging limply:
“Can we talk about that later? Mr. Julius doesn’t know his own strength right now, and I can’t breathe.”
“—Water.”
Therese blasted them with water magic.
Though it wasn’t attack magic, Karen had to receive it without being able to shield her face, and it hurt quite a bit.
While coughing from water that went up her nose, Karen stuck an herb she pulled from her cloak’s inner pocket onto Julius’s wet cheek and poured her magical power into it.
Naturally, the water created by magic was abundantly infused with Therese’s magical power, making it terribly inefficient. Moreover, since she was trying to turn the water soaking their bodies into a potion, the efficiency was even worse. But Karen looked up at Julius and desperately poured in her magical power.
Though Julius looked down at Karen with colorless eyes, he didn’t particularly resist. As water droplets dripped onto Karen from his golden hair, he simply repeated his question:
“Are you afraid of me? Karen.”
“Who knows. I didn’t see you fight.”
“Yet you’re desperately trying to calm me down, aren’t you?”
Julius smiled sardonically.
With terribly dark eyes and a twisted smile as if mocking, Karen looked up at this appearance of Julius she’d never seen before and tried to maintain her usual tone as she said:
“It’s only because you wish not to show that side to anyone that I want to fulfill that wish for you.”
Julius’s eyes widened.
She felt she could see the momentum of the magical power swirling within those eyes slow down.
The next moment, the strength in Julius’s arms, which were squeezing Karen, loosened.
“But… surely you must be afraid of me.”
A dejected tone. An expression of deep despair. Golden eyes sinking in sadness.
Karen looked up at him and exhaled.
“For now, would you like me to prove that I’m not particularly afraid of you, Mr. Julius?”
“What are—Karen!?”
Karen released all strength from her body within Julius’s loosened arms and leaned her back against his chest. Julius reflexively supported her. Caught in his arms as planned, Karen entrusted her full weight to those arms and closed her eyes.
“I’m completely exhausted… I’ll sleep in your arms now, so please handle the rest.”
Though Julius should also be tired from defeating the tenth-floor boss, he seemed to have energy to spare. Dumping everything on him, Karen decided to pass out in Julius’s arms.
When Thor returned to their camp, Julius was holding Karen in his arms. Thor’s hair stood on end, and he approached in an instant, wondering if something had happened, but Karen appeared to be simply sleeping peacefully in Julius’s arms. The slight wetness was probably from dealing with the Treant’s flames.
“Karen is just tired and sleeping.”
“So why are you holding her in your arms?”
Julius turned his face away from Thor and ignored the question. Thor glared at Julius, but if he directed killing intent at him, it might disturb Karen’s sleep.
Since he could imagine she wasn’t entirely displeased with it herself, Thor sighed and decided to get to the main point.
“A horde of Treants appeared on our side. We caught what seems to be the culprit idiot, so I brought him.”
Saying that, Thor presented before everyone’s eyes the man he’d caught with a lasso and dragged along.
“This man… isn’t he a merchant from the Gubert Trading Company?”
The one who came forward with knights in tow to see the culprit was Boromias.
Boromias spoke with an expression that showed more confusion than displeasure.
It was probably because of the obviously bizarre state.
“Help me… help me…”
Isaac said while trembling violently, lying sprawled on the ground. His face, his body—everything was withered and wrinkled as if all moisture had been drained from his body. He gripped something like a jet-black stone in both hands.
His hands apparently couldn’t separate from the stone. Thorny vine-like protrusions extending from the stone pierced through the skin of both hands and dug into his body, and his fingertips seemed to sink into the stone as if being swallowed by it, turning black.
“Prince, this guy apparently did something trying to kill me.”
“He tried to kill a B-rank adventurer?”
Boromias frowned for a moment at Thor’s casual speech, but upon confirming the pendant marking Thor as a B-rank adventurer that he’d deliberately worn, he continued the conversation.
“Apparently, he believed that if he poured magical power into this black stone, a powerful monster would appear and kill me, and he was saying something like ‘this is the end.’ When the horde of Treants appeared, he was triumphant, but when he realized his hands couldn’t separate from the stone, he started panicking, saying something about his magical power being drained, and then he withered up before our eyes. Also, you shouldn’t touch it.”
Told this by Thor, the knights who had been approaching to restrain Isaac flinched and stopped.
“Anyone who touches this guy gets their magical power drained. One of our companions cut off the arm that touched him. Otherwise, he’d have lost his life as well.”
“Boo-hoo.”
A large man who appeared to be an axe user flapped his flattened sleeve while mock-crying with just his voice.
The knights gulped and distanced themselves from Isaac.
Isaac pleaded with his dying breath.
“C-cut off my arm too…!”
“What’ll you do? Prince. You gonna save him?”
“…We must hear his story. How exactly did he lure the tenth-floor monsters? What is that stone? What is happening to that man’s body?”
“Got it. Then I’ll save him.”
Thor casually swung his sword down at Isaac’s arm.
Isaac let out an ear-splitting scream and writhed in agony.
“Ah… doesn’t look like he’ll be saved after all.”
Though the sword Thor swung down could sever Isaac’s arm, it couldn’t cut through the dark red thorns that had burrowed into the arm and extended throughout his body.
To avoid the thorns that stretched toward him through the sword, Thor released his grip on it. The thorns extending from the black stone absorbed the sword and increased the number wrapping around Isaac. Only the sobbing voice of Isaac, being slowly consumed, echoed hollowly in that place.
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