Chapter 134

"Terrible."

"Y-your safe awakening a-alone is s-so..."

"So fortunate, you mean?"

His throat was completely ruined, producing only a rasping voice.

It was fortunate, if one could call it that.

But every time he looked down at his body, he could only sigh.

The bitter smell of crushed herbs emanated strongly from his entire body.

His body was tightly wrapped in bandages. There were fewer exposed parts of flesh than covered ones, arms and legs alike.

Perhaps because he had been frozen and then thawed, as Leandros and Amelia had explained, sometimes his body wouldn't move as he wanted it to.

It was like his muscles would stiffen momentarily.

It was better than showing the scene of dying and coming back to life in front of the two of them.

But still, wasn't this too much?

Amelia sat beside him with a worried face, holding a bowl of thin porridge.

Leandros and Amelia had been taking turns caring for him since he woke up.

The snowman had regained its form the moment he awoke.

But the snowman didn't seem to be in good condition, merely dozing off despite Amelia's efforts to create a body for it with ice she had obtained with difficulty.

It seemed that freezing him had taken quite a toll.

Twice a day, Verde would visit to change his bandages or check his condition.

All he did all day was sleep or eat porridge while receiving their care.

Occasionally, he would reflect on what had happened in Dreamland.

The city ruled by Bast, the sky of mysterious light, and the grimoire Pnakotic that the city's monks had supposedly been guarding.

He still couldn't understand the principle of how something he had dreamed of could exist in the real world, but.

The cover of the grimoire was certainly...

As he was thinking while accepting the porridge Amelia was feeding him, there was a knock at the door.

"Are you awake? How is Your Grace's condition?"

"H-he can e-eat well."

"The physician says it will take more time before the bandages can be removed. In the meantime, I've looked into the current situation of the village."

Gallo.

The name of the area where they were currently located, a village almost large enough to be a city.

This village, where sturdy stone buildings were erected in the center, was administered by someone like a village headman when the representative managing the territory on behalf of the royal family was absent.

In the small and medium-sized villages he had seen so far, there had been no headmen or representatives.

Perhaps this was because the place wasn't directly ruled by a lord equivalent to a king.

"It's on the verge of being promoted to a city management district after being incorporated as a royal direct territory."

"D-did it grow that m-much? As f-far as I remember, it w-wasn't quite like th-that."

"I suspect there has been quite a migration of people between direct territories toward this area."

When a village is promoted to a city, it gains many rights.

The right to trade freely with other regions, and even though it belongs to a royal direct territory, it can obtain administrative freedom in certain areas as a city.

And that's not all. It can also attract branches of various guilds and, if done well, increase opportunities for academic learning.

"I s-see."

"The internal structure of the village is quite complex. I haven't fully grasped it, but it seems divided into areas from the central commercial district where outsiders mainly stay to the residential areas of villagers. However, it seems difficult to easily leave places close to the center if one gets lost."

"H-hmm. In the c-center."

"Of course, we're also staying at an inn located near the center. According to the innkeeper, newcomers tend to get lost while trying to navigate the village."

"R-really? B-but before, it w-wasn't like that, it s-seemed like a village w-with nothing particularly s-special."

Amelia tilted her head, seemingly unfamiliar with the changed village.

He watched the two conversing, then asked Leandros.

"Was there no mention of when it changed?"

"It would be difficult to pinpoint exactly when the changes occurred."

"Lady Arnold, what was it like when you were the assistant head butler?"

"J-just how much t-tax was collected from h-here, that's all. I d-don't remember much e-else."

"So it was ordinary enough that you didn't even notice the characteristics Leandros mentioned. It sounds like the village changed after becoming a direct territory."

It was strange no matter how he looked at it.

Could the events that occurred in Glico be dismissed as mere coincidence?

Let's put aside the fact that he had been mauled.

But why were the pig-humans there?

And what about the mercenaries who were supposedly hired for protection against demonic beasts?

Could this have happened overnight?

The more he doubted, the more questions arose.

At the end of all those questions was, of course, Yurik den Menadia.

He had thought it would be a good opportunity to reclaim part of the territory while simultaneously raising Leandros's reputation.

The Yurik of this iteration probably still desired Leandros.

If so, there was a high possibility that Yurik was also making advances toward Leandros.

But in what manner.

-Everyone must know him. I can uplift him with everything I can do.

Leandros and Yurik were satellites.

Satellites standing on opposite sides of each other.

Each traveling in their own orbit, never able to meet, just running toward each other.

Even without his help to Leandros, the story would progress.

Leandros would meet Yurik and was destined to destroy him.

That was his fate.

He was created for this world for that purpose.

If Yurik also had a meaning for being born in this world.

"...I had the same thought."

"Y-Your Grace?"

Him?

He had been thinking the same as Yurik?

Suddenly, a sense of nausea rose.

A feeling of denial rose first, insisting that couldn't be the case, but at the same time, a disgusting certainty that he and Yurik were not so different slithered up.

Just as he cherished Leandros, Yurik also cherished Leandros.

They moved with the same logic and derived similar results.

Unable to bear this newly realized fact, he vigorously threw off the blanket.

Although his legs, thin and bony, were also wrapped in bandages, it didn't matter.

As he put his feet outside the bed, Leandros and Amelia stood up in surprise.

"Your Grace, you must rest."

"Y-Your Grace, if y-you get up n-now, then!"

"This is not the time."

Disgusting. His feelings were indescribably filthy.

It was like looking in a mirror and seeing Yurik standing there.

He asked the two.

"Bring Verde. Right now."

* * *

Verde, who had been summoned out of the blue, said as soon as Amelia and Leandros left the room.

"I don't need thanks or compensation."

"What?"

"Were you not calling me to give me some jewels or something? If not, that's fine too. Is there somewhere that hurts?"

He looked quite refreshing, scratching his greasy green hair and responding casually.

Perhaps it was because he had only seen people who revered him, calling him "Your Grace" all this time.

He didn't think he had been like this in Korea. This was why adaptation was scary.

"It's not that I'm hurting anywhere. I wanted to thank you. Leandros and Amelia must have caused you trouble. I wouldn't have woken up if not for you."

"Well, for something like that. Just let me examine Your Grace's condition more closely, that's all."

"I heard you belong to a mercenary band. Do you take individual requests?"

"It's not like we're regulated to move as a group. And I'm also kind of being ostracized."

"Then does that mean you can accept my request too?"

"That's a bit..."

"Why?"

"It's bothersome. Given your current condition, you're going to ask me to continue caring for you, right? Just eat well and sleep well. That's the best."

"You don't accept such requests?"

"Why would I accept something so annoying? Tsk. Young people these days don't trust their self-healing ability. At your age, it's a waste of money to call a physician."

Verde yawned and turned around.

His attitude showed a complete lack of interest.

"I'm leaving. Let's pretend I didn't hear the request."

"I'll let you research humans."

His footsteps toward the door stopped.

He turned around with a creaking, unsmooth motion.

"What... did you say?"

"I said I'll let you do research. To research humans, you'd need dead people, right? But here, it's forbidden to desecrate corpses. Whatever your purpose, if you're caught tampering with a corpse, it won't end with just a fine."

Verde stood with his mouth closed and eyes wide open.

When he had been lying down, Amelia had confessed that she had to explain to Verde about his frozen state.

And then the indifferent Verde immediately accepted the request.

Verde was a character with a peculiar disposition.

Who would come running, chuckling about researching someone essentially dead while frozen?

That was just a madman.

In modern terms, Verde would have been called a mad scientist.

But for him right now, Verde's character was only welcome.

Because he had the best bait to give to a physician who pursued curiosity and the desire for knowledge.

"I come back to life even after dying."

This body, Arenheit's body, revived even if it died.

Only when killed by Yurik did it completely lose its physical functions, and his mind and memories returned to the beginning of the story.

He didn't know the cause or reason for this.

He even felt as if this world itself was set up to torment him.

But, it was fine.

He knew that if this deal was discovered by Leandros or those around him, the same route might be repeated as before.

But if the secret was kept, he could offer this body as much as needed.

To see the end of this story.

If it could completely tie up the loose ends for his brother, for himself, for this deed.

"The condition is that you'll be allowed to research me when I die. Since there will be a grace period of a few days until I revive, during that time, as much as you want."

Verde was staring at him blankly.

A pathetic young man sitting on the bed, wrapped in bandages, speaking with a raspy voice.

Though this was him, Verde looked as if he had discovered a huge gold vein, dumbfounded.

Only after a long wait did he finally speak.

"H-how can I believe that? A person coming back to life after dying is a lie."

"Is it a lie?"

"It's a lie, of course, it must be a lie! You're just trying to deceive me, right?"

Excited to the point of forgetting formal speech, Verde stammered and shouted.

He looked at him and then stood up.

His entire body ached, but it didn't matter.

"Let me give you one piece of advice. It would be better to order a lot of food from downstairs from now on."

"What? Why? Why is that?"

"Otherwise, when I wake up, I'll eat you."

Literally.

Adding that, he threw the cup placed beside the table to the floor.

With a crash, the pottery fragments scattered.

He picked up one of the largest pieces.

The sensation against his fingers was rough, but nothing could be a more effective weapon.

"Watch carefully."

A single moment of pain.

His weakened body faded away, having etched the shocked face of Verde as its last sight.

When he opened his eyes again.

He didn't know how much time had passed.

The sky visible through the window was dark, and Verde was standing alone beside him.

He checked his pulse, grabbing his wrist after seeing that he had opened his eyes.

Immediately after, he collapsed to his knees beside the bed.

He looked down at him with a new body that bore no traces of either the wounds from being mauled by the pig-humans or the marks of self-harm.

With trembling hands, Verde ran his fingers down his face and mumbled.

Visible through the gaps between his fingers, his eyes revealed desire, terror, fear, and a conflict resembling a small beast with prey in a trap before it.

"Wh-what do you want?"

Of course, no matter how much he pondered, it would be an offer Verde couldn't refuse.

"Nothing much. What I'm going to ask of you is extremely trivial..."

Throughout his whisper,

A red number flickered above Verde's head.

[75/75]