HPV 33

The branches hanging over the man’s head, rustling as he walked, the bushes brushing against his collar, and the small plants he barely avoided stepping on—they all seemed to turn their heads to watch him.

The mage stopped before the corpse of a dead traveler, leaning against a tree knoll.

The traveler, who must have dried up and died, had decayed until only a bare skeleton remained.

He pulled out a small spade he kept at his waist.

With practiced skill, he dug into the earth nearby.

Sweat beaded on his forehead.

He dug a pit with his bare hands and neatly placed the traveler’s bones inside.

He felt no revulsion at touching the bones of the dead.

After covering the mound into a neat grave, the man stepped back, holding a small finger bone in his hand, as if it were a reward for burying the traveler.

He moved on again, though in truth, he had no real idea where he was going.

“This forest sucks the life out of humans. In other words, it spits out anything that’s already dead. That’s why I took the finger bone. I’m going to try and trick the forest with it…”

He spoke casually to his companion as he walked.

But his fingertips were stiff, and his steps were slightly unsteady.

Yes, he was trembling.

“So don’t stare at me like that when you don’t even have any eyeballs.”

His companion, whose skeletal face was barely hidden by a cleverly draped dark robe, said nothing.

Penzey forced a casual smile, pretending it was just a joke, trying hard not to meet the hollow black gaze.

Was the bone fragment useless?

Or was it precisely because he was carrying the bone fragment?

The darkness inside the empty eye sockets seemed to question him.

Since you’re not even a gravedigger, when will you pay for handling the dirt of the dead so much?

If this were just a hallucination…shouldn’t he not feel like he was being buried alive, walking through dirt?

At that moment, a prayer rang out.

“O my only Lord. Please open the way for this foolish servant.”

Even before he could refocus his mind, his head turned reflexively.

And soon, his wandering eyes regained their former clarity.

Yes, that was the real Yurichen.

“Would you kindly put down that bone fragment this instant?”

That cold, contemptuous tone—that was exactly how Yurichen should be.

Penzey slowly raised both arms.

The bone fragment slid from his palm and fell to the ground, and as it did, he smiled broadly.

Yurichen stood with his arms crossed, waiting.

Waiting until Penzey came crawling to plead that he had no suspicious intentions with the bone fragment.

There were four living people here now.

Whenever the sneaky darkness lurking just beyond their sight tried to grasp their hems, the High Priest cast a glance at it.

At his glance, the darkness died instantly, turning back into powerless blades of grass.

Wherever the High Priest’s steps touched, the forest’s evil power was purged, losing its original force.

It wasn’t obvious, but slick sweat ran down the back of his neck beneath his veil.

“Once we find Banwes, we’re done with this dreadful place.”

Assuming Banwes had followed the scent trail and found Riarun, things were nearly wrapped up.

They only had to follow the sacred artifact’s guidance now.

“Wait a minute. Are we really catching up fast enough? Maybe we should be running?”

Coming from the man who had made them waste their stamina wandering in circles through the forest, no one particularly wanted to listen.

Despite Yurichen’s cold disregard, Penzey stubbornly continued.

“I could just scoop him up and elope.”

Yurichen’s frosty gaze dropped like cold water.

“I’m serious. If I were him, I’d have grabbed the kid and bolted to some hut by now—”

“Banwes doesn’t cherish Riarun with such petty emotions. Do you think he’s anything like you?”

Penzey shut his mouth, then opened it again—but before he could say anything, another foolish comment slipped out from somewhere.

“Wait, Banwes cherishes Riarun? I thought he treated him the worst? Always mocking him with every word…”

Penzey clicked his tongue once and gave up trying to explain.

All he did was glance at his two companions—looking at Yurichen as if he were a ten-year-old child, and at Paronai as if he were a five-year-old toddler.

Honestly, there wasn’t much difference.

Thunk—a heavy footstep sounded, as if demanding attention.

The group turned to see the very man they had just been gossiping about—the hulking figure of Banwes—holding up Riarun with one hand under his hips.

If not for Riarun’s long, flowing hair, he might have looked like he was carrying a small, bundled object wrapped in clothes.

Bzhan jumped down from the tree.

As he hurried to check on the unconscious Riarun, a hand seized his throat.

“Ghk…!”

His feet kicked helplessly in the air.

In Banwes’s grip, Bzhan looked as small as a weasel.

Without a word, Banwes demanded an explanation from the struggling boy.

“I sen—ghk—sensed danger…!

And still, I—koff—came closer to you… to check if Riarun was alright…”

Yurichen quickly stepped forward to explain, having grasped the situation.

“Bzhan didn’t drag Riarun into the forest. We were seeing illusions, that’s all. Riarun wandered in under the forest’s influence, on his own.”

The strength in Banwes’s hand loosened.

The gasping boy fell—and before his feet could even touch the ground, his form disappeared.

Paronai stared wide-eyed at the vanishing act, like a man whose nose had been cut off right before his eyes.

“Show us Riarun. Is he hurt?”

In the brief moment when their movements overlapped, only Penzey managed to catch a certain scene—because it happened to be a field of personal interest to him.

How gently Banwes’s right hand cradled the small body—and even the brief hesitation, almost like a pause, when Yurichen asked him to show Riarun.

Penzey rested his chin in his hand and tapped lightly at his cheek with his fingers.

—

When I came to my senses, the tree above me was gone, and I was surrounded by the group.

Since I had been unconscious the whole time, I didn’t know who had found me in the forest. But my body was very warm, as if someone had been holding me for a long time.

Whoever it was.

I didn’t feel like apologizing for causing trouble. An apology didn’t suit me.

I had been a burden all along anyway—no use pretending otherwise.

“It’s enough that you’re not hurt. In fact, among those enchanted by the forest, you were the wisest. You stayed in one place, so you were easy to find.”

Strangely, Yurichen’s words didn’t sound sarcastic, and that puzzled me a little.

Another good thing about riding on Banwes’s back was that I could close my eyes and pretend to sleep.

That way, no one would talk to me, and I could feel like I was alone.

‘The forest’s hallucination did end up helping me a little.’

I could hear again the mysterious voice I had forgotten, as if replaying a recording.

[Child. Do you want to leave?]

While my mind was still clear,

I decided for sure: it wasn’t Hancanera.

—Catch him!

Instead, this second voice, overlapping just barely, was unmistakably Hancanera’s shout.

The two voices were clearly different.

There was no way Hancanera would have tried to send me outside the cult. Even if he had some hidden motive, he wouldn’t have screamed to catch me.

‘Then I’m back at a dead end. I can swear it’s not the voice of the Rohin, either.’

Spirits, being one with nature, can’t speak human language.

Which meant it wasn’t Rohin—but someone who could slip past Hancanera’s notice.

Someone capable of teleportation, something even sorcerers found difficult.

‘…If it’s a demon residing inside me.’

Since I had been imprisoned underground, the demon would have been trapped too. Helping me escape would be in the demon’s own interest.

It would want freedom, too. To spread chaos across the world. Banwes was suppressing the demon for now, but for how much longer could he keep it contained?

Maybe I was walking around as evil itself.

I had considered asking Yurichen for an insight reading to locate the demon, but that was information I only knew because I had seen it in the game.

If he used insight, he might uncover everything—possession, and more.

‘I have a demon in me, and there’s a specialist who could deal with it—yet I can’t ask for help. Isn’t there a better way?’

…There was one.

Not right now, but later—

there would be an episode where Yurichen would unleash a divine power so vast it would make what he used earlier in the forest look tiny in comparison.

If I stuck close to him then, maybe he could sever the demon’s hold. Setting that goal in my mind, I opened my eyes.

I tried to get down and walk on my own—but by then, the group was already preparing to camp.

We had wasted too much time in the forest and wouldn’t make it to the next village.

“We’ll have to camp. Penzey, start a fire. Paronai, gather firewood. Riarun, get the cauldron from the supplies.”

Yurichen’s leadership was excellent, but he wasn’t following the usual order of things for camping.

He was preparing bathwater before dinner.