STM 192

Even though we’d fled in front of Grand Duke Montaine, we hadn’t returned empty-handed. We had our spoils: Hoiga and Kilu.

There was only one reason we’d dragged them back, even though they were as cumbersome as a load of luggage: we figured they might be useful for something. After all, even a fallen leaf can make good fuel when you light a fire.

“Hoiga’s injuries are severe, and he hasn’t woken up. And as for Kilu…”

Enya, who had been following me and explaining the situation, frowned.

“No matter what we do, he won’t open his mouth. On the contrary, he’s been mocking us with a smug air.”

“No matter what we do.” It surely included brutal torture. Damn it, so in the end, were Hoiga and Kilu both just wet leaves? But I couldn’t give up. I had to bury those leaves in the ground and use them as fertilizer, if nothing else.

“He can’t just keep putting his pride first.”

“Yes, he seemed to have something to rely on. He believes in Grand Duke Montaine like a fanatic. And.”

Enya hesitated, which was unlike her.

“Go on.”

“He acted as if he could leave at any moment if he set his mind to it. I suspect there might be someone among us who’s in cahoots with him.”

“There could be a dark mage here too. But that’s not necessarily a bad thing.”

I replied, then noticed Enya’s intense gaze.

“You don’t trust me?”

“No. I do.”

Ah, was it a look of blind faith rather than suspicion? While it’s nice to be trusted by a colleague, if that trust feels burdensome, I can’t help but feel repelled.

Unlike Haas, she used to avoid me. It was so comfortable and nice back then. But ever since returning from Montaine, she’s been following me around even more than Haas.

“Yes, I appreciate it, but… why are you suddenly trusting me so much?”

“Because you are Salvation.”

Maybe it was because Enya was a knight, but the weight of her words felt different from Haas’s. Maybe Haas would have been better. I sighed and turned to leave, but Enya’s words made me look back.

“How could I not trust someone who acts with knowledge of the future?”

“No.”

I immediately refuted her.

“I don’t know anything about the future.”

“But the Salvation who led us in Montaine appeared as someone who knows the future.”

Me? What? I denied it again, but Enya’s gaze toward me only grew more convinced. Was this some kind of contagious disease? But there was no time now to clear up her misunderstanding. Every moment counted.

Tairok was the only one who could stop Grand Duke Montaine, but it would be difficult to defeat her with just the power of the serpent divine beast. So there was only one option. Tairok had to become stronger. What if he acquired one more divine beast’s power?

To do that, there was a problem to solve: lifting Kun’s curse. But Hoiga, who claimed to know the method, was unconscious, and Kilu in the dungeon greeted me with an air of nonchalance.

“Salvation has arrived.”

I ignored what Kilu said and asked him a question.

“You said that dying in that cave would actually be an honor. Is it the same now?”

“Yes. My sister is a great being who will fulfill the wishes of all dark mages. I’d be proud just to place a single stone in her path.”

“If you die here, your sister won’t even know if you placed a stone or smashed it to pieces.”

Kilu scoffed upon hearing that. I thought I understood why Enya suspected there might be a dark mage among us. That was why he could smile like that, even with his face swollen and bloodied from being beaten.

After all, he had a way to make his martyrdom known to the outside world. But no matter how confident he was, he should have exercised restraint. He shouldn’t have been bragging in such a disadvantageous situation.

“Thank you for confirming it.”

“Thank you?”

“Thanks to you, Tairok will gain the strength to stand against Grand Duke Montaine. Well, you’ll be branded a traitor and attacked by your comrades, but you were planning to die anyway, so it’s not a loss.”

“What are you talking about?”

Kilu looked at me with a wary expression, but I ignored his reaction and called out to the person standing outside the door.

“Enya.”

When the door opened at my call, I issued an order loud enough for the sentry outside to hear.

“Kilu has agreed to the deal. Thanks to him, we’ll be able to lift the curse. Take him to a comfortable place and treat him to some good food.”

“What kind of nonsense are you spouting?!”

A startled Kilu shouted, and this time I smiled.

“It’s alright. In a few days, I’ll move you to a safe place where no one can find you. Rest easy there. No one will know that you betrayed Grand Duke Montaine.”

Kilu’s face turned so red with rage it looked like it might burst, and he startled struggling while screaming. If he wanted to be a martyr, wouldn’t it be fair to let him remain a traitor?

I had no intention of giving him a single thing he wanted. Even after the door closed, his anguished cries echoed through the hallway, prompting Enya to ask.

“Should I make him quiet?”

“Leave him be. No matter how much he yells, if we don’t intervene, they’ll believe Kilu betrayed them. You understand, right?”

Even though I hadn’t told her who “they” were, Enya nodded vigorously. I could see in her eyes her determination to capture the dark mage if they approached Kilu.

But for Kilu to be definitively branded a traitor, the curse would have to be truly lifted. I quickly moved to another prison.

If neither Hoiga nor Kilu could be used, I had no choice but to resort to the last alternative I’d saved for last. I had someone bring the prisoner transferred from Kun’s dungeon to me, and without even greeting him, I asked.

“Ariona, have you thought about it?”

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At first, Ariona didn’t believe the news the soldiers brought. However, before transferring him to Kun Castle, Lu had him ride in a carriage around the capital to reveal the truth to him.

It was only looking out from inside, but that was enough. Just by looking at people’s expressions, he could tell how chaotic and terrified the world had become.

Evidence that the reason for this was Grand Duke Montaine’s betrayal was everywhere. The whispers of the people, the posters plastered on every street. Even if he didn’t want to believe it, he could no longer deny it.

After that, Ariona became one of the many people in turmoil. So when Adeye Lu appeared and dragged him off somewhere, he didn’t even try to resist.

But when they stepped into the thick fog, clearly the work of black magic, he realized where they were headed and began to tremble. Were they going to the cursed Kun Castle?

As expected, a high wooden fence appeared where the fog ended, and Lu opened a gate just wide enough for one person to squeeze through before pushing him inside.

“Why, why are you doing this…?”

He spoke for the first time, but Lu seemed not to hear him; he ignored him as he pressed a small lantern into his hand.

“Walk while watching the ground the lantern lights up. It’s your lifeline, so don’t let go of it.”

What was this? He only realized the lantern’s purpose when they crossed the field and neared the castle. He saw black lines, tangled like a net, rippling across the ground. And people turned to stone.

He stopped in fear, but Lu wouldn’t let him. He grabbed him and dragged him across a rickety wooden bridge.

The narrow bridge, barely wide enough for one person to cross, was unaffected by the curse, but Ariona found it terrifying. What if he fall off here? The bridge was shaking so much he couldn’t move.

“I can’t go. I can’t.”

As he shook his head, Lu looked down at him expressionlessly.

“You can’t even walk. This bridge wasn’t here from the beginning. Someone spent a long time, painstakingly building it all the way to the castle. Risking turning into a stone at any moment if he took a single wrong step. He relied solely on that single small lantern you’re holding. Who do you think that was?”

Ariona, whose mind had gone blank with fear, barely managed to shake his head before freezing in shock at the answer.

“Kun Tairok.”

He flinched. The name lodged in his mind spread red like blood spilling onto water. Lu gazed into Ariona’s trembling eyes and asked.

“What’s the way to lift the curse?”

“Th-that… I don’t know much. I can’t lift the curse with that.”

A sob escaped Ariona’s lips, but Lu shook his head.

“I’ll lift it. You just tell me what you know.”

A moment later, Ariona closed his eyes tightly and managed to say:

“The curse on Kun Castle may have been cast using a spell written in blood. For a curse this powerful, the caster would have risked their life and used all their blood to cast the curse. And they would have done so over a very long period of time. The problem is that since the caster was a dark mage, the standard method of breaking the curse can only be used once.”

“What’s the standard method?”

“You just have to find the spell and read it.”

What? Is it that simple? But there must be a reason why no one had tried it yet. And as expected, Ariona’s explanation didn’t sound easy.

“But spells written in blood are invisible to the human eye. That’s why Lord Hoiga went to great lengths to find a way to see the spell.”

“What’s that method?”

“You cover the spot where the spell was written with the blood of the sacred land.”

One obstacle after another. But no matter how high the mountain, you just have to climb it and get over it.

“What exactly is the blood of the sacred land?”

“I heard it’s some kind of plant. I don’t know the details myself…”

Wait, how many kinds of plants are there in the world? How was he supposed to figure it out if it didn’t even have a specific name? Should he wake Hoiga up no matter what and ask him? Lu was racking his brain.

“I only heard that it’s a poisonous plant and that Lord Hoiga had a hard time obtaining it.”

Huh? A poisonous plant?!