Chapter 116
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 116
There was something beyond that wall. The earthworms? No.
Her unfocused eyes trembled.
There was definitely someone else pressed flat against the stone, just as she was.
Why would they be here, pressed so close to the wall?
They were trying to ‘feel’ the march of the Wolves, which moved like a single living organism. They were doing the same thing she was—reaching out to sense what lay beyond.
It was a heart-stopping moment. A strange draft, as if from a crack in the cave, brushed past her cheek.
“……”
A chilling scent carried on the wind.
That scent instantly solidified the doubts that had been swirling in her mind. Realization flashed like lightning.
Seo-ah immediately twisted her body to escape Abel’s embrace. Startled by the sudden movement from the woman who had been resting quietly in his arms, Abel lost his grip on her.
“……!”
“Hey, hold onto her properly!”
“Grab her!”
The Backup Team running alongside them grumbled at her bizarre behavior, so different from how quiet she had been just moments before. Simon, running ahead, was no different. He stopped so abruptly it was as if his previous speed had been an illusion. He spun around, his eyes flashing like a demon’s.
It’s not like we can just abandon her!
Wondering what on earth she was doing, he saw the strange woman pressed against the wall yet again.
“……”
If you're going to go crazy, at least do it quietly. No, wait, she can't go crazy.
Just as Simon, his irritation reaching its peak, was about to snap at Abel for failing to handle a single woman—
The woman, her cheek pressed flat against the wall, looked back at the Wolves leading the pack.
She was so deathly pale that even Simon was struck speechless. Ashen as a ghost, Seo-ah opened her mouth wide toward them, but her lips only moved soundlessly, as if her voice had failed her.
“What is she saying?” Simon muttered fiercely.
The woman, who had been mouthing silent words, took a step or two forward and then suddenly broke into a run. Belying her previous strange behavior—slowing down the group and acting as if she were having a panic attack—she dashed forward, her eyes fixed clearly ahead.
More precisely, toward Oscar.
Seo-ah sprinted toward him.
The scent of slaughter undoubtedly drifted on the wind, along with the faint smell of gunpowder.
It was the very smell that had swallowed Hoyeonjae.
If this was the work of her father, the one who had raided Hoyeonjae, then their target was clear.
That man.
Oscar’s eyes narrowed. He stared blankly at her as she ran toward him, pale as death. The moment their eyes met, the blockage in Seo-ah’s throat finally broke.
“Get away!”
Neither Oscar nor any of the Wolves understood why Seo-ah was running like the wind. They merely watched with bewildered eyes as the woman darted swiftly through their ranks.
“...Your Excellency!”
Sprinting desperately, Seo-ah reached out toward Oscar. She threw her arms around the man, who stood frozen, staring at her.
Oscar looked down with wide eyes at the woman who had suddenly lunged into his arms. Her long braided hair and ribbon fluttered in the air. The sheer force with which she clung to him felt utterly unfamiliar.
And so, uncharacteristically, his thoughts ground to a halt. It happened at a critical moment when every single second demanded his mind be as sharp as a freshly honed blade.
Seo-ah tried to use the momentum of her desperate run to push Oscar down, but he was like a massive tree. Far from falling, he didn’t even wobble. He merely took a single step back.
Seo-ah gritted her teeth. She quickly released her embrace, moved behind him, and shoved with all her might.
“……”
“You can’t go any further… You have to stop…”
The Wolves watched in a daze as the woman who had just embraced their master now tried to push him from behind. Their master, of course, did not budge.
Oscar, finally breaking from his stupor, turned to face Seo-ah. Panicked, she immediately began pushing against his chest. There was no way he would be moved, nor did he have any intention of letting himself be.
Oscar grabbed Seo-ah’s shoulders and spoke firmly.
“Look at me.”
“Please, please…”
Oscar cupped her cheeks and tilted her face up. Despite the thick darkness, he could tell that her eyes were unfocused again. Her mind was somewhere else entirely.
“Snap out of it and look at me!”
He shouted so fiercely that even the Wolves flinched, but Seo-ah didn’t react.
The Wolves who had been scouting ahead returned.
“Your Excellency, time is…”
But Oscar didn’t even spare them a glance. He only held on to the woman who seemed to have lost her mind.
Seo-ah couldn’t snap out of it. To be more precise, her mind was not here.
With a sense of crisis rising in her throat, the flow of mana around her felt as vivid as if her eyes had been pried open. The presence beyond the wall had reached the exact spot where they stood. It paused, as if doing something, then hurried away as if fleeing.
“...Get away.”
The bastards who used gunpowder always moved exactly like that. Once they lit the fuse and ran, what followed was an explosion.
“Please…”
“Han Seo-ah!”
Seo-ah shoved the man who was cupping her cheeks and roaring her name.
Her unfocused eyes suddenly grew sharp. A voice louder than the man’s roar burst from her throat.
“I said, get away!”
Her cry swept over Oscar and the Wolves.
It was in that moment, as Oscar sensed the despair in her now-clear gaze, that he loosened his grip on her. Her small hands pushed him with all her might.
Oscar, who hadn’t budged even when she’d slammed into him with the full force of her run, was comically pushed back by this final, desperate struggle. It was only a few steps, but…
Boom!
It felt as if the world had gone dark.
As if he were standing on the boundary between life and death, everything drifted distantly away.
The moment a massive, earth-shattering roar and shockwave struck the pack of Wolves, they froze with their eyes wide open.
A single powerful blast was directed not upward, but sideways. Unable to withstand the impact, the stone wall burst, shaking the wall on the opposite side.
And that single blast was only the beginning.
Boom! Boom! Crash! Boom!
The sheer intensity of the devastation unfolding before their eyes stripped away any relief they might have felt at having survived.
A chain of explosions swept right past Oscar’s face.
But as always, Oscar von Reinhardt was a lucky man. Especially when it came to survival.
The explosion didn’t touch a single strand of his hair. He had merely been pushed back a few steps.
Riiiiing—
A sharp ringing pierced his eardrums, seeming to stab right into his rattled brain.
Even the explosions bursting before his very eyes felt surreal, as if they were happening in another world.
He looked down at his empty hands, then raised his head again. Only a few remaining lanterns illuminated the empty space. In the air where the woman had just been, the thick smell of gunpowder lingered.
His thoughts temporarily paralyzed by the shock, Oscar blankly reached out into the empty air. There was nothing.
He slowly opened his mouth, but no words came out.
“……”
Oscar von Reinhardt had not been harmed in the slightest—not a single hair on his head was touched.
Only, the woman was gone.
The woman who had desperately pushed him away had been swept up in his stead.
*
Perhaps the safest place from a predator was right under its chin.
Having survived, Peter had nested right there. Watching his enemy’s movements from the closest possible distance, he had done everything in his power to kill him.
But Oscar was no easy opponent.
For countless days, Oscar had smashed the traps he set. The man was surrounded by a horde of those damn wolf bastards. Evading the eyes of Barbara, Karl, and Simon was no easy feat.
Still, he believed that one day, he would kill him.
With that conviction, he constantly plotted Oscar’s death. However, he refrained from taking action personally as much as possible. The more he moved, the more traces he would leave, risking exposure. He mostly used his subordinates or worked through Count Jerome or the King.
But this time, he had to move himself.
Not only was it a plan that could not succeed without the ability to read the flow of mana, but he also had a strange confidence that this time, he could kill Oscar once and for all.
Even the Goddess of Luck seemed to be smiling upon him instead of Oscar.
The Marquis Reinhardt’s party had entered the exact cave he wanted them to, marching at the speed he had anticipated. Furthermore, the counterattack of the earthworms, which had been a wild card, was still going well.
With every piece of luck falling perfectly into place, Peter could not contain his excitement.
“They are coming.”
The black wolf, whom he desperately wished would just die, was walking deep into the trap, completely unaware.
His blood boiled at the thought of finally killing him.
If only Oscar von Reinhardt would die quietly, he would no longer have to live this wretched life in hiding.
Besides, if he died, his vast fortune would flow to his cold-hearted mother. In preparation for that day, Peter held a fatal weakness over both the mother and daughter, Charlotte and Sabine. Nibbling away at Oscar’s fortune once it passed to them would be child’s play.
To do that, however, he needed the key to Vault No. 5555 of the Pelfe Bank. Inside that vault lay documents detailing the shameful secrets of Charlotte and the royal family. In short, it contained the leash to hold them by their throats.
“If only it weren’t for Han Hong-heon.”
He had never dreamed he would lose such a precious key in a place like that. Gritting his teeth at the thought of Han Hong-heon, who was already dead, Peter composed himself.