The Young Fairy's Vow
The Young Fairy's Vow
The storm had passed.
The dormitory, once filled with wailing and screams, was now steeped in a hush of desolate silence.
"What was... that, just now?"
Atra swept her hair back. The sticky jealousy that had surged within her was completely incinerated by what had just occurred.
The moment had been so intense, so visceral, that nothing else remained.
Everyone in the bedroom understood what she meant.
Though it was now crowded with people of vibrantly colored hair, the bedroom was spacious enough to accommodate them all.
Their gazes were fixed on the bed.
There lay Lee Ha-yul, sleeping soundly as if nothing had happened, and Lee Seo-yul, who had cried her heart out before falling fast asleep while hugging him tightly.
To call it "sleeping" might be a misnomer.
After all, one doesn't usually call the state of losing consciousness after bleeding profusely from the entire body "sleep."
"Well... Could it be a constraint?"
Liana replied. Her complexion was utterly haggard from the storm that had swept through.
"Cadet Lee Ha-yul was clearly trying to convey something, wasn't he? But right before he could, he suddenly stopped, his body shuddered as if convulsing, he vomited blood... Couldn't that be a backlash from breaking a constraint?"
"A constraint? Who would ever place a constraint with such a severe backlash? And more importantly, there's no way the person under the constraint wouldn't know the conditions."
Liana and Atra had gained considerable experience while active on the frontlines of the African Demon Realm. Among those experiences, they had seen—though rarely—individuals bound by constraints.
That was why Atra countered.
Establishing a constraint is exceedingly difficult in the first place, and a constraint this powerful is not just rare—it's practically unseen.
The scene remained all too vivid.
The blood that had poured from his seven orifices as if reversing flow.
The bloody foam around his mouth, and with each cough, the unrecognizable, pulped chunks of flesh that spurted out.
The way the circuits throughout his body twisted and shattered as if entirely torn apart, his body trembling as if in a seizure...
'......'
Just the memory alone gave Atra a headache fierce enough to nearly make her pass out...
What sort of process would it take for a constraint of that magnitude to be established? And Lee Ha-yul, not knowing the conditions, had tried to reveal the secret outright and ended up on death's doorstep.
More than anything...
"Simultaneously with the backlash, he recovered... no, he regenerated at an incredible speed, didn't he?"
"It's not even a case of giving medicine and then making you sick... What the hell is this madness."
The backlash from the constraint had turned him into a bloody mess, and then suddenly, as if time was rewinding, his wounds regenerated.
They had checked him several times, and his physical condition was perfectly fine.
The backlash that befalls one who violates the conditions of a constraint.
Usually, it maims the violator or leads them to death.
But to inflict immense pain and then restore them back to health?
Death by shock from the pain? If they were going to expend those resources, they would be better off just killing him.
"...It's not even certain that it's a constraint in the first place. All that happened was he suddenly vomited blood and lost consciousness..."
"Honestly..."
No one knew the exact reason. Everyone's faces grew somber.
Everyone here knew that Lee Ha-yul had his own secrets to some extent, but they had never imagined that just trying to get him to reveal a little would result in this state.
Hong Yeon-hwa was burning up inside. She couldn't help but feel as if it were her fault that Lee Ha-yul had ended up in this state.
She had questioned him a bit about his secrets before, and she was guilt-ridden, afraid that he might have taken it to heart and that this had happened because of her.
Ellia, standing beside her, was similarly consumed by guilt.
The image was seared into her mind—Lee Ha-yul retching up what looked like bits of his organs, blood gushing out. Even as she poured healing and regeneration into him with her unique ability, the bleeding wouldn't stop. The memory of his skin growing cold and his shallow, labored breathing made her own face go deathly pale.
"Could it be a curse?"
All eyes turned toward the voice that broke through the silence.
And faces hardened at the ominous ring of the word "curse."
Hair like flowing water, straight down to her waist, and deep blue eyes.
Baek A-rin, who had been silently lost in thought, shrugged her shoulders under the weight of their hardened stares.
"The condition is established, but the person involved doesn't know it. There are many curses of that sort, aren't there?"
"Considering the subject doesn't know the condition, indeed, it could be a curse." Liana nodded. "But can a curse be accompanied by such a backlash and an establishment condition? There wouldn't be enough output for that, would there?"
"I imagine it would be possible if meticulous preparation in advance were combined with a sacrificial ritual. Moreover, judging by how the backlash is powerful but not lethal, it might have been established by tacking on non-lethal and regeneration conditions on top of it all."
Liana and Baek A-rin led the conversation.
The others, lacking the expertise to join in, simply listened intently.
The conversation flowed smoothly, and Liana's eyes widened.
Baek A-rin's knowledge regarding curses exceeded her expectations.
Astonishingly, Baek A-rin was several levels above her in knowledge about curses.
She accurately grasped the principles by which curses were established and operated—knowledge that even Liana wasn't entirely familiar with.
"A curse, you say... That's such a minor field that most just learn countermeasures and move on, but you're remarkably knowledgeable about it?"
"Ahh... Well, it never hurts to learn something."
In response to Liana's question, Baek A-rin offered an ambiguous smile and twirled a strand of hair around her finger.
"I also had a personal interest in it."
* * *
Occasionally, humans ponder the reason for their birth.
Why was I born, or what must I accomplish going forward.
For the most part, there is no reason for a human being to be born.
There is no special background to their birth, and it is rare to be born for the purpose of necessarily achieving something.
Usually, humans are not born with a purpose. Nor are they born to be used.
A sword is made to cut and stab things, but a human is not fixed in their utility.
"Huu..."
But Lee Seo-yul was different.
Tears clung thickly to the corners of her eyes. She was overwhelmed with emotion.
A whirlwind of feelings, which the young Seo-yul could not yet dare to define, swept through her.
If they had something in common, it was that they were all negative emotions.
They were utterly distant from happiness and joy.
That night, which had grown dark.
Lee Seo-yul, awakened from sleep feeling the sorrows of the world, turned her head and urgently searched for Lee Ha-yul.
He wasn't there.
Lee Ha-yul was sleeping on the opposite side of Lee Seo-yul, pressed right up against Ellia.
Using Ellia's arm as a pillow, his face was buried against her chest as he breathed evenly.
"Hmm..."
Lee Seo-yul fluttered her wings.
Avoiding Ellia's touch, she settled into the gap between Ellia and Lee Ha-yul. Worming her way in, she clung to Lee Ha-yul's embrace.
Though his body was smaller than before, now smaller than her own, Lee Seo-yul paid no mind and buried her face firmly into Lee Ha-yul's chest.
The sense of reassurance and warmth she felt from him.
The blonde human—Ellia—had a cozy embrace, too, but she was far happier here, as expected.
Several months ago—perhaps even calling it "past" is too generous.
Lee Seo-yul had been fixed in the form of an egg, unhatched, waiting in a hazy consciousness for the master who would someday hatch her.
She didn't know how much time had passed.
Her dim consciousness and instinct merely awaited the moment of hatching.
A stimulus arose.
It was the presence of a master trying to awaken her.
At that time, Lee Seo-yul was certain.
She didn't give it much thought.
There was a small joy in finally hatching, but no great elation.
Even before her birth, she understood the entity known as a Fairy Knight.
She was a shield and a sword, a spear and armor, made to protect her sovereign.
A tool devised and born solely for the protection of the sovereign, spending its life with a single, absolute priority.
The path she would live was already decided.
While the previous Fairy Knight guarded the sovereign, she would rapidly grow into an adult.
During that time, she would acquire combat techniques and the knowledge necessary to protect the sovereign entity.
Once an adult, she would remain by the sovereign's side for life and fulfill her role as a tool.
While thinking this, she felt a touch gently brushing the surface of the egg.
The careful touch, as if handling something extremely delicate, and the warm, cozy emotional waves transmitted through it, shook Lee Seo-yul's mind.
To the Fairy Knight who hadn't even been born yet.
To Lee Seo-yul, who had established her cold ego solely through embedded knowledge without ever experiencing the world, it was an overwhelmingly intense... and soft wave of emotion.
'This is... my sovereign...?'
This was different from the sovereign Seo-yul had imagined.
Contrary to the expectation that she would be cold and stern to lead the species, the act of cradling the egg was warm and gentle.
Holding it in her arms, the wave of protective emotion, as if worried it might get hurt, was so very tender.
- Should I have just a bite?
The bright red human—a woman made of flames—had tried to eat her.
- Just a little taste. It's so big, what's there to worry about? Hmm? How about it?
They were not empty words. The fairy's innate sensitivity detected the sincerity in the red woman's words.
The red woman truly intended to break the egg's shell and eat Lee Seo-yul, who had yet to hatch.
- That's true. Honestly, Ha-yul, aren't you also curious about the taste? If we get something weird from this lucky draw, it's a loss. From the sound of tapping it, there seems to be something inside. Let's cook it and eat.
Next to her was the blonde woman. Despite an instinctive sense of familiarity, the words she spoke were utterly bloodcurdling.
Of course, the blonde woman was closer to joking, but it wasn't entirely insincere.
Break the egg, take out the contents, and grill it on a pan—she'd put it on the pan; slowly roast and roll the contents; cook the whole egg on the fire and eat it; it's so big, it'll surely fill us up...
At each voice suggesting her own horrific end, Lee Seo-yul could only tremble in fear inside the egg.
The one who protected Lee Seo-yul from such threats was her sovereign.
With a body small and frail compared to the other two humans, he held the egg tightly in his arms and desperately protected her from the threat.
After her birth.
Though she was too young and weak to protect her sovereign, Lee Ha-yul didn't mind one bit and looked after Lee Seo-yul, showing her boundless affection.
He gave her a name and dressed her in soft clothes. He held her close so she wouldn't shiver from the cold, and fed her warm food for fear she might be hungry.
At night, he held her in his arms and patted her until she fell asleep, and whenever she opened her eyes, he welcomed Lee Seo-yul with a smile.
It was a deeply moving and happy thing, but she also felt a profound powerlessness.
Before she was a young child, she was a Fairy Knight.
A Fairy Knight, meant to protect her sovereign, was being protected by her sovereign?
The Fairy Knight's instinct rebelled. A Fairy Knight born with a mission should not be like this.
Where had the previous Fairy Knights gone? Why was the sovereign being persecuted alone? Where had the other kin gone?
These were not matters for a Fairy Knight to worry about.
Lee Seo-yul was a 'Fairy Knight,' devised and born to protect the sovereign entity.
She had a purpose.
There was a reason for her birth, an objective she had to achieve in her lifetime.
The protection of the sovereign.
That was the sole objective a Fairy Knight had to fulfill.
"Daddy..."
But for a young Fairy Knight who hadn't even lived a fraction of a year since hatching, reality was far too cold.
Lee Seo-yul was a young entity, yet to become an adult, and her sovereign was still exposed to threats, fighting a solitary battle.
Contrary to her resolve to fulfill her mission, Lee Ha-yul repeatedly hovered between life and death, collapsing over and over.
As time passed, Lee Ha-yul's vitality grew fainter.
Lee Seo-yul was not by his side then, and there was nothing she could do.
It was the same now.
Even when Lee Ha-yul vomited blood and collapsed right in front of her, there was absolutely nothing Seo-yul could do.
Even though she should have thrown herself as a human shield to protect her sovereign, she couldn't even do that.
Unable to hold back her surging emotions, Lee Seo-yul rubbed her face against Lee Ha-yul's back, clinging to him like a child.
'This can't go on.'
Lee Seo-yul bit her lip.
There were many excuses she could make, but the harsh world would not understand them.
'Quickly...'
She had to grow.
A Fairy Knight is an entity among fairies that grows exceptionally fast. This is because she must reach adulthood as quickly as possible to be used in combat.
But even that time felt precious.
There was no room to dawdle.
Lee Seo-yul pulled out the information recorded in her mind, one piece after another. She sifted through it and isolated the necessary information.
Lee Seo-yul gave a small flutter of her wings.
Wings are a mark of a fairy's racial distinctiveness and innate talent.
They aren't simply beautiful, eye-catching features; they perform a variety of functions.
Lee Seo-yul subtly shifted her gaze.
The blue cloth floating softly in the air... it was the Sky Wing Feather, an artifact owned by Lee Ha-yul.
It was also Lee Ha-yul's wings.
Lee Seo-yul gently extended her wings and touched them to Lee Ha-yul's wings.
Her wings trembled slightly. Soon, 'information' began to trickle in through Lee Ha-yul's wings.
'Faster...'
She rapidly absorbed the information needed to become an adult.
This happened two days before the second semester began.
* * *
[Assimilating with Fairy Knight 'Lee Seo-yul']
[The Fairy Knight's growth is accelerating]
...
[Player Correction System: Measurement]
...
｢Beauty's?｣ : ?
｢Fairy?｣ : ?
｢Mental Damage｣ : Severe psychological damage.
｢Incomplete｣ : Fragmented and not whole.
｢Life Force Depletion｣ : Life force has run out and is gone.
...
[The ｢Curse of Solitude｣ activates]
[｢Curse of Solitude｣: Pain cannot be shared]
[The ｢Curse of Silence｣ activates]
[｢Curse of Silence｣: Help cannot be sought]