Chapter 21
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Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 21
Chapter Title: A Brush with Death
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The Tauron's massive spear shot forward, drawing a straight line toward Rireu's slender neck.
The creature's enormous arm, gripping the deeply rusted spear, was covered in hideous burn scars.
Even as its life hung by a thread, the monster followed its instinct for slaughter, stomping its hooves and swinging its arm.
To Rireu, who was moments from death, everything but herself seemed to move in slow motion.
A raindrop fell before her eyes. As it refracted the light, the Tauron's massive spear seemed all the more menacing.
The Tauron's monstrous roar traveled through the humid air, vibrating through her frail body. In the corner of her vision, she caught a glimpse of her master hastily gathering electricity at his fingertips.
A torrent of emotions flooded the young elf's heart as her life flashed before her eyes.
It was a pointless, unfair death.
But this was what a battlefield was.
A place where a single moment of carelessness could drag a genius down to hell.
Just as the fear of death belatedly traced its fingers down her spine.
*Click!*
The sound of machinery locking into place settled over the chaotic battlefield.
*Flash!*
A crimson light momentarily filled her vision. It appeared for an instant, then vanished, leaving only a faint afterimage seared into her eyes.
Immediately after, the Tauron's body was engulfed in the crimson light, and the spear that had been flying toward her neck was sent soaring high into the sky.
"..."
Rireu stared blankly at the Tauron's corpse.
The upper body of the Tauron, which had been charging her with the last of its strength, had completely vanished.
Having lost its brain and heart, the Tauron's lower body went limp, its bulging muscles slackening as it lost its balance and staggered.
*Thud!*
With the sound of the rust-and-blood-caked spear tip hitting the ground, time returned to its normal speed for her.
Unable to overcome its inertia, the Tauron's lower half, which had been charging with a ghastly clatter of hooves, brushed past her robes and began to tumble across the ground.
"Uh, ah..."
Rireu belatedly looked at the creature's lower body, which had fallen behind her.
Covered in mud, the monster's lower half twitched and trembled with rigor mortis.
"Are you all right!"
The voices of the platoon leader and the soldiers finally registered in Rireu's dazed mind.
Her body went weak, and she sank to the ground, collapsing into the muddy water without realizing it.
Her robes were instantly soaked black, and her wide-brimmed hat slipped down. Her blonde hair grew damp and heavy with rain.
"Huu..."
She was alive.
Sensation returned to her numb hands and feet, and the fear of death that had filled her mind was replaced by the euphoria of survival.
Adrenaline flooded her system.
Her hands and feet trembled, her knees went weak... She belatedly gasped for breath.
The young elf's large eyes began to well with tears. Fortunately, with the rain falling, no one would notice.
"Everyone, you let your guard down, didn't you?"
"...That."
Bin.
The frail boy's cold voice cut through the sound of the rain and settled over the battlefield.
She looked up at the white-haired boy. His face was etched with disappointment and anger.
"Our line of sight was obstructed by the trees, and it was raining! Did you really think a single 'Bolt' could wipe out that entire horde of Taurons? Did you truly not consider that even one might have survived!"
Alter Haindel's furious voice then echoed all around. The fact that his most cherished disciple, whom he had raised with such care, had nearly lost her life so senselessly due to a moment of carelessness was enough to enrage even a sage who had grown placid over long years.
"Let's get you up first."
Standing beside the shouting Alter, the boy quietly pulled on Rireu's arm.
She was still reeling from the adrenaline coursing through her, unable to properly grasp the situation.
She dazedly took the boy's hand and stood up, but her legs immediately gave out, and she collapsed to the ground again.
"...Was it you who saved me, Sir Bin?"
Rireu asked, looking up at the boy from where she sat on the ground.
From the small crystal floating above the boy's shoulder, she could faintly hear the same mechanical clicking she had heard before.
"And you, Rireu! Didn't I stress to you that the battlefield is a dangerous place and you must never let your guard down, no matter what! What is the meaning of this! Don't make me regret bringing you here!"
Before the boy could answer Rireu's question, Alter's fiery reprimand fell upon her.
"..."
The young elf flinched, biting her lip hard. Her grip on the boy's hand tightened unconsciously, and she felt something welling up inside her.
*Oh, no.*
The tears she had been holding back finally began to fall. She had just escaped the terror of death, and now, being scolded by her master, she couldn't control her emotions.
Her emotions swung wildly, shaking her to the core. Having never experienced anything like this before, she didn't know how to manage the massive emotional vortex and couldn't say a word.
If she dared to open her mouth now, she knew only an unsightly sob would escape.
"..."
The white-haired boy with the cold face and deep, dark circles under his eyes gently placed the wide-brimmed hat he was wearing onto Rireu's head.
The pitch-black hat didn't particularly suit her fair skin and blonde hair, but this was hardly the time to worry about such things.
The boy quietly picked up Rireu's blue hat, which had flown off when she fell, and brushed off the mud as he spoke softly.
"People die on the battlefield. Don't let your guard down."
"This is insane... I can't believe it."
After seeing the boy tending to his disciple, Alter began to walk toward the center of the battlefield.
"Aren't you all elite soldiers? You must have at least four years of military experience, and surely you are all veterans with plenty of combat experience!"
The white-haired boy quietly watched Alter as he raised his voice and shouted at the surrounding soldiers.
"Mages and soldiers have a symbiotic relationship! Mages eliminate the enemy with magic, and soldiers use their physical abilities and combat experience to protect the mages from all manner of threats! Are those not our respective roles?"
The old man's voice cut through the rain and struck deep into the soldiers' hearts. The more he shouted, the more his voice became a metallic rasp, but no one dared to point it out or mock him.
"..."
The white-haired boy, Bin, couldn't take his eyes off Alter as he berated the soldiers under his command.
Surviving on the battlefield, and furthermore, achieving victory, was not something one could do by simply being strong alone.
One had to know how to encourage subordinates and comrades, and when they made mistakes, one had to reprimand them sharply to ensure they would never repeat the same error.
"...How disappointing."
The boy said, watching Alter's back.
Of course, he wasn't disappointed in Alter, nor was he disappointed in the soldiers who had made the mistake.
He was disappointed that he, the one who held the title of General, was not the one standing there, reprimanding his subordinates.
"We're sorry!"
As if they had heard Bin's quiet remark even amidst the downpour, the soldiers bowed their heads in unison and apologized.
"Whatever. It's fine."
The boy replied curtly to their apologies with a cold expression, then once again helped Rireu up from the muddy ground.
"Let's go."
She managed to stand on trembling legs. The boy's arms had almost no strength and were barely enough to help her balance, but even that small bit of support was a great help to Rireu right now.
Clinging to Bin's hand, Rireu dragged her shaky legs and finally made it inside the temporary barracks.
*Whirrr.*
As the boy stepped inside, the sound of machinery locking into place was heard again.
And then, as if its job was done, the crystal split into countless shards and sank into the boy's chest.
Seeing that, Rireu was certain. She had been saved with that strange mechanical sound; her savior was none other than Bin.
"Sir Bin, it really was you who saved me... right?"
"Well, first, please calm down. Would you like some of the bread left over from earlier?"
Bin spoke as if he were soothing a crying child.
"Than— *hic*... Thank you..."
...In the end, her tears burst forth, and her tongue began to trip over her words. Rireu was mortified to be showing such an unsightly side of herself.
*How could she ever repay the boy who saved her life?* The young elf couldn't find the answer to that question on her own.
"Is this Rireu's first time on a battlefield?"
Bin asked Alter, who had followed them into the barracks, as he roughly wiped the mud and rainwater from Rireu's robes with a handkerchief.
"She entered the Mage Tower when she was four and has spent her entire life training there... This is her first time even being out in the world, let alone on a battlefield."
"Then shouldn't you have been more careful? Rireu can be excused for making a mistake since it's her first time, but you, Sir Alter, are certainly not ignorant of what a battlefield is like."
"To be honest, I never expected something like this to happen. In the past... when the two of us went out to hunt monsters that appeared near our tower, she handled herself well enough that I thought there would be no problem... If Rireu has been a burden to the expedition, I apologize."
Alter apologized to Bin in a hoarse voice. The boy shook his head as if to say that wasn't his intention.
"I's not that she was a burden. Everyone has a first time... She just needs to build up her battlefield experience bit by bit. In an age where people die every day, what use is a mage who can't even protect themselves?"
Bin set the muddy handkerchief on the floor and took out a clean one to wipe the tears and raindrops from Rireu's face.
"It's just that... I don't particularly like seeing people die, so we should have been more careful, something like that..."
The moment the boy's slender fingers and the soft handkerchief had nearly finished wiping the moisture from the elf's cheeks, his vision suddenly lurched violently.
"Uwaah... Thank you! Thank you, really...! I was so scared..."
Rireu, rendering Bin's efforts to wipe her tears meaningless... burst into fresh tears and threw herself at him.
The hat Bin had placed on her head was knocked off, revealing her blonde hair, matted with mud and rain.
The boy's body, which boasted a Strength of 1, lacked the power to withstand the elf's sudden charge.
Bin fell to the barracks floor with Rireu on top of him, a sigh escaping his strained throat.
The young elf still hadn't figured out a way to repay her debt to the boy. For now, all she could do was repeat her endless thanks to the white-haired boy.
"I'm sorry, I was a burden, wasn't I! But still, thank—thank you...!"
The socially awkward elf repeated the same words over and over again.
Then she buried her face in Bin's chest and continued to pour out her tears. At her childlike behavior, Bin sighed and managed to force out a single sentence.
"...You're heavy."
The boy tried to gently push the elf off his chest, where she was making it difficult for him to breathe.
But she didn't budge.
For a boy with such catastrophic strength that his fingers trembled just from lifting a full teacup when he was tired, moving a woman's body—no matter how slender—off of him was a near-impossible task.
Because of this, Bin quickly gave up on trying to move her and instead used his frail hands to gently brush the dirt and water from her hair.
It took a full two hours for Rireu's crying to subside and for the storm of her emotions to calm.
"...I'm sorry."
Having finally come to her senses, Rireu knelt and apologized to Bin.
"Let's just get some sleep. What is all this... We have a schedule tomorrow."
Bin spoke in a tired, listless voice, then clutched his ribs as he lay down on the floor of the temporary barracks to get some sleep.
Unlike Bin and Alter, who fell asleep almost instantly, Rireu had to spend the night wide awake.
...After all, what she had done was far too embarrassing.