Snake (2)
"Kh— uwaaah! I'm sorry, Canisia! I... I killed the Blood Axe King! I'm the one who killed him!"
"Don't say that, you idiot! That wasn't your fault!"
"I couldn't save the Blood Axe King! I killed him!"
"Hic... Alan..."
Heh heh heh! God, I might actually lose it.
This foolish woman. I was telling her the truth and she still refused to believe me. I killed the Blood Axe King. How many times did I have to say it?
Canisia was actually tearing up and trying to comfort me over a confession that I had murdered him, and I came this close to bursting out laughing. I had to sob even harder just to keep her from catching the grin on my face.
The Blood Axe King is dead. I've planted the reason she needs to follow me. Canisia is mine now.
She would never know how much thought I had poured into this, how carefully I had written every beat of this little play. She would never know I had ordered Aquaril to carve those wounds into my own body just to sell the lie.
"Hic... Master..."
Aquaril was not crying because the Blood Axe King was dead. She was crying from the guilt of having cut me open with her own hands.
I felt bad for her — I really did — but it had been necessary. Walk out of a dungeon crawling with enemies without a scratch on you, and someone like Canisia starts asking questions.
Molt — Lv.2 / Mythic
Resurrection complete. All wounds healed. Stamina fully restored. All debuffs cleared.
Thanks to that skill, the body I had come back in was fresh as a daisy. Not a scratch left, and my stamina had been topped off completely.
Tch... still hurts like a bitch, though.
Even with a Durability stat sitting at forty-six points, getting opened up by a blade hurt just the same. You would think it would at least sting a little less.
"Kh... kkh...!"
Hey. Don't do that. Don't look at her like that.
Aquaril was glaring at Canisia with eyes gone red as a rabbit's. She knew I had died once and then deliberately had myself carved up, all for the sake of winning Canisia over. She knew Canisia was the root of everything that had happened today, and the quiet fury in that stare was only natural.
The silver lining was that she was not dumping any of it out in the open. Canisia was too busy comforting my tearful, truth-spilling self to notice a thing.
Alright. Time to move this along.
"...Canisia."
"Yeah, Alan?"
"...I don't think I can take you with me after all. What I said earlier about coming along... just forget it."
"What? What is that supposed to mean?"
"You saw it yourself. The Blood Axe King was a far stronger Master than I am, and even he couldn't dodge their blades. If you follow me after those people... you'll be in danger too. And if that happens... I, I couldn't take it."
You're going to follow me anyway, right? Yeah? You're going to follow me.
"....."
"So... let's just go our separate ways here."
"....."
Why the hell isn't she saying anything? This is making me nervous. Come on, answer! Tell me you'll follow me for the rest of your life!
The silence was starting to rattle me. She was not actually going to walk away... was she?
"...You moron."
"Ah..."
She had just called me a moron, and I was delighted. Why else would she suddenly call me that?
"There's no way I'd ever leave you."
"Canisia..."
That's my girl! Hell yes! I knew I could count on you!
How often do you find someone willing to throw their life away for another person when they are not even a fairy? Plenty of people will say they would die for you. The ones who actually mean it are vanishingly rare.
Canisia was one of those rare few. That was exactly why I had put on this entire performance.
"And those bastards... I will never forgive them. I am going to make them pay for today."
She was even baring her hatred at Palos's Bird. Canisia was everything I had wanted in a recruit, down to the last detail.
Landing her was a completely different animal from summoning one more fairy. Summon a fairy and you have added another mouth that needs looking after. Land Canisia and you pick up two combat assets on the spot.
On top of that, Canisia was a Master. She could summon fairies, same as me. Her conditions for doing so were a lot pickier than mine — I could pull as many as I wanted so long as I had the gems — but still.
Either way, with Canisia on board, our fighting strength had shot up overnight.
"Canisia."
"Yeah?"
"I'm going to build an organization."
"An organization?"
"Yeah. You already know this, but the two of us don't have enough to bring Palos's Bird down. We need more. A lot more. Masters and fairies strong enough to stand on their level. And if we want to pull people like that together, we need something that can bind us into one."
"An organization, huh... Yeah. That's not a bad idea. So what's it called?"
"The name of the organization..."
I had already decided on it. I gave her the name I had been sitting on.
"Snake?"
"Yeah. We'll hide in the brush like a snake, and when the moment comes, we'll cut their throats in a single strike."
"Snake, huh... Not bad. But Alan."
"Yeah?"
"Don't birds eat snakes?"
"....."
She said it playfully. She had put her grief for her dead friend in order with startling speed — probably because she now had a target for her revenge. I could feel it in her. She was hoarding even the tears she might have shed for the Blood Axe King, saving every last drop to pour out on Palos's Bird.
"...Just let it go."
"Heheh. Fine. We'll... we'll let it slide for now."
She nodded, then lifted the Blood Axe King's ruined corpse into her arms, her face drawn and dark.
"Let's go back."
"Yeah."
We returned to Chinnimoni.
It had been a long day.
Once we were back in Chinnimoni, Canisia and I split up. I headed for the hotel I had been staying at. She headed for the palace. The chaos that was about to hit the city needed someone on the ground before it arrived, and she intended to be that someone.
I had offered to go with her and help, but she turned me down. I had been through enough, she said. I should get some rest. I did not argue. I did not say it out loud, but I was exhausted.
What's going to happen to this place now?
On the way back we had run into soldiers still marching toward the dungeon — the ones Canisia had brought along who had fallen behind when their stamina gave out. Not a single one of them missed the corpse in her arms. Through those soldiers' mouths, the news that the Blood Axe King was dead was already spreading like wildfire.
Chinnimoni was about to come apart at the seams.
"Not my problem."
I was going to stay a few more days, wring this city for everything it was worth, and then move on to the city that served as the setting for Chapter 4.
Part of me wanted to put down roots here and start building a real power base. Unfortunately, that was not an option.
The biggest weapon I had was the fact that I already knew the major events this world was heading toward — the scenario of Fairy Masters. Sink myself into Chinnimoni and I would not be able to put my hands on any of it.
I have to stay a wanderer through Chapter 8.
Clear the incident in the city that serves as Chapter 8's setting, and that city becomes yours. From that point on, the player is officially called one thing.
"Anyway... what am I supposed to do about this?"
Chinnimoni was not what mattered right now.
"She seems pretty upset."
Aquaril was. The moment we got back to the hotel she had gone into her room without a word and stayed there. Not even a you did well today, Master. Hard to believe that was a fairy's behavior.
"I did give her some brutal orders, to be fair."
Watch your Master die. Then take a blade to your Master's body. For a fairy, that was as close to torture as it got. She had done all of it because I had forced her to.
"Nothing for it, then. After everything she went through today, her Master is going to wait on her hand and foot."
I knocked before I went in. I am a Master with manners. Barging into a lady's room unannounced is simply not done.
"Aquaril. May I come in?"
"P-please wait just a moment, Master!"
Her voice came through the door in a rush, thick with tears. So she had locked herself in here to cry it out.
"I'm coming in."
"N-not right now!"
"Coming in anyway!"
"Ah— don't!"
I pushed the door open. She must have dove under the covers the instant she heard me, because the blanket was peaked in a suspicious little mound.
She really did cry.
The pillow was soaked through.
"Aquaril."
"Y-yes... Master..."
I climbed onto the bed, pulled her into my arms blanket and all, and spoke against her hair. The way she still answered me from under there was so cute I nearly laughed.
I slipped a hand beneath the covers and stroked her head. She flinched at the first touch, then went soft, the tension draining out of her as if my hand was exactly what she had needed.
"Today was hard on you, wasn't it? I'm sorry I asked that of you."
"Master..."
Maybe she heard the real thing in the apology. Aquaril poked her head out from under the blanket, then shook it.
"It is not, Master. If anything, I should apologize for being so childish. You must have suffered far more than I did..."
She was not wrong. If we were keeping score, I had had the worst day of anyone here.
I am terrified of dying. But I thought about everything I stood to gain, and I crushed that fear down until it stopped moving. I surprised even myself. I had not known I was that stubborn.
"This kind of thing won't happen again... hah. Who am I kidding. I can't promise that. If I ever end up in another situation where dying is the only way to take everything... I'll sacrifice myself again. And I'll come to you with the same request I made today."
"Master..."
"But Aquaril. Watching you die in my place would hurt me more. It would be so much worse."
"....."
"I may not have been the one who summoned you, but you are my fairy. No one else's. You look only at me. You stay only at my side. You are mine. If Hwaryongwang crawled back out of hell and demanded I return you, I would never give you up. Because you are my fairy."
"...I feel the same. I am Master's fairy, and I have no intention of returning to Hwaryongwang. I would take my own life first."
"Really? That makes me happy."
"Master..."
I smiled, and Aquaril smiled with me. I kept stroking her hair, and after a while it was she who spoke first.
"Master."
"Yeah."
"If something like today happens again, I will die in your place. So please... do not throw your life away like that anymore. Do not give me such a cruel order as to stand there and watch you die. I beg you."
"Mm... no."
"M-Master?"
"I already told you. You are far too precious to me. I would rather die than watch you go. Next time I'll be the one who dies. The time after that, too. It'll keep being me."
"But that's—!"
"If you die, I can't just meet you again on the spot."
"Ah..."
"You saw it, didn't you? Even if I die, I can come back right there, right then. You can't. If I get lucky, maybe I find you again quickly. And if I don't? How long am I supposed to spend missing you?"
"....."
"So let me be the one who dies. Not as a Master and his fairy. As a man and a woman. Let me die in your place."
"...Hic! Hh— Master..."
Aquaril stared at me, dazed, and then the tears came. She threw the blanket off entirely and pulled me into her arms.
"Thank you, Master. Thank you for cherishing me. Thank you for loving me. Thank you... for making me your fairy."
"Aquaril..."
"Master..."
I lowered my head. Aquaril closed her eyes.
I kissed my beautiful, beloved fairy.