Grabbing the Opportunity
…Legs…
The dwarf in front of her had legs she could no longer use.
Heungmi covered her mouth, her eyes widening in shock.
“Lune-nim….”
“……”
Rune immediately understood why she couldn’t walk and sighed inwardly.
‘Getting out of the continent would be really tough right now.’
She moved the chair with wheels attached so she could sit and shift forward, and the female dwarf stepped out.
Click.
The dwarf moved the wheels with hands that were only bone and skin.
“If you see me like this, you’ll understand. It’s useless for me to go out onto the continent.”
“……”
A stuffy room with no lights turned on, filled with a stale smell.
A dwarf who could create superb clothes in such a terrible place.
Yet she had lost her legs.
Rune quietly assessed the situation.
‘Right. With no proper medical system, things like this happen.’
Rune looked at her legs again and lifted her head.
The face, lacking any will to give up, looked at Rune and said,
“I know there’s no world outside this room for me. Forever.”
At the time Heungmi and Jed had visited her, she had probably still been a young girl or just become an adult.
But now, the dwarf standing in front of Rune looked worn out by time.
Fifty years of years had taken from her the helplessness and despair that she showed.
The more she aged, the more the dwarf, who was thoroughly dried out, turned her head away.
“If you’ve seen enough, please go back now.”
The calm words of the dwarf who turned her head flowed out dryly, like the leftover ash on her seat.
Rune stared at him for a moment.
Matching the pieces that rose in her mind, Rune recalled what words she needed to say.
When the wheelchair turned halfway toward the work table, Rune opened her mouth.
“I certainly understand why Jed couldn’t grab you. But you shouldn’t hesitate to speak right away, right?”
The dwarf’s hand stopped, but Rune’s voice continued.
“I can treat you on the continent. At least let’s try. That’s what Jed would have said.”
If it was the Jed Rune knew, he surely would have.
As expected, the dwarf in front of her lowered her head and said,
“……Yeah, I did.”
Then she lifted her head again, revealing pure hatred.
“I did say it, but he never came back.”
A vicious resentment was felt.
Rune listened to her words calmly and brought two chairs from beside her.
Thud.
She gave one to Heungmi, and Rune placed the other in front of the dwarf and sat down.
Neither too close nor too far.
Our gazes met closely from a distance.
In the dwarf’s eyes, the turbid emotions she had seen somewhere were mixed appropriately.
Dull and emotionless gaze.
Poison sealed inside herself in the dark place. Bitterness.
Even though her voice came out flat, as if she had given up on everything, deep anger lay within.
Rune looked into her eyes and thought,
‘If I roughly bundle up this dwarf’s emotions, wouldn’t the eyes be like this?’
Rune looked at him calmly.
It was easy to figure out the true identity of the crushed thing.
Rune opened her mouth.
“No. It’s because you gave up.”
“……”
The skinny dwarf raised her dark gaze.
Beyond that gaze, the black-haired girl with no special expression change was looking at her.
With empty eyes, the dwarf licked her lips.
“Don’t talk lightly….”
Rune shook her head.
“I just said what I read in your eyes. After Jed disappeared, you trapped yourself back in reality.”
“So what?”
Rune’s white light sphere created by magic lit up their space.
The place that had been dark and dead was finally being illuminated by light.
The dwarf who spat words out in protest glared at Rune with resentment.
“Anyway, I gave up on that lame dwarf because he didn’t matter. I only accepted reality.”
The dwarf was pouring out her unspoken emotions instead of words.
Rune moved her lips while looking at her.
“You know that Jed died, right?”
Her breath stopped at those words.
The dry dwarf fell silent.
The dwarf, who had barely opened her mouth, spoke hesitantly.
“I’ve never heard…… such words.”
“Then it seems no one told you that fact.”
The dwarf bit her lips hard.
Soon, she poured out words like coughing up blood.
“That can’t be! How much did I expect to be cured on the continent, to be free, and for that madame…… why?”
Rune guessed roughly how the situation had gone.
‘The madame didn’t tell Jed’s death properly. Surely it was related to the ankle wound.’
She didn’t avoid the gaze because it would be too uncomfortable beyond what was needed.
Rune had already noticed the necrotic leg from the ankle.
Rune opened her mouth.
“It would have been better to make her think he abandoned you rather than to tell you that he died.”
Hearing that, the dwarf’s dry lips trembled.
The dwarf’s eyebrows, which were dry and rough, trembled from the cold.
Her lips, which had been parched, twitched a few times.
“H-he died. The madame… she was a good person who raised me after I became an orphan….”
The anxious eyes seeking an answer to the doubt.
Rune answered cheerfully.
“If it was out of love, why would you have been left only in this room?”
Strictly speaking, this too was violence.
Rune had also not been able to leave the rare space often because she was protected, but she hadn’t been left like this.
Feeling that thought, the dwarf protested roughly.
“That’s obviously, my legs…!”
Annoying.
When those words reached her throat, Rune’s voice came.
“So you were kept with an ankle bracelet? Making you only make clothes. As if you were a criminal or a slave.”
The dwarf, who had exploded in anger, quickly closed her mouth.
After empty silence, the dwarf murmured blankly.
“To use me, I guess.”
She had known, in fact.
When she gathered all the clothes made and then didn’t return a single coin, saying they were for meal costs and living expenses.
Not even sweet candy, but no proper meal if she didn’t make clothes.
The dwarf, shocked enough that her lip color was turning white, twitched her lips.
“That’s not possible… not possible….”
The dwarf scratched her head with one hand.
If left as is, blood would have formed between her nails.
Rune interjected and grabbed her wrist.
“Stop it. Your head will get hurt.”
The dwarf looked at Rune blankly.
The something that had been there, crumbling all at once, eyes.
That might have been the heart.
The dwarf’s heart, hardened like an empty tin toy, her color-less button-like eyes shook.
Soon, the dwarf who couldn’t endure the truth screamed.
“Aaaah!”
Rune thought inwardly.
‘The inner wound is deeper than I thought.’
The dwarf in front of Rune couldn’t bear the betrayal wound, and just as she was trying to tear her hair with her hands,
“Yup!”
Puuk!
Heungmi stuffed a stick candy into the dwarf’s mouth.
“I’m Heungmi, so I’m giving this to you. I’m sorry I can’t help with much!”
Though silly, the sincerity that Heungmi wanted to be of some help was there.
“Heungmi, do you remember? Earlier, outside the window, when I was eating candy, our eyes met, right?”
Perhaps because of the sweetness of the candy in her mouth.
Perhaps because Heungmi’s words were true.
The dwarf bit the candy and trembled.
Rune gave Heungmi a look.
‘Good job.’
Rune, throwing her gaze back at the dwarf, said calmly.
“First, I’ll correct something. Jed was saved by me.”
“!”
At those words, the female dwarf who had stopped her movements, Rune said again.
“So you still have a chance to go out onto the continent.”
Saving a dead person.
So, the opportunity still exists.
“That’s a lie.”
The dwarf denied it.
Fearing that believing would bring loss.
Fearing that it would hurt again, the defensive instinct moved her lips.
Rune said calmly again.
“It’s not a lie. I did suffer a lot to save that guy.”
Could a hatchling do something like that?
It was impossible to imagine with a dwarf’s common sense.
But I know.
Even if difficult, the person in front is a descendant of a dragon.
p>That word must have been true.
The one who had been on the verge of panic lifted her head and opened her mouth.
“A miracle like that….”
Rune smiled bitterly inwardly at those words.
A miracle.
“Yeah, it could look like that.”
If I dug deeper, there was the fact that the dwarf’s body had died.
But now, there was something she had to say first.
“So don’t give up either. That guy didn’t give up and came here with you to this village.”
……Crack.
After the sound of the stick candy breaking, the dwarf who exhaled sweet breath asked.
“Then, coming here to find us was…”
Nodding her head, Rune said,
“I came here together to help that guy Jed. Well, there were some connections involved.”
Rune felt confident.
The dwarf in front of her had only expected and lost.
She still wanted to go out of this room and live.
“Grab this opportunity. Maybe it’s the last one, so don’t hesitate.”
Hearing those words, the dwarf’s messed-up body had a faint light beginning to turn in her eyes.
The last chance.
She couldn’t deny it anymore because she hadn’t forgotten the taste of the sweet dream of freedom.
Rune, watching the change in her eyes up close, opened her mouth.
“What’s your name?”
Rune asked, and the voice dripping with sweetness answered.
“Gaild.”
“Hmm, Gaild.”
Rune pushed the chair back and changed her posture.
“About this leg.”
Gaild stiffened her body slightly, but Rune casually took out a white pearl from her spatial pocket.
“It’s not a congenital illness, so this should do.”
A white pearl that condensed a monster’s life.
When I brought it slightly to her knee, it emitted a warm milky light.
“Eh, eh?”
Gaild opened her mouth in shock.
Her legs were healing.
Since she couldn’t even receive simple healing magic, this was like a miracle to Gaild.
After the healing ended, Rune said,
“Can you stand up? It might not feel strong yet.”
At those words, Gaild hesitated, then put strength into her legs.
It was awkward but not painful.
For a long time she hadn’t walked, so she wobbled a bit.
“I, I stood. I stood!”
Gaild, happy, started light hops.
Then she wobbled and fell, but got up again.
“I stood!”
Now, it was time for her to go out of this small room.
Rune, checking her status, retrieved the pearl and opened her mouth.
“For a while you’ll have to do rehabilitation exercises, but you should be able to carry some burden alone, right?”
At those words, Gaild nodded.
“Yes, yes!”
“I’ll send Jed later. Come out together then.”
“Thank you, thank you! I don’t know how to repay this favor….”
There was no reason to refuse to repay.
Rune closed her pocket and said leisurely,
“It would be good if you listen to my requests later. I won’t make any requests that cause harm.”
“I’ll do anything!”
Rune gave a slight smile, then stood up from her seat.
Heungmi also jumped up and waved her small hands.
“Bye, Gaild noona.”
“Yeah, yeah.”
Gaild’s gaze became very affectionate.
At some point, the dream she had when she saw Heungmi passing by the village, the thoughts.
Instead of her being able to go out, she wanted to send at least the clothes she had made.
Even though the madame dwarf hadn’t paid even the material cost.
p>When Heungmi went out the window, she wore the clothes she had made.
‘I did well. I’m glad I made the clothes.’
Because the heart contained in those clothes rose, Gaild smiled even with her dry lips cracking.