The Thousandth Guide
A droplet of water slid down her ample cleavage and splashed onto the wooden floor.
There had been no time to dry her damp hair.
She had only just been relaxing in a warm bath, yet Hermia threw on a robe and hurried to the reception room.
A young man sat waiting.
His short black hair was striking.
His features were handsome overall, but his face was utterly devoid of emotion, like a doll’s.
His expression was so blank it bordered on eerie.
A terminal was visible on his right wrist.
Hermia narrowed her long lashes slightly.
“So you’re a traveler?”
“Why are you only wearing a robe?”
The guard standing beside him asked, clearly uncomfortable.
Since there were no dedicated servants in the manor, the private soldier must have shown him in.
Hermia ran a hand down her generous chest and gave an indifferent look.
“It’s unpleasant to hear that from someone who wears a helmet even indoors.”
“Isn’t it because of my burn scars?”
“I’ve told you many times. The more flawed you are, the more you should reveal yourself.”
Hermia sat down in the chair opposite him.
When she crossed her long legs, the inside of her robe showed tantalizingly.
The gap between her plump thighs was enough to tempt any man.
But the man didn’t even glance at it.
Hermia rather liked that attitude.
“I am Hermia Lepe, lord of Kellin. Please forgive my guard’s rudeness. I took her in as a child, but the burns are so severe that she refuses to show her face. What is your name?”
“Kang Yoonsoo. As you said, I’m a traveler.”
“Elves have keen ears. I caught a little through the window. You said you can handle the Covenant Orb?”
“Yes.”
“Then do you also know what it is?”
“Yes.”
Kang Yoonsoo answered shortly.
Hermia narrowed her eyes and stared at him intently.
Then she suddenly spoke.
Her voice rose like a song.
The one who trudges through the barren desert
Shall meet the thousandth guide
And though he loses half the world,
He shall at last reach the spring he so desired.
Kang Yoonsoo opened his mouth as well.
His tone, of course, remained flat.
The one who endlessly circles above the sandstorm
Shall face the final revolution
Yet touch not a single grain of sand
And wander forever within the mirage.
Hermia covered her open mouth with one hand.
“Oh my, goodness.”
She stared at Kang Yoonsoo in a daze.
Then she muttered as if she could not believe it.
“Oh my, goodness… oh my, oh my, goodness…”
The guard lowered her head slightly and looked at Hermia.
She was surely wearing a worried expression beneath that helmet.
“Shall I bring some tea?”
“Y-yes. Use plenty of tea leaves. And be careful with the fire.”
The guard left the reception room.
Hermia pressed a hand to her forehead and let out a groan as if in agony.
Then, suddenly, she slowly slipped off her robe.
Her milk-white skin and full breasts shimmered brilliantly in the sunlight.
“Check whether my heart is still beating.”
Kang Yoonsoo reached out with his right hand toward the lord’s ample chest.
“Your heart is beating.”
“Is it? What a relief. I was so startled I thought my heart might have stopped, and I wouldn’t have doubted it for a second.”
Hermia put her robe back on.
Any ordinary man and woman would have blushed, yet neither showed the slightest sign of embarrassment.
As if trying to calm her excitement, Hermia stroked her flushed cheeks.
“I’m truly… truly shocked. To hear the verse that the Lepe clan has guarded for over four hundred years from a human—not even an elf, but a traveler from another world.”
Curiosity bloomed on her face.
“How did you learn about the Covenant Orb? And the Ignus Dragon’s verse?”
A memory Kang Yoonsoo did not want to recall rose in his mind.
How could he not know?
The Ignus Dragon’s verse.
Among the elf tribes of the southern region—now the Extinction Desert—a legend had been passed down that one day a person capable of handling the Covenant Orb would recite that verse.
In the past, Kang Yoonsoo had lived a brutal life in the Extinction Desert, overcoming every imaginable peril.
Yet the shock he felt upon learning that the reward for his long ordeal was nothing more than a single verse still lingered.
He shook his head.
“I can’t tell you.”
His life was not something easily believed.
There was no reason to explain his repeated regressions in complicated detail.
“I see. I won’t pry. The Lepe clan are merely witnesses, after all.”
Hermia took a breath and began to explain.
“The ancestor of our Lepe clan…”
“The ancestor of the Lepe clan and noble archer Nahilen was the right hand of Sirian, King of All Things, and a great hero. It is known that Nahilen, then leader of the elves, lost to the Ignus Dragon, lost the forest, and turned the region into the Extinction Desert. But that was a deliberate false rumor. In truth, Nahilen and the Ignus Dragon formed a long covenant and hid the true nature of the orb to prepare for the Demon Lord who would appear in the future. It is the fate of the Lepe clan to find a truly qualified person and pass on the Fragment of Power left by the Ignus Dragon.”
“……”
Hermia’s eyes widened.
Kang Yoonsoo had neatly summarized the long explanation she was about to give.
While she wore a stunned expression, he spoke with his usual lack of change in tone.
“I hate long explanations.”
Having said that, Kang Yoonsoo stood up.
It was right when Hermia had yet to recover from her astonishment.
“I’ve brought the tea. Ah.”
The guard, carrying a tray with teacups, tripped and fell forward.
Kang Yoonsoo extended a hand and caught the guard against his chest.
With his other hand he took the tray.
Clack.
A smooth motion, as if he had expected it.
Not a single drop of tea spilled; the liquid merely rippled inside the cups.
Kang Yoonsoo set the tray on the table.
Then he brought a teacup to his dry lips.
After one sip, he spoke slowly.
“Tastes bad. As always.”
Both the seated Hermia and the guard he held wore dazed expressions.
Kang Yoonsoo said indifferently.
“Before I see the Covenant Orb, I need something.”
What Kang Yoonsoo demanded was, of all things, alcohol.
He said he needed the strongest liquor stored in the manor.
Hermia told the guard to give it to him as a courtesy.
“It really is fortunate that Sir Kang Yoonsoo came.”
The guard lifted a fallen bookshelf with one hand.
Despite her small frame, her soldier’s strength was astonishingly powerful.
She rummaged through the storage room floor cluttered with odds and ends.
Kang Yoonsoo had followed the soldier and now stood leaning against an old stone wall.
Tossing aside a crude empty bottle, the guard continued.
“Lady Hermia is far too good to be stuck in a remote wasteland like this. She was the one who took me in after I lost my family in a fire when I was young. She has often spoken to me about the Lepe clan’s fate as well. Now Lady Hermia will finally be free of that suffocating burden.”
“You think Hermia is beautiful.”
“Don’t most people?”
The guard asked back.
Kang Yoonsoo picked up a hand mirror that had rolled across the floor and slipped it into his pocket.
He spoke in a low voice.
“I know a woman better than her.”
“If there’s someone more beautiful than Lady Hermia, I’d like to meet her too. I’ve lived only in Kellin since I was a child and have never been anywhere else.”
“You can see that woman too.”
“How surprising. How can I meet her?”
“Take off your helmet and look in the mirror.”
The guard’s gloved hands, which had been searching through the clutter, froze for an instant.
Though he saw only her back, he could tell she was angry.
Her voice grew cold.
“…Are you saying that a woman whose hair falls out hideously outside the territory and whose body is covered in burn scars is a beauty? What a crude joke.”
“I hate jokes.”
“You speak like an old man tired of the world.”
“I am tired.”
At last the guard found a bottle of liquor.
It was a whiskey with an extremely high proof.
She stood and began walking toward the door.
A single field mouse darted quickly across the dusty floor.
The guard caught the mouse by its tail and tickled its belly.
A soft laugh leaked from inside her helmet.
“Hahaha… hm.”
Realizing Kang Yoonsoo was watching, the guard hurriedly stopped.
Just as she was about to set the mouse down—
“Squeak!”
“Ah!”
The mouse suddenly leaped and slipped inside her helmet.
It squeaked wildly and scratched around her face.
In her panic the guard dropped her helmet to the floor.
The guard and Kang Yoonsoo’s eyes met.
Her appearance was wretched.
Her hair had fallen out in ugly patches, and the bald scalp was pitifully shriveled.
Burn scars covered not only her face but also her neck and below; it was hard to find any unblemished skin.
The scars were worst on her face.
Especially the left side, where the burn was so severe that her eyeball appeared sunken.
After dropping the mouse, the guard hastily covered her face with both hands.
“Don’t look at me!”
She cried sharply.
She would rather die than show her hideous self to others.
Especially to such a tall, handsome young man.
Though she covered her face, an unbearable shame flooded her.
Kang Yoonsoo tapped her shoulder lightly.
When she opened her eyes a little, he held out the helmet with an indifferent face.
She quickly put the helmet back on and bit her lip.
“I’m sorry.”
“Why.”
“You saw what I look like. I’m sorry for showing you something so ugly…”
“It’s not ugly.”
An answer she had not expected at all.
The guard was silent for a moment, then asked suspiciously.
“Weren’t you frightened by my face?”
“Not at all.”
The guard was puzzled.
Usually, men who saw her bare face either recoiled in horror or spat curses.
But Kang Yoonsoo was different.
He showed not the slightest aversion after seeing her, only indifference.
Nor was he forcing politeness.
Despite his apathetic appearance, she thought he might not be a bad person.
On the other hand, Kang Yoonsoo simply stared at her as she stood by the door.
“What are you doing? Aren’t you leaving?”
“This place should be suitable.”
A vast wasteland.
It felt so empty it was almost cruel.
Three people stood on ground so barren not a single blade of grass grew.
Hermia took out a red orb from her bosom.
The Covenant Orb.
It was a little too large to hold comfortably in one hand, yet it burned with a fierce red as if flames slept within it.
She carefully set the Covenant Orb down on the wasteland ground.
“According to what I heard from my grandmother, the Covenant Orb contains a Fragment of Power left by the Ignus Dragon. But to draw the fragment out, one must pass a dangerous trial. A trial so perilous it requires risking one’s life.”
She could have brought the lord’s private soldiers for safety, but Kang Yoonsoo had refused.
Kang Yoonsoo glanced at the guard.
She seemed slightly nervous; her hands trembled as she handed him the liquor bottle.
She asked.
“Excuse me, but what do you plan to use that strong liquor for?”
“That’s right. I was curious too.”
Hermia asked as well.
But Kang Yoonsoo hung the bottle at his waist without answering.
He walked slowly over and touched the orb on the ground with a finger.
Then he said.
“The one who has walked the endlessly barren desert shall at the end of the scorching flames finally return to the eternal mirage.”
It was a slightly altered version of the Ignus Dragon’s verse.
At that moment, cracks began to spread across the orb on the ground.
The orb poured out a red radiance.
Hermia and the guard hurriedly stepped back.
A blinding light engulfed the surroundings, and a huge shadow rose from the Covenant Orb.
Ignus Dragon's Dragon Minion (Incarnation) has appeared.
If you pass the Dragon Minion's test, you may receive the chosen one's reward.
If you fail the test or give up, you must face the Dragon Minion's wrath.
“I sense one who would inherit the fragment of exalted power.”
The dragon minion.
It had the form of a red dragon fused with an adult male.
Rough scales sprouted all over its body.
It stood roughly four meters tall with evenly distributed muscle.
A thick spear was gripped in its massive hand.
“Is it you who seeks to inherit the potential of a supreme being?”
Kang Yoonsoo did not answer.
Yet the dragon minion raised its huge spear upright.
“I, the Ignus Dragon’s minion, shall test you. Only by passing my test can you obtain the great fragment of power.”
The dragon minion lightly swung its spear through the air.
Whoosh—
Merely a slight shake, yet the sound of it slicing the atmosphere was ferocious.
Hermia and the guard watching from afar swallowed dryly.
Flutter.
A red cloth descended from the air, fluttering.
It naturally wrapped itself around Kang Yoonsoo’s eyes.
Aiming its spear, the dragon minion said.
“You shall face me with both eyes covered. You may fight with magic, puppets, or anything else. If you defeat me, I will acknowledge you. Of course, I will give you time to practice.”
The two watchers were horrified.
To fight such a powerful dragon minion without being able to see?
It seemed impossible even for any master swordsman.
It was truly a trial that only one fully versed in combat could pass.
“Wait.”
Kang Yoonsoo, now blindfolded, held out his right hand.
The dragon minion, about to raise its spear, paused.
In that moment Kang Yoonsoo uncorked the whiskey.
Curiosity and puzzlement mixed in Hermia’s and the guard’s eyes.
Somehow they felt this man was about to do something incredible.
What kind of madness would he commit with that whiskey?
Gulp. Gulp.
Kang Yoonsoo began swallowing the whiskey without pause.
He emptied the entire bottle of harsh liquor in one go.
Kang Yoonsoo tossed the empty bottle aside and drew the machete slung across his back.
“No practice needed. Let’s begin.”
Hermia and the guard looked at each other in shock.
“Did he ask for that whiskey just because he wanted to drink it himself?”
“He’s going to fight while drunk and blind?”
It was so absurd they were at a loss for words.
To the two of them, Kang Yoonsoo looked as if he had resolved to throw his life away.
The dragon minion wore an displeased expression.
“I will fight with all my strength. You may lose your life. Do you truly believe you can defeat me?”
“Yeah.”
“How arrogant you are!”
The dragon minion’s sharp spear thrust toward Kang Yoonsoo’s body as if to pierce straight through him.