45

The vice principal and Hamel walked side by side down the corridor after leaving the room.

The vice principal walked ahead, telling Hamel various things about where they were going.

“The Mandragora cultivation area is about half a day’s walk from here. And the ones out there now are Professor Aran and his students…”

“Before that, I have something to ask, vice principal.”

Hamel, who had been quietly listening, suddenly interrupted the vice principal after they’d walked a bit.

The vice principal, who had been continuing the explanation, stopped walking and turned to Hamel.

Was she anxious?

There was a mix of puzzlement and slight impatience in her eyes.

“Yes? Ask freely. And you may call me Agnes.”

“Then I will. Miss Agnes.”

Hamel nodded briefly and continued with his question.

“The Intermediate Cursed Herbology class — are you the one in charge, Miss Agnes?”

“…Sorry?”

Agnes, taken completely by surprise, wore a blank expression for a moment.

After a moment she nodded with a hint of displeasure.

“That is correct… but is this the time for that discussion?”

“I don’t know. We’ll have to find out now.”

Hamel replied calmly, tapping the sheath with his finger.

Something was bothering him.

And the outline of it was becoming clearer.

But to confirm it he needed someone who wasn’t here right now.

“Do you know where Rena is right now?”

“Rena?”

Agnes’s expression grew more troubled as the conversation became harder to read.

But she soon sighed deeply and nodded.

“If nothing happened, she should have returned to the dormitory by now. It’s getting to be evening.”

“I should go see her.”

“…Very well. Then go.”

Agnes clenched her teeth and nodded.

Her role was to assist Hamel and the other personnel of the order and to keep watch over what they did.

She faithfully fulfilled her role.

They went to the Magic Tower dormitory and searched for Rena.

But she was nowhere to be found.

“Where on earth does she go at times like this?”

Just as Agnes was flustered,

A student approached and spoke cautiously.

“Um, vice principal.”

“Yes? What is it?”

“I heard you’re looking for that Rena. I think I saw her briefly going outside earlier…”

“At this hour? Are you sure?”

“I’m not certain…”

The student shrugged and shook their head, and at that moment

Hamel cut in on their conversation and said,

“That’s likely. I have a rough idea where.”

“What? Suddenly? That’s not the point… Where is that place?”

Agnes’s eyes widened as she asked, and Hamel hurriedly moved on while answering.

“The Old Tree Forest. She probably went there.”

---

Rena walked into the depths of the forest.

According to the priest from the order, the children would be in there.

‘They were bullying me…’

She hadn’t known at all.

Even those kids at the academy who had spoken to her weren’t friends.

It was a bit of a shock.

What should she say if she met them?

Ask why they tormented her?

Ask if they’d enjoyed it?

Well, what of it mattered now?

‘It’s admirable to look for reasons within yourself, but sometimes the answer doesn’t lie in you.’

Rena didn’t waver.

The priest’s words had steadied her heart.

She simply wanted to meet them.

She was curious what they’d say, and above all there was something she had to do.

Rena walked on calmly.

Then Rena suddenly felt an inexplicable unease.

It was the Old Tree Forest she’d been to many times.

But somehow the forest’s atmosphere felt strange today.

‘Something is different than usual…’

The air that touched her skin felt damp and sticky.

Were the trees always this covered in green moss?

‘More than that…’

Why couldn’t she hear any birdsong?

It was quiet.

Except for her footsteps, the forest didn’t even make the sound of leaves falling.

Realizing that gave her goosebumps.

Something was wrong.

Rena froze in her tracks.

From afar a boy staggered into view.

He was a familiar face.

He had been the one to tell her where the blue moonlight herb grew.

In other words, he was the kid who followed Melani around.

His name was surely…

“Charles.”

“Re-Rena? Thank the gods. Thank you.”

He rushed up to Rena in a panic.

Up close, he was in terrible shape.

His clothes were torn and his robe was muddied and covered with leaves as if he’d rolled in mud.

Above all, blood flowed from various wounds on his body.

Had he been attacked by something?

While Rena wondered, he knelt before her, choking back sobs.

“Rena. Save the others. Please…”

“What’s happened?”

Rena quietly gripped her staff and asked.

Her voice was calm, but her hand trembled slightly at the unexpected situation.

Whether he noticed or not, Charles continued, darting his head around frantically.

“We went to play in the forest like always and suddenly monsters appeared…”

“How can you expect me to help against monsters that you couldn’t even handle?”

“O-One of the guys who brought a staff was only Endrew, and he was the first to be taken.”

“…”

Rena was momentarily speechless, looking at him as if stunned, then shook her head.

“Still, someone should’ve called for backup…”

At that moment Charles suddenly cried out like a scream.

“T-The guys are all going to die!”

“…Ha.”

After a moment’s thought Rena let out a short sigh.

She then nudged Charles’s back and said,

“Lead the way.”

“You’ll go ahead? Thank you. Thank you so much.”

Charles kept bowing his head and led the way.

They went on for some distance.

A shabby building came into view in the distance.

It was one of the Magic Tower buildings closed down long ago.

“Is that it?”

“Yes. Let’s, let’s go in.”

“Wait, before that explain what the monster was.”

“…Huh?”

Charles blinked with a look of confusion.

Then he stammered on.

“Re-Rena. This isn’t the time. We have to hurry…”

“No.”

Rena cut him off sharply and replied expressionlessly.

“I can’t go in there without knowing what the monster is.”

“G-Go in first.”

“Explain first… why are your eyes like that?”

Rena stopped and looked into Charles’s eyes.

For a moment Charles’s eyes looked strange.

It seemed something was moving inside his green irises.

“My, my eyes?”

Charles groped for his eyes awkwardly.

He rubbed his pupils as if wiping glass with his fingers.

The motion was so eerie that Rena stepped back instinctively.

Unaware of her retreat, Charles kept muttering on.

“G-Go in. Save the guys. Rena.”

“…”

“I-I like you, Rena. Go out with me.”

He wasn’t in his right mind.

Even someone as oblivious as she was couldn’t ignore this.

Rena quietly raised her staff and aimed it at Charles, saying,

“No.”

“Y-You won’t?”

Charles’s flustered hesitation froze in an instant.

But only for a moment.

“…Why? Why?”

Why why why why why why why why why.

“Why?”

A dead, inhuman voice flowed from his mouth.

In an instant Charles’s face flushed and contorted into something demonic.

And most of all, his eyes.

They bulged and writhed, swelling with green and white.

It looked as if a massive caterpillar crawled inside his eyes.

At the same time the thing lunged at Rena with outstretched hands.

But Rena had already completed her incantation long ago.

“Kotuntito Leoratia.”

When the spell hit, a rock sprang from the ground and smashed into Charles’s body.

The defenseless Charles was knocked to the ground in an instant by the blow.

Rena extended her staff toward him and approached.

Charles’s limbs were twisted into unnatural angles as if bones were broken.

But seemingly unaffected by pain, he flailed his limbs and cried out trying to get up.

“G-Go in. G-Go in. G-Go in…”

He repeated the same phrase like a broken music box.

Rena looked down at Charles’s writhing eyes with an expressionless face.

Leucochloridium.

A parasitic creature said to be found in snails.

It looked exactly like that.

But she’d never heard of such a thing parasitizing a human in that form.

Then there was only one answer.

“A demon.”

Rena raised her staff.

Sssssk sssk

Insect-like demons began crawling out of the derelict building in droves.

Cockroaches larger than wild dogs whipped their long antennae and scuttled forward on hairy legs, closing the distance in an instant.

“Kotuntito Leoratia.”

A rock summoned by another swing of her staff crushed a cockroach.

With a squelch it was crushed, spilling its entrails as it died.

Something fell from beneath its wing shell in the process.

It was a pouch-like sac dotted with round eggs.

“…”

Even Rena couldn’t hide the twist in her expression.

She quietly stepped back.

There were simply too many of them.

Meanwhile, her magic consumed mana extremely fast.

They wouldn’t all attack one by one, but even so her mana would run out first.

Just as she was about to retreat,

Kyaaa! Get away!

A piercing spear of ice!

She felt the flow of mana and heard familiar voices screaming from inside the building.

So Melani and the others were still alive after all.

Rena gritted her teeth.

If she ran away right now she might live.

But if she tried to save her friends?

‘I’d die.’

That was an undeniable fact.

Retreat.

Why die with the kids who bullied her just because they were pitiable?

Her head made the decision without hesitation.

“…”

But for some reason

Her feet wouldn’t move.

Her gaze kept drifting toward the building.

While she hesitated, the monsters coming out of the building closed the distance considerably.

Cockroaches, woodlice, centipedes and pillbugs.

They seemed to have gathered every disgusting thing.

The top way she didn’t want to die just shifted.

‘I never imagined I’d die surrounded by things like this.’

Rena swallowed and took a step forward.

Charles, still muttering, reached out his hand.

“G-Go in. G-Go in…”

Crack

Rena stepped on Charles’s head without hesitation and crushed it.

Then she swung her staff repeatedly and advanced toward the building.

Rocks she summoned smashed approaching monsters one by one, clearing a path.

But only for a moment; soon Rena was surrounded by insects.

‘Just a little more.’

The building was right ahead.

If she could get inside, she could at least avoid being fully surrounded by them.

Just as Rena frowned and tried to move forward,

Flap flap

A brown cockroach fluttered its wings and flew in from beside her.

“It flew…!”

She hadn’t expected a cockroach to fly and couldn’t finish her incantation in time.

When it struck her, Rena toppled backward.

Rustle rustle

The cockroach that landed on her pinned down her limbs.

Her staff flew far away.

A long antenna tapped Rena’s face.

Its mandibles clicked open and thick saliva dripped out.

‘Ah.’

Rena did not scream.

Because she had expected this.

She simply watched the swarming insects and waited for her death.

Just as she was about to accept her death,

Whoosh

a blue flame.

It was so blue and pure it flared like a dazzling, blinding radiance.

“Kiiiiiiii!”

A cockroach suddenly had a dagger stuck in its back.

The creature writhed and fell away from Rena as Azure Flame bloomed around its wound.

Its thrashing legs shriveled and turned to ash, crumbling away.

Sssk sssk sssk

The surrounding insects recoiled in panic as if they’d been burned and scattered.

Rena herself, nearest the flame, felt no heat at all.

What was happening?

It didn’t take long to find out.

Shick

A bug’s head flew up into the air, spraying its characteristic white blood.

At its end, the priest who had greeted her earlier approached, swinging a sword.

The priest, cutting down dozens of monsters in an instant, asked calmly,

“Are you alright?”

“…”

The priest, removing a robe dripping with insect fluids, extended his hand.

His silver hair gleamed in the moonlight even in the forest’s shade.

Rena thought he was very beautiful.