Chapter 44

“On the other hand, it’s the same for me. If a truly dangerous situation arises, I’d throw all of them away as bait and run off with only you.”

They said that to those accustomed to dangerous situations, the value of others is merely that much.

“So, it really does depend on the situation.”

I nodded to Felix, who raised the corners of his mouth in a plain, simple way, asking, “Did you understand?” He then spoke playfully, as if to lighten the atmosphere.

“Above all, rather than having intruders getting in the way, I much prefer nights spent alone with just the two of us.”

I laughed softly, following his lead.

“Yeah, that’s obviously better.”

The next morning, Felix and I stood once again in front of the sunken earth. The party of adventurers who had split off the day before was nowhere to be seen. Either their campsite was far from here, or they had already entered inside.

“Felix.”

“Yeah?”

“You were likely the first person to discover these traces, right?”

“Probably.”

He said, however, that the official report was likely made by the Saint who followed him. Felix stared at me with a serious face, saying he had never once uttered a word about this anywhere.

“I’m not really asking you to explain yourself. I just became curious about the known process, so I asked.”

I heard that by the time I moved the territory, the nearby regions had already finished migrating. So, I thought it might have taken quite some time for these traces to be discovered. But if the Saint had discovered them while following Felix, it was only a difference of a few days.

“What exactly are you trying to check here?”

Felix asked. I looked up at him and pondered for a moment. Just how much does Felix grasp about me? If I ask what I’m curious about exactly as it is, will he really answer me with complete honesty?

Starting with myself, I am in a situation full of things I don’t tell Felix. There was no guarantee that Felix wouldn’t be doing the same.

The more we come to know about each other, the more our relationship changes to match. Even if we don’t feel the changes right away, it ends up naturally shifting in the end. However, no one could know whether that would be in a positive or negative direction.

I don’t want to bring any change to our current relationship.

So, just as I didn’t tell him about myself, I didn’t feel the need to dig into him, either. Since Felix had also been that way, he must have known but pretended not to—closing his eyes, stopping his ears, and putting a lid on his own thoughts all this time.

If he hadn’t felt something abnormal in my behavior, he would have continued like that. It wasn’t that he changed his policy because of the misfortune that would end in six months anyway. It was just that he was put in a situation where he had no choice but to choose it because he realized an abnormality had occurred in our relationship due to my changes.

The fact that I saw no further behavioral changes from Felix after that situation was somehow resolved is proof of that. Even though he must have had many questions, he still doesn’t ask me. It must mean he doesn’t want any change in this relationship.

In the end, I turned my eyes away without a proper answer. Felix didn’t pry.

There was a stone staircase winding downwards along the walls of the trace. I don’t know who made it, but it seemed investigators and adventurers were moving in and out of the interior via those stairs.

“Are you planning on going in?”

“Yes.”

“Understood.”

The stone stairs were uneven, and the height difference between steps was quite large. I took the hand Felix extended and jumped down the first step as if leaping.

We descended endlessly into the gigantic pit-like terrain. At first, I tried to manage somehow with my own strength, but I had to agree with Felix’s remark that we wouldn’t reach the bottom even if we spent three days and nights like this. In the end, following Felix’s suggestion, I obediently leaned into the arm he extended.

He slung me over one shoulder like a sack and stepped off the stairs without a second thought. We began to plummet straight down. I was terrified of the pitch-black bottom that was obscured from view and the sensation of weightlessness that made my internal organs feel as if they were shifting. I clung to Felix’s neck and squeezed my eyes shut.

He periodically kicked off the stairs and walls to reduce the velocity of our fall. Embarrassingly, considering how I had been whining and wasting time on the spiral staircase at the top, Felix brought me to the ground very simply and easily.

“We’re here.”

“I thought my heart was going to drop out…!”

I had been frozen stiff the whole time, and as soon as I received confirmation that we were safe, I started to pant and make a fuss. Even though I’d only been held, my whole body was trembling. Felix supported me as my legs gave way and I staggered, stroking my back gently as if to calm me down.

It was only long after that I came to my senses and looked around. Perhaps because it hadn’t been a pit for very long, nothing special caught my eye. It was just that seeds of plants that had been buried for a long time were starting to sprout. If this much time passes as is, a unique ecosystem of its own might form.

“Are you looking for anything in particular?”

I shook my head at Felix, who said he would look for it himself if I told him the approximate features.

“I told you. I wanted to confirm the anomalous phenomena.”

“Anomalous phenomena aren’t occurring here anymore, though?”

Since I had scooped out the entire Lallanne territory, which was the center of the problem, it was only natural that the anomalous phenomena in the surroundings would cease at that point.

“Yes, I know. That’s why I wanted to see the results of the aftermath with my own eyes.”

All this time, I had been satisfied on my own, thinking I had done enough by ending things with sealing the Master. If it weren’t for the anomalous phenomena that happened to Felix this time, I would never have realized until when that my very existence could be a problem. And I would have been busy making excuses to myself, trying to minimize the scope of my responsibility, saying things like, “I’m just a human in a slightly peculiar situation.” Cowardly as it was.

When coming back up, I didn’t insist and just received Felix’s help from the start. I had declined earlier because I thought it would be difficult for him, but after realizing that him trying to match my speed might actually be more tiring, I decided to just obediently entrust my body to him.

Felix’s footsteps as he carried me on his back and leaped up the stairs several at a time were light as a feather. Of course, since that couldn’t be compared to the speed of our fall, it was inevitable that it would take quite some time to go up. Nevertheless, he climbed nimbly and well without showing any signs of exhaustion or slowing down.

“What on earth happened to your stamina?”

“Huh?”

Felix lowered the water skin he had been drinking from and wiped his mouth lightly. I didn’t hide my admiration as I fumbled all over his forearm and waist muscles.

“If you were a human, this shouldn’t be possible, right? Are you a superman? Are your bones made of steel?”

I made a fuss, asking if his muscles were stone. Felix grabbed me and stopped me, saying I was being distracting.

“I thought I would have to take a break several times, too, but unexpectedly, I just climbed up.”

“You… didn’t you overexert yourself and show off your strength because I was in front of you? You’ll end up with a chronic illness that way.”

If you grind your body away recklessly and then suddenly start failing, who’s going to look after you? Since you’re an adult who’s grown as much as you can, I sincerely advise you to stop doing reckless things. Then Felix got a little ticked off and shouted.

“I wasn’t showing off my strength!”

“No, but really, what’s going on? Were you always like this?”

It didn’t seem possible with just bluffing or mental fortitude. Felix said with an awkward expression, “I wasn’t like this from the beginning. But this time, it did feel like my body was exceptionally light. You felt like a feather, too.”

I looked at him with pity.

“I think you’ve mistaken me for your sixteen-year-old sweetheart, but I don’t feel a flicker of heart-fluttering even if I hear things like that!”

You have to have limits to your absurd metaphors for me to let them slide. These days, even sixteen-year-olds would roll over laughing if they heard that. They’d accept it as humor, not flirting.

Felix, perhaps becoming a little embarrassed belatedly, shouted with his ears colored red.

“I didn’t say it to flirt with you! It really felt like that!”

“Yes, yes, I’m sure. Sigh, instead of answering my questions seriously, you’re just joking around.”

“I told you I wasn’t joking.”

“Forget it. I won’t ask you anymore.”

“You’re the one who isn’t listening to me properly.”

We started walking while bickering. Since we had left the rented carriage at the last village for a while, we had to walk until there.

The argument, which hadn’t been serious to begin with, soon fizzled out. I swung our clasped hands and moved my feet.

“I couldn’t see the people I met yesterday in the end. Those people said they were going to go inside the pit, too.”

“The traces are huge. They must have been in a different spot.”

I nodded, agreeing that that was plausible. Felix soon asked.

“Are you satisfied?”