Chapter 115

As a fountain of blood baptizes her, the girl’s hair deepens in crimson.

The white mist yields to a red cloud. The air, shimmering with heat just moments ago, froze, permeated with the chill of death.

The girl, drenched in the bloody downpour, smiled at the General.

Her red eyes, perhaps stained that color from having witnessed too much blood.

“The service fee totals 62 gold,” she announced.

“…You orchestrated this?”

The boy’s bracelet shifted, glowing crimson.

Sion had fulfilled her duty, and that meant payment was due.

Fail to pay Sion within the allotted time, and the boy would die.

“Of course I orchestrated this! It’s an opportunity to turn trash into money, why wouldn’t I?”

“You must have been spreading rumors while we slept. Quite audacious, no? If someone had invaded our chambers and held a blade to my throat, you would have been as good as dead.”

“Naturally, I took that possibility into consideration while working! Who do you think I am?! The pride of the back alleys, born of them, raised by them!”

The girl recited her catchphrase, a mischievous grin playing on her lips.

“Even though you’re not actually from the back alleys.”

“…Does a catchphrase really have to be truthful?”

Sion seemed rather uncomfortable that the boy had investigated her background.

“Enough with the dull past! Let’s move on to the fun part! Namely, the part where I worked so hard to earn my coin!”

The boy paid her no mind, simply focused on detaching the pouch of gold coins from his belt and tossing them, one by one, towards the girl.

The lighter my purse, the lighter my spirit. Not such a bad feeling, after all.

“The most crucial part of this operation was that the General and Lier Unni wouldn’t react,” Zion declared, tucking each pouch the boy tossed to her into the lining of her cloak, seemingly bursting with glee.

“Magicians are inevitably clumsy when caught off guard, aren’t they? Unlike us, who can just *shwick*—send trash heads flying, they have to run complex calculations in their minds.”

“…So, waking us up when only three minutes remained before the fog vanished was for that reason, I presume.”

“For your information, that was a fib. The fog will drift across the golden sea all day long!” The boy announced, clutching the sixth pouch Zion had thrown to him, erupting in laughter.

“I didn’t want to give General Bin and Lier Unni time to think. If they came to their senses and used magic to deal with these in my stead, that’d be a predicament!”

With her words, she nudged the fallen corpses at her feet with the toe of her thick boot.

“It only counts as ‘income’ if I kill them myself.”

“Hmm…”

The boy withdrew a gold coin from his right pocket, then another from his left, tossing them to Zion as extras.

He wasn’t particularly impressed by Zion’s scheme.

He had, from the outset, anticipated Zion would try every trick in the book to bleed him dry.

“Yessir! That settles the 62-gold debt!”

The bracelet on the boy’s wrist reverted to its original black hue.

“Are you displeased? You don’t look too happy?”

Zion grinned, a wide, teasing smile, as she spoke.

“It’s unbalanced.”

And with that, the boy uttered something Zion couldn’t quite grasp.

“……Huh?”

“It started yesterday, this strange heaviness in my right side.”

Ever since he tossed a gold coin to the girl in the street, the gold in the boy’s pouch had stubbornly remained an odd number.

He’d possessed 99 gold before arriving at Archipelago Mist from the Golden Sea, and having just handed over 62, he was now left with 37.

His utility belt had five loops on the left and five on the right, but no matter how he redistributed the money, he couldn’t seem to balance his body properly.

“They should’ve put a loop right in the center.”

The boy voiced his absurd discontent, complaining about why there wasn’t a loop directly in the middle of his waist.

“……That would look terribly awkward, though. Bouncing around with every step.”

Lille mulled over Bean’s complaint for a moment, then frowned as she spoke.

“I suppose. Still, I don’t want to wander around dangerous places with monsters popping out, while my back is aching.”

Bean pondered for a moment, then reached for his waist, loosening his utility belt. The sound of the gold coin pouches clinking together was a seductive whisper in Zion’s ears.

“Here.”

Bean passed the belt, laden with gold coin pouches, to Zion.

“Huh? What’s this?”

Zion, unable to grasp the boy’s intentions, asked with a bewildered expression.

“Carry it. My back’s been killing me since last night. I should have had you do this earlier…”

“……Are you serious?”

“Take your cut whenever you take down an enemy. I can’t be bothered tossing you coins one by one every time a fight breaks out.”

Zion watched the boy pass her nearly 40 gold coins without a flicker of hesitation, and paused, blinking slowly, rooted to the spot.

He wants me to carry it because it’s too heavy for him?

A sum of thirty-seven gold?

“Well, you’re not going anywhere anyway. Not until I say the contract’s over.”

“…I suppose that’s true.”

“Then carry it. What’s the big deal?”

The boy spoke dismissively, stepping over corpses thick with the stench of blood.

“A hundred gold wasn’t going to satisfy you, was it?”

He brushed past Sion, his voice barely a whisper.

A sneer clung to his lips, and Sion felt as though he saw right through her.

“…”

Sion’s face froze.

But she took a deep breath, forced a bright smile – the kind she always wore – and dashed to the front of the formation.

“Alright! Let’s move on!”

* * *

The moment Veen and his party entered the Mist of the Archipelago, Edward led the children away from the Golden Sea, arriving at a nearby monastery.

The sudden appearance of a line of children startled the clergy for a moment, but after hearing the situation, they warmly welcomed them in.

“We’ll take care of that hand.”

They draped warm blankets over the children and offered to treat Edward’s hand.

The sight of the torn flesh, the embedded shards of blade, sent a chill down the spine of anyone who looked upon it.

“I must decline.”

Edward refused the clergy’s kindness in tending to his hand.

The reason… I know not.

Only the thought that he was unworthy took root, and he refused treatment.

The clergy bid him at least stay for a meal, but Edward, claiming pressing matters, shook off their hands and fled the monastery.

Thus, Edward returned to the Sea of Gold.

If asked to explain his actions, he would likely be struck dumb.

Inexplicable, yes… but Edward longed to see the boy.

To face the boy and offer a proper apology.

To stare his sin directly in the face, and beg for a second chance.

Rex Belzarc would never avert his eyes from his wrongdoings.

With that belief as his guide, Edward quickened his pace toward the Sea of Gold.

And after hours of walking, he found it: a place cloaked in a pristine, white fog.

Without hesitation, Edward stepped into the mist.

The snowy foam engulfed him, and a strange sensation, like entering a warm, deep sea, scrambled his senses.

Soon, a crimson pool unfurled before his eyes.

“….”

Edward slowly approached the pool and reached out a hand.

It was human blood.

Cold, and far too much to belong to a single person.

…At least thirty humans had died here.

“And yet, no corpses.”

He didn’t need to think about it too deeply to know.

He had stepped into a dangerous place.

And instinctively, he realized he’d entered the area he’d heard about during his adventurer days: the “Isle Mist.”

Perhaps the boy had revealed himself in a miserable place like the Golden Sea in order to enter the Isle Mist.

Edward picked up the short, roughly-hewn sword from the puddle of blood.

“…There must be something I can do to help.”

With that belief, Edward walked into the interior of the Isle Mist.

Soon, a faint lantern light flickered into view through the thin fog.

“…You really think that mage came into the mist?”

“Of course! You know that mage has a ton of money, right? Rumor has it he’s carrying over 400 gold.”

“Talk sense. 400 gold? Is that someone’s dog’s name? You have no sense of money, you b*stard… Even at most, it’ll be 30 gold, max.”

“Anyway! It’s a fact that the mage has a lot of money. Let’s ambush him, kill him, and take it. Just like always.”

“But that mage looked really strong!”

“A mage is just a mage, even if they’re strong. If we surprise him and stab him in the back, what can he do? This is what us professionals are good at…”

Crack…!

Edward gripped the short sword with both hands and lowered his stance.

‘These are guys who could be a threat to the General. Better to take care of them here.’

It was the very moment Edward finished his thoughts and resolved to swing his sword at the ruffians…

Whoosh—!

A powerful wind swept past the men holding the lanterns.

Instinctively, the men turned their heads toward the direction the wind was blowing.

In an instant, their eyes were seized by a colossal dread.

Soon, a monstrous thing, resembling a deep-sea anglerfish, appeared and swallowed the two ruffians whole.

It appeared and devoured the men in a flash, then vanished from sight just as quickly as it had come.

Edward craned his neck, following the monster’s retreating form, but only a thick fog remained.

The thugs’ lanterns fell to the ground, whale oil splattering in every direction. Soon, flames, ignited from an unknown source, began to engulf the area.

It seemed that carelessly displaying light in the Archipelago Fog was not a wise choice.