By Zephyria 
First of all, the bold remark based on the premise that the Prince is a bloodthirsty maniac, as well as the extraordinary idea of providing a slaughterground, was nothing short of insane. It was exactly why mages were whispered about as being a bunch of psychos. …However,
‘Surprisingly, this might actually work on that Prince.’
Isaac momentarily thought that it seemed plausible.
He had heard that every mage was desperate to form a contract with Kaieon, but he hadn’t expected to witness it firsthand like this. Even a mage who already had a contract with someone else—and as a Grand Duke’s mage, surely already possessed immense wealth and honor—was coveting the Prince to the point of breaking the taboo against dragging things from another world into this one.
As Isaac watched them, swallowing dryly, the cats were rustling through the bushes, playing among themselves. Fortunately, the two people facing each other in front didn’t seem to notice the creatures scratching at the dirt and chattering “here, here” to one another. Only Isaac, whose nerves were frayed, noticed and whipped his head around.
‘Can’t you brats just stay still!’
Isaac screamed only with his lips, but regardless, one of the cats, who had been hopping between tree roots as if catching bugs, gestured toward Isaac.
「Hey, hey, why don’t you hand over your sword? This little guy is wriggling in the dirt and just won’t be caught, goodness. I need to dig a hole.」
‘There are plenty of earthworms in the graveyard of our front yard, so catch them later and just stay still for now!’
「It’s not an earthworm?」
‘Whether it’s an earthworm, a centipede, or a spider!’
「Did you hear that? I think he raises bugs in his front yard.」
「My goodness, he has nothing else to raise that he’s raising bugs? I knew the boy was lacking in some areas, but his hobbies are truly bizarre. I wonder who will ever take him in…」
Thwack!!
Only then did the creatures fall deathly silent, as Isaac plunged his sword right into the middle of the whispering cats. Isaac’s fist, gripping the hilt of the sword driven deep into the soil, carried the momentum of cutting them all down if they uttered a single word more.
In that heavy silence,
“If you contract with me, I will give you whatever you desire, Lord Kaieon.”
Volkan’s low, sweet voice of temptation whispered once more. And after a short silence, the words Kaieon spat out followed.
“This is not enough.”
In an instant, a chill ran down Isaac’s spine, and he hunched his shoulders. What emanated from those short words was a bone-chilling bloodlust. It was as if the bloodlust that had been tightly locked away had been unleashed by the previous slaughter.
Volkan’s face turned pale, and his lips trembled slightly. It was only natural, as he was facing that terrifying bloodlust head-on. Yet, as if that very bloodlust assured him of success, he grinned, his lips stretching wide.
“――Of course. That is why I have prepared one more thing. This time, you will undoubtedly be satisfied.”
A hoarse voice, a mixture of fear and ecstasy.
The feeling of that voice scratching at his ears flickered through Isaac’s mind as unpleasant, but that was a secondary issue.
The primary issue that Isaac intuited at that moment was—
“…What is this?”
He muttered unconsciously at the unpleasant sensation transmitted through the sword embedded deep in the ground. What was writhing, impaled by the sword beneath the earth, was no mere earthworm. It was something larger… a snake… no, a python? …No, not that. Something far more gargantuan than those…
“――.”
In an instant, animal instinct moved faster than reason, and he leaped back. At that very moment, something like a pitch-black whip surged from the ground with a whoosh, curling around the spot where Isaac had been standing.
The whip, having missed the empty air, continued to crawl out of the ground, writhing violently. Isaac, who had suddenly leaped between the mage and the Prince, felt a momentary sense of ‘disaster,’ but he had no time to look at them; he was too busy dodging the whip as it repeatedly lashed through the air. The two men, who looked at Isaac in surprise, also threw themselves aside to avoid the strands of whips erupting from various points in the ground.
「He stabbed it, he stabbed it.」
「He stabbed the center head perfectly.」
「Hidetssa is quite angry.」
The chattering voices from a distance brushed past Isaac’s ears. Hidetssa… what was Hidetssa? Before he could flip through the dictionary in his head, the whip-like strands endlessly surging from beneath the ground finally revealed their full form.
Yes, that was it. He had read about it in a book once. A magical beast with a body as thick as a great tree, nine heads resembling human heads, and twenty-seven tails thicker than pythons—the monster snake Hidetssa, which hides underground and uses its tentacle-like tails to snatch prey from the surface.
“Crazy…!”
Before he could finish the curse, Isaac had to throw himself frantically to avoid three or four tails flying at him simultaneously. If he let his guard down for even a second, he would be wrapped up by a strand harder than a club or sharper than a blade, and his neck would be snapped in an instant.
He couldn’t believe that Hidetssa, which had reportedly slaughtered an entire small village when it appeared in the human world over a hundred years ago, was right before his eyes. That crazy mage, who had lightly broken the taboo against summoning a magical beast for his own selfish greed,
“Who goes there?!”
shouted at Isaac with a terrifying expression, though he had apparently thought that he shouldn’t be discovered. It was even more irritating that he was sitting inside a small barrier to keep himself safe from Hidetssa’s attacks.
Just let me survive this, and I’ll lodge a formal complaint with the Mage Guild! …But would he even be able to survive?
「What’s there to worry about? Either way, since the center head was stabbed, Hidetssa won’t escape death.」
「Well, it’s still so venomous that it could probably drag one person down to hell before its breath stops, couldn’t it?」
「I suppose so. …By the way, I heard Hidetssa meat tastes quite good?」
「They say if you grill it medium-well, the juices are just perfect.」
「Then we can just watch the show and eat the rice ca—」
“When does its breath stop?!”
While grinding his teeth at the three cats sitting peacefully behind the mage’s barrier and drooling, Isaac shouted, having found his last shred of hope in their conversation. Whatever it was, this monster was dying soon.
「Hmm? I wonder. Once the center head is gone, it usually dies within three hours even if left alone. Hey, hey, watch your back—」
The voice was so nonchalant that Isaac snapped back to his senses, but he missed the timing to dodge by a beat. Whack!—he was struck hard on the back of the head by a club-like tail, and for a moment, his vision blurred. Simultaneously, he reflexively drew his sword and swung, and with a heavy sensation, the smell of blood wafted strongly. One tail was severed and flew off.
That’s it, good boy! Hey, hurry up and start the fire, we’ve got meat, meat! As he regained consciousness to the sound of meowing cheers, Isaac swung his sword to counter other incoming tails, but this time he only cut through the air.
However, it was strange. He wondered why a magical beast terrifying enough to slaughter a village was only this much. As he glanced around, something entered his field of vision.
It was an unbelievable sight.
The nine heads and twenty-some tails sprouting from the giant monster were all surging violently toward one spot. In the center of that horrifying swarm was the Prince.
One on each limb, and another at the waist—the monster’s heads were biting into the Prince. The wounds, torn by sharp teeth and overflowing with blood, were deep enough to reveal the bone. The monster’s heads were greedily digging deeper into the wounds, and it seemed as if a human body would be swallowed whole by that giant monster in an instant.
“――.”
So that was why only one or two tails had attacked him. Because almost all the attacks were concentrated on the Prince.
If he were to run, it was now.
He might be able to escape now. He could somehow dodge a tail or two. No matter how much this was inside a barrier, if he could just get away from the area where the magical beast’s attacks directly reached, he might be able to hide until Hidetssa’s breath stopped.
Yes, that was the wise choice. Against such a monster, it made no difference whether there was one person or two. Moreover, yes, if the Prince happened to die by luck. Yes――then Isaac’s worries would vanish. The oath of the Dark Moon, the damn flint jar.
Run. Run now, Isaac. Don’t look back.
Isaac’s head was filled with his own shouting. His heart pounded so hard that his vision was dizzy. Yes, run, hurry.
“――Dammit.”
However, the moment he heard the crack of bone from the Prince’s torso, which was tightly wound by Hidetssa’s thick tail, Isaac already knew what he would do. He knew he would grip his sword and charge toward that den where heads and tails were writhing like snakes.
And it was at that very moment, as Isaac kicked off the ground and dashed forward. Their eyes met.
The Prince’s eyes, which had been drifting aimlessly in the air, suddenly turned toward Isaac. The moment those languid eyes, which had been seeing nothing, clearly saw Isaac, Isaac flinched involuntarily upon meeting those terrifyingly blue pupils. It felt as if hidden prey had been discovered by a predator――and taking advantage of that gap, a tail flew in and struck him on the back of the head once more.
“Ugh!! …Ugh, seriously, this bunch of snakes!”
Shaking his head to clear the numbness, Isaac glared at the incoming tail and swung his sword the moment it entered range. The tail, which had reached right in front of him, was sliced off, and blood splattered.
Dodging the remaining part of the tail that lashed through the air as if surprised by the attack, Isaac ran toward the Prince.
Only then did the Prince avert his gaze from Isaac and look at the monster’s head clinging to his body. Just as he seemed to casually grab the large head biting into his waist,
Rip.
With the sound of tough hide tearing, the monster’s head held in the Prince’s grip was separated from the body.
“――.”
Before an astonished Isaac, who couldn’t believe the superhuman strength he had seen with his own eyes, the Prince tossed the giant head aside. Then, he drew the sword from his waist. Holding the sword stained with sticky blood, he began the slaughter expressionlessly, without a change in his countenance.
His flawless swordsmanship sliced through the monster’s heads and tails one by one. He swung his sword, seemingly feeling no pain even as sharp teeth tore into his body more fiercely, and at times he tore the monster apart with his bare hands.
Hot steam rose from the monster’s blood covering his body. The smell of fishiness was overwhelming. In the midst of it, he was slaughtering the magical beast without any sign of haste.
Every time one of the nine heads and twenty-six tails was sliced or torn off, the human-like heads screamed horribly, and the spine-chilling sounds of hell became more wretched as the number of heads decreased.
Finally, the last one.
When all the heads and tails had been separated from the body and only the center head remained, the Prince’s entire body was covered in the magical beast’s blood. The blood dripping thickly from his body looked like black mud.
As the eye covered by a cloudy film rolled slowly, the head was already half-dead. The Prince glanced at the head, which had a hole pierced through the center of its crown, and slightly raised an eyebrow.
“No wonder its movements were sluggish and its spirit broken… was it already fatally wounded?”
Muttering this, the Prince swung his sword, and the last remaining head of the magical beast was sliced in half and fell to the ground. Thump, the heavy body collapsed and rolled on the floor. What remained was an eerie silence.
Isaac stood blankly, staring at the surreal sight.
The giant carcass of the magical beast, the sight of the Prince covered in mud-like blood, the deathly quiet forest—it all felt like it wasn’t reality. It felt as if he had fallen into a strange world.
However, the time he spent in a daze did not last long.
“I thought I could enjoy myself for a while since it was a Hidetssa.”
The Prince clicked his tongue. His gaze, looking into the air, was bored.
“Was it you who made this rare amusement so tedious?”
The moment those indifferent words fell, Isaac’s spine tingled instinctively. Simultaneously, he reflexively raised his sword and barely blocked the chilling cold flying toward his head.
Clang!—A cold metallic sound rang out, and the wrist holding the sword grew numb.
An inch above his crown. The Prince’s dark sword blade had stopped, blocked by Isaac’s sword. Mud-like blood dripped, drip, drip, onto Isaac’s forehead. It took a moment for Isaac to realize that his head had almost been split in two, and his expression changed in an instant.
“…Hmm.”
The moment he heard the Prince mutter in surprise that his sword had been blocked, a chill ran down Isaac’s spine. Immediately after, the Prince swung his sword again—this time with a much more explicit intent to attack.
Clang, ――Clang! The reason he barely blocked the Prince’s sword twice was that there was no time to dodge. His senses became sharply alert, as if he had been doused in cold water. Not only the wrist gripping the sword, but his entire body felt a tingling pain.
With just those two strikes, Isaac realized clearly.
This was a being entirely different from himself. He could never win. In fact, even as the man slowly raised his sword again before his eyes, Isaac could not take a single step from that spot.
In that profound sense of helplessness, he saw the Prince swing the sword down. Isaac squeezed out every last bit of his strength to barely block the blade, but—
Slickt.
“――.”
Without even feeling the pain of his wrist snapping, Isaac stared blankly at the hilt remaining in his hand, and then at the blade falling at his feet. The iron sword had been sliced in half instantly, like a bundle of straw.
Was this the man’s power?
“You’re usable, but not enough to handle a Hidetssa.”
The Prince’s muttering faintly brushed past his ears. Isaac’s gaze met the blue eyes staring at him, and he suddenly remembered the look he had seen moments ago. The gaze that had felt as if it were looking at some strange little bug the moment Isaac had rushed toward the Prince entangled in Hidetssa.
It was then.
Gasp, Isaac let out a low breath and grabbed his throat. Suddenly, his airway was blocked. Something invisible was strangling him.
“Who are you.”
A heavily hoarse voice came from behind. As Isaac, clutching his throat, looked back, Volkan was stepping forward from a few paces away. He belatedly noticed the dark smoke extending from the man’s hand, wrapping around his neck. …Oh no.
“Who are you. What were you doing here?!”
The voice, filled with blatant hostility and caution, contained clear murderous intent. The man had no intention of letting him go alive. It was understandable. Isaac had seen things that were inconvenient for the man to have known.
“――Royal Palace, guard, …looking for, Lord Kaieon,”
Isaac answered haltingly with a choked voice, but as expected, the pressure strangling his neck did not loosen at all; instead, it tightened further. He could see a reddish bloodlust flickering in Volkan’s eyes.
“How did you get in here? Who let you in?!”
Anxiety revealed itself in Volkan’s hoarse voice. A barrier had been cast here. That meant there was someone behind this guard—someone with mana at least equal to his own. And while guessing such a deduction, Isaac,
“…Got lost, wandering, …happened to, by chance,”
answered with the plain truth, knowing full well that the man wouldn’t believe him. But he couldn’t exactly say, ‘Actually, some high-ranking person at the Mage Guild has suspected you for a long time and told me to follow you. As it turns out, their hunch was correct!’—which was likely what the man was imagining in his head—could he, damn it.
Sure enough, Volkan didn’t seem to believe a single word of Isaac’s answer. Under Volkan’s glare, his eyes gleaming a vivid red, the smoke enveloping Isaac grew darker and tighter, choking the life out of him.
“Hmph, who do you think you’re fooling! Tell me right now, who sent you?!”
His airway was slammed shut. His face grew hot, and his vision began to blur and distort. No matter how much he clawed at his throat, it was futile. The smoke strangling him was intangible.
“Really… no… one,”
The voice he managed to stammer out didn’t even leave his constricted throat properly, swirling at the tip of his tongue before vanishing. Volkan, who had been staring at Isaac with a terrifying gaze, eventually scoffed and muttered with a chilling edge.
“So you refuse to speak. Fine, it doesn’t matter who sent you. You won’t be able to deliver a message to anyone anyway.”
The moment Volkan finished speaking, the smoke around Isaac’s neck turned as hot as fire. Simultaneously, a distinct killing intent surged forth. He was going to kill him. Right now.
As blood rushed to his head and his vision dimmed into blackness, Isaac saw Volkan chanting an incantation. He couldn’t just stay like this. He had to do something—
“Was it Volkan?”
It was then. An indifferent, slow voice drifted through the air.
For a moment, the smoke strangling Isaac’s neck seemed to loosen slightly. Volkan snapped his gaze toward the Prince, who had suddenly spoken to him, and quickly bowed his head.
“Yes, that is correct. I am Volkan.”
His answer, tinged with a somewhat exaggerated politeness and a faint glimmer of anticipation, however, became the last words he ever spoke in this world.
—Squelch.
Without any warning or omen, the Prince swung his sword, and Volkan’s head popped off and thudded onto the ground right before Isaac’s eyes.
Watching the severed head roll and stop, still wearing a servile smile on its lips, unaware of what had happened to it, Isaac didn’t even realize that the black smoke strangling his neck had vanished instantly.
“If you intended to propose a deal to me, you should have known better than to arbitrarily snatch away what my sword was aiming for.”
With a face as expressionless as his indifferent mutterings, the Prince flicked his sword a couple of times. Looking at the blade already matted with blood and oil, Isaac thought vacantly, Ah, right, come to think of it, that sword was flying toward me just a moment ago. Is it my turn now?
Having witnessed a human head fall in an instant without any sign, Isaac was half-dazed, muttering in his head, Mom, I think this is finally the end. But even as he waited obediently with his neck stretched out, there was no sign of the Prince’s sword flying toward him.
The Prince seemed to have lost all interest in someone like Isaac. He merely glanced at the carcass of the magical beast, appearing disappointed that something worth hunting had appeared only to vanish, and sheathed his blood-stained sword. His gaze, drifting toward the distant horizon as if nothing had happened, was as languid as usual.
Perhaps because the mage had died and the barrier had broken, the sounds of the forest, which had been completely silent until a moment ago, began to drift in. The singing of birds, the presence of beasts, and the distant sounds of people.
The Prince let out a long whistle. It was a call for his horse, which would be searching for its master near the edge of the barrier. Hearing that sharp sound, the thundering of hooves approached from afar. Along with it, the presence of people drew closer in a flurry.
…I guess I survived.
Feeling as though he were alive in name only, Isaac leaned on his sword like a cane and let his shoulders slump. As for the three cats, who were meowing happily and chewing on something like a piece of snake tail as if they’d hit the jackpot—let’s just pretend I didn’t see them.
“Your Highness!”
“Lord Kaieon!”
People rushed in, a step behind the horse that had immediately found its master. While relieved to have found the Prince, they were momentarily speechless, horrified by the sight of the Prince drenched in blood from head to toe, the gruesome carcasses of magical beasts strewn about, and the corpse of the mage rolling on the ground. Perhaps due to the sight or the stench of blood vibrating through the forest, a few people began to gag.
“Isaac! I wondered where you disappeared to, and here you are! …What on earth happened here?”
Chico approached after finally spotting Isaac. To the man who asked in a whisper, perhaps too afraid to speak loudly, Isaac—feeling as though he had aged a hundred years—didn’t even have the strength to speak and simply shook his head. Others seemed eager to ask Isaac about this bizarre situation, but because the Prince, who had clearly orchestrated this horrific scene, was standing right there, they could only watch his expression and hesitate to ask.
The Royal Guards and attendants who had gathered were each consumed by various worries depending on their position: I thought we’d be dragging back hunted animals, but what is this absurdity? Why would a magical beast appear so close to the Royal Palace? What on earth do we do with these spine-chilling magical beast carcasses we’ve never seen before? By the way, isn’t this dead mage a Court Mage? It looks like he was killed by a sword, so it’s ten to one the Prince killed him. The Royal Mage Guild will be screaming in protest; how will we handle this? While they were embroiled in these thoughts, the Prince hopped onto his saddle as if nothing had happened.
“Your… Your Highness, where are you…”
“Returning to the palace.”
With a short answer, the Prince pulled the reins and turned toward the palace.
The attendants of the Prince’s palace hurried to follow, and the other Royal Guards, relieved that they no longer needed to wander the forest, began preparing to clear the area. Isaac also let out a long sigh and pushed himself up from the sword he had been leaning on to help his colleagues.
Just then,
“You.”
Isaac flinched and stopped at the indifferent voice hitting the back of his head. As he hesitantly turned around, he saw the Prince staring at him from atop the horse, seemingly lost in thought. Meeting those deep blue eyes, Isaac’s heart dropped.
“…Yes?”
“Where have I seen you?”
“… … … While serving as a Royal Guard, I have seen Lord Kaieon from a distance several times, but I do not believe Lord Kaieon has ever specifically noticed me. …I occasionally stand guard at Byeokyeong Palace, so perhaps I caught your eye by chance…”
For a moment, all sorts of thoughts flashed through Isaac’s mind simultaneously, and cold sweat broke out down his spine. The Prince stared intently at Isaac as he answered with his head bowed, but as if nothing specific came to mind, he eventually turned away. He gave the reins a light flick, and the horse, which had been excited by the scent of blood, kicked off the ground as if eager to leave the spot.
With the cheerful sound of galloping hooves, the Prince’s silhouette vanished beyond the forest in an instant. Isaac, who remained frozen for a while, only collapsed onto the spot, all the strength leaving his body, after a colleague nudged him, asking, “Hey, what the hell happened?”
Hey, what is it, what happened? Once the Prince was gone, the people seemed to relax, stopping their cleanup efforts to swarm around Isaac. Isaac sat there, sprawled out like a cabbage soaked in a salt jar, and closed his eyes. Ah, he didn’t want to think about anything. Right now, he just wanted to pull a blanket over his head and sleep for a hundred years.
Amidst the crowd of people who seemed ready to grab him by the collar and shake him into revealing everything he knew, Isaac simply prayed fervently that this nightmare of a day would end and a peaceful tomorrow would arrive.
However, there was no way tomorrow would be peaceful after such an unprecedented incident. This was especially true for the sole witness to the circumstances. For the next few days, there was likely no one in the palace busier than Isaac. He could confidently say there had never been a more chaotic time in his life.
The first to seek out Isaac regarding this suspicious and dangerous situation—where the carcasses of a magical beast and a mage were found in one place—was the Royal Mage Guild.
“Tell us exactly what happened. Every blade of grass you saw, every breath you heard—do not omit a single thing.”
“Would Volkan truly have said that? Words can be interpreted differently; could it be that you are remembering something he said with a different intention, misconstruing it? After all, isn’t human memory extremely vague?”
“Can you guarantee that Volkan was the one who summoned that magical beast? Did you hear Volkan explicitly state, ‘I summoned that thing’? Why would he have done such a thing?”
“So Lord Kaieon cut down Volkan? Right, that part is fine. Regardless of the reason, Lord Kaieon killed him.”
Faced with them pressing him relentlessly, Isaac had to rack his brain a hundred times for every single answer he gave.
“Well, I suppose if you put it that way, it could be seen as such…”
“Indeed, I wonder why he did that…?”
“Yes, well, it did seem that way.”
He had spent several years as a Royal Guard, seeing and hearing the subtle power struggles within and outside the palace. He had seen many people suffer great misfortune after a single slip of the tongue.
Facing mages who pressed him for answers that would favor them, fearing that their own position might be jeopardized by the actions of a guild member, Isaac defended himself with the most vague answers possible.
Only after Isaac had broken a bucket’s worth of sweat did the mages withdraw with dissatisfied expressions. Before the sigh Isaac let out while wiping his sweat could even blend into the air, the Royal Legal Officers stormed in.
“The Mage Guild was here, wasn’t it? What conversation did you have with them?”
“In short, the Court Mage Volkan summoned the magical beast because of Prince Kaieon. Regardless of what he said with his mouth, could this not be interpreted as an intent to assassinate royalty?”
“Furthermore, when his evil deeds were on the verge of being exposed, he tried to kill you to silence you, and thus, Lord Kaieon had no choice but to eliminate him to save a human life, did he not?”
Still, having gone through it once, he had become skilled at being vague.
“This and that… just about the things I put in the report.”
“Well, I suppose if you put it that way, it could be seen as such…”
“I’m not sure… why it became like that…”
The Royal Legal Officers, who had always been on bad terms with the Mage Guild—which enjoyed something close to extralegal jurisdiction—seized this opportunity to find any leverage they could, pressing Isaac. Once again, Isaac had to rack his brain hundreds of times to defend himself.
After the Royal Legal Officers left, a lawyer sent by Grand Duke Granian visited.
“To think Volkan requested a contract with Lord Kaieon… how could someone already in a contract with the Grand Duke do such a thing? This is something that must be protested to the Mage Guild, who arranged the contract with the Grand Duke! …But before that, your testimony is surely the truth, is it not? There must be no error whatsoever. You will be able to testify for the Grand Duke in the future, won’t you?”
“Well… that is how I remember it, but as you know, human memory is quite vague and ambiguous, is it not? I trust my own memory, but as for whether it would be appropriate for me to step forward and testify…”
And after Granian’s lawyer left, the Chamberlain, who oversaw the management of Byeokyeong Palace, visited personally to hear about the situation. After that, the official in charge of capital security visited to verify the background of the magical beast’s appearance. Following that, a constant stream of visitors continued, ranging from people with political motives to scholars researching magical beasts.
Isaac had no way to avoid or run away from them and had to accept every visit, because the Royal Guard had placed him under a house confinement order. (This was why the high-ranking officials could not summon Isaac to them and had to visit him personally.)
There was no specific reason for the confinement. It was because a fierce dispute had broken out among the stakeholders—primarily the Mage Guild and the Royal Legal Officers—over Isaac’s report regarding the events at the hunting competition.
The Mage Guild, who stood to be the biggest victims of this incident, claimed that the contents of the report might be false, and went as far as suggesting it was a conspiracy and that Isaac had a backer. At this point, it had become a mudslinging match where anyone could end up taking the fall if they were caught in the wrong place.
Judging that the Royal Guard might get caught in the crossfire, the Captain of the Royal Guard issued a house confinement order, telling Isaac not to show his face for a while. Thus, Isaac was stuck at home, suffering through the visits of all sorts of people.
“Still, it’s finally dying down. It’s been about fifteen days, right? I thought the threshold of the door was going to wear away.”
Humming a tune, thinking that time is the best medicine, Hoden was preoccupied with looking in the mirror. Seeing as he had washed and groomed himself immediately upon returning late in the evening after his afternoon shift, he must have a date with his lover tonight. He had been dating passionately, and they had finally set a date to marry in three months.
“Must be nice… you look as happy as can be…”
Whether Isaac mumbled like an old man with no joy left in life or not, Hoden simply replied, “Hmm? I have been quite happy lately, hahahaha,” while trimming his mustache and styling his hair, purely enjoying himself.
“Some people are so happy, while others…”
To Isaac, who curled up and hugged his knees, thinking life is unfair, Hoden finally turned away from the mirror, seemingly satisfied with his hair, and spoke.
“Don’t say that. If you think about it, you’re the one who hit the jackpot in life. Where else would you find a guy as lucky as you? You survived that situation!”
“…”
Even if he wanted to deny it, he couldn’t. Since that was the general consensus among those around him, Isaac received no sympathy from anyone even in these turbulent times.
In that situation, it wouldn’t have been strange at all if he’d been killed by that mage, the magical beast, or Lord Kaieon—anyone. But he survived, didn’t he? If he had encountered just one of them alone, he surely would have died. It’s a miracle, a total miracle. I guess this is what they mean when they say fight fire with fire. I’ve never seen a guy this lucky, and so on and so forth.
For some reason, Isaac felt incredibly wronged and frustrated, but even he had to admit that surviving that situation was nothing short of a miracle. He should have died a hundred times over, yet he survived without a single bone broken.
“Since you were so terrifyingly lucky to save your life, if I were you, I’d just smile and brush off that amount of harassment.”
“…Still, once you’re actually going through it, you wouldn’t say that…”
“No, you would. You definitely would. Setting aside that mage and the magical beast, since they were just ‘let off,’ why on earth did Lord Kaieon spare you?”
Regarding that Prince, who was treated as more vicious than a magical beast, Isaac had come to realize it for himself after seeing that indifferent gaze up close. The Prince hadn’t saved Isaac. He had simply become too bored to even kill him.
To think there was a person in the world for whom everything was so meaningless and tedious.
Staring into the air for a moment, Isaac sighed and let his shoulders slump.
“Yeah, well, I should just consider it a relief. The visitors have finally thinned out…”
And compared to that person, my life seems tolerable enough, Isaac thought, scratching his head and looking back at Hoden.
“Are you staying out again tonight?”
“Yeah.”
“Is the wedding preparation going well?”
“Yeah, very smoothly.”
Hoden, who was humming while spraying perfume, added while looking at Isaac in the mirror.
“Even after I move out to start my new home, I’ll come visit often, so don’t be too lonely when I’m gone.”
“What kind of nonsense is this after eating so well? Just get out of here already.”
“Why are you being so shy? You’re the one who started raising three cats because you were lonely.”
“I’m not the one raising them!!”
Isaac shouted. Regardless, Hoden patted the cats, who were grooming themselves and licking their paws after devouring a piece of fish in front of the door, and then put on his shoes.
No matter how tightly he locked the doors, those creatures always managed to sneak in like ghosts. Isaac had given up after trying to catch them and throw them out the window a hundred times a day.
“My, these little guys. Aren’t you feeding them too well? Their fur is absolutely glossy.”
“It’s because the Dark Moon has come.”
“Huh? What?”
“Nothing. Just go already.”
Isaac muttered grumpily, waving his hand. Hoden glanced at Isaac while tying his shoelaces.
“You’re looking healthy since you’re resting at home, even if you keep complaining about how unfair it is or what you did wrong to be under house confinement. Your skin is practically glowing.”
Hoden swallowed the words: And that’s because the Dark Moon is almost here. It was a relief that Isaac’s physical condition was good because the Dark Moon was approaching. Even if he was tormented to the brink of death, he wouldn’t actually die.
“Are you coming back tomorrow morning then?”
“No, I’m going straight to work from Aire’s house. I’m on duty until the afternoon tomorrow, so I probably won’t be back until evening. I might even go straight back to Aire’s place tomorrow night.”
“Must be nice. Where are you stationed tomorrow?”
“……Byeokyeong Palace.”
For the first time, the smile vanished from Hoden’s face, which had been brimming with happiness as he hummed to himself. Following Hoden’s gloomy response, Isaac’s expression turned somber as well.
“Is… everything… alright there?”
“How could it not be? Well, I’ll be going now.”
Hoden shrugged, took one last look in the mirror, and waved as he left. The sound of him humming, having regained his happiness in an instant, faded away down the hallway.
Left alone in the quiet room, Isaac sat blankly and looked out the window again. Today, as always, the graves lined up in the front yard were peacefully submerged in the dim moonlight. No matter how dark the world became, that place was utterly peaceful. ……Just like Byeokyeong Palace.
Amidst this unprecedented crisis and commotion, only the Prince—the actual party involved—remained peaceful. While everyone pushed and pressured Isaac, they merely walked on eggshells around the Prince, with no one daring to ask him a single word. And that Prince was spending his days in peaceful normalcy, as if nothing had happened.
‘It’s unfair! This is an abuse of power!!’
How can a powerless person survive this sorrow? Grumbling to himself, Isaac had been trudging toward the Royal Palace gates on the day he left after being summoned by the Captain of the Royal Guard to receive his house confinement order, when he bumped right into the Prince coming from the main palace. Startled, Isaac immediately shut his mouth, unable to say a word even as the Prince passed right before his eyes, keeping his head bowed. At the same time, watching the Prince pass him by with indifference, he realized something anew.
Despite the commotion caused by the hunting competition, the Prince didn’t care at all. To the point that he didn’t even remember Isaac. To someone who was thoroughly indifferent to anything that didn’t interest him, it was a matter of no consequence.
「So, you’re saying you’re upset because he didn’t acknowledge you?」
Before he knew it, one of the Monsters had thrust its face right up to the tip of Isaac’s nose. Startled by the eyeball, as large as a lamp, pressed right against him, Isaac flailed his hands.
“You scared me! You brats, I told you not to approach me without a sound?!”
「I came walking with loud thumps? You were so lost in thought that you didn’t hear me?」
「Hey, just leave him be. Imagine how upset he must have been that the great one just walked past him; he must have been so preoccupied with that thought that he couldn’t even hear your magnificent footsteps.」
“Upset my foot, did you eat spoiled fish or something?”
「Don’t be upset. It’s almost the Dark Moon. You’ll be meeting him again soon, so why make such a pitiful face.」
“I said I’m not pitiful! You damn cats, stop reading and interpreting people’s faces however you want!”
The three Monsters, who had absolutely no intention of listening to human words, climbed onto Isaac’s bed and chattered away at will. He thought about grabbing them all by the scruff and shaking them violently, but remembering how, when he did that a few days ago, all three of them simultaneously vomited damp clumps of fur onto his arm with a ‘blegh’, he simply swallowed a sigh. Then, he turned his head completely toward the window.
The Dark Moon, which would completely vanish in a day or two, was drawing a white, nail-shaped line across the night sky. Below it, Isaac’s face was faintly reflected in the dark window glass. It was the ordinary face he always saw.
“…….”
A pitiful face. What kind of face was that? Isaac rubbed his face for no particular reason.
He wouldn’t say he was upset, but if it was ‘pitiful,’ that might be slightly accurate. No, rather than pitiful, how should he put it?
“……How did such a thing become so inconsequential to him…….”
He muttered it without realizing.
Something that most people might experience once in a lifetime—standing on the boundary between life and death while facing someone’s blatant greed—how kind of a life had he lived for such things to now seem like no big deal? How did this become so ordinary?
「See, there’s that face again.」
A cat, which had leaped onto the windowsill and sat close by, spoke. After staring intently at Isaac, it licked the tip of his nose once with its rough tongue.
Blinking, Isaac looked back at the cat and slowly rubbed his chest. This feeling, which felt slightly painful, leaked out as a bitter sigh.
“……The land of the new moon,”
「Huh?」
“Is it… better than here? Is it more peaceful and happy than the human world?”
「That depends on the person. It’s the same there as it is here. Those who are happy are happy, and those who are miserable are miserable.」
Then it isn’t the so-called ‘heaven’ that people wish for. Isaac rested his arms on his knees and asked again.
“Then if it’s the same whether you live there or here, why do you insist on wanting to go back?”
「But we belong there. This is ‘their world,’ not ‘our world.’」
Another cat leaped onto the windowsill. Perhaps because it was dark, its glass-like shimmering eyes looked even larger.
「You know too. What it’s like to live in ‘their world.’」
「You should cross over too. To the land of the new moon. That place will become ‘your world.’」
The thin purring voice of the cat licked and brushed past Isaac’s fingertips once more. Like the touch of an old man stroking an orphan’s head—pitying, pathetic—it was slightly rough and painful, yet warm at the same time.
「Yes, yes, everyone there will help you a lot. Just as we do.」
“…….”
Suddenly, he didn’t want to go. Just hearing it made him feel suffocated.
Isaac flicked the bridge of the chattering cat’s nose with his fingertip. The cat let out a sharp ‘kyaa’ and irritably licked its nose. Seeing that, his frustration subsided a bit.
After shooing away the three cats, who were huddling together to badmouth the ‘rude fellow’ and the ‘ill-mannered brat,’ Isaac opened the window. The night air drifted in, smelling of earth and grass.
……My world.
My world, our world.
What would that feel like? To live as if it were natural to belong somewhere. He didn’t know. As someone who had lived as a stranger since birth, he couldn’t imagine it. Then, a thought suddenly occurred to him.
That Prince, even though he lives among his own kind in the place where he was born, is still isolated. Without even a place to return to.
“…….”
Once again, a bitter sensation seeped into his chest. After stroking his heavy chest, he turned his gaze out the window.
In the night sky, where the moon had lost its light ahead of the Dark Moon, the stars were twinkling as if they might spill over. And below them, the sliver of the Dark Moon that remained looked even thinner than before.
The room was completely pitch-black, and not only because three giant tigers were sitting side-by-side, blocking the window.
A moonless night.
It was the Dark Moon, the time once a month when the stars filled the night sky with exceptional brilliance.
The reddish afterglow left by the sun that had dipped beyond the mountains faded, and the sky, which had flickered with reddish-purple, gradually deepened into ultramarine. Finally, the evening retreated, and night arrived.
Isaac, who had been sitting in the room without turning on the lights since sunset, was staring gloomily at the dark window. The starlight illuminated the fur of the three tigers perched by the window. Isaac looked hollowly at the jet-black tigers, whose coats flowed with a glossy sheen.
「This Dark Moon has a clearer and better energy than the last one.」
「Oh, look at this coat. It’s so smooth and glossy; would even silk be this fine?」
One of the tigers, who had been idling and praising themselves, glanced at Isaac. It would have been terrifying to be stared at by eyeballs as large as windmills, but Isaac just sat there without moving.
「Why is he staring so blankly?」
「He must be smitten. Look at those vacant eyes. Those are definitely the eyes of someone who’s fallen for me.」
「Haha, the lowly one has a good eye. If he dares to follow me blindly, smitten by my beauty, he’ll get a stern scolding.」
Isaac continued to watch the three of them silently as they joked around as usual. One of them crept closer and placed a front paw, as large as a pot lid, firmly on Isaac’s forehead.
「Is he sick? No. A witch couldn’t be sick during the Dark Moon. Why is he so quiet and unresponsive?」
“……You guys actually know you’re talking nonsense.”
「「「Nonsense!」」」
As soon as Isaac spoke, the three of them responded simultaneously as if they had been waiting, and leaped to sit beside him. Isaac squeezed and released the Firesteel in his hand, letting out a gloomy sigh.
It was the Dark Moon. The time had come. He had to go find the Prince now, and no matter how much of a circus was happening before his eyes, he couldn’t care less.
“Listen. What happens if you don’t keep a promise made upon the River of the Moon?”
「You get swallowed by the River of the Moon.」
「Why, planning to break the promise? You’d better stop.」
Isaac looked out the window. Finally, even the very faint glow of the sunset remaining on the mountain peak where the sun had fallen was vanishing. Evening had passed, it was now full night, and the time of the promise had arrived.
Swallowed by the River of the Moon. What would that feel like? A suffocating feeling, like drowning in water? Would he just die? Going to the Prince would be better than dying… wouldn’t it?
He should have struck the Firesteel quickly, but his hand wouldn’t move. While he stared intently at the red tint in the sky, the last faint trace of red finally vanished, and the deep night filled the void.
And then,
“……!”
It was immediately transmitted to his body.
Clang—a sensation like a lock shaking in his heart. A sound that shouldn’t be audible seemed to ring in his ears. The sensation from when he had sworn the oath upon the River of the Moon returned, and that sound urged Isaac to fulfill the promise immediately. Clang, clang, an ominous sensation hammering at his heart.
It felt as if the sound of rushing water was gathering from somewhere. Just as the sound of a massive, fast, and grand current seemed to crash against his ears, water began to rise from his legs.
Startled by that vivid and obvious feeling, Isaac looked down at the floor. To his eyes, nothing was visible; only the wooden floor where dust had settled. Yet, his feet felt clearly submerged in water. Splash, splash, the current rose rapidly—feet, shins, knees, thighs—swallowing Isaac.
However, before the fear of drowning in an instant could strike, he felt a chilling sensation: something in the water was relentlessly clinging and hanging onto his legs.
He knew instinctively, without being told. These were countless vengeful spirits who had been swallowed by the River of the Moon as punishment for breaking their promises and were now trapped within. Those spirits were clinging to the one about to be swallowed by the River of the Moon. Telling him, Come here too, into this pain.
Was he about to become like them? Filled only with resentment and malice—.
“――Take me to where Lord Kaieon is,”
Isaac whispered, striking the Firesteel in his hand. A small spark flew from his palm, and the tiger with eyes as large as teacups leaped into the air as if it had been waiting.
The moment the tiger’s wide-open maw approached, Isaac closed his eyes, and the sticky hands clinging to his legs were torn away. That chilling sense of liberation was brief; immediately, the air shook and pressed down on Isaac at a terrifying speed, as if his entire body were engulfed in a gale.
“Can’t… breathe,”
「That’s impossible. I’ve never heard of a witch who couldn’t cross the Magic Path.」
Isaac pleaded in fragmented breaths, but the response was nonchalant. As he barely managed to open his eyes amidst the biting wind, a pair of huge, round eyes were staring down at him from directly above. Soon, he saw the two other beasts accompanying them, and only then did the path they were traveling come into view.
In a pitch-black space with no end in sight, countless bead-like objects were scattered. Large, small, dazzling, faint. The beasts ran through those glass-bead-like things of various colors. Isaac realized that this was the center of the moonless Dark Moon sky.
“The Magic Path…….”
He had heard of it. His mother had told him when he was young. That within the Dark Moon sky, there is a path that witches travel. A path that leads anywhere in the world.
「There are several other Magic Paths besides this one, but to take you to that man according to your first wish, this path is the fastest.」
Isaac, who had been blankly staring at the stars as brilliant as beads, snapped back to his senses upon hearing those words. That’s right. This path was the road to hell. This was no time to be careless.
“Wait, I didn’t finish speaking earlier—only for tonight, only for tonight! When tonight ends, I return to my room!”
He had already learned through experience last time that this damned magic required clearly defined conditions. Even a slight slip could bring about a disaster.
「Uh, yeah, yeah.」
The answer was very half-hearted. Utterly unreliable.
The pressure of the air gradually began to dissipate. Realizing he was approaching his destination, Isaac frantically racked his brain. Wait, what else did I need to keep in mind? I’m sure there was something.
“Right, the second wish! So that my appearance today does not remain in Lord Kaieon’s memory. ……So that I do not remain in the memory of anyone I encounter tonight!”
Isaac quickly struck the Firesteel and shouted, adding the part about the servants and other people who would be in the Prince’s palace. The tiger following on the right rolled its windmill-sized eyes and said, 「I shall grant your second wish.」
The third one. What should he wish for as his third wish? While he anxiously searched his mind to see if he had missed anything, the pressure weighing down his body rapidly faded, and the glass beads scattered around lost their light.
At some point, those numerous fragments of light distorted and clumped together, and for a moment, they seemed to explode with an immense burst of light, and then—
“――.”
Isaac was in silence.
It was only after blinking for a few seconds in that quiet stillness that he found himself sitting on the floor, as if there had been no explosion, no pressure, nothing.
He realized he was sitting on a deep grayish-green carpet only after he first felt the short, plush sensation beneath his palms. As Isaac slowly raised his head, the first thing that entered his sight was the royal crest carved in relief in the center of the wall. And below it was a bed large enough for six or seven grown men to roll around on.
It was a bedroom. But a bedroom with the royal crest.
He had often seen that crest, which could only be displayed where royalty resided, while guarding the Royal Palace, but this was the first time he had seen it in a space with a bed. This was because he had never had a reason to enter a private space like a bedroom.
While blinking at the unfamiliar combination of the royal crest and the bed, Isaac shifted his gaze along the wall, which was very plain and devoid of decoration for such a room. At the end of the wall, as long as the vast room, there was a large wooden door. And beside the door was a servant, pale and trembling violently.
“……? ……!”
The reason that servant looked strangely blurry, as if there were fog in his eyes, was that this was a space blocked by magic. As proof, even though the servant’s head was turned toward Isaac, he showed no sign of recognizing him.
Yes, if that was the case, the magic of the Dark Moon night had manifested correctly, meaning the owner of this bedroom where Isaac sat was naturally—
“――.”
A thick scent of blood wafted from behind him.
The moment he realized this, Isaac froze like prey discovered by a natural enemy. He was behind him. The Prince. Likely only a few steps away from Isaac.
The thick scent of blood. A low, suppressed, yet rough growling breath. The heat of a body, burning hot, wafting all the way here.
Isaac barely managed to turn his stiff, frozen body. Only after turning halfway and twisting his head a bit further did a figure finally enter his field of vision.
A man was sitting deep in a large sofa by the window.
At first, Isaac thought he was drenched in blood. But he soon remembered that the reddish-purple hue staining him from head to toe was actually sweat. It had been the same the last time he saw him. Capillaries bursting beneath the skin from excruciating pain, bluish, swollen veins, and cold sweat mixed with blood.
Isaac couldn’t tear his eyes away from that gruesome sight, which looked more like a monster than a human. It was because he had locked eyes with that monster.
In that moment, absurdly, the thought occurred to Isaac: I should have come a little sooner.
Even while trembling with a spine-chilling fear in the face of such a terrifying appearance, a flicker of pity crossed his mind—that he should have come sooner since the man was in such agony. But that feeling lasted only an instant.
“—.”
The monster leaped from the sofa. Though it seemed incredibly slow, it was simultaneously faster than lightning; even though the image of the figure lunging toward him was vivid, Isaac had neither the time nor the courage to dodge. At the same time his heart dropped, Isaac was already sprawling on the floor. A weight like a great mountain pressed down upon him.
“……Right, this was it.”
A growl, a call that did not refer to a person, echoed in his ear. Simultaneously, a searing pain spread through his neck. Completely pinned down so that he couldn’t move a single finger, Isaac trembled, unable to even let out a scream.
He couldn’t tell which was stronger: the pain of having his skin chewed and torn alive, or the terror of blood being sucked out of his neck like a waterfall. Even though every single drop of blood bursting from his neck was flowing down the man’s throat, the smell of blood seemed to permeate the air. His vision blurred.
I won’t die. Even if I lose consciousness, I’ll wake up. He wouldn’t waste a rare pain reliever on a single-use basis. Surely, I won’t die. No matter how much he repeated this in his head, he couldn’t wash away the instinctive terror of impending death.
As his vision wavered and distorted and his consciousness gradually faded, just as the thought ‘…I might die…’ began to surface, the force sucking on his neck finally seemed to diminish. However, the mouth still clamped onto his neck did not let go, tasting the blood flowing out.
He was no longer filling a hunger; he was savoring the taste. The sensation of a tongue moving slowly over the wound was vividly transmitted. Isaac realized that the body of the Prince, lying prone atop him, was no longer rigid with pain but loosely relaxed. Thank goodness. The pain reliever must have worked. ……Then you can stop eating now; does it not taste fishy?
「I guess he didn’t have dinner. He looks like he’s going to fill his belly with blood.」
「Right? A single sip should be enough, but he’s like a kid who’s starved for three days. He’s a Prince, so why would he skip dinner?」
「Well, for a cursed kid, nothing is as sweet and fragrant as a witch’s blood, but Princes usually eat plenty of delicious things, don’t they?」
「The country must be really poor, tsk tsk.」
Even in his haze, he could hear the voices. Isaac weakly rolled his eyes to see three beasts sitting in a row by the window. He had the idle thought that the window must be quite large, seeing as three creatures the size of houses were perched there with room to spare. Perhaps thanks to those uselessly chattering words, the mouth finally released his neck.
The Prince lifted his prone body slightly. The Prince’s face entered Isaac’s view. The Prince was looking down at Isaac from about a span’s distance.
His eyes were a clear, vivid blue. Confirming that the light which had been clouded by pain was gone, Isaac let out a silent breath. I see. He’s not in pain anymore. That’s enough.
The moment he felt relieved, the Prince, who had been staring intently at Isaac, suddenly curled his lips.
“I suppose you think you’ve survived now, you witch’s child.”
The Prince reached out. His grip tightened ruthlessly around Isaac’s neck. The neck bones creaked. It felt as if he might snap them right then and there. Isaac winced as his airway was blocked, but he didn’t move. Whether he resisted or begged, it was useless to this man. He would simply do as he pleased.
Their eyes met. As if inspecting him, the blue gaze slowly scanned every corner of Isaac’s face. Finally, the gaze returned to Isaac’s eyes, which were silently meeting his.
For a moment, the Prince seemed to frown. The grip on Isaac’s neck tightened. The instant the bones creaked again, the Prince let go. However, the hand that moved to the shoulder of Isaac—who was coughing and gasping for air now that his airway was clear—was devoid of mercy this time.
“Fine, I’ll let you live. But as long as you’re breathing, there’s no reason for me to consider your well-being.”
With those words, a suffocating pain struck his shoulder with a snap. His vision went black for a moment and then brightened again. The Prince, looking down at Isaac, who lay motionless with cold sweat pouring down his spine and shallow breaths, finally stood up. Casting aside his clothes drenched in blood and sweat, he dove into a bathtub that occupied a space as wide as a standard bathroom in one corner of the vast bedroom, seemingly no longer caring about Isaac.
One of the tigers by the window leaped over and licked Isaac’s shoulder and the nape of his neck.
「I don’t know why this kid gets hurt so easily. He treats his body so recklessly.」
「Tsk tsk, what would he have done without us? He’s blessed, truly blessed.」
“…….”
If it weren’t for you lot, I wouldn’t have been in this situation in the first place, the words almost burst from Isaac’s throat, but he swallowed them for now. As the rough tongue swept over his skin a few times, the wound on his neck and the pain in his shoulder vanished as if washed away. Though his exhausted heart hadn’t recovered, at least his body was fine.
“Even dog droppings have their use as medicine…….”
As Isaac muttered to himself and sat up, the tiger—who was an expert at sensing when they were being badmouthed—let out a kaak and bristled its fur. Yes, yes, good boy, good boy. Isaac stroked the bristled fur to calm it down and rolled his shoulder. In his field of vision, he saw the Prince standing up from the tub, splashing water everywhere.
The Prince gave a brief glance at Isaac, who had frozen while rolling his shoulder, but stepped out of the tub without a word. Water dripped from his naked body. Normally, a servant would have rushed over immediately with a dry towel, but this was a space where no one other than them could enter.
While the Prince roughly dried his wet body and hair and donned a new robe, Isaac sat there, sweating profusely and remaining as quiet as a dead mouse. It would be so appreciated if he just continued to ignore me as if I weren’t here, so appreciated…….
“What magic did you use?”
A quiet voice suddenly flew toward him, and Isaac flinched, frozen in place. He didn’t move a muscle, only rolling his eyes to follow the Prince’s footsteps until he sat on the sofa.
“I am clearly looking at your face, yet it is blurry. It feels as if my mind cannot recognize it.”
Thank goodness. The wish I made in advance seems to be working properly. Isaac muttered, feeling a momentary relief.
“If we happened to run into each other outside, wouldn’t I be dragged away and thrown into the dungeon immediately?”
Only after speaking did he wonder if his tone had been too grumpy, so he glanced at the Prince, but the man didn’t seem to mind that part. Instead,
“It seems you live not far from the castle.”
Oops.
“However, I do not often go out to inspect the capital.”
Oops-a-daisy.
Isaac quickly shut his mouth. Cold sweat ran down his spine. The Prince’s gaze, looking at Isaac with narrowed eyes, felt piercing.
He must not forget. This man was not only cruel and strong but also terrifyingly intelligent. Among the brilliant achievements he had earned while stationed on the frontier, there were more than a handful of cases where he succeeded in monster subjugations deemed impossible through sheer strategy alone. It was to the point that the university’s strategy and tactics course had a separate curriculum to study the cases he had handled.
What if he digs further? Tense and desperate to answer without making a mistake, Isaac held his breath and avoided eye contact. Fortunately, the Prince didn’t seem inclined to probe further; he shifted his gaze from Isaac and pulled the cord hanging by the sofa. However, when no response came despite the bell calling the servants ringing, he looked at the servant standing by the door.
“Uh, right now, a barrier has been set up with magic, so…….”
Even without Isaac adding an explanation, the Prince seemed to understand that the servant could not hear his call, seeing the servant’s form shimmering faintly as if behind a heat haze. He lightly stroked his neck; perhaps he was thirsty.
But soon, as if that didn’t matter either, he looked down at his own hand that had been stroking his neck. Perhaps finding it fascinating that the pain had vanished despite having experienced it during the last Dark Moon, he slowly bent and straightened each finger before muttering to himself.
“It feels like a dream.”
“Unfortunately…….”
How wonderful it would be if it were a dream, the depressed Isaac muttered unconsciously and shook his head, then flinched and shut his mouth upon feeling the Prince’s gaze. Ugh. My mouth keeps speaking out of turn today. The Prince, staring at Isaac who was pressing his lips shut with his finger, spoke.
“If you can use this level of magic, rumors would likely spread, yet you’ve hidden yourself well. You must be close with a mage of quite high status.”
Such rumors had existed for a long time. Rumors that mages hide witches to obtain mana or learn magic directly from them. And those were likely not entirely baseless. When Isaac’s mother met with fellow witches in her youth, mentions of certain mages they were close with would occasionally come up. In the whirlwind of the Witch hunt that had raged for a while, some witches must have died after being betrayed by the mages they were close to, but there were surely those who hid under their protection. However, since Isaac no longer had a way to hear news of witches, he couldn’t be sure.
Isaac shook his head.
“I do not know any mages.”
“I have killed countless witches, but I have never seen one with healing as fast as yours. With that level of ability, more than one or two mages would have clung to you.”
The Prince’s gaze landed on Isaac’s scarless neck and then on his perfectly functioning shoulder. Isaac shook his head again.
“The healing isn’t my ability; it’s because these guys lick me and I get better…….”
As Isaac shifted his gaze to the tigers lined up beside him, the Prince followed the gaze and lightly arched an eyebrow.
“Those are quite convenient beasts.”
“Would you like them? You can take all three.”
As Isaac looked pleased, thinking he could bundle them as a set and offer them for free as a special deal today, the three of them simultaneously made ghastly faces and let out a 「Kaak!!」 ……These brats, they’re fine with me being the sacrifice, but they hate the idea of leaving. You damn things.
“Does the pain of the Dark Moon also vanish if those things lick you?”
It was when the Prince, lost in thought while looking at the tigers, spoke.
「Absolutely not!」
「It doesn’t vanish, it doesn’t!」
「Of course! What we treat is the physical body! The mechanism is different from the pain caused by a Curse!」
The three tigers roared in unison. The Prince stared at the three for a moment, then turned his gaze away and muttered.
“Useless things.”
「Of course we’re useless!」
「Useless indeed!」
The three, who promptly roared in unison again, seemed to feel something fishy even as they spoke; their eyes gradually turned triangular as they rolled them. When Isaac spitefully repeated, “Of course, useless indeed,” they let out a 「Kaak!!」 in a fit of temper.
He felt a tiny bit better. Ignoring the tiger that was irritably licking its front paw, Isaac spoke politely to the Prince.
“Then, since you have finished your business, may I leave now?”
The Prince, who had been slowly moving his fingers, gave Isaac a brief glance but said nothing. Understanding that the disinterested look was an approval, Isaac turned to the tigers.
“Let’s go back.”
「「「…….」」」
“Why are you just staring blankly? I said let’s go.”
「The sun hasn’t risen yet?」
“What?”
「You said you’d stay through the night?」
「If you said you’d stay through the night, you have to stay through the night, right?」
“…….”
Isaac stared blankly at the tigers. This time, the creatures looked at Isaac with mischievous eyes and grinned. ……That damn magic that follows every single word with useless precision.
What’s the difference between this and being locked in a cage with beasts until dawn? As Isaac hunched his shoulders, the Prince spoke from behind him.
“Does that mean I must also remain like this until daybreak?”
「Yup.」
“Can’t you lot watch your mouths?! ――I’m sorry. If you can just bear with it for a few more hours…….”
Isaac hurriedly rushed over, pushed the tiger’s jaw up to shut its mouth, and quickly turned to apologize to the Prince. The Prince, who had been looking down at his own hand for a moment, nodded.
“Fine. I’m not in a particularly bad mood today.”
Isaac felt relieved for now and gauged the Prince’s reaction. His expression remained unchanged, but as he said, he seemed to be in a fairly good mood. Then again, it’s only natural to feel refreshed right after escaping the horrific pain of the Dark Moon.
The Prince picked up a book he had left on the table next to the sofa. Seeing him remove a bookmark and start reading from the middle, Isaac felt relieved once more. It was the Prince’s habit to read a book until the end once he started, unless he had other plans. The book was thick, and that amount of content should be enough to last until daybreak. Now, all he had to do was sit quietly and hold his breath.
Isaac decided to sit still and wait for time to pass.
The palace was silent.
It might have been because it was the middle of the night or because the barrier filtered the sound, but Byeokyeong Palace was originally a quiet place. Since the master of the palace was that man, the servants of Byeokyeong Palace always moved quietly and inconspicuously, never knowing when they might face his wrath. That was why the royal guards, including Isaac, hated serving at Byeokyeong Palace. It was always desolate and eerie, lacking any human warmth.
Isaac slowly looked around the room. He had stood guard at Byeokyeong Palace many times, but he had never entered the bedroom.
In the room, which was as vast as a typical drawing room or hall, there was a large bed, a bathtub wide enough to fit four or five such beds, and a few small pieces of furniture like a table and chairs; there was nothing unnecessary. There was almost nothing that could be called a decoration, nor anything with bright colors. Isaac soon realized that there wasn’t even a scent. There were no oils or scented candles that were usually placed in spaces where royalty or nobles resided.
No sound to offend the ears, no object to offend the sight, no fragrance to offend the smell—there was nothing to stimulate the senses. What a dry, sterile room.
Could there be a space that described that man better than this?
Isaac quietly tapped his chest where his heart was aching for no reason. Just then,
「Why is this room so shabby? Wasn’t he a Prince?」
「Looking at him earlier, trying to fill his belly with blood like a kid who’s starved for three days, he must be living quite poorly.」
「Just how little money does the country have……, tsk tsk.」
The tigers, who had returned after prowling every corner of the bedroom, put their heads together and whispered again. Isaac thought, There is no country as wealthy and powerful as ours in this entire continent, you ignorant things, but knowing the flamboyant tastes of witches, he kept his mouth shut.