Chapter 62
The “circumstances” I wanted to explain were simply: “I heard Rixion Luhanes collapsed, so I went to check on him because I was worried.”
But if I said that honestly, anyone would think I had feelings for Rixion Luhanes.
And that was something I’d rather die than admit.
“Back then… I should have just left him.”
While I was struggling to come up with another excuse, I heard Jade muttering something under his breath.
“Huh? What did you just say?”
I stepped toward Jade, who lowered his head as if avoiding my gaze. At the same time, he lifted his head, as if he were about to say something to me.
“Aaah!”
A scream tore through the air—high, sharp, and full of fear.
And as if that scream had been a cue, more screams erupted from every direction.
What?
An unpleasant sense of déjà vu washed over me.
Just as I was anxiously glancing around to figure out what was happening, a man stumbled out from between the fleeing crowd.
Pushed by the panicked rush of people, he collapsed right in front of Jade and me.
Through his tattered, worn-out clothes, I could see his gaunt body.
And on his skin—
Red blotches.
Kyaaaah!
The crowd’s screams grew louder as people scrambled away from him. Jade and I were the only ones standing still, staring blankly at the man.
To me, this scene wasn’t unfamiliar at all.
Not long ago, I had faced the exact same situation.
With trembling eyes, I looked down at the man.
Sensing my gaze, the man lifted his head.
Through his filthy, unkempt hair, his eyes—bloodshot red—were visible.
Reflexively, I stepped back.
At the same moment, the man grabbed Jade’s robe with desperate force.
“Save… please save me…”
Clinging to Jade’s robe, the man begged.
Jade’s white robe was crushed in the man’s grasp, stained with dirt.
And at that moment, I saw a flicker of contempt pass through Jade’s ashen-gray eyes.
“Miss.”
Lady Rachel rushed over and stood protectively in front of me.
She must have pushed through the panicked crowd, because her usually neat hair was disheveled.
I glanced blankly at Lady Rachel before looking back down at the man covered in red spots.
“Please… please save me…”
He was now crying openly as he begged.
“My wife, my child—they are very sick. Please… save—”
Thud!
A large hand seized him and yanked him away from Jade.
The man was nearly thrown aside, collapsing weakly onto the ground. The surrounding crowd screamed again.
“My apologies for being late. People suddenly surged all at once.”
Jade’s personal knight—clearly a paladin of the Holy Nation—hurried forward to block Jade from the man.
His expression was vicious, as if he were ready to kill the man he had just thrown.
How dare a lowly human from the Exclusion Zone lay a hand on a priest?
The murmurs grew louder.
The man groaned in pain, unable even to lift his head.
I couldn’t move.
I just stood there, staring at him.
I neither ran away nor stepped forward to help him.
I froze.
“Step aside!”
The city guards rushed in, closing around the man.
They had covered their mouths and noses with cloth, likely having been warned beforehand.
“Damn it, how did you crawl out of there?”
Two guards grabbed his arms like they were touching something filthy.
The man’s limp body dangled like a broken puppet as they forced him upright.
“Move him back to the Exclusion Zone immediately!”
“N–No, wait!”
A woman suddenly pushed her way forward, shouting.
She covered half her face with her sleeve as she pointed at the man with a trembling hand.
“He’s not from the Exclusion Zone! He lives in District 4! I’ve seen him before—he always walks with his wife and daughter!”
District 4 was the closest area to the Exclusion Zone.
The fact that he wasn’t from the Exclusion Zone caused the commotion to escalate even further.
So… a Red Rat patient has already appeared outside the Exclusion Zone.
Fear began spreading visibly among the crowd.
People who had formed a circle around the scene suddenly screamed and ran.
One person slammed into my shoulder while fleeing.
Still dazed, I stumbled backward and nearly fell.
“Liz, are you okay?”
“Miss, are you hurt?”
Thankfully, Jade and Lady Rachel caught me before I fell.
My shoulder throbbed sharply.
But even as the pain registered, I could only stare blankly at the chaotic scene before me.
The last time I faced this exact situation, I hadn’t hesitated.
My body had moved before I even had time to think.
I had saved Rowin and Lynn, who had contracted the Red Rat disease.
And I had never once regretted it.
But what came after?
Because of my irresponsible actions, my family—and the merchant guild my brother had built with blood and sweat—became the target of rumors and slander.
Thanks to Rixion Luhanes and Empress Serena, those malicious rumors had barely been suppressed.
But behind my back, people still whispered criticism about my recklessness.
If I did the same thing again now…
“Liz.”
Jade’s voice called to me—firm, tense.
Just as I turned toward him, he grabbed my arm and began pulling me away.
Allowing myself to be dragged, I looked back at the man being taken by the guards.
He still hung unconscious, limp.
I had no way of knowing whether the fall had injured him, or whether it was because of the Red Rat infection.
As I watched him grow smaller in the distance, I remembered the desperate words he had choked out while clinging to Jade.
“Please… save me…”
His face had been more desperate than anyone I had ever seen.
“My wife, my child—they are very sick…”
His eyes had held unbearable fear—not for himself, but for his wife and child.
Why had a man who wasn’t from the Exclusion Zone contracted the Red Rat?
Why had he appeared in front of me?
Just like with Rowin and Lynn—
as if fate was testing me again in place of Ji Eun‑ha.
Among all the things I didn’t know, one thing was certain:
The man was desperately begging for help.
And I had the power to save him.
To save his wife and child.
It should have been Ji Eun‑ha’s role.
By now, in the original story, she should have descended to this world and begun healing the infected.
But she never appeared.
There was no Saintess to save the Exclusion Zone’s dying people.
These people were being sacrificed—forced to wait for death because of the filthy political games of the Holy Nation.
Frustration surged in me.
I clenched my teeth, planted my feet, and tore my arm out of Jade’s grip.
Startled by my forceful movement, he turned to me.
“Liz, we need to get out of here immediately.”
He spoke gently, trying to soothe me.
I could hear his worry—his fear for me because I had been in close contact with the infected man.
My heart pounded painfully.
Inside me, two sides clashed:
the “foolish hero complex” the gossip magazines mocked…
and the “wise coward” who didn’t want to trouble my brother ever again.
I could reveal my power right now and heal every infected person.
I could save that crying man’s wife and child.
But afterward?
From that moment on, I would be forced into the role of the heroine of The Saintess of Erendel.
It was horrifying.
I would be worshipped as a saintess, dragged into the political war between the Empire and the Holy Nation, threatened countless times, and eventually, I might lose my only chance to return to my original world.
“Be careful of the two stars approaching you,”
the fortune‑telling gypsy woman had said.
“You may lose what you truly desire.”
I still didn’t know what those “two stars” were.
But I knew this much:
What I truly desired…
was to return to my original world.
And if she was warning me that I might lose that—
Then that was absolutely unacceptable.
Just because Ji Eun‑ha hasn’t appeared doesn’t mean my path back home has disappeared.
