Chapter 58
“Wooooah! Betin, amazing!”
After defeating the Orc, the commander praised him for the first time since joining.
“Ho, is this really the youngest who almost died to the giant spider? Not bad at all.”
Even Davien, stingy with praise, gave a small nod. He glanced at Kaeh, who was smiling and waving at him.
‘C-could it be… at me?’
Betin stared in disbelief. Their eyes met, and she smiled gently.
‘Does she… like me?’
Should I confess?
Betin’s heart began pounding again.
Tonight, there was a party for the Helderios First Knight Order—both a gathering and a welcome for newcomers. Of course, Healer Kaeh would attend. Betin wanted to use a little courage, maybe even aided by some drink, to confess his feelings.
Who knows? Maybe she felt the same way.
In Betin’s imagination, she already stood beside him in a wedding dress.
He eagerly hoped the party would start soon.
The party was at a large nearby tavern. Inside, Betin saw Kaeh sipping wine next to Davien.
He wanted to sit across from her, but that seat was taken by his superior, Davien. He didn’t have the courage to drink alongside Helderios’ princess, so he quickly moved to sit with his mentor, where he could at least see Kaeh.
Senior knights, already a bit drunk, welcomed him and kept pouring him more wine.
One glass became two, two became three, and soon he had ten. He started feeling lightheaded, his face warming.
He glanced at Kaeh’s table. She laughed at something Davien said, and then their eyes met. She smiled.
Suddenly, an unknown courage surged through him. Now, he felt like he could sit next to Helderios’ princess and even confess to Kaeh.
Betin stood up abruptly.
“Huh? Betin, youngest! Where are you going?”
He walked straight to Kaeh’s table.
“Eh, Betin!”
Davien shouted loudly, startling him. Even tipsy, Davien’s voice was terrifying. Betin froze.
Just as he was about to step back, Davien slurred and said:
“Isn’t this our youngest? My little one! The tiny kid who couldn’t even kill a spider, now defeated an Orc!”
Davien was very drunk, tongue twisted, but he welcomed Betin warmly. Kaeh giggled at the sight, and Betin’s courage returned.
He knelt before Kaeh and looked at her softly. Kaeh stared at him with an unreadable expression. The noisy tavern gradually went quiet.
“Hey… what are you doing there?”
His mentor’s voice called from afar, trying to stop him.
He ignored it, closed his eyes tightly, and shouted:
“Kaeh, I fell in love at first sight! Please go out with me!”
Instantly, silence fell.
“Puh… puht.”
Puh? Was that a laugh because she liked his confession?
Betin opened his eyes slightly and saw Kaeh looking embarrassed, glancing nervously toward the entrance.
…Did I fail? Then who was laughing?
“Puhahaha!”
The loud laughter came from Davien.
“Ahahaha! Oh my… my little one…”
Davien laughed, banging the table.
At that moment, a chilling aura covered Betin.
“What did you just say?”
From the entrance, a menacing presence made him tremble. Betin turned to see his superior, and the future ruler of Helderios, standing with a red aura swirling around him.
The tavern grew even quieter.
“Hu… huuh… I… I can’t…”
Everyone else laughed with tears in their eyes—except Davien.
For several days now, the First Knight Order had been tense.
It all started when the newest recruit confessed during the party.
And the source of that tension was Lloyd.
The top superior, who should have been in his office working, suddenly stayed in the knight order, starting work there. Now he even attended Davien’s training sessions.
That wouldn’t have been a problem…
The problem was…
“Hey, Lloyd! Tone it down! The monsters keep running away because of your killing aura, and we can’t train!”
Davien shouted from the training ground, glaring at Lloyd.
Yes. Whether it was jealousy or something else, Lloyd had been glaring at the knights constantly since the party.
Now was monster training time. Today’s session, led by Davien, used Kobolds specially brought from the magic tower to improve the knights’ skills.
These Kobolds from the Ascenta Dungeon were fierce, cruel, and very dangerous—but no one tried to stop them. Under Davien’s recent guidance, the knights had grown stronger quickly. The training was effective.
Because these were monsters from a deadly dungeon, the knights were extremely tense. Adding Lloyd’s gaze made it even worse.
But when the seal was lifted, things changed. The Kobolds, supposed to attack fiercely, froze in fear at Lloyd’s presence and ran away.
It was like a level 1 monster running away terrified from a level 9999 veteran.
“C-catch the Kobolds!”
Davien shouted at the fleeing monsters, but the knights were too busy chasing them to train. The training ground became chaos.
Watching carefully, Lloyd drew a huge sword from an extra-dimensional space and slammed it onto the training ground. Black electricity spread across the field, targeting only the Kobolds. They were all electrocuted, some even burned to death.
Davien tore at his hair and shouted:
“You can’t kill them! I saved them to train my knights, and now you…!”
Watching the dying Kobolds, Davien yelled in despair.
“All this effort in bringing them from the magic tower, and you ruin it!”
Seeing the dying Kobolds, Davien glared at Lloyd. Lloyd hesitated, then quietly replied:
“…Sorry. I couldn’t control my power.”
The knights fell silent. Lloyd had accidentally killed them all because he couldn’t control his strength.
He had selectively eliminated only the monsters, which required immense skill.
Among the tense scene, Betin quietly watched, feeling sorry for the young knight.
Poor kid… just drank too much and ended up with the wrong superior.
Then came the applause.
“Wow, Lloyd, amazing.”
Looking toward the sound, Yutias had appeared beside Davien.
Instead of his usual mage robes, he wore a flashy suit popular in the capital. Tall, slender, sky-blue hair, and handsome as the male protagonist of a novel. His beauty shone even more in the suit.
Even if crazy, his appearance was perfect.
Yutias winked at me cheekily. Seeing this, Lloyd growled.
“I heard there’s a rat roaming around the duke’s house like it’s home. Was that you?”
Lloyd, who had been standing on a bench, appeared next to Yutias.
His large shadow loomed over Yutias.
“Why do you keep hanging around?”
Lloyd asked quietly. Yutias grinned and clicked his fingers. A parchment fell, fluttering to Davien.
“Wow, the young duke is terrifying. I’m just here for official business?”
Davien frowned and opened the neatly folded parchment.
[Emergency Report. Monster wave observed in the holy site ‘White Tree Forest’ of the Helderios Northern Territory. Request troops.]
Monster waves were rare phenomena across the continent.
Usually, monsters multiply abnormally, harming people, or appear from cracks in demonic barriers, like in the Dark Forest holy site.
But a monster wave quickly multiplies monsters at the source, causing mass casualties.
They mostly occur in northern or northwestern territories with strong magical energy, rarely in other regions. In the southern region, including Zeronia where I lived, it had never happened before; I had only read about it in newspapers.
“A monster wave isn’t urgent, is it?”
I asked worriedly. Davien replied casually:
“This? This is easy to handle.”
I forgot—they’re overpowered in this world.
“Strange. Didn’t we just handle a monster wave near the territory recently? And the holy site never had a wave before…”
Lloyd frowned. Davien looked uneasy.
“Right. Usually it takes time before a new wave appears. But this is happening too soon.”
