Chapter 76………………………………………..
The culprit behind the sudden incident that occurred just before the signal flare must be here.
For now, saving the children was the priority, so he would leave, but he had no intention of standing idly by regarding the cause of this suspicious chain of events.
“Everyone present here—if you are not back after saving the children, you will be considered the culprit, and I will chase you to the end.”
Leaving a sharp warning, Teodor led the knights into the forest.
To rescue the children who couldn’t escape immediately or were trapped inside for some reason.
Lin handed Paibi the signal flare and the magical tool she had prepared and urged him to leave the forest.
Lin’s face was tense when she returned, and the smoke rising into the sky looked ominous, so Paibi wanted to follow Lin into the forest.
“You… can handle monsters like the one from earlier?”
Accepting Kaidan’s cold remark that he would only be a burden, Paibi cast a worried glance at Lin and followed her instructions.
Kwa-ga-ga-gang! Kuuung—!
Kaidan, whose supernatural abilities hadn’t yet manifested, was using a power Lin had never seen before to crush monsters with unstoppable force—but that couldn’t alarm Lin now.
The words Kaidan had spoken earlier kept haunting Lin’s mind with a dark sense of foreboding.
“Uncle… is going to lose his eye?”
She muttered to herself, imagining the pain, and shivered involuntarily.
“Lin, it’s okay. Uncle is fine, see?”
In that instant, the image of Uncle Teo, casually patting his head with one eye covered by a patch, flashed vividly in her mind.
He had always shown strength in front of her, but imagining him alone in his room, swallowing the pain while covering the empty socket of his eye, made her chest ache painfully.
Feeling as if her heart was being squeezed tightly, Lin hunched her shoulders.
Flap-flap.
Lin shook her head vigorously, opening her eyes with determination.
“I absolutely can’t let this happen. I have to stop Uncle from getting hurt.”
Kaidan had said he came here for that reason.
She didn’t know how Kaidan could know that such a thing would happen, but that didn’t matter right now.
With no time to think about anything else, Lin pressed on, running fast.
Since her animal form was advantageous for speed, both she and Kaidan transformed—she into a kirin, he into a black tiger—and ran.
Following Kaidan to the high ground he had scouted, Lin had only one thought: preventing the great accident about to befall her uncle.
“……”
Glancing back, Kaidan saw Lin silently keeping up, her slender legs moving swiftly.
“Was it right to tell her?”
Seeing Lin’s unusually pale, expressionless face, Kaidan also frowned, deep in thought.
Recalling the memory, during the last Pegasus hunting festival, Acting Head Teodor had been severely injured while rescuing children.
Specifically, he lost one eye and suffered a mortal wound across his upper body.
His abdomen, barely held together by skin, had fortunately not spilled his organs.
The doctor who examined him then said that only because he was a durable bear beast-person did he survive; an ordinary beast-person would have died instantly.
After waking from a coma, Teodor had to spend a long recovery period, and this opened the door for other factions within the Pegasus tribe—the Elders—to exploit the absence of the acting head.
“They blamed the misfortune of the sudden monster flood in the hunting forest on the fact that the acting head, not the clan, was running the festival.”
Not only that, when Teodor’s grievous injury didn’t heal quickly, they spread rumors that the mutant heir brought misfortune.
At the time, Lin didn’t understand why such rumors circulated, but looking back, it was clear who benefited.
With the acting head weakened by injury, the Elders tried to control the sole heir by filling them with guilt.
It was definitely the scheme of old traditionalists obsessed with pure Pegasus bloodlines.
“Those bastards… if they pull that again this time, just wait.”
Remembering the rumor about the mutant heir bringing misfortune, Kaidan’s forehead veins stood out with tension.
“Do you think we can find him before Uncle gets hurt?”
“…It happened while he was facing the biggest monster. Once the fight starts, we’ll know immediately.”
Hearing Lin’s anxious voice, Kaidan didn’t make up words; he only told what he could confirm.
“I see…”
Lin’s voice fell, realizing Kaidan’s words implied that he couldn’t guarantee preventing the injury.
“…Damn it! Why is this ability growing so slowly?”
Kaidan bit his lip, frustrated that his current strength hadn’t reached his prime.
For someone his age, even controlling abilities perfectly would be impressive, but having defeated several monsters alone, Kaidan felt guilty thinking that way.
“……”
After running in heavy silence,
“There it is!”
Arriving at the high ground he had scouted, Kaidan barked shortly to get Lin’s attention.
Following the black tiger’s head gesture, Lin’s deer-like eyes widened as she spotted the spot.
Tap-tap! As Kaidan climbed a tree effortlessly with his large black tiger paws, Lin flapped her cloud wings and reached the top.
Just as Kaidan said, they could see the entire forest from the vantage point.
Lin blinked nervously, scanning her surroundings.
Explosions resounded everywhere—likely battles between monsters like the ones seen earlier.
“Where is Uncle Teo?”
One small relief: according to Kaidan, there had been no fatalities in this unexpected monster flood.
Even the Pegasus children in the forest had returned safely with minor injuries.
Of course, several knights protecting them were injured.
Among them, the worst hurt was Teodor.
“Uncle…”
Golden light seemed to sink like sand in Lin’s eyes.
“Where should I look…”
Her pupils narrowed, like a golden whirlpool, in concentration.
Light began to shine from the still-small horn covered in a multicolored mane.
“Save me! Hic! Please save me!”
“I-I heard… that thorned horn… the monster that devoured half the territory!”
“……”
Pain and the other children screamed, tearful.
In front of them stood a massive monster—and Teodor.
“!”
Though her eyes had never closed, Lin suddenly felt them opening.
She turned swiftly in the direction she was certain of.
“Lin?”
“That way.”
Kaidan blinked and followed her gaze.
In the distance, a colossal monster rose, taller than the surrounding trees.
“Thorned Horn! That’s the one that hurt the acting head!”
“!”
“Go!”
Before Teodor even finished speaking, Lin shot forward like an arrow.
The black tiger descended hastily from the trees and ran on the ground, watching Lin fly through the sky.
For Kaidan, moving through the forest as a tiger while Lin flew unobstructed seemed fast—but Lin’s perception was different.
“Too slow! At this rate…!”
Seeing the monster still far away, Lin felt extreme urgency.
Unlike other Pegasi who used wind abilities to support their wings, Lin had to cut through air resistance solely with her feeble cloud wings.
