Chapter 50
―“L-Lateiner…? B-Blood…!”
―“What… what should I do? Huh? How can I help?”
―“Should we ask the soldiers for help?”
Aibin did her best to save him.
Even Theodore could not deny the undeniable fact.
In the blurred, flickering haze of consciousness, he clung to her like a lifeline, desperate. He even craved her lips, as if they were some kind of breathing apparatus that could clear his blocked airway…
All of it.
It was all true.
If he confessed that what truly brought him back to his senses wasn’t the bitter liquid that had entered his mouth, but the woman’s scent that had come so close… what kind of expression would she make now?
“Thank you.”
Aibin, who had been nervously rolling her eyes, suddenly turned her sky-blue eyes toward him when she heard his voice.
Her expression was unfamiliar, as if she had just heard some very strange sound.
“Huh?”
Those few short words seemed to pierce her heart.
Did Theodore just really thank me?
As Aibin looked at him with a puzzled expression, his low, monotone voice came again:
“…Thank you for helping me.”
Aibin’s lips moved, searching for words, but she couldn’t say anything.
It was true—she had helped him.
She had exhausted herself dragging him down to the basement of the food storage with all her might.
Being thanked in this situation might seem natural enough, but…
‘He’s thanking me so sincerely… it’s strange.’
Based on what she had experienced so far, she would have expected Theodore to scold her immediately upon regaining consciousness, asking what that liquid in his mouth was.
Or, as Obok had said, maybe he’d try to use it to get rid of her this time—poison or whatever—and act like the devil he is.
‘Was Theodore always such an unpredictable character?’
Aibin stared into the jet-black eyes of the man looking at her and thought to herself.
“Why…?”
“Are you asking if I helped you?”
Theodore, hesitating as he started to speak, paused for a moment.
It seemed as if he was thinking, How did she know I was going to say that?
“I just felt I had to. And just so you know, I’m not saying this to put you in debt or use it against you later.”
Use.
At that word, Theodore’s expression darkened.
It felt as if some viscous, blood-like liquid was spreading deep inside him like ink.
―“Could you help this poor little bird, Ned?”
―“Please repay the choice of God by becoming a worthy holy knight, Theodore. That is the only way to honor the grace God has given you.”
Those around him always needed his abilities.
To him, that was an opportunity.
An opportunity to become a special child rather than a cursed one.
An opportunity to belong somewhere rather than being an orphan with no one.
An opportunity to be a human rather than a monster who devours parents.
“Am I… not needed?”
With a slightly heavy heart, Theodore asked Aibin.
This time, it was Aibin who was caught off guard.
“Needed…?”
“For anything.”
“……”
“I’m not such a useless pawn.”
Many people want to use me in one way or another, Aibin.
The fact that he could become the people’s idol and earn the love of the faithful was because of his usefulness.
He could heal, sometimes save lives, and had the strength and intellect to lead a war to victory.
Thanks to the Goddess of Light, his curse became something special… a kind of absolution.
So he always had to remember gratitude, giving his body, mind, and faith completely…
“Do you need some special reason to save a sick person?”
Theodore’s gaze deepened as he looked at her.
He lowered his eyes slowly, as if savoring her words.
Like stars crossing the deep night sky, her words seemed to cut straight through the center of his dark heart.
Purpose.
Could this woman really be a dangerous, poisonous woman?
Theodore felt afraid.
Afraid that she might make him feel something he had avoided all his life.
Afraid that his beliefs and foundations, which had sustained him for twenty years, might shake entirely.
Afraid that she might suddenly create a strange ripple in his black-and-white life…
So, she had to be a devil.
Only then could all this chaos stop.
“Um, I have a question.”
Aibin’s voice cut through his deep thoughts.
Like flat stones skimming over a pond, thwack, thwack, her voice was harmless, containing nothing but curiosity.
“Was almost dying like this… related to Saint Pavela using her holy power…?”
“Stop.”
He cut her words off sharply, more cold than ever, and suddenly stood up.
Though his body was still weak and he staggered, he did not collapse again.
“Let’s go outside now.”
“But my body isn’t—”
Aibin instinctively tried to support him as she followed, but she couldn’t get too close.
His cold gauntlet stopped her at a certain distance.
“I can walk on my own.”
His voice was firm.
“You lead. I’ll follow behind.”
When Aibin stepped out with Theodore into the collapsed auditorium courtyard, the situation was already partially under control.
The gate from which the mimics had poured out had disappeared, and except for a few casualties, all the noble patrons and children seemed unharmed.
“……”
Yet for some reason, people hadn’t scattered and stood tensely in place.
As wet snow began to fall with the wind, Aibin carefully looked around after reaching the rear of the group.
“Brothers…!”
She ran toward the triplets, calling out happily, and noble eyes immediately fell on her.
“Where were you, squirrel?!”
“Was our little one hurt anywhere?”
“Did you hide well?”
The triplets, who had been in a tense standoff with the saint, greeted their youngest as if nothing had happened, bright like their usual big dogs.
While the twins were welcoming Aibin, Theodore staggered behind.
Still recovering, he clutched his chest near the heart.
“Theodore.”
The saint’s eyebrows twitched slightly at the sight of him.
“Saint.”
Theodore knelt on one knee as if about to collapse in front of her.
Pavela looked at him with a strange, scrutinizing gaze.
She didn’t seem pleased that the holy knight, who had remained absent during the battle, suddenly appeared at the scene exhausted.
It was a bad omen.
People would likely question this sudden return, making him an easy target.
“……I think we should leave it here for today.”
Before Aibin and Theodore arrived, the saint had been arguing with the Kinzelos, the triplets, using all kinds of doctrines and logic. But now, she seemed to want to wrap up the situation.
“Sir Lateiner’s condition seems serious, so I will return to the capital with him first.”
“Yes, Saint.”
As one of her guard knights responded, golden dust enveloped both the saint and Theodore in light.
The moment the spatial-transfer powder scattered, the two vanished from the courtyard in a blink.
“What? Just leaving like that? After all that commotion?”
The triplets looked annoyed, feeling like they had been left behind.
Only then did the patrons begin to murmur.
“Good heavens, by the god Flula…”
Since the saint had been trying to blame the triplets for the gate incident, the people reacted in various ways.
Some agreed with her and cast suspicious glances at the Kinzelos. Especially those deeply devoted to the Flula faith eagerly took the opportunity to comment, despite lacking evidence.
“Come to think of it, did the Kinzelos participate in other annual orphanage events besides this one?”
“I heard the triplets beat up the head cook in the kitchen for no reason…”
“Of course, since Saint Pavela herself pointed them out…”
As public opinion began to turn against the Kinzelos, a young girl hiding among the orphans ran up to Aibin, clutching her skirt.
“Miss Aibin!”
“Rena! You’re safe! Thank goodness…”
Aibin held the girl in her arms, patting her small back.
―“Some friends, like Arirang, are missing…”
Rena had been trying to tell Aibin what had happened in the dorm before the gate incident outside the auditorium.
“Then… now that the scary monsters are gone, we can go find Arirang and the others again, right?”
