Chapter 23: Lost Child.

*Yona’s POV*

Once Celia fell into the hole, panic spread throughout my maids and I… Determined to not lose such a golden child, without speaking, we all rushed over to the entrance of the dungeon.

At the entrance was a group of twelve Goblins. With this many outside, this dungeon must truly be about to have a break. Not important at the moment, though. As for the Goblins blocking our way, we just quickly cut them down.

Despite me not exactly expecting this situation to happen, I did put tracking magic on the pouch that I gave to Celia. From what I could tell, she was decently deep into the dungeon.

Like it was out of spite, tons of Goblins got in our way. Honestly, this was the hardest work out that my maids and I have had in years. My maids weren’t as strong as me, but they were still strong, as well as skilled. Thus, the Goblins posed to be no more than a slight interruption to us.

After running at our full speed for an entire hour, we finally came across Celia. Luckily, we managed to reach her before anything bad could happen to her. But a Goblin was now in front of her.

All of us were fully willing to reveal ourselves and save her. Even if it would damage our reputation with Celia. But, with surprising ease, she quickly killed the Goblin. Even the little girl herself seemed to be surprised by how easy it was.

Looking at her weapon, it was the sword that I gave to her, that was held within that pouch. She was able to kill the Goblin so quickly, because of one of the special properties of that sword. Which was something that she realized as well.

With the threat handled by her, we all quickly calmed down, and went back to silently watching over her. After a while of walking, she seemed to realize the other things held within the pouch that I gave her.

Oddly, she took out a pickaxe, and then the little girl started to mine various deposits of Mana Crystals. On her first attempt, she was able to mine the Crystals out, but her pickaxe went flying behind her.

Said pickaxe had enough momentum to pierce the skull of a Goblin that was sneaking up on Celia. Not disturbed by this, she walked up to the Goblin, removed the pickaxe from its skull, and looked to be very happy with herself. Which is something that we all found to be funny.

She then went back to mining. Celia seemed very intent on collecting as many Mana Crystals as she could. Though at some point, she seemed to have lost herself.

Celia looked to be mindlessly mining, and killing anything that bothered her. Not even caring about the blood that would spill onto her. She would just kill, and then continued to mine, always stuffing more and more Mana Crystals, as well as resources from the Goblins, into her pouch.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

At first, we thought that she was just very focused on her given task. But, when I asked one of my maids who is a medic, and who can use healing magic, to check on her, we found out that she was experiencing a case of mana poisoning from the Mana Crystals.

It was most likely due to her body being so young at the moment. The only way for her to break out of this trance, is for her to go to a less mana saturated area. But for now, us just watching over her, will be okay.

Actually, it was far more than just okay… Celia went on for hours, not even stopping for a single break to eat. Or even just taking a single breather. Like she was a skilled fighter, even in a trance, she effortlessly killed all of the Goblins that came to mess with her.

This couldn’t continue much longer. If it does, she will end up dying from starvation. As such, we had come up with a plan. One of the areas that she ended up at, didn’t have many Mana Crystal deposits in it.

With this information, we waited until she had mined, and put away all of the Mana Crystals within this area, before luring ten Goblins to it. She had dealt with far more than just that number of them, but it would be enough to distract her.

And our plan worked out extremely well, with Celia regaining control of her actions. She seemed to be quite shocked by what happened. Even more so from all of the Mana Crystals that she stored within her pouch.

Her shock quickly faded away, and she went over to a pond to wash herself off. After she finished washing all of the blood off of her, she looked at her dress with curiosity. Which caused us to become interested in it as well.

As we looked at it, the dress seemed to dry itself quickly. From what I remember, that dress just showed up on her when she evolved into a human, so it must be a somewhat magical dress.

With all parties distracted, none of us realized the monster that grabbed a hold of Celia. As she tangled upside down in the air, it was clear as day that the monster was a very tricky one. A Red Squid…

As these monsters are known for their cruelty, the squid threw Celia into a wall, with a lot of force. Rather than break down and cry, Celia just looked to be extremely pissed off. And luckily, she was still alive even after sustaining that attack.

All of her weapons were not near her at all, and while she was searching a for a weapon to use against this monster, it grabbed her once more. Seemingly thinking that she was wounded enough, the Squid decided to now eat her.

Celia tried to bite off the tentacle holding her leg, but was not able to do so. Most likely due to her young body not having strong enough teeth. There clearly was no way for her to make it out of this mess. This was something that I could not allow.

In the first place, we should have realized this monster was in this area before going forward with our plan. Even if I might reveal our deception, I broke my invisibility, shot wind magic at that tentacle holding Celia, and then caught her before she fell into the water.

Celia: “Yona!?” She said with a shocked tone and expression.

Yona: “Hello, Celia. Would you require my help with this monster?” I ask with a warm tone, before sitting her back down on solid ground.

Celia: “Sure! Let me grabbed my sword real quick!” She replied before running over to her weapon.

Luckily, my maids did not reveal themselves, and trusted me to save Celia. So I can probably trick her once more. But that is for later, for now, we have to deal with this monster. I have never fought this kind of monster before, so it might be a challenge…