Chapter 116
“Sometimes, the people around us are the real monsters.”
As Rita, Gabriel and Koden helped the wounded heroes to get to safety and get to the first carriage to be attended to by the saintess or healers, Kalysto and Oscar, with the help of a fire mage and several knights, took on the cyclops, the Minotaur and another small group of wolves that held off the few knights who were doing their best to back them up as best they could, though they were outnumbered.
Oscar helped her up as a flare of fire attacked the cyclops, keeping him distracted.
“Are you all right?” Oscar asked her. His dark face was slightly pale as he saw how close they had both been to being crushed by the huge, heavy sledgehammer the Minotaur had thrown at them seconds before.
“Yes, thank you," she replied, observing the wounds and the blood dripping from the lower limbs of the Minotaur, who was making a great effort to get rid of the ice spikes that were piercing his badly injured legs. "Can you attack his eyes?" she suggested, needing him to move a bit away from her so she could pull out a mana stone.
Meanwhile, out of the corner of her eye, she watched the fire mage completely focused on his battle against the cyclops.
But now that there was another mage nearby, Kalysto was very careful not to show too much of her abilities so as not to stand out and arouse suspicion, though she feared that being the only ice mage who had been fighting in the back of the caravan, it was easy to think that the pile of frozen monsters were her doing, which she wasn’t supposed to be able to do with the small amount of mana they thought she had.
Fortunately, Oscar nodded his head and swiftly launched himself at the wounded Minotaur, agreeing to her plan.
Immediately, Kalysto pulled a small mana stone from her inventory.
[Does the user wish to absorb this mana crystal?]
[YES/NO]
Yes! she thought, and touched one of the frozen corpses.
[Congratulations! The user has acquired 6000 MP!]
As soon as she received the notification, she unfroze half of the ice from her area attack and turned the rest of the ice into sharp spikes with which she attacked several wolves that were nearby, then she used the remaining ice to completely destroy one of the legs of the Minotaur who lost his balance and fell to the side.
[You have gained 500 experience points!] x5
Oscar didn’t take long to take advantage of this opportunity, and after blinding the Minotaur, he attacked its neck without any mercy, dodging the beast’s claws again and again while using his great agility to continue attacking it.
“Oscar step aside for a moment!” And as soon as he did, Kalysto conjured: “Ice blades!” However, the Minotaur’s skin was too thick for her blades to penetrate, and barely caused a scratch. “Perfect aim! Ice arrows!” She tried again, and this time, her attack didn’t miss.
For the next five minutes, they both fought the Minotaur until finally the expected notification of his death reached them.
[You have gained 1500 experience points!]
Kalysto wanted to disown the few experience points she had gained despite how hard it was to kill him, but seeing that Milo had joined the other fire mage and was attacking the cyclops and other nearby monsters, engulfing them in his fire left and right, she preferred not to waste her breath and stay quiet.
“Anyone would think that with how strong you are, we could have finished sooner,” Oscar questioned her, looking at her with suspicion.
“And anyone would think that as careful and reserved as you are, you would have realized by now how inconvenient it is for us to let these people see everything we are capable of doing," she answered him in a low whisper, before the rest of the court magicians joined Milo.
It was past midnight when they finally finished annihilating all the monsters.
And while Kalysto, Oscar, Koden and Rita waited for the mages and knights to finish counting the survivors and healing them, Kalysto sat under the shade of a thick tree, which protected them from the cold night breeze.
“We should take advantage and get some sleep, who knows when we will be able to sleep again or if they will make us continue with the trip as soon as the priests finish healing the wounded,” fortunately few of the monsters they had fought had the plague, and although she could not be sure of having eliminated all of them, none of the boys seemed to be infected.
“Don’t you think we should take advantage and..." muttered Koden. But Kalysto immediately interrupted him.
“I think we are all too tired and we should rest while we wait for the others to recover. It’s no use if we stay there in their way while they need the space and all the comfort to heal them, there are already too many people there," she said, trying to alert him with her eyes and pointing slyly to a group of level 35 knights from the kingdom of Bhallys, who were giving a tour very close to them.
From several meters away, Milo’s distrustful gaze fell upon her, as did that of a woman who was one of the knights protecting the prince of the kingdom of Bhallys. And next to her was the only other ice mage among them.
The third one had died during the ambush, along with a large number of Balsahty’s knights.
“Of course, you’re right. It would be troublesome if we stood there waiting for them to be healed," Rita replied.
Oscar looked at them with a frown, realizing that something was going on among the other three heroes, but he preferred not to ask. And just as they did, he settled down on the fine grass and slept for a couple of hours.
The next morning they were attacked on the road and suffered another ambush after they traveled through several villages that had been attacked by monsters and infected by the black plague. And although the wizards of both kingdoms ended up burning two of those villages to the ground along with what was left of their population for fear that the plague would spread, in the end they decided to turn around and take a detour in order to get to the top of the mountain where the tower had sprouted.
And although Kalysto did not agree with burning those sick people, and neither did she plan to reveal her identity as a saintess, she could not help but compare the way the king of Balsahty and the fairy queen acted. For as terrifying as her boss could be, she was not willing to waste the lives of her people. The people of Balsahty, on the other hand, even with Darla’s presence, were all so afraid of catching the plague that they preferred to get rid of the sick.
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“Do these people really prefer to lock up and burn their people instead of looking for hygienic measures to control the spread of a disease?” Rita whispered to her in awe as she saw how extreme these people were. Meanwhile, a small group of knights from the kingdom of Bhallys surrounded them making sure that they could not escape, and that they did not approach the entrance of what was left of the small and dirty village whose destroyed houses were now bathed with the cries of agony and the pleas of those who were once their guests.
“It would seem so," Koden replied. His face was even paler than Rita’s. Then he turned, his despair-filled gaze meeting Kalysto’s. “Please tell me we’ll get out of here and away from these madmen,” he modulated, no sound escaping his lips so as not to alert any of the surrounding knights.
“Don’t worry," she whispered, placing a hand on his masculine shoulder in consolation. “We’ll be fine. Besides, you can always boil the water to burn off the bacteria." it was at that moment that Koden understood why she was helping him and Rita level up. And a heavy burden was lifted from his shoulders after he realized that she would not abandon them.
Rita, as well as Koden, understood the reference and nodded in agreement.
Edward, however, could not stop covering his ears with his trembling hands, wishing he could stop listening to the cries full of anguish and despair of those innocent villagers as tears flooded his face. Completely traumatized by the horrible experience and by the lack of humanity in those he had thought were only good persons who were desperate to save their people from a monstrous enemy.
The next night was spent out in the open while a group of knights from Bhallys kingdom whose levels ranged from 35 to 40 took turns making the nightly rounds, making sure everything was in order.
Ans, the female knight who had been watching over Kalysto since they were ambushed the first time while guarding the saintess and the prince, was among them.
Even when only she and Thomas were left in front of the makeshift campfire that a wizard from the other kingdom created for them, Ans would occasionally stealthily circle around, keeping an eye on what the two of them were doing.
“You mentioned a while ago that you were marked, too?” Kalysto murmured, showing him the arabesque ‘M’ stamped on her left hand, which seemed to be visible to anyone, unlike the tattoo of the contract with the fairy queen, which was apparently invisible to other humans.
“Yes! Isn’t it great? Now, even if I get lost again while walking around the city, I just have to wait for one of them to come and pick me up! You can’t imagine how scared I was when I got lost after the first time I tried to help to look for your friend Alice!” Thomas lifted the sleeve of his shirt, showing her the mark on his shoulder. Unlike her, he had a big ‘B’ tattooed on his skin.
“Didn’t it hurt?” she asked curiously. Considering that lately she spent most of her time with her ‘Mental Defense’ skill activated, there were many sensations that her brain had stopped registering.
“Applying the mark causes no pain to the target, but it takes a mage with at least two circles of mana to be able to use the spell to cast it, and only the mage who cast it can deactivate it,” Ans interrupted them.
Kalysto immediately turned away from Thomas.
“Hey Ans, you almost scared me to death!” Thomas complained, still Kalysto could not understand how he could treat people who would end up killing him in such a friendly manner. No matter that she had again hinted to him that he should read the book, Thomas had simply refused again and Kalysto could no longer try, nor give him any more information about it due to Ans’ continuous sudden appearances.
“You’d better go to sleep at once. Tomorrow we’ll leave early and you must rest!” The stealthy woman scolded them. Kalysto was sure that she must also have the skill of stealth, given how easily she appeared where she was least expected.
Which again prevented her from being able to talk to Thomas freely.
“You’re right, I’ll go to sleep. I’m sure the rest of the guys are already sound asleep.” Thomas muttered as he got up. “See you tomorrow, Kalysto! And don’t worry about Alice. I’m sure we’ll find her sooner or later!”
“Yes...see you tomorrow," she mumbled despondently.
After he left, an awkward silence settled between them, and Kalysto who had dedicated herself to stay away from the other guard went into the tent that had been assigned to her and lay down on the sheet that served as a bed for the three heroines to sleep.
But for some reason, she couldn’t sleep. Her hands itched to finish reading all the books that Caranthir had gotten for her and she was dying to go out and walk around, to get as far away from that place as she could to get rid of the unpleasant feeling that had stayed with her after seeing all those sick people being burned without any compassion.
But she was also not willing to reveal that she could save them. In fact, she did not understand why Darla had not done so and only devoted herself to healing the knights who had been in contact with the sick as a form of prevention.
Although most of them had not even been infected.
After turning several times on the thin cloth that served as a bed inside the small tent that the Balsahty wizards had set up for the heroines, separated by only two meters from the one they had prepared for the male heroes, Kalysto sat down. After verifying that her two tent mates were asleep, she began to meditate and continue her training for the creation of her first circle of mana, just as she had been practicing with Caranthir for the past few weeks during the nights before starting this journey.
And as she tried to quiet her mind and relax her muscles, the memory of the last time she saw Caranthir, one night before she helped the Duke of Lanish escape, flooded her mind.
Caranthir had left her a message through the communication sphere she used to keep inside her inventory, advising that he had already gotten all the notes that had been left after his teacher’s death. Kalysto hurried to go to his house. And there, on the dining room table, she found at least twenty books accompanied by several rolled-up scrolls. However, she noticed something strange in the elf’s compartment.
“Is that all? Are you telling me that your teacher’s lifetime of research is reduced to this?” she questioned in disbelief.
“... Her husband took almost all her things with him after she passed away... cough... He came back a few years ago and ...cough... There was very little I was able to salvage," then he began to cough. His face turned red as he put one hand to his neck and another to his chest.
It was at that moment that Kalysto, who had been about to try to help him, stopped.
”Is this absolutely all you could find of your teacher?” Another fit of coughing seized him before he could answer.
”... No...cough..." muttered the elf in the middle of another coughing fit. It was obvious that he didn’t want to be separated from them.
But Kalysto needed to get as much information as she could on the subject.
“Remember that in the contract it is stipulated that you must not lie to me, besides you need more holy water, not only to finish healing your brother, but because by selling some of it, you can get a good amount of money or resources that could help your people to settle down again,” and although Kalysto could still see the doubt in his eyes, the elf went back to his room and handed her another seven more books.
The yellowed pages and the leather with which the flaps were covered were completely different from the other books on the table. And although Kalysto felt the irremediable desire to snatch them from him and not allow him to continue touching them, she approached the table and began to look through one of them.
“I was waiting to copy them, and I was trying to translate them. I don’t think they will be of any use to you since even I can’t recognize the language they are written in. Still...” he cleared his throat. “I would like to have a copy of them, if possible.”
“We never agreed to do such a thing. But if there is something I want from you in the future that is outside our current contract, I will think about it," she said, looking at the drawing of a magic circle.
“Can you read them?” Caranthir interrupted her when he saw that her gaze followed the lines of the strange symbols in which the journals were written. And by the anxiety in his voice and the longing in his gaze, she knew it was true that he could not read them, though she could.
Still, she did not tell him. And she took the seven journals and put them away in her inventory, then took out all the holy water she had promised him in exchange for his teacher’s research.
And though the rest of that night had been spent training to create her mana circle, all the respect and admiration she had once felt for Caranthir was beginning to dissipate.
It’s a pity that I still need him to find Alice.