Kays Translations

Chapter 40: The Source of Her Strength and a Change of Destination

“We should need about two more days to reach the foot of the mountain,” Fiona said after a brief silence.

“Yes. At this pace, we should reach the former Given territory in that time. Though now that I think about it, perhaps we should not still call it Viscount Given’s territory.”

Given was gone. After the incident, disgrace had been inevitable, but he had taken his own life before judgment could be carried out.

“The land is under the Crown’s administration now,” Fiona said. “But for convenience, we can continue calling it the Given territory.”

Ren scratched his cheek. Fiona’s eyes narrowed in amusement.

She showed remarkably little despair despite their circumstances.

“You are strong, Fiona.”

“What brought that on?”

“I may be mistaken, but even during the attack on the bridge, you barely showed any fear.”

“It is for the same reason I mentioned before.”

Fiona looked up at the star-filled sky. The campfire illuminated her profile, and her breath turned white in the night air.

“If the person I was a little more than a year ago could see this view, she would say it was an impossible dream.”

“A little more than a year ago?”

“I was gravely ill. I had never gone beyond my room except on a few rare occasions.”

She had known the sky only through a window and had never understood how vast the world outside truly was.

“The people at the fort suffered symptoms similar to Vessel Fracture,” she continued. “I had the genuine illness. Mine was so severe that healers, apothecaries, and magic-tool craftsmen all said there was no hope.”

(So that is why she wore the Demon-Destroying Necklace.)

One of the Seven Heroes had originally created the necklace to conceal the presence of powerful companions. By suppressing their immense mana, it could mislead the Demon King and other enemies. The Ignat family had evidently used that same function to restrain Fiona’s overwhelming mana and reduce the damage to her body.

“Is it safe to tell me this?” Ren asked.

“Yes. I believe I can tell you, Adventurer.”

She continued without hesitation.

“My entire world was one room. My father filled it with healing magic tools and potions. There were shelves of books I could read on days when I felt well, and a chair I could not sit in without someone helping me.”

Most days, even raising herself in bed, drinking, or eating without assistance was beyond her. Those small acts were possible only when her condition happened to improve.

Then, one day, everything changed.

“My father and the servants behaved differently. I thought they had learned that I had very little time left. But that was not the reason.”

While Fiona slept, she had unknowingly been given a medicine produced from Thief Wolfen materials. Ulysses had concealed the plan because he did not want to give his daughter hope that might be cruelly taken away.

“When I opened my eyes, my first thought was relief that I was still alive. Then I wondered whether I might be able to sit up alone that day, or eat without help. I prayed for little things like that.”

She smiled at the memory.

“Then I realized my body felt different.”

For the first time, she felt light. The colors around her seemed so vivid that her previous life might as well have been lived in black and white.

“I could not feel any pain. I tried to stand without assistance, fell from the bed, and struck my head hard enough to raise a bump. But that was all.”

Her voice trembled with quiet emotion.

“I lay on the carpet, unable to stand properly, and cried from happiness for the first time in my life.”

Ren saw the strength in her eyes as he listened.

“So I am not afraid now,” Fiona said. “Compared with those days, this hardship is nothing.”

Her gaze met his, making the stars behind her seem dull by comparison.

(In the original story, she was supposed to die.)

Without Ren’s actions, Fiona would not have survived. The intensity with which she lived in the present made her courage entirely understandable.

“I’m sorry. That could not have been easy to speak about.”

“It is all behind me now. And besides…”

Fiona lowered her gaze to her cup.

“When I think about what I will do after we leave the mountains, I can keep going.”

The last words were too quiet for Ren to catch, but she did not repeat them.

“I will make certain we descend safely,” he said. “I promise I will get you out of the Baldor Mountains.”

“You really are kind… just as I was told.”

Her whisper was too soft for him to hear. She gave a small laugh—then suddenly pressed a hand to her chest.

“Fiona? Are you unwell?”

“N-no. I’m fine.”

She hurried to reassure him, and her expression soon returned to normal.

“You should sleep a little longer. I can manage the watch.”

Ren had already dozed off once and wanted to refuse, but Fiona’s concern and his own fatigue persuaded him.

“Then I will rest for a while.”

Fiona apologized again and returned to her tent.

The moment she closed the entrance, she collapsed to her knees.

She curled forward, clutching her chest as severe pain raced through her body.

“Why… now…?”

She covered her mouth with both hands, desperately suppressing every sound so Ren would not notice.

◇ ◇ ◇ ◇

They left camp at dawn.

There was much less snow than there had been several days earlier. The numerous lava flows had melted it, and at first the descent seemed likely to proceed smoothly.

Then Ren saw the path ahead.

(This is the worst possible outcome.)

The road toward the former Given territory was completely blocked by a vast river of lava. More erupted from the base of a nearby slope, surging with greater force than the lava Ren remembered from the game’s battle in which Marquis Ignat attempted to revive Asval.

Ordinary lava might have been manageable. This was not ordinary.

Fiona could sense mana within its heat, almost as if the molten rock were alive. It felt like the flames that had attacked the suspension bridge, and it did not weaken despite the mountain cold.

Ren had tried to create a path with Nature Magic. Fiona had attempted to restrain it with ice. Neither method had any effect. The mana-filled lava only grew more violent.

“Should we return the way we came?” Fiona asked.

“No. You are probably thinking the same thing I am. By the time we retrace our steps, that road will be in the same condition—or worse.”

“You’re right.”

They had no time to lose. The silver mountains were being buried beneath lava, and soon even the ground on which they stood would disappear.

“There is one other route I know,” Ren said reluctantly.

“Can we descend from it?”

“Yes.”

It was a hidden area from the game, assuming that place also existed in this world. Ren had avoided it because of its harsh terrain and the Steel-Eating Gargoyles that inhabited it.

“It is dangerous. D-rank monsters appear there. If we cannot reach the route safely, waiting at the fort might—”

“No.”

Fiona gave a weary, rueful smile.

“You know as well as I do that no rescue can reach us.”

Even if the people separated from them at the bridge had survived and completed their descent, they could not cross the canyon without the bridge. The lava made an approach from another route equally unrealistic.

If an outside party could reach Ren and Fiona by some alternative road, the two of them should already have been able to use that road themselves.

Waiting would only allow the lava descending from higher ground to engulf them.

“Let us go,” Fiona said. “Even if it is dangerous, the path you know is our only chance.”

Rather than remain still and die, they would accept the risk.

Yet Ren could not stop wondering how the disaster had occurred.

Even during the game’s final battle in the Baldor Mountains, when Marquis Ignat attempted to revive Asval, the conditions had not deteriorated like this. If the people seeking the Demon King’s resurrection possessed the power to transform the mountains so completely, why had Marquis Ignat not used it in the original story?

He could have prevented the heroes from ever reaching him.

Was the difference merely game design—or was there another factor present now that had not existed then?

Ren glanced at Fiona.

For an instant, he wondered whether her survival was connected to the change.

He pushed the thought aside and began walking.

“First, we head for the hidden route.”

“All right,” Fiona replied, her voice weakened by exhaustion.

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