Chapter 48
<50화>
‘Come to think of it, he doesn’t look cold at all, even though he’s dressed in rags.’
Despite the wind whipping around us, his violet eyes simply stared at me with an indifferent gaze.
“Are you cold?”
Then, suddenly.
“If you get cold, you’ll get sick again.”
He took off his dirty robe—one I wouldn’t wear even if it were given to me—and draped it over my shoulders.
“If you get sick, you might forget that you met me today. You can’t be cold.”
As if he weren’t joking, he raised his eyebrows slightly and even tied the strings of the robe for me.
The robe looked as thin as a rag, but once it was around me, it blocked the wind and felt much warmer than before.
‘Looking at him like this, he doesn’t seem like a bad kid.’
Or was he?
‘Seeing how he bit my finger just because I didn’t answer his question, he definitely seems to have a bit of a temper.’
Then, I remembered running away from the knights earlier.
When he casually said he had killed the man, I had let it slide because I was so distracted, but that was a serious matter.
I hesitated for a moment before asking cautiously.
“But hey. Why did you kill that man?”
“He kidnapped you and hit you.”
…Huh?
My eyes widened at the unexpected answer.
“Me?”
“Yeah. I need to get an answer from you, and it would be a problem if you died.”
The man kidnapped and hit me? Could he have been the spy for the Duke of Pose who sent the telegram?
“You killed that man just to get an answer?”
“Yeah.”
This kid is really strange.
I was grateful that he helped me, but aside from that, he was dangerous.
I crossed my arms and looked at the boy.
On the outside, he was more than just fine; he was as pretty as a doll. But if he grew up acting so recklessly, he might become a menace to society later.
“…….”
This won’t do. I have to give him a little education.
“Hey.”
“Yeah?”
With my arms crossed, I shivered as I offered him some advice.
“You can’t just go around killing people like that. You shouldn’t do that.”
“Why?”
The boy tilted his head.
Oh my god.
The seed of a social evil.
I emphasized once more.
“Killing people is a bad thing.”
“Why shouldn’t I do bad things?”
“If you do bad things….”
Hmm.
How should I explain this to him? Would he understand if I told him he’d go to jail?
Shake, shake—
Shaking my head inwardly, my eyes suddenly flew open.
I’ve got it. The way to persuade him!
“If you do bad things…”
I whispered to him with a serious expression.
“…I might go into shock and lose my memory.”
“!”
It worked.
His expressionless violet eyes began to widen slowly.
“No….”
He even took a couple of steps back, looking shocked.
Then, he suddenly muttered despondently, like a child who had lost a toy.
“…No. If you lose any more of your memory, you’ll become a fool. Then you won’t be able to answer me.”
Yeah. The fool is you.
I urged him gently, like a teacher.
“So, should you do bad things or not?”
“No. I’ll never do bad things. Never.”
The effect was great!
“Good. Then for now….”
I need to ask the people guarding the portal here to take me to the Duke’s Castle.
Whoosh—
Now that I thought about it, no one had found us while we were chatting.
There were no gatekeeper knights, nor any administrators guarding the portal. Only the portal itself remained.
“That’s right! You said the Ice Wall collapsed!”
Hurriedly looking around, I realized the gravity of the situation.
In the distance, the Crost Duchy Castle was visible through the conifers, and smoke was rising from beyond the forest on the opposite side as if there were a fire.
That was the End of the World.
The place where the Ice Wall stood.
“I have to help somehow. I should at least kill one monster and let people know that the King and the Duke of Pose are the ones who caused this situation!”
Pat, pat—
Brushing off the snow that had piled up on my head, I grabbed my poison needles and ran forward with vigor.
Aisha was a strange girl. No matter how he looked at her.
“Why are you going that way? Your home is over there.”
He pointed toward the castle where Aisha was always seen being carried around.
But she shook her head resolutely and ran.
“My family is in danger! I can’t just stay still by myself!”
The boy tilted his head at those words.
If it’s dangerous, shouldn’t you hide? What if everyone dies?
‘I don’t understand pack animals.’
“Suit yourself, then.”
Yawning with a pout, he followed Aisha, who was walking well despite her short, chubby legs.
It was then.
Aisha, whose hair was a mess from the kidnapping incident, scanned the surroundings nimbly with narrowed eyes.
“…By the way, considering the situation, monsters should be visible by now… but it’s really quiet?”
At the word ‘monster,’ the boy perked up his ears and turned his head.
“…….”
In fact, something had been watching them for a while now.
From behind a tree.
‘Grrr….’
‘Don’t come closer.’
He had been warning it not to come because he was afraid Aisha would go into shock and lose her memory if she saw a monster.
“Is it normal to see monsters?”
When he asked just in case, Aisha nodded.
“Actually, it’s normal to see them. Something is strange.”
Oh. He was supposed to show her the monsters.
Flustered by her words, the boy looked at the monster hiding behind the tree.
‘Sorry. She says come out.’
“Koo-woong…?”
The monster, looking at the boy with pitiful rabbit-like eyes, was about to reveal its paw with sharp claws.
“But it’s better not to see them.”
Because Aisha suddenly changed her mind, the startled boy reversed his order.
‘If you come out, you die.’
“Whimper.”
Whether he wanted it to come out or not.
The monster, which had some urgent business to attend to, whimpered and disappeared behind the tree.
‘Phew.’
Only then did he breathe a sigh of relief and glance at Aisha’s back with a slightly aggrieved expression.
‘Aisha is such a glass-head.’
He couldn’t live for worrying, since she’d be shocked by every little thing.
However, his time for humanization was slowly running out.
‘I should disappear before she gets more shocked.’
The boy had realized something while being with Aisha as a human.
Aisha didn’t know that he was the cat she called ‘Baby.’
When he was a cat, she would hug him and cuddle him. But now that he was a human, she only nagged him and wouldn’t even hug him.
‘It’s better to be a cat.’
He pouted his lips secretly as he said goodbye.
“I have to go now.”
“Huh? Suddenly?”
Aisha, who had been walking triumphantly with her poison needles, looked at him with surprised eyes.
Blue eyes.
The eyes that had found him when he was dying in a corner.
He suddenly thought that Aisha’s eyes looked like jewels and continued speaking.
“Yeah. Actually, my home is in the opposite direction.”
“Oh my! I see. You should have said so sooner! Where is your home?”
He thought for a moment at Aisha’s question and pointed vaguely toward the Duke’s Castle.
“Over there.”
“Ah, so you live in the village beyond the Duke’s Castle.”
He had pointed at the Duke’s Castle.
But he didn’t bother to correct her. It was almost time for him to turn back into a cat.
“Yeah. I’m going.”
Having given a rough goodbye, he was about to turn back when—
“But what’s your name?”
Something hurriedly grabbed his pinky finger from behind.
When he turned around, the child was smiling brightly and holding out her hand.
“I should at least know your name before you go. I’m Aisha.”
I know.
But I….
‘If I say Baby, she’ll scold me again.’
The boy recalled their earlier conversation.
‘Huh? Whose blankets?’
‘Under your blankets.’
When Aisha asked where his home was, he had simply spoken the truth: the place he stayed lately was under Aisha’s blankets.
But Aisha had turned red and gotten angry.
‘You’re the one who told me to sleep first.’
Then shouldn’t she allow him a comfortable home even if he was human?
It was unfair, but he couldn’t provoke Aisha.
If she got startled again, she would go into shock and lose her memory.
‘Aisha is a glass-head.’
The boy, who repeated this in his mind like a mantra, thought for a long time but realized he didn’t have the talent to come up with a name on the spot.
So.
“Give me one when we meet next time.”
“What?”
He just told her to name him.
“My name. Since we’re about the same age, don’t use a weird title like Baby.”
Anything was fine as long as it wasn’t ‘Baby.’
Baby was a title used for weaklings.
Although he was a kitten when he transformed into an animal, he was about the same height as Aisha when he humanized.
“Is that okay? I’m going.”
Aisha seemed dazed by the unexpected answer, but he hurriedly walked away as he felt his human form about to break.
Asking why she saved him.
It had been the only goal in the boy’s dark space, which had been filled only with hunger.
But as he hummed a tune, another desire took hold in his mind.
‘I should hurry up and turn into a cat and go under Aisha’s blankets.’
It was a very simple and modest desire, but for the first time, he felt like he wanted to keep living.