Chapter 35
After a moment of astonishment, Nelly actually felt a sense of relief.
She looked at Melissa’s anxious face and couldn’t help but feel a slight guilt for her own indifference. She suggested, “Why don’t we wait here for a while? Maybe Kal will be back in a bit.”
The sky soon darkened, but the streets of Halga’s Keep were still brightly lit.
Melissa and Nelly sat by the fountain. Pedestrians came and went, but there was still no sign of a person in a black mage’s robe.
“Let’s find a nearby inn to stay for the night and look again tomorrow.” Nelly felt that the spring night still held a lingering chill, and she was afraid that Melissa would catch a cold, so she tried to persuade her.
The silver-haired girl stared around with her violet eyes one more time, then lowered her head in dejection, her voice unusually low. “It’s not hard to get to the Demon’s Lair from the south. He must think I’m a nuisance…”
Nelly’s lips tightened, and she tried to liven up the atmosphere. “Maybe he got lost? Kal doesn’t look like the type to be good with directions… so let’s get some rest first, hahaha.”
After pushing and pulling the dejected Lord Hero to an inn to rest, Nelly herself was exhausted and didn’t want to get up after falling onto the bed. She turned over to face the wall, and the smile on her face gradually faded.
The hazy moonlight shone through the window, and the blue-violet dye on the glass made it look cold. The faint, cold light fell on Nelly’s face, revealing her almost indifferent profile. She stared blankly at the cracks on the wall, her mind filled with a jumble of thoughts.
It was only at that moment that she realized, setting aside her many worries, she was not at all concerned about Kal’s safety.
Although he would cough up blood after casting a spell, in her heart, he was always strong, and had no connection to the weak who were bullied. Therefore, even in the mixed and chaotic Halga’s Keep, she believed he could find a safe place. She actually hoped that she could lose Kal in this huge ancient capital.
That way, she wouldn’t have to face that familiar face and struggle between killing and not killing.
Nelly had a night of exhausting dreams.
※
The next morning, Melissa came to the place where she had agreed to meet Kal again. The sun gradually rose into the sky, and merchant caravans came and went, but there was still no sign of Kal.
“Why don’t we continue the mission first? Maybe we can get some news on the way,” Nelly suggested tentatively.
But Melissa shook her head firmly. “Let’s split up and look. We’ll meet back at the inn in the evening.”
Even though Nelly had a stomach full of objections, in the face of the hero’s clear and resolute gaze, all her excuses and persuasion vanished in an instant. In front of her, Nelly always felt a sense of shame—her little thoughts were really too dark.
Melissa decided to go to the other inns in the city to ask for information, while Nelly aimlessly walked along the narrow alley at the foot of the Norn Palace hill toward the center of the old city.
The ruts left from the imperial era were still bustling with traffic. Citizens came out of the ancient baths in twos and threes, chatting with expressive gestures, a faint echo of the Senate that had died out generations ago. Old customs die hard, and slavery was one that had survived to this day. The number of slaves in Balkan was far greater than the sum of the other ten countries. In the square at the corner of the street, newly arrived slaves were lined up for people to choose from. The slave trader’s cries rose and fell, and to Nelly’s ears, it sounded like he was singing an opera, quite comical.
After turning another corner, Nelly had already reached the west side of Halga’s Keep. The residents here were dense, but also poorer. Nelly stopped at the side of a small square. It was surrounded by dilapidated houses covered in withered vines, and even during the day in the southern country, it was unusually shady, attracting a large number of resting pigeons.
Barefoot, wild children used this place as a playground for their games of chase. The statue standing in the fountain in the center was missing its nose and arms, but the water at its feet still flowed. Nelly didn’t know why she had stopped, as if some unseen force had turned into a tough silk thread and tripped her up, preventing her from moving forward.
Her heart suddenly began to beat fast.
A boy ran past the edge of the pool with a loud laugh, splashing a mist of crystal-clear water. Nelly turned at the sound, but her gaze passed through the water vapor, over the broken statue, and settled on the portico at the other end of the square.
The person in the black cloak was also looking up, revealing a pair of deep red eyes.
Their gazes met across the distance, like the gentle brush of wings when a bird spreads them, silent yet full of tension.
Nelly couldn’t help but bite her lip. Reason told her that she should pretend not to have seen Kal, but she couldn’t just turn and leave as if she hadn’t seen him. After much hesitation, Nelly still slowly walked toward the mage in the shadow of the archway. She lowered her gaze, her tone stiff. “Why did you leave without saying goodbye? Melissa is very worried.”
Kal took half a step back, putting some distance between them, and didn’t answer.
Nelly had to carefully discern his expression in the dim light. With just one glance, she clearly noticed a subtle change in Kal. He was more dejected than usual. His posture, his face melting into the shadows, all silently conveyed small pieces of information. This was not the coy and reserved demeanor of someone who kept others at a distance. Kal was truly dejected and desolate over something.
After a moment of stagnation, Kal suddenly strode forward, his wide mage’s robe fluttering slightly, the hem of his clothes brushing against Nelly’s shoulder.
He intended to leave again without any explanation.
Nelly subconsciously chased after him and grabbed his hand.
The hurried, heavy steps startled the quiet, foraging gray pigeons, and there was a rustle of messy, spreading wings. The arc drawn by the wings was reflected in the fountain, its trajectory distorted by the ripples in the water.
Through several layers of thin clothing, Nelly tightly gripped Kal’s wrist. She felt that this action was not appropriate, and a voice in her heart had been screaming at her to give up since the moment she had reached out. But she was unwilling to let go and let him leave.
For some inexplicable, mysterious reason, she felt that if she let go at this moment, she would never see him again.
Deep down, she was actually terrified of this possibility.
Her heart was torn between two temperatures, ice and fire. Half of her urged her to face reality and cut off unnecessary ties, while the other half was reluctant to let go, swayed by unspeakable emotions.
But at that moment, the white-haired young man slowly and firmly pulled his hand away, bit by bit. His red eyes were half-hidden behind the ends of his white hair, like looking at a red rose through an autumn frost, hazy, and exuding a chilling cold. He took a step back without emotion, paused, and then continued to back away until he had reached a safe distance, once again showing the aloofness and coldness of their first meeting.
Seeing this, Nelly’s fingers curled, and she mechanically pulled up the corners of her mouth. “What am I supposed to tell Melissa?”
“You didn’t find me,” Kal replied softly, pulling his hood lower again, and quickly turned the corner and disappeared.
The noise that she had been deaf to just now suddenly returned. The innocent laughter of children, the low cooing of pigeons, the sound of a carriage speeding by. Nelly’s thoughts temporarily came to a halt in the meaningless noise. She slowly walked to the street corner and looked around. Unsurprisingly, she had already lost track of Kal.
After walking in circles for a couple of laps and forcing five or six clueless, innocent pigeons to take flight, Nelly slapped her cheeks hard. Since it had come to this, it was better to just cut ties and avoid any more variables.
Having made her decision, Nelly spent the rest of the day checking the quest locations—although the side quests she could get each time were similar, there were sometimes subtle differences. As a spirit, it was better to get a clear picture of the situation as soon as possible to prepare suggestions for Melissa in advance.
It was dinnertime when Nelly returned to the inn, but Melissa had not yet appeared. Nelly had no appetite and silently went upstairs to stare out the window for a while. When the moon gradually rose, Melissa finally pushed the door open and came in.
Just by looking at her expression, one could tell that she had found nothing.
Nelly sighed. “Sorry, I didn’t get any news.”
Melissa’s mood sank even lower. She sat heavily on the bed and messed up her hair.
Nelly guiltily walked behind her and patted her shoulder comfortingly. “Don’t think too much. Get some rest first.”
Melissa opened her mouth to say something, but a sudden commotion came from downstairs. She immediately stood up, and without caring about her messy silver hair, she opened the door and ran down the stairs.
Nelly followed her downstairs. A group of people had already gathered at the entrance. In the center of the crowd was a panting middle-aged man, his voice trembling as he repeated, “It’s the Demon King! It’s the Demon King’s mark!”
The crowd looked at each other and whispered uneasily. But it was clear that most people were still skeptical—the demon army was far to the north. How could the Demon King’s evil mark suddenly appear in Balkan, in the south of the continent?
The middle-aged man tremblingly took the wine cup from the innkeeper, wiped the sweat from his bald head with his other hand, and then tilted his head back and drank the wine down in one gulp, as if to bolster his courage. He then continued with a slurred tongue, “It… it was right above the Norn Palace! The moon was suddenly covered by dark clouds just now, and when everyone looked up, a big eye suddenly appeared in the sky. Good heavens! That eye was as big as a bathtub, and it was a terrifying yellow!”
The reply was a chorus of suspicious gasps.
“Don’t disbelieve me. The temple has already sent people to investigate the situation. Maybe…” Before the man could finish, the sound of hurried hoofbeats gradually approached, and at the same time, the great bell of the Norn Palace in the center of the city rang heavily, seven times in quick succession, a signal for an abnormal situation.
The crowd in the inn immediately burst into an uproar. Some rushed upstairs to pack their bags, some boldly peeked out the door at the squadrons of knights galloping by, while the rest stood in place, dumbfounded.
After a moment of stunned silence, Nelly turned to look at Melissa. The silver-haired girl’s lips were tightly pressed together, and her violet eyes were lit by the unceasing fire of anger, shining brightly. This was the first time she had shown this side of herself, chilling and cold. Nelly was taken aback and asked uncertainly in a low voice, “Melissa?”
She quickly came to her senses, and as if she wanted to smile, her face was so stiff that she couldn’t even force a smile. She took a breath and said in a deep voice, “Let’s go and see.”
Nelly nodded. “Alright.”
They walked through the deserted streets due to the warning, and before they even reached the foot of the Norn Palace hill, the clustered houses came to an end. The cover suddenly disappeared, and the view before them was open. They effortlessly found the “Demon King’s mark.”
The sky had been forcibly torn open, in the shape of a cat’s eye. In the center was a dark shadow, like a deep pupil, and the iris surrounding it cast a cold, pale yellow light.
The clasp on Karsus’s cloak was also a cat’s eye, also mysterious and evil.