“……”

Aveline couldn’t answer right away. Of course, she was curious too. But she didn’t want to pressure Edin into speaking and overexerting himself. It might be a memory he never wanted to recall again.

However, Edin opened his mouth as if eager to speak.

“You know, Adonis was there.”

“There?”

“Mount Norca.”

The moment he uttered that long-forgotten name, Aveline was gripped by a hollow emptiness in her chest.

Whether he noticed her reaction or not, Edin continued speaking in a weak voice.

“I always thought it was transparent ice, but I guess it was actually crystal. There’s a crystal cave on Mount Norca, you know that, right?”

“…Yeah. I know.”

There was no way she couldn’t. Mount Norca—now called Beast Mountain. The place where she met her end. And there was only one reason Edin could be so certain that she knew it.

“You were there back then… weren’t you?”

Aveline asked hesitantly. Instead of asking what “back then” meant, Edin simply nodded quietly.

“That’s right. Adonis was there. He witnessed the deaths of Serpina and Hyperion.”

With a dull thud, her heart plummeted to the ground. Her insides felt hollow, as if all her organs had vanished.

“Seeing the two fallen, Adonis was so terrified he couldn’t even breathe properly. Then he was completely overtaken by fear… and when he came to, he was clawing madly at the rock wall. Yeah. I remember he was carving something into the stone. Trying to leave something behind…”

Edin mumbled incoherently in a drained voice, then suddenly clutched his forehead with a groan, as if a headache had struck him.

Startled, Aveline quickly tried to soothe him.

“It’s okay, Edin. You don’t have to think any further.”

She repeated that reassurance over and over into his ear. His tightly drawn expression slowly relaxed, and soon, his heavy breathing gave way to a gentle rhythm. His body hadn’t recovered yet—he must have been unable to fight off sleep.

Once she confirmed that he had fallen asleep, her tension ebbed, and weariness swept over her again. Blinking slowly through dry eyes, she looked around.

The darkness had only just begun to lift. The once pitch-black surroundings were now tinged with a subtle bluish hue. Thierry and Patrick were nowhere in sight, likely standing watch outside. Luen sat against a rock with his eyes closed.

She watched Luen, who had dozed off in an uncomfortable position, for a while, then began to turn her gaze away—but suddenly, his lips moved.

“That kid must’ve been through some rough times too.”

Aveline had no reply to that. She thought she might know what Luen was thinking, but whenever she tried to picture it more clearly, the thought scattered like a mirage.

Then, Luen lifted his head and met her gaze. His deep blue eyes, tinged with the pale light of dawn, weren’t like the clear, sparkling surface of water glimmering with sunlight. They resembled the still, dark depths gathered at the very bottom of the ocean.

A vague, stifling light.

“……”

A silence as cold and still as water settled between them.

If Kazerre unintentionally brought back memories of Serpina, then Luen did so with clear intent. The former vividly revived Serpina’s lingering attachments. The latter forced Aveline to confront her own guilt once more.

They were different enough to be distinctly separate, but so similar that the distinction felt meaningless.

Because in the end, she could resist neither.

Just as she couldn’t now, facing his accusing gaze without turning away.

“……”

How much time had passed? How many emotions had flowed between them without their knowing? Still without answers, it was Luen who first broke eye contact.

Aveline gazed at his face for a moment, then closed her eyes as he had.

It seemed she drifted off again.

But it wasn’t long before someone shook her shoulder roughly, dragging her out of sleep.

In her blurred vision, a tuft of red hair squirmed like seaweed in water. The moment she realized it was Thierry’s faded-dye hair, her hearing suddenly cleared—and the murmuring noise turned into sharp, coherent words piercing her ears.

“My lady! You must escape immediately!”

Aveline’s eyes, still half-lidded until that moment, snapped open. She forced her frozen lips to part.

“What… what’s going on?”

“An army is approaching. It seems the Huster family’s dispatched forces didn’t head to Trois but turned back. We must leave now.”

At Thierry’s urgent voice, chills ran down her spine.

Without another thought, she sprang to her feet. Her head spun, but she bit her lip and tried to focus on the man in front of her.

“Edin…”

“I’ll carry him.”

Thierry slung the still-recuperating Edin over his back. The sudden motion made Edin grimace reflexively, and he barely managed to open one eye.

“Ugh…”

Aveline met his dazed, disoriented gaze and quickly explained the situation.

“Edin. I’m sorry, but we have to move right now. Sir Thierry will carry you, so hold on tight.”

Edin, somehow understanding her words, gave a faint nod. He mumbled something in a barely audible voice. It sounded like he was apologizing.

While Thierry firmly secured Edin on his back with both hands, signaling not to worry, Aveline gently patted Edin’s head once. Then, she hastily slipped on her shoes and stepped outside the rocky shelter.

Patrick and Luen were already prepared to leave. Judging by their light gear and lack of baggage, it was clear their goal was to get away from here as quickly as possible.

The dull, gray sky, still lacking sunlight just as when they had arrived, seemed to reflect her mood. Aveline, squinting as she scanned the surroundings, turned toward Luen, who unusually wore a grim expression.

“Natalie? Didn’t you contact her and tell her to come this way?”

Right after they had arrived here yesterday, Luen had said he would get in touch with Natalie. So she had expected Natalie to have joined them by now. Clearly, something had gone wrong.

Luen ran a frustrated hand through the bangs covering his forehead, adding weight to her growing unease.

“I lost contact. No matter how many times I call, the messenger bird doesn’t return.”

The situation was worse than she expected. The bird failing to return at all meant either it couldn’t fly or Natalie hadn’t even had a chance to release it.

‘If by some misfortune she ran into the retreating soldiers and is being pursued…’

And didn’t Luen say he only brought a minimal number of people to move efficiently? Even if they ruled the back alleys, they couldn’t possibly face a fully armed military unit.

“Then, you…”

Aveline started to ask what he planned to do now, caught in confusion, but trailed off. It was a question with an obvious answer.

Though they’d come this far due to a series of unexpected events, Luen’s base of operations was still the Crimson Merchant Guild. With contact to his closest aides completely severed, there was no reason for him to return to the North. His best option was to get out of here and search for his men as quickly as possible.

Yet Luen shattered her expectations without a hint of hesitation.

“For now, we retreat north.”

“You’re going back to the North?”

Aveline asked, startled. But Luen narrowed his eyes sharply, as if her reaction was harder to believe.

“Of course. I need to confirm what that kid left behind. Why? Were you planning to abandon me here?”

Aveline quickly shook her head. Luen squinted at her suspiciously, then finally averted his gaze.

It seemed he had no intention of letting go of any piece connected to their past lives.

Aveline started to say something but stopped. She didn’t know what hopes he was holding onto, but no matter what decision he made, she had no right to intervene.

“Then we’ll return north immediately, my lady. We’ll take the quickest route, so the terrain may be rough. Please be careful not to lose your footing.”

Patrick approached and informed her. Aveline nodded and followed his lead.

With Patrick at the front, Aveline and Thierry—who carried Edin—began to climb the narrow, rugged mountain path. Luen took up the rear to provide cover.

Just then, Luen suddenly snapped his head around sharply. From far off in the opposite direction, barely visible, a tree branch faintly rustled. What anyone else might have dismissed as mere wind or a passing squirrel, Luen’s sharp instincts immediately caught for what it was.

“We’ve been spotted.”

“What?”

His voice was calm—far too calm for the urgency of the situation. That strange dissonance froze Aveline’s mind momentarily before she clenched her fists. Thierry and Patrick couldn’t hide their shock either; their jaws dropped before they grit their teeth.

“Run!”

Patrick, drawing his sword, began slashing away the branches blocking their path without mercy as he sprinted forward. The severed branches scraped the limbs of those behind him with sharp edges.

But there was no time to flinch from such small pain. Aveline, channeling the power of darkness into her legs, ran after them and shouted urgently to Luen.

“Did you see who it was?”

“The sunlight reflected off their chest. They’re armed. Must be soldiers from the retreating army.”

Luen’s voice carried a bitter tone. With so many troops moving, they must have come up here in search of water.

Aveline couldn’t suppress her rising anxiety and bit down on her lip.

“If we’ve already been spotted, being cautious won’t help now.”

“Our top priority is getting out as fast as possible.”

Patrick quickly revised their plan and increased the pace. Thanks to that, what had taken half a day to climb before was now cleared in just two hours.

However, all that climbing and descending drained their strength. Their lungs felt like they were about to burst, and no matter how hard they gasped for air, their breathing didn’t settle. Their legs trembled, threatening to buckle with any lapse in focus, and their chests ached painfully.

But the knights and even Luen weren’t in any better shape. With their nerves stretched thin from staying alert, their energy must have depleted twice as fast as hers. In fact, they too were breathing heavily. Thierry was even carrying Edin on his back.

Unfortunately, what lay ahead was worse than anything they had faced so far. Even knowing they couldn’t afford to stop, they instinctively faltered.

“This is…”

A dry, barren valley with the ground laid bare awaited them. To reach the mountain range that led north, they had to cross this vast field of stones with nowhere to hide.

“I guess it’s a blessing we don’t have to cross a bridge.”

Luen muttered in a voice that didn’t sound the least bit grateful. But there was no other choice if they wanted to reach the North.

“Keep your heads down and look straight ahead as you run. Do not, under any circumstances, look back.”

With firm instructions, Patrick took the lead and sprinted across the open rock field. They leapt over the uneven stones jutting out like corpses scattered on a battlefield.

They were about halfway across the valley when it happened. A chilling presence swept in from behind, and something ricocheted off the stone beside them.

It was an arrow.