Bellota, throwing cold words like Seiden, turned to leave, but suddenly he grabbed her hand urgently. Startled, Bellota turned to see Seiden frowning and looking seriously at her hand.

“You’re hurt.”

Seiden’s heavy voice sounded harsh. Bellota looked at her palm where his gaze was fixed. It was a wound from earlier when she had hurriedly followed Abel out of the hideout and fell. It seemed he had seen the scar caused by scraping against the dirt floor embedded with dense stones. Bellota, flustered, muttered hastily.

“It’s nothing.”

She tried to pull her hand away, but it was useless. Seiden, seemingly angry, held her delicate hand in his large one, not letting go for a moment. Instead, he pulled Bellota closer, frowning as he examined the wound under the moonlight streaming through the window.

“Didn’t you ask Priest Felton to heal you?”

Hearing those words, the tension in Bellota’s chest melted away. The saintess and priests could heal others using holy power, but not themselves. Seiden knew this, yet he was asking why she hadn’t asked Felton for treatment. Bellota let out a faint, incredulous laugh.

“For something like this?”

Holy power was a sacred force not to be used on such trivial wounds.

“This will heal quickly.”

But, Seiden did not seem to agree. He glared at the wound with all his might. His gaze was so intense that even Bellota momentarily mistook it for a severe injury.

As the heavy and serious silence settled in the quiet hallway, Bellota felt a bit embarrassed. It seemed absurd to be worried about such a small wound in front of a man who’s accustomed to dealing with all kinds of monsters and covered in blood, whether it was his own or his enemy’s.

“I’m really fine, I…”

Bellota, feeling inexplicably embarrassed, blushed and tried to reassure Seiden, but it was also useless. Seiden, still holding Bellota’s hand with one hand, rummaged through his belongings with the other and took out something.

What Seiden held was a very small medicine bottle. Bellota, feigning surprise, watched silently as he lightly opened the bottle with his teeth and poured the medicine onto her palm wound.

“……Do you carry medicine too?”

When Bellota asked quietly, surprised, Seiden, who was still looking at her palm, answered.

“Did you think I was walking around ready to die?”

Bellota finally gave a faint smile when she heard those words.

“To be honest… a little bit.”

Seiden let out a light breath, uncertain whether it was a laugh or a sigh.

In truth, he carried this medicine not for his own safety but for any unforeseen emergencies. But Seiden’s subordinates had never been injured to the extent that they needed this medicine, so the bottle had remained unopened for years. Of course, his subordinates, who found being cut and slashed an everyday occurrence, would be astounded and might even clutch their foreheads in disbelief.

“Don’t worry, I will survive even more fiercely from now on.”

Saiden replied in a low voice that made it hard to tell if he was joking or serious, and he slowly spread the medicine on Bellota’s hand. Her hand, held by Saiden, trembled slightly at the sudden, cold, and soft sensation.

“There’s no way I would die before the saintess.”

When Seiden added this indifferently, Bellota’s ears burned again. The careful and gentle touch of Seiden’s fingers on her palm sent a chill down her spine, despite her will.

“…Not because of me, but because you are an indispensable presence for the Empire.”

When Bellota mustered the courage to reply, Seiden’s hand movements slowly stopped. He lifted his head and met Bellota’s gaze. Because he was holding her hand, the distance between them had closed. Now, she could see his previously obscured expression clearly.

This time, Bellota did not avoid Seiden’s gaze and stared into his eyes. His red eyes, entirely focused on her, felt like a deep abyss. So deep that she suddenly wondered what lay within.

“……”

A heavy and suffocating silence flowed slowly between them. Bellota felt the tingling in her palm from the spreading medicine and slowly opened her lips.

“It’s water.”

Then Seiden’s red eyes, which were entirely focused on Bellota, narrowed slightly.

“The lake water from the Feiren Mountains was the answer.”

Seeing Seiden’s eyebrows slowly harden, Bellota carefully withdrew her hand from his grasp. This time, Seiden did not hold onto her hand and let it go obediently. Bellota rummaged through her pocket with her now surprisingly healed hand and took out a vial of holy water.

Seiden knew that what Abel had thrown at the monster was Bellota’s holy water. He also knew that it had inflicted a fatal wound on it, leading to its death, despite it being seemingly indestructible.

But Seiden did not fully understand what special property of Bellota’s holy water had led to the monster’s death. There were too many variables. Bellota cleared up his doubts.

“The monster you dealt with was probably a rabkrill. Born in the deep sea of winter, yet it prefers dense forests. To survive on land for an extended period, it needs to consume the leaves of the mountain pepper tree. Therefore, it likely moved to Verzio, close to the forest but relatively far from the coast. Just brushing against the spines on its back would inflict a curse that causes a burning thirst.”

Listening quietly to Bellota’s calm and pleasant voice, Seiden finally understood why Selento had been devastated. And also why the monster did not die despite being slashed repeatedly. He had heard somewhere that deep-sea monsters had strong regenerative abilities, healing external wounds at a surprising speed. But no one expected a high-level sea monster, which should have stayed in the deep sea, to come ashore.

“The way to cure that curse was water. It had to be water that was untouched by human hands, imbued with pure magic, without any salt, and collected at the moment when moonlight shone on the surface. Only then could it cure the curse and deal with that sea monster.”

With those words, Seiden’s remaining doubts were cleared up. He could easily recall the previous night. Bellota at the lake in the Feiren Mountains. Her noble stubbornness had ultimately saved Vergio.

Something in Seiden’s chest tightened momentarily, then melted away warmly. His gaze, following that emotion, softened as he looked at Bellota.

“I suspect that the monsters appearing in Torcana and Rivieto have similar traits to rabkrill.”

Bellota’s low, quiet voice held a subtle excitement. If her hypothesis was correct and the next monster could also be dealt with using the holy water from the Feiren Mountains, the plan ahead was simple. Return to the capital, find suitable water to make holy water, and save all the coastal villages.

“If we can confirm that, we can fend off all the deep-sea monsters.”

Seiden never got excited and explained calmly, but he looked into her clear eyes that sparkled with the joy of finally discovering that fact and the happiness of being able to save all the citizens of the Empire because of it.

Really, it was unfair how she shone so brightly in moments like this. Seiden quietly replied, pretending not to notice his heart aching somehow.

“It seems that the person truly needed by the Empire is not me.”

Bellota’s eyes momentarily froze after hearing those quiet words.

“And the person who cannot be matched by any monsters is also not me.”

When Seiden made a joke in an indifferent voice, Bellota’s cheeks blushed red again. Seiden was now telling her what he had told Abel.

“The Saintess said there isn’t a monster you can’t handle.”

Since they were so close, this time Seiden could also see those lovely red cheeks. Bellota, whose face turned red up to her neck, handed over the holy water bottle she was holding to change the topic.

“If you sprinkle this on your sword, you will get the same effect.”

Seiden obediently reached out and received the holy water Bellota handed over. Inside the small bottle, it was filled with water as dazzlingly blue as her eyes. Bellota glanced at Seiden, who was gazing at the sparkling holy water, and spoke.

“Then I should go now. I have to move early tomorrow morning.”

So you too, no, you, most importantly, should rest soon, but Bellota couldn’t bring herself to say it out loud and quietly held it in. Seiden also did not stop her, just quietly watched Bellota, whose cheeks were still flushed.

Bellota gave him a small bow and turned around, but then she seemed to remember something and looked back at Seiden.

“By the way… how did you know there was a hideout here?”

Seiden stared at her at that sudden question. Bellota frowned slightly as though she was genuinely curious. Seiden looked at Bellota’s lovely face without blinking and answered quietly.

“I saw that little boy spying on us. I have good eyesight.”

Bellota’s frown disappeared in vain after that honest answer. Ha… Finally, Bellota learned the secret behind how Seiden was able to find the villagers’ hideout so remarkably and let out a small laugh.

It was an unexpected answer. Bellota, who had been smiling faintly at the thought that she had worried unnecessarily about Seiden having some extraordinary ability, quickly stopped smiling when she noticed Seiden was still looking at her.

Soon, Bellota gave another small bow and turned around. Even after taking several steps, she could tell Seiden was watching her as no sound of footsteps could be heard behind her.

The castle, where everyone was asleep, was somehow so quiet that it made her heart swell. Bellota moved cautiously, trying not to wake anyone, and slowly stroked her palm, which no longer hurt. Somehow, it felt like her palm, where his hand had touched, was still burning.

* * *