[IYFILWATIP] Chapter 39

"So, what do we do now?" the girl asked, raising an eyebrow. Jade gave a bitter smile. What could they do? They had to keep moving. Even if it was a trap set by the basilisk or just the forest's magic warping space, the entire massive, strange forest couldn’t be surrounded by a wall. There might be an exit on the other side.

"We turn back." 

"Turn back? To the center of the forest?" 

"Unless you want to wait here quietly until that snake makes you its next meal? We’re heading to the other side of the forest. There might be an exit." 

"And if there isn’t?" 

"Then we die. I told you before, you should be praying hard to Theresia to save us." 

"......" 

"Guess you haven’t been praying hard enough. Seems like our luck is terrible." 

Jade mocked, and the girl glared at him. 

At that moment, a black droplet fell from the air. It landed on a strand of the girl’s long dark brown hair and began to trickle down. Jade looked up at the sky, sensing something ominous. The girl was trying to lift her bound hands to touch the strand of hair where the black liquid had fallen. The spot where the black liquid touched immediately turned pale. 

Jade grabbed the girl’s hand, twisting it away from the hair. "It’s poison. Don’t touch it." 

"This is…" 

"Just our luck, really bad luck." 

It was a trap set by the basilisk. This entire area was under the basilisk’s influence. 

He quickly dragged the girl under a thickly-leaved tree. Fortunately, there was no sound of the snake’s tongue flicking around, so the creature itself wasn’t nearby. 

However, the poison it had sprayed from its fangs over its territory started to rain down from the sky. 

Jade Eclipse instinctively shielded the girl with his body. He swore it wasn’t because of some ancient code of chivalry or a sense of altruism running through his veins. Living as an Eastern mercenary had taught him the hard way that adhering to the terms of a contract was more important than life itself. 

There was a fate worse than death. 

He wasn’t desperate to live. Life was tiresome and exhausting, and if there were a peaceful way to die, he might even welcome it. But dying like this under Beatrice’s thumb wasn’t an option. If he had to die, he’d rather die cleanly than drag out a life worse than death. Therefore, what he feared most wasn’t losing his life but becoming a crippled slave or being sold off to a gladiator pit because he had outlived his usefulness as a mercenary. 

And Beatrice didn’t tolerate mistakes. If Beatrice had ordered him to bring the girl back without a scratch, then he had to do his best to comply, even if it meant dying here. If he failed, his two runaway brothers would surely be caught and suffer the consequences. 

The black poison raining from the basilisk’s fangs soaked his cloak and touched his skin, causing a burning pain that consumed him. Jade clenched his teeth, suppressing the groan threatening to escape. He cut the rope binding the girl’s hands with his knife and lifted her up. 

At least she’s small. If she were any bigger, I’d be out of options. 

He gritted his teeth and began running, shielding the girl from the basilisk’s poison with his body. 

"Hey, Eclipse!" she called out. 

Jade looked down at the girl in his arms, who was staring up at him, seemingly shocked. Though the pain left him unable to speak, if he could, he’d yell at her to shut up. 

"Eclipse!" 

Don’t call me by that cursed name. You’re just a pile of money to pay off my debts, but when you call me that, it makes it seem like I’m doing this to protect you, like that damned Yuri Eclipse, the founder of my family, the way people mock me. 

The Knight of Flames who betrayed his lord for the goddess he loved, who shielded the sun with his back without any regard for the consequences, saying that since everything he had belonged to the goddess, he had nothing left to offer but his life. That fool. 

I’ll never live like that. 

* * * 

The boundary of the trap was as clear as if it had been cut with a knife. Kirona turned around in a daze, looking back at the ground where a giant line had formed. Just one step difference, and on one side, all the grass had turned black and died, while on the other side, it was lush and green. 

The poisonous rain was still falling beyond the boundary, but this side was safe. 

Kirona looked down. At her feet lay the unconscious kidnapper. He had passed out the moment he threw Kirona outside the trap. The places where his clothes had melted away revealed skin that was red and swollen from the basilisk’s poison.