ERTHMB Chapter 124

The Tower Built with Care

“Get yourself together. This is a tower you’ve spent years carefully building, and you want to go back just because you got hit with a few cups of water?”

“Of course it doesn’t matter to me. I’m just doing stress-relieving work anyway. I’m saying this because I’m worried about you, Cheshire.”

Despite the sunken concern, Natasha threw a handkerchief at his face with a sharp gesture.

“Since you can endure it, just do your job well.”

“There you go again. If that senile woman does that next time too, avoid her appropriately. You’re an expert at that sort of thing, aren’t you?”

“Haven’t you found your way yet even after becoming an assassin? You have to keep taking it so they let their guard down. What strategy is more convenient than making them fall into the delusion that they’re above their opponent?”

“Yes, yes.”

As the scolding grew longer, Raptor bobbed his head up and down, pretending to understand and brushing it off. Natasha also stopped responding and ran her hand through her hair with a tired expression.

Not only was her brain throbbing, but her body was also heavy like waterlogged cotton.

In truth, contrary to her words about being able to endure it, Natasha was somewhat exhausted to the point where even having this argument was a luxury. Besides Christine’s tyranny, there were many things that drained her stamina.

Knowing this, Raptor pointed out the biggest one among them.

“Then is that also endurable?”

Raptor’s fingertip was pointing toward Natasha’s belly. A belly that had been forcibly swollen by inflating organs and flesh to appear pregnant. When it reached the limit of what could be swollen with drugs later, it would pour out stagnant blood and inflammation.

Just imagining it was horrible enough that Raptor immediately grimaced with disgust.

“Even if you pour it out later, it’ll be hard on you since the pus and blood that had been stagnant will come out together.”

“Then what, should I actually have a real child?”

“That wouldn’t be impossible either.”

Raptor grinned, recalling past experience. His subtle desire for what might come next was craftily buried in his words.

Natasha whipped her head forward from where it had been leaning back. Sharp pupils immediately shot at Raptor.

“Heads that don’t know their place are the first to be cut off. Be careful.”

This time Raptor finally shut his mouth that had been lightly teasing. However, Natasha couldn’t smooth her furrowed brow. Her fingertips hesitated as they touched a small bottle on the table. The thick dark purple liquid sloshed viscously.

After steeling herself with some resolve, she downed the bottle. The taste was so terrible she wanted to cut out her tongue. After barely swallowing two mouthfuls, Natasha gasped.

“Love is pitiful for a Grand Duke. This much is cheap as the price of love.”

Well.

Though she spoke those words, Natasha inwardly doubted. Would it really work?

Eugene was a man who had even taken away his own mother’s dwelling. Even blood ties called natural were nothing more than strings to be cut without regret to him.

Natasha, who received baptisms of anger almost daily as Christine’s outlet for venting frustration, couldn’t help but know this.

And she was neither his mistress nor his lover. She was merely a momentary ‘mistake.’

Unfortunately, Eugene was also a man who didn’t tolerate mistakes. Extracting her would be no trouble at all. Hadn’t he already carved out her place from the Grand Ducal residence? So she could no longer exist as a mistake.

Therefore, Natasha decided to drive in one more stake that he couldn’t refuse. She had to become both Eugene Evergale’s guilt and Helena Evergale’s help.

Something neither could refuse.

“Ah, I brought what you mentioned last time.”

To lighten the mood, Raptor took out a small cloth pouch from his bag. It was exactly what Natasha had been waiting for.

Raptor took out the contents of the pouch and sniffed it, then made a puzzled expression.

“But what is this?”

“Roots.”

“I can see that too.”

Raptor held the dried leaf part and shook it. The thin, stringy bottom swayed in front of Natasha’s eyes, emitting a strange fragrance.

Natasha wore a thin smile.

“Roots that will keep me tied to this place.”

At the firm answer, Raptor finally showed a face of realization.

“Is that real?”

Natasha nodded and added:

“I do have genuine feelings for that woman Helena.”

****

On the way back from Praeterita to Dairon, Helena felt anxiety.

The weather was clear, her memories were restored, and the man she loved was by her side. It was a peaceful afternoon that she should simply enjoy comfortably. Yet she couldn’t shake off the ominous feeling.

That feeling swelled as time passed. From the moment they entered the route heading toward Partren in earnest, it reached its peak. The road she had traveled dozens of times felt unfamiliar. The deathly quiet silence squeezed her throat.

Unable to bear the anxiety gnawing at her nerves, Helena called out to Ian.

“Ian.”

“……?”

“We need to speed up.”

Even at the sudden suggestion, Ian immediately nodded. Judging by his stern expression, he too seemed to have felt the subtly twisted silence.

Without any particular questions, Ian lightly kicked the horse’s flank. The surrounding scenery flowed by quickly and finally the guild’s main gate came into view.

Helena jumped down from the horse and rushed urgently to the front of the gate. Unlike usual, the main gate that wasn’t locked opened easily.

“Gelda!”

Without knowing it, she called out her name first. What then entered her sight was a shattered door bolt. Helena quickly looked around.

The feeling she had been anxious about finally became reality. It wasn’t just the bolt that was shattered to pieces.

Everything was collapsed. The guild scene she had seen just before leaving was nowhere to be found. Helena began running frantically around the guild.

On the training ground floor lay the broken handle of a sword that had been cut in two, and the dining hall was cold without the warmth of a lit fire.

In the pathways, debris from broken fences was scattered about, constantly catching her feet. Even the quarters where bustling voices should occasionally be heard were only heavily silent.

It was truly a dead space. Partren had become ruins.

‘What happened in just one week……!’

At that moment, she heard signs of presence behind her.

“-Helena?”

Helena’s head whipped around.

“Gelda!”

Helena cried out like someone who had been drowning and could finally breathe. Unable to overcome the joy that had surged to its limit, she threw herself at Gelda.

Gelda understood and embraced her, patting her back. While Helena caught her breath, Ian and Flam also approached.

Helena found comfort in the smell of Gelda’s leather vest, then suddenly raised her head.

“What on earth happened? What about the other people? Are they all safe? Did magical beasts come down by any chance?”

“I’ll explain everything, so calm down.”

Gelda’s bitter gaze brushed Helena’s cheek. Helena, who had finally regulated her breathing, released her embrace around Gelda’s waist. Gelda let out a long breath and spoke.

“Garta came by.”

“What, what… Then the lord, that bastard did this?”

“What’s the reason? Haven’t we maintained a tacit symbiotic relationship all this time? Was there something that warranted suddenly, and so blatantly, threatening us like this?”

“…….”

Though Helena and Ian asked alternately, Gelda remained silent. She only pressed her lips together several times, but no further explanation came. Perhaps reading the pain on her face, Flam stepped forward between them.

“We don’t know the reason either. There’s a pretext, of course, but it’s even harder to understand since he’s making an issue of that very symbiotic relationship.”

“He made magical beasts hunting the problem?”

After briefly examining Gelda’s face, Flam nodded and continued explaining.

“As you know, the forest is Garta’s private property. Not only is poaching prohibited, but obtaining monetary profit by hunting magical beasts at will is also illegal. Garta used that pretext to attack the very next day after you left.”

Garta’s sudden change of heart along with the timing that fit together as if planned. Helena felt an unpleasant sense of déjà vu.

[I’ll be staying at the Spencer Hotel on Retail Street until this month.]

Surely not, surely not.

Helena tried hard to deny it. The man she had loved wasn’t such a despicable person who would hold people’s lives hostage no matter how desperate he became.

Though arrogant and cold, there was always warmth that knew righteousness in one corner. That was Eugene Evergale.

But the recent Eugene was also no longer the man she had known. The unstable, twisted, and distorted man was also Eugene.

Flam swept aside the debris of destruction scattered at his feet and brought Helena’s drifting attention back.

“And Garta made the guild into this state as compensation for the spoils taken so far. What could they find in a warehouse that had nothing but liquor bottles and wheat sacks, yet they turned all of Partren upside down and swept everything away.”

“……The original purpose was to see this state, so that’s why they did it.”

Gelda spoke again, having seemingly composed herself.

Helena asked, suppressing her impatience as much as possible.

“But why don’t I see the guild members? Are they all okay? No one was hurt, right?”

“Fortunately.”

Gelda continued, looking around carefully.

“There were no casualties, but quite a few got scared by the lord’s tyranny. Half left and half remained. That’s why it’s in this state now.”

“Then was compensation that needs to be repaid also imposed?”

“……Yes.”

Gelda repeatedly rubbed her face dryly. Her face looked exactly like someone who had aged ten more years in just one week.

Gelda stubbornly kept her lips tightly shut, then soon shook her head slightly.

“Money doesn’t really matter. It won’t immediately hinder maintaining the guild. However, since entry to the forest has been prohibited……”

“The villagers will be in danger.”

“It’s wyvern spawning season soon, so if we don’t reduce their numbers now, the damage will be severe later. With this place in this state, even if magical beasts come down to attack the village right now, we can’t even stop them.”

Gelda buried her forehead in her hands and hung her head deeply. At her unusually fragile appearance, Flam wrapped his arm around her shoulder and comforted her.

“When did he ever ignore and stand by before, and now he’s doing this. Really. Listening to what that bastard rambled about that day, it seemed like he had backing forces to handle the aftermath.”

“Enough, it was a situation that would happen someday anyway. As long as I share even a single strand of blood with that bastard, Partren was a castle destined to fall.”

“I told you not to think like that. It’s not your fault.”

“Then whose fault does it seem to be?”

Gelda burst out in anger and raised her head.

Helena flinched. It wasn’t because of Gelda’s anger. It was because of an expression on her face that she had never thought would suit her. It was so unsuitable that she even felt thorns rising in her throat for a moment.

Gelda still wore that expression as she pressed firmly against Flam’s chest.

“Isn’t it enough that I made you into that state?”

It was despair. Gelda, who had always known how to lead from the front with a firm voice, was afraid.

Helena bit her lip quietly.

She could no longer turn away. She felt a familiar shadow behind Garta.

‘Eugene. You’re determined to gift me anger after all.’

If you’re going to come at me like this, then I have no choice either.