Surena’s expression was ghastly. “Understood...”
It would be a little difficult to draw my sword from its sheath with my left arm out of commission. It wasn’t impossible, but I didn’t want to waste the time on it—I couldn’t spare even an instant against this opponent.
Our entire team was now wounded, though Surena had the lightest injuries of us all. I was here to save her, so it would be meaningless if I didn’t get them to the foot of the mountains alive.
The look on Surena’s face was intense—she felt that her failure had become a major nuisance to many people around her. That was surely how she interpreted this situation, and I didn’t deny that entirely. However, my wound was a result of me personally wanting to do something to rescue her. I’d even gotten help from many others to get here—they’d compensated for everything I’d lacked. When you looked at it that way, none of this was her responsibility.
But would she be able to accept that logic right away? Probably not. If Surena and I switched places, I doubted I could’ve accepted it.
“Anyway, given the situation, being alive is enough of a boon on its own,” I told her. “Let’s keep that in mind and move on.”
“All right...”
I tried to be cheerful, but Surena remained gloomy. I doubted this mood would affect her brilliance in combat, but she was injured too. If we let Id Invicius continue to do as it pleased, would we be able to make it out of here alive?
It was curious that it hadn’t finished us after that blow. I’d blocked its first attack and learned that it vanished without immediately following up with another strike. The second time it’d attacked, I’d taken a bad hit. I’d counterattacked, refusing to let it get that hit for free, and though I wasn’t sure my blade had actually bitten into its body, my sword had definitely reached its target.
In theory, it might’ve gotten wary due to my strike and chosen to back off. My attack hadn’t had any effect whatsoever, yet it had still chosen to turn invisible. Considering that I was fighting a wild beast, some things just didn’t make sense.
Maybe it was getting warier because both Surena and I had survived its attacks. This was likely the key to getting out of here, but we had far too little information about our foe. And I’m already bad at the intellectual side of things.
I was confident in my ability to analyze a foe in the midst of battle, but I was quite bad at discovering the truth based on a partial picture or tugging at the smallest thread to find the answer to a tough question. This was especially true when our opponent was totally cheating and using magic to erase its presence. This is completely outside my field of expertise. Lucy might be able to figure it out, but it’s too much to ask for her to be here right now.
Also, pain and the effects of blood loss were dulling my thoughts. I would’ve loved to lie down and get some rest. Stinks that I can’t do that... Still, I could push through on sheer willpower. The strength you could muster in a crisis was unexpectedly impressive, but it didn’t last long. I wanted to secure our safety while I still had that surge of power.
Anyway, it’ll be bad if we get attacked again. Really, really bad. As I continued forward with that thought in mind, Surena and I noticed something at the same time.
“Hm...?”
“Master!”
The scenery had changed. More specifically, we could detect signs of life again. The presences we could sense were those often found in the middle of vast mountain ranges...if that made any sense. Anyway, this meant we’d made it out of our abnormal situation.
“It’s weird to feel safe because we can sense other beings around, though...” I muttered.
Normally, sensing things prowling around in the mountains meant it wasn’t safe. There was no telling when something was going to attack you, after all. But in this one case, things were different. We’d made it out of Id Invicius’s area of influence—out of its territory.
I sighed in relief.
So the site of its second strike was the border of its territory. I only knew of the path I’d traveled, but its territory seemed vast. I didn’t know whether this was because it’d gone on a rampage in the area or if the local wildlife had learned to fear it.
“There’s no reason to stop here,” I said. “Let’s hurry.”
“Right!”
This wasn’t the place to let our guard down—we still had to watch for Id Invicius or any other enemies. Things have gotten easier, though.
At any rate, we hurried onward.
I left watching the rear to Surena and focused only on the front. Even though we’d gotten out of its territory, there was no guarantee Id Invicius would leave us alone. Our only choice was to get out of the mountains as fast as possible.
“Oh, a purple pike.”
A while after traveling back down the path, I spotted one of the purple pikes I’d killed. Judging by the cut, it’d clearly been me. I mean, who else could it have been? Though it seemed obvious that we were going the right way, having proof was a load off my mind.
The sun was still out—it wasn’t dark yet. Even so, it was surprisingly difficult to navigate a mountainous region. My previous experience in the Aflatta Mountain Range was paying off.
“Was this you, Master?” Surena asked.
“Yeah, on the way here... I honestly don’t remember how many I killed, though...”
I’d simply cut down everything that had gotten in my way, so I had no idea how many I’d gone through. At any rate, there were countless numbers of these things in the Aflatta Mountain Range.
Now that we’d gotten this far, the goal was in sight. We were basically at the foot of the mountains, and the monsters and animals in the region were relatively less of a threat. We couldn’t be positive that something wouldn’t suddenly attack us, but I hoped fate would just cut us some slack. Not that I’m going to let my guard down or anything.
“I never thought we’d get out alive...” Pisces said. “Thanks, man.”
“It’s a little early for that...” I replied, trying to get him to stay focused. “Haaah...”
“That’s true... Hey, you okay?”
He’s worried about me. It was honestly pretty hard to keep up a strong front when my arm hurt like hell. To reiterate, the normalization of presences around us had relaxed the tension in the air. Though I’d gotten emergency treatment, the wound hadn’t healed, and I hadn’t recovered any lost blood. I needed proper rest and healing to recover my stamina. Right now, I was hanging on by sheer willpower.
“I’m...not really okay...” I said, “but I’ll hang in there.”
“Sorry ’bout this,” Pisces replied. “I’m carrying Pau already. Two’s a bit much.”
“Yeah, I know.”
Not many people could carry two grown adults. Curuni could probably have pulled it off, though. Surena was still capable of moving on her own, so if I collapsed, she would surely carry me. But if that happened, there would be nobody left to keep watch. Even during our trip into the Aflatta Mountain Range near Beaden, Henblitz and I had watched the front and rear so that Curuni could carry the saberboars between us. In this kind of environment, two skilled fighters was the bare minimum to keep an eye out for threats.
“The foot of the mountain is right there! C’mon!” Pisces yelled, cheering me on.
“Yeah, I’ll manage... Hup!”
We continued down the vague path. I cut down whatever small monsters we came across in a single slash. I didn’t even have the leisure to pay attention to what they were. If anything got in my way, it died. That was all. We repeated this laborious work while descending the mountains, fueled by nothing but willpower and guts.
Finally, an extremely welcome sight came into view, and I shouted in excitement. “There it is!”
The western city of Vesparta lay before us, its walls looming in the distance. We had successfully descended from the Aflatta Mountain Range.
Hoooly crap, that was close. Seriously.
Though I’d somehow managed to keep up appearances, I was on the verge of losing consciousness.
“We’re saved! Master... Master?!”
“Hm? Aah... Yeah...”
I flexed my right arm, refusing to collapse. Or was it my left? I didn’t know which hand I was moving. Probably my right. My feet refused to move forward. My line of sight was pretty low too.
Oh, I’m on my knees.
Embarrassingly enough, I only realized that after hearing Surena’s voice.
“I think...all that’s left...is running straight...for the city...” I groaned.
“I know! I know that! Master!”
“Hey! Forget me and Pau! Lysandra, carry this guy and get going!”
“Sorry!”
My body was hefted up. Immediately after, a strange floating sensation took me over, and my memories of that moment came to a temporary halt.