Chương 8: Chapter 7
As the princess departed, everyone collapsed, falling to the ground with their irregular breaths. Despite being as affected as anyone else present, some exerted themselves to assist those who had fainted due to the prolonged exposure to the pressure generated by a member of the royal family.
"You..." Aiden said, attempting to rise by leaning on nearby objects. "Why didn't you mention that the princess had broken her isolation, Clovis?! I thought I was going to die!"
"It's truly painful..." Riley affirmed, getting up and trying to stand firm despite having shaky legs. "Now I understand how those who are entirely responsible for the princess feel... poor souls."
With hands on the ground, Clovis struggled to extract the part of his legs that had been embedded: "This is a problem..." he said. "Isolation doesn't seem to have had any effect; on the contrary, perhaps the time away from Ethan made the princess even more anxious."
"Anxious? Are you kidding?" Aiden questioned, finally managing to stand without any support. "She's completely out of control...!"
Acting swiftly, the cook covered Aiden's mouth with one hand: "Be careful with your words, boy," she spoke, looking apprehensively at the door. "Do you want to get us all killed?"
Not long after, slow footsteps could be heard passing through the corridor in front of the door. Each step seemed to last an eternity, the sound of the black shoes meeting the cold floor echoing through the ears of everyone in that kitchen. Entering through the entrance, a corrosive dark mist crept along the ground, killing everything in its path.
"Sorry..." Aiden said, containing his voice as he slowly removed the cook's hand from his mouth.
Everyone sighed but soon glared at Aiden with threatening looks.
"About those ingredients, ma'am..." Riley said, forcing a smile. "What are they exactly?"
"What? But..."
"Ingredients?" Clovis inquired, stretching after finally freeing himself. "What are you talking about?"
"Well..." the cook tried to explain but was interrupted by Riley, who promptly said, "Aiden and I will need to go to the human realm to fetch some ingredients she needs to prepare a specific dish that Ethan wants to eat."
"No, but you hadn't said that..."
"That's a great idea!" exclaimed Clovis, quickly approaching the cook. "Tell us what the ingredients are, and we'll fetch them immediately!"
"O-Okay..." the cook replied, reluctant and confused, her eyes alternating between the strange smiles of the three demons around her.
After the list was made, it didn't take long for the trio to leave the Demon Realm and head towards Camelot. They all sighed as they passed through the gate separating the realm from the Dark Forest, but Clovis's happiness was the most evident of all. Unlike his usual serious demeanor, he was now smiling excessively.
"That was truly a great idea, Riley," Clovis said, enjoying, for the first time, the prominent landscape alternating between the Great Forest and the Frozen Peaks in the distance. "Remember, we'll only return, at the very least, after three days, which should be the time until Ethan's return."
"Yes, sir!" responded the demonic knights with great enthusiasm.
The demons' joy lasted for quite some time, but it was somewhat interrupted by a small question posed by Aiden as they crossed the destroyed canyon: "By any chance... does anyone know how we'll get the milk...? And... does anyone here know what sugar is..?"
****
Amid the ascent up the steep mountains of the Frozen Peaks, the coldness of the environment persisted, contrasting with the warmth contained in the cave where Ethan sought refuge. Seated on a small rock, his gaze focused on the inert figure of the armored woman lying on the cave floor, his mind delved deeper into reflections.
"As the informant in the human realm indicated, the heroine will soon be replaced," echoed Clovis's words in his mind. "It seems she is no longer fit to play the role assigned to her."
"Replaced... So, will she be killed?"
"Yes, most likely."
"Why? Among all the heroes I've seen summoned by them, she is undoubtedly the strongest."
Despite her strength, it seems she can no longer fight. A hero unfit to face the enemies...
"It is considered disposable, isn't it?"
"..."
Ethan sighed deeply. His eyes once again turned to Elizabeth, the heroine, silently observing her.
"What could be the cause of this?" he wondered. "Trauma from the events? Or perhaps, guilt?"
The idea of trauma seemed more plausible to Ethan. However, for some reason, he felt that this was not the complete answer to the puzzle before him.
"Guilt..."
Guilt, that feeling of being the catalyst for events that unleashed tragedy in the lives of many...
"How could she even entertain such a feeling?"
Those deaths, all those lives brutally cut short... they were not in her hands but rather...
"In mine..."
The expected reaction from Ethan after the incident, if she truly cared, as she claimed, would be fueled by anger, yet...
"Pathetic... appropriating others' pain and guilt, pretending to grieve for others when, in reality, she seeks only to validate her own need to feel good, to be right, merely to assert that she is grieving for the deaths of individuals she never knew..."
The dead do not witness his actions, and allowing herself to be killed by a simple mountain creature would not erase past events...
"Using such a fragile and false sense of guilt, inherently tied only to her need for validation, to be right, to claim she is mourning the deaths of people she never knew..."
In the midst of her reaction upon seeing him, Ethan did not completely rule out the possibility of trauma. However, even if that were true, he was sure of one thing: the core of the problem was not the deaths, never were. If the deaths were truly the main reason for her deplorable state, the initial reaction would be anger, not fear.
As Ethan's mind wandered, on the cave floor, gradually, starting with small and painful movements, the heroine was awakening. Her eyes opened: "Where is this?" she questioned herself. "Where am I?"
Rocky walls resembling a cave surrounded her, and despite the persistent cold, there was no snow around: "But wasn't I in the Frozen Peaks? How did I end up here?"
Headaches seemed to jolt her brain as she rose. Alongside the pains, which were also muscular, flashes of memory emerged in her mind, sometimes clear and other times as mere blurs. In one memory, with a cold demeanor and an imposing voice, that image alone made her entire body shudder. Slowly turning her body and looking at the face of the one seated on the rock, Elizabeth froze, her body not moving another inch due to the tremors. When their eyes met, everything seemed to stand still, including time.
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