A Runaway Villainess, Now Healing In An Enemy Country - Chapter 75

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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【Chapter 75】

“Hmm… You’re not mistaken about something, are you?”

【I’m not some fool who can’t recognize my contractor! Unlike you, you fraud!】

Judging by that indignant outcry, it seemed to harbor considerable resentment toward me.

‘I don’t remember any contract, dragon, or speck of it.’

To be suddenly branded a fraud and scolded like this.

It should have been absurd, yet somehow I felt sorry for the dragon. And even more frustrated than that.

I wondered if this dragon might be a connection from a past life I couldn’t remember. Because of those lost memories, there was so little I could be certain of.

【It wasn’t supposed to be a contract with you. If I’d known I’d have to wait this long, I would have just become an evil dragon or whatever back then!】

From the dragon grumbling in a voice too young for its size, I felt a strange sense of kinship.

“…Will you tell me? What happened before.”

I unconsciously asked while stroking the dragon soothingly. The texture of scales felt vivid through my palm.

The dragon rubbed its cheek against my hand and spoke with a sigh.

【…It was December of the year 3090 by divine calendar. I was sleeping beneath the roots of the World Tree.】

“…”

【Actually, I was dying. Tainted by contamination, I couldn’t endure any longer. That’s when you came to find me.】

The dragon finished speaking and blinked its golden eyes twice.

Then a pale woman’s silhouette reflected in those pupils. I was drawn into it as if watching a movie.

The woman who appeared like white mist spoke.

“Do you want to die, or make a contract with me?”

【…A Countess of this era, I suppose. I don’t know how you found me, but whatever you do will be useless. Your sanctum cannot repel contamination.】

“Because the sanctum itself is contaminated?”

【You know well. After all that commotion in this land recently, have humans finally realized the truth? That there’s no divine salvation on the surface?】

“Only I know. I also know that you, completely contaminated, will soon become a tremendous evil dragon and spread magi across the surface.”

【You speak as if you could stop such a thing.】

“Of course. I’m quite remarkable, you know.”

‘…This woman is the Countess from a hundred years ago.’

I arrived in Belmayer in 3196. With the year changing along the way, it’s currently the end of winter 3197.

3090 would be over a hundred years in the past.

The Holy War occurred in December of that year, and the Contaminated Region with the World Tree was its final battlefield…

In other words, this scene I’m watching through the dragon’s eyes is from exactly when the Holy War was taking place.

“You don’t want that, do you? You’re a divine beast. I’ll give you part of my soul. Then you might be able to escape contamination.”

【You think a mere human soul has such value? You’re trying to deceive me because my eyes have grown dim.】

“We won’t know unless we try.”

【…If you’ve gone this far, you must want something from me. What is it?】

I couldn’t even see her expression, barely more than a silhouette, yet somehow I thought she smiled.

She raised her pinky finger as if making a promise.

“If you want to know, make a contract with me. It might take a little time… but I’ll make you a proper divine beast again.”

【Then when will you return?】

“After sleeping for about a hundred nights?”

Then light from her flashed brilliantly.

When the dragon’s eyes blinked twice again, the images flowing from within smoothly disappeared.

The dragon finished its recollection and grumbled sullenly.

【You gave me a fragment of your soul, and thanks to that, I gained new life without contamination. Though I lost my former power.】

“…I did that.”

【While I waited desperately, wondering what you were doing and where. You forgot everything? How irresponsible!】

For some reason, my heart beat a little faster. I couldn’t tell if this emotion was nervousness, excitement, or perhaps anticipation.

In any case, I needed certainty.

“On what basis did you… recognize me?”

Recently, Davuer also sees me completely as ‘her’, but this was more like a judgment reached after taking time to doubt and observe.

‘But this dragon…’

【Ha.】

The dragon made an incredulous sound and shouted.

【Because our contract is bound by souls! Would it disappear just because you were reborn?】

…The more I looked at this dragon, the more it resembled me.

It had an aura exactly like a piece that had separated from me. Being in a consciousness state, I could feel it clearly.

【I am bound to you soul and all. That’s the kind of contract it is! Only you can make me be born completely!】

That part of me also exists in the dragon.

That’s exactly the basis of the contract.

【But you only appeared now. Just when some presumptuous Vermin is trying to take over my body!】

At this moment, the dragon’s emotions flowed directly into me. I felt longing and resentment as massive as its body.

“…I’m sorry.”

When I apologized almost instinctively, the dragon smoothly curled its tail that had been expressing irritation.

Looking at it, I organized my thoughts.

All questions came from a past life I couldn’t remember. Both the reason God hates me and the cause of the dragon’s reproach.

If the reason I can’t remember my past life is connected to the Countess who was erased from the world after death.

If I’m really her.

“…Hey. How do you remember me?”

【Wrong. I know the contract I made with you.】

“What’s the difference? You even showed me images.”

【That conversation itself was the contract. I don’t remember anything else about you.】

What?

Then how does Davuer remember?

The Countess whom no one properly remembers.

‘…Me?’

When I questioned like that, my stomach inevitably churned. I slowly pressed my forehead against the dragon’s and spoke.

“This won’t do, little dragon.”

【Li-little dragon? Don’t tell me you’re calling me that?】

I don’t know magic to recall lost memories. But I could understand how I made a ‘contract’ I don’t even remember.

As the dragon said, because we’re bound by souls.

“Give me your certainty too.”

Whoosh!

When I used my sanctum, my vision turned pure white.

A sensation of being connected to the dragon in an intangible way, heat from deep within my soul swept over me.

I recalled the situation just before, which I had momentarily forgotten.

The black egg that suddenly appeared at the Mutant Griffin Stronghold, and the disgusting Vermin that flowed out when it cracked.

The hallucination calling me from somewhere. The feeling of making eye contact with something. That must have been the dragon.

This place is probably the dragon’s consciousness realm.

That’s right. The flash I created with my sanctum then was precisely in response to that call, intended to enter this place.

A sudden instinctive realization struck me.

“…You were inside that egg. You were sealing the magi there. Right?”

【That’s right! That vicious thing invaded me while I was waiting for proper hatching – do you know how much I’ve suffered?】

The dragon poured out complaints, apparently having been quite miserable.

Just looking at that egg made me feel an unpleasant sensation, as if bugs were crawling all over my body. Thinking back on it, its magi was similar to that of the World Tree.

‘Fundamental magi.’

However, I couldn’t sense even a handful of magi from this dragon. What this fact implied was clear.

Dragons and Vermin were completely different, separate beings.

【That thing kept devouring living creatures, causing this body to reach its limit. The seal broke and the magi went berserk.】

“…I see. So that’s what happened.”

The act of sealing magi was fundamentally different from being tainted by magi from the very beginning.

Approaching it from a different perspective, I soon realized the principle by which the dragon could seal magi.

If magi was a virus, then the dragon had a ‘specially sacred’ antibody that provided immunity to it.

An antibody that was part of my soul.

‘Then how did Davuer….’

The situations of the dragon and Davuer were very similar.

What was the reason he could harbor such magi without becoming like the Rotten World Tree, that is, without becoming a living Contaminated Region?

…It was absurd.

It seemed like a crazy thought.

“I was an acquired magical power awakener.”

My rapidly spinning thought circuits wouldn’t stop thinking. A sensation like puzzle pieces fitting into holes dominated me.

The childhood story he had told me once.

The magical power acquired from the Countess that day.

The method by which mages increase their magical power.

“If you want to increase your magical power, you can eat another mage’s heart.”

Screech!

Along with a ringing that struck my head, the conclusion came. I slowly pulled my forehead away from the dragon.

So, long ago that Countess….

“…Ha.”

I swayed from the headache and laughed like a groan.

…I understood how ‘I’ had transferred magical power to Davuer. Even without remembering, I was certain.

I had given him my heart.

Of course, I didn’t literally make him eat it. I probably crudely tore out the heart and transplanted it.

That heart functioned like a fragment of the soul, enabling him to resist for long years while keeping the magi sealed… I was certain of it.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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