I’m Hunting My Enemy - Chapter 87
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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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87. Limitation (2)
“I’m not even ready to accept it, so if only you feel good about it, what am I supposed to say? Are you forcing me right now?”
“Ryuie….”
“Add ‘Miss’ to that.”
Ryuie swung one foot.
“Your respect seems to have that as its limit.”
Thud.
Mos’s eyes shook violently as he was forced to kneel with the very legs he had been so proud of just moments before.
Ryuie had simply tapped the back of his knees lightly, yet his strength gave out helplessly.
As if an illusion had suddenly shattered, Mos felt the cold mud on his legs.
“I can’t call something like this a miracle.”
“…Miss.”
“I don’t believe in miracles that only benefit one person.”
Staring directly at Ohen, whose faint smile had disappeared, and Mos, who was kneeling, Ryuie spoke.
“Try healing all the injured people. Try drying up this swamp. Try removing all the power of the god who made those damn vows.”
Ryuie planted both feet firmly on the ground again.
“Then I’ll believe it’s a miracle.”
Mos couldn’t answer.
And Ohen didn’t open his mouth either.
Ryuie snorted once and walked away, passing by Mos and the priest.
The muddy footprints he left behind created a clear path in the temple corridor.
* * *
Mos was ashamed.
He was so ashamed he felt like he might suffocate.
“Benito! Benito!”
Mos wandered the dark corridor, shouting. He looked exactly like a madman.
After Ryuie had left like that, the imperial investigator had said something about wanting to observe his legs, but it didn’t register in his ears at all.
He could only keep thinking about how the beautiful scene he had imagined of standing beside Ryuie had been shattered and ended up rolling in the mud.
‘I confessed to her.’
He had said he loved her.
It had even been sincere.
She had once shown interest in me, so is it okay to trample on my sincerity like this?
When people’s gazes turned back to pity even though his legs had changed, Mos thought he was going insane.
Love changed in circles to hatred, to obsession, continuously transforming.
“Help me!”
Mos’s pale face was eerily reflected in the windows lining the corridor.
Due to the storm clouds that were still raining, the evening hours were much darker than they actually were.
“More. Give me more changes! Just the legs aren’t enough!”
Mos, who kept going back and forth through the corridor where he had coincidentally encountered Benito, gradually failed to notice that people were disappearing from around him.
The moment he realized that only darkness and himself remained in the corridor, the voice was heard again.
“What do you want?”
“Anything that can captivate Ryuie!”
Mos shouted.
“Fulfill all of Ryuie’s damn demands! Turn the transformed humans back into people, dry up this swamp, and destroy all those betrothal vows!”
The darkness outside accumulated like weight rather than paint.
“So I can stand beside her!”
Mos’s legs, still covered in scales, staggered and leaned against the window.
“I can’t grant that wish.”
“What?”
Mos’s breath caught. No matter how he turned his head this way and that, Benito’s figure didn’t appear.
“We made a contract. A contract where you become my subordinate if you fail to make Ryuie fall in love.”
“Y-yes. I know that, but.”
“Vows can be maintained forever as long as they’re not broken, but contracts are different.”
As Benito’s voice changed, an eerie feeling rose up like poison seeping out.
“If you can’t seduce Ryuie, you die. Until you achieve that condition, I only cooperate—I can’t give you more than that.”
“…What?”
“The contract period is while I make it rain. When the rain stops, you lose your chance.”
Mos suddenly felt extreme cold.
His jaw and legs trembled on their own, making the young man’s already pale skin turn a sickly white.
“You… who are you. You’re not Benito. You’re not a priest either. To manipulate a vow made in Lord Rkultu’s name like this….”
“You didn’t make a vow in Rkultu’s name.”
Benito’s voice changed into an inhuman noise.
“I, who made a contract with you, am Agatos.”
Rumble.
Lightning tore through the sky and struck down beside Mos. It was such a tremendous roar that it made his eardrums ring with a piercing sound and left him feeling dazed.
The moment he heard the name of the unfamiliar deity, Mos couldn’t move a muscle and fell into extreme despair.
He was nothing but a frail human.
Human.
Human.
…Hope.
Beyond the faint sense of suffocation, Mos could barely twist his lips thanks to his only lifeline.
“…What are you trying to accomplish by coming here.”
“Ryuie.”
As the other deity spoke the name that had been Mos’s hope, the light drizzle soon became a downpour.
A rainy season that seemed like it would shatter the earth began.
* * *
“A downpour in this season.”
Glem looked up at the sky with a worried expression as the fierce rain reminiscent of a monsoon poured down.
Autumn downpours were much more depressing than summer ones.
The weather was colder, and instead of growing, the plants became bare.
Even the situation had gotten worse.
The supplies that had been stacked at Glem’s hastily constructed outpost scattered here and there along the slippery muddy water.
“Catch it!”
“At this rate, Yeongae won’t be able to pursue us, but we’ll end up losing all the supplies we received with such difficulty.”
“Wouldn’t it be better to evacuate?”
“…Where to?”
The swampland wasn’t a good environment to stay in even when the weather was clear.
But as it approached this state, they had no choice but to retreat to a more distant location.
‘Ryuie has already taken control of the nearby villages and blocked all the proper routes. Do we have to cut through the forest to go somewhere else?’
Since it was a border area, accidentally crossing the border could lead to diplomatic issues.
Ryuie knew this too and was just slowly tightening the siege.
Although he knew he was at a disadvantage, the reason Glem couldn’t change his position was still because of the Relic of the Swamp.
“We were almost able to extract it all.”
“The swamp would have swollen again anyway because of the rain. Retrieving the relic first is impossible.”
If the swamp has swollen, Ryuie won’t be able to cross over alone either.
Inevitably, Glem’s thoughts turned to Ryuie first.
The ground had become completely soft due to the countless people who had trampled in and out of the swamp.
Only after seeing the swamp almost spiraling as it sucked in the surrounding dirt and water could he definitively abandon his lingering attachment.
Unless Ryuie was crazy, she wouldn’t cross that alone.
Unless she was crazy.
“…”
‘She’s not, right?’
A nagging premonition prevented Glem from leaving the swamp.
He was worried that Ryuie might actually pop out from within it.
What dispelled Glem’s hesitation surprisingly came from elsewhere.
“Your Highness! Your Highness!”
A nobleman who came running with a hushed voice spoke with a face paler than ever before.
“Someone you must meet urgently has arrived!”
“Did Ryuie finally attack?”
“Pardon? No.”
The nobleman hesitated on how to express it before speaking.
“It’s an envoy from across the border.”
“?!”
The Emperor’s empire protected by Guardian Deity Rkultu stretched across vast territories, but other countries definitely existed around it as well.
There was the small principality that had once brought guns to Ryuie, and there was also the republic from which the envoy Glem was about to meet had come.
The nobles who had identified the envoy fell into deep concern.
“We absolutely cannot let them find out that Glem is the Crown Prince. It would become a big problem.”
“Right. We’re just nobles who came for leisure.”
“We can’t be looked down upon by a country that has neither a patron deity nor an emperor.”
The nobles who had been whispering while soaked to the bone in their beggar-like state murmured pitifully.
Under normal circumstances, they would have entered more proudly than anyone, throwing money around.
But looking like beggars was better than revealing that a lovers’ quarrel was escalating into a national problem.
Fortunately, the republic’s envoy rescued them from their shame with deliberate indifference.
“I hope you understand our concern. We cannot ignore the movement of troops heading toward the border area.”
“I understand.”
Glem replied while shaking his wet hair.
Since the nobles below had earnestly pleaded with him, Glem did not step forward as the Crown Prince.
Pretending to be a mercenary after a long time, the speech pattern stuck to his tongue.
“The nobles I’m leading around are so stupid, you see. In the end, they lost all their luggage in the swamp and are just clinging to me. It’s been really tough.”
The nobles who knew his identity flinched for a moment, but Glem remained calm.
The envoy didn’t suspect anything at all due to his brazen attitude.
“I see. Since it’s raining heavily, would you like to stay at our embassy? We have lodging not far from here.”
“Good. Those guys will take care of the payment.”
The envoy tilted his head briefly upon seeing Glem casually write a credit note.
And judging that it would be better to continue dealing with Glem rather than the nobles full of wariness, he suddenly brought up a topic.
“I heard that the army was dispatched from the Empire’s Capital.”
“!”
“Do you know anything about it?”
‘So Father ended up sending the army after all!’
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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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