Leave the Hero's Ex-Girlfriend Alone! - Chapter 21

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

Leave the Hero’s ex-girlfriend alone!
EP21
I turned my head toward the sound on pure reflex.
A black helicopter was cutting through the clouds, drawing closer.
Zero also gazed at the helicopter for a moment, then broke into a smile.
“Looks like I have to go.”
It wasn’t the helicopter that had come to pick us up.
There was no insignia or lettering on the helicopter, but I knew instinctively.
It had come for Zero.
So that was the déjà vu I’d felt earlier, in the gap between his “What?” and his “Right, I suppose.”
A sudden surge of betrayal hit me, and I glared at Zero.
He must have read the look in my eyes, because he tapped his wrist.
“Tracking device.”
Zero only moved his lips, barely making a sound.
A wire came unspooling from the helicopter with a sharp rattling sound.
“Hey! Nobody could pinpoint the coordinates here, so we had to come find you ourselves, and it was a real pain!”
Someone inside the helicopter shouted.
“But you did find us, didn’t you?”
Zero cupped his hands in front of his mouth and called up to the helicopter.
In that instant, Alpha took a single step forward.
The air felt taut, as if it were being pulled tight.
The grains of sand around us trembled, and the tips of my hair stirred in the wind.
“I don’t know who you are, but I assume you’re with the Villain Alliance.”
A red Wave rippled around Alpha.
Just then, a jagged mass of air shot out of the helicopter and slammed into the beach.
It was the same Villain I had run into at the shopping mall.
To shield me, Alpha used Telekinesis to raise a wall of sand.
Meanwhile, Zero moved toward the wire.
Just before grabbing the wire, Zero paused.
His golden hair fluttered in the wind.
Beneath it, a pair of eyes smiled as if nothing mattered, piercing straight into Alpha.
“If it were me, though, I wouldn’t have done that.”
Alpha’s eyebrow twitched for a moment.
Zero looked somewhat angry.
“Even if Haesoo told you to save the citizens first, you shouldn’t have done that.”
Zero’s gaze had grown noticeably sharper.
“Whatever you need to protect, protect it completely. Half-hearted feelings only cost you everything.”
The tips of Alpha’s fingers trembled.
Zero studied me intently, then stepped onto the wire.
The propeller roar of the black helicopter whipped up the sea breeze.
But instead of slicing through the sky, the helicopter gave off a blue-green glow and vanished from sight in an instant.
Alpha stood rooted in place, not moving a muscle.
I could only tighten my grip on the fabric of his sleeve beside him.
Just then, the sound of water being cut came from somewhere far off.
An engine’s hum, mixed in with the crashing waves.
When I turned, a boat bearing the words “Hero Association” was drawing near.
As the boat came close to the shore, someone on the deck waved their arms and shouted.
“Haesoo! Haesoo, is that you?!”
Team Leader Ahn Gyeong-un hurried off the boat and ran toward us.
Reaching us, he caught his breath, wiped the sweat from his face, and spoke.
“Honestly, if I’d been any later, the planet might have split in two.”
Gasping for breath, Team Leader Ahn said it playfully, but there seemed to be some sincerity buried in the words.
Beside him, Alpha was still glaring at the spot where the helicopter had disappeared.
His lips were pressed into a tight line, but the tips of his clenched fingers were faintly trembling.
I quietly reached out to the side and gently took his hand.
Just a silent message that it was time to go home.
* * *
The boat was gradually moving farther away from the island.
I crouched down quietly and stared absently at the tips of my fingers.
My hand still trembling, my nails cracked and worn, the bruises of blue marks.
A sense of actually returning to life began to seep in, little by little.
The sound of waves brushing against the side of the ship reached me faintly.
My shoulders started to tremble, and only then did I notice how chilly the sea breeze was.
Tap—
Something warm settled over my back.
I looked up. Team Leader Ahn had draped a blanket over me and plopped down beside me.
“How are you feeling?”
“Mm… not bad, I guess.”
I tugged the blanket tighter as I answered.
“Seriously, what is this? On your vacation, of all times. Honestly.”
“Right? Quite the rollercoaster.”
“Still, it’s a relief we found you within a day.”
“Seriously. This time, I really thought I was going to die.”
I said it to the Team Leader with a trace of complaint in my voice.
Dropped onto an uninhabited island with nothing, what were the odds of getting out alive within a single day?
Looked at that way, maybe I’m pretty lucky?
“If we’d been just a little later, it could’ve been really bad. I’m not just saying that.”
Team Leader Ahn glanced at Alpha and shook his head.
“Right. That island didn’t have much to eat, either!”
I remembered how Zero and I had wandered around looking for food and I’d fallen off a cliff, and I shuddered.
“No, that’s not what I meant.”
“Huh?”
Team Leader Ahn explained what had happened right after I went missing.
For a while, I just sat there, dazed, trying to grasp what I had just heard.
Then I looked at Alpha, who was standing carelessly at the railing, enjoying the sea breeze.
His face was so serene it was hard to believe he was the one who had done such a monstrous thing.
Still, maybe that’s the reason I made it back alive.
“I’m serious. Alpha literally charged out to turn the whole sea upside down. Everyone up top must’ve been sweating bullets.”
“So I’m… glad I’m alive?”
I said with an awkward smile.
Team Leader Ahn watched me and smiled even more gently.
“Yes. Truly, it’s a good thing.”
The ship was still cutting through the sea.
I pulled the blanket up to my neck and lifted my head slightly.
At the edge of my vision, I could see that guy.
I gave the Team Leader a light bow and got to my feet.
The ship rocked a little, making it hard to keep my balance, but I had something I had to say to Alpha.
“…Hey.”
I called out to Alpha in a small voice.
Alpha slowly turned his head.
“Thanks.”
“For what.”
“What do you think? For saving me.”
The moment the words left my mouth, my throat tightened, but I forced it back down.
“Man, I really thought I was going to die, you know?”
“Looked like it. You were bawling your eyes out, snot and tears everywhere.”
“Oh, like you didn’t come running the second you saw me!”
I mimicked his earlier actions as I teased him.
He said I was exaggerating and that he’d never done any such thing, but that’s not how it looked to me.
“But how did you find me?”
As the laughter faded, the question rose up on its own.
How could they have found me within a single day?
Alpha gazed off into the distance for a moment, then jerked his chin toward the back of the ship.
“The decisive part was the Team Leader’s help.”
I glanced at the Team Leader standing behind us, then turned my eyes back to Alpha.
“The Team Leader? How?”
“Well, he’s capable. That guy.”
Maybe it was because the question still hadn’t been fully answered.
Without thinking, I took one more step toward Alpha.
The ship swayed again and threw me off balance, but luckily I managed to steady myself.
Alpha raised a hand and steadied me lightly.
“I don’t know much either. From what I heard, they just checked the direction of the currents and pointed out which islands were likely to drift…”
His voice trailed off a little.
The words made me laugh, and the corners of my mouth lifted slightly.
“What? You flew all the way here without even hearing the explanation properly?”
At that, his brow twitched ever so slightly.
“There wasn’t time.”
I knew that a great deal was packed into those few words.
In his eyes, still fixed on me without wavering, my own reflection stared back.
He kept looking at me like that, not once blinking.
My heart began to pound again.
That pounding was starting to frighten me more and more.
Alpha brushed a strand of my hair, which the wind had tossed loose, back behind my ear.
When his fingertips grazed my ear, goosebumps spread across my whole body.
Calm down. Please.
Ignoring my heart hammering wildly in my chest, I bit my lip hard.
I turned my gaze toward the sea, pretending it was nothing.
In the distance, the shoreline was coming into view.
Word must have spread, because people had gathered at the pier, waving their hands in our direction.
Finally…
‘I’m going home.’
I let out a sigh of relief, thinking that it was truly over at last.
Alpha tapped the railing with his fingers, seemed lost in thought for a moment, then finally spoke.
“Who was the one that was with you?”
“No idea.”
“…Do you really think I can’t tell whether you’re lying or not?”

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