I Reincarnated Into a Healing Game… and It’s a Zombie Apocalypse?! - Chapter 82

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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 82

“Yes, I do feel a difference in level as you mentioned. In how people treat others.”

“What?”

“The people here may lack pretense, but they treat you sincerely as person to person. They don’t hide thorns in their words, which I really appreciate.”

Murakka’s eyebrows twitched at Nana’s pointed words. But she soon pretended to be composed and lowered her gaze.

“I’m glad you’ve adapted well. Oh my, what’s that in your arms…?”

“Ah, it’s jam. I just ran out.”

Murakka’s lips twisted into a bitter smile. She looked at the paper bag as if viewing filth, then covered her mouth with a deliberately surprised expression.

“Oh my, you bought that directly from a market stall? How… humble of you.”

Murakka covered her mouth with her hand, pretending to be shocked.

“Even when the market is open, I only browse. My palate is so sensitive that just smelling such street food turns my stomach. I suppose eating only the finest things has made my body reject such fare.”

She blatantly implied ‘I can tell your level from eating such cheap things.’ Nana, catching her meaning, smiled brightly.

“Oh dear, how unfortunate.”

“What?”

“This may look crude, but it’s much fresher than those fancy glass jars with sugar masking the taste, preserving the fruit’s natural flavor. That’s why true gourmets seek out only handmade products from places like this.”

Nana glanced over Murakka’s fancy attire and drove the point home.

“You claim to have a discerning palate, yet you don’t know such delicacies? You must have only eaten things that are flashy on the outside but lack substance. How pitiful.”

Murakka openly contorted her face. Her pride wounded, she struggled to maintain a smile while her lips trembled.

“Well. Someone accustomed to easy things within arm’s reach wouldn’t understand, but truly noble things are never easily obtained. Just like my Aibanu.”

“…”

“He dislikes being swayed by emotions. He always maintains proper etiquette with me, keeping a certain distance. Though his coldness in not easily opening his heart sometimes pains me, I know it’s his way, and someday he’ll open his heart only to me.”

Murakka played the tragic heroine enduring a beautiful but bitter wait. It was a desperate rationalization, trying to package the cold treatment she received as nobility.

But Nana couldn’t understand those words at all. So what she said was pure, innocent confusion.

“Really? Isha?”

“…Isha?”

“That’s strange? Isha is warm and takes good care of people.”

“Wh-what?”

“He’s never been cold to me. Rather, he seems a bit naive, which makes me worry sometimes.”

Unaware that Ishanka was only gentle with her, Nana muttered to herself with apparent bewilderment. She was unintentionally crushing Murakka’s bones.

“Ah, look how late it’s gotten? I’ve kept you too long. Well then, I’ll be going. Take care.”

Without giving her a chance to respond, Nana bowed lightly and turned away. She could sense Murakka trembling with humiliation and shock behind her, but Nana paid no more attention.

* * *

Swoosh—!

A cool cutting sound tore through the training ground’s air.

Ishanka moved his body without rest.

Sweat dripping down his jawline dampened the floor, and wet hair obscured his vision, but he didn’t stop.

As time passed, his precise technique disappeared and the sword’s trajectory collapsed violently. Only destructive speed remained, trying to cut down the phantom before his eyes.

But the more he abused his body, the more vividly the voice etched in his mind came alive.

“Who do you think you are?”

“I’m grateful you saved me and let me stay here. But that’s as far as it goes.”

His balance wavered momentarily, and the sword tip swayed pathetically.

Ishanka stopped there, breathing roughly and irritably wiping his forehead. But something—whether sweat or emotional residue—traced hotly past his eyes.

Nana’s words kept circling in his head.

That’s as far as it goes.

That short phrase drew a sharp, clear line through the center of his chest.

A firm boundary that wouldn’t allow even the tip of his toe.

He wanted to cross it.

To cross that line and finally reach her, to stand completely within her world.

But she stood calmly beyond that line and turned her back indifferently. Though she was within arm’s reach.

The moment his heart was rejected, Nana was farther away than anyone else in the world.

“…Hah.”

He readjusted his stance and raised his sword again.

But his gaze could no longer follow the sword’s tip. Though his hands still swung the sword, his eyes only wandered through empty air.

It wasn’t the sword but his thoughts that were shaking him.

Then someone’s shadow approached.

“Take it easy, brother. You’ll hurt yourself.”

It was Ezion.

Ishanka slowly sheathed his sword without even glancing at him.

“It’s not your concern.”

“How can I not be concerned? My only brother is abusing his body because of love.”

Ishanka slowly put away his sword.

After standing silently for a long while, he finally spoke.

“Adrien said… she’s grateful I saved her, but that’s as far as it goes.”

His lips grew parched as he spoke. As if his throat was dry.

“I thought we had grown close enough. I believed I could now stay by her side, but it seems I was mistaken alone.”

Ishanka swallowed his emotions and hung the wooden sword at his waist.

Then Ezion carefully opened his mouth, reading the mood.

“Um… this is just my thought, but could it be because of that rumor?”

“Rumor?”

“The talk that you and Murakka will marry soon. It’s already spread among the Sahad people like established fact.”

Ishanka’s eyes sharpened.

This was news to him. After returning, he’d been too busy handling accumulated official duties to pay attention to such outside noise.

‘Could Adrien have heard that story too?’

If that was why she had pushed him away so coldly?

Then the reason she’d been avoiding him, and why she’d drawn that cold line that night—it all fit together like a puzzle.

Perhaps this was all a misunderstanding. But he could no longer ignore that possibility.

He had to confirm it.

Even if only pain awaited at the end.

“…I’ll go out for a moment.”

“Yes, yes. It seems important, so I’ll step aside.”

Before Ezion finished speaking, Ishanka had already rushed out of the training ground like the wind.

* * *

Rewinding time briefly, Nana, having left the market, was walking silently ahead.

Her steps headed aimlessly into the alley, but her mind was in complete disarray.

Murica Vilona.

Ishanka’s fiancée, whom she’d met for the first time today. The worst kind of human—one who ranked people and smiled while cutting others down.

‘And he’s engaged to such a woman?’

She let out a hollow laugh. To think a man who claimed to be a king of a nation had such poor judgment.

It was beyond disappointing—almost contemptible.

But what truly made Nana miserable wasn’t the disappointment, but the terrible imagination that clung to it.

The image of Ishanka caring for her tenderly and quietly smiling at her words, just as he had with Nana.

Since he was originally a courteous and responsible man, perhaps he showed Murakka the same face he’d shown Nana.

The thought that it might be obligatory kindness shown to everyone made her stomach churn.

“Ugh, I really hate this.”

Nana bit her lip.

Having confirmed he was involved with such a woman, she should cleanly brush it off, but one corner of her chest ached, and she found herself pathetically miserable for even feeling hurt by that betrayal.

‘Because of just one man like that, why am I…’

The jam bag in her hand felt heavy as a stone.

The immature feelings she couldn’t even name had been trampled into mud before they could even begin.

As she walked while tearing at herself, a rough voice came from the street corner.

“How dare a beastkin act so boldly!”

Nana stopped in her tracks and turned her head.

At the street corner, a large man was glaring threateningly at a small child.

The tiny child, who didn’t even reach the man’s thigh, was crouched on the ground with their head covered.

Above the child’s head, small ears that looked like animal ears were clearly visible, trembling.

“You filthy creature with beast blood dares to dirty my clothes?”

The man’s clothes were spotlessly clean. It was baseless fault-finding.

“I’ll teach you some proper manners today!”

With a rough shout, a hand as large as a pot lid was raised high. Just as he was about to bring that hand down on the child.

“Hey, you child abuser!”

A sharp cry burst through the alley.

The moment the man reflexively turned his head, something charged into the center of his vision.

There was no time to dodge.

Thud!

Nana’s body tackle landed squarely, and the man’s body was slammed into the snow-covered ground.

The impact was much heavier than expected, and the man screamed “Ugh!” as he tumbled across the snowy ground.

Nana pulled the child into her arms. The small body trembled within her embrace.

“What are you…”

The man gritted his teeth and tried to get up, but slipped on the ice and sat back down. It was comical, but Nana didn’t let her guard down and looked at him coldly as she spoke.

“If you’re an adult, act like one! What were you trying to do to a child so much smaller than you?!”

“A Kingdom person? You came all the way here to meddle? Hey, get lost. Unless you want to get beaten too!”

Nana still didn’t take her eyes off the man while holding the child in her arms.

Honestly speaking, she wasn’t without fear.

She could barely take care of herself, so she didn’t have the luxury to get involved in others’ affairs.

Nevertheless.

‘I can’t just turn a blind eye to something like this.’

More strength went into her arms.

The man’s eyes widened as he staggered to his feet, breathing heavily.

“Ah, damn… What kind of ignorant outsider is meddling here?!”

“You’re the outsider.”

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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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