Serena and the Mysterious Labyrinth - Chapter 260

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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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260. Unexpected Savior

Beneath golden hair resembling gold, eyes that shone transparently like the finest amethyst were revealed. At the appearance of a beauty that would make onlookers gasp in admiration, Serena furrowed her brow.

“Se… raph?”

The one who came to rescue the Princess buried under dirt and stones was her younger brother, Prince Seraph Parkling Huaim.

When their eyes met, the Prince’s hands, which had been quickly clearing away dirt and stones, slowed down.

“What are you doing?”

Seraph sent his sister the same look she always gave him. It was a look of disdain.

The effect of her younger brother’s mockery was tremendous. The Princess’s blood pressure shot up and suddenly her will to live began to boil.

“…Save me.”

Seraph raised one corner of his mouth and dusted off his hands. The dirt that fell from her brother’s hands landed on Serena’s face.

Serena sneezed several times and detected pain surging from somewhere in her body pressed under the dirt.

“Hurry up and save me.”

“Hmph.”

Seraph snorted and pursed his lips as he cleared away the dirt and stones crushing Serena’s body. Serena rolled her one good eye diligently to survey her surroundings.

Her brother was alone.

“Where are the others?”

“I don’t know. We got separated when the tunnel collapsed.”

Seraph, who had been diligently clearing dirt, grimaced. A large stone was crushing Serena’s lower body.

The Prince barely managed to move the stone using House Huaim’s treasured sword (mk2) as a lever. Only then could Serena move her body.

“Ugh.”

When the stone pressing her lower body was removed, the pain she had felt while sneezing came flooding like a burst dam.

Serena hurriedly reached out to find her bag. She only caught a torn bag strap. The bag seemed to have torn during the cave-in.

“Don’t move and stay still.”

Seraph dragged Serena and laid her down properly. Serena forced herself to lift her upper body to look at her legs. Her ankle was broken, bent at a strange angle.

Seraph carefully removed his sister’s shoe. His pretty face contorted as if the wound looked painful.

The Prince held a recovery potion in his hand and hesitated.

If he just used the recovery potion, the bone might heal incorrectly.

“Do you know how to set bones?”

At the absurd question, Serena responded with a question of her own.

“Do you?”

“Of course I don’t.”

Serena and Seraph were a princess and prince who grew up pampered in the Royal Palace. There was no way they would know how to set bones. Serena gritted her teeth, endured the pain, and waved her hand.

“Just treat it for now. Even if it heals wrong, walking is the priority right now.”

Even if she had to break it again later, mobility was important now. Seraph seemed to agree as he no longer hesitated and poured a high-grade recovery potion on the affected area.

“Kuk.”

Sharp pain surged through her and Serena swallowed her groan. After the pain subsided, Serena examined her ankle. Though it was bent strangely, it moved.

After confirming that her unbroken leg was fine, Serena leaned against the wall and stood up. Her body tilted because her leg lengths didn’t match, but she could walk.

“Phew.”

Serena let out a sigh of relief. Seraph, who hated sighs, habitually furrowed his brow even though he knew this sigh wasn’t because of him.

After brushing off the dirt, dust, and small stones from her clothes, Serena picked up her magic staff. Her brother sneered from beside her.

“You said you needed armor so I gave you good fabric, but did you enshrine it in some vault?”

“Don’t mention it. I’m regretting it.”

Serena looked up at the ceiling weakly. The silver fabric she had traded with her brother was currently being worked on by Countess Nex and Grey to enchant it with plenty of useful magic.

‘I should have finished the clothes before starting exploration.’

If she had, she would have avoided these full-body bruises. It was truly regrettable.

Aside from her broken ankle and her whole body aching and hurting, there were no other significant injuries. Since the ankle was healed with a potion, her body just ached all over.

After roughly checking her physical condition, Serena examined her brother. For someone who had also been separated from his party due to tunnel collapse, her brother was relatively unharmed.

He had properly secured his dimensional bag, and other bags, sword, dagger, and other equipment were all properly equipped.

The lantern hanging from her brother’s waist illuminated the darkness of the tunnel. Serena created a light orb to check if her head was working properly. Fortunately, her mana wasn’t blocked and her head wasn’t throbbing.

“Is there anything important in the bag?”

“No. Just water, food, potions, and a sleeping bag.”

“What about the magic map?”

“Olive has that.”

Originally Serena carried it, but since the tunnels were so complex, the Guide had been carrying it continuously after they reached the 11th Layer.

“Then abandon the bag. Let’s go.”

Seraph spoke coldly and took the lead. Serena agreed with her brother’s opinion and walked slowly. Wobbling. It was uncomfortable limping because her legs were different lengths, but she was grateful just to be able to walk.

“You must have started later than us, so how are you here?”

Serena had been buried after passing through the Lizardman Commune. How had her brother, whom she hadn’t encountered in the commune, gotten ahead of her?

Instead of immediately answering his sister’s question, Seraph pointed to the winding, partially collapsed tunnel.

“You’ll know when we go.”

Since he was walking while assessing danger, Seraph’s movement speed was manageable for Serena to follow.

Serena, who had been internally cursing her brother for not answering immediately, widened her eyes when she saw the tunnel revealed before her.

On the tunnel walls, traces of something massive having burrowed through were vividly remaining. Serena walked diligently with her staff and looked inside the hole pierced through the tunnel wall. Through the gaping hole, another tunnel was visible.

“Th-this…! What on earth…!”

The diameter of the hole was larger than the tunnel. Whatever had made the hole in the tunnel had moved, causing the entire tunnel to shake and collapse in places. Serena was truly horrified.

“What on earth is here? Did you see it?”

“High Priest Hazel called it a Labyrinth Worm.”

“This?”

“He said it would be a large species.”

Serena was so shocked she couldn’t close her mouth. If a worm was this size, it truly deserved to be called a dragon.

Her brother and the priests had encountered the giant worm shortly after reaching the 11th Layer.

While fleeing from the worm, the tunnel collapsed and the party members scattered, and Seraph had reached the place where Serena was. At least a shortcut to the stairs going up had been created.

“Do you know the way to the stairs?”

The 11th Layer was so complex that even experienced guides would be fed up with it. Serena’s piece of trash nodded without hesitation.

‘Is that really true?’

Serena was suspicious of her brother’s memory but didn’t show it. The Huaim siblings left chalk marks on walls and floors before moving toward the stairs.

Seraph took out a labyrinth compass and a hand-drawn map from his chest, choosing paths through the complexly tangled tunnels. Serena glanced at the map and was quite surprised.

‘He drew it well, didn’t he?’

The map her brother drew was as excellent as the automatically generated magic map.

Unlike the magic map that could selectively display necessary information, this one marked all kinds of information, making it seem chaotic and messy at first glance, but it was all necessary records.

Not only the angles of corners but also the slopes of walls and floors, and even the types of soil and rock layers visible on the surface. Seraph was creating a truly excellent labyrinth map by hand.

‘Seraph is… competent? But trash is trash because it’s useless?’

Serena was swept by the strange sensation that her lifelong brother had suddenly become a stranger.

“Damn it.”

Serena, who had been slightly anxious, felt relieved seeing her brother curse with a grimace. Seeing his usual foul mouth, her wildly beating heart calmed down.

“Why?”

“The path is blocked.”

The tunnel ceiling had collapsed, cutting off the path. Serena pressed the pile of dirt. It wasn’t a thickness they could break through.

“Isn’t there another way?”

“There is, but we have to go back.”

“Then let’s go back.”

“That’s what I was planning to do!”

Serena was looking at her irritated brother with satisfaction when she frowned. The tips of her brother’s gloves were torn and his fingertips were covered in wounds.

“Wait a minute. Your hands are injured.”

“It’s nothing.”

“It’s not nothing! Your wounds are full of dirt and dust! If they heal like this, your fingertips will be rough and your sensation will be dulled!”

Serena grabbed her brother and removed his gloves. She didn’t know what he had been doing, but the gloves were completely ruined.

“Even if you treat the wounds later, wash them with water first. Don’t you have new gloves?”

The Prince pursed his lips as he washed his hands in magically created water. When the water touched his wounds, his pretty face contorted mercilessly from the stinging pain.

Seraph shook off the water and took out new gloves to put on. It was fascinating how he saved potions and didn’t use them even after feeling the pain from his wounds.

‘Frugality. That was a word completely unrelated to him.’

Perhaps because he had seen his long hair longer than when it was short, his sibling walking ahead felt like a stranger. As Serena blankly stared at her sibling’s back, Seraph turned his head and spoke curtly.

“If you fall behind, I’ll leave you?”

“I’m coming.”

Serena walked diligently to humor her sibling.

***

“Damn it. This path is blocked too.”

The other path leading to the stairs had also collapsed. This time Serena cursed inwardly as well.

“Isn’t there another way?”

“There is a path, but I don’t know if it leads to the stairs. We’ll have to go and check.”

The Princess and Prince fell into contemplation. On their way here, the two hadn’t encountered any monsters. The siblings who had reached the 11th Layer knew well how fortunate this was.

There was no guarantee this luck would continue.

‘Originally, when you get separated, the best strategy is to wait in a relatively safe place for the party to find you.’

Having finished organizing her thoughts, Serena was about to tell Seraph they should find a reasonably safe place and wait for the party.

She had even planned to make an excuse about her legs hurting too much to walk if her sibling, who didn’t know reality, insisted on continuing to move, but what was this?

“Tsk. Can’t be helped. Let’s just move to here and wait for someone to come.”

Her sibling brought up moving to a relatively safe place and waiting before Serena did. When Serena didn’t answer immediately out of surprise, Seraph got irritated.

“Are you ignoring what I said?”

“No, it’s a good idea.”

“Hmph.”

‘Why is he being so competent today?’

The sibling she had seen in the morning was definitely flower trash, but the sibling wandering the tunnels with her was quite a capable guide. She wondered if it was a dream or fantasy, but judging by how her whole body ached and hurt, it was reality.

Serena gritted her teeth.

‘Get it together, Serena. If Seraph has become competent, that’s good. Don’t lose your mind just because you tasted some dirt!’

What Serena needed to do now wasn’t to be surprised at every turn by her competent sibling. It was to secure safety in the tunnel and quickly reunite with the party.

A dead end made of solid rock among stones. Seraph unpacked his luggage there.

After securing adequate space, he pulled out a bunch of things from his subspace bag.

‘What is it?’

From what she could roughly see, they were all trap installation tools and materials. Seraph wrote a warning in chalk about the presence of traps, then began mercilessly laying traps on the tunnel floor, walls, and ceiling.

“Hmm.”

How much time had passed since the Prince started installing traps? After what felt like not too long, a trap field was completed where humans would die if they ignored the warnings, and monsters would naturally die.

‘Even illiterate people would die.’

Some traps were so concealed that even Serena wasn’t confident she could detect them.

‘Is this a prince or a trap serial killer.’

Serena was once again swept up in a strange feeling. It was the odd emotion she had felt since seeing her sibling’s blonde hair while buried in dirt.

How could she not feel dangerous or scared when she was alone with her sibling in this perilous labyrinth?

Had Serena’s safety consciousness been left in the dirt along with the bag she had torn and left behind?

Serena observed her sibling while recalling her conversation with Muffin.

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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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