Serena and the Mysterious Labyrinth - Chapter 83

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

83. Light and Darkness of the Labyrinth (1)

‘How did this happen!’

The time Serena’s party stayed on the 4th layer was one and a half days.

Even accounting for errors, it didn’t feel like more than three days.

But the lobby wall recorded that over 300 days had passed.

Even that showed signs of the lines becoming unstable toward the bottom before being erased entirely.

“Lavenda! Calm down and tell me! Where did my wife and Grey go? Why are you here alone?”

Count Randy roughly questioned Lavenda. It was natural since his wife and nephew had disappeared.

“They left! They both left, abandoning only me!”

“Where did they go!”

“They went down below!”

“Count! Calm down! Lavenda needs time too.”

Serena forcibly separated Count Randy and Lavenda.

Olive counted the number of days recorded on the wall and frowned, crossing her arms.

Ralph was at a loss, unable to do anything but call Lavenda’s name.

“L-Lavenda. Aaah. Lavenda.”

Ying just stood there expressionlessly like a stone statue even in this situation.

‘I need to find out what happened.’

Dying comes after that.

Serena first sat Lavenda by the campfire and made her drink a potion.

Not only her mental state but her physical health looked poor too. Since Lavenda wouldn’t open her mouth, she forced her to drink it.

Lavenda’s lips were so dry they had cracked and formed scabs.

The Mysterious Stranger, who had been refusing the potion but was forced to drink it, couldn’t refuse anymore once liquid entered her mouth and swallowed it down her throat.

“Slowly, if you drink too fast you’ll choke.”

Serena patted the Mysterious Stranger’s back while adjusting the angle of the potion bottle.

‘She’s nothing but bones.’

The Mysterious Stranger wasn’t even a skeleton, but every time she patted her back, she could clearly feel the contours of bone rather than flesh.

“Hic.”

She must have been dehydrated – tears finally welled up in Lavenda’s eyes, though she hadn’t shed any even while wailing.

“Are you feeling a bit better now?”

“More.”

“Alright.”

“Please pat me more.”

“Of course I should.”

Serena pulled Lavenda into her arms as if embracing her and patted her skinny shoulders and back.

Lavenda looked for Ralph with hollow eyes and reached out her hand to the Young Knight too.

“Sir Ralph too.”

“Yes! I’m here!”

“Hic, hold my hand.”

Ralph quickly removed his gauntlet and took the Mysterious Stranger’s hand.

The Mysterious Stranger’s fingernails, which she had tried to keep neat even after her hands became rough from chores after falling into the labyrinth, were a complete mess.

Lavenda gripped his hand so tightly that her broken nails dug into his flesh.

But Ralph didn’t pull his hand away and instead gripped back firmly. Lavenda lowered her head and sobbed.

“Here.”

Serena looked up at Ying’s voice. Ying held out a handkerchief dampened with water. Since it was warm, it must have been soaked in hot spring water.

Serena wiped Lavenda’s dirty face with the handkerchief.

Count Randy selected herbs with calming effects from the herbs carelessly piled in a corner of the lobby, put them in a pot and brewed them. He added fruit juice and salt to the hot herbal tea and handed it to Lavenda.

“What happened?”

Olive, who had been glaring at the wall with her arms crossed the whole time, questioned the somewhat calmed Lavenda.

Instead of answering immediately, Lavenda sipped the herbal tea.

Olive and the others didn’t rush her and waited for an answer.

“It’s been over a year since you all left for the 4th layer.”

“We stayed on the 4th layer for about two days.”

“Yes, it seems so. But I wasn’t lying, and I haven’t gone crazy. The one who went crazy is the Princess’s mother. I’m perfectly fine. There’s evidence over there.”

Lavenda presented the marks recorded on the lobby wall as evidence.

“Can time differ this much?”

Ralph asked in shock.

“Let’s talk about that later and listen to Lavenda’s story first.”

“I’m sorry for interrupting.”

“I don’t think you’re crazy or lying. After we went to the 4th layer, could you tell us what happened in order?”

Lavenda’s lavender-colored eyes stared blankly at the passage leading to the labyrinth.

“After you all left, things were fine for a few days. The Countess learned magic from Gray Young Master, and the young master focused on meditation. I was so happy tending to the expanded herb garden that I lost track of time. But.”

Lavenda’s eyes became increasingly vacant as if looking back at the past.

“Even after a week passed, you didn’t return. The Countess was anxious, but the young master said it was fine. That two weeks was short for conquering a labyrinth. So two weeks passed. But you still hadn’t returned. That’s when the Countess started secretly trying to go down below.”

“My wife…”

Count Randy squeezed his eyes shut.

“No matter how much the young master and I tried to stop her, it was useless. So the young master set a condition. Since the labyrinth was dangerous, if she passed a test he gave, he would go with her. From that day on, the Countess worked hard to pass the test. I was anxious and had nothing to do but chores, and the young master continued to focus on meditation… but I could feel that he was getting increasingly anxious too. By then, half a year had already passed.”

“Half a year? Ha!”

Olive sighed as if incredulous.

“I was so scared, but I could endure it because the Countess and young master were there. Since the bread tree and fruit trees were fine, the Princess must still be alive. Since there’s no worry of starving, if we wait, you’ll return. Or a rescue team will come. But!”

Lavenda’s attitude, which had been somewhat vacantly recounting the past, suddenly changed. Lavenda threw the cup she was holding with a vicious expression.

“They both abandoned me!”

“Lavenda! Please calm down! They didn’t abandon-“

“Shh.”

Lavenda is in no state for rational thinking right now.

If they tried to correct Lavenda’s thoughts or explain them as misunderstandings, it would only risk making her angrier.

Serena covered Ralph’s mouth and had the others maintain silence before gently stroking Lavenda’s back.

Ying brought a blanket. Serena gestured for her cloak instead of the blanket.

When she covered her shoulders with the cloak warmed by body heat, Lavenda visibly calmed down.

“I know they didn’t abandon me. But I. Hic! I was so scared being left alone.”

“Yes, you would be. I would have been scared too.”

“Hic.”

Count Randy poured herbal tea into a new cup and gave it to Lavenda again. Lavenda politely accepted the cup.

“Three months after the half year passed. The Countess passed the young master’s test. By then, the young master was also very anxious and restless, ready to go down the labyrinth even alone. I couldn’t persuade them, so I tried to go with them. But they said I had to stay here.”

Lavenda looked around the lobby where only the god-given items remained intact.

“Only me here.”

As if newly reminded of how pitiful it was, tears welled up in the Mysterious Stranger’s eyes.

“They said in case our paths crossed, one person had to stay and wait for you all. In case a rescue team came, someone was needed to explain the situation. Even if they left a letter or something, it might disappear in the labyrinth, so a person was needed to stay. Since the labyrinth is dangerous, an ordinary Mysterious Stranger like me wasn’t needed. Then they gave me a letter and a medal or something to show the rescue team when they came, but…”

Lavenda looked at the eternal campfire.

“I threw it in there at some point. I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine. You were scared and angry being left alone, weren’t you.”

“Yes, I was really scared. After even those two left and I was alone in the lobby waiting… I never got thirsty. I never got hungry. There was no one for me to serve. I just had to play and wait, it was really comfortable and easy. Right? It wasn’t dangerous like fighting monsters. But I felt like I was drowning, suffocating, and couldn’t sleep.”

Lavenda turned her head to look at the wall where she had marked each passing day.

“The Princess praised me for doing well, so I tried hard to keep records, but… after being left alone, I didn’t do it well.”

“It’s not an order, so it’s fine if you don’t do it when it’s hard for you.”

A faint light returned to Lavenda’s vacant eyes.

Lavenda made eye contact with each member of the assault team, then spoke with a voice full of hope.

“Now that you’ve all returned, the young master and Countess will come back too, right?”

An unbearable silence hung over the lobby.

No one could open their mouth, so Serena was about to speak when surprisingly Olive answered.

“Impossible.”

It was good that she spoke up, but the content was far from good.

“Miss Olive!”

“Watch your words!”

“The Countess and the child went down alone, and at least two or three months have passed. Even if time got twisted like ours, what could the two of them have done? Without a guide. They underestimated the labyrinth and died.”

“How dare you say such things!”

“The Count thinks so too. Hey, Miss Potpourri, listen carefully. Those two people didn’t abandon you—they died and couldn’t come.”

Count Randy grabbed Olive by the collar. When the tall Count grabbed her collar, short Olive’s feet lifted slightly off the ground.

Serena was about to scold the guide for speaking carelessly when Lavenda burst into bright laughter. She laughed so brightly it was almost frightening.

“Haha, really? They didn’t abandon me?”

“Of course.”

“I see. They died and couldn’t come. Then it can’t be helped. Those two didn’t abandon me.”

Hehehe. Lavenda giggled. Count Randy, flustered by her appearance, released his grip on her collar.

“Hmph!”

Olive pouted and straightened her collar where she’d been grabbed.

Ying lightly smacked the guide’s round head from behind.

“Hey! You know where I come from! For civilians who’ve been alone in the labyrinth, telling them this way is most effective. Miss Potpourri doesn’t have the luxury to think about being sad over other people’s deaths right now!”

It seemed Olive had intended to comfort Lavenda in her own way. She just didn’t consider other people’s feelings at all.

“Princess too~ since your friend is definitely dead, don’t hold onto false hope and get yourself together.”

“I know.”

“Your face doesn’t look like you know?”

“…I want to be alone for a moment.”

Count Randy covered his face and disappeared toward the cave. Ralph hesitated whether to follow or not, then sat back down next to Lavenda.

Ying stood there blankly while Olive deliberately hummed and ate fruit.

She chewed the ripe persimmon with the face of someone eating an astringent one.

Serena stroked Lavenda’s back while thinking about why this had happened.

‘Why on earth did this happen?’

The labyrinth has distorted space-time. This was something she’d heard many times. Having experienced it directly, she realized the difference between simple knowledge and experience.

‘Knowing something and experiencing it directly are different. Too different.’

Everyone seemed to be having similar thoughts when Ralph asked in a tearful voice.

“Can time really be this distorted?”

“Zero and I mentioned it before. It’s possible.”

“But this is too severe.”

“Knight. In the labyrinth—”

“Anything can happen in the labyrinth! I shouldn’t be surprised! I know! But!”

Ralph wiped his runny nose. His freckled face turned bright red with indignation.

“It’s because of me! Because I stupidly fell into a trap! Time flows faster on the 4th layer, and I didn’t even know that, so because we stayed on the 4th layer too long because of me, this happened!”

“If you put it that way, I wasted time looking for the stairs. Is it my fault?”

Olive, perhaps feeling complicated inside too, scratched her head vigorously with both hands.

“Aaaah! This is driving me crazy! There are many labyrinths with time differences, but none this severe! And we didn’t even go to the 50th or 60th floors! We didn’t stay for months either. Just two days passed and a whole year goes by?”

Olive went beyond scratching her head to shaking it wildly. It was such an uncommon case that even the best guide was perplexed.

‘Even so, two days to one year is too extreme a difference. All the adventurer parties in the stories progressed to the deep layers of high-difficulty labyrinths. We were only in the early 10th floors.’

What could be the cause? If she couldn’t figure this out, even dying and regressing would just repeat the same thing.

The Princess, who had been biting her lips and staring straight ahead, suddenly stood up.

As the warmth moved away, Lavenda trembled.

“Are you leaving again? Leaving me behind?”

“No. You looked tired, so I got up to prepare your bed.”

“Then I want to wash up. I want to take a bath.”

The desire to wash was a good sign.

Serena helped the Mysterious Stranger to the hot spring. Ralph set up the fallen screen.

Lavenda always attended to Serena’s baths, but today it was the opposite.

Serena undressed the Mysterious Stranger and helped wash her hair.

As her body soaked in the hot spring water, color returned to Lavenda’s cheeks, which had been pale as a corpse.

‘This could be dangerous if I leave her like this.’

Serena had brought the dehydrated Lavenda to the hot spring in her panic, but she could faint or it could be bad for her body.

Serena quickly helped Lavenda up and had her only soak her feet in the hot spring.

“Princess… I’m thirsty.”

“Shall I bring you fruit juice? What kind of fruit would you like?”

“I’d like lemon.”

“Alright. I’ll be right back.”

Serena walked quickly to pick lemons and squeezed lemon juice into ice water.

“Lavenda, here’s the lemonade…”

Had there been a dagger in the clothes Serena had hastily removed? Blood was flowing from the gaping wound on the Mysterious Stranger’s neck.

Even so, the Mysterious Stranger submerged in the hot spring was dazzlingly clean.

The hot spring bestowed by the gods remained endlessly clear, never clouded by the blood flowing from her neck.

“Haah.”

Serena sat down with a sigh. Salty and sour liquid entered her mouth, perhaps from splashed lemonade.

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