The Youngest Hides a Lot - Chapter 259

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 259
“….”
Rhythmic breath touched my skin, then withdrew.
I sat before the bars, resting my head on my palm, watching the sleeping woman in silence.
This was troublesome.
Now I had learned how those gentle features curved when she smiled.
‘Just one more time….’
Could I see it again?
Suddenly, I felt the rough texture of soil against the back of my hand.
Despite the uncomfortable posture, I felt no pain.
Rather, I was grateful this coarse earth did not touch her delicate cheek.
Such were the only meaningless thoughts that came to me.
Unfortunately, the woman’s magical power was not recovering easily.
Her mana was constantly being depleted to halt the erosion of the ‘Mark’ inscribed on her back, and she said it was even more difficult because this Continent had so little mana to draw from.
The woman naturally remained near Kalid’s cave.
The two of us did not share many words, but we heard each other’s breathing, felt the same breeze, and gazed at the sky together.
“What is this?”
Kalid frowned, looking displeased.
The woman had gathered the hem of her clothes into a bundle, which I now unraveled.
Everything tumbled out.
Well-wrapped bread and various fruits spilled across the ground.
“The Baker gave them to me when I went to the Village.”
“…Who?”
“The Baker from the Lower Village. He said today was a special day when he gives away free bread.”
Such a special day…. Did it exist?
“Eat.”
Kalid was struck with shock as the bread was offered to me.
‘So she went and gathered food for me?’
To feed me?
Thanks to the Dragon God’s power, my body did not feel hunger. Besides, time flowed differently in this cave from the outside world.
‘Though now the Dragon God’s power seems to have weakened enough to match my own strength.’
“….”
What was this feeling?
Should I be moved by her reliability?
Or should I feel ashamed as a man for not providing for the woman?
I could not tell.
“You won’t eat?”
I reluctantly accepted the bread she offered.
Then the woman smiled faintly once more.
Ah, so she smiles when I accept food?
Yet she herself merely placed a single small, red fruit in her mouth and said nothing.
“….”
“….”
They shared their meal again, gazing up at the brilliant blue sky.
‘Now that I think about it, this is the first time anyone has shared food with me.’
Come to think of it, she was also the first to wish me well.
The first to watch drifting clouds with me like this.
The first to smile at me with such tenderness….
She was my first in all things.
“Drink some water too.”
A wooden canteen was extended toward me with a soft whoosh.
Kalid accepted it as though enchanted, and once again beheld the woman’s gently smiling face.
What is this? The water tastes sweet.
As the cool, refreshing sensation moistened my parched throat and descended, every nerve in my lifeless body awakened.
The sensation of being alive.
I had not felt it in so long. Perhaps never at all.
‘When I leave this cave….’
I finally understood what I must do.
‘I must take your hand and venture far, so very far away.’
To a place where you need not contemplate death.
Just as you have dwelt in my dark cave and made me wish to live on like this.
‘I too wish to become such a presence for you.’
It was at that very moment of resolve.
“Ugh….”
The woman, who had been sitting quietly, collapsed to the ground while clutching her abdomen.
“What’s wrong?”
Startled, Kalid rushed to the bars. He stretched with all his might, but could not even reach the hem of her garment.
“What’s wrong? Look at me. Please? I’m begging you.”
“The, the mark….”
A mark?
Only then did Kalid notice that the wooden growth extending from the woman’s hand had grown slightly longer.
“It seems too late to stop the erosion….”
Blood poured from the woman’s nose and mouth in a torrent.
Kalid felt his mind go blank white.
“No.”
He stretched with every ounce of strength. But all his fingertips could touch was the blood flowing from her mouth.
Why am I here?
Why at all!
Kalid cried out in anguish as he watched the woman lose consciousness.
He cursed his own helplessness, his own powerlessness to do anything.
And in that same moment, he realized something—that he could do anything for this woman.
Anything.
Truly, anything at all….
The woman opened her eyes again as the night deepened.
Kalid had endured the longest and most agonizing hours of his entire existence.
Had it not been for the faint, threadlike rhythm of her breathing, he might have already lost his mind.
“A-are you alright?”
“…It was stolen.”
The woman in white priestly robes wiped the blood away haphazardly as she murmured those words.
“What was stolen?”
“…The final formula of the Dark Magic summoning circle.”
She said the Mage King had infiltrated through his mark upon her, stealing the formula that had existed in her mind.
Which meant that soon, perhaps.
This land would be laid to waste by the Mage King who summoned the Dark Magic.
“Get me out. I will stop him. Even if it strains me, do it.”
Kalid spoke those final words.
Once they escaped this place, he intended to offer her a vow of magic. Then he could share his own magical power with her.
“…No.”
At that moment, the woman gripped the ground.
Drip, drip. Circular marks bloomed across the floor.
“I want to end this now.”
In that instant, Kalid sensed that something else had happened to her beyond the theft of the magical circle.
“Why? What is it?”
“You see…. The Mage King left me with a memory.”
“…A memory? What memory?”
“That I….”
In that moment, the woman stared at him with her wet face. His heart seemed to drop at the sight of her utterly crumpled expression.
“…that I was the daughter of Leviathan Zebert.”
“….”
“I killed my own father….”
A bestial cry tore through the quiet forest.
“I can’t do this anymore. Please, I can’t anymore. I’m so tired…. I just want to disappear.”
The woman moved her magical power.
“So please, kill me.”
At that moment, Kalid felt his shackles snap open.
After an immeasurable span of time, he was finally free from his chains, yet he had no moment to dwell on that fact.
He rushed out through the bars that had opened alongside him and caught the collapsing woman in his arms.
But her face had already crumpled like that of a corpse.
“Don’t give up.”
Please.
Don’t give up on your life.
“Good days will come….”
He spoke the very words he had heard from the Goddess.
“Good days will come to you too.”
“No.”
“….”
“Such days will never come.”
Kalid feared the woman might die at any moment. So he spoke whatever came to mind.
“Then I’ll find them for you.”
“….”
“I’ll find happy and beautiful days for you.”
Without fail.
No matter what price I must pay.
“You said you know temporal magic, didn’t you?”
“….”
“Then turn back time.”
The woman’s eyes widened briefly before closing tightly once more.
She shook her head, exhaling a faint breath.
“There’s not a single moment in time I wish to return to.”
A life so weary, so utterly exhausted.
Growing up without a name, living as a puppet of the Mage King, and ultimately even killing her own Father.
She said she simply wanted to see an end to it all now.
“Then return my time to me.”
Kalid offered a binding oath to the woman.
He poured his magical power into her body and whispered.
“Just as you saved me, I will surely save you.”
“What….”
Their foreheads touched. The woman’s eyes glowed crimson.
Seeing her brow furrow in confusion, it seemed this was not her own will.
Wistal!
The power within me stirred, but I pushed it back once more.
Could it be that the Goddess’s power dwelling within the woman was trying to help us?
Kalid prayed desperately.
Anything would do.
‘Send her to that moment when she could be happiest.’
Release me.
Whoooooosh—
In that instant, a light so brilliant it could blind erupted forth.
And a magical circle of overwhelming magnitude rose up, as if to engulf the entire Forest. No—the entire world.
The woman’s eyes opened wide. Kalid smiled gently.
“Next time we meet, let’s decide on a name first.”
“…!”
“One that makes my heart race every time you call it.”
Clatter, clatter. From somewhere, the rough sound of carriage wheels grinding against stone echoed through the air, accompanied by someone’s urgent shouts and screams.
Clatter, clatter.
His world began to rewind.

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