A quiet night passed.
Those standing watch kept a closer eye on Hardin than anything else.
But throughout the night, Hardin made no particular move.
No struggling, no provocation, no foolish tricks.
If anything, he was strangely quiet.
Even when Ayla leaned beside him, chain in hand, and dozed off for brief moments,
Hardin even stifled his breathing, as though not wanting to wake her.
And so the night passed, and morning came.
“…What?”
Ayla, the first to open her eyes, spoke in a low voice.
At her voice, Miryeong and Jincheong immediately approached.
“What is it?”
Without answering, Ayla took another step toward Hardin.
Hardin’s condition was clearly not normal at a glance.
His skin was flushed a dark red,
and the veins along his neck and temples had swollen grotesquely.
As if something had been forced into the inside of his body,
the flesh beneath his skin had twisted and hardened.
His eyes, forced open and fixed in place, were filled with burst blood vessels,
and a faint, unpleasant smile seemed to hang at the corners of his mouth.
But it was already over.
Hardin was no longer alive.
For a moment, no one spoke.
Ayla muttered through gritted teeth.
“…What the hell is this?”
Miryeong briefly examined Hardin’s face and neck,
then the swollen veins, before speaking in a low voice.
“He destroyed himself from the inside.”
Ayla lifted her head.
“What?”
Miryeong continued calmly.
“He drove the Idrin into his own body.”
“Without letting it spread anywhere else, only toward his heart and organs.”
Jincheong frowned.
“That’s possible?”
“It is possible.”
Miryeong’s voice remained cold.
“But he wouldn’t have died cleanly. All night, slowly, without letting anyone notice, he burst his own body apart.”
Ayla said nothing for a while.
The hand gripping the end of the chain tightened, then slowly loosened.
Looking down at Hardin’s stiffened face, Miryeong clicked her tongue briefly.
“Stubborn bastard. To the very end.”
Clatter.
Ayla’s chain slowly came undone.
No longer able to hold itself up, Hardin’s body toppled forward, stiff as it was.
Though it was a corpse, the lingering trace of mockery somehow made it even more unpleasant.
Just then, Raymond approached.
“What happened?”
Still looking down at Hardin, Miryeong said,
“He killed himself. I’ve never seen it done like this before.”
Jincheong, who had been examining his condition beside her, muttered with a look of disgust.
“This isn’t something an ordinary person could do.”
Miryeong replied briefly.
“Exactly. It’s no different from bursting open the inside of his own body. Enduring that pain all night without making a sound.”
Raymond was unable to say anything for some time.
After briefly staring at Hardin’s swollen veins and ruptured eyes, he let out a low breath.
“…If he was capable of that much, interrogation would have been meaningless from the start.”
Miryeong nodded.
“He wasn’t the type to open his mouth in the first place.”
A brief silence fell.
Miryeong did not take her eyes off him, then soon spoke.
“Jincheong. Cover him with earth.”
Jincheong answered shortly.
“Got it.”
After taking another breath to steady himself,
Raymond turned back toward the procession.
“…Then let us depart.”
The delegation’s procession set out on the road once more.
After a long silence,
Ayla was the first to speak.
“He died without leaving a single word in the end.”
She exhaled as if clicking her tongue.
“If he was going to do that, I should’ve just…”
Miryeong cut her off at once.
“Even if you’d dirtied your hands like that, it would only have made you feel worse.”
Ayla narrowed her brow.
Miryeong was silent for a moment.
Then, as if some thought had crossed her mind,
her gaze briefly dropped downward.
Ayla, not missing it, asked,
“What? Something happen?”
Miryeong looked down at her own hand once.
“Well… something similar.”
After a brief pause,
she continued in an even tone.
“There was a knight who killed a comrade of mine once. In the end, one thing led to another, and he died by my hand.”
Ayla asked back with a puzzled expression.
“One thing led to another?”
Then she said, sounding a little mocking,
“Still, didn’t it make you feel better?”
Miryeong let out a short breath.
“No. Not really.”
The answer came faster than expected.
“It wasn’t as if I wanted to kill him.”
Ayla was silent for a while,
then tilted her head back and looked up at the sky once.
“Hmph… You idiots doing all right over there?”
It sounded like a remark recalling Brak and Liber.
Soon turning her gaze forward again, she asked,
“Is that crazy bastard with the sawtooth sword not coming back?”
Miryeong swept her gaze once across the edge of the forest before answering.
“Who knows… But seeing how he ran back then, I don’t think he’ll charge in alone again.”
Ayla gave a short snort.
“True. If he doesn’t even care about someone dying alone like that,”
“then they’re the kind of bastards who never had any intention of coming to rescue him in the first place.”
Miryeong nodded.
“Right.”
After a moment, she added,
“Even if he’d lived, he wouldn’t have opened his mouth anyway.”
“He must have decided the mission had no chance. That’s the kind of people they are.”
Ayla said nothing more.
She merely clenched and opened her hand once in the air, as if gripping a chain,
then silently faced forward again.
After that short exchange, the procession continued on in silence for a while.
—
Inside the wagon, Bido had her eyes open.
The crescent moon mark on her forehead had not yet disappeared and still carried a faint heat.
The pain remained, making it difficult for her to move her body properly.
But her mind was far clearer than before.
The medic, who had been watching her, said,
“Your complexion has improved greatly.”
Bido answered softly.
“Ah… yes… I think I’ve gotten a lot better, thanks to you.”
The medic was silent for a moment.
His gaze naturally turned toward Bido’s forehead.
Bido briefly bit her lip under that overt stare.
The medic cautiously opened his mouth.
“That mark… there must be something to it, yes?”
Bido blinked once.
“Yes…?”
The medic lowered his voice.
“Ever since it appeared, Miss Bido’s breathing has become much more stable.”
“And compared to your wounds, your recovery has been quite fast as well.”
“Whatever the reason, I’m glad it seems to be having a positive effect for now.”
Bido very carefully raised her left hand and touched her forehead.
And she thought.
She had endured the night with the Gate of Moonblood open.
And yet, she did not feel any heavier anywhere in her body.
Rather, within her body that had been growing cold, a quiet vitality continued to flow.
Then,
that voice came to her again.
‘You’re doing well.’
It was a clearer resonance than before.
As the medic adjusted the bandages, he added,
“If you continue to improve like this, you should soon be able to eat regular meals.”
The corners of Bido’s mouth rose ever so slightly before she realized it.
Then the medic stated decisively,
“Of course, today it will be nothing but porridge.”
At those words, Bido’s ears drooped.
As they continued along the road, the scenery around them gradually changed.
The dense forest began to thin out at some point,
until at last, only low hills and yellowed grasslands flattened by the wind spread out on either side of the road.
There were still a few bent trees and bushes scattered here and there,
but there was no longer any growth thick enough to cover the sky.
Instead, a rough wind blew without obstruction, lightly pushing along the drying grass and dusty earth.
The road had also grown wider than before.
Several layers of wagon wheel tracks remained,
and in the distance, low piles of stones and old boundary markers could be seen here and there.
Mixed faintly into the edge of the wind was a smell that could not be found in the forest—
the dry dust and scent of animals left behind by people coming and going.
Raymond looked ahead and said,
“The forest is finally ending. It is proof that we are drawing close to the border.”
Ayla snorted as if fed up.
“I thought we were going to grow old and die in that damn forest.”
After sweeping her gaze over the surroundings, Miryeong also said,
“Still, it’s better now that the view is open. At least if something tries to hide, it’ll stand out.”
Jincheong added in a low voice,
“But that means we have nowhere to hide either.”
No one answered that immediately.
The procession moved more slowly along the open road,
but toward a direction that was a little clearer than before.
Miryeong narrowed her eyes first and looked ahead.
“Over there… isn’t that a place where people live?”
Beyond the distant grasslands bending in the wind,
low roofs could be seen gathered here and there.
Stone walls and wooden fences caught the sunlight, their outlines faintly revealed.
Raymond checked that direction as well and nodded.
“That is correct. It is a small village before entering the border.”
“It is not large, but it is the last place where travelers on this road stop to rest.”
Ayla snorted.
“Then we’re sleeping there tonight.”
Raymond answered,
“Yes. Given the state of the procession, it would not be wise to push any further.”
“We should be able to reach it well before sunset.”
Miryeong looked over the village again.
It did not look like a place where they could feel completely at ease,
but at the very least, it was better than spending another night on the bare ground.
“Fine. We’ll go as far as there.”
Jincheong added in a low voice,
“The view is open too. If anyone approaches, we’ll see them faster than we would in the forest.”
Raymond turned back to the first wagon again.
It was the wagon carrying Bido and the wounded.
“Once we reach that village, I will first find places for the wounded to lie down.”
“We will rest there tonight and move again tomorrow.”
For a moment, the words broke off.
Then the wind swept once over the road.
The small village in the distance was still a long way off,
but now, at least, it looked like a definite destination.
Dragging their heavy steps, the delegation’s procession slowly advanced toward it.