Karen properly opened her eyes at dawn the next day.
This time, she didn't fade quickly like the first day. The fever still lingered, but her gaze was much clearer. While Ruan was changing the bandages around her side, she spoke first.
“You didn't run this time.”
Ruan raised his head. Karen tried to lift her upper body and winced at the pain, but she ultimately swallowed her groan. Sera immediately snapped at her.
“Don't move. If it tears again, we're the ones who have to stitch it up.”
Karen glanced at Sera, then looked back at Ruan.
“Name.”
“Ruan Hese.”
“Military doctor.”
“As you can see.”
The corner of Karen's mouth twitched, just barely.
“Karen.”
“Your surname?”
She answered a beat late.
“I don't need one now.”
Sera laughed in disbelief.
“Saying that just makes you look more suspicious.”
Ruan placed the damp cloth back on her forehead and examined the wound. It was red and swollen, but there was no pus. The sutures were still holding.
Even though Karen tended to endure, she couldn't hide the faint trembling of her side muscles every time she breathed in.
“You'll live.”
Karen immediately retorted.
“You made it so.”
“The medical corps did.”
“That answer again.”
Karen caught her breath for a moment. Her words were brief, but the sound of her swallowing followed right after. It meant her side still hurt deeply. Even so, her gaze did not waver.
“Fine. Then I'll say I owe the entire medical corps.”
Sera scoffed.
“If it's a life debt, that's quite a large one.”
Karen brushed the remark aside and spoke clearly to Ruan.
“Once my body recovers, I'm staying here.”
“Where?”
“By your side.”
This time, Sera openly swallowed a laugh. Ruan's face turned weary.
“Jokes like that are in poor taste on the battlefield.”
“It's not a joke.”
“You can't even walk yet.”
Karen took a short breath in and slowly exhaled. Cold sweat beaded on her forehead as pain flared. Still, her voice didn't shake.
“Once I can walk.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“I'm not someone who needs a bodyguard.”
The moment those words ended, a sharp shout erupted from outside the tent.
“Enemy straggler!”
The air changed in an instant. The medical tent was in the rear, but if the front line collapsed, it wasn't unusual for a lone, disoriented enemy soldier to come bursting in.
Two orderlies stumbled back in alarm, the tent flap at the entrance was shoved roughly aside, and a blood-soaked enemy soldier staggered inside.
He held a short sword in his hand. His eyes were unfocused, but a beast-like desperation to survive remained.
Sera gasped.
“Madman.”
Ruan moved first. He picked up a short knife that had fallen and rolled across the floor. In that instant, Karen's gaze narrowed sharply.
Ruan gripped the knife. But that was as far as it went.
His wrist locked. Above the elbow seemed frozen, refusing to move forward. He could tear open wounds, touch blood, and stitch flesh.
But the moment he had to extend the blade toward a person, something somewhere in his body seized entirely. The enemy before him was staggering and gravely wounded, yet Ruan's feet couldn't advance a single step.
The enemy soldier leaned forward as if about to charge with his sword.
Then, with the sound of a stretcher scraping roughly aside, Karen moved.
Faster than seemed possible for a body that had until moments ago been half-reclining. She snatched the spear shaft propped against the nearby stretcher and struck the enemy's wrist first. The short sword fell to the floor.
Karen immediately twisted her body, driving the end of the spear shaft up beneath the enemy soldier's throat as if stabbing it in. The enemy let out a choked sound and buckled to his knees. Finally, Karen aimed the shaft beneath his chin and stopped.
She didn't kill him. But it was a position from which she could kill him at any moment.
Silence fell inside the tent.
Sera was the first to come to her senses.
“He's not dead. Call the sentries. Quickly.”
An orderly dashed out. Only then did Ruan lower the knife. His palm was soaked with cold sweat. Karen kept the shaft aimed as she looked at Ruan.
It was the gaze of someone assessing an opponent. And also the gaze of someone quietly drawing a conclusion from what she had just confirmed.
“You said you're someone who doesn't need a bodyguard.”
Ruan opened his mouth, then closed it. He had nothing to say.
Karen looked down at his still-stiff fingers for a moment, then spoke in a low voice.
“Yours is a hand that saves people. Not a hand that cuts them down.”
Sera muttered.
“She only just realized that.”
Karen pretended not to hear. Instead, she lowered the shaft and tried to sit up. At that moment, red spread beneath the bandages at her side. It was from overexerting herself just now. Ruan's face immediately stiffened.
“Lie back down. The wound has opened.”
“Then stitch it up.”
She spoke briefly, but her breath immediately faltered. Cold sweat ran down her jawline. She endured the pain, gripping the edge of the stretcher tightly. Seeing her reaction, Ruan said nothing more and immediately reached out.
“It's your body.”
“So I'll decide.”
“I'm deciding now. Because you're the patient.”
Karen laughed very briefly at that. The tremor at the end of her laughter meant the pain was running quite deep. Even so, she didn't let the matter drop.
“Fine. While I'm a patient, I'll listen to what I should. But once I'm recovered, the story changes.”
Ruan took out new bandages.
“What story?”
“The story that you need someone who holds a blade by your side.”
Sera picked up an empty water jug and quietly stepped back. She wore the expression of someone who knew from experience that getting involved at times like this only led to trouble.
Soldiers ran in from outside and dragged the enemy soldier away. Only the smell of blood and damp cloth remained inside the tent. With an expression that said further talk was useless, Ruan reopened and examined the wound at her side. One of the sutures had torn slightly, but fortunately it hadn't opened all the way through.
Each time the needle pierced flesh, Karen's fingers gripped the end of the stretcher tightly. That hand was the same hand that had pressed against the enemy soldier's throat just moments ago. The hand of one who wields a blade.
Ruan suddenly thought: On the battlefield, there are those who wield their blades well, and those who wield their hands well. The problem is when those two are not the same person.
Ruan looked down at his own hands for a moment. Until just moments ago, they had been hands that couldn't even push a knife forward.
It was strangely shameful that those hands couldn't stop an enemy, yet the moment they stood before a wound, they moved faster than anyone else's. But there was no time to hold onto that shame for long.
In this tent, even shame was always pushed to the back.
As if reading that sentiment, Karen paused for a moment. Despite her face pale from pain, her gaze alone was strangely calm.
“It's nothing to be ashamed of.”
Ruan raised his head.
“Even a hand that cannot hold a blade is needed by someone. No—perhaps that's precisely why it's even more needed.”
A brief pause to catch her breath followed those words. Karen gripped the end of the stretcher once more before finally letting go.
That small action alone made it clear how much pain she was in, yet strangely, her words lingered before the pain did.
When the suturing was about halfway done, Karen spoke in a low voice.
“My life returned from your hands. Debts must be paid. That's how I was raised.”
Ruan answered without raising his head.
“We don't take debts like that here.”
“It doesn't matter if you don't take it. I'll pay it back my own way.”
“I don't need it.”
Karen swallowed her breath briefly. It was a sound impossible to tell whether it came from pain or laughter.
“I need it.”
She didn't try to continue speaking after that. Her body had already reached its limit. The sweat beaded on her forehead glimmered in the lamplight. And yet, her gaze alone never left Ruan until the very end.
It was the face of someone more solid—one who insisted with expression and eyes rather than words.
After the commotion outside died down somewhat, Bern approached, glanced at the bandages, and spoke.
“Subduing him without killing was well done.”
Karen answered indifferently.
“There was no need to kill him.”
“That judgment is the harder one to make.”
It was a short conversation, but Sera dropped her playful demeanor. A single sentence was enough to know what kind of battlefields Karen had walked through.
When the suturing finished, Ruan covered it with fresh cloth and set a vial of painkiller beside her.
“If the pain rises, chew only half of this.”
Karen's eyes fell on the vial.
“If I chew it all?”
“You'll pass out.”
The corner of Karen's mouth rose slightly.
“Good. That's more believable than being told to rest.”
Ruan looked at her incredulously. Karen was still drenched in cold sweat, unable to fully steady her breathing. And yet, her gaze was clearer now than it had been at first.
“Permission can come later. But the decision is already made. You need someone who holds a blade by your side. So I will take that position.”
Ruan couldn't reply. That was neither a joke nor a fleeting impulse. It was the kind of conclusion reached by someone who had endured the battlefield for a long time.
As the sun began to set, Sera muttered quietly, holding an empty water jug.
“This is a problem. Now the blade-bearer and the bandage-bearer are going to be stuck together as a set.”
Ruan said with a weary face.
“I objected.”
Karen answered with her eyes closed.
“I heard the objection. I haven't heard the acceptance yet.”
Sera finally burst out laughing. Only Ruan couldn't laugh.
Karen, the knight of unknown origins, was truly not someone who would leave easily.