episode_0050

“Th-Thank you.”

After many twists and turns, Killua’s treatment finished, and she nimbly dismounted from my body.

As she got off, my manhood, which had been pressed down by her body, sprang up as if flaunting its presence.

Flustered by embarrassment, I hastily sat up and pulled the blanket to hide it, and Killua burst into laughter, seemingly amused by my actions.

“Come out when that proud thing of yours calms down a bit.”

Killua giggled, pointing at my lower body, then gathered the bowl, tray, and spatula that had contained the medicine, and lightly walked out of the room.

As she vanished from my sight, my manhood, which had been throbbing to make its presence known, calmly subsided with a cruel emptiness.

As shame and embarrassment washed over me like waves, I dry-washed my face with both hands, then slowly raised my stiff body, which had been lying on the bed for a long time.

Crack… pop…

How long had I been lying on the bed like a corpse?

As my unmoving joints began to move again, a creaking so loud it startled me echoed through the room.

“Just how long was I unconscious?”

Massaging my dizzy head, I opened the room door that Killua had exited earlier and stepped out.

The moment the door opened, the refreshing and fresh scent of herbs permeated my nostrils, instantly clearing my dizzy head.

Unlike Rai’s house, where herbs were simply dried, various herbs were being vibrantly cultivated in pots placed throughout this house.

“It’s a relief you look healthy. Are you not dizzy?”

As I walked out of the room on my own, Killua, washing the used bowl and spatula, asked about my condition.

“I was a little dizzy, but… I think the scent of herbs made me feel better.”

“They’re herbs that help calm the mind and body and aid in awakening. The Hero took quite a lot of care for you.”

Killua gently stroked the vibrant leaves of an herb within her reach, as if commending it.

“Is this the Hero’s house?”

Being careful not to touch the herb pots placed everywhere, I approached the window and looked out at the scenery.

Through the window, a large herb garden, seemingly created by directly cultivating the land, caught my eye.

There, I saw the Hero, shirtless, his large belly jiggling as he vigorously hoed.

“That’s right. The Hero saved us.”

Killua, having casually put away the bowl and spatula, came over to me and looked at the Hero vigorously hoeing in the herb garden he had made himself.

“Us… you mean?”

The moment of chaos caused by the impact of the fall came to mind.

Killua, having recovered one fragment of her pendant, had literally evaporated a slime with overwhelming magic.

Although there had been many mentally shocking incidents… I couldn’t believe that Killua, who had regained a part of her original magic, had felt her life threatened by Rai’s surprise attack.

“Well… there was a bit of a problem.”

At my remark, Killua gave an awkward laugh and lifted the pendant hanging around her neck to show it to me.

“You take a look.”

At her suggestion, I focused my five senses and calmly checked the flow of magic circulating in the pendant.

“This is…”

She had recovered one of the four fragments, but the magic circulating in her pendant was a faint amount, similar to that of an ordinary untrained commoner.

“But didn’t Killua-nim clearly evaporate the slime with immense power back then?”

However, I clearly remembered Killua, having recovered the pendant fragment, instantly annihilating a gigantic slime with tremendous magical power, befitting her alias, “The White Mage.”

“Ahahaha… Well, you see…”

When I recalled that moment and pointed it out, Killua once again let out an awkward laugh and scratched her cheek.

And uncharacteristically for her, as if feeling a bit embarrassed, her nose-tip slightly reddened as she carefully began to speak.

“At that time, I was just too furious… I poured all the power contained in the fragment into that one shot without thinking about the consequences…”

“Th-That’s what happened?”

The magic she unleashed towards the slime was an enormous magical explosion, creating enough physical force to send my body soaring into the air.

The overwhelming magic and power were astonishing, but it was even more astonishing that Killua, “The White Mage” of all people, had lost her composure and poured all the power from the fragment into one attack without any thought for the aftermath.

“Even so, that one shot probably evaporated almost all the slimes in the Lime Forest. It was a single attack poured out with enough will and fury.”

Come to think of it, the colossal explosion of light she unleashed not only contained an immense magical blast powerful enough to send my body soaring but was also accompanied by a massive shockwave that shook the Lime Forest.

I don’t know what kind of magic it was… but since it was cast by Killua, who is proficient in all magic in the world, it was clear that, as she said, the majority of slimes in the Lime Forest had been evaporated by that enormous shockwave.

“So that’s what happened.”

It was my misconception to think that by recovering one of the fragments, she had regained about a quarter of her past power.

Her limit was barely holding Ariel, who was falling due to the aftermath of evaporating the giant slime, suspended in the air.

The fact that she couldn’t heal injuries or illnesses with a mere gesture like before, and instead had to tediously and complexly rely on medicinal ingredients, was for the same reason.

“Well… at least I have enough magic left now to be at an ordinary person’s level… I won’t be a helpless burden like before.”

Killua raised a single index finger, drawing forth her magic.

Unlike in the past, when only a faint shimmer rose from her fingertips, a clearly visible flow of magic gently wrapped around her index finger, climbed up, and coalesced into a small lump at her fingertip.

Compared to her past power, it was an incredibly insignificant amount, but her eyes, gazing at the small fragment of magic coalesced at her fingertip, quietly shone with resolute determination.

“Then what will be your plan going forward?”

That resolute determination, which actually made me uneasy, led me to cautiously ask about her next plan.

Betrayed by someone she loved, there was no way she would want to settle down in one place as before.

“I need to retrieve the other fragments. Thanks to the recovered fragment, I can now pinpoint the exact locations of the others.”

The resolutely shining determination was, as expected, her will to recover her other lost fragments.

“What will you do?”

Killua, having revealed her plan, scattered the magic that had coalesced at her fingertip into the air and asked about my plans.

To her question, I answered without a hint of hesitation.

“I must stay by Killua-nim’s side.”

Initially, when she lost all her magic and became a helpless girl, her plans and actions made me uneasy.

But having experienced and overcome a major crisis with her, I realized that even having lost all her power, she was still the wise, brilliant, and resolute White Mage.

If I were to accompany her, who was like the protagonist of this world, it might be somewhat dangerous, but recovering all the fragments no longer seemed utterly impossible.

“Hmm~”

As if satisfied with my answer, Killua let out a pleasant hum and subtly smiled with her eyes.

“Alright! Then let’s rest for a few more days, and once all the poison remaining in your body is neutralized, we’ll depart.”

At her words, I touched my chest, where she had massaged me with medicine.

“H-How much more treatment will it take?”

“About a month, I suppose?”

At my question, Killua tapped the table with her fingertips for a moment, calculating the dates, then told me it would be a significant period of one month.

This meant I would have to continue receiving Killua’s embarrassing massages every morning for that long month.

“Ahaha. You’re having strange thoughts again.”

Recalling that moment, my face naturally flushed.

As if amused by my appearance, Killua let out a small laugh and put the bowl and spatula she had been washing back in their place.

“If you want to recover quickly, try exercising. They say improved blood circulation increases detoxification efficiency.”

Killua said, pointing at the Hero diligently hoeing outside the house.

The Hero, shirtless and unashamedly exposing his jiggling belly, was hoeing so hard that sweat poured from his entire body.

His stable posture and the firm grip with which he held the hoe, without slipping, showed that he had been consistently performing such labor.

It was almost miraculous that, despite such heavy labor, his belly fat, which perfectly suited the description “jiggling,” had not disappeared.

“By the way… the Hero didn’t do anything strange to Killua-nim, did he?”

Looking at the Hero, I frowned, remembering the mistake he had made towards Killua.

“He just made a few simple requests of me.”

“Simple requests?”

I was startled to hear that the Hero had demanded something from Killua in exchange for saving me, and I turned to her.

At my intense reaction, Killua burst into laughter, seemingly amused, and replied.

“It’s really nothing. He asked me to be a painting model. It seems painting was his hobby.”

Killua pointed to a small room set up in a corner of the house.

In front of the small door, which had a simple lock made by sticking a single branch into the doorknob as if to prove it was the Hero’s private space, small piles of paints, seemingly made by crushing herbs, were stacked.

“Painting was his hobby? My goodness…”

I let out a sigh of exasperation at such a refined hobby, which seemed completely unfitting for the fat, stupid, and easily amused Hero.

“Why? You’re into sculpting too, aren’t you? Since both of you are doing your own form of art, don’t you think you could form some common ground?”

A hollow laugh escaped me at Killua’s words.

I couldn’t accept that she would put my sculpting, which I had done for half my life as a wandering merchant, albeit mostly as a hobby, on the same level as the slightly eccentric Hero’s art.

As if expecting my reaction, Killua also chuckled playfully and spoke.

“Go out and talk to the Hero. Both of us owe our lives to him, after all. It would be polite to at least express our gratitude, wouldn’t it?”

“That’s true.”

Thanks to the Hero’s precise intervention, Rai’s arrow was prevented from piercing Killua’s chest.

I didn’t like the fact that the Hero had demanded something from Killua in return, but I couldn’t deny that, thanks to him, both of us had survived.

“Then I’ll go and have a talk with the Hero.”

“Have a good talk~”

Leaving her fresh farewell behind, I gripped the logging axe leaning next to the door in case of any unforeseen circumstances, then opened the door and walked towards the vegetable patch where the Hero was.