Ch.73Fox (1)

*

After spending a night using the lingering warmth of embers from the burning ruins as our blanket, Silvia and I began wandering through the forest.

We needed a new home since the Millwood Village cottage—which had been my home for the past few months and Silvia’s for several years—had burned down. We also needed to escape the mana that filled the surrounding air, which even I could feel.

Of course, our relocation was anything but simple.

There were many special considerations we had to take into account when finding a place to live.

The first issue that came to mind was water.

To settle somewhere, we absolutely needed a clean water source.

If Silvia had been alone, she wouldn’t have needed to consider survival elements like water or food, but now I was with her, and she also wanted to avoid situations where she couldn’t bathe or do laundry.

However, the river that flowed past Millwood Village quickly became little more than a stream if we followed it upstream, and if we followed it downstream, there was too great a possibility of encountering adventurers or peddlers who occasionally passed through the forest.

We eventually had to give up on the river and search for another water source.

The second issue was space.

We weren’t just staying in this forest temporarily; we had to spend the rest of our lives here.

Since we couldn’t live camping forever, we needed a proper house.

This made me newly realize that Millwood Village had truly been a perfect haven for us.

Neither of us had any experience building a house, but we had plenty of time, and I knew some magic that could help with construction.

Of course, I hadn’t tried using it yet.

Anyway, our new home needed to have a clearing large enough to build a house.

But finding a proper space in this forest—densely packed with trees, some of which grew horizontally—was no easy task.

The third and final consideration was accessibility.

We had to live somewhere as far as possible from human eyes and footsteps.

Should we leave the forest filled with mana, or should we stay hidden within it, away from people’s gaze?

This choice alone was difficult.

After much deliberation, Silvia decided to first look for places within the forest where mana hadn’t spread.

She judged that perhaps not the entire forest was surrounded by mana.

Though we couldn’t know the cause of this sudden spread of mana, even during the time when the Demon King was alive, the entire forest wasn’t covered in mana. Silvia was convinced that somewhere, there must be a place less affected by it.

I agreed with her judgment.

While mana was certainly a great calamity for humanity, if we appeared before people without any preparation, that too would surely be a disaster comparable to the appearance of the Demon King.

This curse was created by the Demon King, infused with his malice to destroy humanity even after his death, so it made sense.

And so we began our journey to find a new home.

*

Though we were in the same forest, night seemed to fall even faster among the dense trees than it had in Millwood Village.

Silvia stopped walking and looked at me.

“Ash, are your legs hurting?”

“No, I can bear it.”

“So they do hurt,”

Silvia sighed and closed her eyes slightly.

She seemed to be using all her skin’s senses to feel the mana around us.

I swallowed my rough breathing so as not to disturb her.

After staying still for about a minute, Silvia slowly opened her eyes and said:

“…I think it should be fine for about a day. Let’s rest here tonight.”

“Phew,”

As soon as she finished speaking, I plopped down on the ground.

As she said, my legs, which had been walking all day, were creaking and screaming in pain.

Even with the help of holy power, and despite the time that had passed, it made sense that my legs—which had once been shattered to pieces—would suffer from overuse.

Of course, that wasn’t the only reason why walking through the forest was difficult.

Throughout our journey through the densely wooded forest, I was sweating cold sweat.

With every step I took, terrible memories filled my mind—the carriage overturning, being chased by a bear, even killing someone.

Originally, because of those horrible memories, I couldn’t even walk to the riverside flowing next to Millwood Village on my own if Silvia wasn’t by my side.

That meant that even with her present, trudging through the forest wasn’t easy.

“So we couldn’t find it today after all.”

“There’s no way we could find it so easily.”

“I knew that, but still…”

Despite wandering through the forest all day, Silvia and I couldn’t find a suitable place for a home.

Of course, this was partly because hesitation and fear constantly pulled at my ankles, making our pace terribly slow, but also because this forest wasn’t an easy place to find a new home so quickly.

I had prepared myself, but as night fell, even the vague and faint hope I had been harboring seemed to fade away.

“…How long do you think it will take?”

“…”

Silvia ignored my question and kept her mouth shut.

She was either calculating the time it would take, or perhaps she already knew but was holding back to spare me from feeling guilty.

This was clearly not a good sign.

We didn’t have much time.

Of course, no matter how toxic the mana was, staying in it for just a day or two wouldn’t suddenly cause serious problems to the body.

Especially with Silvia by my side, who possessed a slight amount of holy power.

But as weeks passed—one week, two weeks, and beyond a month—the mana gradually accumulating in the body would certainly cause problems.

For humans, mana was no different than poison mixed in the air.

In other words, we had to find a place without mana within at least a week.

“It’s okay, just tell me.”

“…I don’t know the entire forest, but I haven’t just been crying in the cottage all this time either. I have a few places in mind where I think there might not be any mana.”

“…”

Silvia brushed her bangs upward and muttered:

“At this pace… in three days, no, four days, we could visit two of those places. No problem at all.”

“…And if they’re both filled with mana?”

“Ash… let’s not think like that.”

Silvia smiled weakly and poked my side.

Seeing her so obviously avoid answering, it seemed there really was no solution.

Of course, she could go ahead and check those places without me, but the problem was, again, me.

With my weak mental state, if she were to leave my side even for a moment in this forest, I would immediately have a panic attack.

Perhaps Silvia was even more anxious and worried than I was.

She had the strength and ability to quickly scout the forest, but she was tied down by the burden named Ash Staff, unable to move freely.

What would happen if both places Silvia had in mind turned out to be unsuitable for us to live in?

I could easily predict the answer.

In that situation, Silvia would have only two choices left.

Either abandon me to die, or take me out of the forest.

In extreme terms, this meant she would have to choose between me or the world.

If such a situation arose, what choice would she make?

“Silvia.”

“Yes?”

“I’m happy I met you.”

“What’s with that, suddenly?”

“Just wanted to say it in advance…”

Whoosh

Silvia’s arm cut through the air and flew toward my face.

She covered my lips with her firm fingers, almost as if hitting them.

Index and middle finger.

With just those two fingers, she covered my lips and gripped them tightly.

“Shut your mouth if you’re going to talk nonsense.”

“…Mmph,”

“I don’t know what you’re thinking, but Ash, you tend to worry about things you don’t need to worry about.”

“…”

“We’ll find a place no matter what. If we have to, I’ll cut down every tree in this forest to find one. So don’t worry.”

“Mmph,”

“Nod if you understand.”

I slowly nodded my head.

It wasn’t easy to nod with my lips firmly held by her fingers and the back of my head fixed against the tree I was leaning on, but by putting strength into my neck and slowly pushing my head forward, I managed to bow my head somehow.

As I nodded, her two fingers that had been squishing my lips slowly lifted my upper lip and pulled down my lower lip repeatedly.

The saliva that had pooled slightly between my lips and teeth got on her fingers.

“…”

“…Heh,”

I slowly licked her fingers.

Perhaps because she had been touching trees all day while walking,

I tasted a slightly salty earthy flavor.

Since I hadn’t eaten anything today, I closed my eyes gently and brought my tongue to her fingers as if coating them, tasting the saltiness.

The tightly closed space between her index and middle fingers slowly opened.

I inserted my tongue between them and gently grabbed her wrist.

Slowly, she also wrapped her other hand around the nape of my neck.

I gently held her cheek and tapped her lips with my thumb.

Her lips parted smoothly, and her warm, moist tongue came out to greet the tip of my thumb.

A pleasant softness enveloped my firm thumb, and I could feel a wonderful, sticky sweetness seeping between my rough fingerprints.

Soon, she closed her lips and bit my thumb firmly.

Like eating candy, her tongue began to roll around my thumb.

“…Silvia… noona.”

I slowly removed her fingers from my lips and said:

“I want to kiss you.”

She also made a small popping sound as she pulled my thumb out and nodded, saying:

“Let’s kiss.”

In the night forest where darkness had settled all around, making it impossible to see even an inch ahead.

Even in that pitch-black darkness, we could find each other’s lips.

As if pieces that had originally been one were coming back together, with such a natural motion.

My heart pounded.

With our bodies feeling as if they were on fire, we forgot even to make a fire and kissed each other.

Though the darkness was the same whether my eyes were open or closed, I deliberately closed them.

“Haa… mmph, Sil… vi, haah.”

Insect sounds, wild animal cries, owl hoots.

The forest night is typically noisier than the day.

“Haa… Ash, more, just a little more…”

But now, I couldn’t hear anything.

All I could hear was her rough breathing and the loud beating of my heart.

.