Chapter 24. Passive Decay Doubles When Injured: The System Is Still Trying to Kill Me

Chapter 24: 24. Passive Decay Doubles When Injured: The System Is Still Trying to Kill Me

At the corner of my vision, the system flickered, displaying Magnara’s name in cold blue letters beside the little SSS that was starting to feel like a sign of trouble.

I looked at it for a moment, and then I dismissed it. Maybe not now...

For the first time since I’d died, I wasn’t thinking about the next power I could earn. I was only thinking about the people sleeping safely around me.

’Tomorrow,’ I thought, closing my eyes, ’I’m taking them home.’

...

I woke up with a fever, a hole in my side, and the distinct feeling that someone had been using my ribs as a drum.

The sky above the overhanging cliff was a pale, washed-out gray, and the air smelled like cold stone and ash from last night’s fire. Somewhere nearby I could hear the soft shuffling of people getting up, along with the low murmur of voices that hadn’t quite decided to trust the morning yet.

My side throbbed with every breath. Apex Physique was doing its best to stitch me back together from the inside, but a spear wound that deep wasn’t something you could shrug off in a night, and my body seemed to have developed a complicated opinion about it.

"You’re awake," said a small voice.

Millie was kneeling next to me with a damp strip of cloth in her hands, and the look on her face told me she’d been awake for a long time.

Her white hair stuck out in a few places where she’d slept on it, and there were faint shadows under her eyes. A wooden cup of water sat beside her knee, and she was already pressing the cloth against my forehead before I could say anything stupid.

"You have a fever..." she said. "Not a bad one... But it was worse a few hours ago."

"I’m fine," I croaked. "I’m just resting my eyes..."

"You were talking in your sleep."

"HUH!? What did I—I say?" I panicked.

"Something about a truck...? Full of rabbits..."

"Ehh... That’s a very reasonable thing to dream about."

She smiled a little and moved the cloth. I noticed she had folded a piece of dried meat inside a cloth beside the cup, and it was exactly the portion Magnara had handed out the night before.

It was untouched.

"Millie... did you eat your breakfast?"

"Yes."

"Millie."

"Sorry..." Her ears drooped. "I wasn’t hungry..."

"You’re a terrible liar."

"I’m sorry."

"Don’t apologize, just split it with me... That’s the rule." I raised my thumbs up. "If I have to eat half a piece of jerky that tastes like an old boot, then so do you."

She hesitated, then tore the meat in two with great care and handed me the bigger half, which I pretended not to notice.

We chewed in silence for a while, and I stared up at the rock above us and tried not to think about how bad my side felt.

That was when the nightmare caught up with me.

I’d been dreaming about it all night, and the memory came back all at once, brutal and clear...

The weight of the sword... The way it went in so easily...

The merchant’s eyes were wide and surprised, like a man who had just remembered an important appointment. I’d been holding the hilt, and I felt it again, warm and wet under my fingers, and my hands began to shake.

I stuffed them under my blanket and put on the biggest grin I could manage. "Hey, did I ever tell you about the time I got stuck in an elevator with a priest and a clown? It’s a hell of a story."

My voice came out thin and strange, and I could hear how forced the joke was. The grin felt like it was made of wet plaster.

"What’s an elevator...?" She asked.

"Ohh...! I mean a room..." I forgot that there’s no such thing as an elevator in this world.

Millie didn’t say a word. She looked at my face for a long moment, and then she reached under the blanket, found my hand, and wrapped both of hers around it.

They were small and cool and a little rough from years of work, and she held on without asking me anything at all.

Oh wow... this... feels nicer than before... She managed to keep me calm from that really bad dream.

We sat like that until the shaking stopped.

Ding!

[LUST SYSTEM: DAILY STATUS]

[Host: Leon Levarion]

[Lust Energy: 89/100]

[Passive Decay: 2 points per day under normal conditions.]

[Decay doubles when the host is injured or severely exhausted.]

[Current Condition: Injured]

I read it, then read it again just to make sure, and felt something cold settle at the bottom of my stomach.

Two points a day sounded like plenty of time until you added the part about being injured and doubled it.

My side had dropped me from 93 to 89 overnight, and if I kept limping around with a hole in me, I’d be in real trouble long before I could find another partner.

’So I’d better get better,’ I thought, ’before this stupid system kills me first.’

...

We were walking again within the hour. The mountain trail wound up through a pass of cracked gray stone, and I leaned on my walking stick with every step and tried not to think about the fever sweating out of my shirt.

The rescued women walked in a loose, shuffling line, and they were quieter than yesterday but not as frightened. Someone had found a few blankets in Magnara’s pack and distributed them, and one or two of the women had even started talking.

The fox woman from the cell, whose name turned out to be Seraphine, walked at the back with a protective hand on the shoulder of the girl beside her. The kid couldn’t have been more than nine.

She had big, round, russet ears and an expression of grave concentration, and she hopped over every pebble in the trail like it might bite her.

"That’s Pip," Seraphine told me, when she saw me looking.

Her voice was dry and tired but not unkind. "She’s not my daughter... I found her in the second cell, and she hasn’t let go of my sleeve since."

"I’m not... scared," Pip announced, loudly and bravely.

"Of course not," I said. "You’re basically a hero!"

"You’re way tougher than I am... because of me... at one time I screamed at a rabbit once."

Pip stared at me with enormous suspicion. "A real rabbit?"

"A horned one... It was terrifying."

She considered this for a moment.

"That’s pretty funny," she said, and then she hid behind Seraphine’s skirt, giggling.

Seraphine gave me a long look, with something that might have been the first small crack in her suspicion. She didn’t say anything, but she let me walk beside her for the next mile, and I decided that was a good start.

Meanwhile, the question I’d been chewing on all morning had finally become too big to keep to myself.

"Hey, Magnara," I called, wheezing slightly. "Can I ask you something?"

She was striding at the front of the column with the axe resting on her shoulder, and she didn’t even turn her head. "No."

"I haven’t asked yet."

"Whatever it is, the answer is still no."

"Okay... but how did you get the name? Like the Gate-Breaker of the Red Gate... It’s actually a great name, wait no... it’s a badass!" I chuckled. "A little much, honestly."

"Like someone sat in a room for three hours and the best idea they had was a gate with a color in it."

She stopped walking. She turned around with a very slow motion and gave me a look that I can only describe as ’one more sentence and I will throw you off this mountain.’

"Fuck... Why do I keep making that mistake...?" I muttered.

"Because you are an idiot," Elsbeth said, falling into step beside me with her usual lack of sound.

She glanced ahead at Magnara’s back and lowered her voice. "She will not tell you, so I will."

"Please... I honestly could die from curiosity."

"Years ago, a town in the south was slaughtered by hunters..." Elsbeth started the story, and I can tell it’s going to be interesting. "The survivors, nearly three hundred of them, walked for weeks to reach Elarune."

"But the council... at that time refused to open the gate."

"They said the refugees might bring human soldiers after them." Elsbeth’s voice was flat, almost clinical, but I could see her jaw tighten. "Magnara stood in front of that gate for two days, asking them to let the people in."

"On the third day, she broke it down with her own hands."

I stared at her. "With her hands...?"

"Yes... The gate was made of iron-banded oak, and all it took was her six blows. " Elsbeth gave a faint, grim smile. "They nearly exiled her for it..."

"But three hundred people were alive who would have died outside the walls, so in the end the council could not punish her as harshly as they wished..."

"She still has enemies in the city because of it."

"Huh," I said. "That’s actually kind of awesome... and even badass!"

"Yes."

"I’ll never make fun of the nickname again... I promise!"

"You will make fun of it by lunchtime."

"...Yeah, probably."

Elsbeth almost smiled.

She let her gaze drift to the horizon, and then, without turning her head, she said, "There is a messenger house in Elarune... I intend to send word to my clan, if they will let me, that is."

"Is that wise? You said the Northern Wolves keep to themselves..."

"They will want to know that I am alive." She paused. "And they will want to know what I have been doing for the past several days."

I grinned. "You mean, saving a very handsome idiot from a snowdrift?"

"More like babysitting."

"Ouch."

"You are getting tired of my care already?"

"Never! I just think you could be a little more affectionate about it..."

"I will think about whether to push you off this path."

"That’s the same joke you made last time!"

"It is still a good joke."