95 – Motivation (2)
“Lone! Escape… !”
Whoops!
To Lorne, it felt like a scene from hell.
Her childhood friend’s desperate voice was uttered desperately in order to save her.
However, before it was finished, she was hit by a club wielded by her man, and her model leaned forward.
Men in similarly shabby clothes approaching from behind.
Knowing that it was Bell’s last courage and sacrifice to save her, her hardened body did not even think of moving her.
“What happened!?”
“This crazy kid wants Drick… !”
The man who died on the spot with a sickle stuck through his heart, and his colleagues around him figured out the situation and approached Bell.
Some pulled out the swords stuck in their waists, or tried to live their lives as if they were going to take care of him with their own ailments.
“Bell… !”
Bell will die at this rate.
But she had no power over her.
The use of magical power, which Bell once proudly showed off, is not helpful at all in the present situation.
Using it to create sparks or hurricanes.
Such a miraculous act was a phenomenon that Lorne, an 11-year-old girl, could not realize.
“Hey, let’s cut off this bastard’s limbs and throw them as food for wild boars, and then take that kid with us.”
“That would be better. She looks young, but her face is smooth, so if you sell her to the slave market, she’ll make a lot of money.”
“The boss will like it. That person, pretending not to be, secretly only likes young girls.”
Meanwhile, the eyes of the men who were deciding how to treat Belle, who passed out from the shock of her head being hit, soon turned to Lorne.
Although she still looks young and her clothes are shabby, she still looks promising with an unfading future.
It’s a pity that my colleague died, but my mouth watered already at the thought that I might be able to get something in return.
In the first place, for them, the sense of fellowship is merely the level of partners working together.
The material thing in front of you feels bigger than the corpse of a comrade who has already died.
“Child, resent your friend. These guys don’t want to do this either.”
“… ….”
Lorne looked at her man who was approaching her step by step with her empty eyes.
With even her will to rebel gone, she only dreamed of a hopeless future about what kind of ending she would face.
“Lo, yes….”
Her voice, very slow and faint, calling her, came from Belle’s mouth, which she was presumed to have passed out.
Even the thieves who were guarding her looked down at her bell with surprised eyes.
“What, didn’t this bastard pass out?”
“Let me see if it’s a dream. It will be my last nap. Kick kick.”
Unlike her men, who laughed at the scene, a change occurred in Lorne’s consciousness the moment she heard Belle’s final voice.
Yes.
Right now, no one can protect the two of them.
Even the village men who scrambled to get rid of wild boars when they came down to the village.
The women of the village who skillfully caught at least one snake without blinking an eye.
And even her childhood friend who cherished her when she trembled because of her fear of lightning at night is in that state.
Her future life is full of her dreams to give up just because there are no people who have protected her and helped her.
She couldn’t even confess to the person she liked, and she couldn’t even try that common kiss.
You must protect it.
The child who protected her, this time herself.
The moment she realized that reality, Lorne’s vision blurred with the sound of something breaking in her head.
The last thing she saw was the scene where her man, who had come close to her eyes, was brutally cut off just before her outstretched hand wrapped around her face, screaming at her.
* * * *
Hooded.
The cold rain water knocks on her face
Lorne, who was lying on a bed of wet leaves, was conscious of her slight sensation and looked around her.
“… Woo!”
There was a horrendous sight that was hard to describe in words.
Her Bell and the group of thieves who tried to lay her hand on her were already so muddy that it would be a shame to call them corpses, and only Bell, covered in her splattered blood, was lying in the center.
From noble mtl dot com
As she watched the blood and flesh washed away by the rain at the same time, Lorne felt a strong sense of nausea rising from her own.
What kind of English is that?
Did someone step in and save him?
No, if that’s the case, then there’s no way he left the normal children behind and disappeared alone.
Putting her doubts aside, she got up from her seat to check on her friend’s condition.
For some reason, her exhaustion surged, and she had to crawl in an awkward position, but Lorne, who managed to get close to Bell, checked his condition first.
Thankfully, he is still breathing.
“… Awesome!”
The moment she realized that fact, along with a sigh of relief, her head started pounding as if someone was rubbing it hard.
I feel like I’m forgetting something very important.
Lorne somehow managed to gather the fragments of her memories that had disappeared beyond her consciousness.
Her whole body was wet with rainwater, and her body started to get cold, but she had no time to care.
I have to think about it.
Because someone was saying that in my head.
After searching for her memories in the pouring rain for a long time, Lorne eventually succeeded in reaching the edge of her consciousness.
However, it wasn’t all good news.
“Ah, ah….”
A grotesque voice came out of Lorne’s mouth like a monster that had lost its language.
I just remembered it.
Who is the entity that made those thieves look like chunks of meat in a slaughterhouse?
The fact that the blood that was slowly being washed off her hands wasn’t just there by chance.
“Wow!”
When the image of the men turning to porridge in her hand came to her mind in her memory, Lorne poured out her disgust on the spot.
It’s a shame because the stomach was empty at the time, otherwise all kinds of vomit would have covered the surroundings.
‘I, how… ?’
What was that power?
In her memory, the eccentricity of the girl named Lorne Elua was impossible, at least with the power so far.
The size of that power, the violence, and the ruthlessness.
She wasn’t in the mood to be relieved, saying she’s just glad she saved her friend.
It’s just that the power I didn’t handle properly was directed at an enemy who happened to be nearby.
What would have happened if the target of that power had been Belle?
Perhaps when she opened her eyes again and regained her memories, she might have made the extreme choice of hanging herself.
The danger of this power was too great even for an 11-year-old girl to realize.
“Rone! Bell! Are you here! Answer when you hear a voice!”
“Ah… !”
Her familiar voice lingered in Rone’s ears as she looked down at her own hands and trembled for a long time.
She was presumed to be Bell’s father, who had been worried and had not returned even though he had gone to the mountain for a long time.
“Rone! I was here… !”
Perhaps it was thanks to the apricot that poured out of the basket instead of Lorne, who had no voice, and told her where her owner was.
Bell’s father, James, who appeared over the grass, became angry as soon as he saw Lorne, and was speechless when he realized the tragedy unfolding around her.
“My, Uncle James….”
The voice of a child trembling from the cold and calling his name in a low voice.
James came to his senses belatedly and set out to deal with the situation.
Judging by their clothes, they don’t belong to the villagers.
Most likely they are a group of bandits who recently fled from the next town.
I don’t know how this situation came about or who made it this way, but that’s something we’ll have to figure out later.
Right now, it is important to take children who have been exposed to rain for a long time home and check their condition.
“Don’t say anything, Lorne. Everything is fine now So let’s go down Get carried by Uncle.”
“Yes….”
Following his words, as soon as he climbed onto his back, Lorne felt at least a little at ease with the warmth encroaching on his body.
At the same time he blamed himself for not being able to tell the truth.
It is you who made those people to that point.
Maybe he himself is a monster.
‘Bell, what should I do now?’
In the midst of his fading consciousness, Lorne was lost and asked for advice from his friend again and closed his eyes.
After coming down from the mountain, Bell came to his senses, but he didn’t remember meeting the bandits, probably because of the shock of being hit by her club.
People around me didn’t bother to reveal the truth to Bell like that.
Also, he didn’t want the people he liked to know that he was a monster, so he hid it.
Just like that, the 7 years went by like lightning.
As the time passed, the sense of guilt in the young girl’s heart grew.
The mighty power that there is no guarantee that you can handle on your own is more terrifying than any other enemy.