Chapter 168 – Friends (3)
20. Friends (3)
“Mom!”
“Arya.”
“Ugh?”
“We are cute.”
“Lol.”
Ar was hugged by his mother. Holding her like this and burying her face in her belly felt the most cozy and pleasant feeling in the world. When she did this, she stroked her hair and patted her back. If you do this, you will feel good twice, no, three times. Ar said that her mother’s arms were the best in the world.
“Arya. We are.”
“Why?”
“What do you think our are would be like without a mother?”
“Yes? Mommy is here!”
“So what if.”
“Ugh… How much?”
“Umm~ One hundred nights? What do you think it would be like without you for a hundred nights?”
“One hundred nights? Why?”
“What do you think? Huh?”
“Mom… Where are you going? Ugh…”
“Ar, pop! Mom, I’m not going anywhere.”
“Huh, heh, really?”
“Yes! It’s just because I’m curious how our cute Arr will react. Our Ar, not cute Ar, but crybaby Ar?”
“I am not a crybaby! Oh, I didn’t cry!”
“Whoops.”
“Really!”
“Yes, yes.”
Ar is back in her mother’s arms. She couldn’t imagine her mother missing for a hundred nights. She didn’t even want to imagine. She was so scared that her tears stinged, but she hated the sound of a crybaby. When she laughed at her mother, she used to laugh along with her Ardo, but strangely, now her tears flowed. She clung to her mother as if she never wanted to be separated, as if she couldn’t be separated even for one night, let alone a hundred nights.
Mom hugged Ar more tightly and whispered.
“Arya.”
“Nah. I mean, it’s going to fall one hundred nights.”
“No, not like that.”
“Sure?”
She seems too quick to tell now, but she can’t help it, she said as her mother muttered and kissed her on the crown of her are.
“From now on, I will tell you one thing Arman should remember for the rest of his life.”
“Ugh?”
“What is that…”
**
“…”
Ar opened her eyes. The surroundings were dark, and as I tossed and turned, I heard the soft rubbing of the blankets.
‘Bedding… Ah.’
Realizing that she was not lying on a cold, hard floor, but on a warm, soft bed, Arga searched for her memory. She ran away unfairly for several days, desperately requested help, weighed between giving up and coming, and even the state of her body that seemed to collapse at any moment…
It was not a dream that Hendrick appeared at the moment of crisis. Came to the inn in my arms, filled my stomach like a beggar as soon as I came home and returned from the car feeling ashamed, and went into the bathroom with Kaya and got into the bathroom, and fell asleep from all the fatigue at once, but was surprised to find Shay hugging me when he returned late. It was an inducement, but the scandalous minstrel who aimed for my gold coin bag greeted me with an awkward smile, and she smiled vaguely as well.
Especially at the end of her life, Hendrick was stroking her hair, and instead of refusing, she almost kicked the blanket when the memory of her happily relying on him came to mind.
It wasn’t that she immediately regained her sanity.
It was not because of the memory of what had happened before she fell asleep, but because of the dream she had just had.
‘I have very few memories of my mother, so how could she have such vivid dreams?’
It was that she had little memory of her mother, but not none at all. Her name and face she still remembered. Her face is a bit pale, but… She wasn’t bad, of course. She was so good Like her when she was little, she almost cried because she liked her. But what she really wanted to cry about was that she couldn’t remember anything from her dreams.
Even at this moment when I was replaying the dream, the content was gradually fading. It was so painful to see her beautiful and kind mother, whom she hadn’t seen in a very long time, as if her handwriting was being crushed by raindrops. It was all the more so for her, who has been living a difficult life alone in a foreign country for a long time.
Right before she woke up from her dream, she wondered what the ‘words that Arman should remember for the rest of her life’ that her mother was about to say…
“Hmmm, hmmm, um, thump thump, idiot, boss…”
“Ugh.”
“Lol…”
Ar’s thoughts were cut off. Shay, who was sleeping right next to her, tossed over and placed her legs on Ar’s torso and clamped them tightly. In terms of her simple strength, Shay, who was the strongest among the party, could not ignore the tightening of her thighs even while sleeping, but Ar did not dare to push it away. She feared waking Shay, but there were things like that… For some reason, I didn’t like the feeling of being hugged tightly.
‘This is all because of a dream…’
Shay doesn’t look like her mother at all.
Recalling the faces of her companions who greeted her, Ar asked her to sleep again.
Shay’s embrace, though not as much as her mother’s… She was very cozy.
**
It was morning. Raising only the upper body, I looked at the bed next to her, and Shay, Illumina, and Ar were still lying down.
‘Has Kaya woke up already?’
Only Kaya, who slept in the same bed as me, was empty. Her whole body was frowning, and she felt like she hadn’t slept six hours, but her mind was fine.
‘The road was bad… I have to do something about the problem.’
It wasn’t that I was afraid of the ephemera. I didn’t even have a good encounter with him. But she wasn’t even on the nun’s side. It’s fine right now, but we couldn’t stay in Salem all the time. If we saved it and headed back to the dungeon, Ar would likely live the same life as before, no, a tougher one. Maybe I’ll give up living in Salem any longer.
I don’t know if Ar wants it, well? She didn’t seem to think so at all. So she must have endured so far.
If you had dozens of gold coins, you could have lived a much better life than before, even if it wasn’t very rich. .
As a colleague who had been together for a while, I couldn’t see that again.
“I’ll stop by Raella-sama’s monastery for a while. If I don’t come back until I eat, I’m doing things first. Hendrick.”
After washing my face, I left the inn. Of course, I left a note without forgetting the lesson I learned intensely in the secret room in District 2. It bothered me a little that Kaya wasn’t visible, but it was clear that she was going anywhere in Salem, and she didn’t even stay away for long unless she gave her a word in advance, so she wasn’t nervous.
‘It’s not quite morning.’
It turns out now that I didn’t sleep a little, but my body was more tired because of yesterday’s incident. Yesterday the weather was damn sunny despite the fact that a girl’s life was about to go down the abyss. I inadvertently raised my middle finger, but Raella-sama and Justitia-sama came to mind and clenched my fists.
“What business are you here for?”
“I’m here to see the nun.”
“Ah yes. Stay in the nun’s office.”
“Thank you. Warm kindness and cold generosity.”
“Warm kindness and cool generosity.”
Raella’s Monastery was originally open, but even taking that into account, I was almost at the free pass level. He had made achievements and had been in and out often, but Sestia seemed to have given him a separate word. Thanks to this, it was always possible to visit the nun directly, which is difficult for ordinary people to meet.
“Oh, welcome. Hendrick. You all come this morning, what are you doing?”
“Do you have to come because something happened?”
“It’s not like that, no, I really hope so, but you’ve been here because you’ve had business so far, right? Is not it?”
“… Hehe, how have you been? Did nothing happen?”
“Whoops. Sure.”
Sestia, whom he hadn’t seen in a while, smiled broadly.
“Anything good?”
“Every day is fun, so I’m smiling. Is it strange?”
“No, what. Just.”
She was naturally the type to laugh a lot, and her smile wasn’t a bad thing, so she had nothing to do except be weird.
“Cestia.”
“Yes, Mr. Hendrick. Please speak.”
“Hey, did you see anything yesterday?”
“Ah.”
Sestia nodded and pulled out a piece of paper from a drawer under her desk.
“Are you referring to the chase that took place in the slums yesterday?”
“Uh. Was Kaya not mentioned by any chance?”
“That’s right. She was thinking about how to deal with it. Since she’s somehow related to Hendrick-sama, I thought she should be handled more carefully. What happened to her? Can you hear it in person?”
“Of course.”
She explained her circumstances to Sestia. On the surface, she seemed like a movie story about a talented girl who rescued a girl who was about to be sucked out of her liver and marrow by numerous hyenas.
Except that her race is a werewolf.
“Surely, the sister who posted the report said that she felt an unpleasant aura from the injured part of a warrior and started tracking her down. She said that at first, she had to pay close attention to barely notice it, but as she pursued her, her aura became clearer little by little. She doesn’t use the expression ‘reluctant’ just because she was injured by the same human or from a different race. In that case, it will most likely be the feeling you get when you encounter the energy of a heretic or a monster.”
“Okay?”
“Yes. And just before the search was almost completed, Sister Kaya appeared and had a conversation, and in the meantime, the energy disappeared as if it had suddenly evaporated… It is written like this.”
Sestia passed her paper to me. She was staring at my face.
“That’s right. She voluntarily came to pay her taxes. I thought it would be fourteen if you could look at it.”
“Are you willing to pay?”
“Just as you are predicting, we were the owners of that energy, and I stole it, to be exact.”
“Yes?”
“It’s a half-werewolf. A colleague from HAT, and a friend of ours.”
“Yes… ?”
“It’s not a cult, it’s not a monster. He’s a weird kid who’s never eaten people and is rather afraid of blood.”
Cestia’s surprised expression was worth seeing.
“I thought it would have something to do with it, but honestly, I didn’t expect it at all to be a werewolf.”
“Hmm. Poor kid Far from harming others, I couldn’t properly take advantage of the goodwill of my colleagues and became kind enough to live in suffering alone. Since the race is a race, he can’t properly register as a hero and is constantly moving around with requests, but he’s a good friend.”
“Hendrick.”
“He has no family and has no connections other than us. All he wants is the right to live a normal life as a single person.”
“Anyway, I’m a bit embarrassed…”
Even if you think of it as a reverse, it was like that. Still, in order not to leave any uneasy feelings in his heart, it was necessary for Ar to live a normal life.
“I have shame too, I’m not asking the church to protect werewolves or look after them. Just pretend you don’t know Then you can.”
“Did you already know that sister and I?”
“That’s why I’m asking you to ‘pretend’ that you don’t know. If I didn’t tell you, I thought it was much better to tell you now than to investigate and get to the truth. I know it’s difficult for you, but… Sorry. Please.”
“Hey, maybe that would be good. I believe in Hendrick-sama, but I also believe that Hendrick-sama is a good person… Still, werewolves…”
Cestia touched her forehead. At first, she seemed to be as reluctant as Kaya, as she opened and closed her fist with her other hand. She was also a special case of Shay.
“Whoa… No matter how much Hendrick asked, this is a problem that cannot be ignored unconditionally.”
“Cestia.”
“I will see and judge for myself. That half-werewolf.”
“Uh, huh? Now?”
“Yes. It is an issue that needs to be dealt with urgently.”
Cestia woke up and grabbed her door, and she looked back at me.
“What are you doing?”
“Okay… Okay.”
I didn’t expect this
