Chapter 2
Ow, ow... Unnie, isn't it still red here? Take a look.
Lia used her slightly sprained ankle as an excuse and plopped herself straight down on my bed.
Your ankle's only like that because you fell over.
But I did fall because I was startled by the magic, didn't I?
Lia said with a bright smile.
Looking at her, I wondered if she was really hurt at all.
Fine, fine. I get it, so could you get down now?
Noooo~ It's so soft here, it feels nice.
Lia hugged the blanket to herself and looked blissful.
Ugh... Do whatever you want.
I let her off because she was the cutest girl in the world.
If it had been some black-hearted bastard doing that?
Then I'd have blasted his back with a Firestorm without mercy.
Lia rolled around on the blanket this way and that before finally getting up after quite a while.
I'm heading out soon. I need to get home a little early today.
Something up?
Yeah. Apparently the forest's been acting a little strange lately. The adults are worried because wild animals like wolves keep wandering into the village.
Lia turned back toward me while holding the doorknob.
Unlike before, she wore a very serious expression.
You be careful too, Unnie. Make sure you close the window before going to bed.
Don't worry. I'm not a child.
If it was a demonic beast strong enough to break into this house, locking the door wouldn't mean much in the first place.
More importantly,
You're the child, though. You're shorter than me.
Well, I guess my chest is a lot smaller than yours.
W-what are you even saying?! I'm talking about your height, height!!
Lia shouted at the top of her lungs, her face bright red.
She was definitely fun to tease.
Lia, you be careful too. If wolves attack the village, don't go charging in and just hide somewhere.
Aw, I'm probably stronger than most adults, though?
Now that you mention it, that's true too.
Lia waved with a playful smile.
See you tomorrow then.
The door closed, and familiar silence settled over the room.
But for some reason, today felt different from usual—somehow unsettling.
The faint rustling sound outside the window bothered me more than usual.
*
For some reason, I couldn't fall asleep.
It wasn't like I'd taken a nap, and I'd used more magic than usual, so I should've been tired.
I tossed and turned on the bed, letting out a pointless sigh.
- Apparently the forest's been acting a little strange lately.
Lia's words from earlier in the day suddenly came back to me.
...Honestly, I couldn't relate at all.
In fact, there hadn't been a single day when the forest hadn't been strange.
Wolves howled, birds flapped about. At night, all kinds of bizarre noises drifted through the place.
Of course, I'd gotten used to it. That's just how country villages were.
Still, Lia's warning kept strangely circling my mind tonight.
“Don't go and make me worry for nothing..."
I sat up and pulled the curtain open a little.
A faint light flickered beyond the window.
That's... the direction of the village, isn't it?
“Is there a festival or something?"
A faint sound drifted in through the crack in the window.
It sounded like a dog barking, and maybe also like a person's scream.
No, maybe I was just hearing things.
It'd be nothing, probably.
I kept trying to reassure myself, but I still couldn't shake the nagging feeling.
“Ugh, seriously, what a pain."
In the end, I got up, threw on my cloak carelessly, and left the hut.
This is just a walk.
I couldn't sleep, so I was just going for a little stroll to get some fresh air.
I dragged my slippers along as I walked down the forest path.
The village wasn't that far, but it was still too much of a hassle to walk there in the middle of the night.
“Did I come out for nothing?"
The cold night air made me hunch my shoulders on its own.
...Still, since I'm already out here. Let's just make sure everything's fine and head back.
As I thought that and walked a little farther, a suspicious shadow caught my eye at the edge of my vision.
“...What is that now?"
Something with huge wings was circling in the night sky.
At first I thought there was only one, but I was wrong.
Another one appeared soon after.
Two, three, four...
Wait, that's a bit too many, isn't it?
The moment I realized something was wrong,
the flames lighting up the village shot high into the sky.
“...!”
My head went cold in an instant.
Sleep vanished completely.
Only one thought came to mind.
Lia was in that village.
Lunaris lifted herself into the air.
Because I rose too quickly, my slippers slipped off.
The chilly wind brushed my bare feet, but this wasn't the time to care.
If I went back home like this,
I'd never sleep soundly again for the rest of my life.
*
The village, which had been peaceful until just half a day ago, had turned into utter chaos in an instant.
The village had been attacked by a pack of wyverns numbering in the dozens.
-Kieeeek!!
-Kaaak!!
By this point, it was already a disaster beyond what human strength could handle.
“Why... wyverns...!”
Amid the people screaming and fleeing in a panic,
Lia glared at the wyvern in front of her, gripping her sword tightly.
Even though it was a young wyvern smaller than the others, it was still twice Lia's size.
The wyvern bared its teeth and charged at Lia.
Lia swallowed hard and quickly ducked down.
Sharp claws narrowly swept past above her head.
Her heart pounded. It felt like it might leap out of her chest.
Lia planted her feet firmly on the ground, steadied herself, and thrust her sword forward with all her strength.
“Nggh..."
The tip of the blade struck tough hide.
It was like trying to stab solid rock.
Her wrist, her shoulder, her whole body trembled.
Lia clenched her teeth and tightened her grip.
-Sshhk.
With a sharp sound like muscle tearing, the wyvern's wing joint was deeply sliced open.
It lost its balance and staggered to one side before crashing to the ground with a scream.
Lia caught her breath in ragged gasps and readjusted her grip on the sword.
Red blood, like her own hair, dripped down the sharp blade.
That was only one down.
And it had only been the smallest, weakest-looking one at that.
Lia slowly lifted her head.
The sight before her was despairing.
Countless wyverns still covered the sky.
'Will Luna unnie be okay...’
Her precious older sister's face, alone in the hut in the forest, suddenly came to mind.
At this hour, she'd surely be fast asleep. I wasn't sure she'd managed to get away safely.
Just as she was about to move, thinking she had to wake her somehow,
she felt a searing heat behind her.
When she turned her head, a blazing red fireball was flying straight at her.
'When did it get there?!'
Lia instinctively threw herself to the side.
The blazing flames just barely missed her.
But the wooden pillar that had caught fire broke with a crack and came crashing down on top of Lia.
“Aaaagh!!"
Pain so intense it felt like her nerves were being ripped apart spread from her left leg throughout her body.
Her vision went black.
A wyvern's shadow fell over Lia's head as she struggled to stay conscious.
Sharp teeth approached, drooling sticky saliva.
“N-no!"
Lia desperately tried to move.
But her legs wouldn't listen.
Gripped by pain and fear, she couldn't even move a fingertip properly.
Just as she shut her eyes tightly, thinking it was all over,
“Why are you doing that."
A familiar voice reached Lia's ears.
“You're always running around just fine, so how can you not dodge something like this?"
A lazy voice, dripping with annoyance.
But there was a subtle thread of concern mixed in.
Lia slowly opened her eyes.
The first thing she saw was the wyvern that had been about to pounce on her, now pinned beneath a massive boulder.
And right in front of it.
The person Lia knew better than anyone stood there.
Ash-gray hair that swayed faintly and a small, delicate back.
But for some reason.
At this moment, that back felt incredibly large.
“Luna unnie...!”
Before she could even ask how she got here, another wyvern lunged at Lunaris.
Before she could even warn her that it was dangerous,
space twisted grotesquely.
At the same time, the wyvern's massive body crumpled like paper.
It was an application of telekinesis magic.
Lia's eyes went wide.
She couldn't understand what was happening before her.
All she knew was this:
the one standing at the center of her vision was the 'Luna unnie' she'd long known.
Lunaris turned around and looked at Lia.
Warmth seeped into her sapphire eyes, which had been cold as ice.
She came over to Lia and bent her knees slightly.
“Just sleep for a little."
Lunaris gently brushed the blood-matted hair from Lia's head with her fingertips.
It was a soft touch, hard to believe coming from the usually indifferent Lunaris.
“When you wake up..."
A low voice, almost a whisper.
As Lia slowly blinked, Lunaris continued with a faint smile.
“It'll all be over."
With those words, the lazy witch stretched.
From her small, delicate fingertips,
an enormous amount of mana began to whirl.
A cold, chilling aura that contrasted with the surrounding flames spread in all directions.
Above the night sky, which had been covered in black smoke.
countless blindingly white magic circles spread out one after another.
“At times like this, my magic going haywire is actually kind of useful."
Hearing Lunaris's sighing murmur, Lia smiled bitterly.
To call the magic that painted the night sky so brilliantly “a mess”...
Well, she was someone who dug a huge hole in the front yard and still said she was only at student level.
Thinking that was just so very like her sister, Lia drifted off to sleep.
*
“What in the world...!”
Baron Avril, who had come to support the village late together with the knights, couldn't believe his own eyes.
High in the sky, countless huge magic circles glowed white.
From those magic circles, massive blocks of ice poured down endlessly.
-KWAANG! KWAANG!!
The wyverns that had attacked the village were struck by the ice blocks and fell helplessly.
Their bodies crushed, or pierced through by ice spikes, were horrifying beyond words.
“My heavens..."
“At that level... no, could that be supreme-tier magic...?"
Baron Avril quietly listened to the knights' murmurs before asking the adjutant beside him.
“Did the Magic Tower say they'd send reinforcements?"
The adjutant shook his head, looking flustered.
“We didn't receive any separate notice."
“Well, the Magic Tower wouldn't be dispatching personnel to a remote rural village like this. Much less a great mage of the future Tower Lord's caliber."
If so, then what on earth was that overwhelming magic?
Soon, the ice storm gradually died down.
The charred remains of buildings came into view.
Still, for an attack by a pack of wyverns, the village's damage wasn't all that great.
'If it hadn't been for that magic...'
Baron Avril and the knights headed deeper into the village.
Wyvern corpses lay scattered everywhere.
One was pinned to the ground, impaled by a massive chunk of ice.
Another had been crushed beneath a heavy boulder.
What was most shocking of all was
the ones twisted at bizarre angles, as if they had been wrung out by something.
“Ugh!”
“How horrifying...!”
Some of the younger knights with less experience covered their mouths and gagged at the gruesome sight.
Baron Avril also frowned and took a deep breath.
But they couldn't keep standing around in shock forever.
“Pull yourselves together. From here on out, search for survivors and check the injured."
“Yes, my lord!"
The knights who received the order moved at once.
After confirming that the knights were scattering throughout the village, Baron Avril walked deeper inside.
'I need to see for myself. Just who used magic like this...'
How long had he walked?
Beyond a faint veil of mist and frost, a small, frail silhouette came into view.
Blue sparks crackled wildly around the body with ash-gray hair falling calmly around it.
'Don't tell me that girl is?!'
It was hard to believe that the one who had cast the large-scale magic he saw at the village entrance was so young.
But given the surrounding circumstances, it was true that there was no one else besides that girl.
Baron Avril tried to speak to the girl cautiously.
At that moment, sapphire eyes, cold as ice, turned toward the baron.
They were empty eyes, showing no emotion at all.
As if what she had done was truly nothing.
The gaze that simply looked back at him was chillingly ferocious.
Baron Avril unconsciously took a step back.
Then he bowed his head politely and slowly to show his respect to the one who had saved the village.
'I don't know why you're here in a rural village like this, but...'
A talent far too precious to be buried in the forest.