Chapter 43.1

Chapter 43 – Part 1

It seemed like he had strong willpower.

Maybe it even made him stronger to the point that he could even make contract with the Fire Spirit King and high-level water spirits. Stroking Frey’s hair, I sometimes felt sorry and thankful when I saw him play with words as if nothing had happened between him and Lisandro.

“Call again later, bye.”

[ Noonim! Watch out for him, understand! ]

“Alright, yes.”

Giving him a vague answer, I pressed the button on the communication port.

What was he so worried about?

“Is that noonim?”

“Who’s your noonim?”

Lisandro, who was laughing heartily, turned ferocious in an instant and glared at Dennis. The latter bit his lips as if it was unfair though his menacing expression showed no sign of disappearing before he casually blew Dennis his murderous aura that other people wouldn’t be able to grin with.

Dennis received that murderous intent quite well.

It was because he had been receiving that since his academy days. He knew very well that even though it was his murderous aura, he didn’t really mean to kill, and although he was also called sword prodigy since childhood, he was overshadowed by Lisandro.

“I mean, even if I call her noonim…!”

“You’re the same age, what’s with the noonim?”

Dennis gasped in embarrassment.

“You said you would kill me if I called her by her name!”

“Call her Princess.”

“Yu… I mean, can’t I just call her noonim? She told me to call her whatever I am comfortable with, saying that calling her princess feels so distant!”

He only said the first syllable of her name, ‘Yu,’ but Dennis had to immediately change his words and could only grumble in front of his ferocious eyes. After all, it was Lisandro who kept calling his twin Yurenia ‘noonim’ everywhere.

Thanks to that, although Dennis was the same age as Yurenia, she felt like an older sister to him for no reason. Although he used to playfully call her that way, he had gotten used to it now.

“If you’re going to call her something, then call her noona.”

“Then, Frey would kill me.”

“Then die.”

Lisandro’s eyebrows raised in displeasure.

Dennis didn’t care if he did or not. To be honest, he was more afraid of Frey than Lisandro. It was because while he always smiled kindly, behind that mask was an eerie and cold person.

On the other hand, even though it was difficult to get close to Lisandro at first, he was much more comfortable to be with once you got to know him. Though of course, he was only able to get close to Dennis and Frey.

If Lisandro had a temper like fire, Frey was ice cold.

It was the kind of relationship where if Frey was sarcastically smiling, Lisandro wouldn’t be able to control his rage and cursed at other people, but neither of them wanted anyone else besides them.

The expressionless Lisandro and Frey equipped with a fake smile were famous even in the academy. In a word, it seemed like a world where only the two of them lived. Dennis was the only friend who intervened between them during their academy days.

The two of them had two things in common.

One was they both had no buddies, two was they both cared for Yurenia. Even as a compliment, they hated having Yurenia’s name be uttered by other people.

Dennis once saw the famous Yurenia and shook hands with her in pleasure, but Lisandro almost cut off his wrists while Frey almost burned them.

‘Though noonim just passed it off as a joke…’

Dennis felt as if he had returned alive from the underworld. When he thought of that time, he felt terrified and his body trembled. Then, he spoke naturally.

“That’s not the problem now. Look at the map.”

Dawphilles, located all the way down from Bongru Mountains, was one of the safe zones. It was definitely quite a distance from the place where monsters live.

“If we look at the direction they took now, they came down from the west side of Bongru Mountains. We found a monster pattern here. Though it was already dead.”

Lisandro’s eyes followed Dennis’ finger. The west side of Bongru Mountains was a place inhabited by goblins and ogres. Both of them were weak kinds of monsters, so it wouldn’t be strange to see them walking around in groups.

However, the strange thing here was ‘They fearlessly came down to the safe zone’ to an especially far away place.

They knew that they would die as quickly with God’s blessing as soon as they set foot in the safe zone, but the monsters came in groups and tried to harm the civilians. The monsters intuitively didn’t even come close to the safe zone.

They instinctively feel repulsed by the pure and good energy that comes from the safe zone.

Between the mountains and Dawphilles was Mahania. It wasn’t even a safe zone, so if a monster was to attack a private house, there was a better chance there.

“If they don’t intend to die, it’s impossible for them to step into the safe zone. But still, we can’t rule out that they came down to Dawphilles because there must be something there. However, it was said that they weren’t in their right minds and seemed to be manipulated by someone….”

Lisandro paused and looked down at the remains of the monster.

“…Maybe, they’re just experiments.”

“Experiment?”

“Experiment in controlling monsters.”

“Aren’t you going too far?”

Controlling monsters wasn’t an easy task, nor was it something easily spoken of. No matter how weak those monsters were, it wouldn’t make sense for a person with normal power to control that number at once. It seemed like they’d gone this far because they weren’t able to control it properly.

‘…No, is it correct to say that they were manipulated? There may be other reasons.’

For other reasons, the possibility that something happened between the monsters was much stronger. They may have run out of food, so they came down to the safe zone. Frankly, this also made no sense, and what Lisandro said made more sense.

Dennis thought that Lisandro had gone too far.

If they could control monsters that easily, then they wouldn’t be defeated twice or thrice a year. If they knew how to control them, then it would be no easier subjugation, driving them to one place and killing them. That was how difficult it was. Enough for them not to have a try unless they make a contract with the devil or use black magic.

Still, even this was very unlikely.

Except if it was a group of black wizards who went crazy enough to work hand in hand, it was impossible that they could ever perform such high-level taboo black magic by themselves. After all, black wizards use the devil’s magic.

It wasn’t enough for humans to control a large number of monsters alone.

“But an organization would be different. If they share that much magic, then it wouldn’t be non-existent.”

Dennis was slightly taken aback by Lisandro’s determined tone but he soon shook his head. Black wizards would be hiding, but to his knowledge, no one had the guts to reveal themselves like this.

__