Chapter 85
Around the time that complete darkness fell everywhere, Celine stood in front of the door to Leonhard’s room and took a deep breath. Although she was still alive, the echo of his voice as he kept trying to push her away lingered in her head.
‘…Don’t mind it. I just need to help Leonhard.’
She knocked loudly on the door three times.
“Leonhard, I’m coming in.”
The door opened quietly.
Unfortunately, he didn’t even seem to get a good nap. As he gazed at her with bloodshot eyes, tiredness was evident on his face.
‘Not even lying in bed…’
Celine let out a sigh.
Leonhard was sitting on a hard wooden chair, expressing his will never to sleep. After all, he, who was still suffering from nightmares right after they met, had no memory of taking a proper nap, so it was not surprising.
“You didn’t get enough rest.”
“…It’s my fault.”
“….?”
She blinked her eyes in bewilderment.
“It’s Leonhard’s fault?”
“N, no.”
Only then did he realize his mistake and hurriedly fixed his words.
“Nothing to worry about. It was a slip of the tongue.”
“I guess it’s because you’re very tired.”
Celine nodded. It wasn’t for a day or two that Leonhard blamed himself for even the smallest things anyway, and since it was an urgent situation, she didn’t want to go into every detail.
“Did you get some rest?”
“Me?
Asking back, she smiled brightly before answering.
“I ate well and slept well. Enough to not sleep at night.”
“….”
When Leonhard’s expression immediately darkened, she immediately recognized the cause.
“Are you worried about looking bad in my eyes?”
“…I can’t say no.”
“Don’t worry. Because Leonhard is handsome anytime, anywhere.”
Although Celine said it lightly, half joking and half serious, Leonhard’s face immediately flushed.
“Oh, are you embarrassed?”
“…Stop making useless jokes.”
Saying that, he slowly rose from his seat and pointed to the bed.
“It’s late. Get some sleep over there.”
“I told you a little while ago. I slept soundly.”
She strode over and sat down on another chair at the table where he was sitting.
“Leonhard intends to sit here and spend the night, right? That’s great. I’m bored, so please be my companion.”
Stunned, he jumped up and stared at Celine, who was right in front of his face.
“I think you know very well that I am not in a position to be your companion.”
“Then, I’ll be Leonhardt’s companion. It’s a little uncomfortable here, right? Would you like to sit on the floor?”
Leonhard sighed and sat back in his chair. He didn’t expect this situation at all.
‘Of course, I thought I just had to hold on while sleeping in bed…’
However, Celine Hunt was always a woman who exceeded his expectations… just like now.
“What are you going to talk about?”
“Well, anything?”
Celine shrugged her shoulders. They had been talking quite a bit, but mostly about immediate problems.
“I want to know more about Leonhard.”
“….”
Leonhard tried to control his chest, which began to run frantically, but to no avail. He, too, wanted to know about her. More precisely, her past, present and future… Although it was close to an impure desire to obtain everything about her.
Still, he managed to hide all those impulses.
“…What about me?”
“Anything.”
Celine’s mouth drew a small arc.
“Then… shall we start with your favorite color?”
“Color?”
Leonhard frowned.
“I don’t think there’s any.”
“Really? I like the color green.”
“I see.”
She continued to ask petty questions.
Even though Leonhard thought the questions were pointless, he answered them in full detail. And by the time the moon rose even higher, his head was already bending down.
“….”
Celine chewed her lips carefully, observing Leonhard. While she was successful enough to relieve his tension, she had no way to deal with the nightmare itself.
‘…This nightmare must be really difficult.’
She closed her eyes tightly.
She could still feel the pain as her whole body was being torn apart.
She wanted to share in the pain if she could. However, she learned that the impossible things in this world must be given up.
After a while…
“…Celine!”
A scream escaped from Leonhard’s mouth, and at the same time, his blue eyes opened like the deep sea.
“I’m here.”
Celine clenched her teeth and nodded her head. She felt like crying just thinking of the pain he must have felt and that he would have felt it all night.
“I’m fine.”
“Leonhard, how are you fine…!”
In the end, tearful words flowed from her mouth.
“Leonhard always, always said you were fine…”
“Isn’t that the same for you?”
“….”
At those words, Leonhard smiled helplessly.
“We look alike.”
Celine reached out her hand and placed it on his, who was holding the table tight.
“….!”
Leonhardt’s hand stiffened for a moment but didn’t shake it off.
“I am always here. Whatever Leonhard sees in his dreams, it’s not who I am now… always remember that.”
“I’ll try.”
After saying that, his head tilted helplessly.
Celine’s breath started to get short. This was the first time she had properly observed him having a nightmare. Leonhard’s sculpted face was contorted whenever he saw her past in the dreams, and cold sweat formed on his brow.
Putting her own hand on top of his, she carefully wake him up.
“….”
Leonhard blinked his eyes with a face that hadn’t quite yet grasped the situation.
“I’m fine, Leonhard.”
She tried to reassure him with her clear voice, but he shook her head.
“…Celine.”
“Yes?”
“I have some requests.”
“…If you tell me to leave, I won’t listen.”
“Not that…”
Leonhart hesitated for a moment.
“Please don’t wake me up.”
“What?”
“What you’ve been through, there’s something unusual about it.”
“….”
She struggled to understand his words.
“It’s just that the experiment went wrong… did something explode?”
“I know very well about the energy contained in the cores of the boss monsters.”
Leonhard poured out his words with great speed.
“But what you’ve been through… the fight. It’s hard to explain them…”
However, his words cut off and his eyelids fell heavily. Celine just stared at him as she clutched at her chest as it started beating like crazy.
Come to think of it, there were a lot of strange things. That kind of darkness was never an enemy in the game. Furthermore, the power to block magic. Rather than the power of monsters… wasn’t it close to the power of a warlock?
‘Ah.‘
She suddenly realized.
Leonhard was thinking that the explosion might have been triggered by the warlocks.
‘He told me not to wake him up in order to find out more accurately…’
In order to know the cause, there would be no more effective method than experiencing the situation dozens of times. Celine buried her face in her hands as she realized that. She didn’t notice anything strange, even though she was the one who had been through it herself.
‘I’m sorry, I…’
She swallowed her sigh.
Leonhard noticed through the warm morning sunlight that the long night had finally come to an end. He gazed at Celine, who had been sitting across from him motionless.
She was dozing with her eyes half closed.
“…Celine?”
“Leonhard.”
Her eyelids quivered, and the watery blue-gray eyes looked at him.
‘….’
He didn’t ask if she cried. He wouldn’t do anything as dumb as ask a question he already knew the answer to.
“I am certain it was a warlock.”
“Is that so?”
Celine muttered bitterly.
“I don’t know how they did it… it seems that the warlock sneaked in and polluted the energy.”
“Do the wizards know that?”
Leonhard pondered seriously.
“I don’t know. If all the data had been destroyed to keep this a secret, they would still not know.”
“No way…!”
“If it were, they would have stayed.”
He sighed. The actions of the wizards who tried to bury Celine, as well as their own colleagues, were still vivid in his eyes.
“Leonhard, I know you don’t like wizards, but…”
“They tried to seal everyone underground alive.”
“….!”
The blue-gray eyes shook in shock for a moment, then started burning with rage.
“So, that is why no matter how much I wait, no matter how much I fight… no one opened the door.”
“Yes.”
“Then, I think the wizards have already figured out the cause.”
“….?”
Leonhard was dumbfounded.
“Why?”
“The people underground are also wizards.”
Celine’s voice was full of conviction.
“…They stay still?”
“That’s right.”
Leonhard muttered blankly.
They must be wizards with considerable skills to study the cores of the chief monsters. There was no way they’d stay still in anger.
“I need to meet them.”
Finishing his words, he stood up.
This wasn’t the first time a warlock had infiltrated the imperial palace and played dirty tricks. However, in principle, this was done in a laboratory where only wizards belonging to the Imperial Family could enter…
It meant that there was a warlock among them.
Leonhard gritted his teeth.
It wasn’t a problem that would end as easily as the previous inspection with the Crown Prince’s aides. Wizards belonging to the Imperial Family could evade his pursuit as much as they wanted. How would he catch them if they left the empire under the pretext of doing a mission or research?
This warlock could never have been caught without the help of the wizards.
Celine looked a little uneasy.
“How do we meet them? I have no way to contact them, so…”
He snorted at the question.
“They must be trying to restore that ridiculous greenhouse. I know where they are.”
Celine nodded and got up.
“You can just rest here…”
“Oh, that’s what I was going to talk about.”
At those words, she smiled.
“It’s exactly the same reason Leonhard is trying to go now. I can’t sit still either.”
Leonhard drove Black as hard as he could. Arriving a few minutes later didn’t change anything, but he was just as impatient.
The moment he finally reached the entrance of Libron Castle…
“….!”
Her body stiffened.
“Leonhardt, th-that…”
She barely swallowed her words. It was because Libron Castle was covered in green smoke that felt artificial.
She knew what it was.
…Poison Zone.
It was a stage she cleared in the game.
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