How to Live as the Terminally Ill Younger Sister of the Villain - Chapter 70
Slash.
Its neck was severed in one strike. After roaming the Dark Forest for so long, his skills had improved enough to handle even full-grown Forest Oxen in 3-4 minutes.
Blake kicked the monster’s head aside which was blocking the path. Then he approached the girl who sat slumped on the ground, staring blankly in his direction.
She flinched and backed away when Blake approached.
“Hey, who are you? Where did you come from?”
Blake stopped in his tracks, finding it strange how she kept backing away in fear. When he stopped, she stopped too.
“……”
“How did you get here? Are you alone? How long have you been here?”
“……”
“Why aren’t you answering? It’s not like you’re ignoring me.”
“……”
“Can’t you speak? You screamed just fine earlier.”
No matter what he said, she wouldn’t open her mouth.
Blake thought it might be because of his sword, so he quickly shook off the blood and sheathed it. Then he took another step forward.
This time she didn’t back away. Instead, she squinted her eyes with a deeply furrowed brow. It seemed she couldn’t see well.
Blake approached right in front of her and extended his hand.
“First, stand up. We need to get out of here quickly. That was a baby, so its mother will come soon. Well, I could take care of the mother too, but it’ll be troublesome if the male comes along.”
“……”
“Can you not hear me?”
Growing frustrated at the lack of response, Blake frowned.
“Are you deaf?”
He pointed to his ear and shook his head, asking if she couldn’t hear.
Finally, she nodded.
“Oh, so you really can’t hear?”
Mystery solved about why she wasn’t answering, Blake moved even closer to her. Though she startled and backed away slightly, she couldn’t retreat further with a tree behind her.
Blake knelt on one knee beside her and grabbed her face. Though she was startled, Blake held her firmly and examined her ears.
“Were you hit by a monster’s sound wave?”
“…!”
She turned to look at him with surprised eyes, apparently having heard his voice.
“You can hear me when I’m close?”
The girl nodded with a slightly brighter expression. Blake found it somewhat cute and let out a small laugh.
“Looking at the absence of blood, it seems to be temporary paralysis. It should get better with time. But your eyes…”
While explaining, Blake noticed something wrong with her eyes. Her pupils were cloudy like they were covered in smoke, and her focus kept shifting around.
“Can’t… uh… can’t s-see…”
“Oh, so you can speak after all?”
Though her voice was painfully raspy, Blake couldn’t hide his joy at hearing her speak.
“If your throat hurts, just stay quiet for now. I’ll give you something helpful later.”
It seemed she had eaten some poisonous mushrooms unique to the Dark Forest. With proper antidote, her voice would return quickly. Unfortunately, he didn’t have the antidote right now.
“Anyway, we need to get out of here first. That baby’s parents…”
Blake trailed off while pointing at the baby Forest Ox’s corpse.
Right, she can’t see now.
“That monster chasing you was a baby monster. So its parents will come looking soon. We need to get out of here before that happens.”
Blake pressed close to speak loudly enough for her to hear.
Then he stood up and extended his hand, but again she didn’t get up.
She hesitated for a moment, then lifted her skirt.
Under her torn skirt, one of her legs was in terrible condition.
“Ah… you can’t walk.”
Below her knee was deeply gashed, and her ankle was severely swollen. The skin was so covered in bruises that its natural color wasn’t visible.
Judging by the blood still flowing from the wound, it seemed she had been injured recently.
“I do have some herbs good for stopping bleeding and bruises…”
Just as Blake was rummaging through the pouch he was carrying.
“Kuaaae-!”
A chilling cry echoed through the trees. The girl startled and grabbed Blake’s leg.
Unable to tell where it was coming from, he looked around in all directions.
“This won’t do. Let’s get out of here first.”
Blake lowered his body and showed her his back. He made a gesture for her to get on, but the girl just stared blankly.
“Hurry!”
With no time to wait, Blake pulled her arms around his neck. Then he stood up abruptly.
“Eek!”
The girl automatically got on Blake’s back.
“Hold on tight! I’m going to run!”
Blake dashed in one breath to the hideout he had prepared a few days ago.
***
The space, built by stacking stones for walls and weaving large leaves to roughly shelter from rain, was enough for two children to enter.
Blake felt proud that he had intentionally made the space a bit larger.
When he was making it, he felt quite depressed thinking he should make it comfortable for a long stay as he didn’t know when he could escape the Dark Forest, but now that the situation turned out like this, he thought he did well to make it big.
Blake had been storing various herbs in the hideout, so he had all the herbs needed for the girl.
He ground herbs to stop bleeding and applied them to her leg, then tightly wrapped it with torn pieces of cloth along with a splint, and also boiled herbs in water to help her throat and made her drink it.
“Your ears will get better on their own as time passes.”
“…Okay.”
As a result, the girl’s expression looked much more comfortable than at first, and she could even respond.
“The eyes… I’m not sure. Whether monster poison touched them or you ate something wrong, I thought I knew most symptoms that could occur in this forest, but this is the first time I’ve seen this.”
“…It’s okay.”
“How can it be okay when you suddenly can’t see?”
“I can vaguely see shapes.”
“Shapes?”
“That you’re taller than me and your hair is shorter than mine… That much.”
“So you really can only see outlines. Can you see how many fingers I’m holding up?”
“…Three?”
“It’s four.”
“….”
“Never mind. Trying to force yourself to see when you can’t might make it worse. Just keep your eyes closed.”
“…I don’t want to, it’s scary when I can’t see.”
Blake’s hand, which was lighting the firewood, paused at her small murmur.
“It’s better if I can see your outline at least.”
It was a statement that showed how much she trusted him. Even though they had only met a few hours ago, she was already relying on him.
He could understand how scared she must have been alone in the Dark Forest, and he could tell that she didn’t come here voluntarily.
This complicated Blake’s feelings. He too had been trapped and brought here, and at first, he was very lonely and struggled.
Now he had learned ways to survive and was somewhat okay, but remembering how it was when he first came here, he could understand her feelings.
“If I had found you a little earlier, you wouldn’t have ended up like this.”
“You weren’t late.”
He said this thinking it would have eased his loneliness and she would have been less hurt, but she quickly contradicted him.
“If it weren’t for you, I might have died from that monster.”
“….”
Blake couldn’t bring himself to deny it.
When he found her, the monster was just playing with her like a toy, but its parents would have appeared soon, and she would have met a miserable death.
“What’s your name?”
“….”
“You don’t have a name?”
“I can’t say it. If I say it… everyone will be punished because of me.”
“What?”
“….”
Saying her name would lead to punishment?
Blake couldn’t understand. But as the girl covered her mouth with both hands and shook her head vigorously, he couldn’t ask further.
Just like he couldn’t tell that he came here because of the Empress’s scheme, that child must have her own circumstances.
“I’m Blake.”
“Blake… That’s a cool name.”
“Is it?”
“Yes. It’s cool.”
“…Ahem. The fire’s lit. Wait a bit. I’ll grill some fish for you.”
The compliment heard for the first time, felt unfamiliar and ticklish.
Blake felt awkwardly embarrassed and tried to change the subject, pretending not to notice.
But that child didn’t know when to stop praising.
“You’re really kind.”
“What?”
“It’s the first time. Someone other than my brother being nice to me.”
Blake frowned.
Being called kind or gentle weren’t words he particularly wanted to hear.
The Empress had always sweet-talked him with “You’re such a good boy” to coax him into doing all sorts of unpleasant tasks, and the gentle people he knew always ended up backstabbing him.
“I’m not gentle.”
So Blake said flatly.
“Gentleness is something you’re born with. I’m not.”
“No, you are. You are gentle.”
But the child insisted without backing down.
He didn’t like it.
But what was strange was that he didn’t feel like arguing against it anymore.
