Chapter 21
-Whoosh!
The hand reaching for Regina changed direction at the sound of gunfire. With a swift motion, a black shadow grazed Noah’s shoulder and crawled up his arm along the gun barrel. As the attack swirled towards Noah’s face from his shoulder, he tilted his head back and drew another revolver with his opposite hand.
Quickly deflecting the black hand while aiming the gun, the shadow dodged inward, avoiding the barrel. In an instant, it expanded into the air.
“Ugh!”
Then, with a snap, it descended and enveloped Noah’s face. As the thin black membrane wrapped around his face, covering his nose and mouth, Noah staggered, trying to tear it off. Seizing this momentary opportunity, the black membrane increased its volume, entwining Noah’s arms and body.
-Slither.
Like a spider hunting its prey, it instantly cocooned Noah in black.
“What’s this, still a greenhorn? I heard someone was hunting Black Fairies, so I came looking, but I didn’t even need to come.”
A black mass settled in front of Noah, whose breathing was completely muffled, and transformed into a human shape. Seemingly at ease after perfectly capturing Noah, the black color receded from the face area, revealing light brown hair. Creating a human appearance down to the chest, he tilted his head, looking down at Noah.
“Why did they send me? This level could have been handled by a newly born low-rank fairy. Sasha is really overanxious.”
Regina, who had just managed to remove the curtain covering her head after much struggle, saw the half-liquefied black man and quickly pulled the curtain back up, curling into herself. Unable to know what to do with Noah captured, she held her breath. Meanwhile, the black man approached Noah, muttering to himself.
“But well, I’ve got to do the job I was assigned, no matter how troublesome.”
He raised his hand towards the motionless Noah. His hand turned black and transformed into a giant scythe-like shape, then swung diagonally. Regina, watching through the gap in the curtain covering her face, tightly closed her eyes, covering her mouth with both hands.
-Whoosh!
It was at that moment that Noah, who she thought would be sliced in half, vanished before her eyes.
“…Huh?”
The man who had slashed at empty air turned his head in confusion, only for his vision to tilt in that very pose. With an “Oh?” his face planted into the floor upside down. With a thud, his upper body, severed, fell to the ground. Surprised by this sudden turn of events, he tried to move his shadow to restore his body, but for some reason, everything below his shoulders was as heavy as stone and wouldn’t budge.
“Why, why won’t this move!”
-Thud!
“…!”
As the panicked man wriggled his remaining shadow, trying to regenerate his body, suddenly a shoe came down hard on his face. The man urgently looked up with his half-visible gaze to see Noah wiping his mouth with a bleeding hand, looking down at him with a smirk. Sharp canines glinted between his blood-stained lips.
“Sorry for being a greenhorn?”
“W-wait!”
-Click, bang, bang!
The man’s face contorted as he hurriedly opened his mouth towards Noah, but before he could finish speaking, the trigger was pulled. With a thud, black powder scattered in all directions. The unregenerated powder trembled and quivered for a while before pouring onto the floor.
A stream of blood trickled down Noah’s hand. When the black shadow had enveloped him, he had inflicted a wound on his own arm, feeding the shadow plenty of blood. Just before Noah would have suffocated, the shadow that had absorbed the poison hardened. By a very narrow margin, Noah had been released first, allowing him to kill the unsuspecting Black Fairy.
“Phew, damn. I was the one who let my guard down.”
He hadn’t expected the Black Fairy to launch a surprise attack first. Having always found and dispatched those hiding among humans, this situation was a first for him. But perhaps it meant that Noah had become that much of a threat to them.
-Thud, crack!
The rest of the black man’s body, which had been cut in half, also hardened and lost balance, falling to the floor. However, it fell in the direction where Regina was curled up. Startled by the black mass falling towards her head, Regina stretched out both hands to catch it.
“Eek! Uwah!”
But as soon as her hands touched it, the black mass instantly crumbled and began to be absorbed into Regina. Startled by the sensation, she screamed, causing Noah, who was extracting a bead from the Black Fairy’s body, to flinch and turn his head. At that moment, even the black corpse at Noah’s feet turned to powder and was sucked into Regina.
“…!”
Noah stepped back from the corpse, removing his foot.
-Sssshh!
Just like when she had absorbed the Black Fairy’s corpse for the first time, it seeped into Regina’s body, giving a refreshing sensation as if cold water was rushing through her veins. The energy first circled her heart once, then spread throughout her entire body.
As if her fearful trembling at the sight of the black man moments ago had been a lie, Regina exhaled lightly at the rising sense of fulfillment. Her purple eyes sparkled with a very faint light. Noah narrowed his eyes, glaring at Regina who had perfectly absorbed the black powder, and handed her the bead he was holding.
“Can you absorb this too, perhaps?”
“Huh? What is this?”
“It’s the condensed life force of the target consumed by the Black Fairy.”
Regina, who had reflexively reached out to receive what he was handing over, looked down at the bead upon hearing Noah’s explanation. It seemed like she had just heard something creepy.
“Uh, so this is…”
“It’s what’s created when a Black Fairy devours a human.”
“Ewww!”
At his direct explanation, Regina was startled as if she had touched a bug. She threw the bead into the air with her palm open, and with a clunk, the fallen bead rolled back to Noah’s feet.
“Looks like this can’t be absorbed by touch.”
He bent down to pick up the rolled bead. It meant that Regina only absorbed Black Fairies, excluding the beads he needed.
‘This might be unexpectedly useful…’
“Why did a Black Fairy suddenly attack? What’s going on?”
As Noah was looking down at Regina, assessing her usefulness, she stood up and asked. He picked up his coat from the sofa, which was in disarray with scattered glass shards, and dusted it off as he answered.
“Looks like we’ve been tailed.”
“Tailed?”
“It seems that high-ranking Black Fairy you met wants me dead. I didn’t expect them to attack directly by sending a subordinate like this.”
“By high-ranking fairy, do you mean that man in the black hat?!”
“Yes, that man.”
-Rattle.
He finished dusting off the glass shards that had spilled onto the luggage and opened the compartment door. Then he called over a passing staff member.
“Hey, suddenly a broken tree branch flew in from outside and shattered the window. Can we change rooms?”
“Pardon? A tree branch? No, the window shattered?! Are you alright?”
The young staff member, not immediately understanding Noah’s words, stuttered before noticing the messy compartment through the open door and was shocked. As the staff member hurried off to call a manager, Noah gestured to Regina.
“For now, there are a lot of glass shards in there, so come out into the corridor.”
“Come to think of it, there was such a loud gunshot, why didn’t anyone come running?”
Regina, following his words into the corridor, belatedly realized that despite the commotion, no one had come to their compartment. Noah pointed to a faint cluster of light floating in the compartment and answered.
“It’s the power of the Light Fairy. They block out surrounding disturbances and sometimes sprinkle fairy dust to put humans to sleep. Light Fairies are reluctant to let humans know too much about the existence of Black Fairies.”
Regina hadn’t even noticed their presence before Noah mentioned it. Come to think of it, they had put everyone to sleep at Margaret’s mansion too. As she looked closely at the light clusters, as if noticing that Regina could see them, they shimmered and moved before returning to Noah. More precisely, they seeped into the pocket watch Noah was carrying. It was the same watch that had pricked Regina’s finger to absorb her blood.
“How are you able to use the Light Fairy’s power, Noah?”
Seeing the light clusters disappear, Noah put the watch he was holding back into his pocket.
“This pocket watch was given to me by the Light Fairy. It contains their power. They are very cooperative in my killing of Black Fairies. They’re probably using me since they can’t eliminate them directly.”
“…”
Ezra the Light Fairy, and Sasha the Black Fairy. These were the names of the fairies Regina had learned about so far.
However, Noah’s words that both were entities not to be approached made Regina feel at a loss.
‘I thought I had finally found someone who could tell me more about the fairies…’
But she couldn’t simply believe Noah’s words either. His ultimate goal was to eliminate Regina. She looked up at Noah’s profile as he watched the direction the staff member had run off to.
‘How much can I trust this person?’
Before Regina could delve deeper into her thoughts, the staff member who had rushed down the corridor returned with a manager. The manager, constantly wiping away sweat with a handkerchief, bowed repeatedly while apologizing. Then, he guided the two to a new compartment.
Noah declined the manager’s offer to refund their ticket price as an apology, saying it was fine. If anything, he felt guilty about receiving a refund when they should be paying for the damage to the compartment.
“Won’t another Black Fairy come looking for us?”
The newly assigned compartment was much larger and more luxurious. Pleased with the large bed, Noah threw his luggage onto the sofa and immediately lay down. Regina sat on the bed on the opposite side of the wall and asked worriedly. Noah yawned as he answered.
“It’ll be quiet for at least a few days. Above all, Black Fairies aren’t that numerous, so they can’t send them frequently.”
“They’re not numerous?”
“Yeah. The number of Black Fairies I’ve encountered recently is unusually high; they’re not usually entities you can see this easily. I’m going to sleep now, so stop with the questions and get some rest too.”
With those final words, Noah turned towards the wall, pulling up the blanket. Taking this as a silent expression that he wouldn’t continue the conversation, Regina had no choice but to stop her questioning.
As the conversation ceased, silence fell instantly, with only Noah’s breathing audible. Regina was at least pleased that the larger compartment meant they were further from the window. She carefully lay down on the bed and closed her eyes. Two days felt both short and long.
