Chapter 52

Episode 52

—You want that woman to stay by your side. And by her own will, no less. Quite difficult and grand, isn’t it?

That was the problem. Ilian wanted Lydia to want him. He couldn’t be satisfied with just what they had now. He wanted all of Lydia—every part of her feelings.

All the emotions he didn’t even want to look at, the ones he’d desperately avoided, came pouring out.

Had he really been longing for her this desperately? To this extent? That his desire for her not to disappear from his life was so clear and intense?

Ilian slowly blinked as he silently stared at the stark truth he could no longer ignore. And yet, even so, he…

“Ilian!”

The first thing he heard, as if rising from a deep abyss, was Lydia’s voice. As Ilian looked down at Lydia, who
was grabbing his arm as if to stop him, he slowly realized where he was standing.

Though he had been standing far away just moments before, now he was right in front of the spirit who stood in the pond.

He was on the very edge—just one more step and he would fall in.

Lydia, thinking he hadn’t come to his senses yet, spoke urgently.

“Someone without enough mana to pay the price will have their soul taken. You can’t make a deal with a spirit. Whatever it is…”

“I know.”

But his reality was here. The Lydia who had kept saying she only wanted him in that fleeting illusion the spirit had shown—it felt alien to him.

The Lydia he truly desired wasn’t a submissive one who did as he pleased.

It was the Lydia of this reality, who constantly reminded him he was alive, who made his life vibrant.

The spirit hadn’t truly understood what it meant for his desire to be Lydia herself.

He didn’t want to entertain hypotheticals, but even if Lydia didn’t want him, it was meaningful because she was someone who expressed her feelings directly, exactly as she wanted to say them.

Ironically, it was precisely that kind of Lydia who would always be his one and only, no matter what.

“I know well enough. That I shouldn’t try to get what I want through her.”

This time, Ilian finally drew his sword. With a familiar shring, the feeling from long ago returned to his hand as if it had never left.

He had never imagined he would hold again the sword he received in his days as an aspiring knight, but then again, ever since meeting Lydia, his life had been nothing if not unpredictable.

And he didn’t exactly dislike that feeling.

“Seems like we’re past the point of talking nicely. You need to disappear now.”

—You’re saying you don’t want a contract with me?

“Yeah. Your contractor is already gone from this world, and you won’t be getting a new one. So just leave.”

There was no hesitation in the way he raised his sword.

He already knew from Lydia’s explanation that spirits, being manifestations of nature’s power, didn’t truly die—death for them simply meant returning to their original form.

But Lydia had hesitated, thinking the pain involved wouldn’t be pleasant for the spirit. Out of respect for her wishes, he had held back.

But in his judgment, this was the limit of what could be overlooked.

Just as Ilian brought his sword close to the spirit’s neck to issue a final warning—

“If you won’t disappear on your own…”

The moment the blade touched the spirit’s surface, she let out a chilling scream and fled deep into the pond. The sharp, piercing sound echoed in their ears.

As Lydia winced and covered her ears, Illian frowned but kept his sword raised, glaring ahead.

—That sword… you… It must be forbidden power… Don’t tell me…

“What are you talking about?”

But the spirit said no more. She simply stood over the now-calm water with a quiet expression, looking down.

Her hand had started to turn transparent enough that he could see through it.

She must have used power beyond her limit while causing the earlier chaos. Or maybe she had simply lost the will to remain.

Her expression, now overcome with sorrow—just like when they first met, or perhaps even deeper—turned toward them again.

—It’s not just my contractor who’s gone, huh. There really is… nothing left here, is there?

Only Lydia understood the spirit’s vague question.

Realizing that the spirit had finally accepted she was alone, Lydia nodded.

“No mages, no spirits, no fairies—just faint remnants, nothing more. Nothing is left here. So you should go too.”

As if peering into Lydia’s heart, the spirit stared into her violet eyes for a long moment. Then she spoke in a tone full of longing.

—You must be lonely too. With no one to understand you.

“But I still don’t want to form a contract with you. I don’t have mana.”

—…I only liked him, not you.

Lydia gave up trying to understand the spirit’s rapid mood shift as she pointed coquettishly at Ilian.

Really, magical beings—why were they all like this?

If this was how they endured the ages, there was nothing more to be said.

Meanwhile, the spirit looked up at the clear sky peeking through the forest and closed her eyes again, as if once more lost in her own world.

—It’s a shame I couldn’t say goodbye.

Her hair began to shift to a faint sky-blue hue again, like it was melting into the pond and disappearing.

—If only I could see him… just one last time…

As if becoming one with the water itself, the spirit slowly dissolved.

After a few blinks, she vanished completely, leaving only the still surface of the pond as if nothing had ever been there.

If it had ended there, it would’ve been a perfectly clean conclusion—but as if the reason the spirit had looked to the sky was not without cause, the sky began to gradually darken.

“That looks like…”

“It’s going to rain.”

Ilian finished Lydia’s sentence as he sheathed his sword.

He was already on the move, and Lydia quickly followed him.

“Where are we going?”

“There’s a place nearby where we can take shelter from the rain.”

Lydia almost asked how he knew that, but stopped herself.

Of course—this was his territory, and he had often mentioned wandering through this forest.

It was obvious he would have a sense of the place.

Raindrops had already begun to fall from the sky. A cold drop landed on Lydia’s shoulder, making her shiver.

Fortunately, the shelter Ilian had mentioned appeared quickly before their eyes.

A small, old log cabin stood alone in the clearing they had just entered.

There was a half-collapsed fence around it, and some logs near the entrance suggested someone had once lived there.

“At least it’s not completely ruined.”

“Where are we?”

“The home of the forest keeper. No one lives here now.”

As Lydia looked around in wonder, Ilian approached the house and felt around beneath the windowsill.

He pulled out an old, weathered key that looked just as aged as the cabin itself.

“How did you know it would be there?”

“I told you I used to come here often. I got lost once while wandering, and the forest keeper who lived here was the one who found me. He used to scold me, saying I’d freeze to death outside at night if I didn’t know where the key was. Said it’d be all his fault if the precious young master of Esteban died like that.”

His affectionate, familiar tone revealed the mischief of his younger days.

As Lydia watched him expertly unlock the door and push it open with a final shove, she realized he must have truly visited this place often.

“Later, when his health got too bad to keep working as the forest keeper, I just managed the place myself. There was talk of sending staff regularly instead of needing a resident keeper. Eventually, it was abandoned like this.”

Outside, the rain had begun to pour in earnest.

But Lydia hesitated, feeling like she was intruding on a deeply personal space.

“What’s wrong?”

Ilian asked, glancing back as he dusted off some of the cloths covering the furniture.

“I just… wasn’t sure if I should go in.”

“If not you, then who else could come in here?”

His tone was indifferent, but the hand he offered her held the warmth of welcome. Lydia hesitated, then carefully took his hand and stepped inside.