LV. 99 The Princess of Dark Flare

hrough the window and watched as he gradually became smaller.

Then, he suddenly realized one thing.

‘… Wait a minute.
Come to think of it, that woman looked just like the Princess of Dark Flare in the ghost story.’

A black dress stained with blood.

A parasol with a black rose pattern.

Shoes with thorns.

Long hair.

Blood-stained skin.

Everything fitted perfectly.

‘No way… It can’t be.’

Gwanghyun shook his head.
At that moment, Siwoo’s warning flashed through his mind.

‘If she wakes up now, I probably won’t be able to stop her either.’

Gwanghyun’s movements stopped abruptly.
His instincts were telling him.

That girl, there’s something about her.

***

Something smelled good.

Eunha slowly opened her eyelids.
She had a headache that felt like someone was poking her forehead with a needle.
This excruciating headache was yet to show any signs of getting better.

“This is…”

She looked around with her forehead throbbing.
Eunha recognized that the smell was the scent of fabric softener on the blanket.

Eunha was still dazed.
As she pulled her body up, she saw a white box in her hazy vision.

‘This.’

Carefully folded inside the box was Eunha’s old military uniform.
Why was this…? During her moment of confusion, a thin shadow fell beside Eunha.

“Oh, are you awake? I will bring the master.”

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It was a young woman cleaning the room.

‘… Room?’

Only then did the surrounding environment clearly enter Eunha’s field of vision.

A fluffy bed,

A wooden table,

White curtains,

And… Sunshine.

When her dazed eyes finally focused, her black pupils widened greatly.

Crash!

Eunha fell out of bed.

“Oh my, are you okay?”

The woman came over and held out her hand.
Without taking her hand, Eunha looked around her with a stunned face.

‘This isn’t a gate.’

Escape… Did she do it?

How the hell?

Eunha’s memories were cut off at the end of the battle against the blue-eyed hunter.

In her confused mind, a voice she had never heard before pierced through.

“Looks like you’re awake.”

“Ah, master.”

“Good job.
Now get out.”

Eunha raised her head.

The blue-eyed hunter.
It was him.

“How is your body?”

Judging from his tone and expression, it seemed as if he was genuinely concerned about her physical condition, even though that wasn’t possible.

Whoosh!

She didn’t answer him and leapt quickly and stood on the edge of the bed instead.
Black flames flared from her shoulders, as if to prove her hostility.

“…”

It was strange.
The man made a troubled face, and instead of taking his battle stance, he raised his hands in a surrendering gesture.

“I’m sorry if I startled you.”

Polite words.
Eunha’s eyes narrowed.
Eunha did not loosen her hardened face in front of the man whose attitude and tone had changed.
It was difficult to comprehend his attitude, which was very different from during the battle.

“I will tell someone to prepare gruel.
Can you eat it?”

A subtle silence passed between the two of them.
Eunha still hadn’t stopped her flames, and looked at him sharply.
The hostility in her eyes still hadn’t disappeared.

Siwoo opened his mouth and spoke in the calmest tone possible without hastily narrowing the distance with Eunha.

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“Please don’t be so wary.
If I wanted to do something, I would have done it already.”

Eunha checked every inch of her body.
There were no signs of injuries or restraint except for the lack of strength in the body and severe headaches.
Rather, traces of treatment were seen everywhere.

“… Why did you attack like you were about to kill me? What’s your plan?”

“Wasn’t it a situation where anyone could misunderstand?”

There weren’t just a few humanoid monsters that appeared in gates.
They were rare to say the least, but they had still appeared before.
Furthermore.

“Normal humans don’t smell that strongly of blood.”

“So you still think I’m a monster.”

“Didn’t I tell you? If I had thought of it that way, I would have already killed you while you were sleeping.”

Exhausted, Eunha slept soundly for almost two days.
During that time, twisting her neck would’ve been easier than breaking a child’s finger.

But, Siwoo didn’t.

Eunha glanced at him.
From Eunha’s point of view, there were many things she wanted to ask him.
How he got into the gate, how he was able to get himself out of there, and… 

‘You called me the Princess of Dark Flare.’

How did he know about the title that even Eunha didn’t know?

“…”

The black flame that was burning by her side slowly faded away.
Of course, it wasn’t completely extinguished.

Eunha, who sharpened her eyes, raised her gaze.
Siwoo was sitting a little further away in an upright position.
He had a respectful attitude as if he was speaking to his superiors.

“Thank you.”

In front of Eunha, who seemed to have a bit of heart to talk, he showed a smile of relief.
Eunha’s eyebrows twitched.
What the hell is up with this guy?

Meanwhile, Siwoo thought.

Judging from the circumstances so far, there was a high probability that she was human.
The evidence was as follows.

1.
The gate exit was open even though she was not dead.
What this meant was that she wasn’t the gate’s boss.

2.
Siwoo checked the surroundings without leaving the gate immediately after Eunha had lost consciousness.
As a result, he found a hut nearby that looked like it was made by human hands.

A pile of monster corpses was charred, as if it had been used as a campfire, and there were old military uniforms, wrapping paper presumed to be emergency food shells, and books with dust on them.

‘I don’t know why the TOEIC problem book was there.’

tl/n: TOEIC is the Test of English for International Communication

3.
Monsters are supposed to attack defenseless humans.
This was unconditional.
However, as soon as she opened her eyes, she did not attack the caretaker she had met.

And lastly, 4.

“I’ll give this back.
I borrowed it for a while.”

Siwoo held out a golden dog tag to Eunha.
The investigation was already over, so it was no longer needed.

Eunha received it with a wary gesture and naturally hung it back around her neck.
Siwoo, who was sitting opposite to her, stared with a strange gaze, then slowly opened his mouth.

“First of all, welcome to the world 30 years later, sunbae.”

As soon as Siwoo finished speaking, Eunha, who was now wearing her dog tag, stiffened like a rock.

… What?