Don’t Concern Yourself With That Book

There was no point talking to Hernan. Amor had said that while thinking so. But as if responding to Amor, Hernan lowered his gaze. But even this action must have been an imitation of Castor’s.

“If you still insist on turning against me at the end of the day…”

Hernan gripped the sword that had stabbed Amor tightly. And at the same time, Amor shook his hands to quickly summon blossoming flowers and plants. Soon, a very thin slender stalk grew towards Hernan’s legs before wrapping around his ankle.

“Keuk.”

Sensibly, Hernan quickly chopped the stalk off. But Amor’s goal had never been to tie him down.

“There’s no use.”

Amor wiped his lips before swinging his other arm widely into the air. The uncountable number of thin stalks that had wrapped around his ankle pulled at his ankle like a pulley, throwing Hernan across the space.

Boom.

The centre of the hall had been hollowed out. Dust scattered as a dust cloud bloomed from his fall. It was hard to believe that such an immense amount of force came from those small plants.

‘I need to stop him from moving for a moment.’

Amor quickly scanned the hall. The spot Hernan had been strewn to was the middle of a large circle that had been drawn on the circular hall beforehand, in other words, their target destination. He needed to trap him there for a while. He just needed to trap him there for the shortest of moments. When Soricks made eye contact with Amor, he quickly shouted.

“Meta, your artefact!”

“Got it.”

Clenching his teeth, Meta readied his daggers. As soon as he threw his dagger that had been attached to a thin thread at the beast, the blade moved like it was alive before piercing through Hernan’s hand. Meta pulled at the thread that had wrapped around his hand tightly. However, soon after, Meta was forced to groan at the strength of the beast’s resistance.

“I can’t hold him for long, my prince.”

Amor currently still had the blade he had been stabbed with inside him. Blood continued to flow profusely from his wound. If he were to take the sword out, he would only start to bleed more.

‘Forget the pain for a moment.’

He whispered to himself. The blood that was soaking his clothes would soon stop. Clenching his teeth. Amor forgot about the pain. Not a moment too soon, Hernan, who had been forced to the ground, could be seen resisting and thrashing about. Amor struck the ground with his knuckles.

“Get ready.”

Hernan’s claws which were thrusting wildly in the air were blocked by a tree. Unlike ordinary trees, the one Amor just summoned was huge and had a stark difference in its thickness. With his claws stuck in the thick trunk, Hernan paused.

“Dane Lowell!”

A huge tree had grown around Hernan, effectively trapping his movements. The tree was so huge it was hard to see where it stopped even if one were to look up. As soon as the prison which had to block Hernan’s front and back was complete, Amor called for Dane.

“Now!”

With his sensitive ears, the beast heard something sliced with a blade. The beast tried to quickly free his body but there was no way for him to escape with the stalks and the tree surrounding him. With a thin yet gradually tightening sensation, the beast narrowed his eyes. He had been caught in a net.

“Growl!”

The beast tried to quickly swing his arm around. He had claws at the end of his fingers as a curse from the God of Ancient Beasts. However, surprisingly, despite his sharp claws and his strength, the net remained intact.

“Give it up.”

Without him noticing, Amor, whom he had stabbed earlier, had appeared again before him. The moment he spotted him, Hernan instinctively tried to reach him. But he then felt the touch of a hand that rarely reached out.

“This is the net of Arachne, the God of Textiles and Spiders.”

For the first time, the beast’s normally expressionless face contorted. Because of the fact that he could not get rid of the net that was currently trapping his body regardless how he swung his arm around.

“The harder you try to break free, the tighter it will get.”

Amor watched as Hernan struggled. This was not yet the time for him to let his guard down. However, as he gritted his teeth and wondered if the beast’s frenzied movements would ever subside, the beast finally calmed down, allowing Amor to let out a small breath.

“Did we succeed?”

The net of Arachne, the God of Textiles and Spiders, was an artefact that would never let go of its captee once they were caught in it. The ones who could create the net were thought to be almost extinct and hence became very rare to find but who would have thought one could be found in Ashley’s palace. Amor contemplated in admiration for a short moment before staring into the still eyes of the beast.

‘Both you and I. Neither of us would have expected that this would be how it ends.’

Amor closed his eyes. He could taste something fishy in his mouth. He was once an unparalleled knight. A man who stood above everyone else. He and Amor had been comrades who knew the situation they each were in very well even though they never ended up being friends. But he then lost his sword and recklessly used his powers of a wild beast. His arm, that was not human, was proof that he was being eaten by his instincts. No matter what happened, Hernan Durzel would have never let others see him with that appearance.

‘Can’t we turn you back? Why is your end so…’

It was then someone softly landed and appeared by Amor’s side. It was Dane. He glanced at Hernan who was struggling next to Amor.

“You’ve left the flesh to get this bone.” (1)

Dane shifted his gaze from Hernan before looking towards Amor. To be exact, what Dane was staring at was the sword stuck inside Amor.

“Even if you’re a templar, the wound looks too deep.”

“I know.”

He wanted to take it out and he would have loved to if he could. But it was because Amor’s consciousness was already fading. He was barely standing now because of the pain.

“Is it all over?”

“Probably.”

This was the end of the operation Ashley suggested and Dane carried out. The capture of the Templar of Beasts and their hunt had ended brilliantly. All that remained was to move him to safety after they had captured him. Just when everyone, including Amor, thought this was the end. Amor noticed a strange smell before quickly retreating from his original spot.

Boom.

The place he had been standing in revealed a hole. Dane frowned.

‘Impossible, he can still move?’

Dane bent his back backwards. Without shifting his feet, Dane kicked Hernan’s claws away with a twist of his leg before landing again by flipping into a somersault.

‘Was Soricks wrong?’

Soricks claimed that he would be trapped in the net the moment he was caught in it but he was wrong. However, as time passed, the net, which was also an artefact, could be seen increasingly tightening around its target. If they waited a little longer, the beast would no longer be able to move.

‘We need to buy time.’

It would take time for the net to be effective. Would they be able to buy that time with the people they have left? But he didn’t have much time to think. In the blink of an eye, Hernan, who had his legs wrapped in the net, appeared in front of Dane.

Punch.

A crushing pain pierced through his back. Dane had tried to minimise the damage he received but it was not enough.

Cough.

Dane let out a soft groan. But Dane already came up with a quick solution to their current situation in his head.

‘So this was what they meant by letting instincts take rein?’

It looked like the Templar of Beasts had changed his mind.

‘This is dangerous.’

To survive, it was clear to him that they should all escape first. The beast was now showing a starkly different behaviour from before.

‘Did he decide to remove the obstacles first?’

He did not have any intention of killing Amor. But what about the others? If the Templar of Beasts had changed his target, the ones who were in the most danger would be Dane and the other two templars. Just when Dane wiped the blood flowing down from his forehead and staggered to stand.

“Dodge, my prince!”

Even before Soricks yelled out, Dane had already swivelled his body around as hard as he could. Because of that, he fell back to where he had been but he managed to avoid the claws that thrusted into the spot he once was.

Clang.

It was Ray who had blocked the blow on Dane’s behalf.

“Hurry and tend to your head, my prince!”

“I know.”

Impossible. He didn’t think Hernan would still be able to move with his body trapped in a net. But their operation had not failed yet. They simply had not expected this magnitude of pure strength which he had only heard of through legends that had been passed down. Soricks who had boasted that the net would be enough must be kicking himself countlessly now.

“There’s no other choice but to stall for time.”

In other words, they had no choice but to buy time for Arachne’s net to restrict his movements as it tightened around him as time passed. Dane analysed the situation coolly.

‘We might die before that happens.’

Amor was seriously injured, Soricks seemed to have sustained a wound from before and Meta had exhausted all his strength. Dane himself had also gotten hurt. Only Dane could still fight. But it would be impossible for him to fight properly while still protecting everyone else.

“Cough, how much time do we have to buy?”

Amor spat out a cough before speaking. The Templar of Beasts suddenly raised his head and pivoted before rushing towards Amor. With one hand, he grabbed the sword he had discarded on the ground.

Did he change his target again?

With quick-thinking, Dane picked up a dagger. The dagger he sent flying towards Hernan pierced through his arm but Hernan waved his arm around regardless. The beast had only one goal with his sword.

‘There’s no way to win.’

With a grimace, Amor stretched his hand out to the incoming blade. As per his command, dozens of stalks wrapped around Hernan’s arm. The sword stopped right in front of his face as it piece through his thorny vines.

Drip.

Blood fell.

As Amor raised his head, he was met with eyes that were of a different colour than he was used to. At the sight of those glittering eyes, Amor smirked. He forgot about the situation he was in and just laughed.

“You fool.”

Just when the blade neared his Adam’s apple.

“Stop it, Hernan.”

A soft but yet not small voice broke out from behind Amor in the middle of their confrontation. Amor noticed the approaching blade halt.

“Hernan, stop.

When he turned his head, there stood Ashley whose presence he just noticed.

“Stop, please.”

Ashley held a white bird in her hand. And her other small hand held a dagger that did not suit her. With a heart wrenching smile, she pointed the dagger at the bird.

“Back away if you don’t want this bird to die.”

T/N:

(1): I am clearly not very good at explaining idioms but 육참골단/sacrificing meat to retrieve the bones (rough translation) roughly means to sacrifice a little to obtain your goal. So, Dane is saying that Amor has sacrificed a lot to trap Hernan but I couldn’t really find an english idiom that captured the literary nuances lolol so I stuck with this.