Chapter 305| I Am A Coward! I’ve Always Been A Coward! But... I Made A Promise..
Eva’s body was violently hurled against the black stone wall of Magniora. Her back collided brutally with the freezing surface, forcing a heavy, wet cough from her throat. Cough! A spray of fresh crimson splattered from the corner of her split lip.
The dark red Scarlet Aura enveloping her arms was flickering on the verge of death—fluttering weakly like a candle caught in a tempest. Purple bruises mapped almost every inch of her exposed skin. Her body was battered, yet the girl refused to yield. Her eyes burned with a fierce, defiant glare, challenging death itself.
Beside her, Adul stood with knees trembling uncontrollably.
His face was smeared with ash and grime. His eyes were red and swollen, wet with tears that carved tracks through the dust on his cheeks.
Yet... his cold, sweat-slicked palm still gripped a jagged piece of rubble tightly.
Atop the stone steps of Magniora, Selene towered over them like a punishing deity.
Her deep-sea blue robes fluttered with elegant ease in the wind. There was not a speck of dust on her attire. Not a single scratch. Not a drop of sweat from physical exhaustion.
There was only an absolute, crushing tranquility, slowly freezing into something far more lethal.
"The two of you... genuinely still refuse to give up?" Selene’s voice drifted down flatly, entirely devoid of emotion.
Eva smirked. Her white teeth were heavily stained with her own blood. "Heh... you will never... hear that word come out of my mouth."
With a suppressed growl, Eva forced her legs to find purchase on the ground. Her knees wobbled violently, but the residual Scarlet Aura on her arms flared dimly, forcing her body to move. It was just enough to propel her forward, closing the distance.
BAM! BAM! BAM!
Three desperate, Aura-coated punches slammed hard against Selene’s protective wall of water. Ripple after ripple spread wildly across the high-pressure barrier, but not a single crack appeared, let alone a breach. Selene didn’t even bother raising her other hand to parry.
"Futile," Selene murmured, cold as ice.
The woman merely gave a sharp flick of her wrist. Fwoosh! The water wall instantly reshaped into a dense shockwave, striking Eva squarely in the chest.
BAM! The girl was launched backward—far harder this time. Her body hit the rough gravel, rolling helplessly until she came to a rigid halt right by Adul’s boots.
"EVA!" Adul shrieked, his voice cracking from sheer panic.
He bolted forward. His stride was completely uncoordinated, nearly tripping over his own feet in his haste. He threw the stone in his hand with all his might.
Thud. The throw was comically wide. Selene didn’t even need to blink to avoid it.
Adul dropped to his knees beside Eva’s unmoving form. The scrapes on his knees tore open further, bleeding into the dirt, but the physical pain was entirely numb under his panic. His trembling hands gripped Eva’s shoulders.
"Eva... Eva, wake up... please don’t die..." Adul sobbed, his tears dripping onto her forehead.
Eva forced her eyelids open. Her breathing was shallow and rapid. Her once-rosy lips had turned a sickly, pale blue.
"Adul... you... just run... get out of here..." Eva whispered hoarsely.
"I’m not running anywhere!"
Adul’s sobbing intensified. Eva could only manage the faintest, weakest smile at the crying face above her.
"You... stubborn idiot..." she whispered, before her consciousness slipped into darkness.
Tap. Tap.
Selene began her descent. One step. Two steps. The rhythmic click of her steel boots on the marble courtyard sounded like a death clock ticking down.
"Playtime is over."
Instantly, the atmospheric pressure around them plummeted. The temperature froze within seconds. Adul’s frantic breaths materialized into thick puffs of white vapor in the air.
The water vortex that had been dancing in Selene’s palm abruptly stopped. It froze. Not into ordinary ice, but into pale blue crystals radiating an absolute, biting cold. The asphalt beneath Selene’s boots began to glaze over with a thin layer of frost, spreading rapidly like frozen veins.
"I have been far too generous with my time."
Selene raised her hand straight ahead. Creak... Creak... The frozen cluster in her palm spun, splintering into dozens of floating ice shards as sharp as daggers.
Adul stood up.
His knees shook like an earthquake. His entire body shivered uncontrollably. Snot and tears smeared his filthy face. Yet, he refused to budge. He blocked Eva’s body, spreading his arms wide like the most fragile living shield in the world.
"I-I... I won’t run...!"
Selene tilted her head slightly, as if observing a bizarre anomaly. "You... a sniveling coward... dare to stand against me?"
"I am a coward! I’ve always been a coward!" Adul screamed, closing his eyes tightly. "But... but..."
His voice hitched in his throat. The world around him suddenly slowed to a crawl. The biting chill radiating from Selene’s ice shards seemed to evaporate.
"But... I made a promise..."
The sound of Selene’s footsteps faded. The terrifying, dark courtyard of Magniora slowly dissolved and vanished. The bleak colors surrounding Adul melted into absolute darkness.
And then... the memory replayed.
Crunch. Chew.
Adul bit into a piece of stale, hard bread he had been saving for two days. It tasted bland and scratched his throat as he swallowed. The flour was coarse, filled with cheap husks of wheat that hadn’t been properly sifted. Yet, he devoured it ravenously, as if it were the finest delicacy in the world.
Across the rickety, dust-laden wooden table, his mother sat watching him. She wore a motherly smile, though she looked profoundly exhausted.
His mother’s face hadn’t changed much since his father died in a mining accident—except her hair was now streaked with white, her skin had grown palely translucent, and her cough sounded wetter and deeper every night. Cough... cough...
"Eat up, my child," his mother said, her voice raspy yet incredibly gentle.
Adul stopped chewing. He glanced at his mother’s tin plate. It was empty, save for a tiny fragment of bread no larger than a thumb.
"Mother... you need to eat more. You’re sick..."
"It’s fine, sweetheart. I’m already full."
Adul knew his mother was lying. But he could do nothing but swallow the bitterness. Their silver coins would never be enough to buy soft, pure wheat bread, let alone medicine from the city’s apothecary. The wages from his sweat in the mines were designed solely to keep them from starving to death by tomorrow morning—not to live decently.
"I promise I’ll work harder today, Mother," Adul murmured, looking down. "I’ll secure some extra coins."
His mother smiled, stroking her son’s dirty hair. "Don’t push your body too hard, my boy. For me... just seeing you come home safe is more than enough."
Adul didn’t dare meet his mother’s eyes. He clenched his fists beneath the table. Because he was acutely aware—in a world this cruel, he was too weak, too clumsy, and far too cowardly to ever guarantee safety.
Iron Mine 17. That was the name of the living hell where Adul poured his sweat. It was located on the jagged border of Ironhold and Northreach.
Adul worked deep in the dark, two hundred meters beneath the earth’s crust. The air was suffocatingly stagnant, choking his lungs with thick coal dust and the acrid stench of rusted scrap iron.
Every day, his task was to haul heavy woven baskets filled with raw ore from the bottom of the shafts up to the surface assembly point. Dozens of trips back and forth, without pause. His small back was already starting to curve at a young age.
CRACK!
The sharp snap of a leather whip lashed against the stone walls.
"Move those legs, you lazy brat!"
The roar of the foreman—a bloated man who reeked of sour sweat and always carried a whip—echoed viciously through the shaft. Adul never once talked back or complained. He merely kept his head lowered, tightened his grip on the basket straps, and quickened his trembling pace.
He did not have the luxury of rebelling. If he got kicked out of the mines, his mother would have nothing to eat tonight.
Midnight came. While the other miners snored heavily from exhaustion in the musty barracks, Adul chose to sit alone, huddled in a dark corner.
With hands shivering from the cold, he pulled a tattered piece of cloth from his pocket. It was his mother’s old handkerchief. He brought it to his nose. The faint, herbal scent of the cheap tea his mother brewed still lingered.
Adul stared at the handkerchief intently, his eyes welling with tears, before tucking it safely back into his pocket.
I have to be strong... I have to be strong, he chanted in his mind like a mantra. It’s all for Mother.
That day, everything began exactly like any other.
Adul had been crawling through the depths of the mine since the first rooster crowed at dawn. The underground air was bone-chilling, yet sweat already drenched his face and back. He had just set down his fifth basket of iron ore when a terrifying sound shattered the mine’s silence.
THWUMP! THWUMP!
Chaos erupted without mercy. Miners screamed hysterically, scattering like ants whose nest had been set ablaze. Some shrieked from gunshot wounds. Others curled up in terror behind rusted mine carts.
Adul froze in his tracks, his heart stopping for a fraction of a second.
"W-What’s happening...?!"
THWUMP! THWUMP! THWUMP! A volley of gunfire echoed again, followed by a commanding baritone voice that rang out with cold, absolute authority.
"Secure the perimeter!"
Adul didn’t know who the voice belonged to. But the sheer decisiveness of the tone froze what little courage he had left.
Reflexively, he dropped his iron basket and ran. He didn’t head for the main exit—that path was clearly a slaughterhouse. He ran deeper into a dead-end tunnel, squeezing into the tightest, darkest crevice behind a massive mound of coal. He curled into a ball, hugging his knees.
"Please... please... save me..."
Only those choked whimpers spun madly in his head.
If I get shot and die in this hole... who will buy food for Mother...?
Tears of absolute terror streamed down, cutting paths through the black dust on his face. His entire body shook violently. His jaw clicked as he tried to stifle his sobs. He couldn’t stop picturing his mother, sitting alone in their cold shack, staring at the door, waiting for a son who was now a corpse beneath the earth.
"I can’t die... I have to go home... I can’t—"
"Hey, kid."
Adul gasped violently, his breath catching.
A man stood towering right in front of him, blocking the flickering light of the tunnel torches.
His posture was tall and imposing, draped in a long black coat that radiated a heavy, intimidating presence. The man’s face was sharp and cold, his eyes staring down... as sharp and piercing as an eagle locking onto its prey.
Adul wanted to scream for mercy. But his vocal cords were completely paralyzed. He could only stare up rigidly, looking at the terrifying man with wide, horrified eyes, while tears and snot ran shamelessly down his face.
"Do you work in this mine?" the man asked.
Adul couldn’t answer. His mouth opened and closed comically, producing nothing but panicked, ragged gasps.
"Calm down. I have no intention of killing you."
The man in the black coat slowly lowered himself, crouching until his eyes were level with Adul’s. His cold gaze stared straight through Adul’s wet, bloodshot eyes.
"Tell me... why didn’t you run?"
"I-I... I..." Adul stammered heavily, his teeth chattering. "I... can’t die... Sir... if I die... Mother... M-Mother..."
Adul broke down in tears again. He sobbed uncontrollably, unable to finish his sentence. In his mind, he was prepared to be executed at any moment.
The man fell silent listening to the boy’s cries. His gaze didn’t waver from Adul’s soot-covered face—yet, slowly, something shifted beneath the icy exterior of his eyes.
"Your mother?"
Adul nodded frantically, wiping his nose with his dirty sleeve. "Y-Yes... I-I’m... all she has... if I die here... Mother won’t be able to eat tomorrow... She’s very sick... Sir... please..."
The mysterious man didn’t respond to his weeping. He simply remained silent, studying Adul’s face for a long time. It was as if he were weighing a peculiar investment in his mind.
Then, slowly, he stood up.
"What’s your name, kid?"
"A... Adul, Sir..."
"Adul." The man repeated the name in a low murmur, testing its weight. Then he looked down at the boy. "Would you like a much better job? The pay is significantly higher."