The magic pool was a stone pool, the blue ore was magic stone, and the dungeon's energy was magic power. Like the trivia that "moles = gnomes," with Victor, Tasha learned many common names for things here.
"What else?" Tasha asked.
"What else what?" Victor said, confused—or feigning confusion.
"Other ways besides killing her," Tasha said. "I want her alive."
"Ah, you think she's cute again?" Victor sneered. "I wish I could introduce you to the succubus clan—they'd steal your soul at first sight, and you'd gladly give it. Fine, eat that old treant. Since they're together, they probably speak the same language."
"That won't work either."
"What?! You find this thing 'cute' too?!" Victor exclaimed.
"None of your business," Tasha replied politely. "Get on with it."
"Make a contract," Victor said. He sounded exceptionally reluctant, blurting out those words and falling silent.
Indeed, just as signing a contract with the Dungeon Book granted demonic language skills, signing with this beast girl would surely make communication effortless. But how to get her to sign? Tasha could conjure a straightforward, trap-free contract. She could offer the best terms. Yet language was a barrier—and writing even more so.
How could she sell the idea when they couldn't even talk?
The beast-eared girl glared at Tasha floating in the air, guarding the unconscious old man. Her fur stood on end with tension. Tasha wanted to show goodwill, but she couldn't speak (the undead's language sounded like an eerie wind to the living) and lacked a face—she couldn't even smile. She asked Victor if they could heal the girl or the old man. Victor said no, leaving Tasha at a loss.
The beast-eared girl had already hoisted the old man onto her back, ready to flee.
What if she produced the contract? Might she understand it? Desperate, Tasha materialized a contract in midair. One perk of signing with Victor, besides mastering demonic speech, was this ability to conjure contracts and pens at will. With a single thought, a thread of magic drew from her body, forming a shimmering pen and paper in the air.
Unlike the Dungeon Book, whose very appearance screamed abyssal malevolence ("It's a necessary aura!" Victor insisted), Tasha's contract looked far more innocuous. She'd always believed only fools wore their evil on their sleeves. The translucent parchment shimmered with holy silver dust, its golden script curling in elegant flourishes. The quill pen was as ornate as a work of art. Had it not appeared in the wilderness, produced by a faceless specter, one might have mistaken it for the work of elves or angels.
Tasha handed the contract to the beast-eared girl with a one-in-a-million hope that her hand would tremble and sign it.
Suspicious? No big deal—maybe she'd just hit her head?
The beast-eared girl's reaction was to turn and run, faster than a rabbit.
Tasha sighed, realizing she couldn't count on long-shot miracles. The magic required to solidify the contract wasn't insignificant; letting it dissipate felt wasteful. She simply wrapped part of her spectral body around the paper and pen, letting them float beside her. After doing this, ignoring the Dungeon Book's mocking voice in her ear, Tasha flew after the girl.
She ran incredibly fast. Considering her battered state and the burden of carrying an old man who clearly weighed a ton, Tasha was deeply impressed by the resilience of otherworldly races. If the beast-eared girl kept sprinting, Tasha would have no choice but to give up to avoid scattering her own body. But just before she lost sight of her, the girl slowed.
Tasha watched from afar as the pair of dog ears perked up. The girl suddenly dashed toward some bushes, setting the old man down among the foliage. Swiftly, she began digging into the surrounding soil and leaves, burying him beneath them. Her movements were so swift and her concealment so thorough that Tasha began to wonder if the old man had been buried alive beneath the earth—Victor had said it was a tree spirit, so perhaps being buried alive wouldn't matter?
Tasha glanced at the mound concealing the old man before resuming her pursuit of the beast-eared girl. The girl ran even faster than before, utterly focused, seemingly unaware of the ghost trailing behind her. Soon, even Tasha could hear the clamor ahead.
A battlefield lay ahead.
A small-scale one. On one side stood a group of ragged, stocky, short civilians. On the other, a small squad of well-equipped soldiers. The disparity in both fighting spirit and gear was starkly obvious. If not for the soldiers being vastly outnumbered, this battle would likely have ended long ago.
It was a massacre.
The civilians cried out and scattered in panic, while the soldiers remained largely stationary. They simply lined up, cocked their crossbows, and pulled the triggers. Rows of bolts flew out, mowing down the fleeing figures within their arc, arrows piercing their backs. Rivers of blood flowed into the stream, so much that even the pebbles within it ran red.
To blame these numerous civilians for lacking the courage to resist is like blaming a flock of sheep for not using their horns against jackals.
Then, the shepherd dog charged in.
The beast-eared girl did not roar. She made not a sound. The first soldier to notice her heard only the gurgling of water—from his own throat. Blood spurted half a man's height as the soldier crashed to the ground. Those whose vision was obscured had no time to wipe the blood from their eyes. Thus, the girl charged into the mass of soldiers, a short blade in each hand. Like a cannonball, she tore through the lines hunting down the civilians.
Her furious green eyes glowed in the darkness.
Soldiers drew blades, formed ranks, and cocked crossbows. Bloody blossoms bloomed across the battlefield, finally no longer confined to one side. Daggers sliced throats until the hunters realized they too could be hunted, until terror crawled into the eyes of these killers.
The beast-eared girl was not invulnerable. A dying soldier's final blow could wound her; a marksman's precise shot could pierce her body. She was injured, her wounds mounting with each passing moment, yet she fought on. The gleaming blade never ceased its dance, the wolf-tooth necklace around her neck leaping with each step.
She was a Valkyrie of vengeance, a lioness gone mad. No one understood how this girl, still too small for her frame, could keep fighting with arrows lodged in her shoulders. She hacked off the shafts that hindered her, but the blood-grooved points must have sunk deep into her flesh. Every swing of her dagger surely brought excruciating pain. So what? Her eyes saw only enemies. Their blades glistened with the blood of the fallen, and the arrows still in their quivers would pierce more living flesh. Thus, she fought on.
Tasha had expected this sight to disgust her. Before her transmigration, she had been an ordinary person in a peaceful era, never having witnessed even the slaughter of a chicken. But somehow—was it because transmigrating into a building had stripped her of the corresponding organs and hormones? She was far from callous, yet the slaughter didn't make her vomit.
Her gaze lingered on the beast-eared girl. Anyone present who hadn't fled in terror would surely be staring at this warrior woman.
Tasha felt an uncanny sense of déjà vu. She was certain she'd witnessed this scene somewhere before. How strange—how could she possibly have seen it?
As the girl staggered, plunging her sole remaining dagger—the other having slipped from her grasp as her left shoulder wound worsened—into a soldier's chest, then wobbled and leapt with all her strength, Tasha remembered.
It was on the library ceiling, witnessing the magic that could shine for a thousand years erupt in an instant. The girl seemed to be burning, fighting like a blazing star.
This scene... was incredibly beautiful.
The thought made Tasha hiss inwardly, wondering if she was losing her mind. Yet if she looked again, she would reach the same conclusion. It had nothing to do with a morbid fascination for bloodshed, nor any connection to lust. This battle and what it contained were profoundly captivating, deeply moving.
Finally, the girl collapsed. Only one soldier remained. Terrified out of his wits, he fled frantically into the distance. Someone tripped him. He scrambled to his feet, only to be tripped a second time. Scattered civilians had gathered around without anyone noticing. Unarmed, some began picking up stones.
The last soldier couldn't escape.
The beast-eared girl gasped for breath on the ground, her ears drooping, hair and skirt stained crimson. People started searching for the wounded, some rushing to bandage her injuries. The atmosphere seemed poised to ease, the joy of survival spreading through the crowd. Suddenly, an arrow shot skyward, exploding into a blinding firework against the night.
The soldier who'd fired the signal from the pile of corpses drew his last breath, a cold smile frozen on his lips.
Dead silence fell over the scene. Someone sniffled, then covered their mouth.
"A large force is coming." " Victor declared, relishing the chaos. "Hmm, how many? Not enough to handle this bunch of stragglers anyway."
In truth, no prompting was needed—the approaching force was already near. The distant barking of hounds and the clatter of marching boots echoed through the air, despair spreading across every face.
"The dog still has a breath left. If you're going to do it, do it now. Once it's dead, it's just scrap." Victor urged.
The dungeon was vast, its passages numerous. Directly below them, the goblins had prepared their ambush. Tasha lowered her body, drawing closer to the beast-eared girl. She made her spectral form as transparent as air to avoid unnecessary attention in the crowd, but as she neared, those green eyes snapped open, fixing on her.
"Invisibility doesn't work on the dying," Victor remarked.
Sorry, Tasha silently apologized. She did feel a measure of respect for this brave girl, but since saving her was impossible, Tasha didn't object to exploiting her dying body. The dungeon's current forces were no match for a large army. Sympathy was one thing; reality was another. Tasha was no idealist.
At that moment, the beast-eared girl raised her hand....
Marion was dying.
She shivered violently, perhaps from cold (she'd lost too much blood), perhaps from fear. Marion had once believed she would face death fearlessly, like her father—dying in battle was an honor. But now she found herself terrified, too afraid to close her eyes.
Suddenly, Marion wondered: Had her father truly felt no fear when he died?
She smelled kerosene, smoke, hounds, and the army—the army rushing toward them, torches and slaughter blades in hand. It was a replay of that night when she was seven, when she would witness her family being slaughtered, powerless to stop it. Her mother had covered her eyes that night, but Marion had watched through the gaps between her fingers, from beginning to end, never closing her eyes—she always believed it was the right decision. On that final night she could see her father, her kin, she had seen the very last second.
But Marion was afraid.
She feared the merciless blades, feared the eyes that regarded them as vermin—both complementing each other, bringing relentless death. They said the other kind were born to die, that they should never have been born at all. Why? What did we do wrong? She had asked as a child, but stopped asking later. Humans and their kind were born enemies. The victor kills the vanquished—it was natural, ingrained in their bones, just as Marion's hatred for all humans ran deep. She knew exactly what those people would do to her family once she could no longer shield them.
They would slaughter every being branded alien. Only harmless varieties pleasing to their eyes might survive, traded on the black market as clandestine pets. Never again would they see their homeland, never again the forest. Cold, damp cages would be their final resting place. And Marion would witness it. Before dying, she would see everyone she sought to protect perish, condemned to a fate worse than death. She could only watch.
Marion did not want a glorious death. She wanted to survive—to become a towering wall, a sturdy shield, a blazing inferno consumed by the enemy. Marion could not die. She had to keep everyone alive, no matter the cost.
No matter the cost.
Marion had heard the tales—of spirits, ghosts, demons. The greedy, tricked by contracts into trading their names for wishes, would lose everything in the end, without exception. Before true terror invaded her life, these were the most terrifying stories. As a child, she'd cover her mouth by the campfire, listening to the oldest crone in the clan recount tales of those who lost everything.
"Never let a demon take your name," the elder would always warn sternly at the end. "You wouldn't want to know what happens after that!"
"I'd never do such a thing!" Marion would promise. "Only fools who want something for nothing make deals with demons. I'm a smart, hardworking, and brave girl!"
The faceless specter stared at her.
I have little left to lose, Marion thought. Desperate hope burned within her. Summoning strength from somewhere, she struggled to sit up. Pushing past the startled crowd, she reached into the void and seized the gleaming quill.
"Hide everyone!" Marion shouted, signing her name with a heavy stroke.