"Hey, hey… no need to be alerted and run away," Nara said as he raised both hands slowly, showing his empty palms. His voice carried neither fear nor mockery, only a careful calm. He tilted his head slightly toward Luna. "She can catch you, I promise."
Ivor did not respond. His eyes remained fixed on Luna. She was not preparing to attack. Her posture was relaxed. A faint smile rested on her lips.
Then it struck him.
Smell.
She had followed him. Not his footsteps. Not broken branches or disturbed soil. His scent.
The realization landed heavily, and with it came a sudden surge of pressure behind his eyes, sharper than before. His face flinched despite himself as the pain drove inward, pushing against his skull. His grip tightened around the sword, but his hand trembled slightly under the strain.
He clenched his jaw and endured it.
He did not understand it.
The pain had been growing with each fight, each crystal, each moment he followed instinct over restraint. But it had never risen this fast, this violently.
"You look like you're seriously injured," Nara said, watching the tremor in Ivor's hand. He misunderstood the cause, seeing only the visible damage. He reached into his pouch slowly and withdrew two small blue berries. "These are Crest berries. They'll help your injuries."
Ivor's gaze shifted briefly to the berries. He recognized them. They were rare. He had read about them in the manuals.
But he did not lower his sword. Pain continued to pulse behind his eyes.
His thoughts moved past the offer and toward survival.
He measured the distance between them. The trees behind him. The open space to his right. His injured leg. Luna's position. Her stance.
He remembered how easily she had closed the distance before.
He could not outrun her.
That left only one certainty.
If this turned hostile, he would have to fight.
"My name is Nara," the boy said after a moment, lowering his hands but keeping his movements slow. His eyes moved across Ivor's injuries, the bindings around his leg, the dried blood across his arm and shoulder. "What is your name?"
Ivor remained silent for a breath longer. There was no immediate threat in their stance, and fighting now, against both of them while injured, would only worsen his condition.
"Ivor," he said at last.
Nara repeated it once, as if committing it to memory. "Ivor."
A smile spread across his face, open and unguarded.
"I saw what you did to the others," Nara continued. "You fought five of them and walked away. That's not normal strength." He tilted his head slightly. "Why don't you join my team?"
Beside him, Luna lifted a hand and pressed her fingers briefly against her forehead, her ears flattening slightly in quiet exasperation.
Ivor did not respond. His eyes remained on Nara, but his mind focused on something else entirely.
He had seen them. Which meant he had followed. Which meant he knew.
"You know," Nara went on, unfazed by the silence, "we can explore the Scar together. It'll be safer, and more efficient. And outside the Scar too." He gestured lightly toward Luna. "I'm a capable fighter, and Luna is better than most. And if you need any information…" he added, his tone shifting slightly, becoming more deliberate, "…I can help with that."
That made Ivor pause.
Information.
He had entered the Scar with fragments of knowledge. Observations stolen from distance. Every decision he had made so far had been guided by instinct and assumption, not certainty.
If Nara was telling the truth, he knew things Ivor did not.
Ivor's grip on the sword remained firm, and despite Nara's calm tone and open posture, the distance between them did not shrink. The offer, the berries, the words—all of it pressed against a wall of distrust that had been built long before this moment.
"No," Ivor said.
The reply came out steady and without hesitation.
He took a small step back, shifting his weight into a more stable stance. The movement was subtle, but deliberate. His injured leg adjusted carefully beneath him, his sword angled slightly forward, ready.
"What?" Nara blinked, caught off guard. The surprise was genuine. He stared at Ivor as if waiting for him to reconsider. "Why?"
His brows furrowed as he stepped forward slightly, his voice losing some of its earlier ease.
"You're alone. You're injured. You don't even have proper clothes, and that weapon clearly isn't yours," he said, his gaze flicking briefly over Ivor's torn state. "You don't know how the Scar works. You're attacking people without understanding what kind of danger that creates for you."
He paused, studying him more carefully now.
"I can help you," Nara said.
Beside him, Luna rolled her eyes faintly at Nara's bluntness, her ears twitching once in quiet disapproval. But when Ivor did not lower his weapon, when his stance remained defensive, when his eyes held no hesitation, her expression changed. The faint smile she had worn until now disappeared.
Her amber eyes sharpened slightly as she watched him.
Ivor did not respond to Nara. He had no reason to trust him or anyone else inside the Scar. But the word information lingered in his mind.
His thoughts shifted briefly to the scrolls he had taken from the five boys earlier. He had not read them yet, but he knew they held something valuable. They had carried them into the Scar, protected them even during combat. That alone was enough.
It meant such things mattered.
And it meant others would have them too.
His gaze flicked once to Nara's waist, to the pouch resting there, to the ease with which he stood despite being inside the Scar.
Ivor's fingers tightened slightly around the sword.
The pressure behind his eyes throbbed louder when he decided to target Nara as well later.
He endured it in silence. His breathing remained steady. Inside, he had already made the decision.
Not now.
But someday.
He would target him too.
When Ivor did not respond, Nara let out a quiet scoff. He slipped the Crest berries back into his pouch with an easy motion, his expression shifting into something between irritation and amusement.
"Fine," he said. "Let's go, Luna."
He turned without waiting for another reply and began walking away, his posture relaxed as if the encounter had already lost its importance.
Luna remained where she was for a moment longer.
Her amber eyes stayed on Ivor, studying him with that same quiet intensity. The faint smile she had worn earlier was gone now. Her gaze moved briefly to his trembling hand, then to his eyes, as if searching for something deeper than his injuries.
Then she turned and followed Nara without a word.
Ivor did not move.
He stood where he was, his sword still raised, his eyes tracking their retreating figures as they disappeared between the trees. He listened carefully, following the fading sound of their steps, waiting for any sign they might circle back.
Only when the forest returned to silence did his body finally give in.
His knees hit the ground.
The sword slipped from his fingers and landed beside him as his hands rose instinctively to his face. The pain behind his eyes surged violently, far worse than anything he had endured before. His breathing faltered, breaking into shallow, uneven gasps.
He pressed his palms harder against his face, as if he could contain it.
Unknown to him, a white crescent flickered faintly beneath his iris, appearing and disappearing without pattern.
Inside his body, his mana core churned violently. The energy he had absorbed did not settle quietly. It crashed against the inner boundaries of the core in repeated waves, unstable and restless, as though responding to a presence that had not yet fully formed.
Ivor forced himself to move.
His hand found the sword again, his fingers unsteady as he lifted it. He grabbed his pouch and pulled himself upright, his legs threatening to fail beneath him. His vision blurred slightly, moisture gathering at the corners of his eyes from the sheer intensity of the pain.
He did not wipe it away. He changed direction slowly and began walking toward where he had left his bag earlier.
He needed to reach it.
He needed to lie down.
He needed the pain to stop.
*******
Several minutes later, far enough that his scent had weakened but not disappeared, Nara slowed his pace.
Luna walked beside him in silence.
"So you are not going to team up with him?" she asked.
Nara shrugged lightly.
"It looks like he doesn't trust anyone," he said casually. "That's fine."
He glanced briefly in the direction they had come from, his eyes thoughtful.
"He will be targeted soon," he added. "They won't tolerate someone like him for long."
Luna said nothing.
"We'll help him when that happens," Nara continued. "Then he'll have no reason to refuse."
He smiled faintly to himself.
"Let's go kill some skeletons."
He leaned forward and broke into a sprint, his movement smooth and practiced as he disappeared deeper into the forest.
Luna followed close behind, her expression unreadable.