"My congratulations..." Ryan said, clapping slowly. "You did a great job convincing me to walk straight into certain death. With all that talk about Immortal Guardians and Ancestral Temples." He then added with a sadistic smile, clapping even more. "You also did a great job convincing me you weren't a demon by claiming to be worse than one. A demon among demons, in your own words."
The apothecary rolled her eyes with a grunt. "This is getting repetitive, but... as is my custom." She said, throwing herself back. "Feel free to die anytime, but remember that in the end, I'll be the only one left to remember what an asshole you were." Ryan laughed sarcastically.
The deadly cold kept falling, threatening to take their lives.
The slave watched them both in silence. "This Legacy seems to be our only way out, no matter how bad the situation looks. Don't you think it's worth a try?" He asked Ryan, who stared at him in silence, thinking deeply.
Ryan knew how to think with a cool head; emotions rarely took the lead over his reason. Even so, the answer he gave satisfied no one. If anything, it only let conflict take over.
"No." He said dryly. "That plan is a last resort I don't want to take." He then turned his focus to the apothecary, who quickly sharpened her posture. "First I want her to open her mouth and admit there's a way out of here that she's been hiding."
"..."
Silence settled, and no one knew whether it was a joke or serious. But in the end, she broke the silence.
The apothecary laughed softly before reaching for her water holster and turning It over. "You're a funny guy, you know that?" She wiped her damp lips with her sleeve. "You make it sound like you genuinely believe that I, a ruined apothecary who looks more like a walking corpse than anything else, more dead than alive, completely unable to take care of herself and dependent on two cubs, have a plan to magically get us out of here while ignoring the damn Glacinata outside." She gave a crooked smile, waiting for the punchline.
But the punchline never came. What came instead was a rising hostility. Ryan gripped his axe firmly while the slave drew his sword and fell back tactically, waiting for a signal.
The apothecary's humor began to sour as everyone braced for a fight.
"I think I've figured out your character," Ryan said, resting his axe against his knee and beginning to polish and sharpen it, sending sparks flying around him. The apothecary watched this with growing tension. "You don't think you're a bad person, do you?" He asked, his voice cold as ice.
She, however, did not answer.
"If life taught me anything, it's that the worst villains never see themselves as such." He continued. "They always make excuses. In the name of survival they act out of necessity, in the name of justice they do what must be done. After all, they're always the poor victims in every situation, they're always the oppressed ones. And of course, with their sharp tongues, they're usually seen as such."
Ryan didn't look at her, but kept speaking with sharp wit. "It's two against one, two men in relatively good shape, both armed, while you're just a weak, badly wounded woman. Sounds unfair..."
"It is unfair..." She said with a trembling voice and eyes on the verge of tears, her eyes shook, her lips shook, even the hand clutching her clothes shook. "I'm clearly the victim if you come at me." She pulled back her posture with fear growing ever more visible.
"Cut it out." Ryan said, his voice heavy. "You put a Glacinata to sleep using sorcery, you kept yourself alive in a situation that can only be called miraculous, and you even brought me back from death's door, going up against the Glacinata will using your own. A force of nature! You opposed it from start to finish!" Ryan stared at her with tension. "I may look strong, but I'm weaker than I've ever been. At any moment I could drop dead and I'd never survive another confrontation. You, on the other hand, grow stronger by the minute yet hide behind your wounded body to fake a weakness you don't have."
"..."
Silence settled between them. Ryan kept sharpening his axe, the slave kept watching with tension while steadying his breath for a possible confrontation.
The apothecary, however, could not stop staring in total silence, her eyes not blinking for even a single instant. The tense atmosphere showed no signs of fading; if anything, it only seemed to grow.
She and Ryan exchanged glances for just one moment, and a thousand words were spoken.
If she didn't admit her own plans, Ryan was willing to bet he was currently stronger than her and would slit her throat right there. If he wasn't enough, the slave would do it for him.
It was a move where everyone would lose, considering the deadly cold kept closing in on them without pause. They would soon die even if the dispute was settled.
But Ryan preferred it that way.
If he tried to face the Legacy's challenge, there was a good chance he'd fail. If the informant wasn't trustworthy, the odds only got worse. He would use that as a last resort, but the minimum was having reliable information.
Not being able to trust her meant death all the same.
They needed to be able to trust each other, one hundred percent.
Finally, amid the sounds of the axe being sharpened, the apothecary sighed.
"Alright, I can summon a rescue group at any moment." She said, making the others' eyes go wide. "However, I can't be in an enclosed space. And I don't need to tell you that my tribe isn't exactly friendly." She then sighed, leaning back, and continued.
"It wasn't that I didn't want to say anything; it's that this is a tribal secret on top of being irrelevant to our situation. Like it or not, we need to get to an open place, and above the Uriel Mountains is a perfect spot for that, as well as being the only available location right now. You must accept the challenge." She then looked at him again. "Also I hope you both understand that once I activate it, they won't stop to ask who you are. They will move to kill, plain and simple, no questions needed.If you wanted honesty, that's all I had to say..."
'Damn it…' Ryan cursed with a sigh. He had hoped this might be a better alternative, but in the end he had gotten more of the same.
'Should I try to get on her good side now?' He thought to himself after having just threatened someone's life. 'It'd be bad if she held a grudge after this... maybe there's some chocolate recipe in that encyclopedia.'
Noticing the troubled look on Ryan's face, the apothecary laughed with amusement. "You summer people are so soft." She rose and walked toward them. "Honestly, in my eyes you only become more remarkable." She sat down beside him as the slave shuddered and his sword trembled in its sheath.
"A man capable of crafting cunning plans and unraveling treacherous schemes is not someone who deserves to be punished or looked down upon." Her hand moved across his chest. "If anything, it's something extremely commendable, worthy of rewards... or better yet... it's something very attractive. The girls in the tribe would love to meet someone like that." She said with a wide smile.
The slave behind them went pale as his body simply trembled.
Ryan, however, snorted.
He was only thinking about the Legacy's challenge.
Now, that was inevitable.