Chapter: 340
I had my left eye closed, but my right eye was open.
However, I couldn’t see anything.
Even though one eye was open, something should be visible, yet my vision was as if it were shrouded in a thick fog.
I couldn’t help but let out a small laugh.
[…Your right eye has a cloudy color. Is it the effect of using your ability? Are you okay?]
At that moment, hearing Lucy’s words, I opened my left eye to check the condition of my right eye reflected in the sword.
Upon closer inspection, I noticed that, just as she said, the vibrant red color of my eye had faded.
It was now gray, the color of ashes left after a flame had burned out.
After confirming that my eye was clearly different from before, I instinctively understood.
This wouldn’t be something that could be fixed like regeneration.
I realized my right eye would no longer function as it should.
I gave a bitter smile and communicated to Lucy who was concerned that my eye had no hope.
“…Well, the eye isn’t okay. I think it’s gone blind.”
[Hah…. Do you think I wouldn’t know whether your eye can see or not?]
Lucy sighed in frustration, seeming to clarify that she wasn’t asking about my eye.
[What I asked about is whether you’re okay or not. I thought you were shocked into insanity because you suddenly laughed. Are you okay?]
Lucy was likely asking because she thought otherwise.
I chuckled at her question.
“I’m fine.”
[…You shouldn’t be saying that. One of your eyes has gone blind.]
“I’m really okay.”
Losing one eye was indeed a big deal.
But I was okay, genuinely.
Because,
“I think it’s a price paid to protect something far more important than one eye, so it doesn’t bother me.”
Although I had lost one eye, I had managed to protect something much more significant.
As I answered Lucy like that, I shifted my gaze to Yoon Si-woo, who was now breathing regularly with a complexion much improved compared to earlier.
It was true that my ability had taken one eye as its price, but what if I didn’t have this ability?
I wouldn’t have been able to defeat Beatrice, and I wouldn’t have been able to save Yoon Si-woo’s life either.
Thinking about that potential future, I couldn’t help but be grateful to the ability that allowed me to create such miraculous results just for the cost of one eye.
And the ability was born out of my desire for the well-being of my precious people, to begin with.
From my perspective, it was as if one of my wishes had come true, so not being okay would actually be strange.
[…No matter how you put it, how can you laugh about losing an eye?]
But Lucy seemed to find it hard to believe that I was really okay, even with my answer.
It seems that I looked weird laughing about being blind in one eye.
Of course, I wasn’t laughing because I enjoyed being blind, so I explained to her.
“Oh, I laughed for a different reason. A worry that I’ve had for a while is gone.”
[Worry? What worry?]
“Well… remember how you asked earlier if I had ever subconsciously used my ability?”
[What do you mean… Wait, no way….]
As I spoke, Lucy seemed to hit upon something with a somber tone.
[…There were more things that broke besides your eye, huh.]
“Ahaha… well, yeah.”
[…What else is broken?]
“Um… my taste, I guess it’s my tongue?”
[…Anything else broken besides that?]
“…….”
I tried not to answer, but with Lucy’s persistent questioning, I had no choice but to awkwardly smile and open my mouth.
“…My nose, my sense of smell too.”
Ever since I suddenly lost my sense of taste, the loss of senses had been a nagging worry for me.
How could I not be worried?
Suddenly, a sense that had felt perfectly fine vanished.
As someone who had experienced it firsthand, it was truly a dreadful affair.
However, when it was only the loss of taste, I managed to shrug it off.
Even if I could no longer taste the food that everyone complained was awful.
Even if one of life’s little joys had disappeared.
Since the sense of taste wasn’t all that crucial to living or fighting.
So I thought it was probably just a side effect of becoming a witch, allowing me to pretend it was okay.
But after realizing that I had lost not only my sense of taste but also my sense of smell, I couldn’t just brush it aside.
I became aware that I had lost my sense of smell shortly after Yoon Si-woo had woken from his long slumber.
It was the day Sylvia fussed about how Yoon Si-woo smelled and told him to wash up quickly.
I wondered what smell she was talking about, perplexed by Sylvia’s reaction.
At the time, I was too overjoyed that Yoon Si-woo had awakened to think deeply about it.
But as time passed and I thought back on it, it struck me as odd, so I checked alone afterward, and sure enough.
I was in a state where both my sense of taste and smell had completely gone.
Of course, lacking a sense of smell isn’t a hugely impactful sensation for living either.
But unlike when it was just the sense of taste that was gone, I couldn’t help but feel terrified after losing my sense of smell as well.
First, it was my sense of taste, then my sense of smell.
What would come next?
What if one day I could no longer see?
What if I couldn’t hear anymore?
What if I couldn’t feel anything when I touched?
The fear and worry that some other sense might disappear someday tormented me to the point of becoming a nightmare every night.
What I could do to avoid revealing that torment was to try not to think about the senses that had already vanished and those that might vanish in the future.
If the people around me hadn’t noticed my struggles and suffering, it would be thanks to my effort to appear otherwise.
But now, I was free from those worries and burdens as well.
“…Anyway, I was really worried about what would happen if other senses broke suddenly one day, but once I knew the cause, I felt relieved and laughed, thinking ‘Ah, that’s how it was.’”
I said this with a smiling face that clearly showed my relief from having the worries disappear.
And Lucy muttered, seemingly unable to understand me.
[…I find that hard to understand. Your body is in that shape, yet you’re smiling just because one worry has vanished.]
“…Yeah, I guess it is strange. I think it’s weird too, but I just can’t stop laughing.”
I agreed with Lucy’s words while unable to restrain the smile forming on my lips.
This newfound laughter was likely not just because I was relieved from my worries.
So why do I keep smiling like this?
Perhaps I was,
“…happy, maybe.”
[…Happy? What do you mean?]
Lucy asked.
I pondered momentarily before answering her.
“…That it turned out that the senses I lost, which I’d been worried about all along, didn’t vanish for no reason.”
Looking back, that made sense.
The loss of my sense of taste coincided with the revival of the World Tree, which had been dead and heavily tainted by miasma.
The loss of my sense of smell happened after the Sacred Remnants, Tears of the Ocean, which had been mired in miasma, regained its true form.
“…It wasn’t meaningless. In the end, it was all used for me and for the people.”
It wasn’t that my losses were without significance.
The hardships I had endured were not meaningless either.
I had only just realized this today.
So much so that it brought me joy that made me forget all my previous struggles.
“…I’m happy.”
My laughter came naturally.
[…What joy is there in sacrificing yourself for others?]
In response to Lucy, perhaps this joy was of a kind that others couldn’t relate to at all.
I had once read a fairy tale titled “The Happy Prince.”
The statue of the Happy Prince adorned with gold and jewels.
Seeing the poor, the prince felt compassion and asked a swallow to take the gold and jewels from his body to share with the needy.
However, after endlessly giving away until he became shabby, the prince is eventually torn down by the people.
At that time, despite the tragic conclusion, I couldn’t understand why it was titled “The Happy Prince.”
But now, I could understand the prince.
Surely, the prince valued the happiness of the people more than his own body.
I might also become like the prince after using this ability someday.
But I certainly wouldn’t regret it, just like the prince.
As I was thinking this and smiling,
“Hmm….”
I noticed Yoon Si-woo’s eyelids fluttering.
I was about to brighten my expression at the sign of him waking up when I suddenly thought of something and hurriedly spoke to Lucy.
“Ah…! Can you keep my ability a secret from Yoon Si-woo? If he knows, there’s no way he’ll let me fight, so please…!”
If Yoon Si-woo finds out that using my ability causes damage to my body, he would undoubtedly prevent me from using it, even in critical situations.
But I realized late that if Lucy told Yoon Si-woo about that, it would be pointless.
So I pleaded with her, and Lucy looked at me and muttered.
[…Now I understand why I keep getting irritated by you. You’re just like me. You don’t spare your body for others. Seeing it from the side, it’s exhausting.]
How Lucy thought of me didn’t really matter, so I silently directed a pleading look at her.
Then Lucy sighed and spoke.
[But since you’re just like me, I can’t hate you either. Hah, fine, I’ll keep it a secret.]
“…Thank you.”
[…You fool.]
And right after that conversation,
“Ugh… S-Scarlet?”
Yoon Si-woo opened his eyes.
“Yoon Si-woo! How are you feeling?”
“How did I… What about the Witch of Sloth?”
“Don’t worry about the witch. I managed to defeat her somehow.”
“Really…?”
He looked a bit dazed, as if still not fully aware, and asked a question, to which I diligently responded.
Then Yoon Si-woo asked,
“…Scarlet, what’s wrong with your eye?”
And I smiled in response to that question.
“…This? It’s fine, it’s nothing.”
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