The Red Caterpillar loved Medea LaHert.
He was a dying orphan wanderer adopted by the LaHert Duke’s family.
Young Medea, whom he first saw there, was the most beautiful being he had ever encountered since his birth.
“I want to place her in the highest, purest place, untouched by the world’s filth.”
That was the Red Caterpillar’s dream.
He picked at an old scar on his forearm, revealing two small cylinders embedded in the hollowed flesh – white for sleeping gas and black for…
The Red Caterpillar grinned viciously and handed Julia the white cylinder.
“Call the guards watching the door. As soon as they open it, spray this.”
Like other women in the North, Julia had learned swordsmanship and was agile.
Surprised, she put the two guards to sleep with the gas and took the keys, freeing the Red Caterpillar from his cell.
Arkadia, upon returning, found the body of the apprentice knight who had been guarding Julia’s room.
He closed the young boy’s eyes and, drawing his sword, hurried up the corridor to the Nugent family’s secret vault.
In front of the vault room, two knights lay unconscious – reserve knights left to guard the castle.
“Sleeping gas.”
Arkadia instinctively covered his nose and mouth, recognizing the gas since the Black Caterpillar incident.
The vault door was open, as was the vault itself. Infidel Nugent was unconscious in front of the vault. The red transmission stone was gone.
Realizing this, Arkadia quickly checked his brother was alive and then dashed outside.
“Did the Red Caterpillar escape? Is he still in the castle?”
He thought of the count’s annex, where the Queen’s brother, Count Antoine, resided. The aged count, with poor hearing and sight, was unlikely to have witnessed anything. But to escape, the fugitive would head towards the castle’s outer entrance.
Arkadia rode towards the main gate. Then he heard a desperate call.
“Vice Captain!”
Near a small forest by the road, under a large tree, lay Yora, deeply wounded in the abdomen.
“Yora!”
Arkadia rushed to her side. Yora, trembling with pain, spoke.
She fought the Red Caterpillar but lost. He stabbed her while she slashed one of his eyes. Bleeding, he fled on a black horse.
“How long ago?”
“Not long.”
“Rest now, Yora.”
Arkadia used his torn clothing to stop her bleeding.
“Vice Captain?!”
He turned towards another voice.
There stood Steward Lewine Axel, disheveled and dirtied, frozen in shock.
“Steward! Are you alright?”
Lewine, her face a mix of horror and fear, approached Arkadia like a petrified puppet.
“What happened?”
Arkadia asked. Lewine wordlessly pulled out the transmission stone given by Esdel.
“!”
Arkadia reached for the stone, but Lewine withdrew it and tucked it back.
“Julia Nugent.”
“!”
“Vice Captain, can you remain impartial in the face of your kin’s crime?”
Lewine’s face was twisted in sorrow.
We returned to the top of the walls, gathering within the yellow aurora previously spread by Adrian.
But as soon as we stood on the wall, something attacked the aurora.
With a sharp metallic sound, a huge monster revealed itself as the aurora flickered.
My heart sank heavily.
The long snout oozing sticky liquid, the saw-like teeth visible within its elongated, triangular mouth.
Three eyes perched atop its comparatively small head, and its incredibly long four arms and two legs, each ending in claws and talons as sharp and long as its snout.
It was these claws that had struck the aurora.
‘This is the Kaligari.’
Unwittingly, I looked towards the Duke. He watched intently where the creature had vanished.
‘Your Grace, have you been fending off such beings alone, without anyone else’s aid?’
The echoing clangs continued below us, shaking the entire massive wall as if atop a quaking earth.
“Are you alright, Adrian?”
The Duke asked the magician.
“Yes!”
But contrary to his response, the boy’s face was pale, the spread of his aurora narrower than before.
‘He’s used too much strength.’
Without realizing, I gripped my sword tighter.
“Pour the oil!”
The Duke’s shout echoed downwards.
“Pour the oil!”
“Pour the oil!”
The small doors along the wall opened, and the Northern army poured boiling oil, but only smaller monsters were hit. The Kaligari, resembling giant mantises, disappeared swiftly, reappearing as soon as the oil ceased.
‘Incredibly fast.’
Suddenly, a Kaligari sliced open a large barrel of oil.
“Ah!”
Several Northern soldiers screamed as they plummeted from the wall.
‘We can’t win like this.’
Then came the Duke’s suggestion.
“Adrian, can you come out to the wall with me?”
“Can you ride behind me and spread the aurora? I’ll attack them from within your aurora.”
“It’s dangerous, Your Grace!”
Mobius protested.
“I can divide the aurora into several parts. It’s more strenuous than one, but I can protect up to five people. Better than going alone…”
“Then I’ll come too.”
Mobius said. Ergo spoke up.
“Is there no other way, Your Grace? If we wait until dawn, the Kaligari will leave…”
“The walls will collapse before then. And the night will come again.”
My Step-brother Is Obsessed With Me (Female-dominant)
A gentle female protagonist vs pitiful in the early stage, and a sick male protagonist in the later stage
Cheng Songer transmigrated into the body of a vicious cannon fodder female supporting character with the same name as her in a female-dominant novel.
In the original story, the cannon fodder female supporting character was inhumane, committing domestic violence, gambling excessively, being lustful, and even wanting to sell her stepbrother to a brothel for money.
As luck would have it, she just happened to transmigrate at this time.
Seeing Cheng Qingzhi biting his lip, enduring the tears in his eyes, looking pitiful, her heart softened.
She stuffed the money back into the Madam’s hand and reached out to him.
“Brother, come home with me.”
