There was no need to be completely honest just because one promised not to lie.

It didn’t matter if one didn’t always tell the truth. There were options to hide, deflect, and make excuses.

However, such avoidance is ultimately just an unseemly, incompetent clumsiness.

Ren acknowledged it. He knew it himself.

Not only had he prioritized Sharti over his memories, but now he valued his life with Sharti more than his lost memories, so he needed to correct his current incompetent attitude, which was incredibly clumsy from now on.

Just taking steps in place would only result in becoming an unworthy and pathetic person who doesn’t even deserve to be jealous.

In the meantime, not knowing people’s true feelings and making all sorts of misunderstandings and misconceptions, Ren quickly became honest.

And at the same time, he realized.

‘Ah.’

I see.

‘I think Sha is pretty.’

And he liked Sharti’s face.

‘From the moment I first saw her.’

The moment he uttered the embarrassing confession out loud, the identity of the improper feeling he had not been aware of until now became clear.

It wasn’t gratitude towards a benefactor.

It wasn’t sympathy or pity either.

‘I want Sha to smile-.’

Her laughter tickles his chest and crumbles his lips.

‘I want Sha to be safe-.’

It makes him think that her hands should hold more fresh flowers than dangerous paralyzing herbs.

‘I want Sha to be happy-.’

Every time, he finds himself wishing that she could live abundantly doing what she likes without worrying or being anxious anymore.

‘I want Sha to look at me.’

It arouses the desire to become the one person engraved in those crimson eyes that hold the light of the sun.

And the meaning of all these emotions was both simple and complex.

‘Because I like Sha.’

Emotions follow their flow and eventually become clear.

Feeling jealousy with Ashu’s appearance, and the excitement felt when facing Sharti, brought a clear emotion that wasn’t sudden at all.

It was love.

‘So what?’

Realizing his feelings for Sharti didn’t particularly make him feel elated.

Rather, he had to steel his heart coldly.

‘I mustn’t let Sha find out.’

Sharti is quick-witted.

Of course, when it came to matters of romance, she was at a disastrous level, but she was keenly aware of goodwill and malice directed at her.

If the goodwill was at an appropriate level, Sharti would be embarrassed but wouldn’t push it away. However, if that goodwill was even slightly deeper and greater, Sharti would feel burdened and avoid it.

Having experienced this firsthand, Ren could declare with certainty.

‘I’d be driven away.’

Sharti was just beginning to open her heart. She no longer shrank back with a disgusted face when holding hands, being embraced, or looking at faces.

To confess romantic feelings out of the blue in this situation where human bonds were deepening?

‘…I don’t even want to imagine it.’

It would be fortunate if her face didn’t turn pale at the confession of liking her.

Sharti didn’t know what to do even when confessing the simple truth that her face was pretty.

So he wanted to postpone it until they got a little closer, until he had built up more favorability with Sharti, until he became a person who wasn’t lacking for her.

At least until he became someone who wouldn’t lose to Ashu, someone Sharti couldn’t even consider as a comparison…

“Ren, do you like me?”

Ren realized anew.

He shouldn’t let his guard down in front of Sharti.

Sharti doesn’t overlook even a moment’s secret, heart, emotion, or thought that the other person shows, and eventually strikes sharply.

Caught by Sharti, Ren answered.

It was an answer that required no thought.

‘I like you.’

However, what came out of Ren’s mouth wasn’t an admission.

“If I answer-.”

Even though Sharti’s face was hidden by the hood and couldn’t be seen, Ren could tell.

The delicate hand that held him didn’t convey any excited trembling.

Only a slight nervousness could be felt.

“Can you handle it?”

It was a question that wasn’t clear who it was directed at.

Ren couldn’t handle her attitude after hastily confessing his feelings, and Sharti wasn’t prepared to handle his feelings, needless to ask.

A confession that neither party is prepared for shouldn’t be carelessly uttered just because of the atmosphere.

“…”

Sharti lowered her head and withdrew the hand that had been holding Ren.

Watching Sharti, who gave no answer, Ren swallowed a bitter smile.

The hopeful thing was that Sharti didn’t draw a clear line like before, nor did she build another solid wall.

‘She seemed flustered until just now, so it’s natural.’

She must have been in a confused state, having had her life threatened until just moments ago.

Ren quietly turned his head to check behind him.

His gaze, glaring at the unconscious masked person, was chillingly cold.

‘They call themselves mercenaries, yet they handle jobs like this?’

Ren’s anger was directed at the Kropf Mercenary Group for allowing such a masked person to infiltrate the lodging.

If he had been even a little later, the person collapsed at the back would have been Sharti.

As the situation he had experienced once before unfolded before his eyes again, Ren’s eyes rolled right there. The hand of the masked person who had strangled Sharti’s neck was completely mangled from the shoulder to the wrist.

‘There must be marks left on her neck.’

He could tell just by seeing Sharti furtively touching her neck, avoiding his gaze.

Ren quietly gritted his teeth.

It wasn’t enough to end the masked person’s life right then and there, but he had to hold back. If he killed such a person in front of a doctor who saves lives, he was concerned that Sharti might subconsciously feel aversion.

“Sha, from now on, it would be better if we stay together in one room.”

“…What?”

At the sudden change of topic, Sharti reflexively raised her head.

Ren nodded, with his arms crossed.

“This has happened not once, but twice now, so I think it would be better if I don’t leave your side.”

“Ah, no? It’s better if I’m alone. Rather than you being in danger because of me…”

“I think it’s better to be in danger together than to be in danger alone.”

“What?”

A reproachful gaze shot out from under the hood, as if to say what nonsense that was.

The confused air that had been evident as she noticed Ren’s feelings and tried to be cautious seemed to have dissipated a lot.

Relieved that she seemed to have returned to her usual self, Ren opened his mouth.

“Like just now, if you, Sha, keep them at bay with ranged attacks, I can immediately finish them off with close-range attacks.”

“No…”

“It’s an unbeatable combination.”

Ren grinned with satisfaction.

Sharti just looked at him with an dumbfounded expression, unable to refute.

Recalling their past experiences, Sharti admitted that there was some truth to Ren’s words.

“I’m not saying we should sleep together, so don’t make any strange misunderstandings.”

“What…!”

It was just meant to alleviate her worries, but instead, Sharti was greatly flustered and jumped up.

“I don’t know why you keep saying I’ll make strange misunderstandings! I, I’ve never misunderstood like that!”

“I guess it was needless worry. I’m sorry.”

Startled by Sharti’s intense reaction, Ren offered a calm apology.

Belatedly, Sharti pulled her hood down low to hide her reddened face.

Feeling like he might laugh, Ren rubbed his lips.

‘The worst-case scenario has been avoided.’

The awkward atmosphere he had worried about seemed to have passed well. Her tone had become comfortable again, as if she had stabilized mentally and emotionally.

He was getting better and better at coaxing Sharti.

Knock knock-. At the sudden sound of knocking, Ren reflexively stood up.

He roughly wrapped a blanket hanging on the wall around his face like a scarf, covering the lower half of his face.

“Doctor! Is everything alright… Eek!”

The one who came to the lodging was a magician belonging to the Kropf Mercenary Group.

The magician, who was using their staff like a torch to inspect the inside of the lodging, first saw Ren’s eyes and was startled, hurriedly hiding their body against the door.

“Does it look like nothing’s wrong with those eyes?”

Ren spoke provocatively, his forehead deeply furrowed with displeasure.

Only then did the magician discover the masked person collapsed half-dead in the corner of the room, and hurriedly restrained them with magic before handing them over to their colleagues.

Then, for Sharti who was afraid of fire, they increased the brightness of the staff’s light to illuminate the room.

“I’m sorry!”

The magician member, who had neatly cleaned up the messy room with magic, quickly bent their waist to apologize.

“Yes! There’s no problem!”

“If there’s no problem, how did this happen?”

“…I’m sorry.”

The magician knelt down in front of Sharti and Ren to explain.

“Oh, of course!”

The magician, desperately avoiding Ren’s fierce gaze, quickly nodded to Sharti.

“Right now, Lady Bireta and our mercenary group are all outside the village.”

A fierce battle was currently raging outside.

From around midnight, they had welcomed an enormous number of guests visiting the village, who were wandering mercenaries hired by the Bridend Marquis family, as they couldn’t openly send their own troops to land that had already been handed over to the Tower Master.

The mercenaries hired with the intention of tearing up the land and massacring the villagers were all armed and were attacking the village in various ways.

“Of course, it’s not too difficult for us since even if we catch them, it would be hard to reveal who’s behind it.”

The magician boasted with a satisfied face, but quickly averted their gaze at Ren’s burning eyes.

“But we didn’t expect there to be an unexpected problem inside the village…”

The outside of the village was perfectly sealed off. The Tower Master had cast a great magic combining his own magical power and the village’s mana, so the village’s defenses were naturally perfect.

The problem was the house of the doctor, who was a spy planted in the village by Daruhan Bridend.

“Who would have thought they would set the basement of that house as a teleportation coordinate to send assassins into the village?”

If there had already been a magic circle drawn, the mercenary magicians wouldn’t have missed it.

They had left the basement as an ordinary empty storehouse for deception and only left a place for the teleportation coordinates.

“Fortunately, our magicians waiting in the village detected the unusual magical power and blocked it, so it was limited to a small number of assassins!”

“So you’re saying you let one of those few slip through and enter here.”

The magician hunched their shoulders at the sharp criticism that the defense was poor.

As the magician made a sad face every time they received criticism from Ren, Sharti poked Ren’s side repeatedly.

Ren turned his head with a sigh.

“We thought we could catch them quickly since the Tower Master had put protection magic on every house in the village…”

Sharti’s fingertips trembled.

‘Was it a problem that Sha opened the window?’

The protection magic must have temporarily stopped since the door was opened from the inside first.

“And strangely, the protection magic on this lodging was relatively weaker compared to other houses. It seems the assassin noticed this too and was only watching this house.”

The magician glanced at Ren.

Ren’s expression became serious as he noticed the meaning of that gaze.

The possibility he had vaguely suspected gradually became clear.

“We’re not certain, but from what we’ve seen, we think it might be due to the influence of the doctor’s assistant…”

The magician, who had been thoroughly dismissed by Ren for their magical skills before, carefully pointed at Ren with their eyes.

“It seems you have a constitution that magic doesn’t work on.”

“…!”

Ren clenched his fist tightly.

After being silent for a while, Ren raised his head with a gloomy expression.

“Then… are you saying it would be better if I’m not by Sha, my master’s side?”

Ren’s face was full of disappointment as he squeezed out his suppressed voice.