Chapter 25: CH 24

Fortunately, however, it wasn’t long until another person’s voice broke the tension between the two.

“Jay? Jay, is that you?”

“Hannah!”

Ethan muttered and asked, “Jay?” but he wasn’t at the forefront of her priority right now.

“Hannah! What happened? I heard it’s an epidemic!”

Instinctively raising a healing spell to boost her constitution just in case the endemic disease were to get to her, as soon as Reina felt warmth enveloping her body, she quickly examined Hannah’s condition.

“I, I’m fine… But… my father and Morgan…”

When Hannah tried to tell her about them, her expression began to crumble. Reina quickly took out a handkerchief and gave it to her, and Hanna sobbed as she continued explaining.

“One day, Damien from next door suddenly got boils on his skin… And then it spread to the other villagers.”

“Boils? What did the shape look like?”

Unfortunately, the answers she got for that question were only words that couldn’t be understood through her tears.

‘It’ll be faster if I look into this myself.’

“Where’s Morgan?”

Preparing herself to check the patient’s condition, she put on a pair of gloves and covered her nose and mouth with another handkerchief.

Yet again, Ethan stopped her.

“It’s dangerous. Unauthorized individuals are not allowed to come near.”

His tone was strict and business-like, but if one were to examine his voice deeper, a slight hint of worry could be heard. However at this moment, Reina couldn’t afford to catch onto small details like that.

As though switching from fire to ice, she stopped throwing herself at him, and at that very moment, she answered with a cold voice that she had never once let him hear before.

“I believe I have a way to help.”

But, just as expected,

“Even still, you cannot. Go back home.”

Her words did not reach him at all.

* * *

“Haa… Insane.”

After the ‘first ever’ fight she had with Ethan, Reina was eventually locked up and quarantined in one house in the village.

“Sure, of course I understand, but…”

Even if it was Ethan, anyone would have reacted to her actions similarly. The public was still under the impression that the cause of any epidemic was ‘the seed of Varan, the god of death,’ and more importantly, it was only policy for imperial authorities to disallow any civilian to come near an area that was riddled with the epidemic.

But, dare she say it, she was more ‘equipped’ than anyone else here.

Back when she was still living as Han Jae-hee, she moved to the United States aiming for a job at a pharmaceutical company that you could even call the workplace of God. And at that time, she was researching all sorts of various diseases so that she could get into the company.

“Sure, they might capture me while thinking I’m a novice shaman, but… At least I’ll be better than those people who touch the patients with their bare hands, slicing into flesh at random while shouting, ‘It is God’s Will!’”

The problem now was that she had a mountain called Ethan to cross over.

“I guess I need to identify the disease first so I can persuade him…”

But then again, she first needed to assess the patients’ condition before she could confirm anything.

“Haa… There isn’t just one or two infectious diseases that have a symptom of abscess.”

There were dozens upon dozens of infectious diseases coming to her mind now. And to reduce the number of possibilities… As expected, she really needed to see it with her own eyes first.

“Miss Reina.”

Speak of the devil. The only person who could solve her problem now appeared.

As she had been immersed in her thoughts, thinking of one thing after another, she soon jumped out of her seat the moment he came in.

“Ethan, let me look at the patients. As a member of House Chantra, you do know that I have the ability to take care of these patients, right?”

But still, he did not yield.

He didn’t ask why she was here, he didn’t ask why she was being called ‘Jay’, he didn’t ask why she was so anxious.

It seemed as if he was just another person trying to keep her as far away as possible.

“Go home tomorrow come dawn. I’ll attach an escort to you.”

“But Ethan—”

“I will not rescind my command.”

Though there had always been restraint on how cold his gaze was before, why was it that his eyes were so cold today?

“……”

Given a dreadful rejection, she clenched her hands into fists and said nothing back.

‘Right, I expected this already. I’m not a member of the health division, and I’m not part of House Bohr, so my words don’t hold any weight here.”

In addition, hadn’t she been acting like a woman with a loose screw all this time? At this point, it would be even stranger if he suddenly believed everything she said.

So, she backed off first.

“…Fine. I’ll stay still. But I’m not going to leave tomorrow.”

“Miss Reina.”

The heavy voice echoed throughout the room, the implicit tone of rejection evident to her ears.

“Please. The people in this village… They’re very important to me. Please?”

There was an unknown tension filling the cold atmosphere between them, and it was enough that she would have recoiled, but she paid no attention to it.

“Reina.”

“Please, Ethan…”

A different kind of sorrow could be felt lacing her request. Did this cause even a small stir in his heart?

In the end, he also showed signs of gradually giving in.

“Haa… Alright. But you must never take one step out of this place.”

With a heavy sigh, Ethan swept his hair up with an expression that said he didn’t like this one bit. And he immediately added precautions.

“And you can only move around while you’re in my sight. Understand?”

“Yes, I understand. Then can I meet Hannah?”

When one straight eyebrow was about to rise into a curve, she quickly added.

“Hannah isn’t infected. And I won’t meet her often! Just once or twice a day? No… Even once is fine. It’s been a year since I last visited and saw her. Of course, I know you’ll be troubled, Ethan, but…”

Trailing off to the point that it sounded like she was saying gibberish, she pretended to be pitiful. And unexpectedly, her ruse worked.

“…Alright. But not often.”

“Thank you, Ethan.”

Oh, what a relief. If she really had been forced to go back without even doing anything, she would have lamented the fact that she couldn’t even lift a finger.

“Just as you said, Ethan, I won’t make any fuss inside the room.”

“I’ll be watching you.”

But Ethan should have noticed it then.

That what she promised so proudly was a rather vague vow with the added condition of ‘inside the room’.