In the pouring rain, Orson cast a barrier spell, shielding himself and Litte from the downpour. Then, activating the floating carpet, the two ascended into the air, heading back toward the family estate.
Litte, having cried for a while earlier, felt sowhat better, though her eyes were still red.
“Alright, alright, Litte, I’m sorry. It’s my fault,” Orson said, clasping his hands together in a gesture of apology.
Litte crossed her arms and turned her head away, refusing to acknowledge him.
Seeing this, Orson felt a chill in his heart.
Oh no, did I push him too far this ti? Is he really going to hold a grudge against now?
Although Orson could still handle Litte even in his corrupted state, Litte was the protagonist, after all. What if so divine intervention suddenly boosted his power and he killed in an instant during a mont of crisis?
That’s the thing with protagonists—they don’t play by the rules!
However, since Litte is the protagonist, he must understand the concept of repaying kindness. Moreover, Orson has been instilling him with all kinds of proper values during this ti, so he should be able to understand Orson’s intentions.
As Orson pondered this, he noticed the wound on Litte’s arm was still bleeding. He quickly retrieved a bottle of healing potion from his spatial ring and handed it to Litte.
In this world, while mages could heal wounds using mana, the process was slow and inefficient. It wasn’t sothing people generally did unless it was an ergency.
Instead, there were two main thods for treating injuries: receiving healing from a priest or using healing potions crafted by alchemists.
When adventuring in the wild, if a party didn’t have a priest among its mbers, healing potions were the only lifeline.
The priest profession was rarer than most on the continent, especially among those who didn’t serve in churches but instead participated in adventuring activities as free priests.
This rarity stemd from the fact that only devout followers of Hela, the Goddess of Life, could receive her divine power and beco priests.
The most powerful priest on the continent today was the Empire’s archbishop, Levi, a Tier 8 priest. Additionally, the Church’s young saintess, Lilia, who had reached Tier 5 at the age of eighteen, was also expected to surpass Levi soday.
Litte looked at the potion Orson handed her, her expression puzzled.
“What is this?”
“Healing potion,” Orson said, pointing to his still-bleeding arm. “Your arm is injured. Drinking this will help a lot.”
“Huh?” Following Orson’s gaze, Litte finally turned her attention back to herself. Feeling the pain from her arm, she furrowed her brow. “It hurts...”
“Exactly. So why are you wasting ti sulking at instead of taking care of it?” Orson sighed, opening the bottle and holding it out to Litte.
“Wait, is this poison?” Litte asked, like a startled rabbit, as she clasped her hands to her chest and stepped back. “Or maybe it’s so strange potion that’ll make obey you after drinking it...”
“Co on, if I had sothing like that, I would’ve made you drink it on the first day!” Orson replied, laughing bitterly. “And why would I need to harm you? If I wanted you dead, I wouldn’t have bothered saving you just now.”
As the saying goes, once bitten, twice shy. The trust Orson had painstakingly built with Litte over the past few weeks had nearly been shattered today. Repairing it would likely take a long ti.
“Alright...” Litte hesitated before nodding. She took the healing potion from Orson. “Are you really sure this isn’t poison?”
“Of course, it’s not!”
“And it’s not so kind of charm potion either?”
“Why would it be? We’re both n! I, Orson, am not into that!”
“Then...”
“Enough already!” Orson, exasperated by Litte’s fussing, reached out, holding Litte’s head steady with one hand while pressing the potion bottle to his lips with the other, forcing him to drink.
He didn’t mind bickering with Litte a bit longer, but the blood dripping from Litte’s wound was very real.
Even if Litte didn’t care about his own injury, Orson did. After all, it was his plan that had caused Litte to get hurt in the first place.
Caught off guard and too weak to resist, Litte had no choice but to swallow the potion as it was poured into her mouth.
Satisfied only after watching Litte drink the entire potion, Orson took the empty bottle back and stored it away. The glass bottles were reusable, after all.
Litte wiped the remnants of the reddish liquid from the corners of her mouth, then shot Orson a mildly annoyed look.
“Don’t say anything yet. Take a mont to feel how your body changes, then speak,” Orson said quickly.
“Hm...” Following Orson’s advice, Litte focused on her body. The pain in her arm had significantly subsided. Rolling up her sleeve, she saw that the bite wound inflicted by the wolf had already closed.
Only the discomfort from blood loss remained, and even that was slowly fading.
Noticing these changes, Litte’s eyes widened slightly.
“Amazing, isn’t it? Your wound healed almost instantly,” Orson said proudly, watching his reaction. “This potion was made by , by the way. You’re the first person to use it.”
“Wait, Orson, you’ve never used it before?”
“Nope. I’ve never needed to. Whether it was the academy’s combat tests or the occasional expeditions, I was always the strongest. Sotis, the instructors wouldn’t even let participate because they said I’d hinder the other students’ progress,” Orson said casually, his tone dripping with unintentional arrogance.
“Uh...” Litte didn’t fully understand terms like “academy,” “combat tests,” or “expeditions,” but she still felt inexplicably irritated.
It was as if she were being looked down upon.
“Oh, we’re almost ho.” After a while, as the brightly lit family estate ca into view, Orson spoke.
“Eh? Already?” Litte asked, surprised.
It felt like barely any ti had passed on the floating carpet, yet they were already nearing ho.
“Mm. I sped up a bit,” Orson said, glancing at Litte’s face before adding, “When we get back, be sure to take a good bath and change into fresh clothes.”
With that, Orson pulled out a mirror and handed it to Litte.
The barrier spell that had kept the rain off them also emitted a faint glow, allowing Litte to clearly see her reflection.
Her face was covered in blood and gri, and her clothes were in tatters. Worse still, a tear in her clothing just below her chest and near her waist exposed so of the bandages she had wrapped herself with.
Realizing this, Litte hastily covered the exposed skin, her face flushing as she looked at Orson.
“Orson, you didn’t see anything, did you...”
“See what?” Orson asked, confused.
“N-Nothing...” Litte shook her head, ending the conversation. She knew that if Orson pressed further, it would only make things harder to explain.
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