The sword in Feili’s hand gathered golden light, ready to strike Xiya.
“Feili, don’t!”
Outside the ruins, a brown-haired girl wearing the same school uniform as Feili ran toward the entrance with two guards.
“Dailina, what are you doing here?”
Feili was surprised by her arrival and stopped her attack.
In her previous lives, when she had ambushed Xiya here, no one had ever come to stop her.
Dailina would still be on the road to town, impossible to bring guards this quickly.
‘Tsk, did I take too long? Why did Xiya take so long to come out this time? I waited outside for ages. If I’d known, I should have just gone in to find him.’
‘This Xiya, possessed by the Blood Demon—if I don’t eliminate him now, he’ll be a huge threat in the future.’
‘I’ve died at the hands of a demonized Xiya in several of my lives.’
Feili thought as she tightened her grip on the sword’s hilt.
“Feili, how can you attack Xiya?”
Dailina ran between them, blocking Xiya.
“Dailina, don’t get near him. He…”
Feili paused mid-sentence, not knowing how to explain.
She wanted to say she had been reborn and knew Xiya was possessed by the Blood Demon, but that would definitely make her seem crazy.
She had tried it in her first rebirth.
No one believed her, and they treated her like a mental patient.
Even Dailina didn’t believe her, thinking she might be sick.
“…He might be infected by a monster.”
Feili hesitated for a long time before coming up with that excuse.
“Xiya is already so badly injured. Why don’t you heal him, Feili?”
Dailina turned and crouched down.
When her eyes fell on Xiya’s wounds, her gaze sharpened.
“How could he be so badly hurt… I’ll heal you right now.”
She quickly drew the short wand from her waist, holding the end with both hands, pressing it against her closed knees.
The wand tip sank slightly into her soft thigh wrapped in black knee-high socks.
[Holy Healing]
A golden magic circle bloomed at the tip of her wand.
Her long hair fluttered with the flow of mana, and her chest’s curves cast a graceful silhouette in the golden light.
Xiya felt his wounds healing, the pain fading, and his furrowed brow relaxed.
He looked at Dailina, who was healing him, and felt a twinge of guilt.
Dailina Coleman was the number one romanceable heroine in the game, skilled in holy magic, and the future Holy Maiden.
But among players, she was known as a “bleeding heart” because she constantly helped the weak in the story, reaping few rewards and wasting a lot of the protagonist’s development time.
Worst of all, later in the story, she would pity a demon who was deliberately pretending to be pitiful, and the demon would backstab the protagonist.
If players didn’t choose the right options, they would get a bad ending instantly.
In his previous life, Xiya had complained about her plenty when playing, even posting harsh reviews of Dailina’s character.
But complaints aside, he never missed a single one of Dailina’s character portraits, and he watched every CG scene without skipping a second—after all, Dailina’s assets were the biggest.
Now, though, he felt he had been really unfair.
“I’m sorry, Dailina…”
Xiya muttered unconsciously.
“Huh? Why are you apologizing, Xiya? If I had been able to save you in time, you wouldn’t have been so badly hurt.”
Dailina looked down at the newly healed scars on Xiya’s leg, her face full of guilt, pressing the wand tip with her thumb.
“Ah… Dailina, you don’t need to apologize. It’s my fault for dragging you into this. We were supposed to finish the subjugation mission this morning and already be on our way back to the academy…”
The three of them had recently enrolled in the elite class at Thorn Academy.
A few days after the semester started, the class assigned an entrance mission.
The trio formed a team to come here and help the local lord clear out the monsters in these ruins.
The clearing had lasted from yesterday until this morning.
Under Feili’s leadership, they finished the mission quickly.
But then Xiya was beguiled by the Blood Demon in the ruins and tried to frame Feili.
Instead, he ended up being the one affected, leading to everything that followed.
In the end, it was because he was too weak.
He had been easily deceived by the demon, while Feili and Dailina were completely unaffected.
“Not at all.”
Dailina shook her head.
“We’re a team. Of course we have to help each other. If Xiya is in danger, we have to save him.”
She put away her wand, stood up, and turned to Feili.
“Feili, please don’t treat Xiya like that again.”
“But, he…”
Feili lowered her sword and tried to explain.
“Xiya is already pitiful enough.”
Dailina’s voice softened, her gaze shifting to Xiya.
Her emerald eyes seemed to glisten.
“He has no family, no friends, came all the way to the Capital alone to study, and everyone looks down on him…”
Her eyes returned to Feili.
“I know you’re not that kind of person, Feili, but just now I saw you trying to hurt Xiya. Are you going to bully him too?”
“I…”
Feili’s lips moved.
She turned her head slightly, avoiding Dailina’s gaze.
Her right hand, which had been gripping the sword hilt, slowly relaxed and dropped to her side.
“Dailina.”
Xiya’s voice came from behind.
He pushed himself up from the ground, moving slowly.
When he brushed the dust off his clothes, the movement pulled at his still-healing wounds, and his brow furrowed slightly in pain.
“Feili’s concerns are valid.”
“Huh?”
Dailina turned to look at Xiya.
“Monsters are dangerous. There must be monsters that can infect humans. Feili isn’t wrong. It’s correct to guard against all possible threats.”
Feili looked up, her amber eyes flickering with confusion.
‘He’s actually speaking up for me?’
She stared at Xiya’s face, trying to find a flaw.
‘Is he faking it? Or has the demon temporarily released its control over him?’
Feili’s doubts only deepened.
Whatever the case, she would have to be even more careful.
“Ladies.”
A guard stepped forward, his eyes sweeping across the three.
“Since your classmate is fine, you should hurry back to town. It’s getting late, and it’s unsafe outside the town.”
“Okay, let’s go back.”
Dailina nodded and glanced back at Xiya.
The three followed the guards out of the ruins.
***
That night, Xiya entered his room, closed the door, and hung a black cloak on the hook.
His school uniform was so torn it was almost unwearable.
He had borrowed a cloak to drape over himself and found a place in town to do a temporary patch-up.
Today, he had experienced life and death twice—once deep in the ruins, and once at the entrance.
Feili had been reborn and bore him such hostility.
When he realized she had been reborn, he thought he was done for.
But instead, he was saved by Dailina.
Given how harshly he had criticized her in his previous life, the more he thought about it, the guiltier he felt.
Knock knock knock.
Xiya had just sat down when a knock came at the door.
“Who is it?”
Xiya got up and walked to the door.
‘Who would come looking for me this late?’
“It’s me.”
Feili’s voice came from outside.
Xiya tensed up.
‘What does she want? Could she be here to finish me off since she failed in the evening?’
‘But she wouldn’t dare act here, would she? This is a town. Isn’t she afraid of being arrested?’
He opened the door a crack, only to meet Feili’s cold stare.
“Listen, Blood Demon, don’t think you can hide inside Xiya’s body and I won’t dare touch you.”
Feili’s voice was so low only the two of them could hear.
“Feili, what are you talking about? What Blood Demon is hiding in my body?”
Xiya looked innocent.
He had no idea where the Blood Demon had gone.
There was no sign of possession in his body.
“And back at the ruins, you kept saying weird things…”
“Keep pretending. I won’t let you off.”
With that, Feili turned and left without giving Xiya a chance to explain.
‘What the hell?’
‘I’m really not possessed by the Blood Demon!’