CHAPTER 47: THE CHILD OF RAGNOR.

"Are you by chance the king, needing me as a servant?"

Dorian asked, his arms folded while lowering his gaze at the cave crawler.

Silence took over for a while as the crawler contemplated whether to give an answer or not. Its green eyes swayed back and forth, thinking.

’It’s still feeling hesitant.’ Dorian sighed. ’Good thing I had the workers escape; they would have run out of mana, and the toxic air would most likely kill them.’

With the workers gone, Dorian could focus on trying to understand the motive of this crawler and why it was holed up in here. If it wanted to crawl its way out, there is no doubt it could.

’When things like this happen, it’s usually either because they are protecting something or hiding from something. Which is it?’

"Lord Dorian?!!!!"

"Master?! Are you alright?!"

Voices unexpectedly filled the air in a chaotic manner.

Both Dorian and Maria turned their attention to the side, where they could see Seraphina sprinting towards them with a worried look on her face. She held a fire torch in her hand that lit up the entire place the closer she got.

Flying beside her was Lili, her pace rather slow in comparison.

As soon as she arrived in front of Dorian, Seraphina grabbed his hand with both her hands and moved it to her chest while looking up at him.

She ignored all the destruction and sparkling beauty around her and focused solely on Dorian.

"My lord, are you alright? Did those monsters get their saliva on you? Lili said it’s incurable if they do; please tell me they didn’t." Her voice was laced with concern.

Dorian nervously tilted his head back before responding, "I am fine; none of their saliva touched me, promise."

After hearing his response, Seraphina sighed, relief playing on her features.

Lili, now flapping her bat wings next to Dorian’s head, perched gently on his shoulder.

"I told her you were fine, but she insisted on making sure for herself," Lili giggled. "You should have seen the look she had when I told her the poison from the monsters was incurable; she ran away like a child, HAHA."

"Is that so..."

Dorian looked at Seraphina for a while, watching as she was now scanning Maria’s body to make sure she was not hurt as well.

He turned away with a slight smile, his attention now on the crawler.

"Lili, can you help once again? I need to discuss with this creature."

"I can link our thoughts so you can understand, though; wouldn’t that be easier?"

"You can do that?!" He shot her a glare.

"Yes."

’Why the fuck did she not mention it before? Nah, it’s partially my fault for not checking her stats anyway.’

"Do it."

"Yes."

[Notice, Lili has linked her thoughts with yours.]

’Hmm, let’s see.’

Dorian settled on the ground, not too far from where the crawler was. Its gaze was fixed to the ground, not daring to look the humans before it in the eye.

"Hi, my name is Dorian. Do you have a name?" Dorian uttered with a soft voice, trying to make sure the crawler felt safe enough to speak.

The crawler slowly raised its head.

"No...name..."

It responded.

Dorian could hear it loud and clear. A look of awe graced his features as he kept pressing, not wanting to lose the opportunity.

"Are you hiding from the world outside? Is that why you’ve been here all by yourself?"

"This is home. Must protect the child of Ragnor. Duty till death."

’Child of Ragnor? Where have I heard that before?’

"So you attacked us because you thought we wanted to harm this...child?" Another question popped right out.

"Protecting home from strange beings. Never seen being. Being scary. But you needed special mana to hasten birth. Can’t kill. Too important."

The monster’s words were like moist code, not easily understood without thinking more about it.

From the little Dorian had gathered, it began to make sense.

This creature most likely never knew anything other than here, where it was born. Born from the mana of a probably dead dragon. As such, to it, especially with its intelligence, it figured beings like Dorian, which it was seeing for the first time, were some kind of threat.

But that also didn’t answer the rest of his question.

Dorian’s eyes widened as another thought crept into his mind.

"I have another question!" he leaned forward. "Please tell me more about this child you’re protecting, and also, what did you mean by servant?"

Meanwhile, at the back, Maria and Seraphina watched as he interacted with the creature.

"S-shouldn’t we go help him?" asked Seraphina.

"Do you speak monster?"

"No."

"Okay."

Silence.

"I’m glad you’re alright," Maria said, her face calm regardless, focused only on Dorian.

"Me too. Although if Lord Dorian’s summons wasn’t there, I would probably be dead by now." Seraphina giggled a bit. "There is also the fact he will definitely yell at me for disobeying his orders. Urrgh, I’d definitely cry if he yells at me," she went low, her hands cupping her cheeks.

Maria suddenly recalled the time before the monsters attacked, when Dorian had screamed at her, telling her that she had to run if he gave the signal.

She could feel her chest getting tighter, almost exploding.

Despite the fact that Seraphina’s statement was probably intended as a joke, Maria was able to immediately identify with it.

She knew that if Dorian became angry with her, even for a brief moment, she might cry, as evidenced by the fact that he had once yelled at her, and she most definitely felt it in her chest.

Maria gripped her chest and said it to herself, her eyes downcast.

’I don’t get it. W-hat exactly am I feeling?’

It didn’t take long for Seraphina to catch the sad look on Maria’s face.

However, before she could say anything, Dorian showed up in front of them.

"We are done here; let’s head back," he announced, wasting no time before he walked away.

"Eh? What about the mining ground? And that too?" Maria pointed at the crawler.

In response, Dorian stopped and turned to face them.

"What about it?" his face was serene. "We are coming back tomorrow to resume work. For now, we are going back. We have gathered all we need." He then continued walking away.

’We need a better plan if what’s to come does indeed come.’

His footsteps became more distant.

Maria and Seraphina glanced at each other with curiosity before they immediately ran to catch up to him.