DAR Vol. 6 Chapter 21 Part 1

Chapter 21 – Harbingers of a New Trouble

Uncle Gry was dreaming.

In his dream, Uncle Gry stood alone in the night sky, confronting a woman. Two shadows floated in midair, facing each other.

“After killing my precious little darlings, you really are a wicked Gryphon.”

The moment he heard her voice, Uncle Gry understood that this dream was a reproduction of a memory from long ago.

Though it was night, only the space around Uncle Gry was unnaturally bright. Because of that, heavy shadows draped the woman’s face, and only her red lips, warped into an amused smile, glittered with unsettling clarity.

For Uncle Gry, it was a memory he wanted to forget. Even as resentment curdled inside him at dreaming of it again, the dream refused to stop.

<Wait! I wasn’t targeting your lackeys! I just sank ships at random, and they happened to be mixed in!>

Uncle Gry protested desperately. But the woman only deepened the smile on her red lips.

A sadistic smile.

She called them her “little darlings,” but she meant her own underlings. Someone as cold-blooded as her couldn’t possibly have been attached enough to them to crave revenge.

It was only a pretext. She’d simply decided it was a splendid opportunity to torment Uncle Gry, an old acquaintance, and she was enjoying herself.

Uncle Gry was already battered beyond recognition.

Magic she’d unleashed had left scorched burns all over his body. He’d been chased for more than half a day, and exhaustion had piled up in crushing layers.

She’d attacked him by the seaside, but now a forest spread beneath them. In his frantic flight, he seemed to have reached deep into the continent’s interior.

The sun that had been high in the sky was long gone, and darkness sealed the land below.

And yet the area around him was bright because of her magic.

Flames had been strung around Uncle Gry in a net, hemming him in from every direction—above, below, left, right—leaving him nowhere to run.

“I don’t want to hear excuses. But, hmm… killing an interesting little thing like you would be a waste. So I’ll forgive you by cooking you half-baked.”

<Even half-baked will kill me if you cook me!!>

“Oh? If you’re lucky, you might survive.”

Uncle Gry sucked in a hard breath.

He’d drawn the worst possible opponent. For years he had avoided her, so why had he run into her in a place like that?

And right after he’d killed her underlings, too, at the most disastrous moment imaginable.

From Uncle Gry’s perspective, he’d only defended himself against people who attacked him. He’d held back just enough to let them flee, tracked where they would run, then wiped out not only the one giving orders, but everyone tied to the affair in one sweep.

The trouble was, the port they fled to had countless ships docked there, and he couldn’t tell which vessel belonged to the one he wanted. Checking them one by one was a nuisance.

So he destroyed ships at random.

They were all in the same place, he’d figured collective responsibility was fair enough. He had never even considered that her underlings might be among them.

Even Uncle Gry, an arrogance incarnate, had people he absolutely could not defeat.

The woman before him was one of them.

Entangling with her only ever led to headaches, so whenever he sensed she was nearby, he’d made a habit of fleeing at full speed. Until now, that had been enough to avoid meeting her.

But when she pursued him in earnest like this, even Uncle Gry, who was proud of his speed, couldn’t shake her.

She was supposed to be a human mage, yet she could fly faster than Uncle Gry. And no matter how he tried to strike back, every attack was neutralized, leaving him unable to so much as scratch her.

<Wait! Let’s talk this out!!>

Sensing a surge of extraordinary mana, Uncle Gry shouted.

The color of the fiery net around him shifted, changing from crimson to a dazzling, blue-white flame.

It was proof that the temperature had spiked violently.

“I’ve been thinking for a long time that you needed to learn a painful lesson. You mischievous nuisance Gryphon.”

Her red lips gleamed moistly in the firelight.

“It was fine when you were obeying your master, but ever since you became a stray, your behavior has been intolerable. Do you know this? Lately, it seems people think Gryphons are the absolute worst kind of warlike magic beast. And that’s basically your fault, isn’t it?”

<That’s slander! I’m this good-natured and charming!>

“…Honestly, you never change. Where does that bizarre confidence even come from…?”

A sigh slipped from her lips.

“Reflect on yourself. Even a little.”

With that murmur, the flames around Uncle Gry lunged at him all at once.

In the next instant, he was engulfed in blue-white fire and plummeting toward the ground… or he should have been.

Heat stole even his ability to breathe. He couldn’t even scream.

If he inhaled, he drew in searing air that burned his throat. For a fleeting moment he caught the stench of charring flesh, then his sense of smell burned away, and even that vanished.

He curled in on himself against the agony of being roasted alive, able only to surrender to the fall. Even through closed eyelids, the blaze scorched his eyes. His consciousness blurred until he could no longer grasp the state of his own body.

It was a miserable memory, one he could never forget.

And yet…

Uncle Gry woke from the dream.

When he opened his eyes and returned to reality, his expression was calm despite the nightmare, because he could feel the warmth of the ones sleeping close beside him.

“…Uncle Gry, you were having a bad dream?”

A gentle voice echoed.

They were in a roadside grove, a place prepared so travelers could camp for the night.

Nearby, a campfire burned. In the quiet darkness, the flickering flame was nothing like what he’d seen in the dream. This fire was tranquil, warm with the same comfort as another’s body heat.

<I was dreaming about the past.> 

“…”

No reply came to his answer.

When Uncle Gry lowered his gaze to his belly, Roa, who should have been the one to speak, had already drifted back to sleep.

He must have noticed Uncle Gry’s distress and woken up for him. Fighting off drowsiness, he’d surely watched over him in worry.

Then, once he confirmed Uncle Gry had awakened safely and nothing was wrong, he must have relaxed and fallen asleep again.

Uncle Gry smiled at Roa’s thoughtfulness.

Right after being swallowed by those flames, Uncle Gry had met Roa.

The one who saved Uncle Gry, charred black from head to toe, had been Roa.

It was not long after Roa had begun studying alchemy. The only magic recovery potions he could make were low-grade, and Uncle Gry suffered lingering aftereffects for a while, but Roa cared for him meticulously until he healed.

Being burned by that woman had been a misfortune, but meeting Roa had overwritten it into a good memory.

Even that moment of searing torment, if it had been necessary so he could meet Roa, felt almost welcome…

<Still… why now, of all times, would I dream of that?>

Gazing at Roa’s sleeping face, Uncle Gry pondered.

Beside Roa, the twin magic wolves, the red Roo and the blue Phi, slept with utterly unguarded, peaceful expressions.

<Ah. Because we’re finally heading toward the sea again…>

The last time Uncle Gry had gone to the ocean was when he’d met that woman. Ever since he sank the ships in that harbor, he’d avoided going anywhere near it.

The fact that they were heading for the sea again must have dredged up that memory.

<I only hope this dream isn’t an omen…>

Uncle Gry’s uneasy mutter dissolved into the silence of the night.

𑁋

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