Elys kept grumbling as she failed to get the campfire lit. Instead of smoke coming out of it, it was her head that was smoking.
Near the stream, Jerome could only smile at the woman’s antics. When Elys happened to notice her companion laughing at her, she immediately tried even harder to get the fire going. She rubbed the two pieces of wood in her hands together, and little by little, smoke finally began to rise.
Knowing Jerome was still watching her, Elys put on a proud expression. She even lifted her chin higher to prove that she had succeeded.
“Are you showing off, Elys?” Jerome asked, a teasing smile spreading across his face.
“What do you think?”
“If you’d left it to me, we wouldn’t have taken so long to start the fire.”
“Hand it over to you while you’re injured? Wouldn’t that be the same thing, Jerome?”
“Elys, Elys. You’re the first woman to underestimate my talent.”
In the middle of their conversation, not far from where they were standing, someone was apparently eavesdropping.
Despite the silence and darkness of the night, someone could be seen stalking them. But who was it? Without Jerome and Elys knowing, that person began to make his move.
He stepped forward slowly, extremely carefully. He continued sneaking up from behind, where Jerome was.
Thud!
The sound of someone falling rang out at the same moment Elys threw her dagger straight into the man’s left chest.
The woman hurried over. With swift precision, Elys subdued him. Elys asked who he really was, what tribe he belonged to, and who he was working for in doing all this.
Not one of Elys’s several questions received an answer.
The man, blood still pouring from his chest, refused to say a single word. From his face, he was clearly someone’s hired hand. And he had certainly been carrying out a mission.
Jerome, unwilling to let the momentum slip away either, tried to bombard him with questions. But unfortunately, too much blood had already been lost. The man died without giving them any important information.
“Your throw was too strong, Elys,” Jerome interjected.
“So you’re blaming me?”
“No.”
“If I’d known you were going to talk like that, Jerome, I would’ve let him stab you earlier.”
“Forgive me, Elys. What I meant was—”
“Forget it. People really don’t know what’s good for them.”
The night grew later, but the mood turned even sourer. There was more distance between Jerome and Elys now. The man whose abdominal wound had yet to dry felt guilty again.
He should never have talked so much earlier.
Now he had lost the warmth. It wasn’t the campfire that had gone out, but Jerome’s heart, which felt truly miserable. Once again, he had disappointed and angered Elys.
Seeing the wavy-haired woman approach the campfire made Jerome feel even guiltier. The man’s heart was now in turmoil. Already feeling uncomfortable, Jerome was also excessively awkward by nature. Especially when it came to women.
Elys lay down beside the fire, while Jerome remained near the corpse of the man, which was beginning to stiffen.
Suddenly, his heart gave him orders, and Jerome slowly lifted the dead man’s body. He thought that burying the corpse would make Elys feel less burdened. Even if it didn’t, he had done what a man was supposed to do. It wouldn’t be a pleasant sight if Elys also had to dispose of the corpse of the man whose life she had taken.
Several minutes after digging into the earth with whatever tools nature provided, he began dragging the man’s corpse away. But before that, Jerome took something from the unfortunate man’s body.