IATAOTHKG | CHAPTER 41 – Novexa Novels

~CHAPTER 41~

Banze glanced once at Caliph, then at Mayna.

He twisted his lips faintly, as if amused.

He had clearly misunderstood something.

After all, he didn’t know that Mayna had just been discharged from the hospital.

He probably thought she had been secretly meeting with Banze again, talking about things he wasn’t meant to hear.

“You always make such a tough entrance, don’t you?”

Banze said with a relaxed smile, looking at Caliph.

“I have something to report.”

Caliph, having already regained his composure, replied in a formal tone.

The angry expression he had worn moments ago was completely gone.

“I was waiting for you, actually.”

Banze gestured toward the chair, inviting him to sit.

It seemed the two had already exchanged some words earlier.

Caliph sat down next to Mayna.

“So, you went to Hiscarn?”

Banze asked.

Mayna turned sharply to look at Caliph.

He nodded with a calm expression.

“As I said this morning, I went with Rob and the inspector.”

“And what news do you bring?”

“Three things. First, the gate at Hiscarn that was sealed 3 years and 2 months ago has disappeared without a trace.”

Even when a dungeon was destroyed and its gate sealed, some remnant of it usually remained.

To ordinary eyes, it might just look like a lone door or some kind of art installation, but for those with abilities, they could still open it or enter the dungeon.

So the fact that the gate disappeared without leaving any trace was unprecedented.

“The gate disappeared…?”

“Yes.”

Repeating Caliph’s words, Banze’s expression darkened rapidly.

“Second, the paths near the gate were cut off, but upon investigation, there were several such places inside Hiscarn.”

Listening to Caliph, Mayna fell into thought.

‘If the paths were cut off, was it the work of monsters or magical creatures?’

“Is it the work of monsters?”

Banze voiced exactly what Mayna had been thinking.

“We don’t know yet. But whether it was monsters, magical beasts, or even a natural phenomenon like lightning, there are no traces left.”

“No traces?”

“It vanished as if there had never been paths there at all.”

“…”

“Just like the gate disappeared without a trace.”

Mayna, having served as a paladin’s aide for seven years, had experienced almost everything both directly and indirectly.

She had faced countless bizarre monsters and witnessed varying levels of damage to civilians.

But for a gate and the paths leading to it to vanish entirely without trace was something she had never seen, something so strange she couldn’t even imagine it.

“Wait a moment.”

Banze hurriedly left the room.

Left suddenly alone, Mayna tried not to look at Caliph, who was sitting to her right, as she stood up.

Just as she was about to pass by, he grabbed her wrist.

“What do you think you’re doing?”

In a low, controlled voice, he asked.

When she lifted her eyes to meet his, she saw a face restraining intense anger.

“What do you mean, ‘what I’m doing’?”

“Why are you here?”

Mayna calmly replied.

Caliph’s grip tightened as he spoke, as if restraining his emotions with every word.

“…”

Seeing him like a ticking bomb ready to explode, Mayna wanted to respond, but she couldn’t.

‘I fainted suddenly and stayed in the hospital for a day, and Motenson visited with a letter from the prince, giving me caring scolding and healthy things for my body.’

…She couldn’t say that.

Caliph didn’t need to know she had been sick, or that Prince Viterion had visited.

Caliph opened his lips, waiting for an answer.

“You.”

“…”

“Did you decide to become a puppet?”

His words were strange, one of the countless quirks he showed when expressing anger.

It was that sarcastic way of speaking he used sometimes.

“Did Banze manipulate you?”

“Please don’t be sarcastic. If you have something to say, just say it properly.”

Mayna said calmly.

Unfortunately, her calm and rational tone made Caliph’s emotions even more tangled.

“You two had dinner alone, conspired, and then informed me you were quitting?”

Caliph gritted his teeth as he spoke.

He was partly correct.

“Even the two-week grace period or whatever, you and Banze planned in advance and notified me unilaterally. And that guy…”

Swallowing a curse, Caliph grabbed Mayna’s wrist tighter.

“Even deciding to work as an aide to that so-called X-rank paladin, you two came up with it together, didn’t you?”

“…”

“Answer me.”

“…”

Caliph considered the meaning of her silence.

Was it acknowledgment of his words, or a refusal to even speak?

Either way, he concluded, it was equally infuriating.

“Are you doing this on purpose?”

“Doing what?”

“Are you deliberately showing me the two of you together?”

“No, of course not…”

Mayna stopped herself from denying it immediately.

She thought about Caliph’s perspective.

‘…I guess he could feel that way.’

Since she had told Banze this morning that she had something to report, he might have misunderstood that she had planned the timing of her visit to the agency to coincide with Banze being in the office.

Furthermore, Banze had deliberately provoked Caliph on the day of the old contract’s cancellation.

Habitually trying to understand Caliph’s feelings, Mayna realized her own behavior.

‘Even now, I try to see things from Caliph’s point of view.’

She laughed quietly at her own foolishness.

Caliph, observing her, grew cold instantly.

“You’ve changed a lot. You can even make that expression now.”

“…?”

She realized her smile had been misinterpreted by him.

The misunderstandings were piling up too fast.

She could correct it if she tried, as she had always done.

But now there was no need.

So she let Caliph’s misunderstanding build like a massive wall in real time.