Surviving the Evil Gods

〈 Episode 4 〉 Prison City Olphasvet

***

Aslan froze.

He stood completely still, not even blinking or breathing, as he stared blankly at the window before him.

Twelve years was by no means a short amount of time.

Aslan’s twelve years had been far from easy, and even if it wasn’t quite half a lifetime for a human, the pain of it was impossible to ignore.

Even recalling those twelve years was agonizing, and the very appearance of a main quest now was incomprehensible to him.

Who was Angela Tale?

Why was a main quest appearing now?

Aslan had no understanding of it.

The only thought moving sluggishly through his mind was the realization that the first main quest was beginning here, in the prison city of Olphasvet.

This wasn’t his first time visiting Olphasvet.

Yet in all his previous visits, no main quest had appeared.

If there was a difference between now and then…

Aslan’s thoughts reached that point just as the girl and the men clashed.

Smack!

More precisely, the girl swung the rock she held.

Despite her small stature, the rock she swung with her outstretched arm struck the man’s head squarely.

The man, who had just begun to charge at her, clutched his temple where he had been hit by the rock.

He staggered but didn’t fall. Gritting his teeth, he lunged forward.

“You filthy little wretch!”

Spewing curses, the man easily grabbed the girl’s wrist. Overconfident in his strength, he hadn’t realized just how thin and frail her limbs were.

‘There’s no way she can break free.’

Aslan thought this as he prepared to intervene. If he was going to act, now was the time.

But contrary to his expectation, the girl moved first.

When she saw the man raising his fist, she leapt forward.

Crunch!

She sank her teeth into the arm holding her wrist.

It was a dirty and crude tactic, but undeniably effective. As she clenched her eyes shut and bit down, blood spurted from the man’s forearm.

“Ahh! Let go! I said let go!”

The man screamed, swinging his fist at her. His blows landed on the side of her head, making dull, thwack sounds each time they struck her crimson hair.

But the girl refused to yield, glaring fiercely as she bit down harder.

“Ugh… Ahhh!”

Finally, the man let go of her wrist. The girl responded by driving her knee upward into his groin.

“Guh!”

With a sharp cry, the man collapsed, and the girl, her hair now disheveled, grinned through the chaos. The crowd burst into laughter, mocking the fallen man.

Now, only the dragonkin remained.

The dragonkin stood silently with his arms crossed, looking down at the girl without any sign of urgency.

From his composed demeanor, Aslan could discern two things.

First, the dragonkin’s confidence.

Second, his discernment.

This was no mere brute with a large frame. He was a warrior.

A warrior with enough experience to gauge the strength of his opponent and assess the outcome of a fight.

And this warrior seemed to see no reason to hurry.

Though the girl had managed to defeat his subordinates through luck and underhanded tactics, there was no way she could overcome a dragonkin over two meters tall. That much was clear.

The girl seemed to realize it as well. The fierce grin on her face slowly faded.

Noticing the change in her expression, the dragonkin spoke.

“Angela Tale. Does my proposal displease you so much?”

Without a word, the girl bent down and picked up another rock from the ground. Even with a weapon now in her hand, the dragonkin didn’t appear concerned.

On the contrary, he regarded her with a haughty gaze, looking down at her as he said,

“A lowborn like you should be grateful for my protection. Was my offer to take you under me so distasteful?”

The girl’s expression twisted with faint contempt and anger as she listened to his words. Her hand, the one not holding the rock, trembled as she shouted.

“Like hell I would, you damn lizard bastard!”

With a burst of fury, she hurled the rock.

The well-thrown rock whistled sharply through the air as it flew toward the dragonkin, who effortlessly caught it.

The rock struck his large palm with a dull thud before rolling to the ground.

The dragonkin let out a sigh.

“Angela Tale, must blood truly be spilled—”

He stopped mid-sentence.

The girl who had been standing before him was gone.

The crowd, now staring behind the dragonkin, gave away the direction of her escape. Realizing what had happened, the dragonkin spun around.

The girl had used the moment to flee, and she wasn’t far. Her figure was visible in the distance, sprinting away.

The dragonkin frowned in annoyance and began to chase. The crowd erupted into jeers and taunts, shouting after the fleeing girl and her pursuer.

Among them, only Aslan quietly observed the girl’s escape route before slipping into a side alley.

*

“Haah… haah… hah…”

The girl ran, her breaths ragged. Behind her, the dragonkin, towering at least three heads taller, pursued relentlessly.

With his thick tail providing balance, the dragonkin leaned forward as he sprinted, his speed impressive despite his size.

The girl shoved aside anyone who appeared in her path, and those she pushed scrambled to avoid the dragonkin barreling after her. In this way, she managed to gain a bit of distance.

‘I’m going to get caught!’

The girl was a Tail.

She had been born and raised in Belus Alphen, the city of the dragonkin.

Who her parents were or how she had come into existence was a mystery. From a young age, she had lived in the slums of Belus Alphen.

Her surname, Tale, was inevitable.

The city of the dragonkin was built beneath the bones of an ancient dragon, once revered as a god. Its districts were divided by the body parts of the dragon, and these divisions determined the social hierarchy.

The most wretched and lowly residents lived in the slums concentrated in the dragon’s tail.

These people were all Tails.

The Tails were all human.

They were neither large nor possessed of tails or exceptional physical abilities. They were, simply put, ordinary humans.

Given that the city’s nobility consisted entirely of dragonkin, this arrangement was unsurprising.

The girl despised the dragonkin.

While she fought and quarreled daily with other Tails over scraps of food, her hatred for the dragonkin burned brighter.

Their haughty, disdainful gazes, as if they were peering down at filth.

The way they avoided her as though she were trash disgusted her.

The way they treated the Tails like livestock to be managed filled her with loathing.

Her defiance of the dragonkin who had offered to take her under his protection was only natural.

Though personal dislike played a role, her rejection stemmed from the sheer inequality of it all.

“Hah… huh… hhh…”

So she resisted and fought, even if the outcome seemed futile.

The girl suppressed the breath clawing at her throat and forced her legs to keep moving. She dashed across the streets dyed in crimson hues and rounded a corner.

Thunk.

“Ah—ugh!”

The moment she turned the corner, her foot landed on a loose rock, and she fell.

As her body hit the ground with a jarring thud, the breath caught in her throat turned into a gag. Clamping a hand over her mouth, she coughed violently.

The sound of the dragonkin’s footsteps drew closer. Gritting her teeth, the girl squeezed her eyes shut.

And just as those footsteps came right up behind her—

“Ugh?!”

Someone grabbed the girl’s wrist and pulled her.

Caught off guard, she stumbled into a back alley, dragged along helplessly.

The person who had pulled her clamped a hand over her mouth and pressed her against a wall. In the sudden shift of events, the girl’s eyes widened.

“Shh.”

As her gaze shot upward, she saw a man.

Towering over her by at least two heads, he had black hair and striking teal eyes. His expression was a mixture of weariness and quiet solemnity. Holding a finger to his lips, he gestured for her to remain silent as he kept her pinned against the wall.

Naturally, resentment began to well up inside her.

“Damn it… did I lose her?”

But before the girl could act on her frustration, the dragonkin’s voice drifted into the alley, silencing her.

Realizing the situation, she clenched her teeth and suppressed her indignation.

Did he help me?

Only after the sound of the dragonkin’s footsteps faded into the distance did the man release her wrist and remove his hand from her mouth.

“That was close.”

As he spoke, it was clear that she had been mere moments away from being caught.

Though she couldn’t be certain what would have happened if she had been captured, it was obvious it wouldn’t have been anything she’d welcome.

While the man’s intervention was undoubtedly helpful, the girl frowned as she looked at him, her golden eyes glinting with caution.

“Who are you?”

She didn’t recognize him. His face was unfamiliar.

She hadn’t been imprisoned for very long, and as a result, she hadn’t had the chance to meet many of the other inmates. The only people she had known were the fellow impoverished workers she’d been with back in Belus Alphen.

Most of them were dead, as was her employer, so it was unlikely this man was someone she knew.

She hadn’t been in the city long, but she understood one thing: few, if any, people in this city could be trusted.

“Why did you help me?”

Her suspicion led her to assume the man had ulterior motives. She expected him to demand something in return.

“You looked like you’d be in danger if you got caught.”

His response was immediate.

And with that answer, he fell silent.

It seemed that was all there was to it, as he showed no intention of elaborating further.

When the girl raised her eyebrows in disbelief, the man added,

“I was watching. Saw you fighting that dragonkin’s lackey.”

The girl’s expression grew even more perplexed at his words.

Throughout her escape, she hadn’t noticed anyone else following her.

To reach the alley and intercept her ahead of the dragonkin would have required incredible speed.

As if reading her confusion, the man gestured toward the far end of the alley with a nod.

The alley stretched ahead before being blocked by an irregularly jutting wall.

It wasn’t particularly high, but it looked climbable with enough effort.

The girl glanced at the wall, then turned back to him as he spoke.

“Judging by the direction you were running, I figured you’d head this way, so I took a straight path to cut you off. Nothing surprising.”

She frowned at his explanation.

She couldn’t tell if what he said was plausible.

But he didn’t seem inclined to elaborate further. Instead, he took a step back from her and continued.

“Even if it’s just a fight, I didn’t feel like watching a group gang up on a single person.”

It was a reason she couldn’t comprehend. The girl opened her mouth to question him, only to close it again when interrupted by an unexpected sound.

Grrrumble.

The noise came not from the man, but from the girl herself.

More precisely, from her stomach.

Embarrassed by the thunderous growl, she pressed her lips tightly together and cast her eyes downward.

“…You’re hungry.”

The man, seemingly understanding the situation, nodded slightly and asked, “Want to eat something?”

As the girl silently stared at him, the man thought to himself.

I’m not letting this opportunity to finally progress a main quest slip away.

***