No30 Ch3

“…Did you see it yourself?”

“What would I gain from telling such a despicable lie?”

Dylan grinned and asked back.

For a moment, the corpses covered in blood flashed through her mind. The bald woman on the chair, and the narrow-chinned man and the braided woman sprawled strangely on the floor, their eyes wide open.

She didn’t really want to hear it. Even if she was terrified, the story of someone pushing someone else was… even more so when the result was death.

Liella, her pale lips moving, tried to think about what was urgent.

“I’ll keep that in mind. More importantly, is your leg okay?”

“No? It’s about to be cut off, you know?”

“That’s a relief. I need to stop the bleeding, so come over here.”

“Are you a psychopath?”

There was no clean cloth. But the bleeding had to be stopped as soon as possible. Liella took off her uniform jacket and anxiously groped the floor, then carefully rolled up Dylan’s pants leg when she touched his ankle.

“Aaaargh,” Dylan screamed.

“Don’t you have a lighter? I saw in a movie that you can sprinkle gunpowder from a cartridge and light it on fire in situations like this.”

“What kind of movie did you watch?”

This wasn’t the Middle Ages. Besides, this guy would probably scream and faint if she cauterized the wound.

Then, at the sound of the hatch opening with a thud, Liella turned her head with a look of joy.

“Aslan!”

“Did I make it in time to repay the favor?”

Liella then realized that she hadn’t even counted the seconds. She probably would have kept waiting even after three minutes had passed.

“Oh, yes. Just barely. Sorry, but can you take out the gauze and bandage first? It’s a penetrating wound in the calf, so I need to stop the bleeding quickly.”

Aslan didn’t ask twice and found the bandage and handed it over. Liella, who had been holding his ankle, estimated where the wound would be, wrapped the bandage tightly, and began to apply direct pressure with her knees bent. Dylan, who had been crying so much until just now, gritted his teeth and endured.

Had all the foreign objects that had been cut off been removed from his leg? What if he got infected with an unknown bacteria? His nerves or muscles might have been damaged. If only she could see the condition with her own eyes.

All of this was a problem because she couldn’t turn on the light. She wanted to cry.

When blood soaked through, she didn’t remove the bandage but put another one on top of it and applied pressure.

Meanwhile, Aslan tapped the floor once, then walked a few steps and swept his hand across the wall. After a moment, with a click, the flame of a lighter flared in the air. Liella was startled and widened her eyes.

“If you turn on the light…”

They were in the middle of a long, wide hallway. There were no windows around. The space, which was dimly revealed, had a structure with rooms on both sides.

“Judging from the degree of echo and the shape of the walls, I thought it would be okay. I’ll take a quick look around.”

“Oh, yes.”

Liella, who had been absentmindedly distracted by her surroundings, suddenly came to her senses and looked down at Dylan’s leg. Fortunately, the wound where the bleeding had been stopped did not show any signs of swelling or infection. Relieved, Liella took out disinfectant from the kit, covered it with gauze, and wrapped the bandage tightly. Only after giving him an antibiotic injection in his thigh did she finally have a moment to breathe.

“Are you okay? Do you have any particularly concerning symptoms? Like you feel being feverish.”

When she asked, looking at the pale Dylan, he frowned.

“I don’t know. I feel like I’m going to die from the pain, so give me a painkiller.”

He was someone who said thank you in a unique way. Narrowing her eyes and glaring at him, she rummaged through the red survival bag, but no matter how much she looked, there were no painkillers. It was then that something flew from over there, and Dylan reflexively caught it.

He looked bewildered as he looked at the painkiller safely in his hand.

“What’s this?”

“You don’t have to thank me. I’m giving it to you because I feel like I’m going to get neurosis from your screams.”

Aslan, who had stopped at the other end of the hallway, bluntly sneered at his behavior of not saying thank you. As Dylan’s expression soured, Liella, who had been blankly looking back at Aslan, turned pale and jumped up.

“How badly are you hurt? Did that happen when you were shielding me earlier?”

She hadn’t realized it because he was talking and acting so normally. Blood was all over the man’s right cheek and neck.

“The bleeding has almost stopped, and there are no wounds that are likely to be a problem.”

“If you’re okay, why did you bring the painkiller? Disinfect it now, in case you get a bacterial infection….”

Just as she approached him and questioned him, Aslan grabbed her wrist with his left hand, which wasn’t holding the lighter. Liella, her words cut off, blinked and stared strangely at her convulsing hand at eye level.

“I guess your own wounds don’t hurt.”

He spoke softly, tilting his head. Only then did she remember how she had painfully cut both palms while helping Dylan earlier. They were covered in blood from trying to stop the bleeding, how did he know?

“Ah…”

She had no idea where her mind was wandering. Her heart had been pounding erratically like she had arrhythmia since earlier, and her eyes were having trouble focusing. She just needed to administer first aid quickly. Someone had died, someone was hurt… the afterimage of blood flickered in her vision, and Aslan released her wrist as she stopped breathing.

“You should rest for a bit.”

“No.”

Liella denied it without a moment’s hesitation.

“If my body rests, I’ll have more time to think, which will only make me more anxious. I’ll look around the rooms with you. And check the injuries. That would make me feel better.”

“I understand how you feel, but I’m not saying this to be nice, I’m saying it because there’s no need for you to do that.”

“What do you mean?”

Instead of answering, Aslan raised the lighter closer to the wall he had been looking at. Liella’s eyes followed naturally, widening as she looked at the wall.

“This is…”

Revealed before her eyes was a tall wall with a diagram of the levels inside an oval vehicle lying horizontally like a whale. Aslan slowly read the white letters at the very top of the diagram.

“Abyss Project 30.”

1F
Emergency Exit, Transport Device, Control and Maintenance Room

2F
Living Quarters, Food Storage, Weapons and Equipment Vault, Medical Facility

3F
Cockpit, Communications Room, Data Analysis and Laboratory

Judging by the fact that only the white letters for 2F were written large, this seemed to be the second floor. Aslan asked,

“What kind of structure does it seem to be for?”

“…I don’t know. I know it’s not an ordinary aircraft.”

“It’s probably an exploration vessel. That’s the only way to explain the structure.”

She was startled by the sudden intrusion of an unfamiliar voice. Turning her head sharply, a plump shadow emerged cautiously from the darkness across the way. It was the bespectacled man who had been intimidated by the tense standoff between the two men downstairs.

He had a gentle face with small eyes behind glass lenses that were striking. When she first saw him, he seemed much more trustworthy than Dylan or the nameless man with the narrow chin.

“I came up first and was looking around, and, well, I think we were dispatched as part of some kind of underground exploration team and then had an accident in the field. Fortunately, there seems to be food and rooms for each of us, so… let’s just wait here for a while. They know there was an accident, so the rescue team might be looking for us…”

Sensing the sharp atmosphere, the man expressed his opinion at length. But the sense of unease came from the last sentence. Liella flinched and looked back at Aslan. Rescue team. That word sounded particularly unreal. And the moment she saw his deep blue eyes, which had become less saturated, she was sure that she wasn’t the only one feeling uneasy.

It was as if he already knew that there would be no ‘rescue team’. Even the man who had spoken the words closed his mouth and furrowed his chin as if he couldn’t understand it himself.

“Rooms for each of us? What, so I have a room too?”

Then Dylan, who had been leaning against the wall like a corpse, suddenly raised his upper body and asked. The man, who had been suppressed by the silence, seemed happy for any kind of reaction.

“The living quarters are this way.”

As if he were the owner of the exploration vessel, he smiled and rummaged through his pockets before turning on a small, palm-sized light.

“You had a light.”

Aslan said tonelessly, clicking off his lighter.

“It was dark when we came up, so I thought there was no one nearby.”

“Ah, well, you never know what might happen… By the way, shouldn’t we pile something more against that hatch? I’m worried about when that monster might break through again.”

“So you were hiding. Watching us struggle to stop the bleeding.”

Dylan summarized simply, and the man smiled awkwardly. The thought of him listening in the darkness made her skin crawl. How was he any different from the monster downstairs?

“I just saw that there’s a sofa or something in there, so let’s move it over the hatch later.”

“Got it.”

Aslan agreed readily, then paused for a moment before speaking again.

“It’s fortunate that someone has already looked around the living quarters. Then, for now, please take care of the injured person first. I’ll go check the food storage and armory.”

For a moment, the man seemed to hesitate. Liella quickly took the initiative.

“Ah, I’ll go with you. It’s safer to split into pairs, and if we need to memorize the items, two heads are better than one.”

“What? Wait a minute. Then I’ll…”

“If there’s a bed, I’d appreciate it if you could lay the injured person there to rest. Structurally, there seems to be a window in each private room, so be sure to turn off the lights before entering.”

Aslan smoothly brushed aside Dylan’s objection and immediately turned away. Liella also picked up only the medical bag from the survival kit she had placed on the floor and followed beside him.

“I feel like I’m being watched.”

She muttered softly as they walked down the hallway.

“I’m not worried about that one.”

“Then who are you worried about?”

The man, who had been looking straight ahead, turned his gaze to her.