The Black-Thorn Betrayal
Karen’s bottom lip trembled slightly as Lisa’s question hung in the cool air of the ravine.
“Shawn…
Shawn promised me a massive split of the reward afterward,” Karen whispered, her voice cracking under the weight of the memory.
“He even swore he would personally present me to their Guild Master so I could get officially recruited.
But the moment the monsters showed up…”
She sniffled, using a trembling index finger to push her slipping round glasses back up the bridge of her nose.
“I really tried my best!” Karen cried, her hands trembling as she aggressively wiped a stray tear from her cheek.
“When we ran into those corrupted bears, I tried to cast a high-level speed and defense buff on myself.
But my magic aim is negative percent—I completely missed and gave Shawn’s target, the lead bear, the massive stat-boost instead.”
She swallowed hard, her chest heaving as she recalled the sheer panic of the moment.
“I panicked and tried to fix it with a gravity-anchor spell to slow the beast down.
But my trajectory warped again—the spell completely bypassed the monster and slammed into our own squad, locking their boots to the mud.”
Karen shrunk back, her posture collapsing as she imitated her former leader.
“Shawn was absolutely furious.
He grit his teeth so hard I thought they would shatter, his eyes burning with pure hatred as he looked at me.
One of the party members yelled that we weren’t going to survive this.”
They left me standing there like a statue, knowing the spell would wear off in five minutes—the exact moment the smoke cleared and the bears would hang all over me while they escaped.”
Kae blinked, his mind momentarily lagging as his modern-world memory database auto-filled the name Shawn.
Wait, Shawn?
Like…
Shawn Mendes?
He silently recalled the rhythm of that old pop track about bleeding love, a stray lyric bouncing around his thoughts.
Before he could hum it, a sharp, irritated vibration rattled the back of his mind.
“Focus, boy,” Pixel growled directly into his skull, her amber eyes cutting a sharp glance up at him.
“We are tracking a homicidal C-rank vanguard in a corrupted wasteland, not auditing an ancient, pre-transportation music playlist.
Keep your head in the server.”
Kae cleared his throat quickly, snapping out of the mental tangent as he looked back at the trembling half-elf.
“Right.
So they resorted to a tactical retreat,” Kae muttered, his tone dropping to a cold, dangerous frequency.
“Yes,” Karen whispered, her gaze dropping to the ground.
“Another mage quickly deployed a smoke barrier spell, completely blanketing the entire area so the bears wouldn’t see them.
But they knew the smoke would dissipate in exactly five minutes, and those monsters would easily track them down by scent anyway.
They knew they needed a distraction to break line of sight permanently.”
She squeezed her eyes shut, her knuckles turning white.
“One of them yelled that they needed a piece of live bait if they wanted to make a clean run for it.
Then…
then someone else suggested me.
They said I was just a nobody.
A low-tier filler who no one would ever care to miss.”
“And Shawn just went along with it?” Lisa asked, her hand tightening on the hilt of her mana-blade until her knuckles turned white.
“He didn’t even hesitate,” Karen nodded miserably.
“He raised his staff and cast a high-grade paralysis spell directly at my chest, completely locking my joints and making me entirely immobile.
He looked me dead in the eyes and said I was a strategic liability.
They left me standing there like a statue, knowing the spell would wear off in five minutes—the exact moment the smoke cleared and the bears would hang all over me while they escaped.”
Kae and Lisa stood in dead silence for a beat, staring down at her trembling posture.
Simultaneously, the exact same painful realization flashed through both of their minds:
This poor girl never stood a chance against people like that.
“They used you as a meat shield?” Lisa’s voice cracked, a heavy mixture of raw disbelief and growing anger distorting her tone.
She gripped the hilt of her mana-blade tightly, her knuckles turning white as her eyes fixed on the half-elf’s tear-stained face.
“That breaks every single protocol in the Adventurer’s Codex!
Leaving a teammate behind to save your own skin is absolute garbage behavior—those guys are scum.”
Kae crossed his arms, his “gamer-focus” dissecting the tactical failure.
“Sounds like you were dealing with low-tier players who don’t know how to manage a high-output unit.
They didn’t see the meta; they just saw a broken stat-tree and panicked.”
“A diamond in the rough,” Lisa whispered to Kae, leaning in close so Karen wouldn’t hear.
“She has A-rank mana levels, but zero control.
And look at her hair—that’s the mark of the High Elves’ lineage, even if she looks human.”
Kae looked at Karen, his eyes widening in sudden awe.
“High Elves’ lineage?
Like…
she’s from some royal or high-status family?”
Lisa gave a slow, deliberate nod, her green eyes fixed intently on the young half-elf.
“Yes.
She could be a really useful asset if trained properly, and she might as well turn out to be the strongest healer there is in the entire Eastern continent.”
Instantly, Kae’s pro-gamer brain began filling with crazy, over-the-top anime ideas.
Visions of unlocking an unreleased, SS-Rank hidden kingdom storyline flashed across his mind, complete with massive global political bounties, secret royal inheritances, and game-breaking infinite gold loops.
A slow, mischievous smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth as he realized the sheer, broken potential standing right in front of him.
Turning a cold, calculating gaze back onto Karen, Kae lowered his head, allowing his messy fringe to cast a dark shadow over his eyes.
He activated a theatrical, villainous whisper, completely intending to tease and scare her.
“Hey, Lisa…” Kae muttered, his voice dropping into a deep, echoing tone that sounded like an antagonist straight out of a dark fantasy series.
“Think about the economics here.
High Elf bloodlines are an incredibly rare, legendary-tier commodity.
Maybe we can sell her off to the high-end underground slave merchants in the capital?
We could easily break the regional economy and make ourselves an absolute fortune!”
He raised his hands slowly, curling his fingers into dramatic, predatory claws as he leaned closer into her space.
“What do you say?
Quick, let’s tie her up before she tries to flee the scene!”
Karen’s amber eyes went wide behind her round glasses, her pupils shrinking to tiny pinpricks.
A wave of intense, suffocating anxiety washed over her face; she took a frantic, uncoordinated step back, clutching her wooden staff tightly against her chest like an impenetrable shield.
“M-Merchants?!
Tie me up?!” Karen stammered, her voice reaching a pitch that could shatter glass.
“But I…
I don’t taste good!
I mean—I’m a low-yield asset!
I’m not worth anything to the market, I promise!”
Kae stared at her utterly terrified expression for a split second, his deadpan facade instantly collapsing.
He completely burst into a loud, frantic fit of laughter, doubling over as he pointed a mocking finger at her.
“Oh my God!
Did you see her reaction?!” Kae choked out between breathlessly loud gasps, tears of pure amusement forming in his eyes.
“She actually bought it hook, line, and sinker!
She really thought she was about to get traded like rare loot!”
“Master, your level of social degeneracy has officially bypassed the integer limit,” Pixel’s voice cut in, a low, utterly disgusted growl resonating in his skull as her tail whipped the air in disappointment.
“If this heretic’s low-tier intellect doesn’t ruin our squad composition, your abysmal comedy metrics certainly will.”
SMACK!
Lisa’s fist came down squarely on top of Kae’s head with flawless, high-velocity comedic timing.
“Ooooouch!” Kae yelped, his laughter violently cutting off as he stumbled forward, frantically rubbing the rapidly growing bump on his skull as actual tears pricked his eyes.
“What was that for?!
My HP just dropped by fifty percent!”
Lisa completely ignored his dramatic whines, elegantly clearing her throat as she stepped past his groveling form to face the trembling healer.
Her posture shifted seamlessly back to a polished, authoritative protector, radiating international-grade authority.
“Please forgive him for making such an unthoughtful, garbage joke, Karen,” Lisa said, her voice smooth, grounded, and comforting.
She cast a sharp, icy glance back down at Kae, who was still clutching his head.
“He has a severe, tragic lack of real-world socializing skills.
He didn’t mean to scare you—he’s just an idiot.”
From the dirt below, Pixel began jumping around in frantic, ecstatic circles, letting out a series of high-pitched, mocking meows that translated perfectly into Kae’s brain:
“Critical hit!
Direct strike to the system operator!
My stock value just doubled seeing you get smacked like a common noob!
Praise the knight!”
Kae glared down at the celebrating cat, gritting his teeth.
“You’re next, furball,” he muttered under his breath.
But the threat completely died in his throat.
Karen’s entire body went completely rigid, her frantic breathing locking up as if her lungs had suddenly turned to stone.
The nervous, flustered anxiety from Kae’s joke instantly evaporated, replaced by a hollow, paralyzing dread that made her amber eyes dull into a blank, unblinking stare.
Her knuckles turned a deathly, bloodless white as her grip tightened on her wooden staff so hard the wood creaked under the strain.
Kae and Lisa both froze, the playful, bickering energy between them completely vanishing as they recognized the severe, visceral trauma response taking over the half-elf’s posture.
The silence of the rain-slicked woods rushed back in, heavy and suffocating, as an invisible weight crashed down onto Karen’s shoulders.
She wasn’t looking at them anymore.
Her deadened gaze was fixed entirely on Pixel’s small, shadow-furred form, her lips trembling violently as she tried to form a single syllable.
“It wasn’t just…
big cats,” Karen began, her voice dropping into a shaky, fragile whisper that made the surrounding air feel deathly cold.
She stared blankly at her wooden staff, her fingers tracing a smooth groove in the wood before her posture completely collapsed under a sudden, invisible weight.
She looked up at Lisa, a bitter, watery smile touching her lips.
“You noticed my hair…
my lineage.
“The truth is, I never knew my biological mother—everything I know is just a story passed down by the people who saved me.”
Lisa’s eyes softened, her hand relaxing slightly on her scabbard as she leaned in, completely captivated by the sudden change in the air.
“My mother was a slave elf,” Karen whispered, her amber eyes shimmering with unshed tears.
“She was a deeply beautiful woman, but she worked under a cruel, wealthy noble in the Eastern Continent.
One night, her master forcefully took advantage of her, which ended up conceiving me.”
Kae’s jaw tightened, his analytical gamer detachment instantly melting away into a cold, protective focus.
“When the master found out she was pregnant, he was terrified of the scandal,” Karen continued, her voice trembling.
“He ordered her to abort me so she wouldn’t disgrace his noble house, but my mother fiercely refused.
In a fit of rage, he covertly planned her execution for the very next night.”
“An honor-killing to erase the evidence,” Kae muttered, his voice dropping into a dark frequency.
“Yes,” Karen nodded, a tear finally escaping and tracing down her pale cheek.
“But one of the other maids overheard the guards talking.
She risked her own life to wake my mother up in the dead of night, warning her that the assassins were already on their way.
My mother fled into the darkness with nothing but the clothes on her back.”
She took a ragged, uneven breath, clutching the staff tighter to her chest.
“She traveled on foot for days, starving and terrified, crossing entire borders until she finally collapsed in the Central Continent.
That’s where they found her.
My demi-human parents, Rose and George.”
A faint, genuinely warm light flickered in Karen’s dull eyes as she spoke their names.
“They found her shivering, hungry, and deeply pregnant, sleeping under an isolated, grass-thatched hut in the middle of a dense forest.
They didn’t see a slave or a burden; they just saw a mother who needed help.
They took her into their village, fed her, clothed her, and loved her as one of their own, farming and feasting happily together.”
Karen’s shoulders began to hitch as the story shifted toward the tragedy.
“But when the time came for her to give birth, the village hunters were deep in the forest.
My foster mother, Rose, only had basic midwifery skills, and George frantically ran out into the storm to find a vehicle for transport.”
She paused, a heavy, suffocating silence wrapping around the trio as the rain-slicked woods seemed to quiet down just to listen.
“The labor was too brutal.
By the time I was born, my mother began to bleed out rapidly, losing far too much blood before George could ever make it back.
Rose held me close and carried me to her side, and despite the agonizing pain, my mother smiled.
Tears of absolute happiness flowed from her eyes as she hugged my tiny body against her chest with the last of her strength.”
“She started breathing heavily, her chest rattling,” Karen whispered, her voice crackling as she stared down at the dirt.
“Rose gripped her hand tightly, desperately comforting her and telling her she was going to be alright, but they both knew the truth.
My mother looked down at my pale white skin, wrapped in a torn piece of cloth from her own ruined garment, and wept.”
She squeezed her eyes shut, a heavy sob tearing through her throat before she forced out her mother’s final, fading words.
“My little girl…” Karen quoted, her voice dropping into a frail, breathless whisper.
“I’ll call her Karen.
That’s her name.
Rose…
please take good care of her.”
She leaned her head back, her fingers trembling violently against her staff as she recalled the exact moment the light left her mother’s eyes.
Karen wiped her face aggressively with her sleeve, her voice shaking uncontrollably.
“She smiled, even though life was draining from her body.
“She smiled, looking at Rose.
‘Thank you for everything.
Tell George I am eternally grateful.’ She looked up at the ceiling of that thatched hut, her vision fading.
‘I wish I had a chance to watch my little girl grow up…
I wish—’ and then, her heart stopped.”
Karen’s voice completely broke, the silence in the rain-slicked woods becoming absolute.