Earth’s Doom Starts with… Me?

"You..." He gritted his teeth as I felt his mana grew more and more malicious.

He wasn't the only one who was anxious. I was probably way more anxious than he was. C'mon, agree with my terms, why were you so hard-headed!?

I bit my lower lip as I felt my heart race. He must've also been able to feel it, since I deliberately put his hand on my chest.

With this, he only needed to extend the mana that was coating his hand a taaad bit more, and there would be a giant gaping hole in my chest, straight through my heart. And dangit, the more I thought about it, the more I regretted doing this.

Like, I'd much prefer a painless death, not something painful like this! I swear, don't you dare kill me now you freaky king, or I'll haunt you for years and annoy you over every little thing.

"You're quite an annoying pest." He grinned at me, which spooked me a bit, causing me to tighten my grip on his hand a bit.

"And you're about to listen to this annoying pest's wish." I pressed on.

"Don't try to sound confident while your heart's beating this much," Erenduill leaned closer to me and whispered into my ears while circling his other arm around my waist, pulling me closer to him, "I've held women intimately, whose hearts weren't beating as fast as yours."

I smirked back, and touched his right cheek with my left hand while whispering into his ears, "and you're about to find out whether it's because I'm scared to die, or..."

I released his cheek and leaned back, "... because I can't wait to see your subjects deem you as an unworthy king."

His eyes immediately went wide, and his chest stopped moving up and down to exchange air. For a fraction of a second, everything seemed to be at a standstill.

Crap, did I say too much? ... But, I thought that threatening him with his identity as a great King would definitely do it. I still remembered it clear as day, when his younger self explained to Ioriell about the thing that was most important to him.

... Was I too hasty, perhaps? Would I die here? Should I just make a desperate attempt to attack?

"Too bad, I will never let myself be an unworthy king for them," he removed his hand from my chest, and tucked my hair behind my ear, "come with me."

"Uh?" I raised my eyebrows in surprise.

... Did I succeed? Did he just give me the a-okay?

"I'll take you to the treasury. But only you." He smiled wide at me, this time seemingly playful.

"Why?" I leaned further back.

"Because the treasury is up there, near my room," he pointed at the top of the castle, around the spot where he just blasted himself outside before dramatically descending upon us, "and I'm not in the mood to carry all of you up there." He answered calmly, still with a smile plastered on his face.

"But--"

"You froze the castle yourself, so unfortunately, the entrance is blocked," he cut me off before I was finished, "and you didn't say that all of you have to come when you proposed this to me."

Ack, this dude was a handful. Sly monkeyface.

"Fine, fine. Let's get this done fast," I sighed, "it won't make a difference anyway. If I die, you all die. Whatever." I shrugged it off, still keeping up my act.

"Good. Hold tight." He tightened his arms around my waist while grinning.

"E--"

'WHOOSH!'

"Uwahhh!" I screamed as soon as this cheeky elf king shot the both of us into the sky, with me in his arms.

"Calm down, human. We're merely taking a little walk," he reassured me although it wasn't working, "but..."

"What!?" I asked loudly, panicking and fearing my fate of falling to my death.

"... Could you please stop pulling so fiercely on my hair?" He continued.

"Huh?" I blinked twice, before finally realizing that my hands, in a state of panic, quickly grabbed and hanged on to anything that they could grab, which was his lustrous blonde hair that was now messy because of my pulling and grabbing.

"... Ah." I nodded slowly and kept my mouth shut as I immediately removed my hand from his hair... What should I grab now, though?

"Thank you. Now hold on tight." He said as he raised his other arm towards the castle.

"Uh, where?"

"On me." He smirked while a bunch of swirly green aura gathered around his hand, forming a ball that was roughly the size of an apple.

'BOOM!'

I gasped when I saw him launch the ball of green aura towards the spot where I had patched up with new shards of ice, destroying it into little pieces that glimmered under the moonlight.

"There we go." He smiled in satisfaction while seeing the huge gaping hole that led to a long hallway that was adorned with beautiful red carpet with golden fringes on the floorboards.

'Tap!'

We landed successfully in the hallway, and I immediately looked around to check my surroundings. Didn't he say that the treasury was around here? Near his room?

"Impatient, aren't you?" He chuckled as he observed my head turning left and right, and left and right again.

'Tap!'

"Huh?" My ears twitched when I heard another landing sound. Who was it?

"Yep, she sure is impatient."

My jaw dropped in surprise when I saw a familiar puff of white hair fluttered ever so slightly in the air, shimmering as the moonlight poured upon each of its strands.

"You're not getting away from me, little cub." He gave me his trademark grin and walked over towards us.

"Why are you here!?" I exclaimed in surprise.

"Hmm, interesting. I thought your element was..." Erenduill paused as he squinted his eyes, "lightning. Your sparks are still visible. So how did you float up here?"

Hearing that, I tried to squint my eyes, too, but I could barely make out tiny spots of blue that didn't look like lightning sparks at all. I guess he was better at sensing magic than I was.

"I didn't float. I ran," general Zhang smirked, "hey, little cub. Before you start scanning your surrounding, get away from him first." He said as he pointed at us.

"Ack! Right!" I flinched when I realized that I was still glued to the elf king, and immediately jumped away.

Phew, that was dangerous. Anyway, back to the scrolls.

"Hey, king. Show us the scrolls." I quickly reverted the topic back, considering that the five minutes limit should be close now. Bad.

"Please, follow me." He turned around and started walking away.

"Little cub, how did you know about the scrolls?" General Zhang suddenly crept up behind me, making me flinch for the hundredth time today.

"Dude, you're spooky," I frowned, "about the scrolls, Ioriell relayed the info to me during my time in that creepy room. He didn't explicitly say it, but he showed me his effort and hard work in managing his kingdom's affair, including the sleepless nights he went through trying to understand the mysterious ancient scrolls they have stashed in their treasury. It all ended up in vain, though."

"Hmm, do you know what those scrolls are, since you seem so eager to get them?" General Zhang asked as we followed the elf king's steps.

"Roughly," I answered simply, "hey king, can you please go faster? As you've said before, I'm very impatient, please and thank you." I crossed my arms in front of my chest and changed the topic.

Actually, I was pretty sure that those 'ancient scrolls' were just buffing scrolls. When I saw the snippets of images in that room, I felt like I had seen those scrolls somewhere, but I couldn't really remember where.

And then, it hit me when I was doing my morning workout.

I hadn't been in this world for long enough to visit a lot of places, so it was definitely somewhere close. And so far, I hadn't been to a library or somewhere that stored important items.

And that was precisely why, I didn't see them in this world.

I saw them in my shop window when I was frantically searching for other items on other occasions. That was why I was so sure that I could buy the scrolls earlier.

"Here we are." Erenduill stopped his feet in front of a small, normal-looking wooden door.

It looked more like an entrance to the kitchen, since there were a few barrels stacked beside the door, and a little shelf filled with various plants and herbs, complete with a little basket of fruits.

"Well-hidden." I commented about their choice of making it so obvious that you wouldn't think anything important was hidden beneath this door.

"Thank you," he grinned and opened the door, "after you."

"Nah, you go in first." I replied.

"Alright then, curious little human." He chuckled and opened the door with ease, which surprised me a bit. They must've had a secret door inside as well, if it was so easy to open.

"Oooh~ I wonder what you will use them for~" General Zhang giggled beside me while giving me a funny stare.

"Don't worry. You'll like it." I gave him a confident grin.

"Then, I'll look forward to it." He patted my head softly, which kinda felt nice, to my surprise.

"This way." Erenduill stepped inside the dark room, only to reveal that it was indeed a kitchen. Huh, was the secret door a fridge probably, or a cupboard?

Oh well. Gotta focus now. The real battle would soon begin.

I took a deep breath, and followed him into the room.

I better not miss this one opening. The one opening that would appear after I finish using all of the scrolls. That would be the only chance we have in killing that elf king.