I was startled and backed away.

Then he raised his eyebrows and stood still.

“Are you feeling okay? Does your head hurt?” Enoch asked me as usual, with a strange, non-human face.

I rubbed my temples. It seems that I am hallucinating.

“I feel bad. My head hurts too.”

In response to my answer, Kayden, who was standing next to Enoch, opened his mouth to say something. But,

-thud. thud. thud. thud.

There was a dull sound of footsteps somewhere, causing the ground to shake lightly.

All eyes on me turned in the direction of the sound.

“Looks like monsters are coming,” said Enoch.

Kayden turned to me. “Damn it. Margaret, I’ll explain later. For now, please cooperate first. I will use the magical aid to seal your mana.”

“What? why?”

“That’s…… no time to explain. Sorry.”

Kayden forcibly grabbed my hand.

I was so shocked for a second that I shook his hand away and stepped back.

Kayden looked at me with a puzzled face.

“……by temporarily sealing Margaret’s mana…….”

He must have said that yesterday.

Wasn’t it a dream?

“Even if you don’t have time, explain it to me. Why do you want to seal my mana?”

“That…… it’s dangerous for you.”

That’s not a sincere answer. As if giving candy to a child, those are just empty words to calm me down.

“I don’t think there’s much time to wait.”

Ruzef slowly approached me. A headache struck me again, and Ruzef’s face grotesquely distorted.

Damn, what is it? I keep seeing nonsense.

Frowning, I shook my head and stepped back. The three men look at me with puzzled faces.

“What are you going to do when my mana is sealed?”

“……perhaps the most dangerous person is Margaret…….”

“Well then, how about testing…….”

“It’s not too late to try and kill…….”

If what I heard yesterday wasn’t a dream, they might be trying to test me now. And if judged to be dangerous, they might kill me.

Yeah, maybe I’ve been trusting them too much. Didn’t these men distrust me and hate me from the first time I met them?

Maybe I’ve been too naive all this time.

The musty smell got a bit stronger. I rubbed my forehead, feeling the disgustingly dizzy smell giving me motion sickness.

I kept getting angry and angry because my head hurt. Feelings of unfairness and sadness came flooding in like a broken dam. Not only was my judgment impaired, but I kept hearing and seeing strange hallucinations.

“What is it, Margaret? Wait, what is this situation? I think there’s a misunderstanding.”

Kayden looked at me with a puzzled face. I let out a sigh, narrowing my brows at the feeling of fatigue that was creeping in.

“I can’t believe anything you say now. You should have explained it straight away before there was any misunderstanding.”

“That’s not it, Margaret…….”

Kayden took a step closer to me, and at that moment, his face changed into a ferocious form like the others. Horns sprouted on his head, his face elongated forward like a horse’s, and his mouth opened revealing razor-sharp teeth.

I was startled and stepped back.

The men who looked like they were wearing monster masks approached slowly. I took out my flare gun and pointed it at them to keep them away from me.

Three men with terrifyingly scary faces raised their hands at the same time.

Seeing that, I slowly picked up my bag that had fallen on the ground, and Eunji quickly slithered up to the bag strap.

-koong.

-thud.

From somewhere, a huge roar sounded again. The sound of slow footsteps, as if looking for something, made me very nervous. It sounded similar to the walking sound of an orangutan monster.

“Margaret, are you alright? You have a nosebleed.”

As the monster with Enoch’s voice approached, I aimed a flare at him.

“I don’t think the poison gas has been detoxified yet?” shouted a monster with the voice of Kayden. His voice rose a little higher than before.

Poison gas? Am I poisoned? My head hurts a lot and I feel really bad, but I don’t feel like I am poisoned.

I tilted my head with a puzzled face and rubbed my nose. As Enoch said, my nose is really bleeding.

I let out a sad laugh.

Is my body breaking down? There’s nothing strange about that. It feels like my mind and body have reached their limits.

Maybe the hypothesis I came up with the other day was right. All of this might be an experiment that pushes us to the limit in our powerless state.

But, what does the experimenter gain by doing that?

‘Whatever it is, it’s hard to guess now. I just want to rest now.’

I slowly closed and opened my eyes and looked at the three men again.

“I really did my best so far.”

The sad laughter kept coming out.

“I thought countless times about running away and surviving alone.”

My heart went up and down. As emotions ran high, my heart began to race, and a fever rose to my head.

I took slow, deep breaths and tried to calm down.

Then, looking at the three men, I continued calmly, 

“These are men who hated me, despised me, doubted me, and made me suffer. There was no affection from the start.”

Hoo.

I took a deep breath as hot emotions rose in my heart. My eyes are getting teary.

Strangely enough, I couldn’t control my emotions, and eventually, tears flowed.

“Margaret.”

“Don’t move.”

The flare gun aimed at the monster with Enoch’s voice this time was aimed at the monster with Kayden’s voice.

I wiped away the tears that ran down my cheeks.

The reason why I am so sensitive right now is the result of trying to subdue the anaconda monster and save everyone. Ever since I woke up on this island, have I not been acting for them?

After all kinds of suffering, now I even have hallucinations. I feel a deep sense of skepticism as I recall the hard work I had endured for them.

“I guess now is the time to really move on separately. I don’t care what your intentions are, I don’t like being taken advantage of.”

“Margaret, you misunderstood.”

“I told you, you should have explained it straight away before there was any misunderstanding.”

“No, I didn’t have time to explain that—”

-koong!

A monster rushed us through the bushes.

-grrr.

I felt blood running from my nose again, so I wiped it with the back of my hand and stepped back.

The monster ran towards us, and I hurriedly lowered the hammer of the flare gun and pulled the trigger.

-puah!

The monster’s body exploded as soon as it was hit. But the problem is the monsters that follow.

Enoch, Kayden, and Ruzef seem to be busy dealing with the monsters trying to get closer.

In the meantime, I quickly turned around and ran.

“Margaret!”

A shout came from behind me, but I had no mind to consider their condition.

Yeah, I think it’s time to go to the bunker alone.

My heart was racing. I was out of breath and my head was still spinning.

But I kept running without stopping

And I succeeded in completely circumventing Enoch and the others.

It was only later that I realized that I had been poisoned by the anaconda’s poison gas.

***

The night before the incident.

After defeating the anaconda monster and carrying the unconscious Margaret inside the barrier, Enoch looked at the barrier with an uneasy face.

“Margaret is unconscious, and I don’t know how long the barrier will last.”

Kayden, who carried Diego on his back and entered the barrier, followed Enoch to inspect the barrier.

“But it hasn’t been long since I strengthened it, so it should be able to last until the morning.”

While they watched the monsters rushing towards the barrier with nervous faces, Ruzef hurriedly brought a first-aid kit and began treating Margaret and Diego.

There were two huge anaconda corpses in front of the barrier, and monsters with bizarre appearances were wandering around the barrier, sniffing as if they were looking for something.

Kayden, who was standing inside the barrier looking at them, quietly opened his mouth. “Looks like they are looking for Margaret, don’t they?”

Enoch nodded as if it was no big deal. “Don’t they always do that?”

Kayden looked at Enoch with complicated eyes.

(Kayden’s POV)
Maybe I think more rationally than Enoch does.

Enoch is blind to Margaret and is crazy about her. So he couldn’t judge Margaret objectively.

I’m not at that level yet. I’d die for Margaret, but I’m not crazy about her like Enoch does.

Therefore, I think it might be better for me to make a rational judgment about Margaret in the future.

The monsters wandered around the barrier for a while and then gradually disappeared. Only then did Enoch and Kayden stop looking outside and check on Margaret’s condition.

Fortunately, Margaret did not appear to be hurt, but her complexion was not good. Ruzef put his hand on Margaret’s cheek to examine her and let out a sigh.

“It looks like she was poisoned by the anaconda’s poisonous gas. This is similar to the symptoms when poisoned by anaconda’s gas on the South Island.”