Abandoning all caution, Micky sprinted toward the lake at full speed, the other survivors right behind his host. It was too late for stealth anyway – given the commotion that their battle against the two-headed snake had raised.

  On top of that, they most certainly lacked the numbers to protect themselves against any other horrors that the jungle might throw at them, so their best bet was to avoid them entirely. Hopefully the monstrous serpent had scared the other beasts off. The group had already covered most of the distance to the tomb, so it shouldn’t take them very long to arrive at this pace.

  ‘Can’t believe we lost two hundred men in three days,’ Marnok said, his heart still racing. ‘Just how unlucky can one get?’

  ‘I don’t think it was all luck,’ Micky mentally shook his head, though he didn’t bother to elaborate.

  Nobody said anything else, the three men rushing through the jungle, this time keeping an eye up at the trees’ crowns in case there were more snakes lying in wait. Fortunately, they managed to reach the circular lake where the Saint’s treasure was supposedly buried without encountering any other creatures.

  Technically, there was a chance that they’d lost their way in their hurry and ended up at the wrong lake, though Micky doubted that was the case. The other bodies of water were much farther away, so he and his companions wouldn’t have reached a different lake this soon.

  As for whether the demigod’s tomb was truly hidden here… he had no idea. None of the deceased sailors had been certain either. Micky didn’t even know how deep the lake was, or whether any aquatic creatures lurked inside its seemingly tranquil waters, as their intel hadn’t included that information.

  The only thing he could tell was how wide it was – a couple kilometres across. Even if the treasure was here, finding it wasn’t going to be easy. Things would have been simpler if they had arrived with hundreds of men as originally planned.

  Listening to the persistent coughs of their companions, Micky remembered that his host was supposed to be faking his illness too. Then again, it didn’t really matter at this point.

  The sailor with the red bandana was breathing and coughing a lot harder than Flammy. It hadn’t been that long since he fell sick, but straining himself during the previous battle must have greatly worsened his condition. The island’s humidity probably wasn’t making things easy for him either.

  “Need some ‘elp, Nodarr?” Flammy asked.

  The healer hadn’t done as much as the others during the battle. Most of the snake’s blows had been lethal anyway – by the time they connected there was nothing left to heal. That said, he seemed more than happy to contribute his life mana after the fact, as always.

  Nodarr gestured for the man to proceed, prompting Micky to do something that none of the sailors could have expected. Taking control of his host’s cores, he allowed a huge amount of air and water mana to spill out of his body, and to mix into a layer of frost that spread toward the healer.

  “Don’t touch him!” Micky yelled as a pale sheet of ice covered Flammy’s feet, freezing him in place.

  He didn’t stop there, however, crystalline tendrils coiling around the healer’s legs and torso, making crackling sounds as they restrained him further. Flammy tried to resist, of course, but the tendrils only grew thicker as they wrapped around his body, soon binding his arms and even covering his mouth.

  “Marnok?! What in the reefs are ya doin’?!” *cough* “And how the–” Nodarr began to say before gasping mid-sentence, his eyes widening with realization. “Ya’ve a second mana core!”

  “Stay away from him,” Micky insisted, making no effort to imitate his host’s accent anymore.

  Meanwhile, Marnok didn’t seem particularly happy about this turn of events either. ‘Micky?! Mind explainin’ why ya’re attackin’ me mate all of a sudden?!’ he asked, trying to take back control of his body.

  Micky sighed. Stirring the spectral fiends slumbering inside his wisp, he used their help to strengthen his hold on his vessel against the man’s wishes.

  “It’s him,” he said out loud for everyone’s sake, his voice calm and confident. “Flammy’s the one who’s infected the whole crew. I’m willing to bet good money that he was behind the shipwreck too.”

  Marnok’s resistance eased slightly, his soul flaring with disbelief, though Micky could tell via their connection that his host was still more inclined to side with his friend than him.

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  Nodarr didn’t appear very convinced either. “That’s a serious accusation, Marnok! ‘ave ya ‘nythin’ to back this up?”

  “I… know more about the life affinity than most people,” Micky replied, scrambling to decide how to best phrase what he was about to say. “I’ve come across a family with multiple life users in the past. They could use it for more than just healing.”

  “That ain’t proof,” Nodarr said.

  “No, it isn’t,” Micky agreed. “Which is why I didn’t say anything sooner, even though I’ve had my suspicions for a while. But I’ve been paying attention to Flammy over the past couple of days, and everyone he ‘healed’ coincidentally started coughing shortly afterwards. Just think about it for a moment – aren’t you the same?”

  Nodarr creased his brow, clearly taking Micky’s words seriously for the first time in this conversation. Even Marnok stopped trying to forcefully reclaim his body, finally willing to at least hear Micky out.

  *cough* “What about ya, then?” Nodarr asked. “Couldn’t ‘elp but notice ya stopped coughin’ the moment that thing attacked us. Were ya pretendin’ all along?”

  “I was protecting myself,” Micky said, not a hint of apology in his voice. “He tried to infect me the moment I made it to shore, but I accidentally got rid of his mana due to reasons that aren’t relevant. It took me a while to piece together what had happened, but I realized that he’d try to infect me again, so I’ve been rejecting all his subsequent offers to heal me.”

  “So what?” Nodarr pressed. “Ya didn’t ‘ave to lie to us.”

  “What choice did I have?” Micky shrugged. “When he started faking his own cough, I realized that he was planning to single me out. I would have been the one who looked suspicious if I’d been the last healthy person in the group. I still didn’t have any evidence to prove that he had infected everyone or that he was faking his own cough, but he couldn’t prove that I was faking mine either.”

  “What’s changed? Ya still don’t have ‘ny concrete proof, so why did ya stop doin’ it?”

  “Well… believe it or not, playing Flammy’s little game was the last thing on my mind while we were getting butchered by a Green beast. And, frankly, I no longer give a shit now that it’s just the three of us. I can handle him just fine, so I could have waited for him to kill you, but I thought I’d do you the courtesy of letting you know.”

  “What about the second core?” *cough* “Or ya speakin’ differently all of a sudden?”

  “I don’t mind giving you a detailed explanation about all of that, but I promise you that it has nothing to do with any of this. I’m not sure you even have the time to hear me out.”

  Nodarr fell silent, seemingly contemplating everything Micky had said.

  However, Marnok clearly had a few more questions for him. ‘This still doesn’t make sense. I’ve known Flammy for decades! I’ve met ‘is family! ‘is boy calls me “Uncle”! Why in the reefs would he do this to us?’

  ‘That much is obvious,’ Micky replied with a mental shrug. ‘I don’t know if he’s been lying to you the whole time or just recently decided to stab you in the back, but he clearly wants all the Fools’ Amber to himself.’

  ‘That’s stupid! We ain’t even sure it exists! And he couldn’t ‘ave known he’d survive this long – he could ‘ave died a dozen times over!’

  Micky scratched the back of his host’s head. ‘This… I admit it’s the one thing I haven’t been able to figure out. It’s one of the reasons I’ve waited so long to tell even you. But I’m pretty sure about the rest.’

  He didn’t think that it was a coincidence that nearly every person Flammy had touched had ended up falling sick and getting killed in the very next battle, but the man’s motivations indeed didn’t add up.

  Flammy could have drowned in the shipwreck or gotten picked off by the aquatic monsters while swimming to the island, and he could have just as easily gotten killed by the crabs or the Green snake. They didn’t even know whether the demigod’s tomb was here, nor did Flammy have the means to survive on the island by himself after getting rid of everyone else.

  It would have been safer for him to betray his crewmates during the return trip, after they’d confirmed the Amber’s existence and helped him claim it. And even if – by some miracle – he managed to get off the island with all the treasure, how was he going to escape from the Green-borns ruling the oceans long enough to use it?

  It almost felt like the man’s greed had robbed him of every trace of common sense, leading him to make all sorts of idiotic choices, gambling his life at every turn.

  “Let ‘im speak.” *cough* “I want to hear what he has to say,” Nodarr said after a while.

  Micky complied, since he was just as curious as the others. He unsealed Flammy’s mouth, only to reveal the world’s creepiest grin. Much like Micky had warned Marnok and Nodarr, their “healer” no longer bothered to cough.

  More importantly, he made no effort to deny the accusations or defend his actions, nor did he look very concerned that his treachery had been unveiled. He merely stared at his former companions, his eyes as still as the lake they reflected, with just the faintest glint of mirth simmering in their depths.

  “Nothin’?” *cough* “Is everythin’ Marnok” *cough, cough* “said about ya true?” Nodarr asked, his coughs growing more frequent by the second.

  “Flammy! Tell ‘em they’re wrong!” Marnok suddenly yelled, Micky allowing him to use his body again.

  Silence.

  Nodarr raised an eyebrow upon registering Marnok’s sudden change in tone, but Flammy didn’t show the slightest reaction to his friend’s outburst, nor to anything else that had been spoken earlier.

  Not until a couple of seconds later at least, when he turned to face Nodarr directly. Ignoring the tight restraints, he shifted within the ice, his bones audibly cracking in the process. The grating noise made every hair on Marnok’s body stand on end, though the healer didn’t seem to even feel the pain. Flammy’s core flared with mana, making Micky realize that something was wrong.

  Countless veins squirmed beneath Nodarr’s skin, the poor sailor clenching his chest in agony as he fell to his knees. His throat and chin turned purple and swollen, blood pouring out of every orifice in his body!

  “Fuck! Stop this or I swear I’ll kill you!” Micky yelled, but the life mage didn’t so much as flinch.

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