Chapter 177: Naiad

Erin sat nervously in her office with a worried expression on her face. She had been contemplating on what to do since the moment Albert had left the room but even now, she couldn't come up with a viable solution to handing the Behemoth of Greed, Mammon. The addition of the generals of Greed was also a problem as there wasn't anyone besides Albert that could go head to head with them.

Her eyes were currently shut but it was clear she was still able to keep track of the situation outside thanks to her spirit magic and her divination abilities. Her shoes repeatedly tapped on the carpet as she contemplated on either listening to Albert's instructions or joining the fight. 

She had already tried contacting Lord Ty several times but it was of no use. She had even tried using divination to find out his location but he was constantly using anti-divination magic on himself so that was hard.

She also had the skill, FutureSight, that allowed her to see parts of a specific future and although the future wasn't a straight line, thus wasn't set in stone. So naturally, what she saw may not come true. However, that didn't matter to her, the fact that what she had seen wasn'tgood was still troubling for her. 

She opened her eyes and suddenly stood up, wanting to head out but hesitated and sat back down.

She remembers what Abert had said before he left and knew he was right about her. Her fighting abilities were minimal and although the few attack skills she had were powerful enough for her to go toe to toe with a behemoth, they also drained her life force instead of just mana consumption and she currently wasn't in the best condition to recover from that.

While she was indeed a demigod, and a Nymph should be considered as an immortal being. That was not actually the case. At best she could only be considered pseudo-immortal.

In general, a Nymph was a minor female natural divine spirits or deities but was different from actual goddesses and are generally regarded as personifications of nature. They were typically tied to a specific place or landform, and usually take the appearance of beautiful maidens based on the element of nature's essence that gave birth to their sentence.

While most of them were not necessarily immortal, and just lived much longer than humans and demons. This only applies to most types of nymphs like the Meliae and Dryads, who only lived as long as the trees they were born from and connected to, which was essentially their source. Of course, there were a few exceptions to this rule.

For instance, Dryads, like all nymphs, were supernaturally long-lived and tied to their homes, which was generally a limited area around their trees. They were an integral part of their trees, such that if the tree died, the dryad associated with it died as well. 

They were also unable to stray too far from their source as they had to constantly protect it from dangerous enemies like beasts, humans, or demons. In essence, their lives were indeed long, but they could not be considered immortal.

However, Erin was neither a Dryad nor was she a Meliae that were born from plants or trees. She was a Naiad or what was called a freshwater nymph that was born from flowing water—springs, rivers, fountains, lakes. She had been born and originally presided over a lake that had been located in the Azarbed Region which was originally the Cronoff family's region. 

Naiads were an incredibly rare type of nymphs as they were actual divine spiritual beings that could obtain physical bodies at will and were technically immortal as they could actually live forever as long as a part of their source remained. They were born from the abundance of nature's essence that was absorbed by a body of fresh water and as such, the water itself was their source and generally could not die out as long as the nymph was present to take care of it or at least, kept part of it safe.

Although their source could be destroyed, the nymph themselves would not die even if they did not keep a part of it. However, they would no longer be completely immortal as their life fore would constantly be drained from them unless they were able to connect themselves to a living being in order to retain the life force they already had and lived the rest of their days as a semi-mortal spiritual being as they could not connect to another body of water without a small part of their source.

Naiads were powerful beings but most of their abilities were generally healing and divination. However, they still needed to protect their source and as such had a few powerful attack magic that required a lot of energy but that energy was gotten from their near-limitless life fore when they were connected to their source. Their magic also required them to be near a body of water to be fully effective.

However, Erin's lake, her source had been destroyed years ago, and as such she was no longer immortal and although her lifeforce was stable now thanks to Abert, she could not refill it and thus, using any powerful attack abilities that required her lifeforce would most likely kill her.

However, she wasn't sure if that was a bad thing though. She had indeed lived an extremely long life by human standards and had mostly spent most of those years on her own just communicating with animals and plants. While she could move away from her source, she had chosen not to as she found those times satisfying and peaceful.

Throughout the period of her life, she had met various beings like demons and demi-humans and her originally cheerful and lighthearted personality had changed after she had befriended quite a few of them and they had all ended up dying before she knew it. 

Most would consider her immortality a gift and something amazing but in the end, it had only made her lonely. Her days spent with the animals and plants had never bothered her when they died so she hadn't expected it to be so painful when her friends would die even when it was just as a result of their age.

Those painful emotions made her not want to open up to anyone ever again and thus she remained at her lake for what she thought would be an eternity. However, her secluded life had suddenly come to an end when a certain young boy strayed over to her lake after getting lost in the wild.

He was already quite the refined young man even then and could compose himself even when lost. And even after she had shown him the way just to get him to leave, he still came back every day after that to see her. Claiming no one deserves to be left alone. A sentence she had considered rude at the time and probably still did.

However, if it wasn't for that boy, she was sure the ones that had destroyed her source would've captured her as well and by now, she was sure to be dead.

So shouldn't she sacrifice herself to save him, not to mention she would be helping Lord Ty who had also saved her life? She had also made new friends in Liz and Rain who also reminded her of her lost friend Callie.

Closing her eyes again, she confirmed the situation outside and immediately balled her hands into a fist. 'No, I have to do something. I can't let anyone die for me.'

She immediately stood back up and lowered her head to take a look at the bracelet on her arm. It was an exquisite bracelet with three aqua blue gems embedded on it. A nymph was strongest when fighting on their elements and while she could create water out of thin air, her attack power would be limited thus the reason why Albert had gotten her this magic item even though it was only a Rare magic item.

Confirming that it contained sufficient water in it, she stormed out of the office and down the stairs. Coming down to the main hall of the castle that leads to all four wings.

The main doors that lead to the outer ward were only a few meters ahead of her and although she hesitated a bit knowing she would surely die from this. She soon steeled herself and walked towards the doors while running her fifers on the bracelet on her left arm.

"Well I guess she was right, you really did leave the safety of the concealed space just to save your fake ass husband."

"Indeed. While I don't like anyone that doesn't show Lady Izabel the respect she deserves, I have to admit she is quite the brilliant tactician. I originally didn't have much faith in this plan but everything had happened as she had predicted. What a scary bitch."

Erin was suddenly stopped in her tracks as she saw someone suddenly walk out of the shadows in front of her and another behind her. They were clad in plain-looking armor but their weapons were certainly top tier as they stared sharply at her with a cold glint in their eyes.

The one that stood in front of her was a man with short white hair, and a handsome face, he wore light cheap-looking leather armor but carried two expensive golden daggers. He had bright golden cored eyes with vertical slits and had a weird smile on his face upon seeing her.

The second behind her had long black hair and green eyes. Was equipped similarly to the first and had a single green whip on his right hand with a greenish black gauntlet on his left.

"Now then, are you going to come with us quietly, or do you rather we drag you back with us."

The one with short white hair spoke with absolute confidence as though what he had said was a matter of fact.

Erin stared at the pair that had boxed her in with vigilance. They may have been dressed like common goons but their weapons were clearly magic items and the fact that they were able to escape her senses even though she had constantly been using divination and clairvoyance on this castle told her that they were well equipped, especially against her.

The fact that they did not attack her for being in the castle and wanted to capture her also reminded her of something Albert had told her sometime back. 

The one responsible for destroying her source was one of the Great Five. They had also been responsible for inciting the nobles around Albert's region to attack as they could not make their intentions public. 

Their plan must've been to capture her secretly during the attack or simply buy her if she had been taken as a slave by one of the families that attacked. However, they hadn't expected Albert to immediately choose to retreat after his family's castle was lost as he became a freeman soon after.

With that, it was safe to say that these two were from the same Great Five that was after her. However —

"Do the two of you really think you're strong enough to capture me?"

Her voice was soft but the castle was silent and thus they could clearly hear her and even as the aura around her intensified and a domineering pressure suppressed them. A sneer still appeared in their faces and the white-haired demon quickly brought out a glass bottle that had a seal on it and immediately removed the seal.

Erin's expression went pale as she stared blankly at the bottle that seemed to only contain a cup of freshwater. The moment the seal on the bottle had been broken, she had immediately felt her connection with Albert's soul being severed and reconnecting her essence with its origin.

"That's- is that?- water from my source?"