I Can Copy Curses

However, Orion's face didn't change, and instead, he nodded to him with a smile. "You are correct, and you are very smart too." I rarely meet smart people these days." He shook his head in pity.

"But you again forget one thing," Ethan said, smiling and commending Orion's courage to stay calm even after he told him that he saw through his plans.

Orion became interested and asked, "And what would that be?"

"Your strength. No matter what attack you planned—what conspiracy you schemed—all that becomes useless in front of the absolute strength that I have in the platinum rank compared to you, who is only at the iron rank," Ethan slowly said, looking at Orion.

Orion nodded as if he understood something and asked with a smile, "I see, so that's why you've been so cocky?"

Ethan didn't get angry with Orion's rude words and nodded. For him, what he said were facts and there wasn't a need to get angry over someone he would soon kill.

Orion smiled and felt that guy was too arrogant for his own good. Initially, when he started talking to him, he gave him a feeling of a calm and composed person, but now he understood that behind that mask was a very arrogant person.

He felt that the difference between Carl, Evans, and many other arrogant people and Ethan was that the latter could hide his arrogance behind a calm mask, while the former could only bark like dogs when getting humiliated. This made people like Ethan more dangerous than those arrogant dogs, and currently, he was facing one such guy.

"So, what are you going to do?" Ethan asked, seeing Orion silent. "Are you going to leave her alone here, or are you going to die with her?"

"None of these." Orion smiled and brought his hand in front of him—a dark purple sphere the size of his fist was hovering atop his palm. It cast a purple glow on Orion's face as he turned to look at Ethan. "Do you know what this is?"

Ethan raised his brows and a frown appeared on his face for the first time since he started talking to Orion. "Is that the attack you have been wasting my time for?"

Orion nodded and smiled, looking at his frowning face. "You can feel it, can't you? The energy stored in this small thing? If it were to detonate, I estimate anything within a 2 km radius of this gorge would disappear from this world, leaving behind only the remnants of ashes flying around as dust."

Ethan's face darkened as he heard Orion. As Orion said, he could feel a huge amount of energy stored in that small sphere, to the point that it made him wonder where Orion got that much energy considering his strength at the iron rank.

And he didn't doubt when Orion mentioned the radius of destruction it would cause if it were to explode. He agreed with him on that fully, even feeling that Orion might have underestimated that attack of his.

As for the explosion itself, he didn't fear it, for he was fast enough to outrun it, but it couldn't be the same for his friends, especially when one of them was heavily injured. But he doubted they could escape, even if nobody was injured.

They just weren't fast enough to outrun an explosion like him nor had any teleportation abilities like the one in front of him, and because of this, he felt that Orion had gotten the best of him.

'I guess he got me here.'

At this moment, he sighed and regretted giving Orion the time. There was only one blunder on his part that resulted in this situation, and that was the assessment of the boy standing in front of him. He had taken him as any other iron rank genius in the Magus Kingdom, but he was someone way above just an iron rank individual.

"You won," Ethan sighed in the end.

Orion nodded. He wasn't surprised that Ethan made the decision to give up on her.

"So, get out of here as fast as you can, and don't even think of secretly following us. Otherwise, I wouldn't mind creating another one of these spheres and detonating it for you," he threatened them. He understood that even if Ethan agreed to his deal, others might not, especially Carl, who had taken the beating. He would definitely seek revenge on them if Ethan just decided to leave them.

Ethan nodded, understanding what Orion wanted to convey.

"Tell me one thing," he said, narrowing his eyes at Orion.

Orion nodded and asked, "What is it?"

"What would you do if she had the power to kill us, the people from the Dungeon Management Association? Would you stop her, or would you not care at all?" Ethan asked curiously.

Orion wondered where that question came from and pondered seriously for an answer. The fate of the four of them had already been sealed by Orion; it was just a matter of time before he would act. So, it didn't matter if they died or not. However, since their deaths would ultimately result in suspicion falling on his sister, he would have to stop the masked girl, even if she didn't like it.

"I would stop her," Orion said. It wasn't a difficult decision for him, considering he planned to kill them later in the dungeon anyway.

Ethan nodded before turning around. "You are naive if you were to do that, which I believe you aren't."

With that, he walked back to his friends and muttered something to them. The heavy-built guy carried Carl on his back and started climbing the gorge, followed by Damian and Ethan.

"May we meet next time as allies," Ethan said before vanishing from the gorge, leaving Orion and the masked girl alone.

Orion immediately sighed in relief, seeing they were gone. It had been mentally taxing while Ethan was there, as he doubted Ethan might not care about his friend and sneak attack him. Now that he was gone, Orion finally calmed his nerves.

The masked girl kneeled on both legs, exhausted both physically and mentally.

"Why didn't you move and stood there like an idiot when that guy's attack was approaching you?" Orion asked with a frown when he saw her sitting down.

At that moment, he also let go of the energy supply to the purple sphere, and it vanished into thin air.

The masked girl shook her head, saying, "It's not that I didn't want to move; it's just that I can't move from my position when I use that skill."

"There are skills like that?" Orion wondered aloud before shaking his head and saying, "Let's leave this place first."

The masked girl nodded, and they headed in the opposite direction of Ethan's group. Orion definitely didn't want to encounter him again in a situation where he had someone to protect.

After traveling in one direction for a long time, they found a cave belonging to a wolf pack. Orion easily killed the wolves and entered the cave.

However, as soon as they went inside, the masked girl fainted, falling onto Orion, who caught her and didn't let her fall.

'She really fainted at the right place,' Orion thought, shaking his head.

He laid her down on the ground and then sat leaning against the wall of the cave, waiting for her to wake up.