Chapter 81
Chapter 81
-----------------------------------------------------------------
>Translator: Lord First
>Chapter: 81
>Chapter Title: Meeting the Family (2)
>-----------------------------------------------------------------
*
Einar led Ivan to the Vasilisa Orphanage. He insisted he had to see where his sister lived with his own eyes before he'd be satisfied.
“An orphanage! This is absolutely fantastic!”
Einar burst into laughter, wandering around the place. The children screamed and ran away from his menacing appearance.
“You really poured money into this without a second thought!”
>“Mm.”
>“To think war orphans look better than the noble brats living in our palace. Ha! What is the world coming to!”
Despite his words, Einar proudly clapped Ivan on the back.
“You bastard, you're better than me.”
>“Mm.”
Since it was an objective fact, Ivan didn't bother to argue.
At that, Einar roared with laughter and slung an arm around his shoulder.
Horrifically well-developed muscles wrapped around his neck, and Ivan had to suppress a shiver.
“Alright, now let’s go see your place.”
*
Einar looked around the director’s office once and nodded.
“A very frugal office. So, where do you sleep?”
>“Here.”
>“What…?”
>“I sleep on that sofa.”
>“Oh…”
Einar hesitated, looking around.
One old sofa. One old reception table.
A single wardrobe and a work desk. The weapons on the wall were gleaming, well-maintained.
*This guy, why is he still living alone in a war?*
Einar narrowed his eyes. Sleeping and eating in the director’s office was one thing, but….
‘He was ready to leave at any moment.’
He was the king of a nation, Droan’s finest field commander, and a man who had fought alongside his soldiers on the front lines.
He saw through Ivan’s state in an instant. This was an office filled only with what was necessary, not what was desired, so that he could leave at any time, under any circumstances, without regret.
If one were to remove the weapons hanging on the wall, anyone could sit at that desk without issue. That’s how much ‘color’ this place lacked.
The color a space acquires from an individual's possessions, collections, and personal tastes. There was none of that here. It was a completely achromatic space.
A colorless, transparent space, completely devoid of any sense of belonging.
“Ivan. Sit.”
Einar gestured with eyes that had grown heavy. The moment he sat on the sofa, his Huscarls rushed over and set a bottle of liquor and glasses before him.
“Let’s hear the story first. You, how did you kill a Dragon General and make it back alive?”
A state of being ready to disappear at any moment, where it wouldn't be strange if he vanished right now.
Einar knew someone like that.
Maximilian. The Hero of humanity.
Because that’s exactly how the man had been just before he disappeared.
*
An accidental mistake by the god who created a race, the essence of racial evolution over tens of thousands of years, the ultimate product of some worldly fate.
The strongest and greatest single entity in an entire race.
During the war, humans called them the ‘Seven Dragon Generals.’
Beings who had obtained the name of a god in a mortal body. Concepts manifested in the world. The representatives of each race that made up the demonkin.
In human terms, would they be like the Hero? No, that’s not right. Even the Hero wasn’t the strongest individual among humans.
They were beings who had become literal ‘racial gods,’ capable of representing their entire race alone.
Seven such beings, and one who ruled over the seven. The multi-racial allied forces surging under their command. Humans, who had lost half the world within ten years of the war's outbreak.
That was the cause, and the history, of the last war.
“How in the world did you come back alive?”
Einar asked Ivan, feeling as if he were witnessing a miracle.
He had faced a Dragon General before. He was one of the extremely rare few in this world who had faced a Dragon General and returned alive.
So he couldn’t help but wonder.
Even the Hero’s Party felt despair when confronting the Dragon Generals. They knew fear and pain. They learned defeat.
They were foes that could only be defeated one by one after the entire Hero’s Party joined the fray and fought to their utmost.
And he faced one of them with only a few ‘well-trained’ soldiers, killed it, and returned alive?
“The one you killed… was it Aviditas? I think that’s what I heard.”
>“That’s right.”
>“The Lord of Avaricious Dragons? Wasn’t that bastard living in Ifera’s Sky Fortress? How on earth did you kill him? How did you get back alive?”
A valid question. Einar propped his feet up on the table, tilted his head back, and drank the liquor his Huscarls poured.
Ivan sat opposite him, silently tilting his head.
Uncomfortable.
Ivan found it hard to understand why this man was in this city, why he was speaking with him alone, and furthermore, why they were having this conversation.
It was just uncomfortable. Especially this conversation, which was reminiscent of those days.
-Lieutenant Colonel. Did you see that? Wow, I was so damn cool. Right? He was a Dragon General, but I blocked everything.
>-Ahaha, I feel like I could do it again if I had to, but it's a shame.
>-If I could, maybe I could have saved Sasha, that idiot. It's a real shame. Truly, Lieutenant Colonel.
-Still, we won't be lonely. Us.
>-We've made good connections in heaven and hell, right?
-You should live a long life, Lieutenant Colonel. Take your time getting here.
>-If you come early, I'll commit insubordination.
Ivan clenched his teeth at the voices that struck his ears like an auditory hallucination.
The blood Cherenovika had coughed up that day still burned hot on the back of his neck. Not only that, he remembered the names of all his subordinates who had died.
One hundred and fifty-six members of the Annihilation Squad had died to kill a single Dragon General.
At the time, there were five active Dragon Generals, so it was fair to say that the entire Annihilation Squad, numbering around 700, had been immolated on the same day.
Kill the Dragon Generals. That was the final order the Annihilation Squad had faced.
Therefore, Ivan did not want to recall the events of that day.
“Let’s talk about something else.”
>“No. I can’t do that.”
Einar’s green eyes blazed like flames.
He was staring at Ivan with burning eyes, as if seeing right through his soul.
“Is it guilt? Or is it fear? I understand. I can even accept it. I heard Enrique and Patricia are in this city too, but they didn't tell you, did they? Then again… they weren't the ones who ‘personally’ did the killing, so it makes sense they wouldn't know.”
>“…What are you trying to say?”
>“The one who personally killed a Dragon General. The one who was drenched in a Dragon General’s blood can’t possibly be alright. That's what I'm saying.”
Einar flicked his hand. His glass was refilled with the viscous distilled liquor.
He tossed the contents into his mouth and swallowed roughly. *Huu*, he let out a deep sigh and continued in a languid tone.
“The first time I realized it was… let’s see. When we killed Tumor. When we killed Tumor of the Great Mountain, that son of a bitch, Maximilian acted strange for a while.”
Einar closed his eyes, reminiscing about the distant past.
“He was back to his old self in a few days… but while the others might not have seen it, I could. The deep, suppressed anger beneath his eyes. That guy, he was always a good-natured fellow, but after that, he became strangely kind.”
>“Is that so.”
>“Yeah. After that, we took down another Dragon General, and that time, he was stubborn even after his arm was blown off. Insisted that he had to be the one to kill it. A strange thing. He wasn't one to care about things like honor, yet he was roaring that he absolutely had to be the one to take its head.”
At the time, he had thought nothing of it.
Those days were harsh for everyone. The Hero’s Party was gradually becoming more taciturn and emotionally volatile.
It had been a long time since they’d seen their families, and days when they rarely spoke to other humans. Demons were all they stumbled upon, and both the earth and sky were after their lives.
It was a time when you had to tear the sky asunder just to see a glimmer of hope.
So, the Hero’s eccentricities were of an acceptable kind. That’s what they decided to think. What did it matter if he dealt the final blow or not? What was important was that a Dragon General had been killed.
“And at the Demon King’s castle…. Hm. It would be trouble if others heard this. You guys, get out.”
>“Yes, boss!!”
At Einar’s gesture, the Huscarls filed out of the director’s office.
Alone in the room, Einar slowly reached out and filled his own glass.
He pushed the filled glass in front of Ivan and, holding the bottle, gestured with his hand.
“Drink up. This brother of yours is thirsty.”
Ivan picked up the glass. Einar raised the bottle and clinked it against his glass.
The two men drank at the same time.
A heavy, bitter, fiery liquid flowed down Ivan’s throat.
After a moment of silence, Einar set down the bottle and spoke.
“Maximilian personally struck the Demon King’s head. At that time, he was in a state where he couldn’t move. Even with Patricia’s healing, his body needed at least a week of recovery.”
And yet the Hero, even while suffering from a grievous wound that should have left him unable to lift a finger, walked over and brought his sword down on the Demon King’s neck.
The blood pouring from between his armor plates was already a fatal amount. Patricia had been pouring healing miracles into the Hero until she collapsed.
Gilles Vert had fainted on his feet, Einar was gathering the party members to prepare for escape, and Enrique and Veolgrin were dealing with the forces swarming the top floor of the Demon King’s castle.
In that situation, Maximilian struck the neck of the already dead Demon King. Endlessly, until they retreated. Endlessly, even after he had lost consciousness.
The only ones in the party who felt that something was ‘strange’ were Veolgrin and Einar.
Veolgrin through his intellect, and Einar through his instinct. They noticed the Hero’s ‘strangeness’ that the other party members had missed.
“That bastard dared… to shoulder the curse in our place.”
>“…A curse.”
>“Yes, a curse. The filth that pours down on mortals who kill a god. The curse that is bestowed upon the deicides who are drenched in a god’s blood.”
A thick killing intent emanated from Einar’s body.
“He dared, he dared to bear that sin in my place. Thinking we couldn’t handle it. All on his own, in his damned pride…!!”
To Ivan’s eyes, it was guilt disguised as anger.
A way of expressing sorrow and guilt, emotions that had no other outlet, only through rage.
Ivan silently stroked his glass.
“When he killed the first Dragon General. That’s when he realized. That this was a curse no human could handle. And then he must have thought.”
*If someone had to bear the same curse in the future.*
*Wouldn’t it be most efficient for him, who was already cursed, to take it on?*
“That fool. Without a thought of consulting anyone else, he took it all upon himself and….”
Einar tilted the bottle and chugged from it. *Kkh*, only after letting out a deep breath did his eyes open low.
“Killing one Dragon General taints the soul. So what do you think happened after he killed the Demon King? The others thought Maximilian’s disappearance was strange, but not me. That bastard had finally reached a point where he could no longer bear it.”
Einar set down the empty bottle and stared at Ivan.
Heavily, as if trying to peer into his very soul.
“The concept Aviditas embodied was greed. You’ve lost your desires, Ivan Petrovich. For the world’s treasures, for honor and fame, for connections and love.”
Pouring all the assets he earned through the war into establishing an orphanage without a second thought, yet sleeping on a sofa himself.
While nobles and high-ranking generals from all sectors of society are still active, he alone has gone into seclusion, living as if dead.
And after rejecting all the marriage proposals he received from the daughters of high society at the time, he is growing old alone.
Einar quietly steadied his breath, swallowing his anger.
He swallowed his sorrow, his guilt, his grief.
“How are you still alive? For the past four years. What in the world is keeping you in this world?”
>“…”
Ivan raised his head at Einar’s words.
“Duty.”
And then, he continued heavily.
“Respect, faith, responsibility, hope.”
Respect for the late king.
>Faith in the ending page.
>Responsibility for all those who died in his place.
>Hope that he can one day return.
And finally, to add one more.
“Survival.”
Not finding a reason for being alive.
But the blindness of making being alive itself the reason.
It was no exaggeration to say that this was everything to Ivan.
After saying that, Ivan thought for a moment before taking a small box from his coat.
“And I haven't lost all my desires, Einar.”
>“Brother.”
>“Einar.”
>“I said, brother.”
>“…Brother Einar.”
>“There you go.”
Einar smirked and gestured toward the box with his chin.
“Alright, what is it? This desire you haven't lost. Let me see what it is.”
>“Don’t be surprised.”
Ivan slowly opened the box. A shining metal comb, preciously maintained, was carefully lifted into his hand.
He flicked the comb open with a *click* and said in a low voice,
“It can also be used as a dagger.”
>“That’s fucking awesome, you bastard!!”
Einar shouted, jumping to his feet.
*