Chapter 17
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Translator: MadScientist
Chapter: 17
Chapter Title: D - 0
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D - 0
The world lost its light. No, it wasn't just the light—it lost everything. The gentle touch of the warm spring breeze, the pure white petals blooming between the leaves, the fresh mint scent brushing against my nose. Once the world began to slip away, it crumbled at a terrifying speed. Even my final remaining sense, hearing, faded away with the sound of their departing footsteps, wrapping me in utter darkness.
Why am I still alive? Why am I still thinking?
At first, I wandered in confusion, unable to grasp the reason. Nothing was left to me anymore. Excluding this worthless life, I was nothing more than an empty stone.
In the midst of my contemplations, it suddenly dawned on me that one more thing remained. Thought. Thought, thought, thought. My sole remaining asset and ability. I began to use that power to reflect on what I had lost.
Hero.
Future. Resolve. Mint scent and elm leaves.
Nadia.
Honor. Integrity. Conviction. Dreams. Knight.
Sera.
Friendship. Jokes. Smiles. Pride. Christmas tree.
Hometown.
Apple chocolate. Mountain ash tree.
Eli.
Each time I chewed on them, pain, regret, and rage mingled and seeped through my wounded lips, but I couldn't stop. Hero, Nadia, Sera, hometown, Eli. Like someone addicted to misfortune, I obsessed over things lost long ago.
Yes, long ago. It must have been long ago.
They left ages ago. After losing her, I couldn't find a reason to hold on, so I just watched them go and closed my eyes. Waves of time, too vast to measure, crashed heavily and then scattered like foam. No matter how much time passed, it meant nothing to me. Because nothing was left to me anymore. So there was no need to feel anything, not even to think.
By now, you're probably wondering. You, who are beautiful and ugly, omnipotent and impotent, must have watched, heard, and perhaps even felt what happened to me. Do you still think I deserve to live?
Eli said as much. That it was enough to love only as many things as you could count on your fingers. The reason was simple. If you try to love too much, things slip through like water between your fingers, but if it's just a handful, clenching your fist is enough to hold them tight.
But I couldn't even do that. Hero. Hometown. Nadia. Sera. Eli. The things I tried to love could all fit in one hand, yet I failed to clench my fist. Even as those filthy bastards, that revolting swarm, pried my fingers open one by one, I offered no resistance.
How dare a pathetic wretch who couldn't protect what was his own claim he could save everyone and call himself a hero. Looking back now, it's laughable. Maybe, just maybe, Eli was right.
I never had what it takes to be a hero from the start.
Yeah.
Hero was never my fate to begin with.
So, this story ends here. Time has slipped away pointlessly again today.
...
...
...
But then, a thought flashed through my mind. Can you lose something you never had in the first place? Pondering it, it didn't make sense. I was never the hero to begin with. Saying I lost the hero's qualification was nonsense.
The budding doubt chained together, awakening my dormant senses. After what felt like an eternity, I opened my eyes and gazed at my pathetic outstretched hand.
The hand I had extended in futile hope just before petrification had all its fingers splayed wide. I counted them one by one, lost in thought.
First, the hero. The hero wasn't something I lost. As I just realized, I was never the hero. You can't lose what you never possessed.
I slowly folded one finger. The splayed fingers reduced to four.
Next, my hometown. The village of mint flowers and poppies blooming year-round, now impossible to return to. But with Eli gone, it was nothing more than a tiresome backwater.
Another finger folded. Now three fingers remained, each bearing a person's name.
One was Nadia. The golden-haired knight who once lit up my dark path. But no longer. Now that I knew the truth, I saw her for what she was: a false shepherd luring a lamb into the wolf's jaws. She, who betrayed me in the ugliest way, wasn't something I lost—she was one of those who made me lose everything.
And another: Sera. When all secrets were revealed, she plunged a dagger into Eli's heart. Sera betrayed her friend, to whom she might have devoted her entire life, all too easily.
After folding each finger one by one, only the index finger remained, pointed straight ahead. Bathed in the blazing sunlight, it was the very finger Eli had slipped the ring onto that day.
But strangely, the ring that should have been there was gone. Had I dropped it? As I scanned the ground, a face suddenly came to mind.
Rick.
Yeah, that's right. Rick.
Staring at his eerily clear face, my other hand began to twitch. The fingers of my tightly clenched fist, trembling uselessly, slowly uncurled one by one.
Rick.
All his deeds flashed before me like a panorama. No, not quite a panorama. A panorama is a painkiller shown to the dying for solace. But for me, already a corpse, those memories made my heart race.
As my long-stilled heart pounded, the buried nightmares revived. And when that bastard Rick took the ring, there was that piglet by his side.
Another finger slowly lifted. The stubby, elongated one now clearly bore the name Bobby.
With two fingers extended, the remaining two, connected by knuckles, naturally followed. No need to ask—their names were easy to guess. Those who breathed life into the things I lost under the names of friend and mentor had finally found their place and raised their heads.
"...Guh..."
Suddenly, a chunk of stone tumbled down. The fallen stone vibrated faintly at my feet, sending heat creeping up from my toes. Once ignited, the heat raced uncontrollably toward my heart and brain.
"Kuh... er... guh..."
More stones fell, and then sand—countless grains—poured down like the rain I'd longed for. The whooshing sound swept through my mind, my congested chest throbbed, and dust swirled. That's when the final unextended finger entered my sight. Gritting my teeth, I spat out the name etched in my brain and slowly extended it.
Leo.
The name that stole everything from me. The demon who snatched my one shred of hope.
Recalling that name, all fingers finally splayed, and my dead life regained meaning. Amid the pouring sand rain, pebbles fell; as pebbles dislodged, massive boulders burst forth, shooting in all directions.
I thought I was worthless to the world anymore. Unable to become a hero because I had nothing to give, robbed of everything until I was little more than a corpse, my only path was death.
But it was the opposite.
The world still owed me far too much.
At that moment, heat surged through my body, and my barely moving heart went berserk, screaming. Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump. As I clutched my chest in agony, one finger still outstretched before me caught my eye.
The dirt-covered girl with black hair flying.
My one and only, always scented with mint.
The lover I alone truly lost.
No, no qualifiers needed. Her.
Ripping free from my heart hardened for far too long, I called her name from my lips.
"Eli."
With a boom, the final stones binding my body exploded outward. The dislodged stones turned to sand in an instant, rising like steam, and as I regained sensation throughout my body, I collapsed to my knees, slamming my head into the ground.
"Kuhuk! Cough! Cough!"
Without resistance, my face hit the dirt, sending a stinging pain through me as my brain rattled. Sand still leaked from my mouth.
"Haaak...! Guh...! Heok! Heuk!"
The cold air accumulated inside the stone rushed into my lungs, choking me instead. Was breathing always this painful? Long-forgotten sensations crashed over me, battering my body.
"Haa... hak... aa..."
Writhing in pain, I clawed at the ground with my fingers. The snow that had piled up was gone; only coarse sand dug into my nails. The tiny grains burrowed into my tender flesh, bringing sharp sensations, and I realized anew.
The petrification curse that had bound me so viciously was finally broken.
"Haa... ha..."
Was this reality? Doubting myself, I bit my finger and tasted the blood of the murderer who killed my wife. Why had the curse lifted now, of all times? No answer came to my questions. With trembling eyes, I scanned the ground, then slowly raised my head.
The cloudless sky scattered a brutally vivid blue, stretching endlessly beyond sight. Wherever I looked, the world was an empty wasteland.
"Eli..."
Abandoned alone in this cruelly hollow world, I instinctively sought one person. Knowing she was gone, my foolish tongue still called for her.
"Eli... Eli... Eli..."
Tracing the sky with cold eyes, I suddenly turned my gaze to the ground. Countless sand grains lay piled there.
"E... li..."
She was no longer there. No, nowhere in this world anymore.
That simple fact finally pierced the center of my chest.
"..."
At first, I thought I might cry. But strangely, no tears came. Instead, undischarged sand merely crumbled off my skin; no trace of sorrow emerged from my body.
I slowly lifted my head, casting my gaze toward the horizon. The vast demon lands held no signs of life.
Or maybe there were some to find.
I turned my head at the ominous aura mingling in the air. The Demon King's Castle entered my view, just as I remembered from long ago.
Still a crumbling ruin, yet it felt strangely different from the first time. What had changed? Examining it with unfocused eyes, I chuckled and bowed my head.
Probably my mindset. The will, conviction, and resolve I once held had long crumbled to dust with the sand.
I used to wonder. What lay inside? Was there even a Demon King? What was he doing to let all this horror unfold? Maybe just a rotten corpse that had taken its own life ages ago.
But whatever. It didn't matter anymore.
I turned away indifferently, gazing at the horizon again. To me, who had abandoned becoming a hero, what lay behind held no meaning. What I could gain now was ahead.
Rick.
Nadia.
Bobby.
Sera.
Leo.
Just as with love, a handful was enough for those bound by hatred.
I stared up at the sky. The piercingly blue heavens remained cruelly dry. Thanks to them not shedding a drop, the earth had thirsted for other things. Semen. Tears. And essences of all depravity. Despite swallowing so much, the parched land still gaped its maw, asking what it would drink next.
For me, unable to even shed tears anymore, there was only one answer.
Now it was time to drink blood.
I rose to my feet. My footsteps, sounding after so long, echoed with my heartbeat. Neither rushing nor dawdling. My heart, pulsing to a fated rhythm, spat thick blood as if foretelling the future.