Chapter 119
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 119
The smoke from the incense burner rose and drifted lazily, curling around Agatha and me.
Agatha Custoria.
Even I, who had spoken the name aloud, found it hard to believe.
The elder lying in the bed was Agatha Custoria—a figure out of a past more than two hundred years gone. Even for a noble with a full-body prosthetic, living beyond two centuries was rare. By my rough calculation, Agatha had endured for nearly three.
Agatha called me Noel. She believes I'm his reincarnation.
Reincarnation and rebirth were nonsense. When you die, everything evaporates. Consciousness is nothing more than a phenomenon of electrical and chemical reactions.
Agatha simply wanted to believe in such superstitions. It was an illusion born of a weakened mind. Above all, Agatha herself had admitted she clung to superstition precisely because she had grown weak.
But I must exploit her goodwill.
I narrowed my eyes and gently clasped her hand.
"By Noel... do you mean Noel Mulrizka?"
"...Mulrizka was a name attached much later," she murmured. "Noel is just Noel. I do not care for the name Mulrizka."
My mind raced. Just organizing my thoughts was overwhelming, but time was short. Agatha could draw her last breath at any moment.
How much does she know? And what about the other elders and Heilas?
Did Agatha know I was the Emperor's Watcher? And was Noel Mulrizka... also the Emperor's Watcher?
A long-standing question surfaced in my mind.
The first rebellion, led by Noel Mulrizka.
Given the depths of the Empire I had glimpsed, it wouldn't be surprising if the Empire had used Noel to instigate that very rebellion—snuffing out the spark before the fire could spread.
Noel, who played the role of the rebellion's leader, must have been the Emperor's Watcher, just like Kinuan.
If so, everything fell into place—including why Akies Victima was a prerequisite for being a Watcher. That was why the Watcher's alias was Akies Domini.
"Seeing you lost in thought like that, you truly look just like Noel."
"Without any genetic connection, there's no way we could look alike."
"I am not speaking of your appearance," she said. "I am speaking of your soul."
Absurd. If some street vagrant had said such a thing, I would have ignored them outright.
"I don't believe in the existence of souls. And even if they exist, they aren't something you can see."
Her raspy laughter followed—a mechanical sound crackling with static.
"There is no need to separate the inner from the outer. Our souls are not inside us; they are on the outside. The shape of a soul is determined not by inner thoughts, but by the actions expressed outwardly."
"Have you been watching me all this time?"
The edge in my voice was no accident.
The secrets I harbored were shields that protected me. But the moment they leaked, they would become blades driven into my heart.
If Agatha knew my secrets, I was in mortal danger. Heilas might be waiting behind that door, fully armed.
"I want my descendants to prosper. But even so, I do not wish to betray you twice. I hope that answers your questions and your fears."
Agatha's words were bizarre. She was projecting Noel onto me. I parted my lips.
"I also want to protect the Custoria family. If there is something I need to know right now, you must tell me."
Silence fell. The light in Agatha's metallic eyes flickered as though it might die at any moment. I feared her consciousness would simply fade away like this.
I had to make a choice here. To pull answers from her, I would have to surrender a piece of my own secrets.
"...The Emperor is trying to destroy the Custoria family. I need your counsel. Though we share no blood, as a descendant who received the Custoria name, I beg of you."
The light in Agatha's eyes flared. She trembled with the effort as she forced herself upright.
"That the Emperor wishes to purge the Custoria family is no great secret. Before begging for my help, you should have revealed that you are the Emperor's Watcher. You hide your own secrets... yet you ask only for my aid—just like Noel!"
She knew everything.
For the first time, a trace of hatred slipped from Agatha's lips. My heart sank. I couldn't steady the pounding in my chest. It felt as if my breath had caught in my throat.
The choice I'd just made was wrong. I had stirred the hatred that lay dormant at the bottom of her heart.
Her feelings toward Noel are a tangle of love and hate.
I couldn't know what had passed between Noel and Agatha. It was surely not a relationship that could be easily explained.
"Does Heilas... also know of the Watcher's existence?"
I had to confirm this first.
At my words, Agatha pressed a hand over her face. It was as if she were weeping—a mechanical body that could not shed tears even if it longed to.
"I already told you I do not want to betray you twice, child. Do not make me any more miserable than this."
"You remained neutral."
Even if I had to trample on Agatha's feelings, I had no choice. There were too many things ahead of me far more important than her emotions.
At worst, I might have to fight Heilas the moment I stepped through that door. It was the worst-case scenario I had prepared for.
"Noel, in the end you repeat the same thing. You will lose everything, chasing after a grand cause."
The light in Agatha's eyes flickered, dimming and brightening in turns. I doubted she was even in her right mind.
Grit.
I ground my teeth and fixed her with a fierce glare.
"If I am to make a better choice, I must know the past. I must know what mistakes Noel made. If you want to sit and sigh in regret, then do so—but do it alone. I'm leaving. You are a person who will die soon. But I must live tomorrow, and the day after that. I have no intention of wasting my time on the fleeting grumblings of the dead."
I stood. Slowly, I sent a combat signal to my prosthetic body, awakening and expanding my senses. My brain was sufficiently warmed, and my concentration climbed swiftly to its peak.
Slide.
I reached into my inner pocket and began preheating Ruina.
If Agatha called Heilas here... I would put a round from Ruina through that door.
There's no need to despair over facing the worst enemy, Luka.
Good fortune in life is rare. Usually there is only the worst and the lesser evil. Today my luck was simply worse, so the worst had appeared.
"Calm yourself, child. Heilas does not know of the Watcher's existence. Nor do the other elders."
Agatha spoke from behind me. Her voice was far calmer now, drained of emotion.
"Why didn't you tell them? It must be crucial information for the survival of the Custoria family."
"Because to know it is to die. Being capable and sharp is not always an advantage for survival. Sometimes being dull and incompetent is far more advantageous. Heilas has always been a child of keen intuition. Give him a single clue, and he'll uncover what he was never meant to know. Even now, he is unraveling the Imperial Family's conspiracy on his own, and preparing. If that child dies, he dies precisely because he is exceptional."
It sounded contradictory, yet it was true.
The Imperial Family kept Heilas in check because he was exceptional. An exceptional Heilas would notice their conspiracy. Thus conflict arose. And because that conflict could ignite civil war, the Imperial Family sought to purge him.
Cause and effect, locked together in a vicious cycle.
The Imperial Family's judgment was not wrong. Heilas was a latent threat. Even his unwavering loyalty was, in the end, nothing more than human will. Will and heart are physical phenomena, and phenomena are subject to variables.
Machines do not change. Humans do. And both Heilas and I were human.
"If it were me, I would have told him. Heilas is the finest soldier I've ever known. His capabilities are beyond measure. He would have devised a plan somehow."
"You do not understand, Luka. No matter what Custoria does, it cannot defeat the Imperial Family. The more Custoria prepares, the more the Empire is weakened by the threat of civil war—until the only outcome is the Empire baring its vulnerability to enemies abroad.
That is why I opposed Heilas's appointment as Family Head. But in the end, that child seized the position with his own strength. As though it were his destiny. Yes—because it could not be stopped, it is destiny."
Destiny again. I felt I would come to loathe that word before long.
"If accepting destiny leaves nothing but defeat and resignation, then I do not want to accept destiny."
At my words, Agatha laughed—that mechanical, static sound. It was strangely eerie.
"You say the exact same thing as Noel, child. Then go, and learn from Noel's choices. Learn the despair and the agony of a man forced to choose the lesser evil, because he was looking at the future."
As though some strength yet remained in her, Agatha rose from the bed. The cables and tubes fastened to her body slipped free and fell away with soft thuds.
She stood behind me like a wandering ghost. Her cold hands wrapped around my neck, then slid down to rest against my chest.
"If you are Noel, then I must believe you have returned to make a better choice."
"I am not Noel."
"Long ago, a mysterious wanderer from Kora—no, Corta—told me. That after enduring the dark years, I would once again see the one I longed for. I have held on until now believing only in those words..."
The light from Agatha's eyes, reflected on the floor, was red.
"...So you must be Noel."
It was the fanaticism of a misguided faith. She saw what she wished to see and believed what she wished to believe.
I couldn't even summon anger. It was only pitiful—that a woman who must once have been stronger than anyone had withered into something so frail.
I closed my eyes, then opened them. Agatha swayed as if she might collapse at any moment.
Creak.
I caught her as she fell and held her steady. Turning, I laid her back down upon the bed.
"We don't have time, Agatha. If my existence has brought you comfort, then you must be of help to me as well. That is only fair."
Perhaps Noel had said the very same thing, in a situation like mine.
Agatha parted her metal lips. I brought my ear close. She whispered a long-held secret to me.
"...Thank you."
I straightened and nodded. Agatha's hand reached out, wrapping around my neck as if reluctant to let go, then sank down.
Agatha would not survive the day. That she had held on until now was a feat of superhuman will. She was broken—and she had just lost the very reason she'd been holding on.
"Goodbye, Noel," Agatha murmured. Beyond the mechanical face lay not an old woman, but a young girl.
She must have wept every night for a long, long time. That was surely why she'd stripped the function to express sorrow from her prosthetic body—so that she would never shed a tear again.
"I hope you have sweet dreams."
I leaned down and kissed her forehead.
* * *
Creak.
I opened the door and stepped out.
I walked down the hallway and reached the second-floor railing. Looking down, I saw Heilas and the elders standing on the first floor. There would have been no wiretap, no eavesdropping.
Some of the elders surely knew that the one dying now was the founder of the family. Given the nature of the Custoria family, they would show Agatha absolute reverence and would never do anything to challenge her authority.
Even when I'd first met the elders, Agatha's presence and voice had loomed largest of all.
The oldest elder sought me out before her death.
I was neither the Family Head nor a successor of the bloodline. It was bound to seem strange that she had summoned me on the eve of her death.
What will they think of me now?
I studied the elders and Heilas as I descended the stairs. They studied me in turn.
Rustle.
The elders slipped past me and headed toward Agatha. They would witness her final moments.
Step, step.
I continued down the stairs. Heilas was waiting for me. "What did you talk about?" he asked.
"She said I resembled her first love."
"Hmm. I'd expected that person to be a woman."
That was the end of our conversation.
Heilas said nothing more. And that left me endlessly uneasy.
But I must not be fooled. This was Heilas's specialty—feigning knowledge, floating assumptions, and drawing the truth out through his opponent's reactions.
Heilas doesn't know.
I had to believe Agatha.