Chapter 83
Chapter: 83
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>Translator: penny
>Chapter: 83
>Chapter Title: Bruno Green (1)
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>That evening, as usual, Sungjin finished his meditation and waited. Before long, Dasha dropped onto the balcony with a thud.
This time, before the Demon King could give any warning, Sungjin sensed her presence first. Ever since she had taught him [Aura Concealment], his ability to detect the unnatural sensation of hidden auras had improved dramatically.
She let out a sigh toward Sungjin, who was gazing at her with bright, sparkling eyes.
"Yes, yes, of course. I won't expect to sneak into the palace without Your Highness noticing anymore. You've completely shattered my steadfast composure."
Dasha then began unpacking the bundles she had brought, piling them up in the room.
A stealth suit and several disguises, various types of daggers, and suspicious vials of potions.
It was surprisingly thorough preparation, considering she had initially resisted teaching assassination techniques.
"You have no idea how much grief I got from Captain Breman."
As she laid out the items, Dasha grumbled nonstop.
"I told you over and over not to go out, and yet you leave the palace right after we part? If His Majesty hadn't given special permission to overlook it, I would've been in serious trouble."
"Uh... sorry."
Sungjin had no excuse for that.
"I just meant to take a short stroll at first, but the palace knights didn't notice. It's all thanks to my excellent teacher."
"Sigh, if only you weren't so glib..."
But their conversation couldn't continue. Suddenly, the Demon King shouted urgently in Sungjin's mind.
[Hey? Sungjin. That guy's coming this way?]
'What? What are you talking about? Who?'
The next moment, a loud knock came from outside the door.
Knock knock.
Sungjin and Dasha froze in surprise, halting their movements. Normally, no one would disturb the prince's rest at this late hour.
Above all, neither of them had sensed anyone approaching!
But the voice that soon followed from beyond the door was one Sungjin knew well.
"Your Highness, is everything all right?"
Sungjin blinked.
"...Captain Bruno?"
He was officially on suspension, so he was staying in the Pearl Palace as Sungjin's [guest].
"I suddenly sensed a suspicious presence from Your Highness's room, so I took the liberty at this hour. Are you okay?"
As Dasha's eyes widened in shock, Sungjin quickly shouted toward the door.
"Yeah, it's fine. It's just a friend I know well, so don't worry, Captain."
There was a brief silence, as if gauging the situation, and then the captain's voice returned.
"Yes, Your Highness. My apologies for the intrusion. Please rest well."
Thud thud.
The footsteps receded into the distance, and only then did Sungjin and Dasha exhale the breaths they had been holding.
"Whew, is that man Bruno Green? As expected of a former Decaron Knight? I thought he wasn't an aura user anymore—how did he notice?"
Dasha spoke, unable to hide her tension.
Come to think of it, she had said Decaron Knights were the natural enemies of assassins.
"You know about Captain Bruno?"
"Of course. He's one of the rare treasures of the continent—a Decaron Knight who lost everything overnight and was chased from the palace."
It was indeed a strange story.
Even if they held him accountable for lèse-majesté, turning a Decaron Knight—who alone could elevate a nation's military strength by several levels—into a cripple so easily?
If anything, Empress Consort Elizabeth, who had ordered his penance, deserved the severe punishment.
"The huge scandal just vanished without a trace, and soon no one knew Bruno Green's whereabouts. But what's this? The man himself was hiding right under our noses in the capital!"
"Wow... really?"
"And that's not all. If you look up Bruno Green's records, there's no official disciplinary action. He's just been on [suspension] from the knight order for years."
"That's intriguing."
"Isn't it? It reeks of some massive conspiracy, Your Highness. There were rumors in the intelligence department that whoever buried Bruno Green must be a tremendous power player."
Sungjin wasn't sure about the conspiracy.
But he had a feeling he knew who the power player involved was.
"Anyway, the whole palace was buzzing with news of him today. The tragic commoner knight captain has returned."
The tragic commoner knight captain.
A peerless genius who rose from lowly birth to captain, only to lose everything in a moment of misfortune. A man who served Delcross and the Holy Emperor with all his heart, yet was discarded and forgotten without reward. That was the Bruno Green known to the world.
Well, the Captain Bruno whom Sungjin had actually met didn't quite match that image.
"And he even suffered from the Gray Plague? How on earth did he come back unscathed?"
"My father cured him."
A universal cheat key, indeed.
"So it was treatable. The Gray Plague is said to resist any amount of holy power. As expected of the Holy Emperor, proxy of the Lord God."
"Uh, yeah..."
Sungjin dodged the response with a vague murmur.
Katrina had said it before—the Holy Emperor's power operated on a different plane from ordinary holy power.
But could it really be explained so simply? After witnessing the Holy Emperor treat the captain firsthand, Sungjin wasn't even sure it could be called holy power.
-This man shall henceforth belong entirely to your karma.
At that declaration.
A white light exploded forth, and Sungjin felt an inexplicable attractive force gathering toward himself and Captain Bruno. The abnormal phenomenon grew stronger over time, making him briefly worry that something had gone wrong.
And there, a true miracle occurred.
The captain's discolored skin regained its natural hue, and his weakened breathing steadily stabilized. He was undoubtedly reviving.
Yet even witnessing it all unfold before his eyes, Sungjin couldn't shake the doubt that it was truly a [healing] process.
This wasn't the first time he'd seen the Holy Emperor wield holy power. Just recently, after the wooden sword incident that landed him in the main palace, Sungjin had experienced the miracle himself.
But if that had felt like an outpouring of vital life force, what was happening to Captain Bruno now had a strangely different quality.
Something was breaking down and reassembling. Axes of time twisted, misaligned, and fractured throughout his body, only to fuse back together.
The process occurred so minutely and simultaneously across such fine scales that for a moment, Sungjin wondered if the Holy Emperor was disassembling the captain at the cellular level.
The odd part was that, among all those present, Sungjin alone sensed the discomfort.
While everyone else was entranced by the holy light's spectacle, only Sungjin anxiously observed the captain's changes.
No, there was one other who sensed the strangeness.
[Th-this... No human could do this... This is insane! Hiiik!]
The Demon King let out a bizarre shriek and then hunkered down in a corner of Sungjin's mind, deathly silent for a while.
Soon after, before everyone's eyes, Captain Bruno rose fully restored.
Even his faintly active aura was gradually increasing, suggesting his destroyed aura layer was regenerating.
Regaining his senses, he took one look at the Holy Emperor, grasped the situation, and prostrated himself on the spot, shedding hot tears in silence.
The perfect return of a genius knight captain.
Yes. In the end, it had turned out well.
[...I don't even know how to explain this. Simply put, your father redefined the very concept of holy power multiple times just to force it into a place where it shouldn't work. It was an insanely dangerous and terrifying act that shook the foundations of this primary material world, Delcross.]
The Demon King, finally recovering, explained while trembling.
Sungjin didn't fully understand, but it clearly wasn't something done lightly to heal one person. That explained the cumbersome [conditions] required.
'And now, the consequences are entirely my responsibility?'
It was all for saving a life, but maybe a bit more caution was needed.
Sungjin felt belated regret.
"Anyway! Let's set that aside for now."
Dasha clapped her hands to refocus Sungjin's attention.
"First, there's something Your Highness needs to learn urgently. I was going to teach it slowly later, but after you sneaked out without me, I'm worried you might do it again anytime."
"I won't anymore."
"I know you're just saying that, so focus. The first thing assassination trainees learn isn't the techniques—it's the secret hand signals of their faction."
The group Dasha belonged to was called [Oberon's Hand], fairly renowned in the trade. All the informants in the Monkey Tower were alumni, apparently.
She taught Sungjin several complex hand signals, earnestly warning that if he encountered someone flashing them during stealth operations, he must respond with the proper countersign.
"What happens if I don't?"
"You'll be hunted across the continent by every member of [Oberon's Hand]. Stealing techniques means death by silence—that's the rule in this business."
Whoa, brutal.
"Consider yourself lucky yesterday. If you'd run into a low-level informant who didn't know you well... Ugh, just imagining it is horrifying."
They would've tried to kill him outright, no doubt.
Of course, he wouldn't go down easily to some novice assassin, but Sungjin just nodded without retort.
"So, Your Highness, if you insist on stealth ops from now on, please take me along. You never know what accidents might happen. And heightened palace security from the fallout wouldn't be pleasant either."
Hmm, maybe.
Frankly, the palace security seemed too lax.
"Wouldn't a little more tightening be better?"
"You're saying that because you don't know. The palace's defense system isn't to be trifled with. There are dedicated assassination squads for patrols. The spot you used yesterday was just a tacitly allowed hole. Even that was flawlessly monitored by [Arenza]."
"Arenza?"
"Yes, His Majesty's direct secret organization—details are classified. Rumor has it it's a spirit surveillance network covering the entire capital. The intel department speculates it's an elite group of high-ranking priests."
That jogged something in Sungjin's memory.
The spirit orb that appeared the moment he scaled the palace wall, clashing with the Demon King for a while!
'Hey, Demon King. Were those guys priests?'
[Eh? Who knows? They were odd spirits, but I didn't sense any holy power.]
Coming from the Demon King, sensitive to priests. The intel department was probably way off.
"Dasha, have you ever actually seen how [Arenza] patrols?"
She gave him a strange look.
"How could I, a non-priest? It's a spirit network—probably angels or ghosts patrolling the palace. That's all that's known."
Fair enough.
At least for the Holy Emperor, who could see spirits, it was a covert, easily controlled asset.
"Thinking about those things wandering around everywhere feels creepy."
"A bit, right? Sometimes passing empty areas gives me chills for no reason."
Sungjin nodded and followed up with another question.
"Oh, by the way, Dasha. Do you know anything about something called an oracle?"
She pondered briefly, then shook her head.
"Hmm... Not sure? Feels vaguely familiar, but honestly, no. Want me to look into it?"
"Nah, it's fine. Not important."
Learning about [Arenza] from Dasha was an unexpected bonus.
Sungjin had only heard about it from the Demon King, so openly asking anyone about the spirit orbs patrolling the palace was awkward.
'Either way, I should look into that spirit network soon.'
Come to think of it, wasn't it suspicious how it immediately drew him to Bruno and Carmen's crisis?
Whoever staffed Arenza, they likely knew quite a bit about Sungjin and the Demon King.
'Well, no point dwelling now. I'll ask the Holy Emperor during my next audience.'
Sungjin brushed it off lightly.
But someone with more detailed info was closer than he thought.
A few days later.
As Captain Bruno warmed up in the training hall, he said to Sungjin:
"Yes. Actually, recently I received an offer from an organization to work together. Do you know of [Arenza], Your Highness?"
...What?