The Refugee Couple (1)
Every flame venerates fire in its own way.
Something Hervis had once said. And he had offered up his own heart as his way of venerating it.
Our King belongs to a woman.
Probably because that was the passage of the prophecy as Hervis knew it. A mere 3rd-tier mage like him had never been given the information in full.
The Sun belongs to a woman. Aroshu had known it down to the letter.
That was why Harad had knocked Aroshu unconscious back then instead of killing him outright. If they learned that his Origin was the Sun, how exactly would the Red Tower behave? He had wanted to see for himself.
As expected, then.
Every flame venerates fire in its own way. The saying rang true. It was Harad alone who stood outside that verse — for by the Prophecy of the Moon, he was a false vessel.
So in the end, it was the Red Tower that most ached to kill me. The Moon Tower may well be the same.
Avery Aquins had wanted him taken alive — a conclusion the Deep Sea Tower had reached precisely because it and the Red Tower were old foes. If Harad died, then by the prophecy, a woman bearing the Sun would be born in his stead.
The Deep Sea Tower wants me alive; the Ivory Tower wants revenge. The others... I can't say.
Not that it changed anything. The Outlands were his enemy regardless.
I would have liked to probe this 'veneration' a little further.
In their own ways. The phrase kept snagging in his mouth like a fishbone. If Hervis had been Aroshu — the thought kept resurfacing. If Hervis had known everything the way that man had, what choice would he have made?
I doubt he would have tried to kill me.
Hervis's reverence had been oddly lofty, for fire. In their own ways. If some flames sought to kill, perhaps others did not. Hervis was his evidence.
Hardly a solid argument — a mere feeling. And he had no intention of being swayed by a feeling, of all things. Not once had Harad ever taken the Red Tower for an ally.
The Red Tower made for an excellent tale — a claim that would set the Outlands against one another, gnawing each other down. To keep that tale alive, he had to keep hiding that he was the Sun. Otherwise, the Red Tower would join hands with the other towers and come for his head.
Star. A useful identity to have.
The King's right hand. The other towers might not care for it, but to the Red Tower it was a rank that undeniably carried weight. It would prove handy time and time again.
"Not hungry?"
Harad asked Buldongi, who had gone motionless on his shoulder. He had given the bird leave to eat Aroshu's heart, yet Buldongi hadn't moved an inch.
"Grown attached to him already?"
— Pweee!
Buldongi let out a sharp cry. A refusal.
"Then what?"
Buldongi bit down on Harad's ear. It didn't hurt. The bird bit gently and pulled — in a direction that ended at Aroshu's corpse.
"You want me to eat it?"
— Pweet!
Buldongi cried out brightly. An affirmation.
"Why? Is my flame tastier than a heart?"
— Pweet!
Buldongi chirped its yes even as it shook its head no.
"So I'm what matters most?"
— Pweet!
A yes. Buldongi nuzzled its face against his cheek.
"Splendid."
Harad meant every word of the praise. Buldongi had not taken fire's side simply for being fire. It was Harad's alone, through and through. These were the ones he wanted at his side.
It would have been nicer if it were more like a rabbit, though.
Raise it well, and it would surely grow strong. Without betraying a thing, Harad pointed at Aroshu's heart.
"But this time, you may eat it."
— Pweet?
"I'm curious, that's all."
On the way here, Buldongi had already eaten a few of the hearts Aroshu had gathered. All of them had come from low-tier beasts. What would happen if it preyed on the heart of a 4th-tier mage like Aroshu? A mage. And one of the same fire, no less. That was what Harad wanted to find out.
"Eat."
By then Buldongi had already fluttered down to Aroshu's heart. It glanced back at Harad one last time, and at his nod, it pecked into the heart and devoured it. A rather chilling sight. Harad kept his attention fixed on the bird — the mana lingering in the organ was being drawn into the creature, bit by bit.
After who knew how long, Buldongi — the heart devoured without a trace — let out a small burp. The change was meager. The flame that had grown in place of feathers was bigger by a little. A very little.
"...Appalling efficiency."
It seemed a far harder creature to raise than he had imagined.
Quality over quantity, then.
The problem was likely in its birth. Buldongi had been born of the Crimson Flame. If he hoped to see it grow, the quality of its feed would have to match the Crimson Flame's level at the very least. And Buldongi seemed to grasp that fact by instinct — knew that if it wanted to grow, its master, Harad, had to grow first.
— Pweetweet!
Perhaps that was why the bird cried out so petulantly: because Harad had absorbed Avery Aquins's heart.
It knows efficient feeding. Is that instinct, too?
It had to be. It was a magical beast, after all. Buldongi was faulting him for having done his heart predation the inefficient way. That's not how you eat it, apparently.
"You remember this too. Unless I'm at death's door, this is how I eat."
Harad lectured the bird. There was no telling when a crisis like the one with Psina might strike again. If Kubel weren't there, Buldongi would have to stand in for him.
— Pweeee? Pweet!
Buldongi seemed not to understand — then nodded along all the same. Harad's word, it appeared, took precedence over instinct. A good omen. Buldongi was no ordinary magical beast, after all.
Perhaps because it was their first real conversation in some time, the bird chattered away on his shoulder without pause, leaving Harad no room to answer.
The River.
The taste of a river — ten meters deep and ten meters wide at the least — still lingered on his tongue. He had absorbed it already, and still his mouth watered more than usual. That was the Sun's verdict. The grander the Origin's concept, or the mightier its tier, the more the Sun delighted in it — for the greater the meal, the greater the growth.
Substantial, indeed.
It wasn't remotely comparable to Tyrell Aquins's, which had once drawn genuine admiration when Harad absorbed it. Avery Aquins had surpassed his own grandson by far — in mana, naturally, but in Origin alike. A man worthy of the name Star of the Deep Sea.
My growth is climbing far steeper than I projected... hardly something to celebrate blindly.
Predation was a means of growth that came bundled with risk, and Harad had not forgotten the danger of addiction.
Time to start weaning off it.
At least once, he needed to gauge how bad the withdrawal would get. In truth, he had meant to try quitting this very time. But Avery Aquins had simply been too great a prize.
Safer to attempt it after I return.
Once home, if the opportunity arose, he would abstain from heart predation for a while. It wasn't that he lacked confidence. It was because Harad's Origin was the Sun — when it came to enduring, he had his own brand of expertise.
...Thanks to that woman, of all people.
He hated to admit it, but there was no denying his patience had grown on Elaine's account. In his mind, Grand Duke Elaine wore that infuriating smile, the kind that made a man's fist itch — and so he thought of Ellen.
When he went back, she was still asleep.
"Can I hit her?"
He would have to endure. For now.
Ellen woke a little over two hours later. Her eyes flew wide open all at once, like someone who had only been feigning sleep. Come to think of it, she had been the same in her past life — Elaine had never once known the languid afterglow of waking.
Envious, honestly.
Heavenly Might was an extraordinary power in more ways than one.
"Feeling better now?"
He needn't have asked. Ellen looked perfectly sound. Less than three hours had passed, yet not only her eardrum but even her left hand — which had been left hanging in shreds — had regained its shape. Wounds of that degree required no treatment where Ellen was concerned.
"I can hear fine. I've mostly mended. And you?"
Ellen asked, after taking stock of herself.
"About the same here."
Harad said, showing her the Moon Orb. The silvery mana that the Agwi had filled it with had drained down to seven-tenths.
"Better than the time with Cassion."
Back then he had been on death's door, and half of that silvery mana had been spent.
"It's 4th-tier, after all."
"And the River?"
"Dead. I got a taste of what the fellow had to offer, too."
The orb's mana had fallen by three-tenths, though by rights it should have cost more. Loath to waste it, Harad had fended off the difference with his own body — for the Sun, suffused with Avery Aquins's mana while Ellen slept, had replenished his vitality in full.
"Then why hold back? Spend it freely."
"You'd only nag me about it."
"Dead right."
Ellen mimicked his tone and flashed a grin. She seemed pleased with the orb's condition. From here on, it would let Harad survive one brush with death and one grave wound.
— Pweeeeee!
Overhead, Buldongi — circling, keeping watch over their surroundings — let out a long cry. A welcome for Ellen, newly awake. Ellen gave the bird a small wave, then glanced around.
"Where's Aroshu?"
Buldongi had been standing sentry over Aroshu.
"Killed him."
"The Grand Duke will have words for you."
It had been Grand Duke Aratus, together with the Outrealm Elder, who had arranged the meeting between Harad and Aroshu. Aroshu's death might not have been the outcome the Grand Duke had hoped for.
"Well, nothing for it. My merits will square it."
The credit for slaying Psina had yet to be converted into reward. And now he had added the deed of felling the Star of the Deep Sea. More than sufficient payment. If I press the Kalinos matter hard enough, that might count as merit too. But that was still a secret. The Commander of the Third Knight Order wished to keep his Sword Master rank hidden, and Harad had every reason to play along — a Sword Master who could pass through the Boundary would prove useful beyond measure.
"You're taking this rather calmly, though. I expected an earful."
Unexpected, if anything was. For all that Ellen had judged Aroshu wanting, she had followed his guidance without complaint — because Grand Duke Aratus had planned that meeting.
"What would I even say? You clearly had your own plans."
"That I did."
"But I am curious. Why did you kill him?"
Ellen pressed forward with her trademark curiosity.
"He tried to kill me."
"...Why?"
"Because he learned I'm the Sun."
In truth, he had shown it to him deliberately. But Harad held that back, and Ellen's expression soured all the same.
"A perfectly natural reaction, when you think on it. The King can only be born with my death."
By the Prophecy of the Moon, the Red Tower had no choice but to kill Harad.
"Hervis didn't, though."
It seemed Ellen had arrived at the same thought as Harad.
"Hervis didn't know the King was the Sun. His knowledge of the prophecy was incomplete."
"Ah."
"Fire venerates fire — but I am the exception. Remember it that way."
Harad saw no reason to add his own hunch to the pile. The Red Tower was his enemy either way.
"Died well, then."
Ellen gave a slow, deliberate nod, as if savoring Aroshu's death. The moment was brief. When she raised her head, her eyes were glinting brightly.
"So — how was I?"
Ellen was a Northerner beyond help, after all. Somewhere along the way, she had already turned to replaying her own heroics.
"Magnificent."
"See? At this rate I'll be a Sword Master too—"
"—you won't."
"...I'm not?"
All Ellen had done was awaken to her Heavenly Might — to her own talent. And Harad could not explain the details, because she was Ellen, not Elaine. He could hardly describe a Heavenly Might that Ellen did not possess.
"But I cut down an Origin."
"What you cut was the Manifestation, to be precise. Not the Origin itself."
"...Is there a difference?"
"There is."
Harad explained it briefly.
"Had the Origin itself been severed, Avery Aquins would never have functioned again. A mage stripped of his Origin is nothing more than a vessel that has lost its contents."
Yet Avery Aquins had kept his reason. He had conversed with Harad plainly enough.
"Even so, it was a genuine feat — no denying that. Manifestations are not so easily cut."
She had not merely severed a 5th-tier spell. Manifestation was the very essence of the 5th tier.
"Then am I not a Sword Master?"
"What is your essence? Commander Kalinos of the Third Knight Order — his was Bravery."
Kalinos had awakened to his own essence, and could name it. To Harad it remained an inexplicable phenomenon, but that was what made a Sword Master.
"...I don't know."
"Then you're not one yet."
She had only just learned what her talent was. Now Ellen had to seek out what her essence was.
"..."
Ellen wilted, as though her spirits had never lifted at all. A familiar sight. In his past life, Harad had found Elaine endlessly amusing whenever she got like this — for all her brilliance, the Elaine of that era had taken a very long time indeed to reach Sword Master.
"Look on the bright side."
Ellen's situation was far better than Elaine's had been. She was already dancing along the line of death — and had she not already grasped her Heavenly Might? Grasping her essence would not take nearly so long.
"..."
But Ellen, knowing nothing of that past life, could not see it that way.
"You haven't even glimpsed your own reflection yet, and already you're strong enough to rival a Sword Master."
Her ears twitched, ever so slightly.
"I'll say it again — no ordinary swordsman cuts down a Manifestation. Even Toremote, the First Knight Commander, would find it difficult."
A touch louder.
"That is how special you are."
Louder still — deliberately so.
"And this is only you as you are. Imagine what you'll be once you're a Sword Master. I'm already looking forward to it. Is that just me?"
"...So am I."
Harad smirked.
Too easy.
Then, as now.
"By the way."
"Yes?"
"Forgotten anything?"
"...Oh."
The refugee couple.
"They may well be dead by now."
They were not, as it happened. Harad had already confirmed their condition through Buldongi. Both were still sprawled where they had fallen.
"Why didn't you bring them in?"
Unaware of the truth, Ellen shot up in alarm.
"And how was I to collect them without knowing where they were? You're the one who carried them off."
"...They're alive, aren't they?"
It seemed to dawn on Ellen a beat too late.
"Still unconscious, the both of them."
"...You're terrible."