Chapter 131: Even the Absolute Being Is a First-Time Dad
Even the Absolute One is New to Fatherhood Chapter 131
After the tumultuous Parents' Day award ceremony had drawn to a close, the thick darkness of night had long since fallen outside the window, yet...
Kang-jun's home remained lively with the guests invited to today's ceremony.
"Grand Duke, could you tell us some stories from the past?"
Bong-gu made an earnest request to Crabsley, who had returned late from his convenience store part-time job...
"I'm genuinely curious too."
"Me as well..."
"I'd like to hear them too."
The S-rank Hunters gathered in the living room all made the same request in unison, as if they'd planned it—they wanted to hear stories of Kang-jun's past.
"Since everyone's asking so earnestly, shall I spin a little tale?"
"Yes!"
"Very well, let me tell you the story of how a man from another world became an emperor..."
Crabsley, caught up in the moment, began recounting Kang-jun's past in chronological order, as if telling a fairy tale to children.
"First, let me explain the history before the empire's founding..."
Starting from when Kang-jun first appeared on the Anux continent and gathered companions like a shonen manga protagonist...
"After that, he led the great war against the thirteen established kingdoms of the Anux continent, achieving victory in every single one..."
The story of how he subdued all thirteen kingdoms through sheer force alone and rose to become an emperor with thirteen kings at his feet...
"Next came the complete eradication of the heteromorphic races that threatened humans across the continent, forcing peace treaties through military might..."
Then followed the "Heteromorphic Subjugation Tales"...
"The following year, he even slew the dragon that had plunged the entire continent into terror..."
And not content with just slaying the dragon, he resurrected it to sweep across battlefields together—Crabsley spun out tale after tale.
"Wow, how many years did all this take?"
When the Ice Witch Seol Eun-bin asked between sips of canned beer, Crabsley answered quietly:
"If I told you that everything I've described so far—from the founding of the Anux Empire—was accomplished by a lone man in just ten years, would you believe me?"
Then he added:
"And this accounts for barely eighty volumes' worth out of the 2,300-volume chronicle I personally wrote."
The Hunters all simultaneously went "Whoa..." in admiration before eagerly urging him to continue...
"If I had to pick one major event that happened immediately after..."
"Yes, what happened next?"
"There was one king foolish enough to plot rebellion before being purged."
"Damn, was he insane?"
Just as Crabsley was about to continue his story—
Creeeak.
The firmly shut bedroom door slowly began to open...
"What's this?"
Kang-jun surveyed the Hunters gathered before Crabsley like baby birds and asked bluntly:
"Aren't you all leaving?"
From amidst the crowd, Lee Soo-bin casually asked:
"Kang-jun, where's Seol?"
"Asleep."
"She must have been tired..."
Then she added:
"Kang-jun, if you're tired, you should go rest too."
"Huh?"
"We'll keep our voices down so we don't wake Seol."
"Eh?"
"Actually, the Grand Duke was telling us 'old stories.'"
As she finished speaking, Soo-bin glanced at Crabsley before asking again with barely contained curiosity:
"So what happened next?"
Kang-jun shook his head slightly, then pulled a canned beer from the fridge and squeezed into an empty spot...
"Let me listen too."
Crabsley continued:
"There was one called Aldebaran..."
As everyone sat mesmerized by Crabsley's storytelling, hanging on his every word—
"Hmm."
Kang-jun felt strangely... odd.
Why was that?
For some reason, a corner of his heart felt warm.
'It's almost like...'
Old memories buried deep beneath the surface of consciousness stirred.
Memories he wasn't even sure were his own.
"A holiday..."
At Kang-jun's murmur, Soo-bin quietly asked:
"Hmm?"
Kang-jun muttered again in a low voice:
"It feels like a holiday."
Soo-bin tilted her head at that...
"Wow, you actually remember that time?"
"Huh?"
"You were really young then."
After muttering "Hmm" to herself for a moment, Soo-bin snapped her fingers and added:
"After our parents passed, we never saw any relatives again, so the last time would have been when you were about Seol's age now, right?"
Kang-jun murmured at that:
"I see..."
Were these truly memories buried deep in his subconscious?
Or scenes he'd absorbed from TV and other media?
The atmosphere unfolding before Kang-jun now felt exactly like...
"Anyway, it feels like a holiday."
That rare time when the whole family would gather to chat and spend time together—it felt remarkably similar.
'Hmm.'
Kang-jun's gaze drifted down to the paper carnation pinned to his chest.
Parents' Day.
Somehow, he'd ended up becoming a parent himself...
And today, he'd even received a flower that little hands had painstakingly made as a gift.
Yet.
He couldn't recall what his own parents had been like.
They were good people who'd died suddenly in an accident.
That was all he knew from what Soo-bin had told him.
No memories beyond that would surface.
'What kind of people were they?'
When he was little, he'd sometimes pester Soo-bin with questions about their 'parents'...
But after noticing how sad she looked whenever he asked, he'd stopped.
He'd buried it all in his heart, and as layer upon layer of time accumulated, he'd simply forgotten.
'Parents...'
He'd keenly felt their absence throughout his childhood.
Sometimes, he'd resented them for leaving so suddenly.
His shabby clothes made him a target for bullying...
Mean classmates never hesitated to call him a "beggar orphan."
His sister always carried the stale smell of grease.
After school, he'd watch TV wrapped in a blanket.
The descending darkness at night had been terrifying...
"Hmm, the electricity bill is high this month..."
After overhearing his sister muttering over the bill, he couldn't bring himself to turn on the lights no matter how scared he was.
Trembling in fear of the dark, he'd just burrow deeper under the blanket and wait for his sister.
In short, looking back now, his 'childhood' was just a gloomy period stained with pain.
Perhaps.
That's why he'd forgotten all memories of his parents.
Maybe he couldn't have endured all that suffering otherwise...
Maybe his unconscious mind had ruthlessly discarded all those memories.
'Anyway, I resented them a lot back then...'
As Kang-jun sipped his beer and took in the scene before him—
"Thank you for giving birth to me and raising me..."
The greeting he'd received from his daughter earlier today with the carnation suddenly flashed through his mind.
If he had to suddenly leave his child's side like his parents had... how would he feel then?
'What would that feel like?'
Kang-jun absently scratched his head.
'What must they have felt...'
Just then, everyone gasped in admiration.
"And so Aldebaran was stripped of his titles, territories, and royal authority by our lord, forced to flee to another dimension in disgrace."
"Wow, amazing..."
"After much time had passed, he eventually arrived at our lord's home dimension—Earth—where he was leading a criminal organization called the Anti-Management Bureau Alliance."
At this, murmurs broke out...
"That bastard, cut—"
Crabsley added:
"In the end, our lord annihilated him."
As the S-rank Hunters learned the backstory of how Kang-jun had wiped out the Anti-Management Bureau Alliance, they all expressed their amazement in various ways.
Gulp, gulp—
After downing an entire beer in seconds, Kang-jun said:
"Have fun before you go."
Then standing up, he added shortly:
"Come visit like this sometimes."
A brief silence followed his words.
"I like the noise."
With a final "I'm going to bed," Kang-jun trudged back toward the bedroom.
Thump.
Kang-jun carefully sat on the edge of the bed where Seol slept soundly and immediately pulled out his smartphone.
The passcode was '4653'.
All his passwords were the same.
For some reason, since when—even Kang-jun himself couldn't remember.
Ever since he was very young, he'd had the habit of setting all passwords to those same four digits: '4653'.
Kang-jun immediately opened a search portal and began typing in the search bar...
Soon, the search results for Kang-jun's query appeared on his phone screen:
- What must parents feel when they have to leave their child behind?
Kang-jun scanned the results.
[No search results found.]
Kang-jun clicked his tongue. "Tch."
"Even the internet doesn't know this one."
Then he looked down at Seol.
It was something he didn't even want to imagine.
Had his parents felt the same?
"I thought I'd buried it all."
But now that he'd become a parent himself, he found himself wondering anew.
No, perhaps...
He'd just been living with it buried all along.
Knock knock.
Just then, a very soft, cautious knocking sounded...
"My lord."
Iriel slipped through the slightly opened door.
"Were you planning to sleep tonight?"
Then she carefully added:
"If you do intend to sleep, I could stay by your side and use my magic to ensure you rest comfortably..."
Back when Kang-jun had battled not only the 72 Demons of the demon world but their Demon King to the death...
He'd been cursed with nightmares by the Demon King, forcing him to experience hell whenever he slept.
As a result, he could only sleep when Iriel was beside him to manipulate his 'dreams' with magic...
Thanks to this, Kang-jun's sleep schedule had become something like once every few months at best.
"You're right, maybe I should sleep for once."
Looking back, the last time he'd slept was when he'd passed out at the comic book store near Sillim Station.
While everyone else evacuated, he'd slept so deeply that he'd ended up getting sucked into the Gate...
Muttering "That was already months ago," Kang-jun tilted his head slightly when Iriel asked:
"What kind of dream would you like tonight?"
Kang-jun always answered that he didn't want any dreams at all.
Even when he was suffering from homesickness.
Because he feared neglecting reality...
He always demanded perfect blackout sleep.
So the question was merely routine.
"Tonight."
Kang-jun answered.
"A dream of my parents."
Iriel startled. "Pardon?"
Kang-jun smiled bitterly and explained:
"You know they died when I was little."
"Yes, you mentioned that."
"I suddenly find myself wondering what they were like."
Finished speaking, Kang-jun asked in turn:
"Is it possible?"
Iriel answered vaguely:
"If any memories remain in your subconscious, my lord..."
Then she added:
"I will do my best."
And so Kang-jun lay down beside Seol and closed his eyes...
While Iriel stood silent guard by his side.
How much time passed then?
Kang-jun began tossing and turning...
His expression visibly contorted.
Iriel began whispering incantations in a low voice.
Gradually, Kang-jun's expression softened again.
As always, a 'horrific nightmare' welcomed Kang-jun.
In a space where blood rose ankle-deep...
A tower of bones stretched impossibly high into the sky.
Every night will be as terrifying as death itself...
The Demon King's voice.
Savor the grudges of those who died by your hand.
Kang-jun sighed in the dream.
"This is why I don't sleep."
As the bloody tide began surging higher, voices thick with resentment came from all directions:
Immortal, you arrogant—
Why, why did you—
I'll never forgive you—
Skulls with horns approached cautiously, each clutching weapons, unleashing a torrent of curses.
Had Iriel not been standing guard, he'd have been helplessly submerged in that viscous blood to be tortured for immeasurable time.
Days? Months? Years?
In that space where time flowed strangely, there was no telling how long the torture might last...
But just when he felt he might go mad, he'd often wake back into reality.
"You're working hard."
Then Iriel's voice rang out.
My lord, none of this is real.
Kang-jun nodded. "Yeah, I know."
Then the scenery shifted abruptly.
Happy memories flashed by—all moments spent with Seol.
May you have pleasant dreams...
With those words, the scenery changed again.
Kang-jun's consciousness began sifting through all his memories.
Like traveling back in time, his consciousness raced backward...
"Ah."
Finally, it reached old memories that had settled like sediment at the bottom of his subconscious.
"Kang-jun! Kang-jun!"
Inside the parking lot of an old villa with green-painted walls.
His young sister's voice called from behind.
"Hurry, let's go to the sledding hill!"
Then a gentle voice spoke behind Kang-jun:
"Kang-jun, get in."
The voice he'd tried so desperately to forget.
His father's voice.
Only then did all the memories return.
"Christmas..."
It was the Christmas when Kang-jun turned six.
"Kang-jun?"
The day he'd cried hysterically since morning because the toy car Santa gave him wouldn't move.
The day he'd stopped crying when his parents promised to take him sledding and ask Santa for a new toy.
"Hey, Lee Kang-jun! Get in already!"
Then Kang-jun's gaze fell on the license plate of the car parked before him.
'4653.'
The young Kang-jun murmured:
"My password..."
The password Kang-jun had used since time immemorial was...
The number on his father's license plate.
Memories that had settled like sediment beneath the surface of consciousness.
Those memories now surged upward like ripples from a stone thrown into muddy water...
This day...
Was his parents' death anniversary.