Chapter 218: Never, or Just Once (3)
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 218: Never, or Just Once (3)
Snake hunting.
You must never grab a snake by its tail, nor by its body. Touch the wrong spot, and you’ll find yourself staring into its cold eyes as it twists its entire length to coil around your arm.
While you hesitate, lost in those pitch-black, vertically slit pupils, the snake will open its maw wide, sink its dagger-like fangs into your fragile skin, and inject death.
"Your Highness."
To avoid becoming the snake’s victim, one must either crush its head or sever it in a single blow, preventing it from ever baring its deeply hidden, insidious fangs. A snake never gives a second chance, so the hunt allows for not a single mistake.
Thus, while hunting a snake might seem easier than catching a gentle deer in theory, it was, in reality, more difficult than slitting the throat of an enraged grizzly bear.
"Your Royal Highness."
Yet, he did not hesitate in the slightest.
He had already done it once; why couldn't he do it twice?
"……Chase."
Lost in thought, he hadn't answered her call, so his name immediately followed.
He needed to respond, but hearing his name only sent him deeper into his musings, the duty to reply forgotten.
—A pure white bird of prey, carrying the sacred bloodline.
Pure white.
Could there be a name more loathsome, more utterly ill-suited?
'I'd rather be a pitch-black snake carrying the deadliest of venoms.'
As his wandering thoughts arrived at this conclusion, Chase let out a short chuckle. Arianne, perched on the edge of the spire, asked with a mix of frustration and anxiety, "Your Highness, what is it? Did something happen again?"
Only then did he turn his head, feeling the wind against his skin.
Barely pulling himself from the thoughts he felt he might drown in, Chase shook his head and smiled gently.
"…No, it's nothing. The wind is just hot. I came up here to escape the heat, but now a hot wind is blowing. It feels both hotter and somehow better. I'm not sure which it is."
It was hard to tell if the spire was a place to escape the heat or succumb to it. It was a contradictory place—closer to the sun, so it should be hotter, yet high enough that a cool breeze should blow.
It was like the suffocating feeling that always gripped his throat whenever he came up here—he never knew whether to fight it or welcome the way it made him yearn for life.
"It's dangerous, Arianne. Come here."
Showing no fear, Arianne sat with her legs dangling over the dizzying drop. Ignoring his warning, she looked at Chase and asked again, "What were you thinking about so deeply?"
Calian took after Chase's stubbornness.
But perhaps Chase took after Arianne's.
'If Prince Franz and Arianne ever had a battle of wills, I wonder who would win.'
Finding himself lost in another pointless thought, Chase looked at Arianne. He knew she would keep asking until she got a proper answer, so he decided to reply.
"My name. I was just thinking that it seems difficult for me to live up to it. It's a bit amusing."
As a non-royal, Arianne had not learned the forgotten ancient language, but she knew what Chase's name meant. She understood that his smile was self-deprecating, mocking his inability to live a pure white life.
"What? And here I thought you were agonizing over something profound."
She also knew perfectly well why Chase, who had been nothing but pure white until now, could no longer remain so.
"There's no such thing as pure white in this world anyway. Even the snowfields of the Northern Great Desert are just rotten, decaying earth underneath. Why should you be any different? It's not a matter of achieving it or not; it was impossible from the start. If you don't like it, just leave it to me, like always. I'll do it. Otherwise, don't bind yourself to it. No one can live a purely white life. Don't go meticulously crafting a noose out of every single thought in your head and slipping it over your own neck, especially after you insisted on stepping forward yourself."
Arianne's solutions were always simple and clear. To the one who always walked ahead, lighting his path, Chase offered a playful remark instead of a direct answer.
"It sounds strange hearing you say there's no such thing as an innocent person. You said something similar last time, too."
Didn't Arianne deal with the law? How contradictory for someone like her to so casually declare that no one in the world was clean.
"I haven't made a noose. I'm done worrying, and I've decided what to do. I won't regret it, either. What you're worried about won't happen."
"Then why did you laugh?"
"Because it was amusing. It's funny how it seems not a single name ever turns out as intended. That's all."
Relieved to hear he wasn't trapping himself, Arianne was about to nod when she paused, pondering the meaning behind "not a single name." She then asked, "Are you talking about your brother's name?"
Though Arianne had spoken Calian's name without hesitation when talking to him, she refrained from doing so in front of Chase. It was difficult to discern whether the "brother" Chase was thinking of was Calian or the nameless someone residing inside him.
About to answer, Chase instead reached out to Arianne, who was still sitting in that precarious position. He felt they could only have a proper conversation once she was somewhere safe.
"I told you, it's dangerous. Come here, Arianne."
Having learned fire magic—which perfectly suited her fiery personality—Arianne's only way of cooling off on a hot day like this was to take off her shoes, perch on the edge of the spire, and catch the breeze. She smiled and said, "What does your brother's name mean? I think I can remember that one."
"I'll tell you if you come over here."
Chase had wondered if Arianne and Franz would ever argue, but if that day came, he doubted Arianne would win. In the end, unable to overcome her curiosity, Arianne took Chase's hand and stepped back onto the spire floor to sit.
Looking at her with eyes that praised her for yielding, Chase spoke softly.
"…Remnant of the Sunset."
Rolling the unfamiliar words in her mouth, Arianne stared into Chase's purple eyes. She imagined a face identical to his, but with longer hair, a taller stature, and many scars. And she pictured those mysterious eyes, said to have shone a lighter hue than Chase's.
Instead of saying, 'Come to think of it, long hair suited you very well too,' Arianne briefly stared at Chase's neck, which still felt strangely bare, and asked, "Is that the meaning of his old name, or his current one?"
"Which do you think?"
"His current one. No matter how out of his mind His Majesty might be, I doubt he'd name his own son 'Sunset' or 'Remnant.' Though in Kairis, where they don't know the ancient language, they might have."
Though he didn't confirm it, Arianne's guess was correct. What Chase had said was the meaning of the name 'Calian' in the ancient language.
"'Remnant of the Sunset'… phrased like that, it sounds incredibly strange. I can't quite grasp the meaning. In our current language, it has such a lovely ring to it."
Remnant of the Sunset.
Come to think of it, could there be a more fitting name? It was a phrase one could picture, yet found difficult to explain in words.
Then again, there was an even stranger name.
The thought of the person with an even stranger, incredibly green name—who lived on the floor above the one with the merely strange name—made Chase chuckle again.
"What is it? Laughing by yourself again. Tell me, too."
"I can't. It'll be troublesome if word gets out."
"My lips are sealed. You know that."
"Still, no. I'm sorry."
Seeing him shake his head with a firm expression, Arianne decided to let it go. Recalling what she had just heard, she spoke again.
"Since you couldn't have laughed because the strange meaning of your brother's current name didn't come true…"
After a brief pause, Arianne let out a short breath and continued in a casual tone, as if talking about the weather.
"You must have been thinking of your brother's real name."
Knowing he couldn't help but think of his brother, she spoke lightly, hoping to ease his feelings of emptiness, loneliness, sadness, and pain, even if only a little.
"Bern. It's Bern, Arianne. His name was Bern."
Chase spoke the name once more—a name he had already told her dozens, hundreds of times, hoping she would remember it.
For a split second, a dull shadow passed over Arianne's jewel-like eyes. She blinked, then asked, "Did your brother's name not fit either?"
Was the wind louder than my voice?
Is that why she didn't hear me?
Is that why she couldn't even hold it in her memory? Why she didn't even wonder what she had just missed?
"If only it were just a matter of not fitting."
Just as before, it was completely and utterly mismatched. How could he explain that with a word as simple as "not fitting"?
Chase held his breath, swallowing the words. Seeing this, Arianne realized that he had just been forced to confront a harsh truth once again.
Thus, Arianne grumbled, changing the subject.
"What on earth was His Majesty thinking, giving you two names that don't even fit? Only to trouble my fiancé's heart."
Hearing her clumsy attempt at comfort, Chase smiled faintly.
"Indeed. Rather than a blessing, my father bestowed those names upon us like a curse."
Come to think of it, their relationship had been twisted from their very first meeting, from the moment he was named. Rather than resent it, Chase decided to consider it a good thing.
"Let's head down now. You have work to do, and I have somewhere to be."
Having sorted his thoughts, Chase stood up. Arianne, usually so curious and eager to know everything, stood up with him without asking where he was going.
* * *
There were times when irritation seemed to flare up.
In truth, he was naturally a bit irritable, but occasionally, his face would be completely flushed with annoyance. To put it in words, his expression was like freshly harvested seaweed—young, yet somehow wilted and salty.
"What is my sensitive older brother dissatisfied with now?"
"I think everything would be fine as long as my younger brother doesn't bark."
Franz, whose face looked fresh yet somehow worn out, replied immediately.
Calian chuckled silently, wondering why the Pea—who wouldn't give him a straight answer anyway—looked so thoroughly boiled. He had been piling work on Franz under the pretext of preparing for a vacant position, or claiming that his older brother needed something to do to keep from dying, but it seemed Franz was growing suspicious.
Suspecting that it was all just an excuse to make him work.
After all, the result was that Franz grew busier by the day, while Calian did not.
"Have you been busy?"
Just as Calian said, he had been busy.
Extremely busy.
He had taken over some of the work Arsen left behind while guarding Hina, handled his own duties, and filled his grueling day with the various events required of a prince who was one in more than just name.
Standing at the entrance of Chermil Palace with a weary face, he heard the clinking of ice nearby.
Looking up was his mistake.
He locked eyes with a pair of crimson orbs staring out from the terrace, their owner wearing an expression that was impossible to read.
Specifically, it was the sight of the bastard’s red eyes. The bastard who had woken up at his leisure, rested, attended a noble gathering, rested, rested some more, attended a luncheon, rested, rested, and rested again, and was now sipping tea without a care in the world. All while Franz had been up since dawn, working, attending that same noble gathering, working, working, attending the luncheon, working, working, and working right up until he returned.
"I'm going to rest."
He didn't care where Calian had been or what he had done since the morning's events. He was simply irritated by the sight of that face and the cup filled with ice on such a hot day.
As Franz spoke briefly and made to enter Chermil Palace, Calian, who had been on the third-floor terrace, threw himself over the railing.
Without even bothering to put down the mint tea in his hand.
"Prince Calian!"
Ignoring Relic's startled cry—he was still unaccustomed to such antics—Calian landed soundlessly below and walked up to Franz. Holding his tea without having spilled a single drop, he grinned.
"Have you eaten?"
Since they couldn't talk with one looking down from above and the other looking up from below, Calian had simply jumped. Just to ask if he had eaten.
"I don't feel like eating."
"Alright."
'If you don't feel like eating, we can eat later.' 'If you're not hungry, let's just have a meal anyway.' 'You must be tired, so eating is exactly what you need.' Calian, who had barked in so many different ways to get him to eat before, surprisingly complied with a simple "Alright."
Seeing Franz's face fill with suspicion, Calian smiled brightly.
It wasn't as if Calian didn't know that "I don't feel like eating" meant "I'm exhausted, so get lost." He acknowledged it but showed no intention of leaving.
"I'm tired."
"Surely not."
Calian replied with a face that said, 'Don't be ridiculous.'
It meant that if someone could get tired from that much work, Arsen would have died long ago. It was also a jab, asking if he, who carried the blood of Brissen, really found such a small task so difficult.
"Since we can't be seen having a long, friendly chat, I'll head inside first. Enjoy your meal, and come to the forest at a suitable time."
Because their relationship had seemingly fractured once again after the banquet and the memorial for Freya, they couldn't converse for long in front of others. Having delivered his message, Calian paused as if he had forgotten something. Then, with another beaming smile, he spoke.
"And don't forget your sword."
Whether he knew those words sounded like an invitation from hell or not, Calian maintained his beautiful smile, offered a light bow, and went back up to his room.
Standing still and watching his retreating back, Franz furrowed his brow, trying to recall if he had done anything involving Hina recently. There was nothing.
"Your Highness, if you are tired, you should rest today."
"It's fine."
"But you don't necessarily have to listen to…"
At Relic's worried words, Franz muttered, his face still tight with irritation.
"I decided… to learn everything."
Relic wouldn't understand, but regardless, hadn't he agreed to learn everything from that bastard?
So, whether he was summoned to hell or across the Senyu River…
He had to go.