Things the Dead Shouldn't Do (2)
I was certain I had killed him. I had definitely sent Loban. I had definitely severed his neck. After confirming the corpse with my own eyes, I had begun every action that followed. So why—?
The thought sent heat surging through my skull and stole the breath from my lungs. Yet—
“You, Yohan…? With everything like this, you suddenly say something like that to me?”
Vankite, a man who lied and performed as easily as he breathed, instinctively slipped back into his glib act. But once he truly considered the situation, the truth hit him.
Yohan being alive meant Loban had failed. The open hostility directed at him could only mean one thing: Yohan knew everything.
Vankite realized it in a single heartbeat. He also understood that his usual sly performance would be useless here. So he twisted the gentle, benevolent voice he had been faking into something grotesque and shrieked.
“God fucking damn it, Iron Giant!! Kill that son of a bitch!”
“I—ah—oaah!”
It was the best Vankite could manage in that moment. He knew it was the act of digging his own grave, but he no longer had the luxury of caring.
With a low whoosh, the Iron Giant obeyed at once, swinging its horrifically vicious steel club down at Yohan.
“Drakaris, block it—!!”
Yohan focused every ounce of his frost energy on the descending arm. He could not freeze it solid, but he succeeded in stopping its motion.
And at the sight of it—
Karalin’s heart slammed against her ribs. She did not even attempt the calm poise expected of her blue blood. She swallowed hard, once, twice, her parched eyes trembling uncontrollably dozens of times as the broken parts of her heart regenerated in an instant.
The only change was that Yohan had returned alive. That alone was enough to make the shattered machine beat again.
“He was alive. He was alive!”
She gasped as though hyperventilating from sheer elation, yet she could not remain still. Whatever else happened, her heart demanded she run to him, hold him, and speak every word she had never been able to say. She wanted to return all the love she had failed to give him.
But even though Yohan surely understood those feelings, he could not allow the plans he had built so carefully to crumble. So he traded blows with the Iron Giant and shouted loudly enough for everyone to hear.
Before Vankite could flee, the collaborator who had helped orchestrate all of this had one final task.
“Cryan, I know you’re listening—do it now!”
“C-Cryan…?”
Startled by Yohan calling the fallen magician’s name, Karalin looked behind the spot where he had been pinned. But Cryan was not there.
“I’m right beside you.”
He had approached her at some point without her noticing, her attention stolen by the chaos. Cryan’s entire body was drenched in someone else’s blood. He spoke with obvious effort.
“Pretending to be dead was exhausting… No. I might truly have died. The reality I stand in now may be nothing more than an illusion created by my desperate wish to keep my promise even after death.”
Despite the cynical tone, he drew out the Fresh Bloom he had carried in his chest since the field training began and held it beneath Karalin’s nose.
“Eek—what?!”
“I’ve been scolded constantly for keeping you away from the flower, my lady. And I’m sorry for deceiving you all this time.”
He flashed a crooked grin.
“I’ve done everything I can. The rest… you two lovebirds can figure out for yourselves.”
Thud. Cryan collapsed forward, unconscious from exhaustion. Even as he fell, his middle finger remained raised toward Vankite, who had been watching him the entire time.
For a man who had always regarded Cryan with suspicion and dislike, the gesture was more than enough to send his rage boiling over.
“Goddammit, it was all a trap! I knew the atmosphere felt wrong. I kept thinking something was off the whole time…!! Iron Giant, kill Cryan! Kill him, kill him, kill him!!”
But who could he blame? There had been a moment when he might have suspected Yohan and Cryan were working together, yet he had been too distracted by Karalin to notice. In the end, this disaster was entirely his own fault.
Slash—!
“Hik…?”
A sword whistled past the side of Vankite’s head. The aim was slightly off and did not strike his face, but a warm wetness bloomed at his ear. When he touched it, he felt nothing on the left side of his skull. On the ground, his severed ear lay in the dirt.
The realization tore a scream from his throat.
“K-Kyaaaaah—!!”
“Vankite von Karlangk.”
The voice that slid into his remaining ear was the same eerie tone he had heard once before, when ranks were being decided. It spoke his name.
“Thank you for letting yourself be deceived all this time. I knew exactly what unspeakable darkness you harbored toward me. Thanks to you, my master and I were torn apart by life and death. How did it look to you, watching all this while?”
“You—you—!”
“Well, as you said, it must have been quite the passionate spectacle.”
Karalin, her memories fully restored, was now carrying out the scheme she had devised with her master little more than a month ago. Hatred dripped from every syllable.
“But I have lost a great deal. And I am furious. So I will kill you. So thoroughly that not even a corpse remains to be found.”
Just as her murderous aura reached for his neck—
Kwaaaaa—!!!
“K-Kyaht?!”
A storm of steel howled in. Black feathers whirled. Because his master had come with Vankite.
“Butler! You’ve come to save me!”
“Your Majesty. I considered slaughtering every student watching from afar, but first I blocked their view so they could not see what happens here.”
“Well done! Touching that place would ruin our future plans. The same if they discover you are by my side! So now we run—run, run, run—!”
Vankite wailed at him.
“Instead, seize every weapon those students carry and turn them into iron beasts! What we have here is not enough. Everyone who has seen you and me—kill them all, every last one!”
“...As you command.”
But how long would he let them do as they pleased?
Who would simply stand by and watch the black meteor at work?
“CRUNCH CRUNCH GRIND CRACKLE CRUNCH—!”
Boom—.
The enormous sound filled everyone’s ears. They all spun toward it in shock. There stood a giant of a man who had forced the Iron Giant to its knees. No—had reduced it to ash and scattered it on the wind.
No matter how strong the creature was, if its body was iron, it could only crumble helplessly before him. That was precisely why Yohan had received the title of Lord of Steel from His Excellency Grand Duke Rexas.
“Iron beast. Is this what you meant by what that thing creates?”
“Impossible! Nonsense! No matter how freakish and impossible your ability to devour iron may be, there is no way my Iron Giant would fall without regenerating even once—!”
Yagnus, who held an oddly inflated pride in the servant he had created, roared in fury before Vankite could even react.
Yohan answered in a flat, indifferent voice.
“How I killed it is none of your concern.”
Clang—. Not a single drop of blood clung to the blade. Following his northern habit, he wiped it along the inside of his arm and spoke.
“You will all die here anyway. Without understanding anything. Without regretting anything.”
At that death sentence, Vankite finally understood that everything had gone to hell. He urged Yagnus desperately.
“Goddammit. Yagnus! Forget everything else—just take me and run! Escape this place at maximum speed, do you understand?!”
“...By your command!”
Yagnus swept Vankite into his arms and shot into the sky at blinding speed.
“Have the remaining steel hawks buy us time! Keep that man from approaching while we escape—!”
He left the order trailing behind him in the air.
But every move had been calculated with surgical precision. Yohan had already predicted they would try to flee.
Shweeeeeek—!
The instant the steel hawks dove toward Yohan and Karalin—
Bwoong—. Flash!
“Senior’s proud junior, Hilken, has arrived?”
Hilken’s dragon squadron, descending from the sky at the perfect moment, blocked the iron horde.
Kwa-kwa-kwang!!
The celestial bodies forged of magic unleashed crushing gravity and brilliant flashes. The swarm of horrific beasts was systematically annihilated by the celestial magic Hilken unleashed without restraint.
The last surviving hunter, the excellent junior Yohan had stubbornly kept alive, now shone brilliantly as if answering every comrade who had fallen meaninglessly to the dark scheme.
“Good, good! I don’t know what’s happening, but Eclipse is making her reappearance too! Come on, everyone, attack meeee…!”
Eclipse, who had been catching her breath high above, descended as well.
“But—uh, kyaa?! Yohan sir?!”
It seemed this was the first time she realized he was alive. Yohan gave Hilken a brief rebuke for failing to explain properly.
“Hilken, you bastard. Did you not explain it clearly? Why make things so annoying? I told you how persistent she is!”
“Senior, do you know how difficult it was to pull this lady free from the giant’s grasp using celestial gravity? After preparing the assault on top of that, I had no strength left.”
“I suppose that’s true… Anyway. I leave this place to you, protagonist. Don’t die.”
“P-Protagonist?! I really don’t understand any of this!”
It was the moment when every scattered fate converged into one—the return of all things to their origin.
“…Khat. Khuhuhuhak—. I knew it. As if you’d actually die, you rice-cake bastard…”
Jurchen had predicted Yohan’s actions from the beginning. He had followed along, saying he wanted to watch the puzzle pieces fall into place. The goosebumps that raised every hair on his body—even the fine down—along with the accompanying rush of dopamine, struck him in this exact instant.
Perhaps he had clung to consciousness through the storm and pressure solely to witness this scene. But he was on the verge of death; his voice was too faint to be heard. Yohan did not notice.
Instead, Yohan approached the one star he had longed to see again—the small, strong, and infinitely lovable lady. He removed his mask.
It had been far too long. Not knowing what to say, an awkward smile rose to his lips.
“My lady.”
Squeeze—.
This time, Karalin reached out first and pulled him into her arms. Their relationship had always been one of strict reciprocity.
“Yohan…”
She seemed to have countless things to say. She drew a ragged breath and poured it warmly against his ear. Normally both would have been mortified, but not now.
Yohan held her even more tightly and spoke.
“…I know you have a great deal to say. I have a mountain of words myself. But right now, we must end all of this!”
“Yes. That’s right. We have to bring this situation to an end…!”
They could not let the despicable crown prince escape.
Yohan supported her hips with one hand, lifted her effortlessly, and seated her before him on his beloved steed. No—his beloved dragon. Jabberwock’s wings thundered as they spread wide.