Chapter 39
Chapter 39
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 39
Chapter Title: The Past of the Now Vanished Hundred Ghosts
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"If you pour out your emotions like that, at least the world won't look gray to you."
She had said that to him upon seeing him at the broken engagement ceremony, triggered by the incident in Hardenharts.
Hearing those words back then, Krash felt utterly baffled.
"What kind of bullshit is that? It's better not to have these damn emotions at all. Do you know how much of a mess they make?"
What good was freely expressing emotions?
In this shitty world, all they were good for was cursing it out.
"Is that so?"
"Is that so, my ass."
Krash clicked his tongue.
He then glared at Bianca with a displeased expression.
"You're the one who's better off, aren't you? This broken engagement is bullshit, even from my perspective. The incident in your family wasn't even your fault. If it were me, I'd be pissed enough to drop dead."
The incident that had occurred in Hardenharts not long ago.
It was the event where the family head, Douglas Hardenharts, had gone mad.
He had suddenly lost his mind, beating his retainers to death with a club.
Then, with his own hands, he killed the family's eldest son and second child, Jenica.
Amid that madness, the sole survivor was Bianca.
The reason she survived was that her sister Jenica had hidden her underground and drawn his attention.
After enduring such horror, what followed was the broken engagement.
From the Valheim family's standpoint, there was no reason to accept the ruined Bianca from the fallen Hardenharts.
"Fucking noble families. They act like they've built up all these ties with engagements and shit, but the moment something goes down, this is how it ends."
Even Krash found the whole thing infuriating.
For starters, Douglas suddenly going mad was suspicious as hell in more ways than one.
The Valheims knew that, yet they cut Bianca loose because Hardenharts had crumbled right then and there.
Bianca slowly caressed her teacup filled with steaming hot tea.
"Drink it if you want."
Bianca slowly shook her head at his words.
"I can't handle hot stuff. I've got a cat's tongue."
Was that right?
Krash, who had never paid much attention to Bianca anyway, just shrugged it off.
"...Then how about this? If I regain my emotions and experience them firsthand, won't I know which is more painful?"
At that moment, Bianca countered with her own proposal.
It was an absurd suggestion.
"If you get your emotions back, you'll be so pissed you'll bite your tongue and die."
So Krash warned her, furrowing his brow.
He didn't particularly care for her, but as her former fiancé, it was the bare minimum.
But Bianca tilted her head.
"It doesn't matter to you if I live or die, does it, Lord Krash? We're strangers now."
A surge of irritation hit him instantly.
He knew she was provoking him on purpose.
"I'm just curious. Which is more painful."
Even as she said it, Bianca's face remained utterly expressionless.
"Tch."
Hearing that, Krash raised his hand.
"If you insist on finding out, then feel it for yourself."
She wanted to experience it herself, didn't she?
Krash stole Bianca's eye doll with Black Hood.
Since she had offered it willingly, he took her curse easily without dialing.
The eye doll curse that transferred to Krash was promptly canceled out by his other curses.
A mid-to-low tier curse like the eye doll was just fodder for the numerous top-tier curses Krash possessed.
"How's it feel?"
"...".
Krash still remembered that day vividly.
And how he should have grabbed hold of her then.
"The world is a cruel place."
That was the day she became the Hundred Ghosts.
Three years after she became the Hundred Ghosts.
One of the Ten Strongest Under Heaven, the Poison King, died by her hand.
The news spread across the world, and the full truth behind the Hardenharts incident finally came to light.
It was the empire's plan to eradicate the Hardenharts.
"Ha, that crazy idiot..."
Hearing the news, Krash clutched his face.
The reason was simple.
The second prince Siphon Epania, who had fled to Hardenharts for asylum, had leaked information so critical it shook the empire to its core.
In response, the empire swiftly deployed one person to silence both Hardenharts and the second prince.
A master of all poisons.
One of the Ten Strongest Under Heaven.
The Poison King.
The poison he administered to the Hardenharts family head, Douglas, was a variant he had personally refined: the Madness Heaven Poison.
The Madness Heaven Poison made his retainers and family appear as monsters in his eyes.
Terrified of those monsters, Douglas killed everyone except Bianca with his own hands.
And when the poison's effects cleanly wore off.
Unable to bear what he had done, he hanged himself.
That was the tragic truth behind the Hardenharts incident.
Once it came out, relations between the empire and Staron hit rock bottom.
It escalated into all-out war, as Staron could no longer tolerate the empire's atrocities, leading to countless deaths.
In the midst of that war.
Naturally, Krash got caught up in it too.
The Generation of the Sky mobilized to end the war between the empire and Staron.
The Generation of the Sky sided with neither the empire nor Staron.
As a result, they clashed using force to suppress both sides, sparking the conflict.
The Generation of the Sky, who should have been fighting World Erosion, was using their power against humans.
It was an absurd situation.
And of course, the Generation of the Sky couldn't stay safe amid the war either.
"Fuckers! At least protect the damn supply lines, you bastards!"
Krash, in charge of supplies for the Generation of the Sky, yelled as he dashed through the snow-covered forest.
Wounded and battered, he passed through the burned ruins of Hardenharts.
Hardenharts, being closest to the empire, was a full frontline.
Especially since the Poison King had died by Bianca's hand.
After killing him, Bianca had holed up in the North Sea Ice Pavilion, the Hardenharts main residence.
Because of that, the empire relentlessly attacked not just Staron but the North Sea Ice Pavilion too.
"North Sea Ice Pavilion..."
Half-collapsed, the North Sea Ice Pavilion came into Krash's view.
"There he is!"
"That guy's part of the Generation of the Sky too! Don't let your guard down—kill him!"
At that moment, the voices of pursuing imperial knights echoed behind him.
Krash ground his teeth and bolted toward the North Sea Ice Pavilion.
Reaching the frozen-shut doors, he pounded on them with his raw, skinned hands.
"Hey! Bianca! You in there?!"
No answer came despite his shouts.
Fucking hell, what the fuck is this now?
Krash clenched his fist and turned to leave.
But the knights were faster.
They had closed in right behind him, eyes blazing with barely contained killing intent.
At this rate, you couldn't tell who was human and who was a World Erosion spawn.
Krash tutted and rolled up his sleeves.
No choice.
He'd have to use a curse to break out, at least.
He could beg the saintess to sort out the aftermath.
That was when it happened.
Kiiieek!
The North Sea Ice Pavilion doors swung open, and ice spikes erupted from behind Krash.
Puh-puh-puh-buk!
"Gaaah?!"
"Kuhuk, gah!"
The spikes pierced their bodies in an instant.
Even with aura protecting them, they couldn't block it.
As he stared blankly, the open doors of the North Sea Ice Pavilion caught Krash's eye.
He rushed inside and shoved the doors shut behind him.
Looking around, he saw the interior of the North Sea Ice Pavilion, everything frozen solid.
Feeling the chill seeping into his body, Krash moved forward.
"Bianca."
No voice answered his call.
With no choice, Krash decided to venture deeper.
After wandering the North Sea Ice Pavilion for a bit, he stopped before a certain room.
Inside the shattered door.
A woman sat with her frozen legs and a sword plunged into her heart.
Drip-
A drop of blood trickled down the sword.
Krash's eyes slowly widened at the sight.
"...Bianca."
It was none other than Bianca.
"...It's been a while. Lord Krash."
Her voice reached him then.
Hearing her faint, powerless voice, Krash realized she didn't have much time left.
"You went wild until you ended up like this—why the fuck are you like this now?"
The sword in her chest was one Krash recognized.
The poison oozing thickly from it.
It was the poison of the Poison Phoenix, daughter of the Poison King.
She must have come all the way from the empire for revenge.
And it had been quite some time since the sword pierced her.
The poison had spread deep into her body; even the saintess couldn't save her now.
"You're right. Why am I like this?"
Even though she had regained her emotions, her face was eerily expressionless.
As if she had forgotten how to make one.
Krash bit his lip at the sight.
After the broken engagement, it had taken Krash a while to learn her full story.
Frustrated, he yelled at her unnecessarily.
"You should've just told me. That it was the Poison King and the empire who did it, that your family was innocent."
Bianca had known even at the broken engagement that it was the empire and Poison King's doing.
Yet she never told Krash.
"Would anything have changed if I had?"
Krash had no reply to that.
Telling him wouldn't have made a difference.
He was just a guy leeching off the Generation of the Sky, stealing curses.
Krash had no power to change Bianca's fate.
Bianca let out a faint chuckle.
Then her eyes drifted into memory.
"Come to think of it, we talked about it back then—whether it's more painful without emotions or with them."
Blood poured from her mouth as she recalled the broken engagement three years ago.
Krash sensed her life force nearly gone.
"What do you think? Why don't you hear my take on it now?"
This was it.
The last conversation he'd have with her.
"...Go ahead."
Bianca had saved his life once.
Listening to her opinion was the least he could do.