The Emperor (2)
Caesar let the hours slip by without end. With the crackling campfire as his only companion, he wandered the corners of this unidentifiable place. He poked idly at the lavish spread of food, and for the first time in his life, he even tried beer.
He rapped on the thin windows. He climbed to the second floor. He explored what appeared to be a kitchen.
And so he reached his conclusion.
"Is this the heavenly realm? Just what in the world is all this…"
The firewood burned on without ever dying. The food on the table never vanished no matter how much he ate, and broken dishes simply reappeared whole.
Caesar's strength left him. He sank heavily into a wooden chair. This was not reality—and the one who had summoned him was a god.
There's nothing I can do.
There truly was nothing Caesar could do.
Nothing but wait.
So he waited, staring blankly into space.
When hunger came, he ate from the prepared feast. When drowsiness took him, he let the crackle of the hearth serve as a lullaby and slept.
How much time had passed? A day? Perhaps a week? In this strange space, everything held to a constant state, warping a person's sense of time until it frayed.
The endless waiting wore Caesar down by degrees.
Why had the god told him he must wait?
Was there something lacking in him?
Caesar began to think in earnest.
Why had the god commanded him to wait… The dry wood split and hissed as it took the flame, and the sound only drove his thoughts deeper.
If something is lacking—what is it…
He put the question to himself. The reason the god had told him to wait was surely because He wished for Caesar to arrive at the answer on his own.
A wise parent teaches a child how to fish. They do so because they want the child to grow, and because simply catching the fish for them is never enough.
A god, he reasoned, would not be so different from a parent.
Caesar pondered, and then he pondered again.
…And still, no matter how much time passed, he could not grasp why the god had told him to wait.
Then the god came to him.
"Ugh—!"
An intense gaze pressed against his skin—or perhaps it was something more primal, something that reached straight into instinct. A gaze that pierced to the depths of his soul descended from the heavens above. With trembling eyes, Caesar looked up at the ceiling, and beyond it.
He threw both arms wide toward the god and cried out.
"O God, almighty God. This foolish human seeks to borrow Your wisdom, bright as the stars, and find the answer."
A human daring to question a god—an audacious act. But Caesar pressed on without shame. If one did not know something, one said so. What else was there to do?
Surely he would not be struck down for merely asking a question.
The god answered.
To seek what one does not know is no cause for shame. Rather, one ought to be ashamed of claiming to know what one does not.
What is it you wish to learn from Me?
Caesar let out a quiet breath of relief. Thankfully, this was not a petty god who would hurl lightning for a single question.
"O God, I do not know. I have thought deeply with this dull mind of mine, and still I do not know. What did You mean for me to awaken to through this waiting? Through this long vigil—what was I meant to learn?"
…
Silence stretched from the heavens. Caesar swallowed dryly for no good reason. Had he been too insolent? Had it sounded as though he were complaining about being made to wait?
He half expected a bolt of lightning to fall at any moment.
Fortunately, what came from the sky was not lightning, but a voice like rolling thunder.
Within you there is a scale. Upon one pan rests an empire that has endured a thousand years. Upon the other rests a young son.
Both are precious, and you can bear to lose neither. So I ask you this.
Are you an emperor? Or are you a young son's father?
Caesar's movement locked mid-breath. His pupils shook violently, laying bare the turmoil within.
Was he an emperor? Or a father?
For the sake of your nation, could you kill your son?
"…I could not."
Then, for the sake of your son, could you abandon your nation?
"…I could not."
Your hands are too small to carry both. In the end, you will lose everything. What will you leave behind? What will you cast away?
Emperor, or father.
Caesar bowed his head deeply.
Upon his back rested the empire—an empire carried down through long ages, from his father's father, and from that father's father before him. An empire weighted beyond measure by countless lives and a vast history.
Upon his shoulders rested his son—a child barely seven years old. His son was so small, so light, that setting him on a shoulder felt as though he might simply float away.
He had agonized for a long time. He had fretted and suffered through endless hours of deliberation.
"I… I…"
Caesar's eyes gradually brightened. He could abandon neither. Nothing among them was anything less than precious.
He could not give up a single thing.
And if that was so—
"I…!"
He would take them all.
"I will cast nothing aside! The empire and my son—both are as dear to me as my own heart! If I abandoned either, I would already be a dead man!"
Caesar's gaze rose, steady and unwavering, toward the heavens.
"You said there is a scale within my heart? No! Within my heart there is a vast land! Upon that endless earth I will hold my son, hold the empire, and hold all those I cherish!"
"I am a greedy fool who cannot let go of a single thing. If my hands are too small, then I will use my feet. If my feet fail me, I will seize them with my teeth if I must—and I will take them all."
"Nothing among them is unworthy of care! I will hold them all. I will give up nothing!"
Caesar's breath came harsh and ragged. He could discard nothing. He could surrender nothing.
Emperor and father—both were Caesar himself. How could he carve himself apart and leave pieces of himself behind on the road?
…
The god was silent. Yet the gaze fixed upon him never wavered. Caesar's eyes no longer trembled. He looked straight up at the sky.
A dull, stubborn, and foolish man.
Caesar bowed his head low.
And yet—
In that very foolishness, you are truly human.
Indeed. How could one carve oneself apart and cast the pieces upon the road?
You are truly, wholly human.
—Saaaah…
Before Caesar's upturned face, bright stars gathered and swirled, knitting themselves into a single form.
To you—a sovereign and a father more human than any other—I bestow a single charge.
—Chwaaat!
The form wrought of brilliant light drifted toward Caesar. As if entranced, he reached out and took hold of the shining shape.
Warm Star-light pulsed through his hands like a living heartbeat.
As you have declared—as sovereign, as father—protect them all.
Within you lies a land without end. Its limits are for you alone to decide.
Cast nothing aside. Surrender nothing. This is your charge.
Protect everything you mean to hold.
Caesar turned the words over in his mind.
And then he let out a quiet laugh.
It was the easiest thing in the world.
"Is that not what I have always done?"
As emperor. As father.
He would take them all. He would lose nothing—he would protect everything. He had done so until now, and he would do so hereafter.
Now you must go where you belong.
"…Pardon?"
Go, and protect everything you mean to hold.
Radiant clusters of light bloomed around Caesar and wound about him. For a moment the suddenness of it startled him—but then he calmly entrusted himself to the Star-light.
The solid weight in his hand made it all feel newly real.
In the instant before the brilliance swallowed his vision whole, Caesar looked up at the sky.
The all-knowing, all-powerful god.
What answer, he wondered, had that god truly hoped to hear from him?
—Hwaaak!
Then the light flooded white before his eyes, and Caesar closed them.
"—Ha! Your Maj—! Are you—conscious—?"
"Go at once—fetch a priest—!"
He flinched against the brightness. Voices shouted all around him, and his head throbbed in answer. The words themselves arrived broken, cut off mid-phrase.
My head hurts…
Caesar clutched his skull and spoke.
"Water… Bring me water."
A cup brimming with cool water settled naturally into his outstretched hand. He drank without hesitation, and felt a measure of life return.
"Ugh… Far too loud."
Caesar furrowed his brow and looked about. The space around his bed was packed with people. There was the chancellor who had served him for long years, Priest Ruel who had come from the Holy City, the imperial physician, and a throng of servants.
Yet every one of their faces looked as though they had not washed in days—grimy and worn beyond measure.
The chancellor dropped to his knees and wept as if a dead man had returned to life.
"Your Majesty, Your Majesty!! Thank the heavens you have woken…!! Truly, thank the heavens!!"
"P-please don't cry… His Majesty needs rest right now."
For reasons unknown, the chancellor was bawling openly. Priest Ruel tried to soothe the man collapsed and sobbing on the floor. Caesar studied their beggarly appearances.
They were covered in grime, and some wore bandages stained with blood. This look—it was exactly like…
Like people in the middle of a war, isn't it?
Caesar addressed the chancellor.
"Chancellor. How long have I… No—what happened while I lay here?"
"Hic— Your Majesty… While Your Majesty was bedridden—"
Between sobs, the chancellor explained everything that had transpired. Caesar's pupils began to shake violently.
"What did you say? The capital is under attack?"
"Yes… For three days now we have suffered the rats' assault. Their numbers are like the sea itself—no matter how many we kill, there is no end…"
"These filthy demons…!"
A grinding of teeth escaped from Caesar. How dare those loathsome fiends defile a capital of a thousand years? It was an insult to the empire—an indelible disgrace.
"I must see it with my own eyes at once. Guide me—!"
"Wh-what? Already getting up is…"
Caesar rose from the bed in a single motion. Ruel's worried words proved needless—he set his feet firmly upon the floor without the slightest falter.
As the chancellor hurried to lead him, he spoke.
"…Your Majesty, what is that in your hand?"
"Hm?"
"Wh-wha—? That's… holy power? Eh?"
Ruel's voice rose in startled confusion.
Only then did Caesar register the solid weight in his grip. He lifted what he held and regarded it.
A cold, heavy sensation.
And that sensation was so welcome that Caesar broke into a grin.
"This is my charge."
His charge as emperor—and as a father.