The Unextinguishable Flame
At that moment, the image of him pointing his sword at Rowell flashed through my mind. The scene of him begging us for help. The sight of me having to hurl flames at the girl.
It happened in an instant. Every emotion I had felt toward myself turned into resentment and rage, directed straight at Hyler.
…Shut up!
I shoved him with all my strength. The boy flew backward and crashed to the ground, landing right in front of his sister’s ashes, which had turned to black cinders.
How dare you point a blade at Rowell and still think you have any right…!
I walked toward him, deliberately avoiding Rowell’s gaze that was surely fixed on me, turning my back on the sun hidden behind dark clouds and forcing my eyes away from my own heart.
You should have protected yourselves in the first place. Or you should have just stayed quiet and known your place! If only there had been no hostages, none of this would have happened! Because of you, because of you…!
Before Rowell or anyone else behind me could react, I raised my foot and stomped down on the girl’s remains, which still held a faint shape. The traces of her crumbled beneath my kick. Hyler could only stare, his mind blank.
Hey, that’s enough!
Even so, this is too much!
A few villagers spoke up. It was only natural. I was clearly more agitated than necessary, crossing the line. But to my ears, their voices were nothing more than the noise of people who didn’t understand the situation.
At my gesture, spirits appeared, mirroring my emotions as they flew about wildly.
You lot are no different…
I never finished the sentence. A strange impact struck my head, and the scenery around me twisted. My back hit the ground, and my connection to the spirits was severed. Before I could grasp what had happened, Rowell’s face appeared above me. He was holding me, crying.
Stop, stop it, Anak. Please, please stop. It’s all my fault, so don’t hurt yourself like this…!
He was still grieving. His eyes, looking straight at me, were filled with guilt, pity, and regret toward me.
But I saw it. Those eyes were shining again. The dark clouds from before were gone. They were once more trying to light my way and guide me down the right path.
“…Yeah. That’s just how you are.”
With those eyes of Rowell’s, the past that had covered my surroundings was erased once more, and the present reappeared before me.
“Hyler, how do you feel right now?”
It was a cruel question.
“How do you think? Obviously, it feels—
“You, clown, shut your mouth.”
Whether my threat worked or he simply found it more amusing, the red-haired man didn’t interrupt again.
“Answer me, Hyler. Are you happy?”
“……”
Hyler, who had been looking away, turned his gaze back to me. For the briefest moment, his eyes, filled with hatred, wavered. Yes. That was the answer I had wanted to hear.
“Right. I thought so.”
That hatred wasn’t only because I had killed his sister.
Back when Rowell and I left the village, he had only been angry at his sister’s death and at me for killing her. For a while, that anger had been a comfort that could overcome his grief, an escape from his helplessness.
But time passes. Unfortunately, people cannot remain trapped in a single emotion. And as time went on, the feelings he experienced, the things those memories gave him, were never that simple.
Every time he came to understand the situation. Every time reality crept closer. Every time he heard of the hero’s exploits that justified my actions. And every time he remembered his sister dying so horribly.
With every breath. Every time he thought of his sister. Every time reason and emotion clashed.
What he felt, the pain he received, was never simple.
Every time he thought my actions had been unavoidable, he must have felt guilt toward his sister. And the image of her burning in the flames must have haunted him like a nightmare.
Even if he wanted to forget, he couldn’t. Even if he wanted to forgive, he couldn’t. Every time such thoughts arose, his soul burned with the guilt of betraying his sister.
It wasn’t something reason could handle. It wasn’t something understanding could fix. It wasn’t something he himself could do anything about. It was like carrying an unquenchable flame in his chest that would burn him for eternity.
He couldn’t endure without rage. He couldn’t live without rage. That wasn’t life, and it wasn’t himself. He was merely bound by the rope of anger, surrendering his body to the flames, with no self left in that emotion or that life.
That was what his hatred, his rage, truly was. And as long as I lived, that flame would never waver, even for a moment. Of course, my death wouldn’t extinguish it either.
“I’m sorry, Hyler.”
That was the one thing I wanted to say. And the one thing I had to say.
“…An apology won’t bring Ana back.”
“No. This isn’t an apology for the choice I made back then. Even if I returned to that moment, I would make the same choice. That’s why I don’t regret it.”
What I wanted to apologize for wasn’t that.
“And just because my choice turned out to be justified in the end doesn’t mean you need to care about that. I didn’t make it while thinking about such things. I was simply that kind of person.”
That was why I couldn’t make excuses. No matter the outcome, no matter if there had been no other way, none of that mattered. I would have made that choice anyway.
Even if I regretted it, even if I grieved, that memory, that fact, would never change. And because of that, I don’t regret it. Nor do I truly grieve the way Rowell did back then.
I simply hated and hurt because I was that kind of human.
“What I’m apologizing for is what’s about to happen.”
And I activated the Key of Tantalus in my possession.
As the Key of Tantalus activated, a bizarre and intense swirl of colors that seemed to mix spatial perception itself spread across the surroundings.
“……!”
Caught off guard by the sudden change, several assassins immediately threw hidden weapons. Though their speed was too fast for my eyes to follow, they couldn’t pierce the barrier.
Even the fifth barrier, which had been wavering uneasily just moments ago, had already returned to its original form.
Before the pocket dimension temporarily created by the Key of Tantalus, binding spells or mana-disrupting incantations meant nothing.
The pocket dimension created by the Key of Tantalus didn’t merely add a new physical space to the existing one. It maximized and materialized the gaps that existed between dimensions and worlds. The mana filling this strange space wasn’t ordinary enough to be affected by artificial mana-disrupting spells.
After all, in a pocket dimension, the very nature and form of mana were completely different, to the point where ordinary mages couldn’t even use magic.
“Now then, let the counterattack begin.”
But I was different. At my gesture, black runes appeared in the empty air around me, and strange shadows began to reveal themselves one by one.
A summoner was, by nature, someone who created passages to other worlds. Manipulating gaps between worlds or the powers of other realms was an easy task.
Anything that deviated from its own world’s natural flow was difficult to control, but as long as that wasn’t the case, no matter which world it came from or what its form or properties were, there was no problem controlling it.
After all, the very creator of the Key of Tantalus had been a summoner.
At my gesture, the black runes continued to appear, and the few shadows that had emerged multiplied, gradually covering the surroundings. The assassins instinctively drew their weapons, and the red-haired man pulled Hyler back, drawing swords in both hands with a somewhat stiff expression.
The Key of Tantalus was a powerful artifact capable of creating a pocket dimension in an instant, but its duration wasn’t very long.
Because it used a highly advanced method of maximizing the gaps between dimensions, the artifact’s power was insufficient to maintain it longer. In truth, this had been the creator’s original intention.
Leaving such a space open for too long was dangerous. These gaps didn’t only exist between worlds; they also connected to some abyss that existed separately from the countless worlds. If the gap remained open too long, it might call forth that abyss.
That was why the pocket dimension would soon disappear. And once the mana-disrupting spell tangled the flow of mana in this area again, controlling the summoned creatures I had called would become difficult once more.
That was why I had chosen these particular summons. They were beings that didn’t require mana to maintain their physical forms after the Key of Tantalus’s space vanished, nor did they need a mental link to control their minds.
The shadows that had already completely covered the surroundings were one by one taking on solid form.
“Grrr…”
A gloomy, ravenous beast’s howl echoed from all directions.
Creatures with bodies twice the size of an average person, rough ashen skin reminiscent of stone, and no eyes or ears—beings that looked somewhat like ogres or trolls at first glance—were the Grendels. These creatures, which inhabited the Gorge of Despair where the sun rose for only a few months each year, were debated among scholars as either ogre variants or beings transformed by a curse. What was certain, however, was that no summoner had ever attempted to call or command them.
They possessed neither the ego nor the reason to form contracts, and soul resonance or mental communion was impossible as well.
Even though summoners could commune with creatures from entirely different worlds, it was unclear why they couldn’t do the same with these beings, who weren’t particularly high-ranking monsters. Some scholars, citing this reason along with ancient legends, claimed that the Grendels were sinners cursed by the gods and condemned to eternal isolation.
“Oh? I was wondering what you’d summon…”
A playful smile returned to the red-haired man’s lips. And it wasn’t just him. For a brief moment, disappointment mixed with cold mockery flashed in the other assassins’ eyes as well.
“Quite an interesting choice.”
The man’s figure blurred for an instant, and three Grendels near them collapsed to the ground.
As I had said, they simply couldn’t be controlled. The Grendels themselves weren’t particularly strong monsters. Their strength and size were inferior to ordinary ogres, and their skin wasn’t as tough as it appeared.
Against assassins of the highest rank, even a large number of monsters at this level wouldn’t pose much of a threat.
But that wasn’t what I was aiming for in the first place.
“The real fun starts now.”
I curled my body as small as possible. Once the Key of Tantalus stopped activating, the mana and mental links would be severed anyway, making control impossible. No matter what I summoned, the summons would either be canceled entirely or attack me first, since I was the closest target.
But these creatures were different.
Finally, the Key of Tantalus ceased its activation, and the surrounding scenery returned to normal. At the same time, the Grendels, which had been momentarily disoriented by the instinctive sense of foreignness from the pocket dimension, leaped in all directions at once.
As I had said, they had neither eyes nor ears. The only thing they possessed was a strange organ resembling a split nose on both sides, used solely to detect surrounding temperatures.
They distinguished themselves from other living beings through temperature, and to them, any lifeform other than their own kind was nothing more than prey. To the Grendels now, I, curled up inside the barrier, would be perceived as little more than a rock, while the others surrounding us—some even holding torches—were a feast laid out before them.
Because I had opened gates connected to the Gorge of Despair in every direction and summoned as many as time allowed, even I didn’t know the exact number. But the sound of the Grendels’ footsteps made the ground tremble.
“Protect the mage unit at all costs!”
Seeming to finally grasp my intention, the red-haired man gave the order and quickly retreated with Hyler, but it was already too late.
“E-Everyone, stop them!”
“F-Fire Bolt!”
The regular soldiers also rushed forward to block the Grendels, and the higher-ranking assassins leaped backward to protect the mages. But the number of Grendels I had summoned wasn’t small.
The mages, seeing the Grendels charging toward them, had no choice but to stop their disrupting spells and immediately cast offensive magic. The Grendels struck directly by the lightning and flames summoned by the mages collapsed on the spot.
But as I had already said, that wasn’t enough to deal with their numbers.
Moreover, having been unaware of what had happened inside the Key of Tantalus’s pocket dimension until it suddenly appeared, it was only natural that they couldn’t respond efficiently to the sudden emergence of the Grendel horde.
Finally, the Grendels reached them. Not only the regular soldiers but even the mages who had failed to maintain proper distance lost their lives meaninglessly to teeth and claws.
Of course, they would eventually be dealt with, but what mattered was that the front line, which had perfectly surrounded and contained me until moments ago, had collapsed. And while individuals might still manage, the mages no longer had the capacity to chant large-scale mana-disrupting spells like before, as if forming a barrier.
“Since it’s come to this, I can’t let even one of you escape.”
At my gesture, dark-red runes covered the sky like gathering storm clouds. It was fortunate that I was wearing the Necklace of the Upper Heavens, which amplified mana, and the Ring of the Law King, which increased mana recovery speed. Otherwise, I could never have summoned these beings with such a short preparation time.