Chapter 99: The Lost Legacy
Translator: RaidenTL
Chapter 99: The Lost Legacy
“It’s dangerous.”
Her right hand was burning. Blood from the wound trickled down her sleeve.
Callis couldn’t even breathe properly. A razor-sharp blade had pierced her hand and was now halfway into her neck. If her hand trembled even slightly, the blade would carve deeper into her flesh.
It was a stroke of luck that Callis was a mage. Having trained her senses for mana, she had detected the ominous surge of power flowing through the bio-receptor. While she couldn't cancel it, she had managed to block it just in time.
Somehow, it felt as though someone had urgently warned her.
If she had failed, the blade would have run her through the neck.
Her palm was locked against the blade. Forcing strength into her trembling right hand, Callis pushed the blade away. Blood streamed from the hole in her neck. As she pushed it back a certain distance, the blade snapped with a crack.
Forged for a single, swift strike to the throat, the blade had sacrificed durability for sharpness. It was useless as a weapon, but a suicide tool didn't need to be reusable.
Callis pulled the shard of the blade from her right hand. Her blood dripped from the glass-thin edge. The blood from her neck wound soaked the front of her shirt.
She had narrowly escaped death. But this wasn't even a reprieve.
If anything, she might have just thrown away her chance at a painless end.
‘From the very beginning… I was a disposable piece….’
Callis had received the packet. The main reason she had felt safe volunteering for this mission was the existence of the escape packet. If anything dangerous happened, she could use it to get away.
But… the packet she thought was her only way out was, in fact, the despair that lay in wait to swallow her at the end of hope.
Her thoughts ground to a halt.
The despair of betrayal, the loneliness of being abandoned, and the fear of impending death.
Before her body could break, her spirit shattered.
‘Where did it all go wrong? What did I do to deserve this…?’
That single question echoed in her mind.
Pushed to her limit, her consciousness fading, a whisper reached her ears.
“Lieutenant Colonel Callis Kritz. This is quite a predicament. The State suspects you, and your organization has abandoned you. Now, you’re even on the verge of losing your life.”
The voice was filled with affection, yet tinged with amusement. It sounded like a curious child asking an innocent question.
“Were you satisfied with Level 3? How does Level 4 look to you? Was it all worth pursuing, even if it meant throwing everything away?”
“Ah…”
Through her blurry vision, Lieutenant Colonel Callis recalled a distant memory.
A story from her youth, when she had been the protagonist. The countless memories that had made her shine. Until her mother died of illness, until the cold reality gnawed away at her fairy tale, she had been the center of the world.
After reality came knocking, she was pushed to the world’s periphery, but she remained the center of her father’s world.
When she came home from secondary school on the weekends, her father was always standing at the gate, waiting for her. On the rare occasion he wasn't there, she would habitually check the tin mailbox. A letter written in a round script on crisp paper would be waiting for her in his stead.
Then one day, something was different. Neither her father nor a letter was there. Instead, two officers in full dress uniform stood rigidly at the gate, waiting for her.
It was a death notice.
The house with the yard, the old but luxurious automaton carriage, the gold-leafed sword, and the special combat arms.
Everything that held a memory became a legacy. She was told that if she failed to acquire the inheritance rights, the Military State would reclaim all of it.
In her grief and confusion, she understood only one thing.
To get it all back, she had to become a Level 3 citizen. That was it.
What is lost becomes an obsession. For her, who had lost one thing after another until she was all alone, the legacy was her last lifeline.
Fortunately, she had talent. She graduated from secondary school with excellent grades and entered the Advanced Military Academy. Surviving the cutthroat environment, she became a Level 3 citizen and inherited her father’s legacy.
The joy and relief she felt then were incomparable.
But human greed knows no bounds, and people fear losing what they have more than they desire gaining more.
The legacy was Callis’s, but she didn't fully possess it. She lacked the right to bequeath it. The only way to obtain that right was to reach Level 4.
Greed and obsession. Because of them, Callis made a dangerous choice. She joined hands with the secret society she had only heard of in rumors… The Human Regime.
Feigning loyalty to the Military State, immersing herself in The Human Regime, and pretending to hate beasts and beastkin, Callis steadily climbed the ladder of success.
But all her actions were driven by an obsession with what she had left.
Callis was an ordinary person.
She had no grand cause, no profound loyalty.
“…I don’t want… to die….”
She never intended to die.
She had no goal she was willing to sacrifice her life for.
She just thought she could do it. That if a Level 0 laborer could survive, then she, a Level 3 citizen, could too.
Perhaps survival itself wasn't the hard part… but it was now.
“Do you want to live?”
Callis nodded. She had to live. Because she was ordinary.
The voice then broke into a peal of laughter and faded away, as if echoing in the darkness.
“If it’s that precious to you, then try to protect it with everything you have. Use all that you possess, be prepared to throw away everything but your life, and somehow manage to keep that one thing. But it won’t be easy. Others don’t know about your desperate circumstances, nor do they care.”
Before departing, the voice added one last thing.
“Except for an ordinary person like me, who is moved by such trivial stories.”
Callis lifted her head. She frantically looked around, but the owner of the voice was nowhere to be seen.
Was she bewitched by a ghost? Callis wore a confused expression, but the mystery, as always, remained hidden.
Callis forgot about the voice. That wasn't what was important right now.
To survive, she had to let go of everything.
Everything.
No matter how pathetic, how miserable.
Death allowed no respite. The Regressor, who had walked steadily up the stairs, approached Callis with clear intent. Callis let her bleeding right hand hang limp and faced her demise.
A chilling killing intent pierced her body.
“Last words?”
Let’s rewind. How had Callis survived until now?
The answer was simple. By doing nothing.
Specifically, before she had provoked the Beast King or the laborers, the residents here had been uncomfortable, but they hadn't shown any hostility.
Which meant…
“…The Human Regime has abandoned me.”
They knew about The Human Regime.
How a mere prisoner knew of the Military State’s most secret organization was a mystery, but it didn't matter.
What mattered was surviving, and to do that, she had to sell out The Human Regime.
“The packet they gave me to escape… was a suicide packet.”
Appealing to emotion wouldn't work. It would be of no help. The person before her likely had no interest in it.
Instead, she stated the facts calmly.
Callis deactivated her Clothing Packet.
As the packet was unsummoned, the medal pinned to her chest fell to the floor. The medal she had once been so proud of rolled away like a common stone.
Clad only in her shirt, she immediately dropped to her knees.
“Please… spare me.”
She bowed her head to the floor.
This had clearly caught the Regressor’s attention. Otherwise, she wouldn't have even spoken.
“A member of the Human Regime, begging for her life? You should have just shut your mouth and died with dignity. Isn't that the 'human nobility' you people are always talking about?”
I’m just a pawn. I’m willing to tell you everything to save my own life….
She was about to say that, but she was suddenly certain the other party wouldn't care.
Instead, Callis brought up a different topic.
“I received an order from my ‘patron’ to bring back the Dog King. I was told there would be no one to interfere, that it would be no different from dragging away a well-behaved dog.”
Information on The Human Regime was her only weapon.
With her head still bowed, Callis clearly and precisely laid out the information she knew.
“However, contrary to expectations, there was an obstacle. So, a different method was required. The reason I put the chain on the Dog King was because I was told that was the way to control him.”
It was a good thing her head was bowed. A moment ago, a massive slash had passed right over her.
At the last second, Chun-aeng’s trajectory had shifted. The Regressor, who had intended to kill her in one blow, had a sudden change of heart upon hearing the unexpected information.
“That’s ridiculous. As if the Dog King could be controlled by a mere chain. That would only deepen his disappointment in humans… and you don’t even know what happens when a dog is disappointed in a human.”
“Even among the Beast Kings, there are different ways to control each one. I was told the method for controlling the Dog King.”
“That’s absurd.”
The Regressor scratched her head in annoyance, her voice filled with dissatisfaction.
“Tch. Why does it sound true? If they’re the kind of crazy bastards who’d put a nose ring on the Bison King… they might have come up with another way….”
She had piqued her interest. A brief reprieve was granted.
The hope of survival elated Callis. Now it was time to drive the nail in.
In that short time, she had frantically racked her brain and come up with a hypothesis. A secret that might be the most fatal to The Human Regime.
She would sell it.
“I am a disposable pawn. Even so, The Human Regime readily gave me a leaf of the World Tree. Besides that, there’s no way their cash flow would go unnoticed while operating a secret organization within the Military State. The Human Regime has another source of income, and that is probably….”
“Ah, I know about that. It’s because those bastards are secretly cultivating a World Tree.”
Callis, who had been about to suggest a connection to the guardians of the World Tree at most, snapped her mouth shut in shock.
Privately cultivating a World Tree. That was a world-shaking revelation.
More than that, who in the world was this person, who could so casually drop a piece of information that would shock the entire world?
The being nonchalantly swept her hair back and asked.
“Well, whatever. More importantly, who is this patron?”
“…All contact is anonymous and conveyed through metaphors, so I don’t know.”
“So, you don’t know, is that it?”
“That is… correct. I surmise they are at least two ranks above me. Because I was sent here as a… litmus test, to check the safety of this place before that ‘patron’ arrived to serve as a warden for Tantalus.”
“A warden. A real warden.”
The voice turned icy in an instant. Callis instinctively flinched. Fortunately, this killing intent was not directed at her.
The Regressor spoke, sounding utterly fed up.
“Pawns, pawns, pawns… Don’t these people ever get tired of it?”
Silence fell. To kill, or to spare. The scales wavered in the Regressor’s calculations.
Anxious moments passed. The air grew heavy as Callis waited for the sentence. She no longer dared to even think of lifting her head.
The right arm broke through the curtain of silence.
“Haaaah! O, right arm!”
The right arm flew through the air and gripped the window frame tightly. The tin frame buckled with a strange noise. The Undying’s voice followed.
“Pull me in!”
The Undying’s massive body flew toward the arm he had sent ahead. Crashing through the window, he rolled across the ground and shouted.
“I have arrived!”
The Undying lifted his head and looked from side to side. To his right, Callis was on her knees. On the other side, the Regressor was lost in thought, fiddling with an invisible sword. She was clearly deliberating.
“Haha! I thought I was a bit late, but it seems you’ve had a change of heart! Well done, my boy!”
The Undying laughed heartily and wedged himself between them.
“Yes! The deaths of those who die easily should not be easy. A flower that blooms briefly is the most beautiful. Even if it blooms for only a season, its value is not short-lived! To watch over it until it withers in its own time is the virtue of an evergreen!”
A dash of annoyance was added to the wavering scales.
The calculation was complete. Annoyed at the prospect of continuing a fight with the unkillable Undying, the Regressor withdrew Chun-aeng and crossed her arms.
“…Pointless meddling. You think anyone will thank you for keeping this thing alive? Not even a god would care about one person dying.”
“I will! I am in awe of your noble decision, my boy, and in return, I will not ask about you dicing my body into seventeen pieces! Though, to be precise, it’s because I have no way of holding you accountable! Hahaha!”
Instead of replying to the casual remark, the Regressor left Callis with a stern warning.
“You keep a close eye on her. If she does anything stupid… no, if I so much as see her walking around alone, I’ll kill her without a word.”
“Of course! I shall stick to her like glue.”
And so, Callis’s death turned and walked away. Even after the footsteps had faded completely, Callis couldn't bring herself to stand.
The strength drained from her body. A cold sweat soaked her shirt. Along with the relief of having survived, a sense of enervation at having no way back washed over her.
“Is she gone? She’s gone? Right?”
The Undying, who had been repeatedly glancing in the direction the Regressor had disappeared, let out a great sigh and said.
“Phew. What a violent little kid! All brute strength, she was, casually carving up my body! If I weren’t undying, she would have killed me fifteen times over!”
“I…”
“No need for thanks! What are friends for? If you truly feel indebted, let’s just call it even, since we’ve each saved the other once!”
He was clearly a good man. Without him, Callis would not have survived.
She should have been grateful, but Callis had lost far too much to afford such a feeling.
Callis muttered weakly.
“…I threw everything away to survive.”
She had been suspended from duty. Callis would stand before a harsh investigative team that would pick apart her every action. Flaws she didn't even remember might be exposed.
That would be the best-case scenario. If The Human Regime found out about her betrayal, it wouldn't end with a forced suicide.
She might die a miserable, painful death somewhere no one would ever find her.
“My dignity, my position, my mission, my father’s legacy, everything. I have… nothing left….”
In other words, Callis had now lost everything.
Everything she had painstakingly built up over the years.
“But you saved your life, did you not!”
The Undying clapped Callis on the shoulder encouragingly. Then, with a broad grin, he held her trembling body steady.
“You survived, and that’s what matters now! Even if you’ve lost everything, you can just fill it up again in your own way. You’re young, Lieutenant Colonel! You have plenty of time, you can fill your life with things far more valuable than the possessions you’ve gathered so far!”
“But…”
Callis’s weak voice was drowned out by the Undying’s powerful one.
“Most importantly, you still have the most important legacy, do you not! The most beautiful legacy your father left behind is none other than you!”
Callis couldn't answer. Instead, tears welled up in her eyes. Without even realizing it, she was crying.
The Military State was a place of no blood and no tears. It was said that the officers of that harsh nation, much like the nation itself, became so dry that not a single tear remained.
If that was true, then Callis was no longer an officer. For she had both coursing blood and hot tears.
The book was not yet finished.
Because it had not prepared for an ending, it had left blank pages to continue on, and it used everything it had in reserve to write the rest of the story.
Now, as long as no unforeseen accident occurred, a story many times more beautiful would emerge.
If nothing happened.
The Regressor’s head snapped up. Staring into the distant darkness above the Abyss, her indigo eyes flashed.
‘An intruder?’