Chapter 285
Chapter 285
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 285
Chapter Title: The Hero, Galrahal (4)
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It's a cold and light body.
The body of the dead, not the living.
Raniel, who had seen countless deaths, was certain of it. Galrahal was dead. Even if the Saintess were here, she couldn't change this fated end.
Kuuk.
Raniel bit her own lip.
Blood seeped from the bitten lip.
Countless circuits flickered into existence and vanished in Raniel's mind. In this very moment, she was desperately searching for a way to save Galrahal.
Of course, there was no such way.
Galrahal's allotted time had run out.
Providence pointed to his death. The truth that shaped the world whispered of Galrahal's demise. It was an irrevocable decree.
The hundreds of circuits Raniel had mastered over her lifetime, thousands of pieces of magical knowledge, and tens or even hundreds of millions of volumes from bookshelves everywhere—they were all utterly useless now. Raniel's tightly bitten lip trembled faintly.
She couldn't save him.
It was impossible.
There was no answer.
What Raniel felt in this instant was utter helplessness.
Even amid that helplessness, Raniel thrashed about, trying to find something, anything. The only means she arrived at was one.
'It won't make a difference anyway.'
Even as her mind told her that, Raniel opened her mouth to call upon the gods. If they would grant a miracle, even she—who didn't believe in gods—would pray right now.
It was the moment Raniel parted her lips.
"Hea— Balan..."
"Raniel."
Galrahal cut her words short.
"It's dizzying. The blood's rushing to my head."
Leaning against Raniel, Galrahal gave a wry smile.
Even though there was no blood left to rush anywhere, he joked like that and gently pushed Raniel away. Propping himself against a tree, Galrahal looked at her.
"Why the long face?"
Raniel couldn't say a word.
Her lips opened and closed repeatedly before she spoke in a voice she herself wasn't sure of.
"Even now..."
"You know it's too late."
Galrahal shook his head.
"I'm going to die soon. My time is up."
Blood pooled on the ground.
The midwinter wind was bitterly cold, but to Galrahal now, even that breeze felt warm. His body was far colder than it.
"You know what, Raniel?"
He spoke in a voice grown light.
"I beat the heretic. That great calamity, the one who killed my comrade... I beat him."
His lightened voice was like a child's.
Like boasting to his parents of his achievements, Galrahal smiled as he spoke.
"I reached it. I could reach it."
"...Yeah."
"I'm happy about that, but even more than that..."
Galrahal shifted his gaze.
Chloe, who had come to her senses at some point, met his eyes. She stared at him, hand over her mouth.
Looking at Chloe, Galrahal said,
"I could save her."
He had saved that child.
He had pierced the heart of a calamity that had reigned for centuries and burned away its thousands, tens of thousands of tentacles. But more than any of that, saving her was what brought him the greatest joy.
"..., .........."
Chloe swallowed her tears and said something.
Galrahal couldn't hear it properly. Still, he could guess what she meant.
"It's okay."
Galrahal said.
"You're alive, aren't you?"
That was enough.
He had seen so much and experienced so much, but the conviction Galrahal held never changed.
Save people.
Pick up your weapon not to strike down, but to save. That one is the true hero.
He had fought to save.
He had lived to become a hero.
If the end of that life was this conclusion, he would accept it gladly. Galrahal exhaled. His body felt a little lighter. Plop, something spilled onto the ground.
The more it spilled, the lighter he became.
One by one, he shed the things anchoring him to this earth. Death approached, yet his mind was clearer than ever.
"Raniel."
Galrahal looked ahead.
In his blurring vision, deafened ears, and fading senses, Galrahal saw his dear friend.
Raniel van Trias.
This mage, called a sage, had been his comrade and idol, the one who guided his path. In this moment, Galrahal felt gratitude toward her. Though their time together was short, it had given him the answers he sought.
Because he had found the answers he had wandered in search of.
Because he had achieved what he set out to do.
Because he could face his life with pride.
Before death, Galrahal could be serene.
"Was I..."
Galrahal opened his mouth.
"Was I a hero?"
Raniel answered his question.
Though her voice didn't reach him, from the movement of her lips, Galrahal saw what she meant.
...More than anyone.
More than anyone I've ever seen.
You were a hero. At those words, Galrahal smiled. More peacefully than ever, more joyfully than ever.
"Ah, I see... That's..."
Galrahal's voice grew faint, almost inaudible, no longer vibrating the air—like it would scatter in the wind.
"A joyful thing."
Tuk.
Galrahal's head dropped.
His permitted time had long ended.
The man who had clung to that ended time by sheer will let go.
One star fell.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇ 2.
The faint pulsing sound that had lingered stopped.
No breath came.
It heralded one man's death.
Chloe bowed her head.
Tears fell to the ground. Chloe couldn't bring herself to look at Galrahal's corpse.
Why? How?
The girl who had drunk the hero's blood and survived felt doubt for the first time about what she possessed. The death of the one she admired shook her mind.
All deaths are wretched.
There is no such thing as a glorious death.
When you see a body spilling blood, mangled beyond recognition, the thought of glory never crosses your mind. Yet Chloe wanted to deem this death noble, so she kept her head down.
As Chloe kept her head bowed.
Someone's breathing reached her ear.
Turning, she saw Lania van Trias there. In her final moments, she had been called Raniel by Galrahal, but Chloe had no time to think even that far.
She simply gazed at her face.
Lania's eyes, fixed on Galrahal, were sunken. Her face wasn't its usual impassive mask. Her jaw trembled. Her lips quivered, her eyes clenched shut and opened repeatedly.
And tears flowed.
She wept silently.
She bit her lip hard, then opened her mouth as if to speak... only to close it again. Uncontained emotions revealed themselves in her gestures.
Frustration, sorrow, and helplessness.
It was such an unfamiliar sight.
As Chloe watched Lania, she swallowed her tears and finally lifted her head. To face reality. And so, Chloe looked at Galrahal's corpse. As expected, it was horrific. One arm torn off, and the remaining one... Huh?
"...Huh?"
Chloe, mid-tears, cried out.
She pointed at Galrahal's body.
Lania looked up as well.
Galrahal's one remaining arm.
It was slowly moving.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇ He arrived at the end of the path he had walked.
The path was severed. He could go no further.
He looked around.
Countless paths stretched out.
Paths leading forward in their own ways, with their owners standing upon them. All had different forms.
Not all were walking their paths.
Some had stopped, others agonized. Some had collapsed entirely. Some paths were broken, others twisted toward entirely new directions.
He looked down at his feet.
His own path was severed too.
Yet he didn't see it that way. He raised his head and looked ahead. The light that had walked his path with him was there.
A brilliantly shining light.
It was now leaving him.
Leaving him to dwell in a new path.
What that path was, he didn't know. The light didn't know either. He reached out toward the wandering light. To share the answer he had found.
His hand pointed to something.
Another path.
A path just beginning.
The moment he pointed to it, the distant path drew near. The end of the path he had walked connected to the start of another. Thus, the path was not severed.
The path he had walked became fertilizer.
The foundation for a tower someone else would build.
It meant the paths continued.
Paths connect.
To the next, and the next after.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇ The star fell, and the return began.
All that the star had held was returned.
Where does the returning starlight go? No one knows. The will of the gods is unknowable. Just as the starlight set off to find a new master, it halted for a moment.
The starlight beheld its master's final moments.
It watched the end of the man who, trailing a small light, achieved brilliant feats. Breath had stopped, heart ceased. The dead flesh suddenly stirred.
An impossible event occurred.
A miracle even the stars couldn't foresee unfolded now.
The man slowly raised his arm.
Spreading broken fingers, he pointed at something. That finger aimed at a young girl. The man pointed at the girl just beginning to shine.
As if telling it to go there.
The starlight saw that fingertip.
...The star calls its starlight.
The star does not tolerate defiance of providence. It violates the contract. The star tries to reclaim its part, but the starlight refuses the call.
If the star has a will, it must be the human's own resolve and wish. The starlight follows its master's intent. The brilliantly shining starlight chooses a new master.
Light overflowed.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇ 3.
Raniel stared blankly ahead.
She watched Galrahal's dead body move. She saw his fingertip clearly pointing at Chloe. Whether it was mere rigor mortis or bore Galrahal's will, Raniel couldn't tell.
She couldn't tell, but.
Soon, the overflowing starlight gave her the answer.
It wasn't starlight lingering in Galrahal's flesh. It had already left his body. Then what was this starlight?
A trace left in his soul.
The mark of the life he had lived.
Separated from his shattered soul, the starlight halted midway to the heavens. Then it turned, flowing into Chloe. The overflowing starlight dwelled in her body. Though scant in quantity...
It shone more brilliantly than anything.
Raniel looked at the Saintess's arm floating in the air. Four stars orbiting it. One seemed to fall, then seeped into the star circling beside it.
Not four stars.
Three stars.
The orbit drawn by the stars began to shift to match the three. The flow upheld for centuries changed. It meant a stalled clock hand moving once more.
The contract was rewritten.
Raniel looked up at the sky.
Just before sunrise, amid the faint dawn light, the still-dim night sky. The constellations there began to shift.
A new constellation rose.
A new constellation no one had ever seen.