Chapter 336
Chapter 336
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 336
Chapter Title: Given Time (5)
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◇◇◇◆◇◇◇ Stars shone down on the mansion.
Beneath that illuminating light, the elf's faded silver hair sparkled like it had been reborn. Kyle gazed at the elf standing before him. Her appearance hadn't changed a bit from what he remembered. Over a dozen years, he had changed, but this elf hadn't altered even slightly.
...She's different from Remia, after all.
A being shrouded in mystery, a symbol of eternity unchanging.
He felt no such enigma from his comrade, but from the elf before him, Kyle sensed a kind of divinity. And all the more so because he knew her true nature.
"Yeah."
Kyle slowly opened his mouth.
"Long time no see, Cardi."
"You know my name. I'd like to think you learned it when we met in my homeland, but..."
"Great Sage, Cardi van Armiel."
"I figured it wasn't that."
Cardi muttered and gave a wry smile.
"Have you remembered everything?"
"More or less."
"How much do you know?"
"Everything."
The memories contained in the crystal orb.
Kyle had seen them all. Cardi's identity, her journeys, everything... There were gaps here and there, but he knew the bulk of it.
"When my contract with the stars grew faint, all the memories came back. And once I became a transcendent, I didn't lose them again."
"A stroke of luck, then."
"Luck upon luck."
Kyle let out a chuckle.
With his emotions restored, Kyle no longer hid his smiles. Smiling lightly, he murmured,
"Thinking about it, it all started back then. Me dreaming of becoming the Hero, ending up with this contract... That was the starting point for everything."
Kyle looked at Cardi.
"Even if the memories were erased, even if I forgot it all, it must have lingered in my subconscious."
Gazing at the ancient great sage, Kyle said,
"The contract you made—what it entails, and what that sword is that cleaves through demons."
"...Seems like it."
Cardi let out a short breath.
When he had encountered Kyle in his homeland, Arcadia, Cardi had instinctively realized it. The contract Kyle had made with the stars was fundamentally the same as his own.
Not for himself...
A contract made for another.
A contract to bear the 'trials' that should be imposed on someone else. That was the pact Cardi and Kyle had forged.
"Are you going to fulfill the contract now?"
"I have to."
Kyle nodded.
Kyle wasn't curious why Cardi was waiting here for him. After all, his own contract was modeled after Cardi's.
So Cardi would know.
What he was about to do next.
That must be why she was waiting here, Kyle vaguely thought.
"What about Raniel?"
"I put her to sleep."
That makes things easier.
Kyle took a step forward. Instead of blocking him, Cardi stepped aside.
"You're not stopping me."
"As if that would work."
Cardi gave a wry smile.
Kyle brushed past her. He bowed his head to Rosel, who sat silently on the sofa watching him, then stood before the open door.
Beyond it, Raniel slept.
Before entering the room, Kyle turned back.
Looking at Cardi, who had stepped aside, Kyle slowly, very slowly, opened his mouth.
"Cardi, you know what I'm about to do, right?"
"Of course."
"Then, can I ask you one thing?"
"Anything I can answer... No, I can answer anything for you. Ask away."
Kyle steadied his breath.
Gripping the hilt of his sword, he said,
"...Does it look possible?"
A question without a subject.
Reading the meaning from the context, Cardi let out a short breath and replied,
"You already know the answer."
Exhaling slowly.
As the comrade of the first Hero.
And as the great sage who had once made the same contract, Cardi advised her distant junior.
"Trust in nothing."
If there was anything to believe in.
"Believe only in yourself."
Because that was the only thing.
"Believe in yourself, and do what you believe is right. That will be the true path."
With that, she bowed her head to Kyle.
"I'm sorry."
"......"
"For leading you down this road, for not finding the answer myself, for passing the burden to you..."
Truly sorry.
To Cardi, who said that, Kyle simply shook his head slowly.
"I'm not standing here as the Hero, or some grand hero figure."
Kyle smiled.
"I'm just here to pay back a debt."
I've caught that damn guy's inability to live owing anyone anything. This is something Kyle chose to do himself. No need for apologies or thanks from anyone.
Click.
Kyle stepped into the room.
Immediately after, a gust of wind blew through. Once it passed, no one remained in the room.
Only the stars.
Just the faintly glowing stars remained.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇ 2.
The Demonic Realm.
The boundaries of the Demonic Realm, divided by the front lines, were never fixed. Whenever humanity's front expanded, the border retreated accordingly.
Advance and retreat.
Expansion and contraction.
Lands that oscillated between human territory and demon lands were countless... but there were also places that never recovered. Mostly areas swept by catastrophes.
The Grave of Swords, Galatric, where death had passed.
The city of filth, Artia, defiled by heretics.
The sand hell, Catena, ravaged by storms.
And.
Arcadia, the Kingdom of Ashes, the origin of all catastrophes.
Such lands were never purified.
They had remained part of the Demonic Realm for centuries, and no one dared approach them.
"Thinking about it, there aren't many."
Sara spoke, chin resting in her hand inside the jostling carriage.
"You can excuse the catastrophe-swept areas, but places known to have been visited by the Demon King? You can count them on one hand."
She spread her fingers wide.
"Out of centuries of history, just these five... whatever."
Sara let out a hollow laugh.
"The funny part is that each of those five was a whole kingdom. Well, if 'that thing' sets its mind to destroying something... what couldn't it shatter?"
Even now, nightmares of it haunted her sleep.
Shuddering as she recalled the waves of filth from back then, Sara trembled. Seeing her shoulders shake, Kyle gave a wry smile.
"Scared?"
"Of course I'm scared. Terrified to death."
"Then..."
"If you're about to tell me to turn back, don't."
Sara cut him off firmly.
"I've already decided. I said I'd see it through to the end."
"...Thanks."
"Save that for after it's all over."
Sighing, Sara looked at Kyle.
Kyle no longer hid his emotions. Seeing his thoughts plain on his face reminded her of the journey's beginning long ago.
The self who had tormented Kyle relentlessly.
And Kyle, who had come willingly to save her.
People fall for each other in an instant.
In that instant of emotion, that moment of mistake, lives can plummet endlessly, shatter irreparably. In that sense, Sara's life had been beautifully ruined thanks to Kyle.
Betrayed the god I served.
Tried bad things.
The old church fogeys told me not to do everything, and I did it all. Really lived it up.
Did all the forbidden things.
So Sara was reasonably satisfied with her short life. Just one regret...
Never became the saintess from a fairy tale.
The saintess in heroic tales.
The world's most beautiful, most noble woman achieving great feats alongside the hero. She didn't particularly aspire to such radiance, but she'd dreamed of it once or twice.
Though it'd just be exhausting.
Muttering that, Sara turned her head.
The person sitting beside her.
Glancing at the man who, like a fairy-tale hero, had lived a lifetime of fatigue, Sara sighed.
"Anyway."
Raniel van Trias.
Sara's companion slept soundly beside her, undisturbed even by the carriage's jolts. Eyes closed, breathing softly in sleep. Sara touched her forehead.
Gauging her condition was easy.
She was beyond broken—practically a corpse.
When Sara first heard Kyle's plan, hatred for Raniel burned in her. But seeing her like this dulled those feelings.
Either way...
She too owed her life to Raniel. Sighing, Sara withdrew her hand.
"We're almost there."
The scenery whipped by in a blur.
The church's carriage, propelled by divine power without a coachman, neared its destination. The passing landscape soon grew uniform.
A colorless forest.
The carriage racing down the rugged path between trees halted abruptly. It stopped before an ancient church, grand enough to rival those in the Delorim Church's holy sites.
The church in the colorless forest was colorless too. As Kyle opened the grayed door, Sara surveyed the surroundings.
A forest without color.
Hidden by dense trees, she knew what lay beyond. The ruins of a long-fallen kingdom.
The Kingdom of Selleph.
A kingdom destroyed overnight 600 years ago. Despite being in the Demonic Realm's heart, not a single demon beast—let alone Demon King forces—lurked nearby.
...Naturally.
The Demon King had toppled the Kingdom of Selleph.
Where the Demon King passed, no life could take root. Lands untouched by starlight. Eternally tainted soil. Rejected by the stars.
Only black grass grew.
The true Demonic Realm.
But to Sara and Kyle, the land beyond the forest was more than just a 'Demonic Realm.' To them, it symbolized failure.
"...Kyle."
"Yeah."
"It's been a while."
"Yeah, four years."
Kyle gripped his sword hilt.
"We're back."
The ruins of the Kingdom of Selleph.
A field overgrown with black grass.
The place the world called the Black Plains.
Four years ago, they had faced the Demon King here.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇ 3.
The colorless church.
Entering, Kyle and Sara could only smile wryly. Just before facing the Demon King, they had spent a night here. Four years later, the traces remained intact.
Tracing those marks, they ventured deeper.
How long had they walked?
Kyle and Sara stopped.
Their eyes turned to the altar at the church's far end. It hadn't been there four years ago.
Everything else was worn, but that altar gleamed like new. Amid the faded hues, it held vivid color. Carrying Raniel toward that alien altar, Kyle approached.
He laid Raniel upon it.
In that moment, the stars whispered in Kyle's ear.
⚙ SYSTEM NOTIFICATION ⚙ Fulfill the contract. A voice he had heard ad nauseam.
But now, it was welcome. Smiling, Kyle replied,
"Yeah."
Fulfill it.
The moment Kyle murmured that,
With a flood of starlight, scales appeared before him.
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