Chapter 101
Chapter 101
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Translator: penny
Chapter: 101
Chapter Title: Lena Rubel's Reminiscence
-----------------------------------------------------------------
I want to ask.
When you opened your eyes today, were you at peace?
Did you sweetly cherish the dazzling sunlight, the gentle patter of rain, or the quiet hush of snow?
Were you able to smile in gratitude for your daily bread?
Were the people you passed kind?
Were there no moments when you felt alone in sorrow?
After a grueling day, did you find tender comfort?
Did you feel that this world holds more love than hate?
And so, did you find the strength to live another day?
Today, I just want to ask.
. . .
Lena spoke.
For the first time, she confided in someone else about everything she had been through.
Lin listened.
He paid earnest attention to her words, holding back his surprise at every turn.
Through this, he learned.
How Lena had become a sacrifice for the marquis and Clavis, falling into the grave.
How she had met the being called Regina there.
How she had tried to live again afterward, only to become marked by the Snake King, leading her to fight.
And how, growing accustomed to risking her life, she had resolved to kill her father.
Throughout that long tale, Lena's face remained as serene as ever.
Lin found that all the more heartbreaking, but instead of empty consolation, he waited patiently for her to finish.
Reassured, Lena poured out the rest of her story to him.
***
"I'm going to kill them. The ones who sold me out, and the ones who dropped me here."
Lena made this resolve right after tearing apart the King with Many Hearts several times.
At that moment, she understood the feeling of the strong for the first time.
She realized and experienced the predator's position.
So there was no need to cower any longer.
You all deserve to die. So I will kill you.
Be it a count or a duke, you're all weaker than me anyway.
As Lena ground her teeth coldly, the one who stood in her way was Regina.
But Regina's persuasion fell on deaf ears, and that day, Lena lunged at Regina for the first time.
The one trying to push through and the one trying to block clashed without yielding an inch.
Lena's strikes were sharp as a freshly forged blade, but they fell short of slicing through Regina's heavily accumulated experience.
After dozens of clashes, Regina's true strike finally wounded Lena.
But when Lena's shoulder tore open and blood flowed, it was Regina who suffered more.
Even so, Regina did not stop, and in the end, with her knees buckling, Lena bit her lip and groaned.
"Why are you stopping me . . . ?"
A father sold his daughter, a mother looked the other way.
They shoved their helpless girl, who knew neither resistance nor rebellion, into hell when she needed protection most.
Some noble snatched her up, mocking and jeering before shoving her into a grave.
And that's not all? Some man handed a wandering girl to a brothel, some woman imprisoned her to exploit her.
Then they all burned to death.
This is the world.
What Lena Rubel endured was just this much; add in others' stories, and it never ends.
There, they rip apart healthy neighboring lands; here, they trade people like livestock.
Above, they flick gold coins with ha-ha-ho-ho laughter today still, while below, they fight like sewer rats over scraps.
Amid it all, the dead pile up and come slashing at their own descendants.
The Empire is mad, the world spins on curses.
So why.
Everyone's already living like maggots, so why.
"Why are you making me the only one who can't!"
Lena screamed at Regina in resentment.
At the time she resolved to kill her father, Lena was still just thirteen.
—If things continue like this, you'll be ruined.
"No, now it's them who'll be ruined. I'm already like this!"
—I know the fate of those who choose that path. I can't let you become that.
"What right do you have, what qualification . . . !"
Thirteen, so young, Lena's rage was filled with confusion.
Her cry wasn't just questioning reasons.
Deeper still lay a heart yearning for affection.
Lena's anger was really a plea.
An instinctive cry to hold her crumbling self, a desperate beg that at this rate she'd truly die, so please do something.
A fervent appeal for her mentor, friend, and the one person who cherished her to fill her cracked heart.
Even now, Lena wonders.
What if Regina had said something else then?
If she'd stopped her with mere scolding, some trite nagging—would things have changed?
But that day, Regina ignored Lena's desperation.
Knowing full well what Lena truly wanted, she chose cruel truth over kind lies.
She was too noble to speak empty words.
—It's my responsibility.
Under Lena's relentless questioning, Regina finally confessed.
"What . . . ?"
—The reason you fell to ruin is all my fault.
At Regina's admission, Lena momentarily forgot her anger.
As the fury subsided, a sticky unease bloomed in a corner of her heart.
More than the urge to argue, she first sensed something was wrong.
As Lena froze, Regina continued.
—I have no qualifications. Only responsibility.
"What does that mean . . . ?"
Lena wished she could seal Regina's mouth.
She didn't know what would come out, but it felt like standing in her father's study.
What Lena wanted from the start wasn't truth.
She just wanted simple comfort, someone to lean on briefly.
Are you betraying me too?
With trembling eyes, Lena asked Regina.
Regina averted it and spoke through cracked lips.
—It's time you knew. At least who I am.
You've grown strong enough, you can survive alone now.
No more pretending to be your protector.
The noble king, crushed by her own sins, confessed to the fragile girl before her.
—I am Regina Grasha. Sister to the one who dropped you here, the reason and purpose he cast you down, the origin of your misfortune.
As if drawing a line, as if saying she had no right to be your mentor or friend.
—And I am Nihil Grasha, the one who rules over you all.
***
". . . Nihil?"
Lin, who had been listening quietly, gasped in shock and asked again.
He sat up as if he couldn't even lie down, and Lena, understanding his turmoil, rose with him.
"Earlier, you said Regina was the Unforgiven King . . . ."
Lin groaned, recalling what Lena had said before.
Just moments ago, he had been fascinated by the veiled tale of the Unforgiven King.
But that being was Nihil?
The Empire's emperor was a Wraith King?
As Lin looked at her with crumbling eyes, Lena nodded silently.
And in her response, Lin felt an odd sense of familiarity.
It was clearly shocking, yet not hard to accept.
No suspicion, no revulsion.
Rather, it felt like misaligned puzzle pieces finally clicking into place.
"Then Nihil is . . . ."
Feeling all his long-held doubts bundle together, Lin asked in a cracked voice.
"A wraith?"
Lena nodded again at his question.
Lin closed his eyes and sighed.
A dizzying vertigo washed over him.
If Nihil was a wraith, then what meaning did everything the Empire had done—blocking the wraiths—hold?
"Do you remember how to enter a wraith's castle?"
Lena suddenly asked the agonized Lin.
"You said calling the king's name lets you into their domain."
The king's name is the key to the king's castle.
That was how Lena had conquered Chelleste's castle and defeated Hiems Grasha.
"That was how I returned to the surface the first time I fell into the grave."
"That method?"
"In the grave, Regina made a small door. And told me to call her name."
Back then, Lena followed Regina's words without understanding.
Whispering the master's name to the small castle Regina created, Lena returned to the Grasha Empire.
Because that place was the domain of the Unforgiven King, Regina Grasha.
At that final nail, Lin let out a heavy sigh.
"If Nihil is a Wraith King . . . what about the Authority the dukes received?"
"I don't know exactly, but I have a guess. Haven't you noticed too, Lin? That it resembles something."
Lin lost his words and rubbed his face with his hand.
Then, covering his eyes, he muttered.
". . . The emperor didn't recognize you."
"Regina and Nihil are the same person, but they split long ago. So Regina doesn't know what Nihil does, and Nihil doesn't know what Regina does."
It was a concept hard to grasp easily, but he felt no urge to doubt.
In a world where the dead walked alive, nothing seemed impossible anymore.
Lin endured the torment with eyes closed for a moment.
It was because Naza's form in the grave came to mind.
"Quite the shock, huh?"
Lena asked worriedly, watching Lin repeatedly wipe his dry face.
Lin couldn't deny it and nodded.
The secret itself was stunning, but the fact that Lena had carried it alone was a considerable blow too.
So after sighing for a long while, Lin recalled Lena's earlier words and asked back.
"And if she's the sister of the one who dropped you . . . ."
"Clavis Sirenchium Grasha."
Lena answered calmly, as if expecting the question.
"He's Regina's blood brother."
Lena said this with a bitter smile.
Lena truly hated Clavis.
But even so, the reason she hadn't killed him was because he was Regina's brother.
***
Lena recalled what Regina had said when they first met.
[You were sent by that guy too, huh.]
[Let me apologize instead. No, it's not even 'instead.' I apologize. For everything you went through.]
Words spoken in haste amid chaos.
Words she had deliberately ignored.
"What am I supposed to do with that now . . . ?"
Forced to confront it mercilessly, Lena trembled and groaned.
"Blame you and get revenge since it's all your fault?"
—If that's what you want.
At Regina's humble—perhaps cold—reply, Lena paled.
This wasn't what she wanted.
What Lena needed was an ally to curse the villains with her, not her last supporter confessing she was one of those villains too.
But dumping it on her like this, what was she supposed to do?
Would it have been better if she'd begged forgiveness?
But Regina fell silent like one awaiting judgment, leaving the judge Lena to shudder at this cruel severance.
". . . Then what was helping me?"
Tears welled in Lena's eyes as she asked.
"Atonement? Self-satisfaction? A way to express guilt?"
Lena demanded roughly, yet gazed at Regina with a thread of hope.
Pleading arduously, desperately for Regina's mercy.
But Regina chose her convictions to the end.
—I won't deny it.
With those words, the girl's barely held world shattered.
And as if waiting, the grave split, grasping hands pouring out.
—Lena!
As cold hands wrapped around her, Regina cried out.
But Lena didn't stir.
She was helplessly swallowed by the encroaching grip.
She thought she heard Regina shouting something, but it didn't matter anymore.
Regina had been Lena's last trust in the world.
The child who lost even that plummeted into a void deeper than any grave, in utter despair.
As she was dragged to a place without light or sound, Lena recited the poem by habit.
I want to ask.
When you opened your eyes today, were you at peace?
Did you sweetly cherish the dazzling sunlight, the gentle patter of rain, or the quiet hush of snow?
Were you able to smile in gratitude for your daily bread?
Were the people you passed kind?
Were there no moments when you felt alone in sorrow?
After a grueling day, did you find tender comfort?
Did you feel that this world holds more love than hate?
And so, did you find the strength to live another day?
Today, I just want to ask.
Reciting the poem into the void, Lena thought unwittingly.
If someone asked me that, I'd smile brightly and die.