Chapter 3
Chapter 3
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 3
Chapter Title: Live Your Own Life
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Wife Stella's dying words had a profound impact on Sion.
For her, it might have been a wish that her immortal husband, who could not die, would live freely without being bound by family or the dukedom.
Or it could have been an expression of gratitude toward her husband—a member of the hero's party, the king's brother-in-law, and a supreme duke—who had remained devoted to her alone until the day she died, without taking another woman.
But the dying words reached Sion in a slightly different sense than she had intended.
A life that was purely his own.
For Sion, such a life did not exist here.
He was a citizen of 21st-century Korea, and those twenty-odd years there had been his true life.
Of course, that didn't mean the time spent in this world was false.
His love for his wife and children was too deep to dismiss it as fake.
But it was an undeniable truth that Sion's roots were not here.
And so, Sion decided to follow his wife's dying words and seek "his own life."
By finding a way back to his original world.
Not that he desperately wanted to return there right away—he simply wanted to know if it was possible. The choice would come after he learned the method.
Right after quietly handing his wife's urn to his eldest son, Sion began formulating his plan.
The plan was simple.
He would uncover each legend and mystery that existed in this world, one by one.
If he had come to this world due to some power beyond explanation, then the answer to returning to his original world would likely lie in a similarly inexplicable power. It was a simple but logical deduction.
And legends and mysteries were precisely those hard-to-explain phenomena.
Ancient temples haunted by ghosts, swampy areas where secret witch gatherings took place, vampire castles, werewolf legends, assassins wielding unknown powers akin to superhuman abilities, ancient religious groups passed down from antiquity, and so on.
Sion sought out every person, group, and place that people deemed mysterious, whether it stemmed from ancient legends or mere rumors.
As the undying one, Sion had plenty of time.
Thus, after his wife's death, he wandered various places, chasing down countless legends and mysteries.
Just as he had once gathered masters to grow stronger long ago, he did not linger in one place for long.
In as little as four or five days, or at most half a year, he personally unraveled each mystery he targeted.
Of course, there were many crises and threats.
But for Sion, who was now incomparably stronger than before and seasoned by vast experience, solving them was not difficult.
His method was usually brute force.
However, in cities drawing much attention, he acted discreetly to avoid notice.
Axon, where he stayed to uncover the truth of a secret religious cult, was the same—until he heard news of his eldest son Theo.
* * *
“…….”
Sion looked around at those surrounding him.
About thirty bizarre figures wearing tall white hoods like cones had him encircled.
Cultists armed with swords, axes, clubs, and various other weapons.
Their hoods bore the image of a black snake.
The only one among them not wearing white, but a red hood instead, stepped forward.
“Brother, we already knew you were suspicious. What was your purpose in joining our brothers who serve the Holy Serpent?”
“…….”
Seeing Sion give no reply, the red-hooded man seemed to think he was shocked or had given up. He continued in a very confident tone.
“Your return is a bit unexpected. I thought a clever brother like you would just flee.”
“…….”
“Did you meet the ones who sent you here? Did you hand over the cult's information? Who are they?”
As the red-hooded man's words continued, the atmosphere among the surrounding cultists grew increasingly hostile.
Eager to execute the heretic on the spot, several brandished their weapons roughly or pointed blades at Sion.
“Huhu! No need to answer right away. The night is long. We'll find out slowly.”
The red-hooded man, letting out a sinister chuckle, nodded to his left and right.
At the signal, the cultists raised their weapons and began slowly tightening the encirclement.
“It'd be best if you stay still. We said we'd leave you breathing, so one or two limbs might get smashed. Not sure if you know, but that's some pretty unbearable pain.”
“Pain? Pain, you say…….”
At the low reply that finally emerged, the eyes visible through the red hood narrowed slightly.
Sion's voice held no fear or tension.
Above all, Sion was smiling.
As if the current situation posed no threat at all.
“I know it well. Very well. Probably no one knows pain better than I do.”
“What……?”
“You don't know real pain. Oh, and you asked why I came back? I originally planned to just leave quietly. That was before I realized you lot were a third-rate scam cult.”
“Y-You heretic scum! How dare you!”
At the word "scam cult," the red-hooded man bellowed in rage, and the cultists' mood turned even more ferocious.
“Why not just keep scamming blind fools for money and exploiting the ignorant, like a proper scam cult? Then I wouldn't have had a reason to come back.”
“You…….”
“Yeah. I came back on purpose. You're not total idiots, right? I figured you'd gather in a mob like this to execute a traitor like me. Looks like you're not completely brainless after all.”
Shring.
As the two swords crossed in an X behind his waist, hidden beneath his cloak, came into view, the red-hooded man's mouth snapped shut.
The blades, over forty centimeters long, resembled kukris from his original world.
“If it were up to me normally, I'd ignore trash like you scam cultists. There are just too many of them. Can't deal with every single one. But I can't just leave child-sacrificing bastards be. If I hadn't seen it, fine—but now that it's in my sights, it's a bit hard to ignore.”
“Y-You demonic heretic! The immortal Holy Serpent, overseer of death, commands it! Kill him! Just kill him!”
Unable to hold back, the red-hooded man roared, and the cultists let out beastly howls as they lunged at Sion.
The distance between them and Sion was a mere four or five meters—six or seven strides at most.
But.
“!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”
Without any warning, like a lie, the bodies of the cultists charging at Sion froze in an instant.
“Gurk!”
“Keuk!”
Then, as if by prior agreement, they dropped their weapons to the ground and collapsed right there.
Thick killing intent permeated the space, and its owner—the true immortal—bestowed death upon the fraudulent mortals who falsely claimed immortality.
* * *
After slaughtering the cult leader of the Holy Serpent Cult and all its key figures, and rescuing the women and children meant to be offered as sacrifices, Sion left Axon that night.
He spared the ordinary cultists, excluding those who had gathered to kill him.
Without their laughable "Cult King" and the four "Seal Lords," they were like sandcastles destined to scatter.
Even if some sly ordinary cultist rebuilt the cult, that was none of Sion's concern.
“In the end, these guys were just another fake. Tsk.”
Having fully exited Axon via a pre-planned route, Sion clicked his tongue.
The legends and mysteries he had earnestly pursued since his wife's passing.
Unfortunately, most were worthless, like the Holy Serpent Cult.
Of course, there were occasional "real" ones among them.
But even those "real" ones did not align with Sion's goal.
None held any connection to a path leaving this world for his original one.
He had investigated magicians, who were all frauds, and everything from the most powerful religions to scam cults worshiping petty gods like the Holy Serpent.
‘There must be something worthy of being called a true god…….’
Otherwise, his own existence—summoned from another world and granted immortality—could not be explained.
Thus, Sion could hold onto hope.
Someday, he would surely find something that answered his questions and purpose.
“Well then, what's left now?”
Atop his beloved steed Blackie, clopping along, Sion pulled out a notebook and map.
Most maps of this world were a mess, so over nearly forty years of wandering, Sion had created his own.
Though distances and detailed terrain were inaccurate, at this world's level of civilization, the map Sion made was worth its weight in gold.
He marked Axon's position lightly on the map, jotted something in Korean in his notebook, then examined the map again.
“Hm?”
His brows furrowed for a moment.
Tilting his head, Sion stared intently at the map.
Alternating between notebook and map as if confirming something, he soon muttered in resignation.
“Only those three left?”
After decades of tracking various mysteries and secret groups, just three remained.
Of course, more might exist if he searched further, but among the famous legends, mysteries, and enigmas, these three were the last.
“Eltis Island, Northern Great Snow Mountains, Dragon's Wasteland.”
These three were the oldest and most renowned mysteries in this world. Perhaps he should have investigated them first.
But Sion had placed them at the very bottom of his list.
The reason was that none could be reached easily.
Eltis Island lay somewhere in a vast inland sea resembling the Mediterranean, yet no one had ever returned from there.
There had been no shortage of funds to build ships or hire crews, or people brave enough to head into the unknown—but none came back alive.
Some claimed to have gone and returned, but under Sion's polite(?) questioning backed by physical persuasion, they all confessed it was a lie.
The Northern Great Snow Mountains and Dragon's Wasteland were similar.
Though on land rather than sea, they were places no human could reach.
Even for Sion, venturing into uncharted wilderness requiring mortal risk without thorough preparation and resolve was impossible.
Thus, he had saved those three for last.
But now the time had come.
“Hmm.”
For now, Eltis Island should be last among the three.
No ships went there, so he'd have to buy or build one—costly in money and time.
Money wasn't an issue; even buying a ship outright, he'd need crew, and revealing the destination would spread rumors wildly.
It would inevitably lead to hassles, requiring much attention to preparation, so best saved for last.
“The Northern Great Snow Mountains…….”
He could hire guides to the foothills, then proceed alone—better than Eltis Island.
But there were still issues for an immediate trip.
“The season's the problem.”
Aside from a couple summer months, even herbalists and hunters based at the foothills avoided approaching.
Exploration had to align with summer, but it was just entering autumn.
The journey to the Great Snow Mountains alone took three or four months, meaning he'd arrive midwinter—no need to court unnecessary hardship.
That left only one option.
“Dragon's Wasteland, huh…….”
Sion looked at the eastern region on the map.
A vast area occupying nearly a quarter of the map.
It bore only a small drawing of a winged dragon—otherwise completely empty.
Unlike the previous two, people had entered and returned, yet nothing was marked.
That was because the Dragon's Wasteland had no mountains or rivers aside from plains and deserts.
There might be some, but according to those who reached the deepest parts and "lived to return," there was nothing. No one ventured farther and came back, so that was the consensus.
Yet every few years, challengers still emerged to push deeper into the wilderness.
“Because some claim to have really seen a dragon.”
Not all, but a few testified to sightings.
Not up close, but from a distance.
“Hm. No choice.”
Along with the Northern Great Snow Mountains, its sheer physical distance had kept it low priority until now—but the time to go had arrived.
It took over half a year just to reach the wasteland's edge, and who knew how much longer inside.
Moreover, no guarantee a real dragon existed, or that one could be found in such vastness even if it did.
“Still, I have to go. No matter how long it takes, I'll check it myself.”
Though he had a premonition of grueling hardship yielding empty results again, Sion set off to pursue one of his last three slim possibilities.
And 14 months later, Sion met a dragon.
(To be continued in the next installment)