Chapter 63
Chapter 63
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 63
Chapter Title: The Ancestor's True Face
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[Triad Eagle Castle has been re-registered as the first base of the Sion Clan.]
[User 01, Jang Sion, has been re-registered as clan leader.]
[The first base and clan leader cannot be transferred.]
[Would you like to re-register clan members using clan leader privileges?]
[Existing clan members will be re-registered without their consent.]
After re-registering Triad Eagle Castle as the base, messages popped up one after another for Sion.
And so, Sion re-registered each of the high-ranking officials gathered in the grand conference hall as clan members.
Simply by looking at the target and thinking the intent to re-register, it happened automatically.
However, a few wouldn't register. It meant they weren't original Sion Clan members.
They had risen to high positions in Triad Eagle Castle, yet weren't Sion Clan members?
It marked them as traitors.
Or else, from the start, this god or system or whatever hadn't recognized them as clan members.
Blint was clearly the latter.
It made no sense that his own bloodline couldn't be re-registered.
Proof was that Piot and Yonas could be.
In the end, the conclusion was that Blint wasn't Sion's blood.
The bitch Katrina had taken seed from another man to bear Blint, aiming to make him Duke Sion.
"Hic! Hic!"
Sion glanced at Katrina, collapsed on the floor and just hiccupping, like she was a bug, then turned his head away from her.
Then, to the high-ranking officials staring blankly at him, he spoke softly.
"Listen up."
The nobles flinched in unison at the low, heavy voice that pierced their guts.
"Everyone except these ones saw letters floating before your eyes that you'd never seen before, then vanish. That was the divine word."
Whether god or system, to the people here it was something they'd never laid eyes on, so calling it divine word would do.
"D-Divine word...?"
"The words of a god, you mean?"
Ignoring the murmurs, Sion continued.
"I'll explain the details later, but everyone here who saw the divine word has one thing in common. Loyalty to the Sion Ducal Family. These scum aren't."
As Sion's cold gaze fell on them, the four high nobles pinned by Piot and Stelmann, plus the mother and son duo, flinched and soon began raving.
"B-Bullshit!"
"This is nonsense! Our family has loyally served the Sion Ducal Family for three generations—we're the loyalest of the loyal!"
"You dare, to me of all people..."
Bam!
Sion slammed the stone table in the grand conference hall.
Stunned by the eardrum-shattering boom for a moment, they tried to open their mouths again.
But.
Splatter...
As stone dust fell from Sion's fist, they all shut up.
Blaho, who had been staring gravely at Sion, widened his eyes. The surface of the stone table Sion had struck was cracked.
Not even a swordmaster could do that.
"Who am I, you ask?"
The traitors gulped at the chilling voice.
Sion drew a dagger.
At the sharp blue edge, the traitors instinctively shrank back.
Unfazed, Sion pressed the dagger under his ear and meticulously peeled off the glued-on beard.
Rip.
With the beard covering his cheeks and under his nose gone, his bare face emerged.
Even with the beard, he'd looked under thirty; now it gave the impression of five or six years younger.
But their shock at the too-youthful face was brief. Those with keen eyes and good memory had theirs widening bit by bit, soon ballooning to saucer size.
"Th-That face..."
"My God!"
As trembling voices rose, others tilting their heads to peer at Sion's face began widening their eyes too.
Their gazes darted frantically between Sion standing at the head seat and, right behind him, the 'statue of the ancestor.'
The resemblance was uncanny.
Not just similar—strikingly so.
More than the previous duke or the one before, this young man here resembled the ancestor most.
"D-Duke Jang Sion...?"
"N-No way..."
Yonas walked through the stunned crowd and stood beside Sion. Struggling to suppress his trembling excitement, he boomed in a thick voice.
"Vassals of Sion. Our father, the revered ancestor, Duke Jang Sion—kneel before him."
Finishing, Yonas slowly dropped to one knee and bowed his head to Sion.
"......!!!"
The nobles gaped, jaws slack like they'd unhinged.
Thud.
As if waiting, Piot and Priel knelt on one knee simultaneously.
Not one or two, but nearly everyone excluding a few had shared this otherworldly experience called the divine word—truly magical.
And not only Yonas, clearly Gede's man, but even the elf warrior who barely nodded to past dukes before this man so like the ancestor's portrait—they revered him.
With the chain of shocks, the high nobles' minds erased any notion of doubt.
And as if by promise, a rumor from their childhood resurfaced.
- The ancestor Duke Jang Sion neither ages nor dies!
Those born and raised in Sionia, especially nobles close to the ducal family, grew up hearing tales of Sion.
Nothing captivated children quite like stories of one of the six heroes who founded the dukedom.
Thus, all had encountered the 'undying ancestor' tale at least once.
Of course, as they matured, they dismissed it as childish legend and laughed.
But it wasn't legend.
It was truth.
Thump!
Stelmann, stunned like the rest, snapped to and shuddered violently before hastily kneeling.
One by one, the high nobles followed, dropping to their knees.
Excluding the four traitors sprawled on the floor and the mother-son pair, only one remained standing.
The dukedom's swordmaster breathed raggedly, face flushed red.
Naturally locking eyes with Blaho, Sion curled his lip slightly.
"You're lucky or unlucky—either way, aside from your face, you hardly resemble your grandsire."
"......!!!"
True to his exceptional mental fortitude as swordmaster, Blaho who'd clung to doubt till the end now bulged his eyes at those words.
His grandfather had died before he was born, but whenever his father spoke of him, those were always the closing words.
In the end, everyone in the grand conference hall.
The highest powers in Triad Eagle Castle, heart of the Sion Dukedom, knelt before Sion.
The day the dukedom's alpha and omega returned to them.
* * *
"My apologies, but is it alright to reveal your identity—Grandfather's—to those men?"
Yonas looked uneasy.
The faint regret of no longer being among the trusted few who knew the ancestor's secret was minor.
Yonas, who already pledged absolute loyalty to Sion, worried far more that today's events might trouble the ancestor.
"The vassals? They'll be fine, probably."
Originally, he'd planned to reveal his identity only to select direct kin, but Sion changed his mind.
The house and territory were far more of a mess than expected.
In this state, swapping them out one by one with a tiny circle of direct kin was a waste of time, with no guarantee of clean resolution.
But upon arriving at Triad Eagle Castle, a 'message' came from this god or system or whatever.
That was when Sion realized.
From the start, only he could be master of the house and dukedom.
So he altered the plan.
The old monster who'd lived a century-plus, brain unaged, had found the surest way to seize the house and territory.
"Defy me on this land? Think that's possible?"
Yes. In the Sion Dukedom—especially Sionia—Sion held godlike status.
Even nobles split between Gede and Blint vying for duke didn't defy the Sion Ducal Family itself.
And Sion was the Sion Ducal Family.
"Besides, those words you saw recognize the person as my kin. Without loyalty to me and our house, they wouldn't appear at all."
"Then... I'm relieved."
Sion patted the shoulder of his great-grandson, who still couldn't hide his worry.
"Worry not. The vassals' roots and every foundation lie here. None are fool enough to blab and abandon it all."
*Because I've already killed all who were.*
He hadn't voiced it, but Yonas sensed it and finally bowed his head in relief.
"My apologies. This foolish descendant worried... But Grandfather."
"Hm?"
Glancing at Sion briefly, Yonas continued cautiously.
"The traitors aside, what of that mother and son?"
Katrina and Blint.
The pair had trembled like aspen leaves the moment they learned Sion's identity.
Katrina had even pissed herself right there and, struck mute as if aphasic, hadn't spoken since.
On land where Sion reigned as god, the god had truly descended.
And he'd uncovered their greatest secret.
No words, no thoughts would come.
Rebellion was meaningless; they could only await the god's judgment.
"I'd love to erase them both... but that'd cause issues. The subjects would think it excessive."
To execute the mother-son pair with justification meant exposing Blint wasn't the child of dead Brian.
Without that, sentencing them to death would be hard for the dukedom's subjects to swallow.
After all, Katrina was the late duke's wife, and Blint their sole surviving son—or so they believed.
"True. I couldn't stop whatever you decree, Grandfather, but the subjects don't know the truth, so it might trouble you."
"Me? No, I'm talking about you."
"Pardon?"
Yonas blinked.
Sion smiled meaningfully.
"Anyway, killing that pair would trouble you more than me. For now, lock them in the spire. No visitors. Meals via deaf servants only."
"Ah... Yes."
Bemused why it'd trouble him, Yonas didn't press.
As always, he'd explain in time—and likely had a solution ready.
"Now, just one left?"
"...Yes."
Thinking of Gede, Yonas nodded.
By now, he'd grasped the rough situation, details aside.
"Shall you muster the army?"
Half a day's ride away: half-brother Gede, his knightly clans around Paloma, and their forces. Yonas recalled them.
Rushing with their escort troops, Sionia guards, and Blaho's Black Eagle Legion—which would heed orders anytime despite being left out—victory was assured.
"No need for the army."
Yonas's eyes widened at the unexpected reply.
"I'm enough alone."
"Y-Yes!?"
Sion chuckled at Yonas's involuntary yelp of shock.
"Think those following Gede are any different?"
(To be continued in the next installment)