Chapter 253
Chapter 253
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 253
Chapter Title: The Method of Distinguishing Good and Evil (1)
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Leaning her head on Fernandez Cerned's lap, Kirhas Hearttaker let out a purring sound as she mumbled something. In the world, I finally did it. Clouds and sunlight and wildflowers were mixed in here and there, but piecing the words together gave roughly that meaning.
Fernandez chuckled softly and stroked her hair. Each time he did, her tail swayed gently.
“Benefactor.”
“What.”
“Benefactor.”
“I'm listening.”
“Fernandez Cerned.”
“……Yeah. Kirhas Hearttaker.”
“Hehe.”
Kirhas whined as she leaned her body against him. She wasn't heavy at all, but she felt weighty. More than her body, more than her physical weight. Her heart.
“I adore you.”
“…….”
That made his response late. Her feelings—ridiculous as it sounded—had to be rejected. It felt too selfish to say it after they'd already done everything, but drawing a clear line was better.
The emotions Kirhas felt now were an illusion. The longing he'd intentionally instilled in her. From pulling her out of the underground aqueduct and steadily, over a long time, injecting a series of illusions into her……
“Stop.”
“Huh?”
“Stop thinking.”
Kirhas's bronze eyes glistened with moisture. She gazed intently at Fernandez's face and said,
“Abel's words from time to time are only now making sense. You have no romance, Benefactor.”
“Kirhas.”
“Is it that 'guilt' you mentioned before? That it wasn't the fate I was originally supposed to have, the fate of 'Kirhas'? Do you really think that?”
“What?”
“Really, truly. Do you think my fate is just a string of phrases like beastman great chieftain, shield of the wilderness, guardian of civilization? Heir to the Dain King, Round Table Knight, envoy of the Elf Queen, concubine of the great chieftain, archbishop, slayer of the archdemon. Sir Fernandez Cerned?”
Were those names your fate? Kirhas's voice grew sharper and sharper. It wasn't anger directed at Fernandez. This was an expression of sorrow. Her words overflowed with deep resentment and attachment.
“Does fate exist? Does it even exist? Must our futures inevitably march toward a fixed point…… Are we mere puppets of time?”
“……No. Fate doesn't exist.”
He'd already experimented with it. He'd pondered fatalism through too many events. If fate were set, heroes would never fall, the dead would never revive, and those meant to live would never die.
And the world would never be saved.
So, fate doesn't exist. It mustn't, and it doesn't.
“Then what's the reason I shouldn't have fallen for you?”
“That's because I……”
“Saved you, raised you, made you who you are? No. Not all knights adore their lords, and not all beasts grow attached to their handlers. Do sheep love shepherds? Do goats love farmers? Benefactor, am I that kind of existence to you?”
Fernandez couldn't respond to her words. Saying no would be a lie, since it had indeed started from such motives.
But saying yes wouldn't fit either, because the feelings he had now as he looked at her were far from that. Kirhas was a clever woman, and without a reply from Fernandez, she could already predict thousands of sentences.
Her prediction was navy blue. Eyes darker than indigo. Fernandez's color. The first color that came to mind when looking at him.
The color of victory.
Kirhas's lips curved softly into a smile.
“Do you remember what you said to me when you saved me?”
“……That purpose matters more than reason, right.”
“Yes. Is it still the same now?”
“…….”
“Not for me. Now, reason matters more than purpose to me. Being loyal to you, following your orders. No matter how grand the cause at the end, or how radiant the purpose driving it, those things hold no value to me.”
Kirhas declared.
“To me, there's only one reason for all my actions: your name. If I must step forward and shed blood, or even see blood, it's solely because you wish it. Fernandez Cerned. You are my reason. And to me now, reason is more precious than purpose.”
She climbed onto Fernandez's body. Her long, black hair draped over his forehead, casting shadows. Between them, her turquoise eyes sparkled like jewels.
“Bad person. Haven't the roles switched? I was the first, so why am I the one convincing you?”
At her words, Fernandez stared silently into her eyes. As Kirhas opened her mouth to say more, Fernandez cupped her cheek and pulled her close.
Time seemed to stop. If so, may it last forever. Kirhas slowly closed her eyes, thinking that. His scent was thicker than honey, navy blue, that sophisticated allure embracing her.
* * *
As if embodying the young Knight King's rage. Inside La Mertion, the once-splendid ducal palace was engulfed in massive flames, burning away.
After weeks of grueling siege, La Mertion had fallen. The heart of the Silk Road to the eastern kingdoms. Like heralding the end of a history built on gold. Utterly, so massively it could never rise again.
“Where will you head now, Your Highness.”
The Knight King steadied his breath quietly beneath his helmet. He couldn't contain the boiling rage. The reality he'd witnessed firsthand was horrific beyond words. Over eighty percent of the nobles' residences in this region had become vampire lairs.
There had been a time when Franzrit fell and he cleared the Widow Spider Coastline. Back when he was still a prince. He recalled the rage he'd felt then.
It was a horrific place. All citizens treated merely as potential food stocks, bound and bled bit by bit into bowls for more efficient blood supply—like livestock.
Humans must not become livestock. With that conviction, King Vicente—in his days as Prince Helrga—had burned away every last vampire remnant on the Widow Spider Coastline.
“The Emperor…… did this intentionally, you say.”
“Yes, Your Highness. He turns his minions into vampires to control them.”
“He's probably become a vampire himself by now.”
“The Emperor appeared publicly just days ago. It was broad daylight.”
“…….”
At the words of Silveric, permanent Magus of the Round Table Council, Vicente fell silent. Some texts said high-ranking vampires had immunity to sunlight.
Day Walker. The lord of a vampire bloodline, monarch of vampires. Circumstantially, the Emperor had to be a vampire, and if he'd strode boldly under the sun, his identity was Day Walker.
-Crunch.
“Unforgivable.”
Vicente spoke in a grim voice. He gripped his sword hilt as if to crush it, then slowly released it and removed his helmet.
Flames flickered within his sky-blue eyes. Not mere reflections from the burning city. His eyes now blazed with rage and the innate sense of justice unique to the great Dane royal bloodline.
“Your Highness, please reconsider. The purification of this region will be announced publicly. Thorough enough that the Imperial House can't easily fabricate a pretext to move against the kingdom. But directly antagonizing the Imperial House is unwise.”
“That would be true if we were alone.”
-Clank.
Vicente turned his horse's reins. His armor grated, producing a heavy sound.
“You mean……?”
“Convene the Eastern Kingdoms Alliance Council. Gather opinions from all royal houses. It's difficult with our strength alone, but the Imperial House is weakened by internal strife like never before. Isn't this our sole chance to escape the Empire's shadow?”
A king wields the sword for the greater good. But the hand swinging it must always be guided by wise judgment.
A king's actions never stop at personal deeds or failures. His decisions directly determine the nation's rise or fall.
Vicente was no fool. No child challenging a giant on mere righteousness. The pretext of vampires exploiting humans, the Empire's internals more vulnerable than ever.
With those two baits dangling before them. The monarchs of the Eastern Kingdoms Alliance—who'd long paid taxes under the Empire's shadow to survive—would finally cease their feuds and turn their blades.
The Eastern Kingdoms Alliance, despite its name, was a group bound by razor-sharp covenants. Each kingdom was a beast ready to bare its fangs at the others at any moment.
But now, they would no longer remain beasts snarling at one another. Now, at last, they could form a true 'alliance.'
They would temper Eastern blades with Imperial blood. King Vicente ordered all his knights to return home.
Three months before the flames of La Mertion died. The allied forces of the Eastern Kingdoms Alliance began their march.
The continent's brief spring had passed, and summer approached.
A brutal summer.
* * *
The Sun Festival, heralding summer's start. A holy day dedicated to Shilde when the sun's power peaks, and every city and village in the Holy Pantheon's domain buzzed with festivals.
Fernandez walked streets draped in colorful linen banners. He wandered the festival crowds, lost in thought.
After the so-called 'Spring of Shame,' where the Empire's east and west crumbled to foreign invasions. The myriad lords were surely preparing to rise now.
Count Sephor, first to lead armies, saw his house shattered. The fall of one of the eight electoral houses was unprecedented in Imperial history, and all electors viewed it as more than Sephor's blunder.
Electors never underestimate foes. They are lions coiled to strike, beasts giving full force even against rabbits.
Thus, their instincts had gauged Count Sephor's ability and prestige. Their conclusion:
-Sephor is no fool.
-Sephor marched with a massive regular army capable of seizing the capital.
-Brigands could never defeat an elector's regulars.
-Thus, brigands didn't eliminate Count Sephor.
Anyone could think that far. Of course, publicly, each elector downplayed Sephor's death as 'a foolish noble's petty end,' but what they truly believed was another matter.
So the lords began a game of chicken. Someone had to step forward and identify the shadowy force behind Sephor's fall. But as Sephor's example showed, that foe could annihilate 15,000 elite troops overnight.
Chaos where friend and foe blurred. Now, after that turbulent spring, as electors launched indiscriminate disarmament races against unknowns.
'How to start.'
The first to light the fuse would inevitably face all others' assaults. All electors eyed the juicy Imperial capital, and they'd check each other's advances.
Before the Eastern Kingdoms Alliance struck the Imperial east, the Empire needed another massive ordeal.
In this massive powder keg, hunkered like a tortoise, claws sharpening. How to make it explode properly.
“Brother Fernandez.”
Then, from an alley, someone called him. A very small voice, from a fair distance. Calling him amid this crowd from that range meant they knew he was Demonica.
“A message from Abbot Beorn Shieldbane.”
“Who are you?”
“Pardaro of the Reverse Cross Relief Knights. An honor to meet the Saint himself.”
The robed man bowed toward him. Fernandez returned the greeting and approached. Pardaro reached under his robe and produced a small rosary of chained links.
A key-sword, reverse cross, and spearhead intertwined. The Reverse Cross Relief Knights' emblem.
“The Abbot called for you, not the brothers of St. Bartholomew Monastery?”
“The central priests are all under the Abbot's orders in seclusion now.”
“What……?”
Fernandez couldn't hide his uncharacteristic surprise. That stubborn inquisitor halted all duties?
Information first. Fernandez hardened his expression.
“What did the Abbot say to relay?”
“Brother Zephys has gone to the capital.”
“The Pope would forbid it.”
The Pope would surely ban direct Imperial interference. The Pope matched Fernandez in strategic thinking and had likely grasped his plans from his actions.
Such a man wouldn't rashly strike the Emperor. Not yet time.
“Yes. Brother Zephys requested excommunication. He went to the Imperial House alone.”
“Typical of him.”
If he sensed the Imperial rot and the Shilde Church shielding it, Zephys would act. Even if the Pope blocked him, by any means.
-Impressive.
Feizashi exclaimed briefly. Fernandez shared the surprise. His perspective broadened.
'Staring one way traps you in a mold, as expected.'
Obsessed with grand strategy, had his overall view died? Fernandez self-mocked.
Not the shrewd Pope expert in strategy, nor Fernandez crafting the board. The stubborn inquisitor's simple, direct thinking neared the strategy's core.
'At this point needing variables, one appeared.'
-Now's the time to fan the flames bigger.
Fernandez smiled and patted the knight's shoulder. The knight, meeting the recently famed saint, stood rigid.
“You're with the Relief Knights, right.”
“……Yes? Yes, Brother.”
“Sorry for the trouble, but could you deliver a letter to His Holiness the Pope?”
“Yes, of course.”
The Empire needed to suffer once more. Enough for capital-coveting electors to bare their ambitions fully.
The Eastern Kingdoms Alliance couldn't be the fuse. The moment electors rallied against external foes, his division-stoking plan would falter.
Division must arise internally. Guer's aid, Grand Duke Carbellier's opposition army. Burang's beastmen. These pieces couldn't yet paint the full board.
Then…… flip the board entirely.
[Shilde Church's Paltenoia Diocese requests full-scale heresy investigation.]
That should do. The Empire's capital, Paltenoia. Shilde's largest diocese. If Beitasser Church announced a total audit, Shilde would rebel.
Gods' interests and the church's differ utterly. Human interests, even rooted in goodwill and piety, can't be purely selfless.
Beitasser declaring to burn Shilde's largest diocese would be seen as a declaration of war.
Weightier than the prior condemnation.
Church against church, the Holy Pantheon no longer 'Pantheon of All Gods.'
Religion would grasp secular power again.
-Feels like old times.
'Don't get sentimental. It's all for the world's sake.'
-You've gotten preachy. Haha!
Feizashi cackled. Fernandez shrugged. Anyway, electors could no longer stand by.
Shilde's might notwithstanding, the Empire had no state religion. Meaning Holy Pantheon domains overlapped chaotically.
Even if secular and sacred separated strictly, politics can't divorce religion cleanly.
Pro-Imperial electorates had Beitasser churches,
Anti-Imperial ones had Shilde.
Greater chaos, greater strife.
If the Empire must suffer, dye the world in fever.
The fever of 'religious war.'