Chapter 309
Chapter 309
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 309
Chapter Title: War of the Puppets (6)
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Compared to the open plains, night falls faster and lingers longer in the forest.
Seyri followed silently behind Darian as he walked ahead, lost in thought.
Before the Emperor's fall from grace, he had been one of the most promising knights of the cathedral.
A young man who bore the righteousness of the sun in his heart, possessing talent so overwhelming it seemed as if the gods themselves had forged him.
He had been cheerful and warm, like the midday sun. She still remembered the day they first met.
In the training grounds of the "Emperor's Eyes," nestled deep within the imperial heartland, he had grinned happily and said to her,
"Nice to meet you! Fine afternoon, isn't it? I'm Darian Shrike!"
"I'm Seyri de Arianne. You're that new 'cathedral knight,' aren't you, sir?"
"Not anymore! Let's get along, fellow 'Emperor's Eye'!"
Darian laughed heartily in response. She found his laughter strangely captivating.
He surely knew what the Emperor's Eyes were about. There was no reason for someone from the church to welcome such a position.
The Emperor's Eyes were assassins.
On the surface, they were the Emperor's elite guard officers, but in truth, their missions centered on assassination operations based on intelligence from the Iron Sides.
Under the Elector system, the imperial authority was far from secure. The Elector Counts were beasts born of power, each reigning as kings within their own domains.
To maintain the framework of the Empire as a single nation, a minimal "line" was necessary. A line that could be called noble duty.
That was the Emperor's Eyes: the bare minimum code needed to check and properly manage each Elector Count.
What if one plotted rebellion? By imperial law, there was no provision to restrain an Elector Count until actual war broke out. They would view any interference in military expansion as meddling in internal affairs.
Even if war erupted, the rebels could easily masquerade as a "peacekeeping force" depending on the pretext. That was noble society for you.
In that den of beasts, the Emperor's leash was intelligence and assassination. Iron Sides and Emperor's Eyes. If an Elector Count prepared for rebellion, the Emperor's Eyes would pay him a visit.
They would never kill the Elector Count directly. A power vacuum would only invite greater chaos.
Instead, the Emperor's Eyes eliminated those involved in bolstering military strength. With minimal cuts, minimal damage. Preserving the Empire's foundation.
Yet no matter how righteous the outcome, their actions were undeniably assassinations. Not the work of a cathedral knight.
Someday. When she had asked him about it, Darian had smiled and said,
"You mean why I'm here?"
"You could've stayed with the church and easily become a knight commander."
"You're right! This is a secret, but the Grand Master of the Light Martyr Church once told me to take over as the next knight commander."
"Then why go out of your way...?"
"The church wanted ties with the imperial family, and the Emperor coveted my strength."
Even as he said it, Darian smiled without a wrinkle of doubt. Seyri could say nothing.
Before his eyes must have stretched a rose-tinted future. The brightest path a cathedral knight could walk.
He had forsaken all that honor and status to become the Emperor's assassin because his church had willed it so.
To plant one of their faithful in the Emperor's innermost circle.
At that time, fifty years into the prolonged war, imperial authority was plummeting.
The Emperor needed strong military might, and the church had no intention of missing the moment when it hit historic lows.
Under such circumstances, one man's honor was all too light. One man's life was easily denied.
Darian had been in that very situation, and to Seyri, his smile—so pure—seemed utterly out of place.
"Why are you smiling?"
"Is there a reason I shouldn't?"
"Pardon?"
"Does brooding and putting on a grave face make a shitty life any better? Listen, Seyri. From my experience, most problems don't get solved by worrying. You just... do your best that day."
"Words worthy of a Shild priest."
Even if the sun hid behind storm clouds, even if rain fell and darkness gathered, was there no sunlight above? Winds would part the clouds eventually, and the sun would rise again without fail.
The prayers of Shild's faithful in the face of hardship usually followed that tone. And Darian, cathedral knight of the Shild Church, was no different.
"How in the world did it come to this...?"
Snapping out of her reverie, Seyri gazed at Darian's back as he walked ahead in silence.
Was it the forest shadows? The shade settling on his back seemed larger than his frame.
As if a mountainside rested upon his shoulders.
-Clink.
At that moment, Seyri's foot brushed against a piece of wood jutting out from the edge of the path.
Not a small shrub or branch. It was something crudely carved.
A stake? A post? Why here...?
"This is...?"
Seyri stopped short and stared. It was a grave. A humble mound with a wooden stake whittled into a makeshift tombstone. Crooked letters were scratched into it.
"Armin...?"
"Armin. Age 7. Last words: 'Please save me.'"
Darian spoke without turning. Seyri scanned the surroundings as she followed behind him.
In the darkness, things that clearly weren't natural stood out. More and more, densely packed.
Before long, both sides of the narrow mountain path were filled with graves. Some very small, others larger. All marked by simple stakes in lieu of tombstones.
Wherever her eyes fell, Darian's voice followed.
"Ansel. Age 15. Last words: 'Lord, it's too hot.'"
"Melia. Age 12. Last words: 'Merciful God the Father.'"
"Peter. Age 28. Last words: 'Take me instead of these children.'"
"Captain...?"
"All of them. War refugees."
Darian's voice was chillingly cold, hardened like steel long asleep in an old armory. Cold, heavy, rust-eaten.
"Refugees. Orphans wandering after losing parents and seeing villages burn, the sick and weary weak. I..."
Darian halted. By now, they stood before a small hut in the midst of the graveyard. He turned to face her from the doorway.
"After my 'eyes' opened, I gathered them first. Children who survived the Crusade by sheer, stubborn luck. I collected refugees and helped them endure the madness of the era."
"This place... was a refugee camp."
"One such village."
Only then did the surroundings come into sharp focus for Seyri. Without a single light, it had seemed like a clearing in the forest's heart.
But it wasn't. Traces of clumsy attempts to ward off beasts lined the clearing's edge.
The reason they hadn't noticed at first was simple. This clearing's boundary—no, the entire clearing—had been completely burned not long ago.
The traces lay buried under black ash, and the ashes beneath the forest's moss and weeds.
"Do you know why they had to die?"
"..."
"Because they were 'fugitives.' Because they were lucky. Priests judged that no one but a devil's minion could escape the pyre, and without the devil's aid, they wouldn't have survived."
"That's..."
"Seyri. Is that really true?"
Seyri couldn't meet Darian's eyes. He was crying.
"Was it truly only the devil who could offer them a way to live? Why couldn't our merciful and glorious God save them? Because they were truly fallen? Because these children fell for the devil's temptation and were stained by darkness?"
He prodded the dirt pile beside a small grave with his staff tip. Beneath it emerged a half-burned holy icon.
"This child clutched Shild's icon to their chest even as the village burned. Their origin in a 'place strongly suspected of corruption'—that was their cause of death."
"Captain..."
"I... was too late. Seyri. Far too late."
Too late for what? She didn't need to ask. She knew. Had Darian been there unscathed, these children likely wouldn't have died.
A handful of priests and holy knights raiding a refugee camp couldn't have stopped Darian rampaging in the mountains.
Having served long as an Emperor's Eye, Darian was more adept at ambushes and sabotage than anyone.
And in another sense. Too late meant:
"So, you leave."
Having crossed an irreversible river already. Leave and return to the imperial court. Darian turned his back again as he spoke.
Black darkness, deep shadow clung to his back.
Unthinkingly, she took a step forward. She had no choice.
She couldn't pretend not to see that radiant youth crumble overnight, wallowing in misery.
"Captain. We're all accomplices."
"Seyri."
"If that's the case, we should have acted first. Before debating greater good and sacrifice, we should have acted. We were cowards. Under the excuse of orders, we acted like emotionless blades."
"Seyri..."
"But did we lack hearts? When we killed, did we feel only the weight of the blade? Were we merely useful tools? Captain. How did it come to this?"
Tears choking her, she approached Darian. Her hand cupped his cheek.
"You've saved my life exactly thirteen times, by my count."
"Twelve."
"Once was just now, from the inquisitors. So thirteen. And you've been keeping count? Stingy!"
Seyri forced a chuckle through her joke. Darian gazed silently into her eyes.
"So I'll give you a chance, Captain. That many. Thirteen chances to convince me. Then... we'll convince the world together."
"I can't forgive the church."
"Forgiveness aside, we can negotiate."
"The church won't forgive me either."
"First times are always the hardest."
"No need for you to throw yourself into a hopeless path and share my suffering."
"Hardship from an 'Emperor's Eye'? That's too harsh. How many death traps do you think you and I have overcome so far?"
Seyri kept her voice bright and resolute despite the tears, hoping he wouldn't see them.
In that instant, Darian's face hardened as he shifted her behind him.
"Captain?"
"The inquisitors didn't come alone."
"What do you—?"
"Come out. Which church are you from?"
Darian growled, glaring into the forest shadows.
Then, with a sharp whistle of air, something streaked toward them. Darian swung his staff, batting the projectile from the sky.
A quarrel. A short crossbow bolt. He eyed the thing embedded in his staff's center, then ground his teeth.
"Fairn Royal Hunting School?"
"I am Carlo Mano Pavilos, professor of the hunt. Sir Shrike. Not from the church, but commissioned by it."
"Right. The Inquisition Office... was inside Fairn Kingdom."
Darian slowly readied himself toward the voice from the shadowed woods.