Futile (2)
This was a shabby underground tavern tucked away in some small village. The place reeked of stale cigarette smoke and the musty odor of old furniture—an atmosphere that was far from pleasant.
Above all, the only light came from a handful of torches. It was so dark you could barely make out the face of the person sitting across from you. Of course, that was exactly why I kept coming back.
“Did you hear? That one-armed bastard supposedly swept up every last undead extermination request in Dyer Forest again.”
“What? Again!?”
The voices of the men sitting to my left drifted into my ears.
Dyer Forest.
The forest where I had first fled on horseback with Saren. The same forest where Saren had slit Chloe’s throat.
“It’s already been two years, hasn’t it? And they still don’t know who he is?”
“I heard a rumor recently that it might be the young master of the old Elsia family.”
“Huh? No way! The entire Elsia line was purged. The imperial family made an official announcement.”
“That’s why it’s just a rumor. How many people have white hair and red eyes? And he’s skilled, too, so people talk. No one actually knows for sure.”
“Come on, is that even possible? Why not just set up an ambush at the undead hunting grounds?”
“You think it’s that easy? Dyer Forest is incredibly dangerous. Even the imperial palace and the guilds avoid sending people there.”
“Huh, I guess so.”
I kept my left ear tuned to their conversation while lifting my drink with my right hand and quietly swallowing. At the same time, my face twisted into a grimace.
“Innkeeper.”
“Y-yes!?”
The owner, who had been wiping cups behind the counter, flinched violently. He looked more startled than the situation warranted.
“Are you sure you washed this cup properly? It smells even worse than last time. I can’t even catch a whiff of alcohol—just that dank stench.”
I swirled the wooden cup around as I spoke, my voice laced with complaint.
“O-of course! I wash them thoroughly every time!”
“Tsk, doesn’t seem like it. This isn’t the same cup that had horse piss in it last time, is it?”
“Absolutely not!! That was an honest mistake, I swear!”
“……Hmm.”
I stood up from my seat and pulled the hood of my cloak over my head. My black hair was pressed down, slightly obscuring my vision.
“Here.”
I dropped a few coins onto the wooden table with a sharp clink and turned to leave.
“Please come again!! I’ll make sure to clean everything properly next time!!”
The owner called out from behind me.
Please come again. As if admitting he hadn’t cleaned it properly this time.
“Tch.”
I pushed open the creaking door, slowly climbed the stairs, and stepped outside. The harsh sunlight stabbed at my eyes, making me frown.
“Ugh… did I take too long?”
Vivian had insisted I return by morning. Why was that again? Anyway, whenever I caught wind of rumors, I always ended up like this. But most of those rumors were about me—ignoring them would have been stranger.
“She’s going to nag me again.”
Once she started scolding, she rarely stopped. What should I do? I supposed I could stop by the market on the way back and buy her favorite bread.
Deep in the mountains, where no one would ever come looking. A small cabin stood in the middle of a vast field blanketed in pure white snow. There was Vivian, wearing an apron and hanging laundry out to dry.
The day Saren died, Vivian had carried me out of Dyer Forest and headed for the church. But after Marian warned her that the imperial surveillance had intensified, they couldn’t stay there either. So she kept walking for days and nights with only one eye, until she finally found this abandoned ruin.
While treating my injuries, she had also turned this dilapidated place into somewhere livable. I couldn’t even begin to imagine how much effort that must have taken.
“Young master!!”
Vivian, who had been hanging laundry, spotted me and planted her hands on her hips as she shouted. Her lips pressed into a tight line, her face full of anger.
“Uh… good morning…?”
“Do you have any idea what time it is!? It’s noon! We were supposed to wash the blankets together this morning!!”
Oh no. I had completely forgotten. But I couldn’t tell her the truth, so instead of answering, I simply waved the thick paper bag full of bread.
“What’s that!”
“Bread from the shop you like.”
“Oh my, really?”
Vivian dropped her hands from her hips and walked straight toward me.
“Hmph─”
She was so pleased she even hummed a little tune, something she rarely did. I should buy her more often.
“Sorry I’m late. I was gathering information here and there.”
The hand Vivian had been using to rummage through the bread suddenly stopped. Even though she had heard this before, her expression was always filled with anxiety whenever the topic came up.
“Still……”
“Yeah. Probably will be for a while longer.”
I gently pushed her back, and we walked toward the house. Once we sat at the small wooden table in the tiny living room, she brought over warm tea and placed the bread I had bought onto a plate.
“Thank you. Eat some too. I bought it for you.”
“……”
But Vivian remained seated without moving.
“Vivi……”
“It’s already been over two years since you started searching for Chloe.”
Vivian cut me off, her voice heavy. The look in her eyes held more sorrow than anger.
“Has it really? Time flies.”
“You haven’t left a single place unchecked! You even went to the imperial capital! Do you know how much I worried the entire day!?”
I had no response. Officially, I was dead. Unofficially, I was still a wanted man. The mere act of me going to a city with the royal palace was an enormous risk. I still remembered how, the moment I returned home that day, Vivian had burst into tears and pounded on my chest.
“I’m sorry.”
So all I could offer was this dry, meaningless apology.
“But Vivian.”
“If you’re going to say the same thing again, don’t.”
“……”
I had been about to say, ‘But I still need to avenge Saren,’ but I shut my mouth. It was the same thing I repeated every time.
The wooden chair scraped against the floor with a dull sound.
“Eat the bread and rest. I’ll hang the rest of the laundry.”
Leaving behind her sorrowful blue eyes, I stepped out of the house.
It wasn’t that I didn’t understand Vivian. And it wasn’t that she didn’t understand me.
This was simply my own stubbornness. Since I would meet Saren again in the next life anyway, was it right to wander around searching for Chloe like this under the pretense of revenge?
Especially when, in these two years, I hadn’t found even the smallest clue about her.
I had visited every church near Dyer Forest, but there was no pink-haired saintess named Chloe. They had said she was someone the imperial palace had raised among many saintesses, yet even the largest church in the capital had no information on her whereabouts. So I changed direction. Instead of the churches, I began roaming Dyer Forest—the place where I had first met her.
Dyer Forest was the demon king’s army’s primary habitat, so humans rarely entered. Occasionally, monsters that wandered out of the forest would harm people, which led to frequent requests to eliminate the undead there. I had taken every single one of those requests.
Today was no different—I had accepted all the available ones before coming back.
Of course, none of this would have been possible without Vivian. She was the one who had taught me the basics of swordsmanship and magic.
Although it was only the most fundamental foundation, perhaps because Serion’s body was special, at some point I had become able to defeat the undead with just one arm without much difficulty.
“I hung all the laundry. You must have struggled washing the blankets alone.”
When I entered the house, the bread was still sitting untouched on the plate. Vivian sat with her head bowed so low that I couldn’t read her expression.
I pulled out the wooden chair across from her and sat down again.
“I’m heading out again today. It’ll probably take a week.”
“……”
“After this trip, I’ll rest for a while.”
“How long is ‘a while’?”
Clear tears fell drop by drop from her bowed head.
“As long as you want.”
“Even a year? Ten years… No, if I said for the rest of our lives, would you stay by my side forever?”
“That……” I swallowed my words. The word “lifetime” felt vague to me. After all, even if we spent our lives together and died, I would simply gain a new life. And in that new life, I would meet Vivian again.
Then where did my “lifetime” even begin and end?
“You wouldn’t, would you?”
When I hesitated to answer, Vivian snapped.
“I know you’ve been through a lot because of Lady Saren……”
“……”
“I know it all too well… but now I’m the one who’s struggling, young master……”
“Yeah.”
“Have you stopped loving me? Is it because of my missing eye? Does it disgust you?”
“No. I still love you. You’re still beautiful.”
“Then are you bored when you’re with me? Does my cooking not suit your taste? Or… am I not satisfying you at night anymore?”
“It’s not that either.”
“Then please!!”
“……”
“Can’t you just look at me… only at me from now on…?”
She grabbed my right hand tightly. As if begging me to hold onto her, she gripped it with all her strength.
“I’m sorry… for raising my voice… hic… I’m sorry… I’m truly sorry……”
“Vivian.”
At my low call, she must have sensed my unease. The tears welling in her blue eyes fell heavily down her cheeks without even tracing a path.
“I’ll be back.”
Without hesitation, I pulled my hand away. I stood up and left the house.
“Hic… hiccup……”
Through the gap in the closed door, I could hear her sobbing. My feet refused to move. I wanted to kick the door open and hold her. In this life without Saren, I wanted to live peacefully with Vivian, laughing together every day.
But cruelly, the system would not allow me such a life. Because once I died, all these emotions would become futile. Only I would carry these memories and feelings with me.
In the next life. And the one after that. Because of these intact emotions, only I would suffer. Yes. In the end, I was a terribly selfish person who had used Chloe as an excuse to make a cowardly choice.