Chapter 186
Chapter 186
Iron Emperor — Chapter 186
Chapter 57: One Who Walks Toward Hell
The Roselin soldiers dragged along by the Gauri troops had no life in their eyes. Though perhaps it was more absurd to expect life in the eyes of prisoners, their gazes held the terror of an unknowable future.
"Move faster!"
Thwack!
"Urk!"
A stumbling prisoner was kicked hard in the backside, the force sending him lurching forward. Curses rained down, a baptism of clubs fell upon them, and the prisoners instinctively flailed to take fewer blows. Yet the Gauri soldiers only resorted to such treatment on rare occasions. It was the minimum beating necessary to maintain the prisoners' marching pace.
Even so, the prisoners' entire bodies trembled at every word from the Gauri army.
"Moooooohhh!"
"Hey, this one looks hungry?"
A soldier holding a Minotaur's reins remarked at the creature's mournful cry. The prisoners could not understand the words, but they felt their whole bodies freeze. The Minotaur's gaze, drool dripping from its mouth, was fixed on them.
"I told you we're not eating them, you bastard!"
When the annoyed soldier pointed a finger at a prisoner and shouted, the prisoner—who had no way of understanding—foamed at the mouth and collapsed. It was because the Gauri soldier's fingertip had pointed directly at him.
King Alsein's face was rigid.
Roselin soldiers dragged along in misery. It was not pity for these prisoners that stiffened Alsein's expression.
"This is wrong."
The words that escaped King Alsein's tight lips bore the meaning of strong denial.
His gaze was not on the prisoners but on the horde of monsters following behind them. Prisoners who flinched every time a monster let out a cry... Seeing human dignity ground into the dirt, Alsein could not understand the actions of the Gauri people.
"We've caught almost all of them."
"Your Majesty..."
The voice that came from behind was stiff. Alsein turned and slowly offered his respects. But Go Jin-cheon was not one to miss Alsein's expression, so different from usual.
"You look displeased by something."
At Jin-cheon's words, which implied he did not understand the reason, Alsein's brow twitched faintly. He drew a deep breath, then looked Jin-cheon squarely in the eye and began to speak.
"No matter that they are enemies, they are human beings."
"And so."
Alsein's voice carried strength. This was not the man who had wanted so much to resemble Go Jin-cheon. When Jin-cheon coolly questioned him, Alsein moistened his increasingly parched lips and continued.
"Then how can you use fell creatures to defile the dead and to harm the living? This is something no human should do."
"......."
That was Alsein's grievance. This was on a wholly different level from raising monsters as livestock. Even under Alsein's reproach, Jin-cheon's expression did not change. Inwardly, Alsein had been hoping for some plausible excuse. But Jin-cheon, preserving his silence, showed no sign of offering one.
"To use fell creatures to punish human beings—I could not understand this at all. You may call my actions rude, but because I cannot accept it, I speak to you this frankly."
Jin-cheon looked at Alsein, who stood before him speaking so boldly, and revealed not the slightest change of expression.
A brief silence passed.
Go Jin-cheon, who had been gazing outside, slowly began to open his mouth.
"Because the method is easy and effective."
"Your Majesty!"
At Jin-cheon's indifferent answer, Alsein's eyes flew wide open. A boundless disappointment overflowed in those complex eyes. Jin-cheon, who had watched that expression for a moment, raised one corner of his mouth.
It was a smile.
"You're dreaming."
Alsein was not incapable of understanding Jin-cheon's words. It meant he was being too idealistic. But this matter was something that defied common sense, beyond any weighing of ideals against practicality.
"It is a deed fit only for hell."
Alsein did not back down.
"Heh."
The smile on Jin-cheon's lips thickened. What was making him smile? Jin-cheon's gaze turned out the window. At the end of his gaze lay the colossal tomb being raised without a moment's rest, even with war fast approaching.
"Do you see that?"
Alsein could not know. He could not even guess what Jin-cheon was trying to say now. But he did recognize the tomb of an unfamiliar form caught at the end of Jin-cheon's gaze.
"I see it."
"Good."
It was precisely the tomb where Jin-cheon would lie. The Yeoljes of Gauri, when they ascended the throne, began to build the tomb where they would lie. While still alive, they constructed the resting place where they would be buried after death. Alsein could not understand this unfamiliar custom, but knowing well that Gauri itself was not something to be comprehended by the common sense of the continent, he had let it pass by.
"Though it is the Yeolje's tomb, it is too large... too massive a space for a single human being to lie in."
"......."
Alsein was quietly listening to his words. Jin-cheon, who had glanced once at that Alsein, picked up a splendid ornament lying beside him.
"When I am buried there, splendid objects like these will go in with me. Why do you suppose that is?"
"I do not know."
He truly could not know.
Just why was he telling this story now? Jin-cheon looked at Alsein like that, then erased the smile that had lingered at his mouth. In that moment, under the crushing presence emanating from Jin-cheon, Alsein began to feel his breath choke off.
"The place I shall go when I die is hell in any case."
"What do you..."
At the voice so cold it carried an actual chill, Alsein unknowingly stepped backward. Even so, the momentum and icy aura pouring from Jin-cheon did not relent. No, rather, they were intensifying.
"Do you wish to die and ascend to a glorious heaven, you wretch!"
At Jin-cheon's thunderous rebuke, Alsein could not collect his wits. The barrage of condemnation...
"Are you saying you proclaimed yourself a king with such rotten thinking!"
"Urgh!"
"I ask whether you know the truth hidden beneath the splendor of the throne!"
Thud.
Alsein collapsed powerlessly.
Clatter!
"Your Majesty! What is the matter..."
Marquis Helios Baikal and Alsein's escort knights, who had burst in, were forced to swallow their words at the tremendous aura filling the room. No, the aura was secondary; it was more that they could not act rashly before the man called Go Jin-cheon.
As if the intruders were not even in his sight, Jin-cheon took one step toward the collapsed Alsein and roared on.
"Countless lives vanish at a single word from me, the Yeolje. By your judgment, your people submit, and your people also fight! Do you truly not know that beneath the glory of the supreme seat lies a place drenched in that countless blood!"
"Urrghh!"
Prince Alsein's pupils shook violently, and his upper and lower teeth clattered together without cease.
"Remember this! The splendor of the supreme ruler is the final comfort a man racing toward hell may enjoy while he still lives! It is the price, the burden, that takes upon its own back the karmic burden of the soldiers who march to war, raise their weapons, and slay the enemy!"
Following the icy cold, a searing heat slammed into Alsein's mind. Everyone's lips were sealed shut. Jin-cheon's low voice broke the silence again.
"The one called the Yeolje, the supreme sovereign of all men, is nothing more than a single moth hurtling toward hell. And so, I..."
"Your Majesty..."
Jin-cheon's gaze turned out the window again, and Alsein's trembling lips slowly parted. Jin-cheon's voice, which had grown faint, pierced clearly into Alsein's ears.
"I can do things far worse than this. I am a man bound for hell regardless. What act is beyond me? If one fears that, he is no supreme ruler from the start."
"Hrghk."
For some reason, Alsein felt hot tears overflowing from both eyes.
"Do you wish to be the supreme ruler?"
"I do!"
At Jin-cheon's question, a scream mixed with tears burst from Alsein.
"Then come with me to hell."
"Hrgh, hnng."
Jin-cheon smiled.
A smile whose meaning could not be read—as if sad, as if strong, as if joyful...
"And in the first place, this all began because they brought it upon themselves."
"Wuugh, hurgh, hurgh!"
He tried to stop crying, but the tears would not stop. For the first time, Alsein glimpsed into Jin-cheon's heart. The reason he had seemed so strong, and that sorrow... As Alsein poured out tears like that, Jin-cheon's voice drifted leisurely into his ears.
"That great tomb and the treasures placed inside it are bribes. Bribes asking that when I die, I might be thrown into a slightly cooler fire."
On Jin-cheon's lips as he gazed at the tomb where he would be buried was drawn a smile that transcended life and death.
Leaving King Alsein behind, Go Jin-cheon walked out. His personal guard commanders followed him wordlessly. They too had glimpsed Jin-cheon's inner thoughts and so could say nothing. Yet in their eyes as they followed, watching Jin-cheon's back, a firm resolve was crystallized.
'Even if hell lies at the end of this man's path with his broad back, we will follow.'
The repeated vows were almost visible, as if they were declaring it aloud. At that moment, from one side, Yeon Hwi-garam approached with a smile on his face. Seeing this, Jin-cheon furrowed his brow and spoke.
"What."
"I could hear everything."
"Hmph."
At Hwi-garam's answer, Jin-cheon showed a displeased look and kept walking. Despite that, Hwi-garam did not erase his smile and followed behind, speaking again.
"Your Majesty's tomb looks far too small."
"......."
At Hwi-garam's words, Jin-cheon furrowed his brow deeply and continued onward. Even now the mausoleum was sufficiently enormous, but Hwi-garam was jesting that it would be small compared to the deeds Jin-cheon had already committed and would commit in the future.
"We'll hold a proper exorcism to send you off for a nice bath in brimstone fire."
When Jin-cheon retorted gruffly, Hwi-garam's smile deepened further.
"Are you the sort of man who would go simply because the Yeolje tells you to go to hell?"
"Keuh-heh."
Jin-cheon let out a laugh while still scowling. Knowing Jin-cheon as he did, Hwi-garam understood that this was a man who would likely pick a fight with the King of Hell himself.
"Even if I cross blades with the King of Hell, isn't the place I'm bound for hell anyway?"
"Hahahahaha!"
At Jin-cheon's jesting remark, Hwi-garam's loud laughter rang out.
After the laughter subsided, Hwi-garam addressed Jin-cheon again in a composed voice.
"Five thousand South Roselin troops, soldiers formerly of the South Road Army, and twenty thousand reinforcements are ready."
Listening to Hwi-garam's voice, Jin-cheon answered without looking back.
"Our side's defenses will be without issue, I take it."
"In defending a fortress, none can match our Gauri."
"Good."
Hwi-garam, who had been gazing at Jin-cheon's back as he strode forward unhesitatingly, turned his eyes for a moment toward where King Alsein was.
'Was this what you had in mind?'
Hwi-garam turned his gaze back toward Jin-cheon and smiled.