Chapter 81
Chapter 81
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 81
Chapter Title: I Told You It's Not Easy - 4
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As Veronica entered without hesitation, Cecil looked at the remaining two.
"Hmm..."
"...What?"
The more people who participated in this trial, the less the burden on the leader, the Sage.
In other words, wasn't it about how much pain one could endure for the Sage?
So, wouldn't it be better to leave it to someone who could handle it?
With that thought, she smirked.
As if mocking the two left behind.
"Just... well. I'm friends with the Sage. He's willing to fight demons for my sake, so as a friend, this much is natural. But you two..."
Seeing Leventia grit her teeth was amusing, like the taste of roasted salt.
Cecil held back her laughter with effort and took a step toward the ripple.
"You already have plenty of painful memories, don't you?"
They flinched.
Leventia and Evangeline trembled at Cecil's words that struck right at the heart.
Plenty of painful memories?
She had misspoke.
Reality itself was painful.
And this trial stimulated that.
It might deal a major blow.
"So, why don't you rest."
Smiling slyly, Cecil stepped into the ripple.
"This is 'my' business, as someone in a friendship with the Sage."
Even knowing it was provocation, Leventia couldn't stay still.
So she strode roughly toward the trial, and Cecil smirked before following Evangeline, who trailed behind her, into the ripple.
- Ha. Why go that far?
The familiar voice hit her the moment she entered the ripple, and Leventia clenched her fists without realizing it.
Before her eyes was a beauty with long cyan hair and a stern face.
She tried to maintain an expressionless look, but in truth, she was tinged with anxiety and inferiority.
It was an emotion hidden so deeply no one else could know, but Leventia knew exactly what it was.
And how could she not?
The woman in the white robe glaring at the man was Leventia herself.
- They're just thieves who only stole in the village. Don't you have more important things?
She had defeated a man who stole in the village and received his request.
His family had been captured by bandits in the Ropien Mountains.
So he had no choice but to pickpocket money to pay the tribute.
Demons empowered by the Demon King had thrown the continent into chaos.
People who lost their livelihoods had no other way to survive.
Just going somewhere else, there were too many doing this sob-story scam.
And she would help a thief?
What if this guy was the one deceiving them?
Leventia showed her irritation at the Sage's attitude of always trying to do good, no matter where or when.
She had no choice.
She wasn't as merciful as the Sage, nor did she have the insight to discern truth from lies.
- It's necessary.
The Sage's responding expression looked dark.
Leventia knew well why he, who never lost his smile when they first started traveling, had become like this.
- With such a weak heart... Last time in the village, you bought a ton of flowers from that girl selling them at high prices to help her, and now...
The Sage slowly raised his head. She could feel the light in his eyes weakening.
You who shine brighter than me.
You who are kinder than me.
You who are more honorable than me.
The dark pleasure of defiling such a you.
Her body trembled with the sordid thrill, like staining a pure white canvas no one had touched.
- Sorry. But I have to do this.
- Ha. Then why don't you go alone? No, wouldn't it be better to just leave the party?
Stop it.
- Haha. Yeah. I'll go alone...
- It's always like this with you. Acting all saintly alone. Acting like you know everything alone.
Stop.
- Still, helping them will aid our journey. In the Ropien Mountains...
- You're not even the Hero, right? Cut the nonsense. I'm sick of hearing you talk like you know it all, like you're above us every time, every time.
- Haha...
- Do you have some disease where you die if you don't help people? If your heart is that weak, toughen it up!! Go to the Cursed Wasteland or something! Coming back from there will make your heart stronger!
She knew.
She knew the flower-selling girl was selling expensive flowers to earn medicine money for her sick sibling.
And thanks to the info from that sibling, they could destroy the secret weapon of the Demon King's subordinate.
She knew.
She knew his words were true, that the bandits in Ropien Mountains were linked to the Demon King's forces, and not defeating them would make the journey harder.
She knew.
She knew helping them was the right thing.
Yet, driven by ugly jealousy and inferiority, to avoid facing how small she felt before the Sage, she couldn't stop berating him.
As a result, the Sage was losing his light bit by bit, but that wasn't a big deal to her.
Please.
Please stop.
The Sage is doing it for all of us.
So please.
But Leventia's cries never reached the illusion.
The berating continued afterward, and the enduring Sage finally spoke in a weary voice.
- I have somewhere to go, so I think we should pause the journey for a while.
The Sage looked exhausted, pained.
She knew that.
And yet, what did she say?
- What?! Don't talk nonsense! You want to stop this journey for your personal reasons?! If that's the case, just leave the party!!
She exploded in anger.
Even though deep down she wanted him gone.
Feeling inferior just from him being nearby, making her feel endlessly pathetic, she hoped he'd distance himself even a little.
Driven by the desire to dirty him more, she berated him until he left.
Ah. Why did she do that.
Why didn't she hold back the wounded him as he left.
She was the one in the wrong.
Why did she only hurt him.
"Ah... You... You..."
Even in the moment he left.
His haggard face on the verge of collapse, yet he smiled at them as he departed. When he returned, Hyunwoo was different from the old Hyunwoo.
He seemed stronger, able to smile slyly through berating and criticism.
But he had changed enough to ignore even the occasional encouragement she offered.
Leventia's heart felt like it was tearing apart.
Why hadn't she noticed the Sage was cornered enough to lose his composure?
No.
She had turned away.
Because it was the best way to ignore her own ugly, filthy self.
"Huff... Huff..."
Panting, dry-heaving several times, Leventia just wiped her face.
A splitting headache and crushing chest pressure made breathing impossible.
Shivering, she barely calmed after taking a mental stabilizer, but there was no more room to endure.
At least she held out to the end.
"Sob... Hic... Sorry... Sorry... Sorry..."
The trial vividly showing her sins was painful enough to crack her heart.
In that pain, Leventia barely stood and staggered toward the ripple signaling the trial's end.
With each step, her heart shattered.
Her mind began to crack under the guilt.
- It's because of you...?
"Ugh..."
- Because of you. Because of your filthy jealousy...
The cyan-haired beauty who had been berating the Sage just moments ago.
The past Leventia turned her arrows on herself trying to leave the trial.
Even knowing it wasn't real, but an illusion born of her guilt.
Leventia couldn't ignore it.
"Ah... Ugh..."
- It's all because of you. You did wrong. So what right do you have to cry like that?
The arrows of blame hurt too much.
Leventia knew why all too well.
Of course.
Because Hyunwoo had never once resented or blamed her, the blame born of her self-loathing hurt that much more.
With her tear-streaked face, Leventia staggered forward step by step.
Hyunwoo.
Even if you've changed, you're still kind.
Sniffling, Leventia recalled what happened before entering the trial.
He said he'd go alone this time, that it would be too hard for them.
As always, he was right.
The trial was hard, agonizing.
She vomited several times, drowned in self-loathing to the point of losing consciousness.
"Ah... Ugh..."
If only the real him had cursed her, blamed her, even slapped her.
Would that have eased this illusion's blame, her self-hatred even a little?
A meaningless what-if.
The kind Sage would never blame her.
Leventia entered the final ripple and collapsed, gasping for breath.
"Haa... Haa..."
She barely escaped the trial, but Leventia had no choice but to tense up.
"Hyun...woo..."
Because she saw a ripple in her sight.
A ripple with the Sage's face. Ripple.
A box that must never be opened.
The Sage's most painful past lay right before her eyes.
"Ah... Aah..."
She mustn't look.
She mustn't enter there.
Her instincts screamed urgently, but Leventia ignored them with effort.
If Hyunwoo was in there.
If it was about the time he had changed.
Then...
She had to know.
Why Hyunwoo had changed.
She had to know.
It felt like thousand-pound chains held her feet.
That was how scared she was to see the Sage's past.
Even so, she couldn't turn away.
Because that.
Was her sin.
"...Urk...!"
Her instincts were right.
The moment she entered, what Leventia saw was Hyunwoo leaving the party.
Of all places, he headed to the Cursed Wasteland.
Even skilled knights suffered intense stress just entering that wasteland—what reason could Hyunwoo have?
"Ah... No, no way..."
Leventia recalled what she had said to Hyunwoo back then.
- If your heart is weak, toughen it up!! Go to the Cursed Wasteland or something!
Coming back from there will make your heart stronger!
If Hyunwoo.
If he, who was struggling so much then, came here to toughen his heart.
If he came here to train to endure her berating.
"Ah. Aaaah! Aaaaaah!! D-don't go!! Don't goooo!!"
Her face paling, Leventia desperately reached for Hyunwoo.
But even power to slay monsters in one blow couldn't grasp mist.
Still, she flailed to grab him several times, but it was all futile gestures.
Because this was an unchangeable truth that had already happened.
A reality she couldn't deny without turning back time.
"Please! Please! Y-you can't go there!!"
So her desperate cries went unheard as Hyunwoo calmly entered the thorny thicket.
With each step through the thorns, his flesh tore.
With each pass, his blood dripped.
And.
The once pristine white robe gradually stained red.
Just as Leventia herself had wished, the Sage was being defiled.
"St-stop... Please... D-don't go... Please... If you enter..."
But he couldn't hear.
He just kept walking, as if it was what he had to do.
"Ah... Aaaah... Please... Don't... gooo..."
Her screams.
Her hatred.
The hatred for herself that drove him here turned to tears soaking the wasteland.
But even that couldn't slow his steps at all.
-Look straight.
-You made him change.
-This is just the beginning.
-You led him here, didn't you?
-How does it feel? It's going just as you wanted? He's breaking just as you wanted?
-Shouldn't you be happy instead?
-Is this the pride of that great knight?! Is this what you dreamed of?!
Watching Hyunwoo change himself.
Watching him wound himself for the "training" she mindlessly spat out.
Silently enduring horrific pain, developing mental illness alone, treating it, repeating—watching that.
Like tears and screams couldn't wet the ground.
There was nothing Leventia could do here.
Just collapse in place, denying all the pride she so desired.
"Sob... Waaah... Hiiing... Hing.... O-oppa... Oppa... Sob... Ueheeng... Waaah... Sob... Hooo... Aaaang!"
Nothing but become the child she was before dreaming of knighthood, whom even she herself had turned away from, and wail loudly.
Author's Note (Afterword)
Hello! It's Malmulmalmul! Phew...
It's already Wednesday.
When will the holiday come...orz
Hang in there for the rest of the week... See you tomorrow! Bye~!