048. Premonition (6)
The sun was setting.
However, as the sunset set in, the sky in the west, which would have been dark before, became brighter than ever. This is because a huge flame erupted from the ridge to the northeast, covering the entire valley. It was a slash-and-burn village.
Enrique glanced back.
“I guess it’s started.”
Nate stared at the scene in silence. His eyes were looking beyond the bright, festive lights.
soul. Above the burning mountain, transparent souls are moving through the sky and rising into the air.
Perhaps some of them are struggling against the painful death, and others are struggling because they cannot let go of their attachment to life. Still, to those watching from a distance, it appears as if everyone is just dancing.
They immediately turned around and hurried their steps along Guandu.
As we neared the Asin Gate, a familiar coffin popped out.
Enrique secretly watched him, but Nate obediently went into the coffin and lay down. She would have gone in even if she had been told to lie down in the grave immediately, not in a coffin. Because she was just so tired.
Slurp. As soon as the lid was closed, I lost consciousness.
When he arrived at the guild branch, it was already dark.
As I entered the building with Enrique’s help in a dazed state, Aslan and Max were waiting for Nate with anxious faces. She was suffering so much that her complexion was turning dark and dying. Aslan even ran towards him, holding on to the hem of his robe and crying.
Even an old man with whom he is not in a close relationship cannot bear to ignore him, and he cares so much for Nate, whom he has only seen for a few days. I thought he was a truly affectionate boy.
While we were in the middle of sharing a touching reunion, a loud laugh was heard from inside the lobby.
“Hahahaha! “It’s been so slow, have you finally arrived?”
A man with long bones and well-developed muscles came out to the lobby, smiling brightly. It was Asean branch leader Justin Astros, a powerful figure in the guild and one of the continent’s few sword masters.
“Kkkkkkkkk, Your Majesty. I heard you had a hard time this time? The Aslan kid said, you’re so… … .”
The man laughed and walked towards them, wondering what was so funny, but suddenly stopped talking. Because Nate quietly stretched out his arms toward him.
The man looked at Nate in surprise when he saw the blood-soaked bandage wrapped around his wrist. In an instant, the once friendly atmosphere in the lobby becomes cold.
“Justin.”
The man trembled at the quiet call.
“If you pull a prank like this one more time, I will unconditionally impose a 30% tariff on your store. Do you understand?”
“what?”
Justin’s eyes were so wide that they seemed like they were going to pop out.
“Tariff 30… . hey! Isn’t that a complete thief? Not even Asin in the world would do something like that! “Besides, what on earth am I importing and you’re imposing tariffs on it, huh?”
“You import it, right? “The latest trends in Brittany.”
“what… … .”
Justin’s mouth dropped open.
Are trends imported? uh? Hey, great, yeah! Instead, they will raise the price! I’m going to raise it a lot! Did you know that our store’s best customer is your wife?
After babbling for a while, the man obediently took out his Auror blade and cut off the handcuffs.
Tang Gang, Tang Gang. Aslan exclaimed as he saw the handcuffs falling cleanly to the floor. wow.
A man who seemed so straightforward was actually a man of great skill.
As Nate was turning his wrists around, feeling lighter for the first time in a few days, Justin, who had been looking at him for a while, asked with a confused look on his face.
“… Hey, are you okay?”
“… … ?”
Why is this guy and that guy doing this today? If you’re going to ask if it’s okay, shouldn’t you have joked from the beginning?
Before returning to Delcross, Nate received a brief report on the current situation of the Asean branch and the direction in which this matter will be handled. Among them was the whereabouts of the two people he had rescued from the slash-and-burn village.
Old Max, who had no family or connections, decided to first make a living by helping out with odd jobs at the guild.
His face was beaming at the thought that he had finally escaped from the bandits he had been tied to for half his life. I wasn’t even looking for my favorite drink, but it seemed like the successive waterfalls of divine power had suppressed my alcohol withdrawal symptoms.
In Aslan’s case, there was a wider range of choices.
“He’s a kid with a lot of talent. “He is beyond reproach as an apothecary, and even has a great talent for learning Aurors on his own.”
Although he had been involved in a band of thieves since childhood, he was a child with a rare upright character. The boy’s face lit up with joy at Nate’s calm praise.
“To provide as much help as possible according to the child’s wishes. It would be a good idea to first continue your studies as an assistant to a famous pharmacist, or to write a letter of introduction as a squire for a promising knight.”
However, upon hearing those words, the Asean branch leader secretly laughed and gave a strange glance towards Aslan.
“Hmm, anyway, I had all kinds of interesting stories with this kid while I was waiting for you.”
I was glaring at Justin, wondering what he was up to, but Aslan stepped forward with a very nervous look on his face.
The boy walked quickly in front of Nate and then carefully got down on one knee. He probably saw Enrique doing it and seemed to be imitating it. Although his head-down posture was awkward, it was quite serious.
The boy who bowed like that spoke to Nate in a slightly trembling voice.
“Bart… No, Your Majesty. “I want to be your Majesty’s person from now on.”
I heard Enrique clicking his tongue next to me.
“Another innocent life… … .”
Whether or not there was noise next to him, Aslan looked up at Nate and continued speaking clearly.
“I plan to improve my swordsmanship skills and go to Delcross. I want to take the imperial knighthood exam to be held next year and become a knight in the royal guard that protects His Majesty, always helping by his side. “I will do my best to make sure that happens.”
“… … .”
Nate was inwardly taken aback by Aslan’s unexpected words. It hasn’t even been a day since he escaped from the bandits, and his life plans are going too fast. Besides, isn’t the process strangely specific?
Sure enough, there was a guy next to me blowing air.
“Hmm, I decided to take a look at the sword. “It’s about the knighthood test. The great Justin will easily pass it!”
Mhahahaha! After glancing at the careless branch leader who was smiling confidently, Nate focused his gaze on the boy who was looking up at him with sparkling eyes.
“Aslan, you are still young. There is no need to try to decide everything in advance. Childhood is not as long as you think. “It may not be enough to try things you’ve never done before and enjoy things you’ve never had before, so why not take a little more time and think about it carefully?”
But Aslan shook his head.
“If it weren’t for Your Majesty, I would have definitely lost my life to the punitive force today. My life now is as if it was given to me by Your Majesty. “Then wouldn’t it be right for me to dedicate the rest of my life to Your Majesty?”
He spent his childhood struggling alone in a gang of thieves. After he had barely adapted, a punitive force came and he had to cross the border of Flanders alone. Although he worked hard, his days were extremely lonely for a young boy to experience.
But after following Nate over the past few days, Aslan felt a sense of stability that he had never felt before. Even in an urgent situation of chasing and being chased, she was able to firmly trust, rely on, and follow someone. The boy never wanted to lose that sense of security and connection that he had gained for the first time ever again.
“Aslan.”
Nate opened his mouth to dissuade the boy again.
But for a moment, the boy’s face, looking up at him, overlapped with that of a grown young man. Nate immediately recognized him as Aslan from several years later.
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The young man, who had grown up well, was wearing the uniform of the Knights of the Guard, as he had assured me as a child, but his uniform was torn here and there and soaked in blood, as if he had been in a difficult battle. Other knights of the Royal Guard can be seen chilling around him.
He stood with his sword pointed at the dark gray sky. He glared at the unknown person and shouted loudly.
-If I had known it would be like this, if I had, I would never have… … !
The scene disappeared very quickly. However, the youthful sorrow in the young man’s screaming voice made Nate ask the boy the same question again.
“… “Won’t you regret it?”
However, the confident boy’s eyes were as straight as ever.
“Yes, that will never happen.”
“… … .”
“… Why not?”
What could he say to those earnest eyes?
“… “I look forward to the day when Delcross welcomes another great imperial knight.”
Nate was finally able to clear his throat and reply.
* * *
Chellang-challang.
Nate opened his eyes while listening to the small sound of water rippling. It was a small artificial pond located deep inside the imperial palace.
He got up from the surface of the pond and slowly walked out. The soaked robes become soggy and the body is dragged heavily to the bottom of the pond.
A middle-aged woman with a gentle face approached him holding a clean blanket. She is the leader of the Knights of St. Aurelion, who has always been reliable and loyal.
“His heart actually stopped on two occasions. your majesty.”
Was that why his face looked a little haggard? It looks like he’s been in a lot of trouble for a few days. Later, I heard something from Francis, who loved his knight leader so much.
“Good job, Katrina.”
“It was nothing. “Have you found the prince?”
Nate stopped before he even got out of the pond. He stared for a moment at the water droplets dripping from his hair and the hem of his clothes, then nodded his head.
“Yes, I found the child. “I decided to become another Klanos and live outside the empire.”
“… “I see.”
I thought that the Seonghwang personality she was familiar with would have brought the child right away, but it seems like something wasn’t going well. Sure enough, Nate stopped right there, covered her face with one hand, and made an unexpected noise along with her sigh.
“If you knew this would happen, Solomyu, you wouldn’t have hated that guy so much… … .”
Katrina involuntarily took a breath. This is because it was the first time that the Emperor mentioned the previous Emperor.
Solomyu Klein. The 16th ruler of Delcross, a cool-headed monarch who tightly bound the Theological Academy and the National Assembly through political weakness.
This is a man who just frowns and drinks wine while his young son vomits blood in front of him.
As a child, Nate used to inadvertently think of such things while watching the success of his ancestors. In the end, isn’t his and his mother’s misfortune caused by the author? If I kill that guy, wouldn’t everything be resolved?
However, when I received the same gaze from my own child, the memories of my childhood took on a different meaning.
Although he seemed to calmly respond to the conversation in the end, Cayenne occasionally conveyed a slight hint of murder towards him. He must have decided that it would be better to take the opportunity to kill him and completely run away, rather than live his whole life under the watchful eye of the continent’s most powerful person.
The only reason I obediently stepped down was because I could never find a loophole in Nate.
Above all, while talking with Kaien, the eerie malice conveyed by the child’s soul with black cracks here and there was still vivid in my mind. The soul shed black tears and continued to pour out curses at him.
-I’ll curse you! I will curse you! The reason I’m so sick is all because of you!
-I’ll eat your soul! I will tear it to pieces and eat every last bit of it!
These are his true feelings that Cayenne, who can hear the voices of other souls but cannot actually hear what his own soul says, will never recognize.
“Katrina, I… “At first, I thought I would give him the freedom to speak.”
The thoughtful knight commander silently listened to what he said.
“But now I keep having that doubt. “Maybe I was just scared that I might cut that child with my own hands.”
Nate didn’t believe that Cayenne would be obedient forever, but he wasn’t prepared to engrave the oath of restraint directly at the risk of ruining the child’s soul.
Can the soul of a broken child be restored? Could it be that it has already passed the critical point and collapsed? What should he do if it turns into something completely wrong?
“I decided never to raise a sword against my child again… … .”
Katrina looked at the water droplets running down his chin for a moment, then unfolded the blanket she was holding and quietly wrapped it around him.
“your majesty.”
“… … .”
“No matter what, that will never happen.”
Her voice was firm yet soft and confident.
“Your Majesty gave the prince what your Majesty wanted most.”
Even if it says something different from his premonition, it is a firm voice that makes you want to believe it forever.
“… okay.”
So he always thought that he wanted to be someone like this knight commander for his children.
fantasy,
