Side story episode 12
* * *
As we stepped beyond the gate, indescribable colours of this world enveloped Dale.
As the steps I was taking turned into the next ones, the landscape of the world changed.
The gray winter night stretched on endlessly.
I remembered when I first arrived here in the ‘Winter of the Universe’ from the elven kingdom.
The cold that froze his blood and tore his lungs open was evidence of this: the apocalyptic cold flowing through Dale’s body.
After the decisive battle with the Third Reich, Dale confronted the cosmic winter that was about to engulf the continent. The primordial fear that this world would end in ice, the Apostle of the End.
Even Dale couldn’t fight back with force. However, Winter willingly stopped his actions and let Dale go.
‘Because there is an ending, you can be saved, and sad and painful things can end. Your existence should not have been born in fear of everyone, and should not have been an object of fear to be pointed at, but rather, should have been a being who received their blessings.’
‘It’s so trivial that it’s not even worth dealing with. I’ve lost interest. Get out.’
A silhouette made of pure white frost spoke, and that was the last conversation with winter.
And now, the place Dale was standing on was once again that winter world.
Dale looked around in the blood-freezing, lung-chilling cold. He couldn’t see anything.
As Ray Uris says, is this really where the history and answers of the lost Fourth Reich lie?
I couldn’t figure it out.
Dale just started to move forward in the black and white winter night. Without even a hint of hesitation or reluctance, just silently.
In this world, it is difficult to measure the passage of time.
How long did it take, how many days, how many weeks? In a world where hunger, sleepiness, and even the basic feelings that should be felt as life were frozen, the only thing that sustained Dale’s existence was consciousness.
At the end of the journey, Dale’s consciousness finally reached the place where the answer was.
“… … .”
The tentacles of Shuve that wrapped around the heart throbbed and fluttered, and the silent cold and darkness began to stir.
──The Empire of Winter was there.
“I’ve been waiting for you, brother.”
The Queen of Winter was there.
Not Dale, but with the old dark mother smiling beside her. But it was all right. Just being able to see their faces again was enough.
“… … .”
Ironically, what enveloped Dale’s body at the end of winter was an indescribable heat.
The cold heart that even the scorching hot earth could not melt began to melt.
As spring melts winter, every part of Dale’s frozen body melted and was enveloped in warmth.
“… … Lize.”
Something hot rose up past my throat. Like a child, I felt like crying.
“I believed, Brother, that you would eventually reach here.”
But after his frozen heart melted, warmth brought out another emotion in Dale.
He believed that there was nothing to take seriously in a world where he was left alone. No, he was not. What Dale was now faced with was no longer a world where he was left alone.
There was something before him that he had to face more seriously than ever before.
“Lize, what are you decorating?”
So said Dale. Towards the other Shadow Lord before him, the Black Gold Emperor, and furthermore, the Winter Empress.
“I’m not decorating anything.”
“Do you really think so, Lize?”
“sure.”
Lize didn’t hesitate a bit.
“All I wish for is a world where my brother and everyone can be happy.”
“… … .”
“Look, brother.”
As she said that, Lize turned her back. Without a shred of caution, she obediently exposed her back and continued walking.
The old dark mother who had been guarding her side also turned her back with a silent smile.
“An illusion that does not awaken cannot be distinguished from happiness.”
Turning her back, Lize whispered.
“Welcome to the world of happiness, brother.”
Lize whispered, and as she spoke, Dale’s consciousness sank into darkness.
* * *
When Dale woke up again, he found himself in a place that was both strange and familiar at the same time.
Because it was once the ‘Emperor’s Bedroom’ that reigned over the Fourth Empire.
“Dale?”
When he turned his head, Charlotte, also dressed in a nightgown, was lying next to him. Without saying a word, Charlotte reached out and stroked Dale’s cheek.
“You don’t look so good. Did you have a nightmare?”
“… …It was a happy dream.”
But Dale shook his head quietly and answered.
“Then why do you have such a sad expression?”
“Because it’s a dream you have to wake up from.”
Dale answered bitterly and got up. But that didn’t mean the whole world would shatter like glass and reveal the truth. This scenery was never a lie in the first place.
Because Charlotte being there was the truth beyond doubt.
Likewise, everything in this world was an indisputable truth.
Dale sat up straight, and Charlotte slowly reached out her arm toward him.
“Dale, can you feel it?”
Charlotte took Dale’s arm and led him to her boat.
Thump, thump. There was a pulse. It was Charlotte’s pulse, but there was also life surging from there.
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“……huh.”
“Our child.”
“I see.”
“You know, Dale. I’m really happy.”
And the child between the two was also an unquestionable truth. Charlotte smiled, and Dale also ran a hand through her hair without saying a word.
“I’m so scared, because I feel like this happiness will shatter like a dream.”
Dale was unable to respond to Charlotte’s subsequent words, the fear in her voice making him unable to say anything.
* * *
When Dale left his castle, what lay beyond the horizon was an endless black-and-white winter night.
There was the Empire of Winter, and the Empress who ruled that very Empire of Winter.
“Lize.”
“How are you, brother?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Aren’t you happy?”
Lizzie asked, and Dale smiled bitterly.
“well.”
“Until the end of the universe comes, the happiness of this world will never be broken.”
Lize said. Here, where she and Dale stand, above the winter of space.
“No one can stop the apocalypse. But you can be happy until the apocalypse comes. That was the answer I found.”
He thought back to the Golden Lords and their riders who had once struggled to prevent the end of the universe. Lize was not as foolish as them.
“That was your wish.”
“In this world, no one gets hurt, no one suffers. Even the conflict between gold and shadow has no meaning. Until the end of the universe, you can just dream endless dreams in this happiness.”
Lize said.
“You’ve changed, Lize.”
“I haven’t changed.”
At those words, Lize shook her head.
“Ever since the day you first taught me magic, I’ve only had one wish.”
“… … .”
“A world where I can make everyone happy with my magic. I can finally make that dream come true.”
As Lize said, you could be happy, buried in a dream from which you never wake up.
Dale was silent. Still at Lize’s side, the old dark mother looked at Dale with amusement.
“Lize, let me ask you something.”
“Go ahead, brother.”
“Are you included in the ‘everyone’ you are talking about?”
“sure.”
Lize didn’t hesitate a bit at those words.
“My beloved brother, my father and mother, and the loyal retainers of the House of Saxony, and the people they love and their families, all of them, may they be happy in a dream from which they never wake──.”
The Empress of Lies said.
“That is ‘my happiness.’”
“I see.”
Dale laughed when he heard that.
“You are just like me, Lize.”
Dale said, smiling bitterly.
“You are forcing everyone you love into misery for your own happiness. Just like I did.”
At those words, Lize’s expression distorted. Still, Dale was not flustered.
“Sometimes the pain of sacrifice is sweeter than happiness. But, Lize, it’s hard to even imagine how much pain my one-sided sacrifice for the world has caused you.”
“… … Brother.”
“I also did not understand the pain you must have felt because of my sacrifice, the pain and fear that those close to me must have felt when I was intoxicated with narcissism through the selfishness of my sacrifice.”
Dale said.
“Lize, just like you are now.”
“… … .”
“You asked me if I was happy, Lize.”
Dale said to Lize.
“You know, Lize. I’m not happy at all. I’m so miserable and miserable.”
“Why, sir… … .”
At those words, Lize held her breath.
“The one-sided sacrifices you make for me are so painful that I think I’m going crazy.”
“… … !”
“And before my sacrifice, you too must have felt such pain and suffering.”
Before he knew it, Dale’s voice was sobbing like a child’s.
Dale continued to speak, still on his knees, begging.
“It’s my fault, Lize.”
Regretting my past foolishness won’t make a difference. As the Great Emperor of Black Gold, I clearly remember the ending that didn’t require anyone’s understanding or permission.
The pain Lize gave Dale was ultimately nothing more than atonement for her old foolishness.
“It was my foolishness not to understand your suffering, the suffering of my father and mother, Charlotte and Sepia, the suffering of the knights who served me, that led you to this.”
“… … .”
Lize did not respond to those words.
Before she knew it, the old dark mother who should have been by Lize’s side had come to Dale’s side.
─ Ah, my lovely human child.
It wasn’t even my mother. The girl with the horns of a mountain goat whispered, unable to contain her love.
─ To think that he could maintain his human form until the very end.
“Because that was our promise.”
Dale answered Shuve’s words blandly.
Human, now I couldn’t even understand the meaning behind that word. Dale had once wiped out the real humans of this land. As the king of monsters.
And yet, Dale, still here, was human.
“Sacrifice does not atone for anyone’s misfortune. It only atones for one’s own.”
Dale said.
“I believed that as the Lord of Black Gold, I had atoned for the suffering and sins of mankind. However, from the beginning, the only thing I had to bear through my sacrifice was my own sin and suffering.”
In return, Dale drove his loved ones into a pit of misery.
I realized that fact too late.
“Please, Lize.”
So there was only one thing Dale could say.
“Stop tormenting yourself any longer.”
