Chapter 238: Living Like This (3)
Right now, this instant, I could tell her to stay here. If I did, she would stay. My single word could break her entire will.
But I can’t do that.
It would bring her greater sorrow, bring me anguish, and make her blame herself for my pain.
“It’s really funny. It can’t be anything but funny. The place I want to live the most is, of all places, the place I have to leave. I guess this is why the world is interesting. Ahahaha, hahaha, ha, heu, heuk, heuheuk!”
She laughed blankly, then eventually covered her face with both hands and began to cry. I didn’t hide my flowing tears either. There’s no point in hiding them. They’ll just keep coming.
She lifted her head. A voice like a sigh flowed from her lips.
“I don’t want to go……!”
Beside her, Levidian shed tears silently. The affection we’ve built up until now. It ends now. We can’t build it up anymore. We can’t be together like this, the three of us, anymore.
Aila sobbed.
“I don’t want to go yet, I want to stay, I want to stay like this for a little longer. I don’t want to leave. I love it here so much. I don’t want to leave, I don’t want to leave, I don’t want to leave, I don’t want to leave! Heuk! Euheuk!”
Like a desperate outburst, like a death throe, she wailed, scattering tears everywhere. But she knows too. That she shouldn’t do as she says.
“Tell me to leave.”
“What?”
“Tell me to leave here, to go back to my home and be happy. Like a father sending off his daughter, like a lover saying goodbye to someone they can never meet again…… Give me strength…… in my resolve.”
“I, I……”
I can’t say it. I can’t say it like I’m cutting her off. But if I don’t say it, she won’t be able to leave. Too much lingering attachment, too much to leave behind.
I know this is the best path for each other. I know it’s the best method. I know full well that there is no other way.
But I don’t want to say it.
I can’t say it!
I can’t say it’s over with my own mouth!
“I, I……! I!”
I don’t want to let you go. I’d rather keep you in sight than remember you forever. I love that time too. If I take you out of the time we’ve spent together until now, it’s only half a life!
Then why…… so cruelly……!
Aila’s lips part. A faint voice, like a sigh, like a candle placed before a storm, about to be extinguished at any moment, comes out, filled with only a meager will.
“Tell me……”
She said she couldn’t oppose my words. If I tell her to stay, she will stay. The three of us will be able to enjoy the upcoming time with excitement.
And that’s a wrong kind of joy.
Damn it! Damn it!
I roughly wiped my eyes. My sleeve grazed them, stinging. What kind of expression am I making right now? I can’t even control that.
Words poured out of my mouth, like water bursting from a broken dam, unstoppable.
“Go…… Go! Go away! To where you lived! Just like when you first came, so suddenly! Without a word, like every time you visited! Naturally, like every time you left! Go! Go and don’t come back! Don’t ever come back! I won’t welcome you, I won’t even speak a word to you! Go! Go back! Go and……! Go and……! Live happily. Live so happily you want to die!”
“Yes…… Yes. I will.”
She nodded, smiling. She was crying, but she was smiling. She was happy that I had told her so, grateful that I had ended it myself. She was so grateful that I had ended it, since she had approached me and started it.
I could tell without words.
How sad it was.
She smiled and nodded, and nodded again.
“Yes. I’ll go now. I’ll go and not come back. I’ll go and live happily. Always with memories, longing for this place I can’t return to, but still, I’ll live happily. Thank you.”
She shed tears incessantly. My eyes are hot too.
So hot that I feel like I’m going to cry…… I said.
“Don’t cry. Smile! You……! You look best when you smile! So, smile! Like when I first saw you!”
That year, the summer of my second sixteenth birthday.
Blocking the sun, she came to me with a bright smile.
And I saw countless smiles.
Even though time passed and it became difficult to find her old appearance, that smile remained the same.
A bright, dazzling, warm smile like the midday sun, a smile that made me happy without even realizing it.
“Yes, I’ll smile. So smile too, Risel. Let’s part with smiles, like the first time we met.”
I couldn’t disobey her words either.
So I smiled.
Because we felt the size and weight of the sadness that occupied each other’s hearts so well, we couldn’t help but smile.
Aila smiled brightly and spoke to Levidian as well.
“Unni, please smile.”
“Yes…… Ye-yes……”
She hadn’t been able to say anything since earlier.
Besides me, was there anyone else Levidian had opened her heart to as much as Aila? Aila’s bold approach played a big part, but Levidian also held her in special regard.
Midday, a teatime that should have been leisurely.
Our time that started with laughter, turned to tears, and ended with laughter.
Now it must end.
Goodbye, our happy days.
May 16th, Year 1 of the Herduke Empire.
There were many places to go.
Everywhere was a place we could go, and the places we could go didn’t stop us.
The top 3 of the former AJOR, now the Imperial Intelligence Bureau, handed me two forged identification documents without a fuss. Along with the inconsiderate remark that the organization functioned well even without me, so I was unnecessary even if I was there.
Leaving behind the instruction to freeze Jay’s salary for three months to Old Man, and ignoring the fuming Jay, we headed south.
“Where are you going?”
“I’m thinking of going to my aunt’s house. She’s in the Penkeal Republic. With the new Empire established, she must be enjoying an unprecedented boom. She’s the Emperor’s relative, after all. Besides, we didn’t see her at the wedding, did we?”
“Ah, you mean your aunt. Good. Let’s go.”
She and I had our ceremony last January. The venue was the Herduke family mansion in the Imperial Capital. It was then that people learned about the existence of Sword King Levidian, which had been vaguely rumored, and I remember quite a few were shocked.
Since we sent out the invitations quite a while ago, there were people who came from far away. For example, all the formal disciples of the Hall of Martial Arts who seemed to have easily caught over a hundred monsters in the wilderness.
Ah, even thinking about that time makes me dizzy.
I almost had my hand crushed by those (including both men and women) who offered handshakes with looks that said, ‘How dare a lowly creature like you take our idol and pride, the Sword King……’
It’s been over 10 years since she left the Hall, but she’s still that popular. As expected of Levidian.
Of course, I paid them back in kind. I’m not the type to just take it lying down.
Like walking around with Levidian in her wedding dress as if we were on a stroll, intentionally clinging to her and showing her embarrassed side, or kissing her deeply at the end of the ceremony.
I can still picture the men and women of the Hall of Martial Arts grinding their teeth so hard they almost wore them down. She’s an object of admiration even for women.
That evening, the highly self-disciplined martial artists of the Hall of Martial Arts collapsing drunk is already a famous story in the Imperial Capital. There’s even an absurd rumor that the Hall of Martial Arts teaches martial arts while letting people drink.
Who knows? Maybe someone inspired by that will develop something like ‘Drunken Fist’.
She and I lightly sped up on horseback.
Unfortunately, we left my horse and Levidian’s horse at the mansion, so these are different horses. I wonder if Finder will be angry.
I glanced at her and saw her hair fluttering in the wind and with the horse’s gait. A black waterfall undulated.
“Hoo, the wind of freedom. It’s truly liberating.”
“Indeed. It’s been years since I’ve come out like this…… And this is my first aimless journey. Whether in my previous life or this one, an aimless journey was impossible from the start.”
“Oh my, is that so?”
“Somehow, it feels like your words are as thorny as a pufferfish.”
“What’s a pufferfish?”
To explain the metaphor, I talked about the pufferfish that lives in the sea, the one that inflates its body and raises its spines whenever it feels threatened. She tilted her head.
“Hmm. I’d call it a porcupine fish. What’s a pufferfish anyway?”
“Let’s go see one later. And don’t dig up your memories now and beat me up for no reason.”
“Hehehe. I’ll keep that in mind.”
She smiled like a cat that understood the order to keep the fish instead of eating it.
Speaking of which, women are bewitching creatures. Especially beautiful women are precious natural resources and valuable bewitching creatures! Kaaak!
“Anyway, I didn’t live as leisurely as Levidian thinks. Especially in my previous life, my childhood, adolescence, and youth were even busier than now.”
“To the point where you couldn’t even dream of traveling?”
“Really. I swear, on that ring on your left hand.”
She grinned.
There are two rings on her left ring finger, one is the engagement ring I gave her a long time ago, and the other is the wedding ring I gave her at the wedding. I have the same ones on my ring finger.
Thanks to my and her preference for simple designs, they’re magic rings made of metal with magic imbued and embedded with emeralds.
The effect is that we can find each other’s location even if we’re on opposite sides of the Sair River, also known as a ‘dog collar’. Father, when he saw this ring, talked about how pitiful a man who lost his freedom was.
‘Even if you’ve picked up someone for a one-night stand, if she barges in when you’ve just finished foreplay, you’ll have no room for excuses. Since it’ll let her know you didn’t come straight home from outside in the first place, it’s a life where you can’t even look at another woman. Do you want to be that unhappy?’
Hmm. Father. Please stop ruining your image after I accepted you as family.
“Yes, okay. I believe you. There doesn’t seem to be any disadvantage in not believing you.”
“Disadvantage? What do you mean?”
“Who knows? You might have another woman stashed away somewhere on your travels. If I see a strange woman jumping into your arms as soon as we arrive, I’ll cut you both in half. My blade has been sharpening quite nicely lately.”
“You might have mistaken me for someone else……”
Please stop talking about gruesome things like cutting people into pieces with a bright smile.
More than anything, it’s scarier because you’re serious! If I die for the crime of being mistaken for someone else or resembling someone I don’t know, what will they say about me in the afterlife!
I fiddled with my waist and neck, the parts that could be cut in half if hit by a sword, as I quickly changed the subject.
“Speaking of which, I wonder if Lucy is doing well. I bet he’s chasing after women somewhere.”
“He actually is chasing after women.”
“Puhaha! I see. In that sense, I guess Al is relatively better.”
“No, I don’t think so either. From what I saw, that Baius person wasn’t easy either.”
Like that, she and I rode for a while, talking about them.
August 7th, 378th year of the Imperial Calendar.
The day after the victory, the leaders of both sides who had led the war gathered to discuss future plans. Of course, it was also because I regained consciousness today.
I recounted yesterday’s events in as much detail as possible, and the first person to speak up was Lucy.
“So, Referndi ran away?”
“She ran away, but I wonder what she can do. She lost an arm and both legs. Just living will be an ordeal. She won’t be able to use magic properly either. Right, Lucy?”
Lucy nodded at my question. He sniffled and said energetically.
“Of course! Why do you think I train my body? A magician must have all four limbs intact! Not only the cleft-lipped, deaf, and blind, but even one-armed people can’t become magicians! Someone like Referndi might find a way, but don’t worry. It’ll take her years to develop it, and I’ll find her before that.”
“I’ll join you in that.”
Silvan, who had been emanating an aura that said he wanted to be treated as nonexistent, suddenly appeared from the shadows and spoke.
At his appearance, Aila sprayed the tea she was drinking, Baius was startled, Namia dropped the grapes she was eating, and Levidian cut herself with the knife while peeling an apple.
“Pfft!”
“Whoa?!”
“Ah……”
“Ouch!”
Lucy was also startled. He clutched his chest and scolded Silvan.
“Whoa, whoa! You almost stopped my heart. Hey, do you want to see someone die of a heart attack?”
“Whatever.”
Silvan replied flatly.
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