Chapter 292 Volume V – Chapter 10: Different Yet the Same

‘Why?’

This question echoed in my whole being. In the endless darkness, unable to understand anything… it suddenly appeared.

But… it was not directed at me. It was also a strangely familiar voice.

‘Why…?’

I heard the same voice once more. It reached me through the darkness, this time much more emphatically. Not just in my presence… this time echoing everywhere.

Then, another voice answered it. A voice much deeper, much more ancient.

‘You already know the answer.’

It had the sound of tens or hundreds of different people speaking at the same time. But the questioner did not find it strange in any way.

‘Just because I know doesn’t mean I understand. Just… why?’

‘You have no choice but to understand.’

I didn’t hear another voice, no one spoke. And I, again, fell silent for a long time.

The darkness seemed to fluctuate again from time to time, even trying to get closer to me, sometimes… but at the same time it seemed to be afraid. As if something was holding it back, as if it was just waiting, seeking the right moment.

I don’t know why, I swallowed. The pressure of the darkness was so heavy that it forced me, maybe that was why. But… as I swallowed, I realized something else. I realized that I really ‘existed’ in this… strange place where I could only see the darkness wherever I turned my head.

With the fact that I could swallow, I realized that I could try something that for some reason I had never tried before.

I tried to speak. I called out to the infinite darkness that surrounded me, all too aware that there was nothing else but it…

“Where… where am I?”

But as soon as those words were out of my mouth… the infinite darkness surged more violently than ever as if it had been waiting for this moment all along. Before I could understand what was happening, the darkness that had avoided me as if it was afraid of me until now… suddenly descended upon me.

Everything fell into an eternal silence again. Everything… disappeared into the darkness, taking me with it. Countless hands enveloped my whole body so fast that I found myself disappearing into them.

It was like I was being dragged toward the end…

However… I did not ‘disappear’ into the darkness with it. Instead, an emotionless voice echoed again from nothingness, as if breaking through the silence. Someone… sighed as if annoyed.

The whole darkness, my body, everything… suddenly trembled with fear. Time seemed to stop, and a feeling of heaviness came over me that was even more breathtaking than before.

The countless dark hands wrapped around my body shook madly as they fled backward, releasing me, literally disappearing in an instant. They took with them not only themselves but also the endless darkness from which they had emerged in the first place.

Just a few seconds ago I was in a darkness where I couldn’t feel anything… but the next second, I found myself lying on my back, looking up at the blue sky that suddenly appeared, unable to move a muscle.

At least… I couldn’t until someone’s shadow fell on me.

*******

My eyes flew open, I saved my head from falling down at the last moment.

When the tiredness of lack of sleep hit me once more… I realized that I had almost fallen asleep. My eyes had closed on their own, and the support I had been trying to keep upright had disappeared.

I squinted. First I sat up in my chair again, then I wiped the burrs from my eyes with my hands. The darkness of my room encouraged me to sleep even more, so I turned on the lights and looked at the table I had just sat at.

Several holographic screens floated above it. Some had my research on them, some had Adrian on them, some had a few notes I had taken.

My eyes fixed on the screen with Adrian’s photo for a moment. The shine of his silver hair caught my attention, followed by his green eyes that sparkled like emeralds. The only contrast to the idea in my mind was the slight smile on his face.

I remembered the moment I saw his necklace. How he had turned into an elf… or rather a half-elf, right before my eyes, when I was so close to killing him.

He was the same as me. He was a hybrid. He had the blood of an elf and the blood of a human. He had the same hair as me.

But… although he was the same as me, he was also very different. It was impossible to tell that he was a half-breed, except that his ears were slightly different from a normal elf’s. If he had blended in with the elves, unlike me… he wouldn’t have even been recognized as a half-breed for a long time.

He didn’t have my disease. In fact… he was strong. Too strong. He didn’t have black eyes like mine, he had one of the signature looks of elves, light-colored eyes. He was making his own path rather than being used as a… tool like me.

I clenched my fist as my eyes twitched. I hated him again and again and again as my face grew ugly and I realized again how… unfair the world had been.

Why did I get all the bad parts of being a hybrid and he got all the good parts? Why am I so weak when I try so hard and he is so… strong? Why am I being used as a slave and he is free?

I don’t care what happened in his past. I… why is he at least in charge of his own life while I… didn’t have the slightest freedom from the very beginning? What have I… done…? What was my crime that he lived a different life while I was abandoned among demons with the family name Laute…?

My eye twitched even more, my face became even uglier.

I paused for a moment, not thinking about anything. I closed my eyes, trying to calm myself, but I didn’t give myself over to sleep.

I’m stupid… why am I thinking about empty things? The past is the past, what has happened has happened. Why am I doing this when I have nothing to gain by standing where I am and complaining?

I went to my kitchen, took a pill for my illness, and made a hot coffee. As I sat back down at my desk, I thought about the things I should be doing instead of thinking about nonsense.

For example… I’ve been idle lately since no one from Laute has given me any orders, and I’ve been making the most of it in my own way, of course.

Finding a cure for my weakness and illness was foremost among them. But… I also had to find a way to break the chains that bound me to my family.

I turned my gaze to one of the screens on my desk, a photograph of a huge bird with red-colored feathers…

It was a phoenix. These ancient creatures were something that could fix the chaotic system in my body, something that could remove the obstacle to getting stronger.

Or rather… something that these ancient creatures left behind with each rebirth.

I brought the screen in front of me, all the recent news about ‘phoenixes’. But… at this very moment, something different happened.

Something small on the other edge of the table, a dot almost the size of my fingernail, suddenly began to flash with a blue light.

I paused for a moment, trying to stop my hands from shaking, then I took a deep breath. First, I turned off all the screens on the table, then calmly clicked on the little blinking light.

Because… I had been waiting for this for a long time.

The next second, all the screens on the table that had just been turned off were replaced by another one. The person on the screen, clearly an elf by the ears, looked at me with glazed eyes.

His face twitched for a moment, but it was so fleeting that I might have seen it wrong, but… I had no doubt it was right. Because all elves loathed me. Without exception, every one of them found my presence… unnecessary.

Even the servants. But… as so often, I ignored it this time, focusing only on what he was going to say to me.

“Alysia Laute, yes?”

“Alysia, you have a new task.”

I couldn’t help squinting my eyes slightly when I heard what I was expecting, but I didn’t do anything else, not even sigh.

“Adrian Caleo’s identity has been confirmed. Your new mission is not to kill him but to help us get to him. Two months from now, in late August, we will carry out an operation to bring Adrian Caleo to the manor. In the meantime, you’ll be updated and your goal will be to get close to him and build a bond of trust between the two of you. Learn as much as you can about him, research all his habits, and more. Become his… friend. You have no further duties until further notice.”

He said exactly what I expected to hear. I didn’t want to hear those words… but he said exactly what was on my mind.

He confirmed what I had no doubt was true.

“Understood…”

The elf on the screen sighed lightly as he grimaced again and ended the call without saying anything else.

As a deep silence descended into my room like never before, all I could do was let out the deep breath I had been holding inside me.

At the same time… I couldn’t help a smile forming on my face.

Identity confirmed, huh? It’s… clear what that means.

I knew it.

Hahahah…

I knew it that day, from the moment his elven appearance was revealed.

As different as you are from me… you really are the same as me, Adrian Caleo.

We both carry the blood of the dirtiest, most disgusting family on this planet.

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