Chapter 339 : Side Story (9)

“How is Mano?”

“She’s overflowing with energy.”

Ferbias laughed.

“If anything, she’s livelier than before. It’s thanks to you, Mr. Obro.”

“Right. That’s a relief.”

It was the middle of the night.

Obro looked at the Village Chief’s, Ferbias’s house. It was clear that all eight children were fast asleep.

He felt Cheshih’s gaze from inside the house but pretended not to notice.

“Actually, the amount of Golden Medicine was a bit much. She’ll probably grow up to be a child with double the energy of others.”

“…She’s always had great energy, you know.”

“Mr. Cheshih will suffer a bit raising her.”

Obro tossed out the words.

He held a stick in his hand.

If it were anyone else, maybe not, but since it was in Obro’s hand, it was enough to kill a human.

“Still, since you’ll die today, you won’t have to see that.”

“…Yes.”

Obro poked Ferbias’s chest firmly with the stick.

Even though it must have been quite insulting, Ferbias did not get angry.

Instead, he bit his lip and nodded.

“Thank you, for giving me time to prepare.”

Since he was thanking him for saying he would kill him, Obro didn’t really have anything to say. He tapped his own neck area with the stick.

“I have no worries now. Since Cheshih is here….”

“Let me ask one thing.”

Obro asked.

He stroked his chin, which felt rough as his beard had grown quite a bit over the few weeks.

“During the day.”

The hot sun.

The girl who had fallen, ran over by a carriage.

And Ferbias’s clasped hands.

“You, you prayed, right?”

“…….”

“Didn’t you seek a god?”

Obro Denoebang raised the stick.

The end of the stick was fierce as if it would cut Ferbias in two right away. He spoke as if growling.

“I just can’t understand it at all. To whom on earth did you pray? The Hotus Eight Gods? An Ancient God? Or did you perhaps seek Emperor Continua?”

“…….”

“Answer me!”

He ended up bursting into anger.

The reason was unknown.

Because all sorts of feelings, the reasons for which even he couldn’t understand, were about to overflow, he had no choice but to shout. Obro pointed his finger while spitting.

“You are Ferbias Caseptus!”

“…….”

As soon as he heard the name Ferbias, the Village Chief’s face hardened instantly.

It seemed to sound more painful than anything else in the world.

Even though that was his name.

“Cordis. The Empire of humans that did not tolerate gods. The Emperor of that place! That was you. It’s you! Yet what god on earth did you seek?”

“……I don’t know either.”

He looked incomparably weary.

“Just, to that child, to Mano… the one who would have given life….”

Every single word was difficult.

There were too many hardships in Ferbias Caseptus’s life, so it was truly difficult to answer Obro’s fierce question.

However, he could not avoid it, and he did not avoid it.

“…To the heavens that would duly have mercy on the pitiful child… I prayed….”

“That’s laughable.”

Obro twisted his lips.

He did not hide his sneer.

It was an incomparably aggressive attitude.

Obro couldn’t understand why he was so on edge.

Even though he had never acted so sharply toward anyone in his life.

“Do you think they would listen?”

He realized that he was angry.

He also felt that this resentment was old, but he pretended not to know.

He pretended not to know even without knowing that he was pretending not to know.

“I’m asking if the heavens would listen to the prayers of a wretch like you!”

“…Me….”

The area around the bearded Village Chief’s eyes was full of fine wrinkles.

He looked so weary that his age seemed to be eighty.

With great difficulty, he spat out his own name, which he used to shout overflowing with pride just three years ago, very painfully.

“…Even this Ferbias… even this arrogant and dirty… Ferbias… Caseptus…….”

He recalled the time when he was the Emperor.

Also, he ended up remembering the time he was scared of Shion and fled outside the Great Imperial Palace.

The time he tried to throw himself onto his own sword.

The time he tried to lay everything down because he didn’t have the confidence to bear it….

Suddenly, a gentle breeze blew.

A gentle breeze blew toward Ferbias who was retracing his old shame.

This gentle breeze had blown back then.

It had sent a single insect flying so that Ferbias could not end his own life.

He tried to die but could not die.

It means the reason for his life is not within him.

If so, within whom does it lie?

Whose life is this that was extended?

He doesn’t know the answer.

The empty night sky was just beautiful.

Even though it was so pitch-black, even though it was dark like lacquer and nothing could be seen, it was just achingly beautiful.

“…Since they still kept me alive, that pitiful child… surely they would have mercy on her.”

“…….”

“It is enough now.”

Ferbias lowered his head.

“Thank you for saving Mano, Mr. Obro.”

He had no more energy to sustain his life.

His entire life was just shameful and painful.

He could no longer manage the task of bearing this shame and pain.

“Please let me die now.”

***

Obro faced his anger.

He wanted to pretend not to know, but he came to face it.

“…….”

Why was he angry?

It is different from hatred.

It is closer to a kind of pathetic feeling.

It resembled the feeling directed toward a foolish person.

‘It’s familiar.’

He kept seeing himself in Ferbias.

The sight of him suffering as if vomiting his guts while saying his name, the sight of him bearing guilt alone in a place where no one would acknowledge it, the sight of him unable to lay it down even while knowing it was all useless, was just like Obro Denoebang himself.

The sight of struggling. The sight of writhing.

No, that appearance of life close to a convulsion resembled Obro’s eleven years so much that it felt identical.

‘Your appearance is too familiar to me, Ferbias Caseptus.’

So he was angry.

He was angry because the fact that Ferbias prayed toward the sky felt foolish.

‘What’s the use of praying? Does something change if you pray? No, why are you still alive in the first place.’

If you struggle to bear that guilt, will something change?

Will your sins be forgiven if you do that?

Isn’t it a fact you know well yourself?

But why do you still live on?

Why are you still struggling to embrace someone?

‘Maybe, maybe I am… at myself….’

Perhaps Obro Denoebang wasn’t angry at his old self?

Is he trapped in the nightmare of eleven years?

Wasn’t he extremely angry at the fool who still hadn’t given up on life even after being crushed so terribly?

Whom on earth did he trust to only endure the reasonless and fruitless pain every day?

No, why was he doing that without dying even though he couldn’t endure it and collapsed?

It is vain. It is vain, and vain again.

Everything is just vain.

Wasn’t it a fact he realized painfully every day, no, every hour, no, no, every moment for the eleven years he lived in a state close to excrement rather than a human, bound and collapsed?

But why?

Even knowing that everything is just vanity, why on earth did he stand up again and be here?

‘It’s okay now.’

Suddenly he recalled an old event.

It was when he fought against the ‘Black Light of the Abyss’ in the Underworld.

He failed again, and was on the verge of losing Mariet.

‘You don’t have to try anymore. I’m so grateful just that you came to save us, Mister. Don’t suffer because of us. Now ……forget us and be at peace.’

‘…I can’t do that, Mariet, I can’t…. Not twice….’

Will I lose them again, again?

Will I make that young child say such words?

What kind of pain must she have passed through for a barely nineteen-year-old kid to say such words?

How much must she have hurt?

How lonely and sad must she have been?

While pouring alcohol down your throat during that time, you still haven’t come to your senses, Obro Denoebang?

‘……Not twice, never-!!!!’

Obro Denoebang ended up accepting it.

Back then, when he rushed at the ‘Black Light of the Abyss’.

When he never even thought that ‘Grayish-white Nobility’ would be pulled out from his soul.

Why did he rush at it?

Why did he do such a foolish thing?

It is unknown. Just, it was because he couldn’t let Mariet suffer a miserable fate again.

‘…Is that so….’

Obro realized only then.

‘Even though I hate to admit it this much, was it like that….’

There was a welling up.

The lump of emotion he had been ignoring suddenly surged up to his uvula.

He even realized the name of the emotion.

This was a pity.

This pity, which he didn’t want to bestow even a little bit toward the hateful and detestable Ferbias, had grown this much before he knew it.

‘You, you are….’

I still hate you.

I don’t want to bestow even a tiny bit of pity on Ferbias Caseptus.

Yet, there is pity toward Ferbias in his heart.

‘…You were me, Ferbias.’

He finally realized with what heart Ferbias looked up at the sky and clasped his two hands.

‘Even though you are this hateful, to think you are going through the same time as me back then….’

Obro closed his eyes.

‘…I can’t be harsh anymore.’

***

“I….”

He looked at the stick in his hand.

“…Came to kill Ferbias Caseptus.”

He threw it away carelessly.

“But where did Ferbias Caseptus go?”

“…I, Ferbias is here.”

“No. You are not that Ferbias.”

Obro ended up looking back on his past.

The days he called himself the White Lord, the days he collapsed due to arrogance, the miserable drunkard days that followed. The pitiful feeling eventually melted away the hatred.

“How are you, Ferbias? How arrogant are you, Ferbias Caseptus?”

“…I am me, Mr. Obro. The me from back then is also me.”

“No. I cannot admit it.”

It’s not that it didn’t hurt.

Even though it was an incomparably painful thing, the feeling of pity won in the end.

“I will not kill you.”

“…….”

Ferbias was silent.

“Don’t be too happy.”

Obro Denoebang looked at Ferbias, and then looked behind him.

Something was approaching from beyond the road.

The sound of horse hooves.

A splendid carriage that did not suit the mountains was coming.

“I am merely sending the decision upwards.”

Ferbias also heard the sound of hooves.

He looked at the carriage, and recognized that that carriage was of the Great Imperial Palace of Cordis, and moreover, an item permitted only to royalty.

“Just in time, he has come.”

***

They waited for the carriage to arrive.

The coachman was a man with a stylish mustache.

Ferbias recognized that that coachman was the Four-Star Mage Cornelius Merhes.

Cornelius also recognized Ferbias and nodded awkwardly.

“…….”

Ferbias realized who the owner of the carriage was.

But instead of speaking, he waited for him quietly.

The splendid carriage stopped, and Cornelius quietly opened the door.

A not-so-large man got off from there.

“Oh.”

His blonde hair was beautiful and his eyes were blue.

“So this place is Paeniteo.”

“…That is the old name. Usually, they call it Peniteo.”

“I see. Peniteo.”

The man laughed lightly.

There was a Golden Crown on his head.

It was an item symbolizing the Emperor of the Cordis Empire.

Once, Ferbias Caseptus also wore that on his head.

“It sounds like the Ancient Hotus language. Do you know what Peniteo means, Cornelius?”

“Hmm. I am not certain, but….”

Cornelius touched his mustache.

“Probably regret, remorse… or repentance. It would mean something like that, Your Majesty.”

“I see.”

It’s a good name.

The man wearing the Golden Crown moved his steps.

Obro Denoebang bowed deeply toward him.

The man smiled and nodded back to Obro. And then he stood in front of Ferbias.

“It’s been a long time. I heard everything that happened meanwhile from Obro.”

“…….”

“It was quite awkward in the past, but the beard suits you quite well.”

Ferbias dared not open his mouth.

“Have you been well, Brother?”

His name is Shion, Shion Pollinglight.

He is the 51st Emperor of the Cordis Empire.

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep