Chapter 172. I Lost...
“....”
I wiped away a drop of cold sweat running down my forehead.
My breathing had become slightly rough.
My arms and legs felt heavy.
I couldn’t even remember the last time I had moved this intensely.
The Spiral, was it...?
It was incomplete, but unquestionably powerful.
If he refined it just a little more, then....
“Good work.”
“Ah....”
Erol turned toward me.
“What do you think, Great Hero of Patience?”
“In your eyes, do these people possess the qualification to survive?”
“W-Well, I....”
W-Well!
When the time came...
Surely things would somehow work out?!
The Great Hero of Salvation was beside this man too...!
It would work out somehow...!
If this man ever started walking down the wrong path, surely this person, the Great Hero of Salvation, would stop him...!
Come to think of it, it really was a strange coincidence.
A man who looked exactly like Hero...
And someone who possessed the power of Madness...
Together.
It reminded me of four hundred years ago.
“....”
But there probably wasn’t any place for me among them.
Just as the me from that distant past had been of no help to those two....
Still, this man had gathered many decent people around himself.
He was certainly different from Unni, who had nobody around her except us.
They already possessed enough strength to deal with someone like the me from back then.
And judging by how everyone in my trials had shown affection toward this man...
They probably wouldn’t end up like us.
As ridiculous as it sounded, he had even briefly set foot in that inhuman realm he called the Old Fist, using that special power called the Spiral.
No matter which direction he went...
He would undoubtedly cause something enormous.
Qualification, huh.
Even though I had been the one to make them fight...
At first, he had openly shown hostility toward the Agent of Pride, telling him to go fight and die.
Then suddenly, he received that very same person’s help.
His companions trusted and loved him.
And every one of those companions was fairly remarkable.
It was almost strange that the man himself was so unbelievably frivolous.
“He has more than enough qualification.”
Erol’s eyes widened slightly.
“Oh? You think highly of him.”
“He has accomplished several things most people would consider impossible... yes.”
I hesitated.
“If someone like that lacked qualification, that would be a serious problem... wouldn’t it....”
Erol smiled.
“You’re my senior, so you can speak comfortably.”
“...Yes.”
I probably wouldn’t be able to act confidently in front of this man for a long time.
Longing.
Guilt.
Unless I could somehow escape emotions that had not faded even after four hundred years....
Step. Step.
Now that I had acknowledged that this man possessed qualification...
There was something I had to give him.
Something I had decided upon the moment I first chose to remain here.
Something Unni had entrusted to me with her final words.
The remains of my sister...
Who had faced death standing upright until the very end.
Who had blown her own body apart and died....
Erol looked toward them.
“The body of the Great Witch of Madness.”
“You intend to give it to him?”
“There is no one who could handle this better than that man.”
I looked toward Ingwang.
“Because he is Indomitable.”
And besides...
He had the exact same goal as Unni.
He would surely need it.
Rustle.
I carefully lifted Unni’s remains.
For four hundred years...
I had looked at them and cried.
Looked at them and remembered.
Looked at them and smiled.
Four hundred years.
Even though I had lived through all of it, it still didn’t feel real.
Perhaps because I had spent every single one of those four hundred years in this place.
The short time when Hero, Unni, and I traveled together...
Had been more valuable than those four hundred years.
That was how I had endured until now.
Can I finally... stop doing that now...?
Unni had apparently asked that man...
To take care of me.
Then would it be better for me to follow him?
Just like I had remained here for four hundred years because of Unni’s final request...?
No.
I had failed.
I had run away.
I had left Hero alone.
Calling it Unni’s dying wish...
Had merely been an excuse for me to run away.
I did not have the qualification to walk with them.
All I could do was bless their path ahead....
Tap.
The moment I placed Unni’s remains beside the man...
The presence of the white-haired man who had spent the last twenty years talking endlessly beside me stretched outward.
It drew the remains into his body.
“You’re leaving too.”
Out of pride, I wanted to say those twenty years with him had meant nothing.
That frivolous man who had spent every day except the very first complaining that he was bored and talking my ears off.
But that wasn’t true.
At least during those twenty years...
I had briefly been able to step away from four hundred years ago.
It had been fun in its own way.
It had definitely possessed value.
Shhh.
The black energy of Madness flowed out.
It wrapped around one of my fingers like a ring.
My left ring finger, of all places.
What a cruel person.
“You know it can’t happen.”
I was someone who had died four hundred years ago.
Hayangi was an unstable existence who could only remain by staying with that man.
Perhaps, in that sense...
We were a fitting pair.
But neither of us was an existence capable of moving forward on our own.
We had to cling to something else in order to survive.
Hayangi clung to that man.
I clung to Unni’s dying wish.
“Besides, that man already has someone he likes.”
Right now, the witch’s power of Love was sleeping peacefully because she had no enemy.
If I pitied Hayangi and tried to remain beside that man...
I had no idea how that witch would react.
After all, when I showed the witch a trial where that man lived happily with another beautiful woman....
“Disgusting.”
She immediately saw through the illusion.
Then she stole the man within that illusion away for herself, enjoyed him as much as she wanted...
And eventually killed him too.
What shocked me most...
Was how peaceful and beautiful that entire process of enjoying him had looked.
To think she would curse the man and transfer all of the feelings he had for the other woman entirely toward herself....
Pure and clear love...
Combined with horrifying possessiveness.
It was terrifying.
If I tried to stay beside this man only because of Hayangi...
That monstrous possessiveness would definitely try to cut me away.
To survive the witch, I would have to make the man like me just as the others had.
But it seemed I had already gotten on his bad side.
And besides...
I didn’t like this man either.
He was far too bulky for my taste.
I preferred someone moderately slender like Hero.
“Then, Great Hero of Patience.”
Erol spoke.
“Please take them out of here.”
“...Hmm.”
“Is something wrong?”
“No.”
Erol looked at me carefully.
“It just seems that the Great Hero of Patience has a tendency to underestimate this man.”
He smiled faintly.
“Even at the very end... weren’t you honestly careless?”
“!”
He struck directly at the truth....
“Still, it is a request from my senior, so I’ll do it.”
“Thank you.”
“If it isn’t rude, may I ask what you intend to do from here?”
“...Who knows.”
“...I see.”
Erol turned away.
“Whatever you are thinking...”
“He will come looking for you again.”
I gave him a small smile and watched the Great Hero of Salvation leave.
I watched his back until he disappeared without hesitation.
And then...
I was alone again.
It’s fine.
I’m used to being alone.
The voice that had always appeared whenever my ears grew lonely was gone.
For a moment, my heart felt strangely empty.
But it didn’t matter.
My life would end here anyway.
I had no lingering attachment left.
“Ah, the ring.”
The ring Hayangi had left behind like a gift.
For a moment, I considered removing it.
But then I thought of those twenty years.
If I considered it a final farewell gift...
I suddenly didn’t want to take it off.
And....
At least with this...
The end would feel a little less lonely.
“A fabricated life....”
I had vaguely suspected it already.
Because I knew what lay beneath my feet.
Something horrifying and twisted.
The remnants of... something.
At first, I thought it was merely some terrifying substance Unni had left behind.
Only after hearing that man’s story did I finally realize that wasn’t the case.
For four hundred years, I had wondered whether even Unni’s mind had become twisted.
“Perhaps the Sea from the Origin Myth...”
I murmured.
“Might actually be that substance.”
Following the roots that extended deep underground, I walked toward the enormous chamber where that revolting material waited.
I had not come down here once since becoming bound to Hayangi.
If I threw myself into that thing below....
Then even this body of a Great Hero, one that could barely die even if I wanted it to...
Would surely be erased easily.
Grrrraaaaakaaaaa....
“That sound is strange and disgusting no matter how many times I hear it.”
I didn’t think it had been like this in the beginning.
It started sometime after that man came looking for me.
It must have reacted to his Madness.
A sticky hell that felt as though it could seize the soul itself.
A mass of ancient things whose intelligence had long since disappeared.
The origin of the world created by the person that man called the Chairman.
If I had been born from that place...
Then perhaps returning to it was my destiny.
If my role ended here...
I had no more regrets.
“...It was long.”
Unni’s death.
Running away afterward....
Later hearing about Hero’s death....
Hiding deep within the Maze Forest and simply guarding Unni’s remains in emptiness.
Four hundred years since then.
I couldn’t even cry anymore.
Thinking back on it any further was nothing but lingering attachment.
“Unni....”
I prayed.
That we would meet again....
And threw myself toward the boiling darkness.
...
GRAB!
Something caught me.
Me, who had finally let go of everything.
Me, who had entrusted what remained to someone qualified.
Me, whose purpose had disappeared.
Someone grabbed me.
Why?
A trembling hand clutched my limp wrist.
It looked as though it would lose strength at any moment.
Yet it desperately refused to let go.
I didn’t even need to look to know who the hand belonged to.
That man.
