Chapter 224: The Great Warrior Part 7

“That’s why I’m not going to die. I’m going to challenge fate.”

With those final words, the Oracle never appeared before Vidar again.

There was no need to look for her. She must have died.

But he didn’t grieve.

“Well, even if I die, I’ll just be reborn someday. And when a flower-like girl who resembles me sees the future, she’ll make the same choice I did.”

“You’re a bit too rough around the edges to be called flower-like, though.”

“Vidar, you must respect me. Not just me, but all pioneers, those who would follow, those who had not yet learned, and those who hold potential. You must respect them all.”

“Is that where the story ends?”

“In any case, don’t be sad. Someday, a flower-like girl bearing fragments of my memory will be born.”

“……”

“Answer.”

“Ah, yes.”

The Oracle that lived in Vidar’s memory had never shown any sadness.

That’s why he wasn’t sad.

He believed that one day, another Oracle would appear in the world, and when that time came, they would meet again.

Several years passed like that.

Vidar fought desperately to save his younger brother, but he failed.

Before he even had time to mourn, he himself suffered from Varg’s curse.

Years had passed cursing his fate.

Vidar stopped running from the light and stepped into the world.

A declaration of war against the sun and moon.

The burning pain of sunlight searing his skin and the freezing chill of moonlight could not break his will.

That’s how he became the Great Warrior.

Because he never broke under the trials the world threw at him, he came to be recognized as the strongest warrior.

Thus, a flower bloomed in the snow.

At the tip of a spear sharpened like a blade.

***

After becoming the Great Warrior who led the Speartip of Snow Blossoms,

Vidar separated his identity as a scholar from that of a warrior.

Whether in battle or diplomacy, knowing your opponent and not knowing them made all the difference.

And so, Vidar lived between civilization and barbarism.

In the same hut as always.

After his younger brother’s death and his master’s farewell, Vidar continued a modest life in that place.

Then one day—

“Hmm?”

Vidar spotted someone near death, collapsed in the snow.

The clothing suggested a child from a noble family.

The situation stirred old memories.

But there were several clear differences from back then.

First, the person lying unconscious was still a young boy.

And second, he hadn’t collapsed from hunger but rather from anemia. It was likely after shaking off someone pursuing him.

“This kid…”

Vidar checked the boy’s face.

The snowy wilderness was far too harsh a place for a child to wander.

There had to be a reason.

As he confirmed the boy’s identity, Vidar felt a surge of killing intent.

“The Second Prince, huh.”

Second Prince, Loki Vicious van Miltonia.

An imperial brat infamous for being both immature and vicious.

Should I kill him?

This was an opportunity.

Such a perfect chance would not come again.

No… forget it. I’m a scholar now. Killing a brat like this would be nothing more than venting anger.

Loki was already a discarded pawn within the Empire.

A failure among imperial members, shunned for his vastly inferior abilities.

What gain would there be in killing such a child?

It would be nothing but reckless hatred toward imperial members.

If he were a barbarian, that would be one thing. But this place was Vidar’s homeland.

The boy who had once learned etiquette and letters in a small hut now understood what mattered most as a scholar.

“Ggh… urgh!”

“You’re awake?”

“Damn it, where am I now? And who the hell are you?”

“A pleasure to meet you. I’m just a shabby little scholar who lives in these snowy mountains.”

“Ah, I see.”

Vidar greeted the boy.

He hadn’t yet decided whether this one would be an enemy or an ally.

“If it’s not too much trouble, may I be so bold as to lay hands on your noble body?”

“Ha! You’re quite the polite beastkin, aren’t you? Seems to have some refinement, too. Fine, I permit you to touch my body.”

Loki clicked his tongue.

He realized that his identity as an imperial member had been exposed.

Otherwise, there’d be no reason for him to say, “lay hands on your noble body”.

***

Loki awoke in Vidar’s hut.

True to his twisted nature, the first thing he did upon waking was click his tongue.

“Tch.”

“You’re awake. You passed out while I was moving you. I thought you might’ve died.”

“Yeah, lucky me. And you, too.”

“Haha, honestly, I was chilled to the bone when you didn’t respond.”

If a member of the imperial family were to die in these snowy mountains, the Empire would raze the entire region.

Vidar remembered having had similar thoughts in the past and let out a chuckle.

“So then, Your Highness the Second Prince… what brings you to such a remote place?”

“What do you think?”

“How would an ignorant fool like me know?”

“You’re kind of pissing me off. Are all scholars like this?”

“Haha, I apologize.”

“Forget it. I suppose you really wouldn’t know. But even though you didn’t know who I was, you still saved me? What if I kill you now to keep you quiet?”

“It could just as easily go the other way. Maybe you’ll reward me for saving your life.”

“How optimistic.”

“I was simply considering all the possibilities. Whether you become an enemy or an ally depends on how we proceed, doesn’t it?”

“……”

Loki let out a sigh at Vidar’s shamelessness.

“Up until now, I thought all beastkin were savages.”

“A common prejudice.”

“Yeah… but looking at you, I see now it was just that….a prejudice. My mistake.”

“……”

Vidar was honestly surprised.

For someone of imperial blood typically arrogant beyond belief, Loki had admitted his own mistake without hesitation.

“What? You think I’m strange or something?”

“I did find you a little unusual.”

“Compared to the other imperials, I’m far weaker and lacking.”

Loki spoke with self-deprecation.

“That’s why, if I want to stand on equal footing with them, I have to be able to admit my failures.

I have to acknowledge my shortcomings. And even if I have to act cowardly or secretly, that’s the only way I can finally stand beside them.”

“……”

Vidar realized that Loki’s viciousness had been for the sake of survival.

“I’m a half-baked failure who got a failing grade in the imperial trial. You know about it, right? When we reach a certain age, Father summons us and invites us to a banquet.”

“He has a considerate side, it seems.”

“Yeah, that’s how it looks. And it really was that kind of occasion. At least, it would’ve been if a knife hadn’t flown toward my head at the end.”

“Hmm.”

“His Majesty is always testing us. To survive in the Imperial Palace, you can never let your guard down. That was the most basic thing he was testing.”

A rite of passage for the imperial family.

Those who fail die.

And they lose both their name and status.

Loki wasn’t the second prince because he was the emperor’s second son. The brothers who had been above him had all died, one by one.

“I caught the knife Father threw. But the thing is… I was weaker than the other imperial heirs. Even the force behind that knife was too much for me, and in the end, it drove itself straight into my head.”

“You somehow survived.”

“I did survive. But since I ultimately failed to stop it, that made it a failing grade.”

That day, Loki saw the emperor’s astonished expression for the first time.

Even he hadn’t expected Loki to live.

All the warm words he had spoken during the banquet were hypocrisy. He had already considered Loki a dead child.

“That day, I saw His Majesty smile for the first time. And I heard his true feelings, too.”

“What did he say?”

“He said he would support me.”

It didn’t matter if he was lacking. As long as he survived in the end, he could still become the victor.

The emperor Abraham had smiled when he saw the poison Loki harbored.

That was precisely why Loki who had received a failing grade in the emperor’s trial was nevertheless acknowledged as the second prince.

“When I left the banquet hall, His Majesty gave me one of the imperial treasures.”

As Loki said this, he stretched out his hand.

Mana poured out from his palm and began forming the shape of a huge wolf.

“It’s a spell called Fenrir. Though right now, it’s practically an empty shell.”

“That’s…!”

A huge wolf in the likeness of Varg, the god worshipped by the barbarians.

Vidar realized why Loki had been lying alone, collapsed in this snowy field.

Loki turned his head.

Then, with eyes as venomous as a snake, he looked directly at Vidar and asked.

“Hey, you barbarian in a scholar’s disguise. Do you know how to make this spell move? Judging from your reaction, you seem to know it’s a power related to the beastkin.”

“……”

“If what you said earlier is true, then I could become your ally, couldn’t I? And that would mean you could become mine as well.”

Loki had seen through Vidar’s disguise. Only he could have done so.

Because he was a coward who used any means possible to survive, he knew how to admit his own mistakes and imagine the worst possible outcomes.

“And what will you do after you learn that?”

“Why ask something so obvious? I’m going to become emperor. So I need every means I can get. Damn it….when even wandering around this frozen wasteland is a matter of risking my life, do you think I’d be afraid of negotiating with barbarians?”

“……”

“Take a gamble on me, barbarian.”

“And if I do?”

“The day I ascend to the throne, I’ll grant your people a truce.”

“Haha.”

A small, frail boy who looked as if he might break at any moment.

An inexperienced child flailing among monstrous imperial heirs. Vidar looked at the boy and thought:

“The price is fine. I’m simply curious about your future.”

Could this boy escape his destined end?

Vidar placed his hopes on him.

He himself had challenged fate countless times and failed, which is why he wanted to witness Loki’s challenge.

“When we get back, maybe I should try becoming a scholar. Your way of speaking is irritating. I’ll become someone like that too.”

“Someone irritating?”

“Yeah, I’ll be that kind of person.”

“Haha, that would be amusing.”

But fate, cruel as ever—

“Yeah. Just you wait, barbarian. I’ll become the most dreadful villain imaginable.”

Loki struggled desperately, using every possible means to survive, but in the end, he met a miserable death.

***

Fate is cruel.

Vidar’s younger brother ultimately failed to overcome Varg’s curse.

The Oracle ultimately failed to escape the death she had foreseen.

Vidar became the great warrior who led the barbarians.

And Loki could not become emperor.

“So that’s how it is.”

Vidar stood upon the snowy plains.

The snowy plains where he had lived. The place where his home and his homeland once were.

The place that held his memories.

“Are you our god?”

Vidar lifted his head.

Before he realized it, a massive shadow that even blotted out the midday sun had fallen over him.

“Varg.”

At that, the beast opened its jaws wide enough to swallow him whole.

A massive beast that devoured the sun and moon and even concealed the sky.

Vidar, though immense in size, was still nothing more than a small being before the god of beasts.

How could he oppose it?

How could he deny its will?

He was merely the vessel of the beast.

A small vessel barely capable of holding it.

“What is it that you seek?”

No answer came.

Only the beast’s growls shook the world.

Vidar finally understood.

In the end, it was simply a beast. A beast that moved by instinct.

“Once you take my body, what do you intend to do? Do you want to survive that badly? Or do you simply want to leave your claw marks on this world?”

Crack—crrrrack!!

Varg’s jaws began to close, as though crushing the earth itself.

Vidar, standing helplessly before it, lowered his head.

Fate is cruel.

The young beastkin who once dreamed of civilization had been the most savage of all.

“Fine. A beast is meant to roam the plains as a free creature.”

On the empty snowy plains, Vidar charged toward the beast’s gaping jaws.

“How could someone like you ever hope to suppress the freedom of a beast!”

Bang!

Vidar pried apart the jaws of the beast that sought to swallow him.

No creature in the world ever yields its life without resistance.

“If you truly are the god of beasts, then you too must follow the law of the strong devouring the weak!”

A small flower blooming in the snow was sharpened like a blade.

Born a barbarian, reaching towards civilization, blooming into legend, and forged into a spear.

“You and I! We are both losers who failed to adapt to this era. And so, it is only right for the defeated to accept their end with humility!”

The Speartip of Snow Blossoms pointed toward the path that must be taken.

***

From the air, Ariel watched everything. The great warrior Vidar rising from the abyss.

In order to meet his end as a person, not as a beast, the great warrior tore open his own chest and pulled out his heart.

Crunch!

Vidar extinguished the flame of life that burned within him, and he laughed.

“Ha… ha.”

A feeble laugh.

The moment the once boisterous and wild barbarian returned to the form of a civilized man.

“We have lost.”

Vidar acknowledged defeat once more.

As the great warrior who led the Speartip of Snow Blossoms, he had committed countless sins.

He had been cruel and merciless.

“My kin. You savage beasts who could not become part of civilization.”

He looked up at Ariel.

Looking at the representative of the beastkin who had adapted to the world, he smiled.

Not the smile of Vidar the barbarian, but the smile of Vidar the scholar.

“Let us descend together to the very bottom of hell through the most wretched death.”

His corpse would be torn to pieces.

His head would be severed and mounted on a pike, his limbs torn apart and reduced to scraps for wild dogs. All the barbarian tribes of the world would come to know of his death.

“Through this, let us break the chains of sin and send our friends into a new age.”

But even so, this would be the signal that Vidar had defied his fate.

It would become his proof.

“And I, Vidar the scholar who longed for civilization, speak.”

Vidar straightened his posture.

Though his body was stained with blood, he looked more dignified than ever before.

“O world, break through every impossibility and press ever forward.”

Vidar bowed his head.

The man who had chosen to remain in the past now offered a farewell to the future.

“I believe in that brilliant possibility.”

In the very first manner he had learned from civilization, he expressed his respect to the pioneers, those who would follow, those who had not yet learned, and those who hold potential.

“Then, farewell.”

The finely honed Speartip of Snow Blossoms pointed toward the future.

And in that moment… it shattered into pieces.