In the end, under the emperor’s tyranny, we were practically thrown out of the imperial palace and had no choice but to return to the academy in silence inside the carriage we had arrived in.
“…….”
“……”
Ever since we got into the carriage, the princess had sat quietly across from me without saying a word, making it unbearably awkward for me.
Judging by the conversation just now, if I tried to offer some clumsy words of comfort to someone who had just been all but disowned by her father, it might only deepen the wounds in her heart.
“What a stupid girl I am, huh?”
Just as I was quietly waiting for us to arrive, the princess finally broke the silence in a low voice.
“If it was going to turn out like this, I should’ve just played up to my looks and acted cute. I went around acting above my position and ended up gaining nothing. Hahaha…”
“…….”
“I mean, I’ve always had quite a bit of confidence in my face. Want to be the one to take my virginity while we’re at it? I feel like shit anyway, and maybe I’d feel a little better if that bastard First Prince lost his bride’s virginity to someone else first.”
“Your Highness…”
I hurried to stop the princess as her words veered completely off course, like someone who had let go of all reason.
“I know, I know. Just joking. Too bad for you though. That would’ve been your only chance to sleep with me. Hehe!”
She threw out all etiquette and spewed the most vulgar words imaginable; her expression was that of someone who had lost everything….no, someone whose broken heart had left her with no choice but to let go.
Was I… like that too?
To a child, a parent is always the sky, the ground, and their everything.
Even if that parent ignored them, cursed at them, or beat them, the child would live on believing that one day, they’d turn around and embrace them warmly.
When such a parent disappears, it means being left behind in utter solitude, sinking into a deep abyss without even a foothold or a rope to cling to.
That was what she was going through now.
Because I had been the same in my past life.
***
My father was trash.
Ah, not my current one. It was the one from my past life.
He was a parasite and a piece of trash who threw fits like a madman if his stomach wasn’t filled with alcohol every day.
A man lower than a beast, who beat his wife and son like rats.
Perhaps unable to endure the violence any longer, my mother eventually ran away, leaving me behind.
Unfortunately, I must have resembled her, because every time he looked at my face, the violence that rained down on me doubled….as if to make up for her absence.
I hated my father more than anyone else in the world, and right after him, I hated my mother for leaving.
It wasn’t that I didn’t try.
I always greeted him with a smile, kept the house spotless, and even begged on the streets to bring home a few coins. But all I ever received in return was relentless violence.
I don’t even remember why he hit me.
Maybe he had gambling debts, maybe his business had gone bankrupt, or maybe it was over some affair.
Then, one day, my father died.
To be precise….I killed him.
He came home staggering drunk, and that night, he swung those thick hands of his even more wildly than usual, eventually committing the unthinkable. He was trying to strangle me to death.
When he crossed the line, something in me snapped. Just when my consciousness began to fade, I grabbed something nearby and struck him in the side of the head, then used that moment to slip away and run to the kitchen.
Even at that young age, I must have known just how dangerous a knife was. I rummaged through the drawer, pulled out a kitchen knife, and tried to threaten him with my small, scrawny body.
My father must have found my defiance amusing because he staggered forward, slowly approaching me—
Stagger—! Thud!!
When I came to my senses, what I saw was my father’s face filled with resentment as he lay dying with a kitchen knife gripped in my hand, buried in his throat.
He was drunk and unsteady on his feet, he had stumbled and fallen, and his own weight had driven his neck into the knife I was holding, which ended up killing him.
As a result, I had been arrested by the police.
Although I had committed murder, there was overwhelming evidence of my father’s severe abuse, and considering the fact that I had done it out of necessity to preserve my own life, I was ultimately declared not guilty.
But the fact remained that I had killed someone with my own hands. It was my own father, no less.
– You killed me… You did this!!
In my head, I knew he was a man who deserved to die, that it was a fitting end for someone who had never once acted like a parent.
Yet even so, I couldn’t escape the sensation of his body at my fingertips or the realization that even his blood, for all his coldness, had been warm. Whenever I closed my eyes, it all came back to me.
In my past life, my father became an evil ghost who tormented me endlessly.
And even in this new world, he continued to gnaw away at me in the form of a heart demon.
The reason I had been able to become an Aura Lord in this other world was partly because I had a natural talent for the sword and partly because I trained myself to the brink of death.
But the most important reason was that I had overcome my heart demon.
“Mars, why do you not swing your sword?”
It was only a few years after I had opened my eyes to this world.
Because our territory was nearby, I had grown close to the House of Helios and would occasionally visit their mansion with my father.
As a result, I had the honor of training alongside Pollo, who, true to the name of his famous swordsmanship family, had started learning swordsmanship from a very young age. We were treated as peers and even received the same swords.
However—
“…No reason.”
I did not pick up the sword.
More precisely, I could not pick it up.
– Die! Die!
– Die and rot in hell!!
– How dare a traitor like you show his face and live!!
Every time I tried to hold a sword, those cursed voices swirled in my ears.
It was because the curse, contempt, and wailing of the father I had killed echoed from all directions.
Since it was a fantasy world, perhaps that made the sound of the ghosts so realistic that it didn’t allow me to hold the sword.
“…A curse has taken root in you.”
Flinch.
“To gain what those who’ve reached the end of the Sword Master stage obtain only after hitting the limits of their growth… at such a young age… and for it to be this deep a heart demon… What in the world happened…?”
“……”
“I’m sorry, but this is not something I can help you with. Wounds can be healed, curses can be lifted…but a heart demon must be overcome by one’s own strength.”
“I… see.”
“But I can offer you one piece of advice.”
“?”
The count gave a faint smile, then offered a response that was as simple as it was absurd.
“Cut it down.”
“….…?”
“I mean cut down the heart demon that is devouring you.”
“I won’t ask why someone your age is carrying such a heart demon.”
“Because I too was once consumed by one.”
“But if you truly want to rid yourself of that heart demon, then cut it down with everything you have.”
“…You’re probably thinking it makes no sense right now. Telling someone who can’t even hold a sword to ‘cut down’ a heart demon.”
“But it’s the truth.”
“Isn’t it ridiculous? It’s not like you’ve witnessed an overwhelmingly powerful enemy, nor are you suffering from an incurable, flesh-rotting disease, nor are you under the influence of someone else’s witchcraft or curse. And yet, a person can become utterly weak just from the worries rooted in their own mind.”
“But if you look at it another way, it’s just a worry.”
“Don’t let yourself be trapped by something as meaningless as an illusion you can’t even see or touch. Cut it down and break free.”
Thanks to the count’s advice, I was able to overcome the barrier of the heart demon at an early age, and with rapid growth, I stepped onto the path of becoming an Aura Lord.
Generally, in the late stages of Master level, just before becoming a Lord, the final wall to transcendence was the heart demon.
Anxiety, despair, fear, frustration, anger…. all directed at one’s own limitations. And the process of overcoming all of it to transcend oneself and become an Aura Lord.
But with the count’s help, I gained enlightenment, cut down the heart demon that had been eating away at me, and before even turning twenty, I stood at the threshold of transcendence as a human.
That was the decisive turning point in me becoming an Aura Lord.
***
“Tch. This turned into a hassle.”
In the end, the carriage that brought us to the academy dropped us off and left, and Her Highness the Princess, with eyes that looked as though they might snuff out at any moment, trudged off toward her room.
If I had acted according to my usual nature, I wouldn’t have cared whether the princess got married or not.
The reason I had been helping her little by little to develop her relationship with Pollo was simply because I had been paid, and I was fulfilling my end of the deal. I wasn’t some romantic fool who’d risk his life for someone he had no ties with.
Besides, the Kingdom of Cretia wasn’t exactly a weak or unstable country. It wasn’t quite the Empire, but it had its own share of power.
I didn’t know how the First Prince would treat her, but he couldn’t be so crazy as to mistreat an imperial princess.
Maybe being “sold off” wasn’t such a bad option after all.
But.
How could I just walk away after seeing eyes like that?
It didn’t show on the surface, but she too was a pitiful girl, trapped in the violence of indifference.
Parents who were worse than absent. A child who was left alone in the middle of it all.
“…Tch. This really puts me in a bad mood.”
It wasn’t as if she had killed her own parents with her own hands like I had to inherit the throne but I too knew all too well the feeling of being abandoned by the very person you most wished would love you.
Was it pity? A sense of shared pain?
Or perhaps, did I see myself in her? My past self, longing for salvation amid my father’s violence?
Maybe it was our shared fate of being cast aside by our parents that stirred something in me. I began to feel that I wanted to save our princess.
***
“Haha! What a pleasure to meet you! I was so eager to see the woman who would become my wife, I couldn’t wait another day!”
Wait… What is this?
An encounter with someone completely unexpected.
That brief meeting had the power to completely change all of my carefully laid plans.
Leave a Reply