/
The sword danced on the white beach.
It cut through the air, sending countless white particles flying with each swing. Not grains of sand, but bits of bone—the entire beach was made up of the minuscule fragments of dragon bones that had been ground to dust by the sea breeze.
Many islands in the Kaliduk Archipelago had appeared in the same way, as wind and waves eroded the bones of who knew how many dragons.
While Gerard was the true creator of this beach, since he had killed countless dragons, he actually very much liked the dragons. He liked their hot breaths, their wisdom from the bygone eras, their hard scales, and even their huge wings.
Dragons were beautiful beasts, and it was only natural to be fascinated by them. However, Gerard had always been convinced that he had to subdue them if they ever threatened humanity.
Or so he had thought. Now, he no longer knew if that had been the right mindset.
All he could do was watch as the young man swung a sword on the beach. Every time the young man stepped on the bones of the dragons and jumped into the air, memories of the olden days came to his mind. That was a distant past that Gerard could no longer go back to.
[I believe that I am becoming accustomed to this.]
Gerard raised his head to the source of the voice, which was coming from a far higher position. A huge dragon was crouching on top of a hill and watching the young man with Gerard.
“Getting used to what?” Gerard asked.
[This idyllic life of catching fish, farming, and watching the youngling prance about.]
Gerard agreed with the dragon that they were living an idyllic life, but he felt the need to point out and correct the part about the kid running around the beach.
“The kid you are talking about will be the one to inherit the empire. What I’m teaching him is swordsmanship that His Majesty himself devised and taught me, and inside his eyes is the sealed power of the Crack.”
[There is indeed splendid potential in the young, is there not?]
Gerard nodded in agreement. It was Gerard himself that had been the most surprised when he had found out about Haild’s existence, to the extent that he had almost fainted. His Majesty didn’t have any biological children, and none of Gerard’s siblings had any children either. Gerard was the only one who happened to have a child.
“To be honest, I had thought that all of the emperor’s children were infertile.”
[Wherefore such inauspicious thoughts?]
“It’s because neither His Majesty nor my siblings have any children. But there’s more to it than that—His Majesty and his children are all so different and powerful that they seem downright inhumane. I had even thought that we might be a different species.”
Due to this reason, Gerard had been suspicious about Hela in the beginning. Of course, he did not blame her for choosing to get married quickly. After all, the Henna family had to erase their relationship with Gerard as soon as possible.
It went without saying that it would be dangerous if anyone found out that Hela was pregnant with Gerard’s child. Fortunately, the man Hela got married to was kind enough and very understanding of her situation.
But as he grew older, Haild’s appearance became a problem. Some were already talking about the possibility of Haild being Gerard’s child ever since he became twelve years old, and it was to the point that Haild had to be cautious about his looks when he reached puberty.
Gerard could no longer stand by and watch. He even felt that Haild getting pierced by an arrow on the battlefield was a good thing. It was not a fatal wound, but Gerard made it seem like it was: he immediately rescued Haild using Dane’s magic, leaving behind a fake corpse. Then, he stopped Haild’s growth using a magic spell from the Crack.
To find that magic spell, Gerard had even visited the leader of the Thornbush Church for the first time after a long time.
The Thornbush Priest Organization was controlled by Dane, just like many other groups in the empire, but they completely fell out with Gerard after he failed to take the Crown out of the emperor. This was because the Thornbush Priest Organization believed that Gerard, in fact, had the Crown in his possession but was hiding it to monopolize it.
That didn’t affect Dane all that much, since the Thornbush Priest Organization had become useless to him as well. Thus, Gerard visited the leader of the Thornbush Church to torture him, interrogate him, and finally kill him.
When he returned, he plucked out his own eye and imbued powerful magic into it. Then, he planted his eye into Haild's empty eye socket.
[I was rather bewildered seeing thee act thus,] Entalucia murmured. [Didst thou indeed have to pluck out thine own eye to cast magic? However little I know about the Crack, I feel that thou shouldst not have gone to such lengths.]
“It was necessary.”
In addition, unlike Gerard, who had the essence of the emperor, Haild ended up with his face covered in cracks, since he couldn’t handle the power of the Crack. It was unfortunate, but Gerard muttered to himself over and over that it was necessary.
Gerard had a job to do. His son, Haild, couldn’t be free from it either.
At that moment, Haild suddenly seemed to become blurry for a moment. In the blink of an eye, he had moved a few steps forward.
Seeing this, Gerard leaped out of his seat.
The white bone powder on the beach that Haild passed by was burnt black, while Haild threw himself into the sea as if he was on fire.
[Oh? The youngling has achieved what thou hadst in mind, I see. How very swift!]
“...Yes, he is.”
However, contrary to his words, Gerard’s expression was not bright. Watching Haild, he grit his teeth and muttered, “This is enough, Haild will be my eyes.”
And when the Crown reappears one day, Haild will be the one to make the judgment on my behalf.
Gerard had finally finished all his preparations. It was now time to visit Dane.
***
The emperor’s skinny body was covered with gold and decorated with colorful jewels, but it gave off a grotesque energy.
The first emotion Gerard felt when he saw the emperor’s body that was enshrined on the eternal throne was disgust. Since he respected the emperor more than anyone else, the sight was all the more of a shock to him.
Gerard endured the surge of nausea and looked around. Dane was standing beside him with a knight he had never seen before.
“This is His Majesty?” Gerard asked as if to confirm.
“To be exact, this is His Majesty, who was revived by Dismas using Spirit Calling. The power of the emperor—no, Mananen McLeir is being squeezed out and distributed throughout the Church. Consider it to be some kind of expensive and fancy mana pump,” Dane answered in a calm manner.
Gerard covered his mouth with his hand and managed to hold back the urge to vomit. Gerard could not understand how Dane could remain calm in the face of something so horrible even if he didn’t have any respect for the emperor.
“Don’t give me that look. The bastards from the Church did it purely out of respect. If you want to blame someone, then blame them for having terrible beauty standards. Some of them even shed tears of emotion at this sight,” Dane shrugged.
‘This is not respectful
 it is insulting.’
This kind of treatment was not a pleasant sight, regardless of who received it. As for the emperor, he was the one who had saved and protected all of humanity, so how could he be subject to something like this?
Dane noticed Gerard feeling unpleasant.
“It is up to you whether or not you think this is His Majesty or not. But you’d better think practically. What I will have to do from now on is even more terrible than this.”
Gerard remained silent and barely managed to stop himself from wanting to vomit.
No matter how badly the emperor’s body was insulted, it was not as bad as his own sin of stabbing the emperor with his own hands. He didn’t deserve to say a single word.
When Gerard finally seemed ready, he gestured to the knight standing next to Dane, a man with amber eyes.
“This is Lenly Loen. He is a talent that the entire empire is paying attention to.”
Lenly silently bowed to Gerard, but his face was full of distrust.
“Lenly Loen is the current Captain of the Imperial Guards. Thanks to him, I was able to meet His Majesty again like this. It was through the same type of manipulation through which Barth Baltic made Winoa Weaver into the one who assassinated the emperor.”
Dane looked back and forth between Lenly and Gerard while giggling as if he found all of this to be funny. However, neither of them was laughing with him.
Seeing this, Dane pouted and approached the emperor.
“Alright. Now
 we will make you the emperor.”
“...What?” Gerard’s expression turned ugly.
“What do you mean ‘what?’ We already talked about this.”
“Yes, we did talk about it before. But how?”
Dane smiled and tapped one of the emperor’s fingers.
“As you know, those who have the essence of the emperor have boundless regenerative power. There is no need to worry about problems like mana contamination either, since the regenerative power is brought forth by stimulating one’s own potential and not mana. We’ll take advantage of that.”
“Take advantage of that?”
Dane pulled a dagger out from his pocket.
Seeing this, Gerard had an ominous premonition.
Before he could even say anything, Dane quickly cut off one of the emperor’s fingers.
Gerard jumped at Dane and grabbed him by the collar.
“You son of a bitch! What kind of game are you playing now!?”
“I told you—think practically. This is just a corpse that is sharing its power with us. Don’t attach any unnecessary sentimental values to it. Come on, we are running out of time. Stick out your finger.”
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Gerard shuddered and glared at Dane.
But at that moment, Lenly approached Gerard and put his hand on Gerard’s shoulders. Seeing Lenly’s eyes, Gerard understood that the man was just as angry and wanted to draw his sword at any moment as well.
“Hurry up and stick out your finger. I will have to cut off another one if you keep wasting time like that.”
Gerard bit his lips and stuck out his finger in front of Dane. Dane quickly cut off Gerard’s finger without the slightest hesitation, and then he placed it in place of the emperor’s severed finger.
Soon, only a red scar remained, which also disappeared in moments. It was utterly bizarre to see only one of the skinny emperor’s fingers looking fresh, as if it had been alive until just recently.
Gerard started to breathe heavily.
“What the heck are you trying to
”
“I will slowly transplant you into the emperor’s body using this method.”
“What?”
“From fingers to arms, legs, shoulders, and finally the head. I’m going to glue all of your body parts except for the heart to the emperor—the heart will remain Mananen McLeir’s. Both of you have the same face and there won’t be any adverse reaction, since you are a clone of the emperor. Thus, Mananen McLeir’s heart will finally be yours. My plan is to destroy the old castle called the emperor and build a new castle called Gerard on top of its foundation.”
Hearing all this, Gerard started to wonder whether Dane was right in the head.
“You are doing all this just to get Mananen McLeir’s heart?! Can’t we just pluck it out and plant it inside me? What kind of crazy shit are you trying to do?!” Gerard shouted.
“Enough with your ignorant remarks. This is the only way to obtain Mananen McLeir’s heart as quickly as possible. If we plucked out Mananen McLeir’s heart as it is, the emperor’s body would immediately collapse. Not only would the Church fall into chaos, but Barth Baltic would also come after you to kill you. Although he doesn’t care about the emperor’s body, he still cares about the safety of the empire. Besides, this body will be destroyed immediately if Dismas uses Spirit Calling. You need to be here so that we don’t get caught.”
Gerard looked back at Lenly; he needed someone who could sympathize with him and thought that all of this was utterly crazy.
However, Lenly was completely calm, as if he had already heard of Dane’s plan beforehand.
Gerard felt like his blood was starting to flow in reverse.
“Aren’t you supposed to be the Captain of the Imperial Guards? And you agreed with this insane plan!?”
“That is exactly why I agreed with this plan,” Lenly answered firmly.
“What?” Gerard’s expression distorted as he asked back.
“I’m the Captain of the Imperial Guards, not a corpse cleaner. The magician promised me a living emperor who would rule humanity forever. As far as I know, you also agreed to this plan. Gerard Gain, you are the one who assassinated the emperor. Right now, not only do you have no value, but you’re a liability instead. The only way for you to be forgiven for your sins is to become a true and eternal emperor.”
Gerard’s face twitched. He wanted to kill these two and get out of this crazy place.
At that moment, Dane opened his mouth before Gerard could do anything.
“Gerard, you’re not as determined as Dismas.”
“What?”
“It took Dismas’ efforts to revive His Majesty, even in this form. Chopping yourself into pieces is nothing compared to what Dismas did. Do we seem like the only crazy ones? Who among those here isn’t crazy?”
Gerard remained silent.
“No one has been sane ever since we found out there was a creature that could destroy the entire world with just a slight turn of its body. Didn’t you stab the emperor just to stop that? Are you trying to act like you’re normal now?”
Gerard clenched his teeth and glared at Dane for a while, then soon released the strength he was gathering in his fist. Dane was right—this was nothing more than a corpse. The real emperor had been stabbed to death by Gerard himself, and he was inside the Crown that no one knew when it would reappear.
On the other hand, Gerard himself was nothing more than a chunk of meat compared to the emperor.
“...Fine.”
Dane grinned.
“For your information, the pain of cutting off parts of your body is nothing. The real pain will start after that. Some powerful magician might try to look into your soul, so I’ll set up a magic spell to restrain your consciousness and make sure that you don’t end up moving by accident. So, you won’t be able to move or talk even though you will be fully conscious. It might take decades or even hundreds of years until the Crown finally finds you.”
“You think that lightly of me?”
“Yes. To be honest with you, I can’t even imagine being trapped inside a body like that. I’ll leave your consciousness to the Saintess. Then it won’t be a problem even if you end up talking in your sleep sometimes. It wouldn’t be too strange, since it’s not like the emperor’s voice would be coming from a random person.”
“The Saintess?”
“Yes. The pope came up with it. Apparently, she will impart the emperor’s will or whatever. So I’m just making use of that.”
Gerard realized that Dane had prepared everything meticulously—all he had to do was give up his body and sit still.
Then, Lenly approached Gerard with something that he had set aside by the pillar. It was a mop, a wet towel, and a bucket full of water. Only then did Gerard realize what role Lenly had to play.
“I thought it would be better to leave the butchering to an expert while I focus on the magical part,” Dane said with a shrug.
“...You,” Gerard said as he looked at Lenly. “Are you
 are you sure about this plan? I have been deceived by this magician several times already. I can tell by your eyes that you truly respect and love His Majesty. But how are you certain that it is okay to mutilate His Majesty’s body?”
Gerard’s conviction had all but disappeared from the moment he stabbed the emperor. All that was left within him now were excuses and hesitation.
For a moment, Lenly made a pained expression upon hearing Gerard’s words and then he slowly opened his mouth.
“I’m not sure about it either.”
“Then
?”
“I have studied and heard testimonies about His Majesty countless times. And I have done my research on you as well. As a result, I came to the conclusion that it is better to have an emperor who would stay with us humans forever, and share destiny with us despite being unstable rather than a perfect emperor who would leave us one day. In that respect, I think you’re more suitable to be the emperor.”
Gerard looked at Lenly, then closed his eyes. Lenly’s firm attitude was very much like Gerard’s old self; however, Gerard no longer had the will to decide anything.
Lenly’s sword whistled as it left its scabbard.
Dane whispered in Gerard’s ear, “I’m warning you in advance, but instead of your body being destroyed, you should be wary of your mind being destroyed.”
“Dane, don’t look down on me like that.” Gerard closed his eyes. “When I finally meet him again, if he turns out to be His Majesty, then I will give him everything with joy. Then, His Majesty will kill you even if I don’t. This plan you worked on will just be a small apology to His Majesty from me.”
“Hmm. What if he is a monster?”
“If he is a monster, ” Gerard answered in a quiet voice, “then I will become the emperor after taking away the Crown. Then, I will find you, and I will kill you.”