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‘Qzatquizail Calberg Kennosis… even my name was giving me a hint right from the time of my birth. How did I not notice it until now?’
Only then did Juan realize that his name ‘Juan’ was fake and used to hide his real name. Although he had always felt that his name was different from the way others were named, he simply thought that it was due to the fact that he didn’t know his parents. It wasn’t until now that he thought deeply about it.
Aruntal gave him the name ‘Juan Calberg,’ and ‘Kennosis,’ which meant that ‘a god has descended in a human body.’ Juan suddenly thought that this was enough to answer all the questions he had. It was a grand enough name to be given to an orphan boy who had no name.
‘So my real name is that of a monster’s.’
Juan no longer knew anything. He couldn’t tell where Dane’s plan began or where it ended. He began to wonder whether he would have still ended up in this situation if SIna hadn’t died and he successfully regained his powers from the holy body.
‘Should I not have started the journey of revenge in the first place? If this journey was supposed to end like this from the very beginning, then why did I even come back to life?’
Juan stared blankly at Sina, but she remained silent.
‘Sina, I tried my best.’
Juan had tried as hard as he could, and now he was exhausted.
‘The moment I lost you, I was already broken. Now, breaking one more time in this state won’t mean anything anyway. Maybe the journey you and I began together was only meant to lead us to our deaths from the beginning.’
Gerard’s gaze turned toward Dane when he saw Juan fall completely silent.
As soon as Dane’s eyes met with Gerard’s, he dropped down on one knee before Gerard and bowed his head.
“I pay my respects to Your Majesty.”
“...Dane.”
Gerard stared at Dane, who was paying his respects. Gerard had already gained enough power to kill Dane at any moment, and he had not forgotten the oath that he made before being transplanted into the emperor’s body.
“I couldn't be happier if my first duty as the emperor was to splatter your blood everywhere.”
“How could I refuse an order from you, Your Majesty?” Dane smiled and raised his head. “However, I believe that you will fully understand the reasoning behind my actions now that you have become the emperor, Your Majesty—and also how useful I am.”
Gerard glared at Dane for a while and soon sat back down on the throne. There was no more murderous intent in his eyes.
“Yes, it is exactly as you say. The world looks much wider and bigger now,” Gerard said as he looked at Dane with a distant look.
“I’m not sure how useful you are, but I can tell just how trivial you are. I can see how worthless it would be to kill you. I can also see just how narrow and crude our ideals and values had been.”
For a moment, Dane was taken aback by Gerard’s words—a shallow sense of disharmony passed by Gerard. Yet, Dane felt that there was nothing bad about the way Gerard perceived him when he saw Gerard staring into the distance with a calm face.
It was only natural for the emperor to be a great being when compared to Dane himself. Dane had tried his best to create such a being, and Gerard was above all the closest to his ideal.
It didn’t matter even if Gerard’s creator looked worthless in Gerard’s own eyes.
However, Haild didn’t seem to think so.
“You!”
Haild carefully placed Juan down on the floor and shouted at Gerard.
“That man instigated you to kill your own father and even convinced you to betray everyone! Does that really mean nothing to you?”
“Haild,” Gerard frowned. “I won’t stop you if you want to kill this man with your own hands. But…”
At that moment, Gerard’s expression distorted and he turned his head toward the other direction.
Dane looked up at Gerard with a perplexed expression when his words suddenly stopped.
Gerard was frowning with his hand placed over his forehead.
“I feel dizzy.”
“You have moved for the first time in decades, Your Majesty. We need to examine your physical condition. Perhaps it’s because of suddenly accepting such a great power? Let’s wrap up all this unpleasant talk and get going,” Dane said.
Gerard lightly rubbed his forehead and stood up. Haild nervously fumbled around, trying to find Elkiehl from his waist, but it was no longer there.
Gerard stood in front of Haild and then looked at him with sad eyes.
“I thought that at least you would understand me despite all my sins, Haild. I have also been watching him from the beginning to the end of his journey through your eyes. I felt just as betrayed as you. But why are you looking at me with those eyes now…?” Gerard murmured.
“What I saw was that he is the true emperor. I believe in him, just as my mother did,” Haild answered as he glared at Gerard.
Gerard nodded in a calm manner upon hearing Haild’s answer.
“Yes. Your other eye definitely resembles your mother’s.”
At that moment, Elkiehl pierced Haild’s solar plexus in an instant.
Haild’s eyes opened wide as he looked ahead. As soon as Haild inhaled a deep breath, his left field of vision suddenly went dark.
A long shadow spread out like a net and ripped out from the place where Elkiehl had pierced through him—it was the power of the Crack planted within him by Gerard a long time ago, a power which Gerard had said to be too deeply embedded within him to be pulled out.
“As expected. I can pull it out with the help of the power of the Crown.”
Gerard pulled Elkihel out of Haild’s body and fiddled with the power of the Crack at the end of Elkiehl’s tip. Then, he lightly squeezed and crushed it.
Meanwhile, Haild collapsed to the floor and screamed in pain as he clutched his left eye. As the flow of time that had been paused for his body began to flow once again, the wound he had gotten in his childhood also returned to how it used to be—blood began to flow out of his hollow eye.
“I’ll take back what I had planted within you. Back then, your wound was fatal, but probably not anymore. You might be able to live if you get lucky enough,” Gerard sighed deeply.
Then, his eyes turned to Dane.
“Maybe you’re the only one who can understand me.”
Dane smiled and tried to answer Gerard in a calm manner.
However, it wasn’t Dane who answered Gerard.
“No—that bastard can’t understand you.”
Gerard turned his gaze toward the back beyond Dane. Juan, who had been lying on the floor like a corpse until now, was slowly standing up.
“No one else will be able to understand you—I’m the only one who can.”
***
Juan stared at Gerard with dead eyes.
Gerard could not figure out why and how Juan managed to stand up when he had thought Juan to have collapsed completely. But Gerard didn’t feel that that to be very important. What was important to him was that Juan was a remnant of the monster that should be punished and still had some of the power of the Crown, which Gerard had yet to absorb.
Meanwhile, Juan continued to speak as he watched Gerard, who was approaching him.
“You will realize just how insignificant, small, and trivial human beings are.”
Gerard frowned; humans being insulted like that was unfamiliar to him. However, for some reason, Juan’s words felt like they were poking at his heart.
“Humans are weak enough to make one feel compassion for them and nasty enough to make one feel a seething anger when watching them. They’re so small that you would think that you could just crush them to death, but there are certainly moments when you feel proud of them. Of course, it is not often—it is only sometimes.”
“Shut up.”
Gerard revealed his teeth as he growled and grabbed Juan by the collar.
Juan just smiled at Gerard while hanging in the air.
“It must be an unfamiliar concept for you. After all, you have never seen a human being while holding my power. You probably just feel like your vision has widened. No, maybe you can find a little bit of a familiar feeling—the feeling of looking down at the world from atop the back of the dragon while soaring above the clouds. Did you ever think that humans were lovely and that you wanted to protect them at that time?”
Gerard could not answer Juan’s question.
“I don’t think so. You probably just felt liberated. No one cares about the lowest part of the world when you are that high up,” Juan continued speaking in a calm voice. “Pity, affection, as well as respect for humans spring up only when watching them from the lowest of points. I already felt that, so I tried to be like them as much as possible.”
“What are you… what are you talking about?” Gerard asked in a trembling voice.
“I’m trying to teach you the disciplines of kingship that I couldn’t teach you before, since I died too early,” Juan said in a calm manner. “These are the things you should know if you want to become the emperor. It is the education that you deserved from the very beginning. I can’t stop you if you want to become the emperor like this. Instead of stopping you, I will teach you what thoughts and values the emperor should have.”
Gerard looked like he didn’t know what to say.
Then, Juan shouted while glaring fiercely at Gerard.
“Do you think that I will let a bastard like you become the emperor as you are now!? Get it together and listen carefully to what I say if you still have the slightest bit of love left for humanity!”
It was then.
Dane swung his cane and struck Juan under his chin.
Juan closed his mouth for a moment as his throat was struck, and Gerard ended up dropping him without even realizing it.
Dane threw Juan to the floor and Gerard belatedly burst into rage.
“What are you doing!?”
“Your Majesty, these are the unnecessary words uttered by the remnant of a monster. There is no need to listen to him,” Dane said politely.
“Listen to me, Gerard… I cannot… accept you… becoming the emperor the way you are now…”
Dane shoved his cane inside Juan’s mouth.
Juan could no longer say anything anymore as his mouth was blocked.
Dane wiped off the sweat from his forehead and hurriedly opened his mouth to whisper to Gerard.
“Your Majesty, absorb the power of the Crown still remaining within his body. Then this man will be absolutely nothing more than a trace of the Crown.”
Gerard remained silent.
“Your Majesty! This man is completely broken; there is no need to listen to his disciplines of kingship! Your Majesty’s thoughts will only end up being contaminated if you listen to him! Your Majesty is feeling confused because you have absorbed the power of a broken man—that’s all!”
Gerard clenched his teeth and clutched his own head. Strands of hair were pulled out but that didn’t seem to matter to Gerard.
After breathing heavily for a long time, Gerard opened his mouth as he glared at Dane and Juan.
“You are right. I have already risen to the throne and I do not think that I lack any learning. I will not stop at simply following in the emperor’s footsteps. I will become a better being than him.”
“Yes. That’s right, Your Majesty! You are the one to…”
“And that’s why…”
Gerard reached his hand out and grabbed Dane’s head to throw him to the back.
Dane was flung away with a bright smile on his face. Blood splashed all over the wall, but it wasn’t very clear, since the wall was already red in color. Dane’s body twitched for a while but soon drooped.
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Everything happened in the blink of an eye.
Gerard slowly approached Juan and looked down at him.
“...I will keep you alive.”
“Gerard…”
Then Gerard started moving toward Sina’s body that was lying in front of the throne. He slowly lifted her body from the floor.
“You called this woman a watchdog and a counterweight. By being acknowledged by her, you became closer to a complete emperor. You also gave up on being the emperor only because of this single human being.”
Gerard stared at Sina, then soon turned his gaze toward Juan.
“Now, you will be my watchdog and counterweight. I will become the perfect emperor, one that even you will not be able to deny, and I will wait for the day you kneel before me on your own. By then, you will have no choice but to admit it—admit that I am the true emperor and that the world needs me.”
Juan couldn’t figure out what to say.
At that moment, the sound of the horse hooves began to ring throughout the red fortress. As the sound of the horse hooves approached closer and closer, Gerard muttered quietly toward Juan.
“I’m sure that I’ll be acknowledged by you, Father.”
Before Juan could stop him, Gerard disappeared in an instant, taking Sina Solvane’s body with him. The only thing left at the spot he had been standing on were some scorch marks.
Not long after Gerard disappeared with Sina, someone hurriedly burst into the hall with a bang.
“Your Majesty!”
It was Pavan and Ivy.
Ivy jumped off the horse first, almost as if she was rolling, and Pavan hastily followed her.
Pavan’s expression stiffened when he saw the situation in the surroundings. Most of the situation could easily be grasped just by looking at the traces left behind.
Meanwhile, Ivy slowly crawled toward Juan, since her leg was broken.
But Juan shook his head.
“Examine Haild’s condition rather than me.”
Haild’s condition was already being examined by Pavan. Realizing that the wound in Haild’s eye was similar to a wound that one would get when pierced by an arrow, Pavan began first aid right away.
Taking care of a wound caused by an arrow was a piece of cake for Pavan, someone who had spent years on the battlefield.
However, Haild wasn’t the one who was the most severely wounded.
Pavan opened his mouth as he took a glance at Juan.
“Your Majesty, it seems like you are severely injured.”
“I’m all right.”
Juan didn’t seem to be visibly injured—there were only traces left on Juan from being stabbed on the arm and the chest.
“It seems to me that Your Majesty’s injuries are worse than the limbs amputations,” Pavan said.
Juan realized that Pavan had already noticed his condition. He figured that it would have been enough for Pavan to notice what had happened just by looking at the blood that was still flowing out of the wound on his chest.
The essence of the emperor was what allowed Juan to recover from wounds in an instant. The fact that he was still bleeding meant that his regenerative ability had fallen to a level close to that of an ordinary human being.
But Juan simply smiled as he looked at Pavan.
“Do you want to check?” Juan asked.
Pavan also smiled.
“How could I, Your Majesty? I’ll go and call Captain Anya and General Nienna right away.”