69
What? Daughter?
“Have you found the whereabouts of my daughter?”
Daughter, all of a sudden…? Does the Demon King have a daughter?
I was flustered by the sudden question about the child’s whereabouts. As I frowned and grasped the situation, the Chief Mage slowly raised his head and opened his mouth.
“As the Demon King must already suspect, the daughter you sought so desperately is…”
“I asked for her whereabouts.”
The Demon King cut off the Chief Mage mid-sentence.
An ominous aura once again began to creep out from his body. I instinctively knew. If the Chief Mage ran his mouth any further, none of us would be safe.
“Your daughter, whom you sought so desperately, has been dead for a long time at the hands of humans! Now, forget about her and place the continent back in the hands of the demon race!”
The Chief Mage shouted with a trembling voice.
The air seemed to stop for a moment.
And soon, a black aura spread out from the Demon King.
“How dare you…!”
A fierce wind began from him. The ground vibrated, and sounds of cracking and splitting could be heard from the walls here and there.
“My daughter is not dead!”
An immense surge of energy erupted. It felt like we could die if we were even slightly touched by it.
Lucas helped Stella up and hurriedly began to run away. Kaiden and I also ran without looking back, fearing that staying here any longer would lead to disaster.
Kugugung!
With a huge noise, the Diamond Palace began to collapse. Even amidst this, the Chief Mage, who had lost his mind, continued to run his mouth.
“Oh, Demon King! Do not obsess over a child born with a mere human, and please look after us…!”
His words were cut short. When I looked back as I ran, I saw his head and body had been separated.
The Chief Mage, the greatest among the mages of the Gratia Empire, lost his life instantly. My spine felt chilled.
“Marion! Don’t look away!”
Kaiden shouted, pulling my hand. I straightened my head again and ran towards the exit.
As soon as we escaped, there was a rumbling sound, and the Diamond Palace completely collapsed. A tremendous amount of debris and dust scattered.
Kaiden and I protected Lucas and Stella, who were relatively weak, by surrounding our whole bodies with aura and striking away the large debris with our swords.
“His Majesty and His Highness…”
I heard Lucas muttering as he fled. The Emperor and the Crown Prince ultimately met their end in the Diamond Palace.
Regardless of their political interests, they were blood relatives. His feelings must have been indescribable.
However, there was no time to offer even a brief word of comfort. The world that unfolded after leaving the Diamond Palace was no different from hell.
“Oh, Nyx…”
Stella looked up at the ripped sky and sought the god. Not only her, but people who hadn’t been able to escape the Imperial Palace yet also looked up at the sky with helpless faces, seeking the god.
I, too, wanted to cry out to Nyx.
The wound in the sky opened, tinged with a red, lava-like light. And soon, immense lava boulders began to pour down from it like hail.
“Damn it! Everyone, take cover under something!”
I shouted until my throat burst. Kaiden grabbed Lucas, and I grabbed Stella, and we threw ourselves behind a huge piece of debris.
The ground shook. Sparks flew, and tearing screams echoed everywhere.
It was hell.
“Damn it, how do we stop that…! Grand Duke, isn’t there any way?”
I urgently asked Kaiden, but the answer came from somewhere else.
“It’s all over.”
Stella muttered with an empty face.
“What do you mean?”
When Kaiden asked, Stella spoke like a doll.
“I saw it in the future. We will all die.”
“……”
Silence flowed.
No one asked how Stella saw the future. We had just seen the Demon King, how surprising would a Saint seeing the future be?
At that moment, the wailing sound of the Demon King, who had somehow ascended to the sky, shook the world.
“If my daughter is dead, bring me even her corpse! Aaaaah!”
Along with the ferocious cry of anger, more lava boulders poured down like a downpour.
“That… we can’t possibly stop that.”
Lucas muttered in a drained voice. That was true.
The wrath of a god was something a mere human could not deal with.
I felt Kaiden’s gaze. Our eyes met.
“Can we survive if we run away?”
He was looking at me, but his question was directed at Stella. I widened my eyes and looked alternately at Stella and Kaiden.
“Since the two of you are Sword Masters, you might survive if you’re good. Because you are faster than a galloping horse.”
I was momentarily stunned. Kaiden had just asked if he could survive by abandoning Lucas and Stella and running away.
“What…!”
As I tried to jump up, Kaiden firmly grabbed my hand and pulled me down.
“Marion, sit down. It’s dangerous.”
“Grand Duke!”
How could he abandon the people right next to him!
Stella looked at us and muttered.
“It’s alright. What can we do in the face of such a disaster? The people who can survive should survive. The two of you, please run far away. Survive and make sure to leave this scene in the records.”
Etch it into history. That is what the Saint was saying.
In fact, I also wanted to live.
I felt like I could survive if I used the mission she gave as an excuse and ran away with Kaiden.
But what about the people here? What about the family at the Grand Duke’s residence?
The former Grand Duke and Madam Mach, Bethel, Vito, Durante, the chef, the servants and maids, the gardener, and their families. And the Imperial citizens in the capital.
What about those people?
Suddenly, the words the former Grand Duke had said flashed through my mind like lightning.
“Do you think a noble is something special! Your ability and attitude are what make you look noble!”
I bit my lip tightly and looked around.
Lucas, watching the Imperial Palace being devastated with a blank expression. Stella, blankly watching the lava boulders falling on the capital outside the Imperial Palace.
An old noble covering his head and trembling. A maid crying, clutching a laundry basket like a lifeline. A young page lying face down and calling for his mother.
The only people here who could even touch the Demon King’s toes were just Kaiden and me.
“Grand Duke.”
“Marion, please.”
Kaiden tightly held both my hands and bowed his head. He had figured out what I was going to say.
“Please, let’s run away.”
He, the Grand Duke of Balstein and the King of the North, was pleading for us to abandon everything and run away.
I stared at him for a moment and then slowly opened my mouth.
“When I was in the slum, I just wanted to eat as much as I wanted.”
Kugung, a lava boulder fell nearby with a crash.
“Because I was hungry, I tried stealing bread with the slum kids, picking up food others dropped after eating, and even catching and eating rats. It seems there was nothing I didn’t try.”
Kaiden raised his head. His blue eyes were flickering.
“Even struggling to live like that, people died. Lucy, who starved to death after giving me her food; Leon, who was beaten to death after being caught stealing bread; a female beggar who looked after me just because I was young, even though she was sick.”
I took a breath.
“They all died.”
“Marion…”
I tightly grasped Kaiden’s hand.
“I don’t want to see people die anymore.”
His face contorted. He strained his voice and said.
“So you’re saying you’ll die?”
I forcibly pulled up the corners of my mouth. I tried to smile, but I don’t know if I succeeded.
“Grand Duke, actually, I wanted to become a noble.”
“……”
“The people who threw me silver coins when I was begging on the ground were all nobles. I simply envied them—rich, wearing fancy clothes, and eating rich food.”
On the day I received a silver coin, I could eat freshly baked bread with all the children in the slum.
The hot, freshly baked bread was truly delicious.
What I only wished I could try once, I was able to eat as much as I wanted from the time I became a Sword Master soon after starting my mercenary work and was entrusted to the Waldstein.
“But I learned that being a noble who eats delicious bread comes with responsibility.”
I learned that at the Waldstein.
“When I die, I will die honorably.”
Kaiden closed his eyes. He must have felt that he couldn’t change my mind.
There was so much I was grateful and sorry for to him. How much hardship he must have endured, taking care of me, teaching me, and having patience when he was only eighteen himself.
Our first meeting flashed through my mind.
His blue eyes, looking down at me on the snowy field, with his black hair and black cloak fluttering.
I offered a faint smile and delivered my final farewell.
“Grand Duke, thank you for everything. I will never forget the kindness with which you looked after me, until the moment I d—”
“You got a hit in.”
Kaiden cut me off. He slowly lifted his eyelids. The same blue eyes I had encountered at our first meeting stared directly at me.
“If you want to die honorably, I will die protecting the person I love.”
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