Don't Concern Yourself With That Book -
Chapter Side Story 6-3
Side Story 6-3
Translator: yun
The child had caught Castor’s attention. Although this could not spell good news for the child, it did not matter.
A long time, no, so much time had passed that he no longer felt anything by its passage. And it was only natural to him for time to pass him by. It would flow, flow, and flow before he reached the end she had set for him. But perhaps Ashley had dropped him here thinking that things might be different in this time.
But he was also aware that he might be completely wrong. He was no longer the frightened man he was before and had morphed into a monster without any regrets.
Nevertheless, Castor’s interest was indeed piqued by the child. And it was only because he could call Ashley’s name through her. That alone turned the child from an insignificant ant to an existence that could stand on level ground with him.
So, this was nothing to him.
Drip drop.
Castor beamed ecstatically as he gripped his bloodied sword. Anyone might find his giddying smile ethereal and see him as a god that had descended upon the earth but not as he stood in the middle of more than 40 bodies strewn about him. Rather, he looked more like a demon that had crawled out of hell.
“B-bandits!”
A band of bandits had attacked a small village. On behalf of the lacking men, Castor stood against them. Defeat was not a word that was synonymous with Castor’s name. Because he slayed them all with one stroke. Effortlessly. Quickly.
Castor turned his head around languidly. There were people here. Everyone in the village was cowering in fear as they watched him. He felt nothing from the gazes that he was used to feeling pointed his way. His gaze shifted slowly to face Elia Blurose who was being tightly embraced by a man and a woman.
He then let out a low laugh.
To his surprise, the eyes of the child capturing him were filled with fear. She might not have realised it as he slew wolves but she must have noticed something was wrong as he killed humans.
But to him, red blood ran through both men and wolves the same.
He strolled forward. The blood dripping from the tip of his blade to the ends of his feet was eerily familiar. It made him feel as though he was back in the palace. His clothes flapped about revealing his toga beneath.
As he approached them at a sluggish pace, the people who had been running away found themselves frozen in fear. Far from feeling grateful for him, they only felt helpless and afraid in the face of his immense power.
Castor knelt on one knee. And he stared into her trembling orange eyes.
The child slowly spoke without a prompt.
“T-t-thank you.”
“…..”
The child stifled her tears. It was in this instance that she looked more mature than those adults.
“I-If it hadn’t been for you, mister, a-all of us would have been dead. Heup.”
At that moment, Castor noticed something through the child.
“A-actually, I knew I was going to be meeting you, mister.”
“Who told you about me?”
Without being taken aback, Castor asked. There was no such thing as coincidences in a templar’s life. Just as he expected, the answer he had been awaiting arrived.
“A p-pretty girl told me. She said that you would pass by here some day. A man with black hair and golden eyes… Since n-no one else in the world has golden eyes anymore, I-I’d be able to tell at a glance.”
That meant one thing. No more Templars of the Lord were left in the world. Other than the two of them.
Castor revealed a dark smile. The ends of his eyes curled even deeper. It had been her plan for him to meet this girl.
“… Had she been alone?”
Of course, she was. He thought that was the only possible outcome. So much time had passed that even Hernan, a templar with such an immense amount of divinity, had died. A faint sense of ecstasy enveloped him.
“No.”
The child shook her head in fear.
“T-there was someone accompanying her.”
The child had momentarily forgotten about her fear for him in the midst of conversation as she just blinked. However, she was quickly reminded of her terror as she tightened her grip around her parents’ hands.
“Who was it?”
“T-t-there was a very handsome man with her. He looked a little younger than you…”
The child’s eyes caught a glimpse of Castor crumbling. Through Elia’s eyes, Castor did not look like he was smiling or laughing. Nevertheless, for some reason, he looked very sad.
Drip drop.
Why did those drops of blood look like tears?
“Ha… hahaha.”
Covering his face, Castor laughed like that for a long time. The fact that he had spent his whole life, or to be exact, all of his remaining time on earth, longing for the face of the woman that had once visited this place and the fact that he had been wrong was eating away at his sanity.
Slowly, his laughter ceased. HIs eyes slowly opened through the cracks between his fingers. Madness rose in the eyes that had been drowning in boredom. HIs golden divinity wriggled beneath his feet like a haze.
At that moment, he understood the message Ashley had left for him through this child.
“You have disappeared and I. I will forget you.”
She told him that she would forget about him. But the traces of her left behind in this child indicated otherwise.
‘Castor, if you can change for yourself. Change.”
Castor burst into another fit of laughter. No one could stop him from laughing from what sounded like a mix between madness and joy.
What was he thinking? Even he could not tell? He had been broken a long time ago.
Slowly, he raised his head and stared at the child.
“Thank you, for telling me.”
Madness laced his gentle smile but the child was too young to tell.
He closed his eyes bewitchingly.
“Rose.”
Ashley, that was the name you had never given me permission to utter. You made it so I could never call you by that name.
The child’s name was pronounced differently from hers. As though this was the most he was allowed to have. His smile was as transient and bright as a firework.
He grasped the child’s small hand. It felt so small. It was much smaller than his. He kissed her fingertips.
“For the first time in a thousand years, you are the first human to have been blessed by me.”
He looked at her with a deep gaze as he tilted his head.
“I wish for your happiness. And for everything you wish for to come to fruition.”
If anyone who knew him saw the way he was wishing for another’s happiness right now, they would think he was bluffing. But Castor was currently sincere.
“Well, Rose. God is blessing your love and your life.”
In an era where the gods had disappeared, a mere relic of an ancient templar left a trace of himself in a small child. No one knew how a blessing of happiness from a being that had slaughtered and murdered all his life would manifest.
But he knew. Whatever she wished for would come true with divinity.
As his divinity conferred a ‘will’.
***
A long time had passed since he left the village before stopping in the middle of a wasteland.
From the moment he left the village, he could no longer see. The dry scent of dust and the smell of dirt struck him. A sandstorm had surrounded him and howled about him as he flew into a frenzy alone.
‘If you can change for yourself. Change.’
They both had gone through the same misery and yet one thing set them apart. He left his misery broken while she was intact. That was why he wanted to destroy her with such euphoria.
Ashley. Did you think I would end up like you after some time passed?
She must have thought that a long time before he would eventually forget her and live his own life. Funnily enough, the girl that had always lived with his shadow looking over her still did not know him well.
Already, he was blindly chasing after her with all the time he had left. Change, change? Had the man changed because he saved someone though he had massacred people for hundreds, or perhaps, thousands of years?
Slowly, he closed his eyes and counted.
‘70.’
That was the number of villagers he had kept safe in that village. These hands that had only been used to kill for half his life had saved people yet again.
Ashley had only seen him kill people but she had never met the once wise and sagacious prince who dreamed of becoming a great king–one who would save hundreds and thousands of people with his policies. Wasn’t that funny? It was not as though he hadn’t lived that long.
Did she really think he would change?
Slowly, his laughter ceased. Standing in the middle of the wasteland, he swept his face down. His long hair fluttered in the winds.
“Alright, I will if you want me too.”
If this was the ‘change’ she wanted from him, he was willing to do it for her. Because he couldn’t do anything else about the hell she had dropped him in.
Alright, he would save people from now on. He would save tens, hundreds, maybe thousands of people and perhaps he would be known across the world.
If he managed to save more than he killed as time flowed and flowed, would she appear before him again?
In the meantime, he would walk on the path she had set out for him.
“Rose.”
Ashley.
All they had left was time.
“Rose.”
The fragrance of roses struck him from elsewhere. A wasteland where even weeds didn’t grow, the scent of roses struck him amidst the smell of sand.
His fist grabbed at empty air. The scent fell through his fingers. And finally, the fragrance scattered into the air as though only its embers remained. It faded away.
Into ashes and roses (Ashley Rose)1 he never had.
And it was the name of the maze he would wander through forever.
T/N:
And that’s a wrap??? Look forward to a new series I will be tl-ing on the website and support the work! This story is finally done after 2.5 years. I am TIRED of angst. (so go check out As Long as Your Are Happy)
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