Chapter 190 : Chapter 190
Chapter 190
There was no such thing as an inn in the village of Raenit.
This was because it was remote and small, and Desep Denoebang, the de facto owner of the village, did not want outsiders to stay for long.
Amethus and I found a quiet clearing near the village and prepared to camp for the night.
Though we called it camping, after taking out a variety of high-end magical tools, our sleeping arrangements became more luxurious than a decent private home.
We pitched a small tent and stepped inside.
The inside was wider than it appeared from the outside.
Exactly fifteen times wider.
The tent, expanded by spatial magic, was equipped with an entrance, a hallway, a kitchen, a bedroom, and even a simple chandelier and a steaming hot bath.
I had a lot of wealth and felt no need to lower my quality of life.
This candy tin is really well-made.
I popped a lozenge into my mouth.
Clatter, clatter, clatter.
As I manipulated the button that appeared inside the metal tin, a magical fog enveloped us.
Now, our conversation would not leak outside.
"Amethus."
Ready to reveal my secrets, I opened my mouth.
"I told you the Cordis Empire trampled the West with four calamities. Do you remember the names of those four?"
"I heard them directly from you."
Amethus slowly listed their names.
First, the 'Calamity that Poured from the Sky'.
Second, the 'Calamity that Sprang from the Land'.
Third, the 'Calamity from the Sea'.
Fourth, the 'Calamity that Crossed the Mountains'.
The Empire gave the West four calamities.
They skillfully hid their involvement, making everyone mistake them for natural disasters.
Before my regression, no one knew that these calamities were the Empire's doing, let alone that they were related to each other.
The entire West was under that illusion until the fourth calamity, the invasion of Cordis.
"The one we resolved before was the third, the 'Calamity from the Sea'."
Before my regression, the third calamity was only the horde of seventy thousand fishmen.
Nana Nereyades and the Cordis 9th Legion, who were working in the shadows, were not revealed.
However, the seventy thousand fishmen were enough to trample the Bururade Peninsula.
The West was not prepared, and there was no hero like me.
"The fourth calamity is the great advance of the Cordis Empire over the great mountain range. It hasn't happened yet."
I told him that the fourth calamity would strike in 100 days.
"The problem is the first and second calamities... the timing is before my regression."
It has been seven years since I regressed.
The first and second calamities happened 14 and 11 years ago, respectively.
Even for someone like me, there was nothing I could do.
"The one that turned the White Lord, Obro Denoebang, into that state was the second, the 'Calamity that Sprang from the Land'."
I smiled bitterly.
"It all started 11 years ago."
***
Let's tell an old story.
"He was a hero. Noble and great."
No one could deny it.
Even the people of the Empire would openly express their respect for Obro Denoebang.
He was that noble, and that great.
"The greatest knight who always stood on the side of the weak, without a single scandal. How easy is it to admire someone like that?"
He was a man who had no connection to women or wine.
He didn't like them, and had no intention of liking them.
Obro Denoebang protected his integrity to the point of being almost obsessive.
At least, that was the case until 11 years ago.
"But 11 years ago, something very joyful happened to him. The daughter of his closest friend, a child for whom he had gladly become a godfather, was celebrating her eighth birthday and starting school."
The friend was not a nobleman, but surprisingly, his daughter was admitted to a school in Maesh where only the most prestigious gathered.
The fact that the child's godfather was Obro Denoebang was reason enough.
"He was so happy that he couldn't refuse the suggestion of 'isn't it okay just for today,' and for the first time in his life, he decided to have just one drink, just one single glass of wine......"
The first glass is the hardest.
The second one is easy.
Any drunkard would agree.
"He got delightfully dead drunk. He fell asleep as if he had collapsed and woke up the next afternoon, as people who drink for the first time always do."
If it had ended there, there would have been no problem.
But no matter how many lines you draw, life has a way of striding over them as if they don't exist.
"The unfortunate thing was......"
I shook my head slightly.
"...that the day he got drunk was the 'Night of Inversion'."
"...Good heavens......"
Amethus let out a sigh.
The name 'Night of Inversion' came as a shock.
Come to think of it, that was right; the calamity from 11 years ago could only be the 'Night of Inversion'.
"...One day, 11 years ago, the gate to the underworld suddenly opened. Death flowed in reverse and overwhelmed life. The dead rose and evil spirits swarmed. The things that were already dead clutched at those who were not yet dead......"
It is a calamity because the reason is unknown.
The 'Night of Inversion' still remained a great wound for the West.
"In the areas of Maesh and Schmeizen, it was an inversion of just one night... but in that single day, people from as many as three cities disappeared."
"......"
"In the middle of the night, people looked for the White Lord. They desperately searched for Obro Denoebang, but he did not appear. Can you imagine the anger and disappointment the West felt when it was revealed that the White Lord, who had not appeared while millions of people disappeared, had actually been asleep, drunk?"
Amethus shook his head.
It was a feeling that only those directly involved could truly understand.
But he could guess a little. At that time, Amethus was in the Empire.
Even though the Empire and the West had almost no interaction, Amethus had heard a lot about the 'Night of Inversion' and Obro Denoebang's only mistake.
The fact that millions of people were suddenly dragged away by things from the underworld was that shocking.
"It was a single mistake... but it was too big a mistake to be excused with such words."
To say 'millions' makes it sound light.
But when you start to think that each and every person is precious, it becomes an unbearable weight.
So many lives were lost, and the responsibility for it lies with one person.
What kind of weight does that speak of?
"But the White Lord, being the White Lord, did not break."
Criticism arose.
They blamed Obro Denoebang for everything and tore his entire life apart.
Insults, mockery, and resentment.... A single tongue is enough to tear a person to pieces, but tens of millions of tongues tried to tear him apart.
"In the face of pointing fingers and insults, he just bowed his head and silently carried on with his work."
Obro Denoebang apologized.
He admitted his mistake and readily accepted the public's condemnation and yet, he still protected people and tried his best to find the missing.
"So people couldn't help but soften."
A one-night mistake.
Even if millions had disappeared, wasn't it the first time the White Lord had ever had a drink?
Many people began to look at him with eyes of compassion.
Of course, there were those who remained cruel to the end.
"Despite his mistake, the White Lord was still the White Lord, and his human side, of overcoming his mistake, even earned him greater support than before. But......"
Amethus held his breath.
"...he suddenly disappeared 8 years ago."
After that, it's simple.
He holed himself up in the village of Raenit and drank.
For eight whole years, without stopping.
"There are many speculations and hypotheses about his disappearance, Amethus. But few connect it to the mistake of the 'Night of Inversion'."
This is because they believe it was something the White Lord had completely overcome.
"The truth is often simple, though."
I had a sad look in my eyes.
"The White Lord was also human."
Obro Denoebang is thirty-seven this year.
A man as trained as the White Lord could even look to be in his early twenties.
But the bearded man, especially his droopy eyes, was so steeped in fatigue that he looked to be seventy.
"He seemed to have overcome it, but he hadn't. He seemed to be unhurt, but he was. He seemed to be unafraid, but he was."
"......"
"Even though he seemed to have won, the truth is, he was just enduring. He tried his best to act unfazed, but his limit came."
There were cruel people.
I don't know what kind of individuals they were, but there were definitely those who spat out their dirty hearts with sharp tongues.
It was enough to leave a scar on the heart of Obro Denoebang, who was only twenty-six years old 11 years ago.
"The missing people are not found, and the mockers follow him to the end. How could he be okay when he exhausted all his energy day after day with no results?"
Responsibility is heavy.
He had to take responsibility, he thought he could, but to live without forgetting those he couldn't take responsibility for is even heavier, and even painful.
I knew this better than anyone.
To the point where my own soul had become a hunchback.
"The pre-regression Obro told me, at first, he just thought he had become more sensitive."
Because he was a man with naturally keen senses.
"Blades particularly bothered him, he felt like he shouldn't leave them as they were, he felt anxious, but he didn't think of it as anxiety. Because he was the White Lord, there was no way he could be anxious."
Obro Denoebang's hell began like that.
"And so, gradually, his mind became distorted. It seemed as if every blade was trying to stab him, every gaze was glaring at him, and every heart hated him."
"......"
"It's a delusion. A fantasy. It's a lie that's nothing more than a feeling, but it was so persistent that he couldn't shake it off. No matter how false the feeling, if that's how it feels, what on earth is one supposed to do?"
A sad heat tinged my voice.
"...And even while his mind was being shaken like that, Obro Denoebang was too strong."
Everyone looks like an enemy.
Everything seems to want to stab him sharply.
An ordinary person would have sunk deep into fear and despair and collapsed.
But Obro Denoebang was by no means an ordinary person.
"If the whole world was attacking him, he had the power to overturn the whole world."
At first, he tried to endure it.
After a while, he began to fight back with words.
But his mind, captivated by false feelings, created even greater delusions.
Obro Denoebang, suffering from constant attacks, eventually drew his sword.
"...However, when, tormented by auditory hallucinations, he swung his sword and took out one of his younger sister Daltur Denoebang's eyes...."
He thought Daltur was attacking him.
Even though she was his beloved younger sister, he felt that she dared to criticize him.
He felt it was shameless, so shameless that he drew his sword.
But it was all a lie. A deception.
He didn't even know who had deceived him, but it was clear that he had been deceived.
His cherished sword, stained red with his sister's blood, accused him.
"...He realized that he had become completely ruined."
He had to admit it to himself.
That I have become a madman.
That my mind has become no different from a garbage can swarming with maggots.
So a choice followed.
Whether to spew this onto others, knowing that one's own mind is swarming with maggots and stinks, or to keep one's mouth shut and die alone.
Whether to inflict wounds on those he sought to protect, saying 'I am still right, look at how hard I tried,' or to swallow his broken self alone, admitting that he was wrong despite all his efforts and tears.
The White Lord chose.
Following the name people had called him, following the duty he ought to follow, he chose to disappear quietly and alone.
But it was a choice so long ago that even he himself had forgotten it.
"He had the power to overturn the world, but he didn't want to overturn the world, so he became a drunkard."
He killed his own mind with his own hands.
No one acknowledged it.
Not even himself.
A life came where he couldn't endure unless he called all the brilliant moments of his life an arrogance he had enjoyed undeservedly.
It came and did not leave.
It crushed him so terribly that he couldn't even breathe without drinking.
"Eight years passed like that, and now he's so broken that you can't even tell where he's broken. He's forgotten why he became afraid of blades, and now he's in a state where only the fear remains."
"......"
"That's the reason Obro Denoebang is broken. Ordinary, isn't it?"
The regressed prince chuckled.
I heard it while sharing a drink with Obro Denoebang before my regression, and during the war, it was a really ordinary story. I remember that point being terribly sad.
"...Your Highness......"
As always, when Amethus wanted to express his sincere feelings, he called me 'Your Highness' and used formal language.
"......The 'Night of Inversion', and the fact that the White Lord, who didn't drink, happened to get dead drunk on that very day, surely......"
"Yes. Your intuition is correct."
My blue eyes blazed with hatred.
"As expected, it was the work of Cordis."