Chapter 130 : Chapter 130
Chapter 130: Black and White (5)
At the moment she heard my answer, Ibi's two eyes gradually widened.
The gaze, which had been filled with a hopeful expectation, was instantly covered with disappointment, and then gradually began to be tinged with anger.
But suppressing those mixed emotions as much as she could, she looked at me with an expression that demanded a reason.
“…Why?”
So, I told her.
“Because it's not the right thing to do.”
“I know that too!”
At that, Ibi suddenly shouted.
“You…!”
Suppressing the anger that had momentarily flared up once more, Ibi shook her head and bit her lip hard.
“You guys, you don't know, how I've lived… what I've been through…!”
She said, as if pouring out the resentment that had been building up.
“…Yes, I don't.”
I don't know.
I only know what Ibi has been through because I've ‘heard’ about it, I have never experienced it myself.
As such, I shouldn't rashly say that I ‘know’.
So, I don't know.
How many emotions were contained in that single teardrop that Ibi, who had stood in front of the railing, had shed while looking at the black-and-white horizon.
Therefore, I couldn't bring myself to scold Ibi for trying to make a choice like this.
I don't have the right to do that.
“Then! Is just leaving it alone, is that the right thing to do!?”
“If Krom's invasion begins, many people will die.”
“A lot of people are already dying!!”
If I had lived the same life as Ibi, if I had experienced the same things firsthand, could I be sure that I wouldn't make the same choice she is trying to make now?
“But who the fuck cares?! No one gives a damn!!”
I can't.
The reason I can comfortably say that it's not the right thing to do is because I am not the one involved.
“If the uptown bastards, or the soldier bastards who are only busy protecting them as if they are the only citizens, don't die like this, that damn city will never change a thing!”
It's very easy to judge from a step away, whether it's right or wrong.
“Do you think I'm doing this now to live well and eat well on my own, like other noble bastards? If that were the case, fuck, I would have just continued to work under that damn old geezer and taken over the organization! Not running away after betraying that bastard!”
In short…
“I'm sorry.”
To be saying this so firmly, I even feel a kind of guilt.
“No matter how much you want to do the right thing, it's not the right way.”
Even though I know I don't have the right to easily speak of right and wrong.
But, I still had to say it.
I couldn't help but say it.
“You'll surely regret it.”
Because if she chooses this path, I know that Ibi will surely regret it someday.
Because I know well that a day will come when she, who has erased the free ‘Ibi’ and become ‘Evie Midrashi’, will feel lonely about her situation where she can no longer return to being Ibi.
“Think about it. Is ruling Tiaria through violence, becoming just like the powerful people you so ridiculed and cursed, really what you wanted?”
“What I want is! At least I don't want to be a cowardly bastard who just stands by when I have the power!”
“You will become just like them. Unfortunately, that's what power is. Especially if it's power obtained in that way, even more so.”
“I'm different! I… I've experienced it firsthand! I know exactly, what it's like to live being victimized by guys like that!”
Bang!
Ibi slammed her fist on the table roughly.
“I've lived my whole life running away like a street rat! But now… I finally have the power to not have to run away anymore! I have the power to change something myself, so what the hell is wrong with using it…!”
Ibi, who gritted her teeth and slowly shook her head as if to resent me for not understanding her, then glanced at me again.
It was a desperate look, as if asking me to take her hand, even now.
But, when it seemed I had no intention of changing my mind.
“……Right.”
She finally muttered in a cold voice, as if she had given up.
“Anyway, I didn't expect you to understand.”
She said, completely withdrawing the gaze that still held a glimmer of hope that I, that we, might change our minds.
--
‘Evie Midrashi’ is leaving the party.
--
“If you're not going to help, at least I won't let you interfere.”
Then, Ibi called for the soldiers who were waiting outside the room.
“At least until I return to Tiaria, you guys will have to stay here.”
She then ordered them to lock us up and watch us.
“I can't give those guys time to prepare in advance.”
“Ibi…”
“Don't call me that.”
Ibi cut me off firmly before I could even finish my sentence.
“We just happened to be traveling together because our interests aligned for a while, we're not real friends, are we?”
In the meantime, the soldiers who had entered the room began to bind us according to Ibi's orders.
Ibi, who had been watching for a moment, then turned her head sharply as if she didn't want to see anymore.
At the same time, from behind, a sack was placed over my head to cover my face.
“…Anyway, I was always alone. I'm just going back to that.”
With my vision obscured like that, only Ibi's voice, muttering as if to reprimand herself, could be heard.
Nevertheless, I knew very well what kind of expression she was making right now.
“Sister Ibi!”
“Sister…!”
Then, Ibi kicked her chair and left the room.
My companions, who, like me, must have been bound and forced to their knees by now, must be watching Ibi's retreating back with eyes of disbelief.
Normally, I would have persistently tried to [Persuade] her or done something, but the current Ibi was in no state to have a proper conversation.
Back in Stout, when we were searching for the trident, there was a chance to hear a glimpse of Ibi's true feelings when she thought she had come up empty and was disappointed.
For example, Ibi is the type who goes around saying that there's no way Santa exists, but still secretly hopes that such a being will appear before her eyes.
But he did appear.
Suddenly, in front of her.
In the form that Santa often takes, that is, as a ‘father’.
A being she thought she had never wished for, but in fact, had always wished for.
And even with a bag of gifts.
Saying that all of this is yours, and you can use it as you please.
And Ibi was not the type to want to monopolize that bag of gifts.
Of course, she would make all sorts of excuses, saying it would be heavy to carry alone, but in the end, she is the type who wants to share at least a little with those who have never received such a thing, like herself.
As can be seen from the fact that she didn't take all the gold from Don Paulo's safe for herself, but—although it was not delivered because she was betrayed by a friend she had trusted—intended to give it to the orphanage where she grew up, to Laira who had taken her in as a child.
But now that she suddenly had a whole bag of gifts in her arms, she couldn't help but be excited.
Because this much might be enough to share with everyone.
So she became infatuated with that possibility.
Turning a blind eye to the fact that the bag of gifts that everyone thought was a supply was actually filled with the supplies brought by the soldiers.
Trying hard not to look down at the fact that the blood that was soaking the bottom of the bag she was holding in her arms was dripping, drip, drip, at her feet.
As if she had forgotten that outside of this Krom, where everything appears in black and white, both her arms and the ground beneath her feet would surely appear stained red.
In a word, she was blinded.
“Follow me.”
To the point where she even assigned the guard who had brought us here, to us again.
The current Ibi was missing a lot of things.
So, I'm going to show her, even if by force.
My face, which she had covered with a sack, telling the soldiers never to look.
So that we can face each other again, and have another conversation.
***
“It seems your conversation with your friends didn't go well.”
Kain said with a gentle smile to Evie, who was standing alone in front of the terrace railing, looking down at the black-and-white sea.
“…….”
At this, Evie, who had turned her head slightly, immediately picked up the wine glass she had placed on the railing and downed it in one go.
Kain, with his hands behind his back, then lightly walked over to Evie's side.
“While I was in Tiaria, I came to understand their strength, but at the same time, I also came to understand that we and they are fundamentally different.”
Especially humans.
Kain added.
“…What do you mean?”
“Their lifespans are, absurdly short compared to ours. They are but a fleeting moment. That is why they cannot see as far as we do.”
That's why they can't understand our thoughts, Kain said.
“I know what you want to do in Tiaria, Evie. A lot of blood will surely be shed. Your friends must be thinking that blood should not be shed.”
At the accurate point, as if he had been eavesdropping on the conversation in that room, Evie couldn't retort and closed her mouth.
“However, it is because we shed a lot of blood in advance that we can avoid shedding blood later. And yet, their lives are so fleetingly short that they can only look at the blood that is visible right in front of them.”
Kain, who had been staring intently at Evie's silent profile for a moment, then asked carefully.
“By any chance, will they not be a hindrance to your plan?”
“…That's why I locked them up.”
“Then, are you planning to keep them locked up?”
“I just need to make sure they don't tell on me before I get to Tiaria.”
“That's true, but is there any reason to leave a source of anxiety?”
At that moment, Evie turned her head and glared at Kain.
It was a glare so fierce that even Kain, who saw it, flinched inadvertently.
“If you say something like that one more time, I'll make you like that damn old geezer.”
“…I see. I'm sorry.”
At that, Kain raised both arms and made a gesture of surrender.
At Kain's obedient attitude, Evie stopped her threat again and averted her gaze from him.
“Indeed. You have been living with humans until now, so it is inevitable that you still sometimes see the same scenery as them. I understand.”
Ignoring Kain's muttering that time would eventually solve it, she continued to stare at the horizon, and then.
“…You.”
“Hmm?”
She suddenly began to speak again.
“Didn't you have a human you cared for?”
“What do you mean?”
“My mother, what was she to you?”
She said, gently moving away from the railing and away from Kain.
“In the first place, I've never heard what kind of person my mother was. Of course, I've heard a lot of taunts about what my mother was, but I've never seen her myself, so how would I know.”
“Your mother, you mean.”
“Was she also, to you, just a source of anxiety that couldn't see as far as us? Is that why you left her there?”
Kain could not answer Evie's question.
Of course, it might have been different if he had opened his mouth right away.
“──You were here.”
But in the end, that did not happen.
Instead, a young man appeared before the two and interrupted.
The young man, who had not yet come out onto the terrace and thus had not been deprived of his unique ‘color’ by the Gloom, was, of course, a dark elf, just like the many others who roamed this castle.
However, one thing that was clearly different from them was that he had the same bright silver hair as the two people here.
“…Yes, it's you.”
The silver-haired young man said this as soon as he glanced at Evie.
“The illegitimate child the Baron brought.”
At the young man's words, which were seemingly friendly but did not hide his open contempt, Evie did not avoid it and retorted immediately.
“And who the hell are you?”
“Nice to meet you, half-breed relative.”
The young man insulted her in a tone that showed he didn't care at all, even in front of Kain.
“I am Gray. Gray Midrashi.”
And Kain showed no sign of trying to stop him.
“The man who will kill you and seize the honor of becoming the vanguard.”