I Became the Commander in a Trash Game Who Copies Skills

Chapter 168. The Emperor (7)

There are events where context is important.

If it's an irreversible event that cannot be undone, only the result matters, but not everything in life is like that.

I heard that the Emperor had fallen gravely ill.

This was an event that had to be reversed as much as possible.

At this point, let's take a moment to look back on the hectic past month.

That's right.

A month.

It had been almost a month since the plague bomb exploded in the Ratman den under the imperial capital and I was warped to Wolfskrig.

Many things had happened inside and outside the domain over the past month, but the worsening of the Emperor's illness could be pinpointed to exactly one week ago.

On the day the magic stone factory started operating, during a usual sick visit, the Emperor had told me.

“You sent them all to the capital?”

“Yes. How can Count Pewin handle it alone? The 100 or so people I evacuated are the most important personnel among the seven thousand expeditionary force. They will be of help.”

As the Emperor said this, he briefly explained the ‘power’ he had received, which he had promised to tell me about before.

The power of the Warrior he received was the ability to enter the ‘battlefield’.

“The sacred relic is a kind of key. It's a key to communicate with the Outer Gods, but it's also a key to access the power of the Warrior.”

“…….”

“The power granted to me is the power to open a path.”

A path to the battlefield of the gods.

That's how the Emperor explained the power of the Warrior he possessed.

That universe-like space must be the battlefield of the gods.

Well, it was a rather plausible explanation.

I had already seen the Outer Gods confront each other in that incomprehensible place where both time and space were distorted two or three times.

“Originally, the purpose of this power must be to enter the battlefield and fight something. That's why I can lead my troops in.”

“I see.”

“However, I couldn't see an opponent to fight. Perhaps I didn't meet the qualifications? So I found a workaround to use this in my own way.”

The Emperor explained.

If it was a place outside this world, couldn't he come out to a different space than where he entered?

In fact, after some effort, that ‘workaround’ had succeeded.

His spatial teleportation ability was created that way.

However, perhaps because he was stepping into a place where time and space were dissociated, after entering and coming out once, an intense feeling of lethargy would weigh down his body for a while.

The fact that everyone in the Emperor's party, including me, was weak for about a week was due to that side effect.

Therefore, the Emperor decided to use this as an escape ability.

In the event that the entire army was on the verge of annihilation on the battlefield, it was an escape ability that could evacuate important personnel to a pre-selected safe location's coordinates.

“It would have been great if all seven thousand elite troops could have evacuated together, but unfortunately, I could only move a small number with my ability. These are the true power of the imperial capital.”

“Then shouldn't they be kept by Your Majesty's side even more?”

“Well. I feel like I'm doing a little better now. And isn't a situation like this the very moment they should be in the capital? Especially that friend, the Apothecary, he must go.”

I was a little surprised.

To send even the Imperial Secret Knight Order, who were practically his personal guards.

This was the story I heard a week ago during a sick visit.

In fact, until then, I wasn't too worried.

The Emperor's illness, while not improving, hadn't worsened significantly for three weeks.

Honestly, three weeks was a point where the immune system would start to peek its head out for any illness.

We know that the human immune system can sometimes produce miracles.

The plague bomb was no exception, and even a patient who was hit directly would not necessarily die.

Of course, even if it wasn't such a miracle, I thought there was nothing to worry about.

Because the Emperor possessed an absolute means of revival that no one but him knew about.

Anyway, most of the personnel who had fallen into Wolfskrig with the Emperor went up to the capital.

The only ones left were the Emperor, Archduke Gabir, and a handful of attendants.

The Imperial Secret Knight Order, including the Apothecary, also left for the capital to deal with the increasingly uncontrollable plague situation.

And now, a week had passed.

This was where the second incident occurred.

The reason Archduke Gabir had summoned me.

“…No matter how much you said so, I shouldn't have sent the Apothecary.”

The Archduke let out a deep sigh.

“His Majesty's symptoms hadn't improved. The Apothecary's prescription was just suppressing the illness.”

The Emperor's condition began to deteriorate rapidly within a few days of the Apothecary's departure.

“I spoke with the Apothecary through the communication crystal sphere. He said it was probably because of his absence. There was no need to interrogate him. The Apothecary himself had insisted until the end that he couldn't leave His Majesty's side.”

“Then why…?”

“His Majesty summoned the Apothecary separately and issued a stern warning.”

The Archduke leaned his head against the back of the chair and said, as if sighing.

“He asked if he could take responsibility for the lives of all the citizens of the capital. What could he do? The Apothecary is not as bold as Siollus. His Majesty also admitted to the threat.”

“Can't the Apothecary return?”

“His Majesty commanded it. If by any chance he doesn't arrive in the capital on time, he will be sentenced to beheading.”

“…Oh dear.”

“It's a problem even if he comes. We described the symptoms through the crystal sphere and got a remote diagnosis. He said there wasn't much time. Two days at most, something could happen even today. And……”

The Archduke lifted only his head from the backrest. Get full chapters from novel✶fire.net

His brilliant blue eyes stared at me.

A look that, unlike him, seemed pushed to the limit.

Firmly closed lips.

Calm breathing.

On the desk, a tightly clenched fist.

“…….”

They often compare a person's mind to a deep, inscrutable well, but sometimes that well water overflows.

I felt it instinctively.

That there was something the Archduke hadn't told me.

Those eyes were not the eyes of someone conveying the Emperor's critical condition to the ruler of a domain, speaking with the intention of gathering strength to respond to a crisis.

Warning, threat, deliberation, doubt, a myriad of complex emotions were faintly felt.

It was a moment when I had a premonition that I was deeply involved in this matter in some form, and that the process would not be smooth.

“…And His Majesty is looking for you.”

Bad premonitions are usually right.

***

Death is a phenomenon.

It goes without saying, but it has no texture, sound, or visible form.

And yet, it has a smell.

This is what those who have walked with only a step's distance from death all say.

On the verge of the inevitability of death descending upon a person, one often remembers the impending end by its smell.

I remember two smells of death.

The smell of the battlefield.

And the smell of a hospital room.

The former I smelled for the first time after falling to this land.

The latter was a smell I had known even before that.

Because I had smelled it every time I visited the local hospital ward to see my only remaining kin after my parents passed away.

“…….”

Thud. Thud.

I was walking down the corridor with Archduke Gabir.

Silently.

Neither he nor I were the type to make unnecessary conversation.

In the silence, the past naturally came to mind.

At that time, my younger sibling was dying.

Honestly, it was as good as being half-dead.

Can you truly say that a person who has been lying on a hospital bed for years, paralyzed, with only minimal signs of consciousness detected from the cerebrum, is alive?

When you look at a body where all moisture and nutrients are injected intravenously, and whose breathing even stops from time to time, requiring an artificial respirator to be attached and detached, you feel with your skin that it is decidedly closer to death than life.

I have seen an article about a person who became a vegetable due to an unfortunate accident and recovered after a long period of nursing.

The article repeatedly used the expression ‘miracle’.

At that time, I was too cynical to look for miracles.

Perhaps death was more familiar than miracles.

Because the first place I visited after returning from the threshold of death was my parents' columbarium.

The habit of calling my sibling ‘kin’ must have been a defense mechanism to protect my weak self.

It was no coincidence that I recalled old memories as I approached the room where the Emperor was staying.

I can feel it.

The smell of death.

It was faint but clearly wafting through the entire corridor.

It was the exact same scent I had felt while walking down the corridor of that hospital back then.

I stood in front of the door with the Archduke.

It was my first visit in three days.

It was a place I had visited every day for a while, but I had stopped my sick visits three days ago as the Emperor's condition rapidly worsened.

I knocked on the door.

“Cough! Gack, c-come in. Come in.”

His voice was not good.

When I hesitated for a moment, the Archduke opened the door instead.

Inside the room, a caregiver and two honor guards were standing watch.

Familiar faces.

Not the Imperial Secret Knight Order.

“Viscount.”

“…….”

Near the entrance was the vice-captain of the Patama Knight Order.

By the bedside was a veteran knight of the Pegasus Knight Order.

The vice-captain at least nodded at me, but the veteran knight just stared.

There was wariness in both of their gazes.

Well, right now, it would be the same no matter who it was, not just me.

The Emperor said in a half-hoarse voice.

“Th-that's enough… you may all leave.”

“…….”

“Ha, haha…. Stubborn, all of you. Are you going to fight the illness for me?”

“…Your Majesty.”

“I have something urgent to discuss with the Viscount. A matter on which the fate of the…cough! cough! Empire hangs.”

The Emperor raised a trembling arm and pointed to the entrance.

Only then did the two knights reluctantly leave the bedside.

The caregiver also left the room with the knights.

The Archduke did not enter the room.

When I looked back, he nodded with that same meaningful gaze and closed the door.

“…….”

Click.

What did that mean?

I would soon find out.

Now there were only two in the room.

The Emperor and I.

I slowly approached the bed.

The closer I got, the more strongly I felt the familiar scent.

The smell of death.

The Emperor's face was pale.

“Cough! Cough!”

It was beyond polite description.

Tumors and spots covered his face, and his arms and legs were emaciated, revealing bone.

The bed was already soaked with pus that had seeped from various parts of his body.

It wouldn't be strange if he died soon.

“The Apothecary, cough! just kept me alive… is all. Cough! Heok!”

In the 21st century, where medical technology is extremely advanced, there is something called ‘life-sustaining treatment’.

Literally, it's a treatment that just keeps you breathing, sustaining life.

Usually, life-sustaining treatment is administered because the rapid metastasis of cancer cells or pathogens cannot be stopped, or because the patient's body can no longer withstand further surgery or medication.

Of course, there are rare exceptions.

Cases where ‘ignorance’ itself is the cause.

It means they can't find the cause of the illness.

Despite the amazing advancements in modern medicine, the number of diseases with unknown causes is as numerous as the number of ‘syndromes’.

“The symptoms, heok, the source couldn't be found. The Apothecary is an expert in that area… Cough! Cough!”

“…Please save your words.”

The plague bomb was similar.

Even if it wasn't the plague bomb, most illnesses of this era were probably syndromes.

Surprisingly, medicine was the discipline that remained in the realm of superstition for the longest time, and in this era, there was no way there would be a microscope to observe bacteria, let alone viruses.

Anyway, despite such circumstances, the Apothecary seemed to have continued his miraculous life-sustaining treatment—though it might not fit the modern definition.

As befitting the empire's number one healer, he was said to have adjusted his procedures and medications according to the symptoms every day, blocking the problems erupting from various organs in real time.

Generally, the cessation of such life-sustaining treatment means death.

But I don't think the Emperor will die like this.

“Cough! At this rate… it will be difficult to talk.”

The Emperor lifted his arm.

On his emaciated wrist hung numerous accessory-shaped magitools and a single bracelet.

A pure white bracelet.

As he gently grasped it with his other hand, a miracle began to unfold.

His coughing subsided, and his complexion improved dramatically.

It was a color that was unbelievable for someone who had been on the verge of death just moments ago.

“You're not surprised. As I thought, you knew? It's a keepsake from my grandmother that no one knows about.”

“I would have been surprised if you hadn't used it.”

“Then you should be surprised now. I have no intention of using this.”

The Emperor let go of the bracelet.

His rapidly improving complexion turned dusky again.

It was incomprehensible.

He could have survived if he had just held on a little longer.

Because that bracelet was a sacred relic that could completely restore the user's body once.

It was imbued with a power that could reverse even death, not to mention illnesses, and even if one was torn to shreds, as long as it wasn't too long ago.

“Ash, it's time for you to answer my question.”

The Emperor said, his voice still cracked, though the coughing had lessened somewhat.

“I've already told Gabir. Only Gabir. He is my loyal subject, and he has the ability to judge between truth and falsehood.”

“Is that so.”

“Can you live as my face? As one of your many faces.”

The Emperor asked.

It would probably be his last request and question.

“…….”

The answer was already decided.