Chapter 169 : Chapter 169
Chapter 169. The Emperor (8)
I started to feel something was off around the fifteenth day of my sickbed visits.
“I think I was twelve. I liked a palace maid of the same age.”
The Emperor suddenly brought up a personal story.
“She was a girl who helped the landscape gardener trim the trees and flowers. She had fair skin, dark lips, and a few freckles. Knowing she worked with the gardener, I deliberately took frequent walks. Wondering if I could run into her just one more time.”
The topics of our sickbed conversations were usually official.
Plans for the northern subjugation, factions among the nobles, trade with the city-state alliance, the quarantine situation in the imperial capital, and such.
Of course, it wasn't as if there had been no personal topics before.
In the first place, a monarch rarely has a private sphere.
For someone in the Emperor's position, a dispute between brothers is a direct threat of civil war, and an immature child means difficulty in selecting an heir.
Even marital harmony becomes a political issue.
“What happened? Well, it didn't work out. Men who have just awoken to women tend to become more timid than usual, don't they? It just ended with me stealing glances from afar. I don't think anyone knew except for the gardener and a few of my attendants at the time.”
However, this was a bit different.
It was a truly personal story.
One that almost no one knew.
It wasn't political, nor could it be used as such; it was just a memory that a man had brushed past as a boy.
The reason for this must be that the story had already reached its conclusion.
“It was around autumn. That year, I was away from the palace from late spring to summer. I had traveled to various territories to learn the geography of the empire and the climate of each region. What do you think I did when I returned after a long time?”
“Did you go for a walk to see the maid?”
“That's right. I went out before I even had a chance to recover from the journey. Full of anticipation.”
The Emperor said with a foolish smile.
“She wasn't there. I found out later. That a fever had briefly swept through the palace during the summer. Most were cured by the priests' miracles, but three or four had apparently died.”
“…….”
“She was buried on a hill northwest of the imperial capital. It's a hill with lots of wild strawberries and roses.”
His tone was as if he were talking to a close childhood friend.
I listened quietly.
Thinking that even the psychopathic, iron-blooded emperor had feelings.
Of course, I didn't blindly believe it.
Even if [Lord's Unyielding Mind] canceled each other out, he could deceive me if he put on an act.
“That year, I made a vow. To live for the empire. To dedicate my life to all the subjects of the empire.”
“Why is that?”
“Because if the empire becomes prosperous, the number of people who die in vain from fevers or accidents will gradually decrease.”
The Emperor concluded his story calmly.
The topic moved on again.
I didn't know.
Perhaps he had a human side to him.
Or perhaps he was just pretending.
At least I could see that he was once a boy, a kid, and a suckling babe.
From that day on, the Emperor told me personal anecdotes every day.
When the Emperor was six, he had thrown a ball and shattered all the expensive stained-glass windows.
On his first day at the hunting grounds, he had shot an arrow incorrectly and hit his father's prized hunting dog.
To revitalize the southern sugar cultivation, he would put a lot of sugar in his coffee, but he was actually a holder of the admirable preference for bitter coffee.
Honestly, I couldn't understand.
Why was the solely purpose-driven, psychopathic emperor telling these stories?
Had he changed because he was sick?
That question was resolved one day when the Emperor threw an unexpected question at me.
“Have you ever thought of becoming emperor?”
Now I know.
The Emperor wanted to tell me the name of his first love.
He wanted to tell me about the trouble he got into as a child.
And he wanted to tell me his true preferences, even if no one else knew yet.
Because that was the only way I could act as the real emperor.
Back to the present.
The Emperor rose from the bed.
His barely recovered body managed to find balance, and he got out of bed and sat on the chair placed beside it.
“I told you that I used my Warrior's power for escape, right? That I intended to evacuate with my key aides to a pre-designated location when a crisis struck.”
“You did.”
“Weren't you curious? Why I chose the forest near Wolfskrig as the escape location?”
I shook my head.
The Emperor put his hand inside his robe.
He placed an object that looked like a pendulum on the table.
A sacred relic.
“I have dreamed of the imperial capital's fall hundreds of times.”
“…….”
“You'll be able to find records from even further back than what I've told you.”
The Emperor continued to place objects on the table.
Bracelets, rings, necklaces, and so on.
All were magitools.
Magitools that blocked curses, defended against hidden weapons, reflected spells, and folded space.
“I thought that this land you have pioneered might become the empire's second and last bastion.”
Each one held a power on the level of ‘Kashutal’s Amulet’, which could reflect all cannonballs.
They would be difficult to buy even with a cartful of gold bars, let alone gold coins.
The table was covered with such magitools.
“I want to ask one last thing.”
The Emperor brought his hand to the last piece of jewelry.
A piece of jewelry made of woven pure white chains, fitting for the name ‘Bracelet of Life’.
That was a sacred relic of the Luark Church.
An item that usually kept the user's body as healthy as possible, and, just once, could show a miracle of reassembling the body to its best condition, ignoring all damage and diseases.
“What is your purpose?”
Looking at the fingertips holding the clasp of the bracelet, I thought.
My purpose.
At first, it was survival.
Because when I woke up in the execution ground, I had to survive first.
After that, I thought about clearing the game.
In a way, it was an extension of survival.
Because I knew this world would be swept up in the flames of war.
And that if the human nations collapsed in those flames, it would become difficult to survive as an individual human.
I wanted to form my own faction and survive together.
Because I knew I couldn't survive alone.
On the other hand, I think I also thought about returning to Earth.
Isn't it a cliché?
A protagonist who falls into a game clears the scenario and returns home.
Since the cliché of falling into a game world had come true, the other half could also come true.
Sometimes, the worry that the hospital bills I had generously paid in advance might run out would suddenly pop into my head.
Although I called him kin, not my younger brother, it was true that I had felt that way.
Perhaps I finally had the leisure to look back on it now.
Because I had a clearer and stronger mind than before.
I gathered these thoughts and said.
“I will survive. With my people.”
“I see.”
The Emperor smiled.
“I think you'll do a better job than me.”
I didn't ask why, but the Emperor answered.
“After losing my first love, I vowed to live for the empire. At least, I thought that was my motivation. But when I came of age, I thought about it again. What if the sacrifice of that first love was included in a decision for the sake of the empire? Which of the two would I have given up?”
He would have chosen the empire.
The emperor I knew would have.
This time too, I didn't say it out loud, but the Emperor seemed to agree.
He nodded his head and continued.
“I learned that what is important and what is precious are different. The will of a father protecting his precious child is stronger than the security of a safe filled with gold and jewels.”
Click.
His fingertips moved.
The bracelet made of woven pure white chains slid off and was placed on the table.
“Survive. With your people. Instead, you'll expand that scope to the empire. This empire is now…cough! yours.”
His complexion worsened rapidly.
Increased coughing and a phlegm-filled voice.
The Emperor, who was trying to get up from his chair, collapsed back into his seat.
I barely managed to catch him.
“Cough! Heok, I-I've already told Gabir. He's like… like a godfather to me.”
A drop of blood splattered on my clothes.
It was black.
The blood on his lips was also dark red.
I laid the Emperor on the bed.
“I should apologize for placing such a heavy burden on you, but…Keoheok! you know it's just a pretense anyway, so I won't bother apologizing. Cough! Cough!”
The sound of coughing would be audible outside, but the caregiver did not come in.
The coughing, which had continued for a while, stopped for a moment.
His ragged breathing stabilized.
It wasn't that he was recovering.
I could feel the body I was holding grow cold.
The Emperor glanced at the table and said.
“The Bracelet of Life. A sacred relic of the church. That was passed down from my great-grandmother to my grandmother, and from my grandmother to me. Do you know that it's the tradition of the imperial family for the empress to wear it?”
“To ensure that the emperor does not lose a place to return to by protecting the empress.”
“That's right. Since I showed no intention of getting close to a woman, she gave it to me in a fit of desperation.”
“I believe you made maidens from noble houses to the countryside cry their eyes out in your youth.”
“Haha, I can't fool you. That's right. I'll correct myself. She gave it to me because I showed no intention of taking a proper wife.”
The Emperor turned his head.
He looked out the window.
The sky, which had been raining all morning, had cleared up and was now shining with sunlight.
“My proper wife is dead. Buried on a sunny hill. My second proper wife is the empire.”
“…….”
“But the suitable consort for the empire is you. I am not delicate, but you are.”
The Emperor took a deep breath.
His eyelids slowly closed.
“I lived thinking only of duty. Contrary to what I expected, rather than regret… I feel a little relieved.”
A small murmur, like a breath.
His emaciated chest, with its ribs showing, rose and fell a few more times.
And at some point, it stopped moving.
I checked his wrist.
No pulse.
I got up from my seat.
‘Kkumteuli, Starfish.’
‘Master.’
‘…Kiiing.’
I made a doppelgänger.
In the form of the Emperor lying on the bed.
With an emaciated body covered in boils and spots, but with an appearance that seemed to have recovered a little color.
The Emperor's motionless body was changed into different clothes and placed in the subspace.
Due to the nature of the subspace, which is isolated from time and space, the body would not decompose unless touched.
In the meantime, the doppelgänger put on the gown taken from the Emperor and wore the accessories placed on the table one by one.
It lay down where he had been and covered itself with a blanket.
And opened the door.
“…….”
Two people were waiting outside the door.
In addition to Archduke Gabir, there was one unexpected person.
“…Olif.”
“My lord Viscount.”
“Viscount Ash, how is His Majesty?”
The Archduke asked.
I looked at him.
From Olif's expression and the Archduke's gaze, I could tell.
That he had told Olif what had happened in this room.
I don't know why.
Did he think that just as the Emperor had told his closest aide a secret, he should also tell my closest aide, Olif?
“Come in. Cough!”
The Emperor called them.
They lined up by the bedside.
“As soon as my body recovers, I will go to the imperial capital. With Viscount Ash.”
“…….”
“Gabir, prepare for the trip to the capital. Olif, manage the domain for a little longer in Viscount Ash's place.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
“…Yes, my lord.”
The two subjects bowed their heads.
They bowed their heads to the same emperor.
But the object of their loyalty was different.
Of course, that didn't change anything.
‘Newbie! You're a pendulum, but the name Tick-Tocky is already taken. Let's call you Ding-Dong.’
‘D-Ding-Dong?!’
Because the current empire was like a candle in the wind.
To keep this candle from going out, I had to pour all my strength into it.
The sacred relic the Emperor had passed on didn't just convey records of the past.
‘Ding-dong…….’
‘Tick-tock…?’
Those who had been holders of the sacred relic in the past.
Among them were monsters who were still alive after thousands of years.