Chapter 59 : Chapter 59
There is a king in Jershu.
A king who inherited the throne when his father was assassinated by his mother.
A king who ended all the noble rebellions that followed.
A king who expanded Jershu’s territory to its greatest extent through endless conquest.
To praise these great deeds, everyone on the continent knows him by one name.
“The Lion King.”
Duce spoke his father’s epithet, his body trembling slightly.
“I was the Lion King’s First Prince, but I was confined to the detached palace from the moment I was born. Neither my mother nor my father ever came to see me.”
Recalling a rare happy moment from those days, Duce’s trembling stopped and a faint smile touched his lips.
“The only one who came to see me was the Marquis of Blanc. Whenever I asked about my parents, the Marquis would tell me that my father was the Knight King and my mother was a noble lady worthy of him.”
Duce’s smile widened, as if he were asking himself if he had truly been happy back then.
“So I admired knights, like my father. I wanted to become a knight worthy of a noble lady like my mother.”
Smiling, Duce lifted his head to look at the night sky.
“I devoured novels about knights because I admired them. I learned about knighthood from the Marquis because I wanted to become one. However…”
But Duce’s head never reached the night sky.
“One day, my father came to me. I saw him for the first time and told him, ‘I want to become a knight like you.’ And then my father said…”
Duce’s head had not stopped of its own will.
“‘A cripple like you has no right to speak of knights.’”
His back was so bent that he could not raise his head high enough to see the sky.
“‘If your mother hadn’t taken responsibility for making a cripple with my blood—by killing herself—I would have killed you the day you were born.’”
That day, Duce finally understood.
That he was locked in the detached palace because he was a hunchback, too shameful to be seen.
That his mother had killed herself for the sin of giving birth to a hunchback, to save his life.
That his father was so ashamed of him, he wanted him dead.
“And the king beat me and said, ‘I want to kill you, but I made a promise to your mother. So become a jester. If you can’t even be a jester, I will kill you.’”
After that meeting, Duce was moved to the main palace where the king lived.
If he did not act like a true jester, the king would beat him to within an inch of his life.
His brothers, taking their cue from the king, would torment him if he did not play the clown.
“Yes. That’s how it was. To live, I had to become a clown.”
Duce lowered his head and gazed at the night sky reflected on the surface of the waterway. Since he could not look at the sky directly, he looked at its reflection.
He felt pathetic, a cripple who couldn’t even look at the sky. And yet, he pitied the part of himself that refused to give up, the part that still gazed at its watery reflection.
Tearing his eyes from his own plight, Duce turned his head toward Sevha.
Sevha was listening to Duce’s story while looking directly up at the night sky.
Watching Sevha do with ease what he could not, Duce poured out his heart.
“I envy you. I envy you so much it’s driving me mad.”
Sevha lowered his head and looked at Duce. He finally understood why the Prince wore such a look of twisted admiration and envy.
The king had tried to shatter Duce’s admiration for knights with the terror of violence.
But the admiration had not shattered completely. It had only broken in half, and envy had filled the void.
He had submitted to fear, but his violent admiration and envy never disappeared… like a leashed beast.
Sevha understood what kind of man Duce was, but he did not know what to say.
Sevha’s world was one of hunters, where there was no time for self-reflection, only the goal.
So, like a man from such a world, Sevha simply said what needed to be said.
“The Great Underground Road is filled with undead. If the seal is broken, they will pour out. Help me stop the investigation.”
At Sevha’s directness, devoid of comfort or advice, that same look of envy and admiration twisted Duce’s face.
Then, he burst into laughter, as if Sevha were truly something remarkable.
“You chase only your goal! I envy you! I really do!”
Duce kept laughing. He laughed, but he also cried, as if his own pathetic state were magnified by Sevha’s presence.
“A man like you becomes the knight who throws down a handkerchief and challenges a mighty foe for the sake of a noble lady!”
Duce kept crying. He laughed as much as he admired, but tears flowed as much as he was jealous.
“You’ll become a hero, envied by men like me, admired by men like me…”
His laughter and tears spent his energy, until his bent back could no longer support him. He collapsed, his face hitting the ground.
As he did, Sevha’s pitch-black handaxe, tucked at his waist, came into view.
Carved on the handaxe was the image of one woman sending another away.
Duce looked at the image, then rose to his feet.
“Do you know what the carving on your handaxe is?”
“Diaka, sending Jestika away.”
“Do you know why Jestika and Diaka parted ways?”
Sevha recalled the part of the story that Fernoka had omitted in the chapel and answered, “Because they were too different.”
Duce nodded as if to say, You and I, also, are too different. As if to say, That’s how it is.
And then, like Jestika, Duce turned his back and walked away.
Sevha could not understand how he and Duce were different.
He only felt a stifling frustration as he watched Duce walk toward the end of that dark road.
He wanted to say something to relieve the tightness in his chest, but he didn’t know the reason for it, so he couldn’t say anything.
So, wanting to spit out anything to ease the feeling, he recited a line from the myth.
“And so, Diaka and Jestika decided to fight, following the voice of Gerda.”
***
“The Third Prince’s pet dog is threatening the nobles of the domain to testify to the truth of the Great Underground Road.”
Teresse sat at the desk in her office, speaking to Sevha, who was perched on top of it.
“The nobles who know the truth are preparing to shift the blame to House Blanc, and the nobles who don’t are starting to fawn over the Count, anxious that House Blanc might be annihilated.”
But Sevha wasn’t even looking at Teresse, lost in his own thoughts.
“The fortunate thing is that this investigation seems to be the Third Prince’s sole doing. The problem is that it will take time to inform the king of the Third Prince’s plans…”
Teresse stopped talking when she realized Sevha was not paying attention.
To get his attention, she poked his wound with her finger.
Sevha grunted in pain and glared at Teresse. “What are you doing?”
“What are you doing?”
Sevha looked at her intently for a moment before voicing his concern.
“How do I remove the leash from a leashed beast?” A vague question.
Teresse replied at once, as if it were a ridiculous thing to ask.
“Why should anyone else remove a beast’s leash? If it’s a beast, it should either break the leash itself or die under the weight of its fate.”
Sevha smiled faintly at the sound reasoning, as if to admit it was indeed a foolish question.
Just then, the office door burst open, and Legra ran in.
Having seen this happen several times recently, Sevha asked immediately, “What bad news have you brought this time, Legra?”
“Pesyon…!”
“It’s Poshong, Legra.”
“Pashon, Hunter.”
“Anyway, that rat is going to use Prince Duce’s knights to open the gate to the Great Underground Road!” Legra yelped.
A second later, the door burst open again.
Pashon and his men, along with Duce and the Knight of Ornament, entered the office.
“Bastard! I can endure no more! Whether you permit it or not, I will open the gate to the Great Underground Road immediately!”
According to Teresse, what they needed now was time.
Sevha considered how to stall, then spoke.
“We still haven’t caught the culprit who instigated the recent attack on Prince Duce. If you go outside the castle in such a dangerous situation, you might be attacked again.”
It was a threat: If you leave the castle, I’ll kill you all and blame someone else.
Pashon couldn’t find a retort and ground his teeth, then shot Duce a look, as if to say, Say something.
Duce, frightened, said, “A-A needless worry. The recent attack was my own doing.”
“What… did you say?”
“I-I wished for my father to worry about me, so I bade the attackers to attack me.”
As Duce told the clumsy lie, his cadence growing even stranger than usual, a silence fell over the room.
Duce is still a prince, Sevha thought. If the Third Prince’s pet dog uses Duce’s authority, it’ll be hard to buy time. In the end… I have to stall with a reason Duce can’t refuse.
To find a way, Sevha thought about what he knew of Duce.
“I devoured novels about knights because I admired them. I learned about knighthood from the Marquis because I wanted to become one.”
He recalled the admiration Duce held.
“Yes. That’s how it was. To live, I had to become a clown.”
He recalled the envy Duce harbored.
“A man like you becomes the knight who throws down a handkerchief and challenges a mighty foe for the sake of a noble lady!”
He recalled Duce’s state as a leashed beast.
Having thought that far, he found a way.
“Magus. Do you have a handkerchief?”
“I do.”
“Give it to me.”
When Teresse gave him the handkerchief, Sevha took it and walked toward Duce and Pashon.
“W-What are you trying to do?”
Pashon scurried behind the Knight of Ornament, but Sevha didn’t even glance his way. He stood before Duce.
Then, he tossed the handkerchief in Duce’s face.
Everyone in the office knew the meaning of Sevha’s action.
“Dan le Blanc challenges Duce Barsh to a duel.”
As Sevha issued the sudden challenge, Pashon, realizing it was a ploy to delay the investigation, screamed in protest.
“Why this sudden talk of a duel! Duce Barsh! There is no need to play along with such tricks!”
But Duce only stared at the fallen handkerchief.
Sevha spoke of the duel’s meaning. “Duce. Let’s duel, like the knights in the novels.”
Pashon looked at Duce, about to scream at him to refuse the duel at once.
But Pashon could not scream. Duce wore an expression he had never imagined.
“Of all the words I have heard in my life, these are the most joyous.”
Duce was smiling brightly, tears streaming down his face.
Sevha knew why.
For Duce, who both admired and envied the man he saw as a knight from the novels, a duel with him—fought in the manner of those novels—was the realization of a dream.
It was an offer he could never refuse.
And so, Duce answered, “Duce Barsh accepts the duel with Dan le Blanc.”
***
At dusk, a large crowd had gathered in Rasseu Square.
They were spectators, gathered to watch the duel that had been arranged a week prior.
Among them were Sevha’s companions.
Teresse, Hwin, Mary, and Vega were on the second-floor terrace of a nearby building.
Legra, Eshu, Tataka, and Baren were at the very front of the crowd.
A moment later, Duce emerged from the crowd, flanked by Pashon and the Knight of Ornament.
Duce leaned on a sword as if it were a cane and wore light armor.
The crowd began to murmur as soon as they saw Duce’s hunched back.
“Can he even fight with that body?”
“Shh. He’s still a prince.”
But the murmuring soon ceased.
Thud.
From the opposite side of the crowd, Sevha emerged.
Thud.
Sevha wore no armor and carried no weapon.
Thud.
Watching Sevha approach, Duce had a thought Sevha could never have imagined.
Death approaches.