Chapter 163: Second Thoughts

It was past evening, and the sun was about to set.

Homeless and poor people were getting ready and rushing to a certain place with bowls and glasses in their hands.

They all lined up to the table where the food was served.

There were dozens of tables serving melted rice and hundreds of homeless people eagerly waiting for their turn to come.

Among them, there was a woman in a cloak wearing a blue dress, Azure eyes, and black hair.

She was wearing a bracelet in her hand and a pendant on her neck.

She carefully glanced around as though she was hiding from something or someone.

However, just like those homeless people, she was also waiting for her turn to come.

When her turn came, she didn't have a bowl or glass with her. But there were extra glasses on the tables.

"Where is your vessel?" the soldier asked.

"I don't have one, so please let me borrow one of the glasses from the table," the woman replied.

"Not happening," the guard denied with no hesitation.

The woman glanced around at the other soldiers, but all of them gave her the cold shoulder.

"Get out of the line!" The old man standing behind the woman in the line yelled.

"If you don't have a vessel, then get out of here," the soldier asserted.

The woman bit her lips and moved her hand forward to the table, making a shape like a bowl by joining her hands together.

The soldier sighed and filled the woman's hand with hot melted rice.

The woman wanted to scream in pain, but she endured it as though she was used to it.

Then, she rushed to the corner of the alley where a one-year-old boy was waiting for her.

The woman swallowed all the pain and smiled brightly at the boy. But the boy made a sad and painful expression on his face as though he could understand everything.

The woman sat beside the boy with still hot melted rice in her hands and blew it with her mouth to make it cool.

After blowing for a while— when the melted rice had finally gotten cooler, the woman slowly moved her hands at the boy's mouth to feed him. But, just as the boy was about to open his mouth, the woman pulled her hands back and sniffed the melted rice.

Her eyes widened as she bit her lips and threw the melted rice in the ground.

She glanced at the boy with a painful expression on her face and started crying.

The food the kingdom was serving to the homeless people had poison in it.

Homeless people would die from hunger anyway, but the king was so cruel that instead of killing them from hunger, he wanted to kill them slowly by feeding them a slow poison.

The poison had a special type of effect in that it didn't smell when it was hot and only smelled when it was cold.

However, as the food only arrived twice a week, the homeless people were always famished that they ate the food when it's hot.

"Kind people always meet a bad end," the woman muttered.

She then gasped and covered her mouth as she glanced at the boy with a horrified look on her face.

"No. Please forget I ever said that," the woman uttered to the boy, even though he shouldn't be able to understand anything.

"I am sorry." She started crying and hugged the boy in her arms: "I am sorry... Zeus."

____

"Master Zeus, are you listening?" Arnold asked Nero with a nudge.

Nero and his party, and Arnold and Rosemary were on their way to the next town in a luxurious carriage of two horses.

The girls were sitting in the back seat of the carriage; Sophia and Rosemary were seated next to each other, and Emilia and Asteria were sitting opposite to them. 

Nero and Arnold were driving the carriage. However, it looked like only Nero was driving the carriage, while in truth, it was Arnold who was handling the carriage.

Nero was back to his senses after receiving a nudge from Arnold. He looked up at the sky and muttered, "I am having second thoughts."

"Huh?"

Nero sighed and spoke in a solemn voice: "Sometimes, I think I shouldn't have been born into this world. But, I always have second thoughts."

"Did that sight remind you of something?" Arnold asked.

"..." Nero stayed silent and didn't bother to answer Arnold.

Sophia clenched her fist with a wry smile on her face behind the carriage.

After a while, Nero glanced at Arnold and uttered, "What happened after I was sealed?"

Arnold was one of Nero's friends who he had invited to his wedding. However, because of a sudden war, all of them had to participate in the war.

"The war continued for two years," Arnold replied with a distant smile.

"I see."

"But, we won the war." 

"I see."

"But…"

"But?"

"Many of our friends died," he added.

"I see."

"I also died, but since Mary was with me, she helped me by transmigrating my soul to the body of a newborn.

"I see."

"Ajax… died too."

"I… see."

The rest of the journey was quiet after that; no one said anything, not a word—the same with the girls.

However, Rosemary glanced at Asteria and nudged Sophia.

Sophia looked at Rosemary, and she pointed her gaze at Asteria.

She looked at and found her crying.

"Asteria?" Emilia placed her hand on Asteria's shoulder and asked, "What's wrong?"

Sophia patted Asteria's head and uttered in a gentle voice: "Don't worry, we are here for you, and we will always be there for you."

Asteria heard Arnold mentioning Ajax's death and couldn't help but cry.

She was the reincarnation of princess Astrea, and Ajax was her father, which made Asteria his daughter, too.

Even though she personally had never received parenting and love of Ajax's, the feelings she got with her memories never changed.