Chapter 220 – Pain

Chapter 220 – Pain

Pain gives one a feeling of forgiveness.

Dismas, who often acted out arbitrarily, was frequently scolded by the emperor. But even such a trait of his was defended by others, since he was well known for his good nature and not being able to hurt people easily.

To Dismas, battle was nothing more than a fun game and it was very rare to see his battles getting bloody. It was even rarer to see someone dying. Even if any of the enemies lost their lives under his command, he treated them as honorable warriors and held a polite funeral for them.

There were mixed evaluations about Dismas—some said that he was not suitable to be the ruler in charge of one of the corners of the empire, while some said that they wanted to be ruled by such a generous leader.

Yet none of that really mattered to Dismas. The only person he admired and looked up to with a simple and upright mind was the emperor.

But then, Dismas lost the only person who could scold him. It was even when he was wrestling with the Giant King Helgrim for fun and had gotten drunk after the battle. Dismas had never once imagined the emperor could be defeated or killed by someone.

Dismas suffered greatly from guilt and regret, but there was no one left to forgive him now. Pain made him feel like he was being forgiven. It didn't take long before he constantly started inflicting self-harm. The most basic ability of the essence given by the emperor was the ability to regenerate one’s body, and this ability caused Dismas to go through strange hallucinations.

In that instant, his upright mind became bent.

And that was the moment when the Pope came to visit him with a magician that gave off a strange atmosphere. Until then, Dismas didn’t attach much value to the Pope. Although he had heard that Gerard had been showing interest in the Pope, Dismas had been busy respecting and admiring the emperor.

But the story told by the young child that the Pope had brought along with him was something that Dismas could not listen to in a calm manner. The young child told him that there was a way to revive the emperor and it required Dismas to suffer from pain.

Fortunately for Dismas, pain was something that gave him a feeling of forgiveness.

***

“-----!!”

There was no meaning in Dismas’ unintelligible cry and wailing that could be heard from a distance. However, Sina felt like she was about to shed tears upon hearing his desperate screams. No one could tell just how many gods’ spirits had descended into Dismas’ body, but even all those gods were vomiting from pain and sadness in a single voice. It was a long wail that contained all the pain and despair in the world.

Sina stumbled and tightly clutched her sword. She felt a strong urge to stop Dismas’ cries right away; she had a feeling that her heart would also sink to the bottom if she kept listening.

“Dismas Dilver!”

At the same time as Sina let out that scream, she summoned the biggest ice spear she could and threw it toward Dismas. An ice spear the size of a huge battering ram soared from the ground and penetrated Dismas’ abdomen. Then, Dismas’ body that had swollen to a huge size rose into the air with Sina’s attack.

“Stop this right now! This is not what His Majesty wants!”

But Dismas did not stop. He was recklessly using Spirit Calling and summoning the powers of gods way beyond the limit of his capabilities. His physical body was already collapsing, unable to maintain its original form due to the overflowing divinity that was encroaching upon him. He was slowly transforming into something that should not exist in the world.

Dismas was suffering from terrible pain, but he did not stop. Before resurrecting the emperor, the young magician had warned him to never use Spirit Calling after the emperor had been resurrected. This was because the power of Spirit Calling that was granted to Dismas’ used his flesh for the process, and so the resurrection of the emperor would stop completely if the gods were to descend into Dismas’ body through Spirit Calling.

What Dismas was doing right now was basically giving up the ability that has been supporting him throughout his life—there was no hesitation in his actions. He had never really liked Spirit Calling anyway. He had always preferred to train his pure physical strength.

When Dismas had begun to insult the gods by creating Cainheryars, he noticed that the process of reviving them was very similar to the process of reviving the emperor. However, Dismas deceived himself. He told himself that the Cainheryars and the emperor were different, since the emperor was not resurrected in a vile and disgusting environment like the Cainheryars.

Nevertheless, he already knew that all the Cainheryar would collapse if he used Spirit Calling. Dismas could sense that all the Cainheryars that he and Imil had scattered throughout the empire had been destroyed as soon as he used Spirit Calling.

But none of that mattered to Dismas anymore.

The resentment of being used, the revenge on the Pope, as well as his anger, all of that meant nothing to him now. All that remained was a desire to punish himself. He thought that being killed by his father, who he had believed to be the fake emperor until now, would be the only way to be forgiven.

“----!” Dismas continued to roar in an inaudible cry.

“Dismas!” Sina shouted desperately.

She repeatedly summoned more ice spears to throw at Dismas, but his grotesque transformation did not seem to subside no matter what she did.

Dismas was now crawling through the city of Cabragh as a huge unidentified mass, with only his barely recognizable face left. Meanwhile, the Western soldiers hastily attacked the monster with shocked expressions when they saw it appearing out of nowhere.

However, such crude and weak attacks could not attract Dismas’ attention at all. Sina was the only one who was barely able to cause some damage to him, but Dismas wanted to die at Juan’s hands, not Sina.

But Sina was already at her limit. She felt like she could collapse at any moment and that her organs were already ruined. Her muscles were ripped and her nerves had burned up.

Nevertheless, Sina clenched her teeth and pumped strength into her body.

The fire in her eyes was burning more fiercely than ever, and her fluttering blonde hair rose like flames. She threw herself into the air for the final blow at the risk of her life.

However, at that moment, her attack was blocked by a sword that suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

“...What?”

Sina couldn’t understand the current situation, since her vision had only been focused on Dismas until now.

The sword that blocked her was scattered like glass as soon as it met Sina’s sword. Then, the sharp fragments of shattered blade penetrated Sina all over, and her blood vessels that had already been heated to the limit began to madly pour out blood from the wounds.

Amidst the soaring bloodstreams, Sina stood there with an unbelievable look on her face when she saw the person who was blocking her way.

“...But why?”

The person who had blocked Sina was Lenly Loen, the Captain of the Imperial Guards.

Lenly Loen, who was not supposed to be here, was standing in Sina’s way. Sina blankly stared at him for a while and stretched out her trembling hand. Then, she removed the hood that had been covering Lenly‘s eyes until now as if scratching him. Lenly did not shake off her hand.

His two eyes that were revealed under the hood were clearly shining. He seemed to be clenching his teeth and in pain—but Sina couldn’t tell if this was due to the pain of blocking Sina’s sword or something else.

At that moment, she remembered Lenly saying that he was keeping his eyes covered for training purposes, despite having recovered his eyesight a long time ago.

Only then did she realize that Lenly’s words had been a lie.

Lenly Loen’s eyes were shining with an amber light.

‘The swordsman with amber eyes...’

He was the swordsman who fought Sina on the day when Dane tried to assassinate Juan in the Magic Tower.

‘He is a member of Aruntal.’

There were no other witnesses and all Sina could remember about him were his amber eyes. Although she had thought that he must be hiding within the Imperial Army, she didn’t think he was someone who had volunteered to become the Captain of the Imperial Guards.

‘No, perhaps he took advantage of his position as the Captain of the Imperial Guards from the beginning, since that would allow him to come into contact with the emperor’s body everyday.’

Sina, who had been pushing herself to the limit, began to slowly collapse. Her life was already in jeopardy because of pushing herself past her limits. The moment her attack was forced to come to a stop by Lenly, the aftermath of pushing herself started tearing her apart.

Meanwhile, Lenly backed away with a painful look as he listened to Sina’s scream.

“I’m sorry, Dame Sina,” Lenly gasped for air as he whispered.

His hand that was holding the broken sword was trembling.

“I had no choice but to do this for everyone.”

Lenly turned his head and looked back at Dismas. Upon coming to the conclusion that he didn’t have to be the one to finish Dismas off, Lenly strode forward and disappeared.

After Lenly left, Sina finally collapsed completely. She looked forward with a weak breath. All she could see was the crumbling city, a pale sky, and the corpses scattered everywhere. There was nothing she had to be ashamed of, since she was dying as a knight on the battlefield, but the fact that she couldn’t end Dismas’ life lingered in her mind and held her back.

“Juan,” Sina muttered with her last breath.

She tried to say a few more words, but she couldn’t make a voice no matter how hard she tried.

‘Live for yourself. I root for all the paths you will walk.’

Dismas' distorted body slowly went over Sina, who had fallen to the ground. The sound of flesh being torn apart rang out.

Finally, Sina no longer felt any pain.