Chapter 481: A Painful Seperation [Part 2]
Shin stood still for a few seconds. The warm breeze of the cozy space tugged at his body from all sides, making the entire space seemingly heavy all of a sudden.
The atmosphere was rife with tension and both of them could feel it, although Shin more than Northern.
He clenched his hands again and tried to suppress all the emotion that kept causing his heart to thump disturbingly.
And he took another few moments to wallow in the thought of what to say to Northern.
After which he raised his head and frowned his face slightly to build up confidence to say what it is, as it is.
Through it all, Northern observed his father. All his disposition formed a visual emotion that Northern could see better than anyone would've.
They further informed him that the problem had to carry a more significant weight than he had thought.
He was already beginning to consider the worst case. And considering such worst case made him tense, like a large rock was pressing against it.
Even he felt the pressure as much as Shin did. And all the atmosphere needed from both of them was for one of them to just open their damn mouth and talk!
After another few moments again, Shin finally swallowed and started.
"I caused it." His voice shook and he clenched his fist tighter again, "No, it's my cursed family."
Northern widened his eyes a little bit at the mention of his family.
He had a first-hand experience of how cursed they could be with how they breed a spawn like Raven.
No sane family would raise a child like that or in that manner.
Shin continued, "If you remember, you wanted to know my family, you wanted to know their swordsmanship because I used to brag so much."
Northern remembered very well and chuckled at the memory.
'Those were fun memories'
It was quite sad how fate had stolen such beautiful moments and much better that could have been made from him.
Northern looked away slightly. The atmosphere felt like it had turned on him, Shin's words took reins of the wistful air.
"It wasn't entirely without your contribution. Our daily drills went a long way in helping me stay alive at the very least."
His words sounded suppressed and muffled but Shin heard them clearly.
And hearing them only made him feel worse, but appreciating what Northern was trying to do, he sucked it all up and continued.
"The Kageyama clan is a family of assassins. They operate almost as a kingdom, they have vassal families that serve and honor them, they train soldiers, in the main family and in the branch family, all of them strictly committed to learning the Kageyama family arts which takes on different forms.
"There's much to tell about the family but I'll say it's a vile place for a child to be birthed and raised. Sadly, my brother and I were birthed and raised in such a place."
He paused, reflecting back on his life in the clan brought a film of memories that left a bitter taste in his mouth.
"Our father was a vicious patriarch, well, every patriarch is vicious, except that my father was more vicious because he kept giving birth to girls."
He looked at Northern who was about to say something but paused as Shin took the words right out of his mouth.
"It's not supposed to be a bad thing. But there's a written law in the family that prohibits a woman from ever becoming a Patriarch, it's simply tradition. Should the Patriarch fail to give birth to a male child. The mantle of the crow will depart from him and go to another branch family. His family will become the branch family while another family becomes the main family. Everything will turn around and the focal point will become the family with the
mantle."
'I see, so it really is a big deal that he had no female child. Was the first Patriarch a
misogynist?'
"So when my father gave birth to my elder brother and I, he became very hard on both of us. I'm saying, save the family's crude ways, he was even harder. He had nine daughters before my brother and I, so when I say he was hard, you can't even fathom." Those memories resurfaced as he spoke, wearing a slight frown upon his face.
"While things were specially hard for my brother and I in general, there was a certain degree
of hard between the both of us. And mine outweighed his... simply because I had something
he didn't."
Shin looked at Northern, his face serious without a shred of triviality. Then he said:
"I was referred to as a genius."
Unknowingly, Northern blurted out, "Sorry, you were what now?"