149 – The Soldier (完)
If there is a theme that appears in most literature without being left out. That is none other than love
Emotion that occupies a common denominator for everyone beyond all times and places.
Fever of joy.
Artists loved love because no emotion could draw a line more complex and delicate than this.
Love was an object of admiration even for ordinary people, not just artists.
Even in an age when survival became a shallow joke, love remained someone’s romance.
It was the same for me.
Is it because I didn’t receive much love when I was young? I was quite interested in making love.
Of course, the immediate survival was urgent, so it ended with interest.
It wasn’t for the relief of s*xual desire.
Like kissing between friends is possible if you are in a hurry here.
In the world before, when solving daily desires was the number one virtue, it was possible to establish a relationship even if it was a casual friendship. In the old days in Germany, it was said that a relationship first develops into a lover after that. It’s similar to that.
I tried it a few times, but it wasn’t very good.
In the midst of that, why did I suddenly become interested in dating? The reason is simple.
As the owner said, ‘a slave cannot even have a family without his master’s permission’.
It was because I saw the lover I had passed by before with such a happy expression.
The feeling of wanting revenge for someone’s injustice and the happiness of someone hurt me.
In a word, it is an inferiority complex.
Other people do it, why can’t I? It started with the same feeling.
As I always did, this time it started here too.
It’s a trivial occasion.
It started with low feelings that would even cause contempt for someone.
“Wow… That’s spectacular.”
Muttered the old man looking around.
“I enjoy the scenery at my leisure.”
Now, the person himself has resolved everything that needs to be resolved. Now that you are ready to die satisfactorily, you have time to look around.
“hahahaha, don’t do that. Look. Where else can you see this kind of scenery? Look around a lot before it disappears. Everything is an experience. Before I died, I saw unfamiliar things and lived well.”
The old man chuckled and spread his arms wide. It’s an attitude that is hard to believe even for a person who was skinny until now.
There was no reason to refuse, so he turned his head and looked around.
It was definitely a mysterious sight.
The nothingness that used to be a single white object is stained with blood before you know it. Colored. My wings were the same color, and the circle the old man drew was the same color. It was the same color, but the difference was that the color of my blood was a symbol of life, and the color of the old man’s was a symbol of death.
It’s sweet and terrifyingly colored as if blood had been added to milk. At first glance, it seems that the original background is bloody and white drops are dropped in between.
It is a beautiful sight. Someone’s death bloomed profusely like an abstract painting.
“Hey. Stupid.”
The old man called my name without asking.
“Why, old man?”
Me too.
“I used slang and then used honorifics. I’m confused… Try to speak more normally. Anyway, what did you want?”
“What do you want?”
“What is it? It’s what you wanted when you came here.”
Should I even say that? It wasn’t something to brag about, it was hesitation.
“…”
“Idiot. Why are you hesitating when you’re going to search here anyway? It’s a story that won’t be left. Talk to someone who will be leaving soon.”
That wasn’t exactly wrong.
Like the story of the demon 300 years ago, a small story that won’t be remembered or recorded.
After licking his lips a couple of times, he opened his mouth.
“…Love.”
“What?”
Damn it. It feels like heat rising on your face. Hot.
“I want to date… That was my desire.”
The old man’s face hardened for a moment. After a while, the corner of his mouth twisted up and the wind escaped between his lips.
“hahahaha! Dating? Dating?? hahahaha!!!!”
“Don’t laugh, old man.”
I felt really bad. A person may have such feelings.
Even if I thought about it, I couldn’t come up with a good counterargument even though it wasn’t a very proud wish, but even ridiculed.
“Keuhehehe… Love. Love…”
The old man chewed on my wish like chewing tough meat and then opened his mouth.
“That’s a good goal. Why, have you never had a relationship with a woman before?”
“No, that’s… Not really.”
I’ve had a kite with a woman a few times before. Of course, the problem was that most of the women I was close with were lesbians, but…
In that world, there are many cases in which people falsely claim to be lesbians with the intention of protecting their bodies from men.
Still, there was no relationship that developed into a romance.
Before that, I stepped out.
“What? So what’s the problem… Maybe, there’s something wrong with the lower leg…”
“You’re fine, crazy old man.”
It works normally as before or now.
“Then what’s the problem? Can’t we just do it?”
This is not such a problem. It is not a physical or environmental problem.
“That wasn’t the problem… It was just because I couldn’t afford it.”
“What are you talking about?”
The old man asked dubiously.
“Isn’t dating, after all, a relationship that puts others first? I can’t afford that. I can’t even take care of myself properly, but what. I’m in a hurry to make myself a person…”
That’s why I couldn’t date.
Man’s romance is love, but how can a person who is not a proper person embrace love as romance?
“For me, love is to transcend me and embrace someone. Without a single doubt, without hatred, without calculation. Only love.”
I am well aware of my shortcomings. I know my empty parts, so I know what to fill in their place.
That’s why, to bugs, to children, to the elderly, to friends, and to the devil. You can be jealous of everything.
You can hate everything.
That’s why I can’t love others properly.
Spica was jealous when someone led the mercenaries.
Lilia was jealous of her achievements.
I was jealous of Innis’ talent.
He was jealous of Wiz’s authority.
He had an inferiority complex towards everyone he was close to.
“So, I want to date when I can be confident with myself.”
So, not now.
When I don’t feel inadequate to myself.
When the inferiority complex disappears.
In that case.
I want to embrace someone only with love without hatred.
I want to suffer from the fever of love.
Why did I have a longing for love?
Now I know.
I don’t see dating as a simple act.
Because I wanted to use it as the last wedge on my way to becoming a human being.
Love is the culmination of my life.
From nob le mt l dot com
People are the point of walking the road.
“…Yes, is it?”
“That’s it.”
The old man laughed. I laughed too.
The old man must have smiled relieved that he could solve everything now, and I laughed at the futility of what I had promised.
“So, old man. Do you have anything to say?”
The white space of the World Tree is almost entirely blood red. I asked the old man
“I have nothing to say. There are things I want to hear.”
The floor started to vibrate. The hot heat brushes against your cheeks. Acrid smoke fills the throat.
The World Tree is collapsing. Goes up on fire
“Idiot. How do you want to change yourself?”
The old man did not ask the original mission of the stranger how to change the world. Instead, he asked how he would make himself like himself.
There was only one answer to say.
“A good person.”
Together with love, it was the goal of all ages and places in the East and West. As they get older, those who pursue them are treated as fools.
It was the number one problem that made my life sick, and the number one romance that made my life colorful.
The cancer that gnawed at the old man’s life moved to me.
**
Innis knows Iva’s personality.
How he hates restraints and stagnation.
I know how bored he was during his month-long settlement in Solusio.
That’s why she doesn’t know what kind of agony Iva must have had until she got into that tree.
I can’t even guess why he went there, why he made the decision to be imprisoned there, leaving his friend behind.
“What is this…”
“It’s heavy~… What is it…?”
Even when others suffered under the weight of their superpowers, Innis continued to look at the World Tree.
Without a word, just blankly.
I chewed on her joys and sorrows, imagining Eva in there. The delusion came to mind once again, and it seemed that Iba’s face could be seen.
“Innis.”
Look. Isn’t he right here in front of my eyes?
“What’s wrong? Are you afraid I abandoned you?”
Eva smiled in front of her eyes.
“Right. I abandoned you. You killed me. There’s no reason why I shouldn’t abandon you, right?”
Innis knows. I know he doesn’t say that. But I couldn’t be sure.
The body, which suffered from delusions for days and nights, could not shake off the illusions.
What if he really abandoned me? What if he left disillusioned?
She had no face to see her family. That’s why she hid even though she lived in the same city.
She had no face to see her friend. That’s why he avoided it even though he lived in the same city.
“Innis, you know. We are no longer friends.”
Innis couldn’t deny Eva’s words. The color of the ink spreading across her chest now was clearly not that of friendship.
“…Right.”
Innis nodded.
“We are no longer friends.”
No longer, Innis could not avert his eyes. Even that delusion told me the truth.
“It’s not your problem, it’s mine.”
Dude. And tears spread down. Even with the music the elves resounded, Innis felt like the main character of a tragedy.
“I don’t consider you a friend anymore…”
As much as the number of notes resounding, as much as the force of the weight that presses down on the body, as much as the waves of madness flowing through this land. Innis’ sorrow spread.
“I don’t consider you a friend…”
He ruined the best friend he had ever had through his own changes.
“I like you…”
The fever of love changed all that. Loss spoke the truth. Innis now acutely realized that his pain and all these illnesses did not stem from friendship.
“I really like it… I love it like crazy…”
It was a heart that should be hidden rather than familiar. It was a sin that could never be told to others. To love the one he killed, to have such an impure heart towards the person who befriended him with a pure heart.
But it was too big to hide, and overflowed.
“So sorry… I’m not your friend… I can’t be… I don’t want to be…”
The singing voices of the elves resounded, and a huge magic circle emerged under the ever-changing sky. Beneath him, Innis howled his love.
“Because I love you… I love you so much… I can’t remain your friend…”
Eva in front of her laughed at her confession.
And then it disappeared.
It was a small yet powerful appearance, like a spark that popped out for a while.
Innis conceded.
Now, there is no going back. Never in those days when we spent together in bed together.
The moment his figure was volatilized, a new spark arose.
The location was right in front of my eyes. However, it was too vast to be in front of my eyes.
World Tree.
The huge prison that imprisoned Iva, the idol of the elves, the tree that corrupts the world to prevent her corpse from decaying.
It has become a piece of firewood and is falling away.
“… Huh?”
Someone muttered that. A small word that is too small to be expressed as a language.
Everyone here was of the same mind.
Question.
A sudden change in circumstances. In a world where change was disappearing, a bigger change than anything else has occurred.
The chatter spread. It spread like a wave. It was a wave originating from the flame.
A bright red branch protruded from the stem of the World Tree. It was bloody. Innis knows that.
“…Ah.”
It didn’t end as one, it pierced and tore through the World Tree like a swarm of insects, increasing its size. Instead of pale trunks and branches, bloody wings filled them.
“Yeah… I think a year was an irrational number.”
Nostalgic voice. Since the day I lost him, I haven’t forgotten a single moment, and I hear the voice I’ve been hoping for.
“It was crazy. How could I be imprisoned for a year by my personality.”
The world tree turned black like a bonfire, and the world turned red with flames and blood. In the center, a person walked out with the fire as the light.
“This body appeared.”
Jerbug. The sound of ordinary but beautiful footsteps struck Innis’ ears.
The sparsely visible skin was as pale and white as the World Tree.
“Long time no see?”
Innis remembered a day. When he was sure he had lost him, he saw a miracle that broke his despair and appeared.
“…Do you guys have any clothes?”
That sight overlapped with the present.
It was like magic.
He was magic. She was more of a mystery to her than anything else.
Just by looking at his face, I knew that Ennis’ fear of witchcraft had melted away like snow.
At this moment, the disease disappeared from Innis.
Something like paranoia or phobia.
All those sick things die and die.
The flame of love, which must be worshiped, burned up.
Innis became a soldier wielding a sword of joy in the name of love.