Ch.212Monarch (4)

A Memory from the Past.

When the snake stayed in the kingdom, the monarch offered him a drink.

An underground city where not even starlight entered. A gloomy night view.

The two conversed against such a backdrop.

“Would you care for a drink?”

“I’m not quite old enough to enjoy alcohol yet.”

“Oh my… I keep forgetting you’re still a child. I forget every time.”

“You seem to be getting senile. I’ll be considerate of that.”

“Tsk tsk, such disrespect when speaking to your elders.”

“I don’t believe we’re in a relationship that requires formality.”

The snake responds coldly.

Despite such coldness, the monarch merely shrugged his shoulders.

He simply smiled with slight disappointment as he tilted his glass.

Clink-

The sound of ice hitting the glass echoed.

A winter wind seemed to blow between the two people.

After a moment of silence, the old man suddenly spoke.

The strong scent of alcohol spread.

“You know what?”

“I don’t.”

“You may hate me to death, but I don’t think you’re all that bad.”

“…What are you trying to say now? I have no intention of being swayed.”

“I’m not trying to manipulate you. I’m just speaking my honest thoughts.”

“Honest thoughts… that doesn’t suit you.”

“Why? Did you think I always lived with lies?”

“Weren’t you?”

“Well, who knows.”

Chuckle-

The old man laughed a few times, then fiddled with his glass.

Something lingered in the coolly formed shadows.

As if reflecting on something.

“You and I are very similar. At the same time, completely different.”

“That way of speaking again…? It would be nice if you spoke more clearly.”

“You’re still young. You pretend to be an adult, but essentially you’re no different from others your age.”

“What a fresh observation. It’s the first time I’ve heard such a thing from someone else.”

“Perhaps you haven’t met a true adult yet.”

“So, are you saying you’re a true adult?”

“Why not?”

“You’re truly unbelievable.”

The snake furrowed his brow while the monarch burst into laughter.

The dew collected in the glass flows with the night.

He speaks with a somewhat softened atmosphere.

“Let me give you one piece of advice.”

The monarch’s eyes were slightly relaxed.

“Don’t regret.”

“Regret what?”

“Anything.”

With sunken eyes.

The snake tilts his head but asks for the meaning.

“Does that mean don’t do things you’ll regret? Or does it mean don’t regret things even after you’ve done them?”

“That part depends on your interpretation.”

“……”

“Which one do you want to be?”

A question given casually.

The snake couldn’t answer hastily and maintained a straight silence.

The old man lightly punched the boy’s shoulder.

With a word as if to say it didn’t matter either way.

“Don’t worry. You’re still young.”

“Why the sudden talk about youth?”

“You can become either one if you want. That’s the privilege of youth.”

“You’re being ambiguous again. Your manner of speaking is particularly dense today.”

“Ambiguity is the greatest aesthetic created by adults.”

“Well… I suppose I understand the feeling.”

The conversation continued aimlessly.

The two chatted until morning came, alongside the night view.

It was a memory that had already become a vague trace.

***

Inside the cathedral where starlight seeps in.

The faint moonlight passes through the stained glass.

The colorful light and shadow illuminate the blood-soaked floor.

Holy stains color over sin, creating a shimmering contrast.

The aftermath of battle was utterly silent.

“……”

At the center lay an old man.

His aged body was in tatters.

His blurry vision blinks.

‘Ah.’

His arm wouldn’t move.

Because it had been severed.

His legs wouldn’t move.

Because they had rotted and collapsed.

He couldn’t breathe.

Because his lungs had been pierced.

His aged vision kept growing distant.

Because the old man’s life was fading away.

Splash-

A puddle had formed around the monarch.

Blood from the old man soaked the floor.

He lay on a red mirror.

‘…Is this the end?’

The old man muttered.

Even as he withered, there was no despair in his eyes.

Just a calm and shabby old man.

-Don’t regret.

He had always thought.

That someday he would be punished.

He believed there would be judgment for a life treading on sin.

That punishment wasn’t from the detestable god.

Nor was it from the upper echelons or system he so hated.

Since becoming a monarch, he hadn’t cared about such things at all.

Rather, punishment was something one inflicted upon oneself.

A monarch is one who rules.

Then the one who punishes him must also rightfully be a monarch.

The old man was both the subject of life and the executioner aiming at death.

Therefore, he always lived as if preparing for the end.

-Your Eminence.

-Is this too, God’s will…?

And now, the monarch faced his punishment.

The shadow of death looming. Consciousness sinking.

Despite everything, the old man remained composed.

Raising his golden eyes, he looked up.

“Monarch.”

At the end of his gaze was a figure in a robe.

The conductor. The very person who had finally delivered the monarch’s end.

He was looking down at the old man.

“Even cornered like this, you still haven’t breathed your last…”

The conductor was also in a mess.

The victory decided by a hair’s breadth had dealt a heavy blow to the winner as well.

His right arm burned by a flash of light, half his face melted, revealing his skull.

The conductor’s appearance was utterly miserable. At the same time, it showed the monarch’s strength.

Even in an exhausted state, he had pushed his opponent to the limit.

The man clicked his tongue.

“Tsk… I’ve wasted too much time.”

Despite his fatal wounds, the conductor didn’t waver.

The twitching muscle tissues regenerated his wounds.

He passed by the monarch without hesitation.

Then, he stood before the central cross.

“The conditions have been met.”

His blood-soaked hand touched the sculpture.

The once-sacred holiness was defiled.

“The blood of the false ones, the song of the stars, the blessed land, countless screams, the sacrifices offered over the past decades… it’s time to conclude the ritual.”

His blood-red eyes glowed ominously.

“The true master of the world shall bring forth the primordial night.”

The conductor offered a wicked prayer.

He smeared blood on the cross and drew a hexagram over it.

All kinds of resentment condensed at his fingertips, adding cruelty to the Demonic Energy.

The monarch could only watch such a scene.

‘I was wrong.’

The old man quietly monologued.

He had no strength left.

His consciousness was becoming hazy.

The fallen star was slowly losing its light.

‘It was truly a tenacious life.’

There was no regret in this end.

It was the conclusion derived from his own choices and decisions.

Like many monarchs throughout history, he was simply facing decline.

The old man was neither arrogant nor stupid enough to find this bitter.

For decline is a principle given to all living beings.

-I am not wrong.

-Even if I am wrong, I do not regret.

He had ruled sufficiently.

He had been sufficiently evil.

He had committed sufficient sins.

He had been sufficiently not wrong and

He had sufficiently not regretted.

The old man was sufficiently a monarch to himself.

‘However…’

After a sentence stating sufficiency, a conjunction follows.

Was there some lingering attachment to life?

The old man sinks into idle thoughts.

But life doesn’t allow it.

Crash-!

A shattering sound. The old man’s monologue is cut off.

Even those pitiful thoughts disappeared without a trace.

His aged eyes barely confirm the situation.

“Aah…!”

The interior of the cathedral was shattered.

Red cracks connected in the air, forming a circle.

It was twisting dimensions to summon some “being.”

The conductor was desperately conducting the Demonic Energy at his fingertips.

His expression was full of ecstasy.

“Finally, the door has opened…!”

The scene distorting grotesquely.

Air that gave goosebumps.

An intense tension lingered, but the monarch couldn’t see what followed.

His consciousness was fading. He had no strength left to cling to life.

The old man simply accepted the approaching punishment and execution.

“God descends! Let the creatures of the world face the primordial night!”

What echoed in his ears was the conductor’s loud cry.

Slowly- The monarch’s eyes closed like that.

It was at that very moment.

“Power is so beautiful…!”

Slash-

The voice that had been rambling loudly was cut off.

The next moment, the conductor’s head was flying through the air.

A cleanly severed head.

Simultaneously, a dark shadow fluttered.

“Ha…”

A presence that instantly enveloped the cathedral interior.

Sensing him, the monarch let out a quiet breath.

His eyes followed the fluttering coat.

“You appear quite quickly…”

“You look terrible.”

Thud-!

The conductor’s body fell with a delayed beat.

Regardless, the old man looked up.

With his dying final gaze.

“You’re late.”

A blonde boy with narrowed eyes.

Judas Snakus.

He had arrived here, at the grand cathedral.