Chapter 143: Children Who Had to Grow Up (9)

[143] 22. Children Who Had to Grow Up (9)

Don’t you sometimes have moments like this?

You simply think of someone’s name, and a specific scene flashes before your eyes. Or a certain unforgettable scent wafts into your nose. And then, suddenly, you find yourself lost in memories.

It’s like a concentrate of memories.

All the time you spent with that person condensed and crystallized into a single moment. Would it be easier to understand if I called it a one-line summary of those times?

So, for the boy, the name ‘Amy’ was Amy’s back.

It was always like that. The boy was behind, Amy was in front. No matter what trouble approached, no matter what sadness befell them, their positions remained unchanged.

Amy was always protecting the boy from the front.

And we already know what to call such a relationship.

An adult and a child.

Amy was only two years older than the boy, but to the boy, she was an adult. Likely, the first adult he’d ever met.

And now, the boy was the same age as Amy back then. Behind him is Amy, left there just as the boy once was.

The boy wanted to repay what he’d received from Amy.

“I, I, I did it…! The Baron’s dog, i-it suddenly attacked me…”

He wanted to do it well, to be brave, but it wasn’t easy. Tears were dripping down, and his shoulders were trembling as if he were ill.

But the boy forces himself to be brave.

Because Amy must have done the same.

“S-sister A-Amy had n-nothing to do with it. So…”

But at the same time, the boy didn’t know.

That the adults before him were far too cunning to believe his lie.

He didn’t know the baron’s rage at losing his dog,

Nor the limits of the malice a human can contain.

“If, if you’re going to p-punish someone, then only m-me…”

*WHACK-!*

Struck by a poker, the boy collapses to the floor. The Baron pressed his foot down on the groaning boy’s head.

“You expect me to believe that pathetic lie?”

“I’m, I’m sorry…! Pl-please forgive me…!”

“Shut up.”

*Crack-!*

The Baron’s foot stamps down on the back of the boy’s head. With a short cry of pain, blood flows onto the stone floor.

“Ugh, how filthy…!”

With a look of disgust, The Baron stepped back. Then, he glared at Sir Sinclair.

“Well, that settles it, doesn’t it. Sir Sinclair.”

The color drains from Sir Sinclair’s face.

“Baron…”

“Bring your daughter here. If she were truly innocent, this filthy brat wouldn’t be making such a fuss like this.”

At those words, the boy who had been groaning in pain suddenly lifted his head.

“N-No, that’s not…! I…!”

*WHACK-!*

The poker strikes the boy again. And this time, it wasn’t just once.

“Shut up!! I told you to shut up!! Who told you to open your mouth, you brat!!”

With each strike, his skin tears, and moans escape his lips. But unlike the wounds that only multiply, his moans gradually subside.

The Baron put down the poker only when the boy’s moans had completely stopped.

“Huff…! Huff…! You filthy orphan brat…!”

The Baron loosens his collar and turns to face Sir Sinclair once more.

“In any case, bring that girl before me immediately. I will personally…”

Suddenly, the Baron stops mid-sentence. Then he looks down at his feet.

The boy, who had crawled over, was clutching his trouser leg.

“I…’m… sor…ry…”

His voice was so faint it was barely audible. Yet he was gripping the baron’s trouser leg so tightly that his hand had turned white.

“I… did… it… so…”

At that moment, finally, the Baron’s patience reached its limit.

“Head Butler Cromer, bring the chopper.”

“Y-yes?”

Cromer, his face pale white, asks back in bewilderment. The price for that question was harsh.

“The chopper!! I said bring me the chopper!!”

*Crash-!*

A flowerpot smashes against the wall, and Cromer hurriedly runs off, answering.

“Yes, of course…!”

It doesn’t take long for Cromer to return with the chopper. He places the chopper, which was half the size of his own body, on the floor.

“I-I’ve brought it. But why the chopper…?”

However, the Baron doesn’t even glance at Cromer. With his strong hand, he grabs the boy’s hair and lifts them up.

“So, you’re saying that you did all of this, is that what you mean?”

“Ye-yes… so… Ugh…!”

The boy’s body is thrown towards the chopper. The boy immediately tries to get up.

“Then cut off both your wrists with your own hands.”

Until those cold words were heard.

The boy’s body freezes. He barely lifts his head to look up at the Baron’s face.

“Th-that…”

“You said you were sorry. Then you must show me proof of your remorse.”

The boy’s frightened eyes turn towards the chopper. In the gleaming blade, as big as his arm, the boy’s pale, terrified face is reflected.

The Baron’s cold judgment falls upon him.

“Cut them off.”

Of course, the baron didn’t mean it literally. Rather, his true intention was the opposite of what he said.

He wanted the terrified boy to betray Amy.

And after hearing the betrayal, he planned to throw both the boy and Amy to the dogs as food. Because he couldn’t let those who dared to touch his dog live.

The Baron watched the boy, waiting for him to burst into tears.

However, the boy does not cry.

Instead, he swallows his tears with effort and look up more at the baron.

“If, if I cut them off… I-If I do… will Sister… be left out of this…?”

Dumbfounded by the unexpected question, the baron’s face goes blank. But only for a moment, a sneer soon appears.

“Yes, I’ll make sure of that.”

Because there was no way this little boy would actually cut off his own wrists.

He had underestimated the boy.

The boy looks at the chopper once more.

Naturally, fear floods in like a tide. His whole body trembles, and the thought of wanting to run away fills his mind.

But even in the midst of fear, the boy can’t help but wonder.

Was Sister Amy also like this.

On that moonless night, when she grabbed his hand and escaped the orphanage,

When she first stole to survive,

Each time she showed her small back to the boy,

The boy had wanted to become an adult like Amy.

The answer the moon whispered to him that night.

The boy’s delicate hand

Beneath the blade

Teeth onto the handle of the blade

Starlight swirls in the boy’s eyes

The moment tears slide down the blue blade

The boy brings the iron into his body.

______!!

In March, in that half-spring, in that season when even flower buds have yet to bloom, a red flower bloomed far too early.

***

What woke the boy was an itching sensation. It felt as if ants were crawling all over his wrists. The boy slowly opens his heavy eyelids.

“Sir Sinclair…?”

Sir Sinclair, who was sitting beside the bed, smiles faintly. The boy instinctively senses the shadow within that smile.

“Why is, Sir Sinclair…”

“Stay in bed a little longer. Not yet…”

“No, I can get…”

At that moment, the blanket covering the boy slides down. Naturally, the boy’s arms, which had been hidden, are revealed.

Two stumpy wrists wrapped in bandages.

“Ah…”

Memories pour down like a torrential rain. Like shattering raindrops, they are fragmented.

The red flowers that had bloomed fully on the chopper.

The white buds that were barely severed.

The one hand that still remained.

The feeling of the chopper’s handle that he had bitten with his teeth.

The flash that passed before his eyes.

Sir Sinclair’s sword that cut off the remaining bud.

The boy’s back starts to tremble.

Unable to bear the guilt, Sir Sinclair lowers his head.

“I’m sor…”

“Wh-What about Sister?”

Sir Sinclair raises his head to look at the boy. The boy’s anxious eyes are trembling.

“But, Sister is okay, right…?”

Sir Sinclair is momentarily speechless. Because he had been expecting accusations, reprimands, and resentment. Because he didn’t expect that, even after losing his hands, the boy would worry about his Sister.

…Because seeing that made guilt pierce his heart.

“Amy is… fine. The Baron won’t hold her accountable.”

At that moment, the boy’s anxiety melted away like snow. A smile appears on the boy’s previously stiff lips.

“Thank goodness… Thank goodness… Thank… Hic…!”

But the smile soon turns into tears.

The smiling boy covers his face and curls up his body. His back heaves as he let out uncontrollable beast-like sobs.

How, how could he possibly be okay.

Sir Sinclair starts to reach out his hand to the boy but withdraws it with a dark expression. In the end, he stands up and leaves the room.

So that the boy, who has become an adult, can grieve alone,

And so that he himself wouldn’t have to face his sin any longer.

***

Even after the tragedy, time flows relentlessly, and a blue dawn arrives.

Amidst the thick fog covering the world, Sir Sinclair and the boy stand at the village entrance.

Facing the morning fog, the boy looks back at the village where he had lived for a year, while Sir Sinclair looks at the path the boy must now walk.

The boy couldn’t stay in the village any longer.

Sir Sinclair explained that the Baron thought the boy was dead. That he had been fooled by Sir Sinclair’s lie that the boy had died from excessive bleeding.

…And there was no evidence that Amy was involved in this matter besides the boy. Having lost the last piece of evidence, the Baron, though still furious, had no choice but to withdraw his suspicious gaze from Amy.

“So, if he finds out that you’re alive…”

“…He might harm Sister, right?”

The boy nods with a faint smile. That faint smile pains Sir Sinclair, so he lowers his gaze.

“I’m sorry. I can’t do anything for you…”

“…It’s okay.”

The boy gives an awkward smile.

“I’m still alive, aren’t I. Since I’m alive…”

His sentence trails off. Sir Sinclair bites his lower lip. He clenches his fist tightly but… ultimately hands a backpack to the boy.

“I’ve packed food and other necessities for your journey. It should… be of help for a while.”

The boy silently slings the backpack over his shoulder. Then, with a smile that seems about to crumble, he asks.

“Then…”

“Go. Go and… never come back.”

The boy slowly nods. Then, he slowly walks into the morning fog.

After taking five or six steps,

Suddenly, the boy turns to look back at Sir Sinclair. Due to the thick fog, his expression couldn’t be seen from that distance.

But his trembling voice speaks volumes.

“Before… before I go c-could you do me one f-favor?”

Sir Sinclair nods slowly.

“Could… Could you t-tell my s-sister, that I just, left? Th-that I wanted to become a sch-scholar, o-or a r-rich man or whatever… S-So I left… this b-backwater village, a-and I… left her… b-behind…”

His trembling voice finally cracks.

Not even the thick fog can hide the boy’s trembling back, his heart breaking into pieces. The boy, now an adult, swallowed his tears as if he might shatter at any moment.

So Sinclair swallows the boiling sensation in his throat and barely manages to answer.

“I will.”

And that was the end of it.

The boy, or rather, Rem, mumbles something and then walks on again. He hides his trembling back in the fog.

And not long after, a hunter passing by hears a sorrowful cry coming from the fog.

Rem’s cry.

Who can no longer be a fog fairy, a boy, or a little brother.

That’s how this story ends.

…

But there’s a part of this story that we, or rather you, Rem, do not know. Shall we say, the missing part of this story?

[If you ever go back, ask that stupid bitch why the Head Butler knew where our cottage was.]

Actually, you probably have some idea already.

Now, then, open your ears and listen.

Who it was that was *really* supposed to have their wrists cut off that day.