episode_0018

My entire body felt hot, as if ablaze.

‘It’s been a long time. Welcome~’

It felt as if that past moment, which I was meeting again after ten years, was greeting me.

At the same time, a temptation echoed sweetly in my mind.

‘You’ve already been through it once. This time, I’ll truly lead you to the ends of the sky, so drink it all. Aren’t you afraid of wasting all the blood and corpses, the hatred and rage you accumulated?’

I couldn’t tell if it was my own voice, the voice of the ‘realm’ I had built up and then lost, or the remnant of the Nine Heavens Extinguishing Flame Art.

The unidentified voice tempted me by changing its tone, cadence, breathing, and the emotions contained within it.

Not a chance.

I somehow knew that even if I grew stronger in that way again, there would be nothing left for me in the end.

I poured every drop of the tempting but lethal drug onto the ground.

Ras Etgard had returned from the end of the hell he had created for himself, and the foolishness and immaturity of his past life must never be repeated.

Being forgiven for ‘I didn’t know’ twice applies not only to Irha but also to me.

‘Irha. Don’t worry and wait. I’ll wake up fine… Take care of yourself.’

I spoke to those innocent eyes, which looked at me with worry but were full of trust.

It is truly a joyous thing to have someone who trusts me, anytime, anywhere.

My vision blurred, and I lost consciousness.

However, this time, unlike before, I was able to avoid losing myself within that darkness.

*

I stood once again on that day of apocalypse, now a bygone past.

The world was entirely engulfed in pitch-black darkness.

Stars, sky, night, all were erased.

Even the last faint current flowing beneath the frozen world had stopped,

The sky collapsed,

The earth sank,

And you too…

Before my eyes, the magnificent Empress, who had been nobler than anything in this world, always commanding everything, was fading away emptily.

My master, who once stood at the ends of the sky, was now sprawled on the ground, weakly calling my name with blood-laced coughs.

“Cough… Ra… Ras… Ras…”

What did I answer her at the end of the apocalypse…?

“I haven’t gone anywhere. I’m here.”

Seeing her searching for me with her dilated pupils, my heart ached as if being carved out.

Because I already knew what desperate words she had left for me in her final moments.

“Ras… I’m… I’m sorry… love… love…”

Thud, her beautiful lips closed weakly.

Thus, Semere Laufeyga Kashmir died.

Two words that suited her least in the world, left unfinished.

“……”

Angry at this foolish woman who left without finishing a single word, I probably didn’t answer her.

Resentful of the one who could no longer hear, even if I answered her heart belatedly, I must have stubbornly kept my mouth shut.

Rising from my place with a heavy heart, before my eyes stood an incomprehensible entity, just as it had been then.

It had the form of a human, yet at the same time, an abyss, so distant its beginning and end were unfathomable, looked at me and parted its emotionless lips.

“You are the last one…”

I did not answer the chilling, eerie voice.

No matter how strong the opponent, Ras Etgard always threw himself forward, burning himself up.

Completely consuming my body, more than half burned and little left, I threw myself into the pitch-black abyss.

Would this frozen night desperately burn once more?

Towards the unmoving, cold darkness, a ferocious flame, capable of consuming and evaporating even oceans, surged forward.

The pitch-black, icy darkness clung entirely to my burning body.

Swimming within it, I once again encountered the times I had lived through.

The weary past, where I fought life-and-death battles every single day, rapidly flashed past me.

The arena of Kashmir, the battlefield against the Kingdom of Azuldah, the back alleys of the Sephiroth Empire….

The fiercely burning flame gradually diminished in size as it traced its way back through time.

The darkroom where I lost everything and was mocked by Leon, the fallen and annihilated family, a certain night I was framed as a rapist, the forest where I became crippled after consuming an unknown drug…

And finally, the spring garden where I witnessed Leon and Lizley’s secret meeting with my own eyes.

At every moment, the countless turning points I chose and walked down left lingering traces of deep regret, becoming black snares that entangled me and extinguished the flame.

Now, the last flame remaining within me was a tiny ember, leaving only a faint trace in a corner of my exposed, perforated heart.

It was a frail flame, exhaling only a faint, shallow breath as it faded.

Having returned from everything, what do I regret, fear, hesitate about, and what do I desire?

‘Do you fear the thorny path you will walk again, repeatedly? Or… do you fear the apocalypse that will ultimately stand proudly at the world’s end?’

A small flame, almost gasping for breath, tiny and frail yet holding an unfading light and warmth, asked me.

I reached into my faintly beating heart and carefully cupped the dying flame.

Whoosh-

The black snares that bound me, and the abyss with no ceiling or floor, all burned away, leaving not a single speck of ash.

As the darkness lifted, I now stood in an empty space.

Though it was my first time in this clear, clean space, I knew what it was and where I was.

My inner world, still completely empty, nothing yet filled, transparently vacant.

I realized for the first time that the burning hell that had caused me endless eons of pain was originally such an empty space.

Only the very small flame remaining in my hand was warmly illuminating this empty place.

Again, the voice of the small flame was heard.

No, it was being etched into my soul.

Oh flame, consume the past and move forward.

Burn the black night, the frozen rivers and sky, even the fate of the apocalypse standing at the end, and rise above them.

Let go of all regret, fear, and hesitation, and simply hold the first, pure flame in your heart.

Ignite your true desire and welcome the brilliant morning that awaits.

For you still possess a burning red heart,

There will be no more billions of years of night in the place you reach by walking again.

Whether it was an oracle delivered by someone, a guiding principle, or simply a cry embodying my hopes and wishes, I did not know.

However, it was certain that the trajectory of this second life, accompanied by this small, fragile, yet inextinguishable flame, would be vastly different from the first.

The inner world I would newly create would be a flame with an entirely different temperature and hue than the flame of my first life, which I had ignited by losing everything, raging madly, and through only blood and slaughter.

Since I would start from a completely different point than before, the path I walked and my destination would all be different.

Before my eyes, unlike before, the people I needed to protect in this life flashed by.

My family, Marisa, Rosalie, Isera, Irha, and Semere. Finally, Ras Etgard.

These were the faces that had met an empty end and withered away, but who would encounter entirely different conclusions in the life that would follow.

The time of the past, which had traced backward, now flowed forward again, scattering like fragments.

As if to awaken from the shackles of the past and welcome a new dawn.

When I reached the moment of apocalypse again, I could finally utter the last words that had remained as regret, unspoken.

To my last love, whom I had loved most throughout my first life.

“I loved you deeply. If we meet again next time, I’ll speak first. So, sleep well. My beloved master.”

The last image of Semere etched in my eyes was smiling with a peaceful expression, unlike that day.

Now, it was time to return.

*

It was an unfamiliar ceiling.

This slightly bright room felt incredibly unfamiliar, as if I had wandered in a dark forest for a hundred years before arriving.

My body felt a little hot and somewhat heavy, but my condition wasn’t too bad.

I remembered losing consciousness after taking the shoddy drug Irha had given me, and then wandering through an indescribable span of time for a long while.

It was so vivid that it felt disgusting, yet at the same time, it was a beautiful, faint memory.

Anyway, since I’m back to reality, should I check my body first?

I need to check how the drug’s effects manifested.

Let’s see, look once, look twice… observe thoroughly and completely.

Firstly, it’s undeniable that my basic constitution has slightly changed through the shoddy drug and the journey within my inner world.

However, there was no misfortune like the uncontrollable burning pain or the fatally hot sensation I felt in my previous first life.

Should I say it’s a more rational state now, unlike before, when my constitution was an extremely Yang type, almost akin to a ‘crazy disease’?

It feels slightly hot, but my mana, heart, other organs, and muscles all move well…?

…….??!!!

It seems not everything moved well after all.

No, right? It’s a lie, isn’t it?

…….!!!!!!

Unlike my grand resolution, I was immediately met with a major crisis upon returning, and I could only let out a helpless sigh.

“There’s no sensation down there… What in the world is happening…?”

Ras Etgard instantly became a ‘man with a bowed head.’

A flurry of footsteps!

I felt someone swiftly approach my bedside.

“Ra… Ras!! What in the world are you saying? You… you have no sensation ‘down there’!! Are you really okay?”

It was Irha, whose voice was annoyingly loud, whether she was awake or asleep, though I didn’t know how many days it had been.

And… why would you say it so bluntly? ‘Down there’ and ‘nether regions’ have completely different connotations…

However, as a ‘man with a bowed head,’ I didn’t even have the strength to correct Irha’s words.

“Teacher-nim Rosalie! Ras…!! Ras is awake, but he says he has no sensation in his nether regions!!!”

“…Stop… please stop…”

My weak cry couldn’t stop Rosalie-ssi from rushing over upon hearing the sad news.

“Ras, my goodness. Thank goodness… It’s truly fortunate you woke up.”

Rosalie-ssi, looking a little more haggard than usual, rushed to me in a single breath and hugged me tightly.

If it had been my usual self, I would have let out an exclamation like ‘Ohh…!!’ in her soft, ample embrace, but now, I was too distraught for even admiration to survive.

Rosalie-ssi then quickly took my temperature, felt my pulse, and placed a hand on my heart to check something, examining me carefully.

“Whew… although his fever has gone down, he’s still generally a bit warm. For now, let’s do a detailed diagnosis later… But Irha, did I… hear that correctly…?”

“Yes! Ras definitely said that the moment he woke up.”

Under Rosalie-ssi’s gaze, looking down at my ‘down there’ with a blank stare, I felt as sorrowful as if I had committed blasphemy.

Today, for some reason, the spirited Irha was incredibly hateful.

Just like before, it seems the first crisis always comes to oneself.