episode_0091

Shocked by Ian’s words, Eram’s mind went blank and he was unable to say anything.

His younger sister Ellie was an innocent girl.

“Brother~Let’s play.”

Even when he was hungry, he didn’t show any signs of suffering, and even on the day his mother abandoned him, he tried to smile rather than feel sad. For Eram, his younger sister may have been the only refuge in the hellish town of Lugeron.

That kind of younger sister now…

“’Opaa~Noozaraa–’”

I came back as a window cleaner.

“My… What should I do to save Ellis?”

“No. Because a being that has become a ghost can no longer receive the grace of Hel, the goddess of death and the underworld.”

“That, is that true?”

“Why? Does this sound like a delusion?”

“…So what has the village been doing up until now?”

“What the heck, I just mass-produced the window.”

Not everyone who is eaten by a monster becomes a ghost, but in the village of Lugeron, where people were often forcibly abandoned and offered up as living sacrifices, the frequency was particularly high. It wasn’t for nothing that Ian saw the village of Lugeron and claimed that it was worse than all the evil monsters in the world.

“I’ll buy you some time. Run away.”

“You? Didn’t you hate me?”

“Of course I don’t like it. But I hate it more that you get eaten by your sister. You’re still just a snail, but if you get eaten, you’ll be fine.

Ian sighed and shouted at Eram as he watched the Warbear gradually approaching.

“Run away if you can. I can’t guarantee that you’ll win!”

And then he fought the Warbear with only a longsword. There was only one thing Eram could do after seeing that.

Running away.

It was what he had done so far and what he should continue to do.

. . .

“Oh, the tea has cooled down.”

“Village chief?”

At the most crucial moment, the village chief stopped talking.

You shouldn’t play with your readers’ minds like this.

“Wait a minute. I’ll get some tea out.”

“Okay. So what happened after that?”

“As you expected, Ian defeated his sister who had become a window cleaner.”

“Are you talking alone?”

“I don’t know what kind of miracle he performed, but it seems he performed a miracle because he wasn’t just joking and saying he was a warrior.”

The most shocking part of the village chief’s story was that his father was a warrior. He clearly had not told me anything, so why on earth did he keep it a secret from me?

The village chief continued his story while drinking cold tea to me who was worried.

“You may not know this, but they say that in order for a person to become a ghost, they must have an obsession with life. And Ellis

“I don’t think it’s plural.”

“Why did you think so?”

In response to the village chief’s question, I took a moment to collect my thoughts and then said

“If you were obsessed with revenge, I think you would have attacked earlier.”

“Haha, like father, like son.”

The village chief smiled and told me a story about my father at that time, wondering if my answer was correct.

“Yeah, Ian explained it to me too. He said that Ellis probably became a ghost just to play with me. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have won so easily.”

“…..”

“When I heard that, I cried endlessly. I was tormented by guilt at the fact that I was the one who survived after sacrificing my sister’s life and soul. Maybe what I should have chosen that day was not to ignore my abandoned sister, but to lure the monster myself.”

I was left speechless by the village chief’s words.

Because the end of a man who ran away from many things to survive was nothing but bitter regret.

A man like that gave me some advice.

“That day may come for you too. You will either run away from a disaster that you cannot solve with your own strength, or you will fight it, ready to die. Yes, just like your father.”

“Father?”

“Ian said. He, like me, fled from a disaster that he could not resist. As a result, he lost the woman he loved the most.”

My father’s regret consumed my mind.

I never dreamed that someone who had never been in my presence would have such a past.

“The reason he came to the village of Lugeron was to bring that dead woman back to life.”

“Can you raise the dead?”

“I don’t know for sure, but he claims there’s a passage in the Titan Mountains that connects to Niflheim. It seems he was trying to meet the spirit of the dead woman through there.”

To the north is the snowy mountain, and there is the old troll castle, which can be called the northernmost point.

To the west lies the Dark Forest, and beyond that the Titan Mountains.

Niflheim, the underworld inside there.

I felt dizzy as the world view gradually expanded.

What the heck is this neighborhood…

“Well, I didn’t hear it directly, but as you know, he failed. He came back without saving his woman. But… ”

The village chief looked into my eyes and said:

“I brought you.”

“Me?”

“Yes, since that day, Ian’s face has lost its shadow. Maybe you have become an answer to him.”

“I see…Thank you for telling me.”ㅓ

I was able to hear the story of my father, which I did not know, indirectly through the village chief.

“Father… why didn’t you tell me this story?”

“Well? I don’t know. We weren’t close enough to share secrets.”

“Huh? From what you said, it seems like you two are close enough to joke around with each other.”

“It’s my imagination. That guy has a way of playing pranks on people who seem easygoing”

From the fact that you call him that guy, it seems like you’re very close?

“Anyway, the reason Ian doesn’t tell you this story is probably because he respects your choice.”

“My choice?”

“Yes, I didn’t want to limit the future you, my son, could create because of my own choices. Because I loved your potential more than anyone else.”

“…..”

I was somewhat convinced by the village chief’s opinion.

Considering my father’s personality, I don’t think he would want to cause trouble to his son because of him.

‘Is that the same for me?’

I now regret not having confided our secrets to my father while he was still alive.

I’ll do better.

. . .

“Thank you for today.”

“No. I was just doing what was expected of me as the village chief.”

After bowing his head and expressing his gratitude, Si-an headed towards the dark forest instead of his home.

He is probably heading to the house he once shared with his father, Ian.

Is this the last greeting, or maybe…

That wasn’t something the village chief needed to worry about anymore.

Because what happens in the future will be entirely up to his choice.

As he watched the departing Xi’an, the village chief wrote in his diary again.

“Your son has now become a respectable head of a household.”

It’s been just over a year since Ian died.

If you say it was long, it was a long time, and if you say it was short, it was a short time, but in that time, Sian had a family, had children, and even had good relationships with the people of the Holy Kingdom.

And now, I’m starting to think deeply about the future for my newly born daughter.

It was a good sign.

Because I became the best in the true sense of the word.

Unlike us who are busy running away.

“That’s amazing. Even though you’re not my biological child, your drive and initiative are just like yours. Even the way you flirt with older women.”

It was a shame that even the bad things resembled each other, but on the contrary, it seemed like it was proof that Sian was Ian’s son.

“Well, there are cases where even biological children don’t look alike. Isn’t there anything particularly strange about that?”

The village chief’s son, Farrell, was not like himself at all. Unlike his rational and cynical self, Farrell was emotional and braver than anyone else.

Unlike himself and the other villagers, he became a living sacrifice.

To protect his son and wife Nabira.

Since then, the town’s bad customs have been completely eradicated, with Ian claiming it.

So sometimes the village men pointed their fingers at Farrell.

He slandered me, saying that I was ruining the mood of the town with my pointless actions.

But the village chief, Ani Eram, was proud of his son, Farel.

He praised his son’s courage in facing disaster and not running away, unlike himself.

Eram knows.

There was no salvation where they fled.

“Maybe I shouldn’t have run away that day.”

Eram always ran away.

Even when his sister was abandoned, when he abandoned Aunt Vivi, when he abandoned his beloved wife Mabeli, and when he welcomed his sister back as a ghost, he always ran away.

All that came to the end was dry regret and vain despair.

“If no matter what I did, it was just despair.”

Eram continued to write down his regrets in his diary.

I hope that future generations who read this diary will not have the same regrets as I did.

“As you said, I might have had to fight back, even if it meant failing and dying.”

At least you won’t have any regrets about it.