601. [Side Story] 포고 (Proclamation)
After the funeral ceremony, I visited all the newly created graves.
“Your Highness Prince Ash.”
In front of one of the tombs, a man who had been silently touching his handsome beard looked back at me.
It was Valen, the head of the city-state federation.
“Vallen Ball.”
As I approached and called his name, he glanced at the newly created tomb in front of him. I saw the tomb too.
It was the tomb of the Insect Busters, a mercenary group that had been introduced by Valen during this defense.
Five mercenaries who were experts in exterminating insects, but were captured by Lord of the Flies in the first battle of the outpost.
Unable to retrieve even their bodies, they had to be buried in empty coffins, and there were few mourners because they had no connections in the city.
Valenman only guards the tomb like a permanent lord.
After a moment of silence, Valen opened his mouth.
“Insect Busters.”
“yes.”
“Actually, it was a one-sided relationship with me.”
“yes.”
“I just scouted him and brought him here because of his reputation.”
Valen let out a long sigh.
“I feel strange.”
“How strange is that?”
“It looks like I arranged their deaths. A very lonely and solitary death.”
“….”
“It’s not just them. Of the soldiers I brought with me, not many survived.”
A hot wind blew.
I asked as I casually brushed back my hair, which was disheveled by the late summer gusts.
“Do you regret it?”
“As the head of the city-state federation, that shouldn’t be the case. But as an individual… is it so. I regret it.”
Valen muttered bitterly and looked at me.
“I, who have only been enlisting, am suffering this much, and I don’t know how heartbroken Your Highness must be.”
“No matter how much my insides burn, can anything compare to the loss of the bereaved? Can it be compared to the pain the dead went through at that moment?”
how can i compare
No matter how much my stomach burns…
I paid a brief moment of silence in front of the graves of the Insect Busters. When I finished the silence and raised my head, Valen asked.
“Your Highness, will you die a lot in the future?”
“I will.”
“To be honest, it feels like it will break my heart.”
“….”
“I’m afraid of that gigantic monster, and it’s painful to see the people I brought die… It’s embarrassing. You are still the head of a group.”
“You don’t have to be shy. It’s normal for humans.”
“What should I do? Will those who have become weak like me be able to fight in the future?”
I thought of Candler. She remembered how she had already fled and returned and fought again like her lies.
Such a miracle, such a sacrifice… You cannot force everyone.
“About two months are left until the next battle.”
I turned the answer
“Until then, make up your mind, Lord Vallen. Will we be able to keep fighting, or…”
or not…
Even if you leave this place, I can’t hold on to you.
Valendo, and everyone else who has fought here. Because I know better that I’ve done my best so far.
That you’ve already fought hard enough.
That my heart can be broken enough. well i know
Valen, who hesitated, gave a bitter reply and bowed his head to me.
“I will, Your Highness.”
***
When the southern wall collapses.
There were many who could not evacuate in time or were swept away by the collapse. Half of the casualties in this battle occurred here.
And, among those caught up in this collapse were wizards.
“….”
Junior was looking at the grave in front of him with reddened eyes. In front of the tomb, two young wizards were weeping, their bodies wrapped in bandages.
They were the young wizards who formed a party under Junior and learned magic from Junior and Diarmudin.
When the wall collapsed, these young wizards who were physically undertrained were caught in an accident.
In the end, two died and two were injured like this.
Junior, who quietly approached the crying young wizards, brushed their shoulders. The three wept together.
“….”
Diarmudin, who stood behind him, watched this in a daze.
“Children die, old people live.”
His dejected murmurs were blown away by the summer wind.
“Children die, old people live…”
“….”
I stood quietly next to him and meditated.
There was nothing I could do but meditate.
***
Skuld and Kellison.
Elf queens and dwarf kings did not have imperial burials. They had a separate burial in their own tribal way.
Skuld’s wooden coffin was filled with white flowers. Heaps of gold coins piled up inside Kellison’s metal coffin.
However, even if the format is different and the order of eating is different.
The human heart is the same thing.
The elves holding hands and sadly singing hometown songs, and the dwarves silently pouring precious metals into the coffin were all crying.
Belldandy and Kelly Bay, dressed in mourning clothes, also tried to hold on, but eventually shed tears.
“….”
After stopping in front of the coffins of the two, bowing in the manner of the two races.
As I turned around and walked out, I saw a giant with blue hair looking at me from afar.
King of the mermaids – King Poseidon was the thirteenth.
As I approached, the mermaid king opened his mouth.
“I have looked down on them.”
“….”
“You’re younger than me, or you’re weaker than me… I was ignoring you Still, in this place where the kings of the different races gathered, I was mistakenly thinking that I was the best.”
Instead of the usual sign language, the mermaid king poured out in a fluent language.
“But it wasn’t at all. Those two were far greater kings than I am.”
“….”
“Sacrificing one’s life to save the people and the world… Even if I had that ability, I wouldn’t be able to do it.”
King Poseidon spat out honestly and shook his head.
“I’m ashamed of myself for being self-important.”
“Their sacrifice is noble and great. however.”
I stood next to King Poseidon and watched the coffin go into the ground together.
The two dead kings wrote wills in advance.
When they die, they ask to be buried here. And after saving the world, ask them to bury them in their hometown. like that.
Looking at the tombs built in their own style, I continued.
“Because of that, those of us who survived shouldn’t feel guilty. We should not regret that we did not die like them. That’s not what they want.”
“….”
“It would be more important to count what they left behind and what we must leave behind.”
The mermaid king let out a long breath. His hand, which held his trident like his staff, trembled slightly.
“What did they want to leave behind by giving their lives…”
After bowing deeply towards the completed tomb.
King Poseidon stretched his back and murmured heavily.
“We, the mermaids, should think about it too.”
***
Besides that, after hearing the graves of all heroes and all soldiers at least once.
Finally, I revisited Burnout’s grave. When I stopped by earlier, the body bag was crying so sadly, it was because it bothered me.
The time when the sun goes down to the west. At the grave site dyed red with the glow of the sunset.
Bodybag, dressed in black mourning clothes, was squatting in front of Burnout’s grave. In front of him, Lily, also dressed in mourning clothes, was sitting in a wheelchair.
“cadet!”
With his young son, Sid, in his arms.
The child, unable to understand what a funeral was like, struggled innocently. Every time I see it, it gets bigger and bigger, but it’s still small.
“Godfather is here, Sid.”
“Aww!”
“Ah, Your Highness! You are here.”
After waving to Sid and Lily, who greeted each other, I headed to the side of the body bag.
“Oh, it’s the waist.”
I’m tired from standing all day. I groaned and pressed my butt to the floor next to the body bag.
“….”
Bodybag glanced at me with reddened eyes, then nodded slightly. I gently stroked the light green hair of the body bag.
A moment of silence passed without conversation. After a while, Body Bag slowly opened her mouth.
“… majesty.”
“huh.”
“My code name, Body Bag, means ‘body bag.’”
We quietly listened. Bodybag mumbled with difficulty.
“You mean the bag in which dead allies are collected. And, the code name came true. All of my colleagues except me, with that death, I survived.”
“….”
“I am scared now. To be someone else’s ally. getting to know someone else. I fear that person will die too. I’m afraid that person, too, will be put in my body bag…”
Bodybag’s face was buried in his forearm.
“All my colleagues are dead. There’s no way I’m not to blame for all these deaths.”
“….”
“scary… Wouldn’t it be better for me to die quickly and go to everyone’s side… ? Then no more…”
Placing my arm on the trembling body bag’s shoulder, I slowly opened my mouth.
“Body bag. You know what a body bag does? It is to return the death of an ally to their homeland safely.”
“….”
“So you can’t die. Surely live, live long, the death of your comrades… You have to remember their lives.”
Bodybag’s quivering eyes looked at me. I nodded slowly.
“According to Burnout’s will, Bodybag. survive You’ll survive and prove it. That the Shadow Army existed here. The five of you lived here.”
“….”
“That we are fighting here, you.”
After a while, Bodybag asked in a muffled voice.
“With that… Will it work?”
“I don’t know.”
I smiled.
“But, let’s start there.”
“….”
“It’s okay to crouch for longer. Let’s rise again slowly. on these ruins. together.”
It was then. Sid, who was looking this way from Lily’s arms, struggled with him and stretched out his hand.
With a babbling of unknown meaning, Sid’s small, plump hand touched the pale body bag’s cheek.
Bodybag stared blankly at Sid.
Light green mixed with hazy brown – Sid’s eyes just like his dad, God Hand.
A faint smile crossed the corner of the weeping body bag’s mouth. Sid laughed and pressed the cheek of such a body bag.
“….”
Lily, who was watching this scene with a quiet smile, suddenly turned her eyes to the grave site.
Like looking for a grave that isn’t there.
Still missing, but everyone has already accepted death… God Hand’s non-existent grave.
***
The period of truce proposed by the Black Dragon, Night Bringer, is until the next great flood.
In other words, until the next boss stage – just before stage 40.
Stages 36, 37, 38, 39… It was said that it allowed them to pass without having to fight four defense battles.
Of course, it’s not safe to take the monster’s words straight, but he seems to be faithful to what I say. It is true that a certain amount of grace period was obtained.
‘About two months…’
Dinner after the funeral.
I visited Serenade.
The upper crossroads branch of Wintersilver was busy. This is because they were put in the forefront of the restoration work.
Workers carried out supplies that were constantly coming in.
past that busy scene.
“serenade.”
“majesty! If you had sent me a message, I would have gone out to meet you…”
“I know you’re busy, but how can you?”
Entering Serenade’s office, I made a request without hesitation.
“I have a request. Send a proclamation to every country, every city, every village in the world.”
“What do you mean by proclamation?”
“You can call it an announcement, or you can call it an advertisement, but anyway, it’s because I have something to announce to the whole world. can you do it?”
“sure. It’s not difficult. Leave it to the girl.”
He took out a new sheet of paper on the desk, and held a quill in his ink-soaked hand.
Serenade looked up at me. Her silver eyes gleamed through the lenses of her spectacles, which she wore as she worked.
“How shall I use it, Your Highness?”
“Recruitment of warriors.”
Behind Serenade was a window with half-closed wooden blinds.
Looking out the window through which the setting sun came in, I recited what I had been thinking.
“Monetary reward, high. Honor and honor, Most High.”
The serenade’s quill, which had been dictating my words without interruption with elegant strokes, flinched at my next words.
“Survival odds, low.”
“….”
“Probability of success, extremely low.”
… fade. fade.
The paused sentence continues as if nothing had happened. I also went on without showing off.
“Nevertheless, let’s save the world. A person who has something to protect. One who can fight the world’s worst monsters, against destruction, for all he loves.”
I finished talking.
“Everyone, come to the southern end of the world, the Crossroads.”
“….”
“Proclamation in the name of Ash ‘Bonehater’ Everblack, Commander of the World Defense Front.”
My words stopped, and the serenade sentences I was following also stopped before long.
Silence fell in the office.
Serenade looking down at the crest and me looking at the city outside the window.
The smell of ink on Serenade’s hands. the smell of paper. The smell of bandages wrapped around my body. The smell of dried blood.
The distant sound of construction, the faint cries of workers, and the faint sound of an ode from the tomb…
“serenade.”
Splitting the silence that filled the two of us, I suddenly asked.
“If the world were to end tomorrow, what would you do today?”
“….”
Serenade slowly raised her head, and I turned my gaze from looking out the window to her.
Our gazes mingled between the setting sun through the window.
Serenade thought for a moment, then opened her mouth.
“Festival… I will hold a festival in this city.”
“and?”
“I want to dance with you. Until the moment the world perishes.”
Serenade laughed.
So I laughed too.
“Then let’s do it.”
“yes?”
One step closer to the puzzled serenade.
I took a new piece of paper from the table, took the quill in her hand, and wrote the second proclamation.
about a month from now. on the coming eve.
The Autumn Festival will be held at Crossroads.
“Even if the world really perishes…”
I smiled and handed the completed proclamation to the serenade who blinked as if he was dumbfounded.
“Would you still dance with me, partner?”
recruitment of warriors.
And, the fall festival notice.
With two proclamations in hand, Serenade stared at me for a while with reddened eyes… Then she smiled brightly.
Late summer is over, and now it’s early fall.
The third-year Crossroads Fall Festival was approaching.
