Silence (3)

“Hmph……”

Edge Forys was floating above the ruins of a collapsed world.

There was no ground. No sky either.

All that remained were fragments of rock left behind thanks to the magic Edge Forys had deployed.

He was simply drifting, lying on a rock floating above the darkness.

“His Holiness was truly a monster.”

“Indeed. But I didn’t go this far against Cotinus. I felt that against you, half-measures wouldn’t suffice.”

“Should I… take that as a compliment? Wallace.”

“Of course. Where else in the world would I find an adversary like you?”

Belial descended near Edge Forys. The red-tinged eyes and wings that had covered the world were gone.

Somehow the world had returned to its original form, and Edge Forys could look up at the blue sky.

It was Belial’s mercy.

It was Wallace Hope’s show of respect to Edge Forys.

Noticing this, Edge Forys smirked.

“I know it’s shameless of me, but may I ask one favor?”

“I’ll listen before deciding.”

“Let her go. She doesn’t deserve to die so meaninglessly.”

-Edge…..

Edge Forys gave a bitter smile as he looked at Hecate, who was being held captive in Belial’s hands.

She had weakened.

Yes, she was in a considerably weakened state. Yet she had still helped him.

With her limited power, she had poured everything she had to create confusion.

She had released the hosts of the dead from Necropolis to allow Edge Forys and Belial to face each other one-on-one.

But that was the extent of it.

Hecate had sent the members of Necropolis back when the battle between Edge Forys and Belial intensified.

The dollhouse was merely a medium connected to the ghost city. They would still be wandering the world.

-I’m sorry…..

“What are you sorry for? You gave me this opportunity.”

She was merely one who collected regrets.

Not everyone in Necropolis was her subordinate. That’s why she had to send the spirits of Necropolis to a safe place.

Everyone in Necropolis might have thought they could die for her, but Hecate didn’t want that at all.

They had died. They had died and left behind lingering attachments.

They regretted and became vengeful spirits because they wanted to rectify those lingering attachments and regrets.

She couldn’t let such beings depart without accomplishing anything.

She had even defied the gods and suffered divine punishment, wandering the mortal realm solely to protect that.

It was both madness and pilgrimage.

“The high-and-mighty Edge Forys using honorifics for someone other than the Emperor—how rare. But it’s fitting. She deserves respect.”

Belial willingly released Hecate from his grasp. While Hecate’s feelings might be uncertain, Belial held considerable respect for her.

That was because she was someone who listened to people’s lingering attachments and regrets.

She was one who didn’t dismiss anyone’s resentment but engaged with them and guided them.

Yes, she accepted even human malice as it was.

“Ugh….. Duke Forys…..”

The request was granted. But it couldn’t be granted without conditions.

That was because he was facing Edge Forys not as Belial the devil, but as Wallace Hope.

This was the nature of their relationship.

They were adversaries who could only respect each other through mutual interest.

With that, Belial… no, Wallace Hope gestured toward the empty air with a cold expression, and Another Hope appeared with his limbs bound.

He was biting his lip in frustration from his defeat at Rex’s hands.

“Since you’ve disrupted my plans, you should at least serve as a substitute. To die at this child’s hands.”

“I see. You truly are a vile person, Wallace.”

“People are just like that.”

“Indeed they are. Hehe.”

Edge Forys laughed heartily.

People were indeed like that.

Not because Belial was a devil, but because such people existed. Edge Forys was someone who knew this.

“Go ahead then.”

As Edge Forys accepted the deal, Belial released Another Hope from his bindings and tossed him a sword.

A single old, shabby sword. Yet to Another Hope’s eyes at this moment, it looked sharper than anything else.

“…I can’t do it.”

“You must. If you don’t, I’ll have to kill Edge myself.”

You know what would happen then. Belial’s eyes alone pressured Another Hope.

If Another Hope didn’t do it, Belial would. Not as Wallace Hope facing a political rival, but as Belial the devil who relished human screams.

“But…!”

“Young Master Another. I’m dying anyway. My age, you see. I must have injured my back badly when I fell to the ground—I can’t even get up. Shouldn’t you at least ease my suffering?”

“……”

Another Hope’s eyes wavered. This was something Edge Forys himself wanted.

Easing suffering. Perhaps that was what he needed to do.

“Young Master Another, come here.”

“……”

Another Hope approached Edge Forys unsteadily, sword in hand.

And just as he was about to take the outstretched hand, it happened.

Swoosh!

With surprising strength for a dying body, Edge Forys grabbed Another Hope by the collar and pulled him close.

“You’re much too naive. That’s why you ended up like this, biting your lip in helplessness.”

He was half-hearted.

He shunned the power consuming his body, considering it unequivocally evil.

This was the result.

If he had at least been able to push back Rex, perhaps Edge Forys could have escaped too.

But until the end, he couldn’t accept what he had become.

“You epitomized the classic hero. I didn’t dislike that image. But now it’s time to face reality. You can’t remain a storybook hero forever.”

“…Then what should I do?”

“Kill me. Plunge your sword into my corpse and feel that sensation. Feel that sensation of sinking into evil, so deeply that you never forget. Engrave it in your soul and always be vigilant.”

Untainted purity.

A naive attitude and upright disposition.

These were Another Hope’s flaws. People sometimes need to envy or resent others.

Another Hope wasn’t good at that. He only hated villains, never envying or resenting those better than him.

“And only by overcoming all of that can you become a proper man.”

“……”

“You wanted to be a hero, didn’t you? By your own will, not someone else’s. Then strike! If you can fall into the abyss and crawl back out!”

Edge Forys grinned as he gripped Another Hope’s trembling sword hand. There was no force compelling him. He was just steadying the trembling hand.

“Then you can be reborn as a true hero.”

One who doesn’t know pain cannot fight for others’ pain.

That would merely be self-satisfaction. Only by correcting one’s mistakes, feeling regret, and still pursuing goodness can one become the protagonist of an adventure.

“Yes, father-in-law.”

“It’s too soon… I’d like to say, but I can’t help it. Take good care of Siris, son-in-law.”

Another Hope assumed a knight’s stance and raised his sword.

Even if he was to kill his opponent, he had to show him the utmost respect.

Thus, with a restrained demeanor, Another Hope thrust his sword to minimize prolonged suffering.

Thud!

The sword pierced the heart.

Edge Forys coughed up blood with a short cry.

But he wasn’t dead yet.

He still had words to say. He had to ask a question to someone else besides Another Hope.

Forcibly delaying death with the mana circling around his heart, Edge Forys crawled forward.

“That’s enough.”

He waved off Another Hope, who was about to approach him, and Edge Forys crawled toward the ghostly figure floating in the air with a gloomy expression.

“I remember when you first came to me, Hecate.”

-……

“You came with the spirits of those who died unjustly because of me, demanding answers.”

Naturally, Edge Forys hadn’t been a perfect person.

So he made mistakes and had misperceptions.

People died from Edge Forys’s missteps. Yes, at his single gesture, people fell to ruin all too easily.

Edge Forys held such a position, and he faced the consequences of his mistakes.

Hecate had come to confront him about that. That was their first meeting.

“It was truly an eerie moment. Perhaps that’s why I became better at what I do.”

It had been so shocking that even now Edge Forys would occasionally have nightmares about that moment.

Hecate had confronted Edge Forys about his hasty judgment and forced him to face the victims.

The vengeful spirit he encountered shed tears of blood as it cursed Edge Forys.

Edge Forys had to listen to those curse-filled words, frozen in place.

-That’s enough now, Your Grace. It seems I just wanted to lament.

But surprisingly, it was the ghost that gave in first.

As if satisfied with simply pouring out curse-filled words at him, the spirit ultimately forgave Edge Forys with a dejected expression.

And requested one thing. That there be no more victims like them.

Edge Forys did just that.

He lived his life doing his best to ensure no one was wronged.

Was it because he lived that way?

When he came to his senses, Edge Forys had risen to a position rivaling even the Hope duchy.

But he still had nightmares.

“After that, how many vengeful spirits resented me?”

-…Not few.

“Hahah! I see. I was still just a novice after all.”

Because he wasn’t a perfect person, because he was someone who made mistakes.

He could only belatedly realize and regret.

The last thing he was curious about was that.

How many innocent people had died because of his mistakes.

A nobleman and politician like Edge Forys shouldn’t have cared about such things, but in his final moments, wasn’t he just a human being?

What he had feared and agonized over all along, he could finally ask in his last moments.

-Edge Forys, may I ask you something this time?

“Of course.”

Edge Forys could no longer see. But perhaps because of that, the tablecloth ghost floating before him looked like she had in the past.

A spine-chilling ghost with long, snow-white hair.

Yet with a gentle smile—God’s apostle.

She asked:

-Do you have any regrets you’re leaving behind?

“Ah, yes. Of course I do.”

In his final moment, Edge Forys spoke of his regret with a mischievous child’s smile.

“Getting stabbed is quite painful. I should have told them to stab gently when dealing with political rivals……”

The final words of Edge Forys, always noble and strict, were as bright as a boy’s joke.

*     *      *

Belial wandered alone through the Hope duchy, where only ruins remained. Everything was gone. His domain, the people, even the traces.

Everything that Wallace Hope had achieved as a human had vanished.

Belial remembered.

The final moment. Like an imprint, he remembered Edge Forys smiling like a child and making a joke.

“The political rival is gone, and only silence remains.”

Belial muttered, then immediately clicked his tongue and shook his head.

“Your humor was better than mine.”

He admitted defeat.

It seemed he couldn’t beat Edge Forys as a human after all.

Like a defeated opponent, Belial decided to show him the utmost respect.