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Densetsu no Yuusha no Densetsu (Light Novel) - Volume 11, Epilogue: The King's Awakening
Volume 11, Epilogue: The King's Awakening
This chapter is updated by NovelFree.ml
He didn’t know how long he slept for.
He couldn’t tell at all. He had absolutely no sense of time. But he still felt that he’d been out for quite a while from how heavy and stiff his body felt. Judging by the pain when he tried to raise them, he’d guess that it’d been two days. But it also could have been three.
His eyes were heavy and difficult to open.
“…Mm.”
But Ryner forced them open anyway and looked up at the sky. It’d stopped raining. Sion was gone. So were the assassins. Now that he thought of it, he wasn’t outside anymore.
“……”
Ryner looked around. He was presently in a cold stone room with bars on one side, and no window with which to see outside from.
He was in jail. The very jail that he’d spent two years in before in order to free Kiefer.
“…Wow. What kind of an ending is this supposed to be?”
Ryner sat up. Sharp pain rushed through his shoulder. “Ah, ow.”
He looked at his arm. It’d been bandaged.
“…Ah, right. Burns from that guy with the burning hot skin… But someone bandaged it.”
Sion’s subordinates had inflicted it, but someone then treated his wounds.
“He said he was gonna kill me, but… He actually couldn’t do it, huh?” Ryner didn’t even have to think about his situation to know what’d happened. “He locked me up.”
But why? Ryner crossed his arms to think. It probably had something to do with what’d happened that rainy night.
“……”
Actually, was any of that even real?
Sion had pulled a weird black sword out of nowhere, and a woman’s arm came out of his chest, and his surroundings disappeared. None of that sounded even remotely real.
“Huh? Was that really a dream?” Ryner wondered. But he couldn’t deny that his arm had been hurt and was now bandaged. “No, it had to have been real…”
Sion had really tried to kill him…
“……”
Ryner was silent. So much had happened. He could hardly process it. But it was all real.
“…Man. I would’ve liked it if it were a dream,” Ryner mumbled. But it wasn’t.
Reality was that Sion had gotten wrapped up in something serious. What specifically, though?
“……”
Ryner shook his head.
“C’mon, self. That doesn’t matter right now.” There were more important things to worry about.
What had Sion gotten himself into? Who was that woman in his chest? What was Lucile? What about that Alpha and Omega stuff? He didn’t know the answers to any of those, but none of them were the most important thing.
The most important thing was…
“……”
It was him. Sion, who had made that stupid face and cried. He’d looked like he was suffering so much. Like he wanted someone to help him, like he wanted to run away, like he was trying to shoulder way too much all by himself again.
Sion was normally a bully who talked incessantly about frivolous things, but never what was actually important.
“…What happened to that idiot?” Ryner wondered with a grimace.
Ryner stood. His arm hurt. He unwrapped his bandage a little to peek at the burn. It was pretty nasty.
“Uwah, this is pretty gross. No wonder it hurts… It’ll probably leave a nasty scar, too.” There was a limit even to what medical magic could do. If it didn’t heal well, then… “I’ll give Sion an earful about it.”
Ryner stretched his arm out and tried to ignore the pain. He had good range of motion. It didn’t feel like it’d scar so badly that it’d cause a problem with trying to move around.
“Alright… I can move it. Good.” He sighed in relief, then nodded to himself. He’d have been in trouble if he couldn’t move freely anymore.
He was in a pretty troublesome situation now. He didn’t know exactly what’d happened, but he’d been imprisoned. So he figured he ought to try and get out.
“I guess I won’t get to see Sion normally from now on.” He’d tried to kill Ryner and then imprisoned him, after all.
Even if Ryner escaped, Sion probably still wouldn’t meet with him. He’d probably just send someone to chase him down and bring him back to jail.
“…So there’s no point… Ahh, there’s no real way to go see Sion, is there… So what should I do if I get out? And…”
Why had he been imprisoned?
Ryner thought of Sion, who’d transformed into something odd that night.
“…He said he wants to devour me, whatever that means…”
If he recalled correctly, Sion said that he was going to devour the Solver of All Formulas and become Truth. But what did that mean? It sounded like the pompous name a god would have. It was absolutely incomprehensible, but he already knew that Sion was wrapped up in something incomprehensible even without considering that…
“…Maybe it’s a Heroic Relic or something?”
That was the only real explanation he could come up with. The things that’d happened weren’t explainable with just magic. And his Alpha Stigma hadn’t been able to comprehend the thing flowing in Sion’s veins.
“…A Heroic Relic… No, it’s actually closer to the Demon Kings in fairy tales, isn’t it… Man, Sion’s gotten himself wrapped in something suuuuuuuuuper annoying to deal with. How am I gonna save him?”
Ryner crossed his arms. It was like a monster in a legend or fairy tale. How was he supposed to stand up to it? Also, he probably wouldn’t be able to walk around Roland freely once he got out of here. He’d have tails upon tails.
“…So I’ve gotta leave the country…”
He had tons of clues. Tons of keywords to work off of.
The Creator of All Formulas. The Solver of All Formulas.
Alpha and Omega.
The door. The key.
The red monster inside of his dream.
‘Truth,’ whatever that was supposed to mean.
And there was also…
“……”
Ryner closed his eyes, then opened them again. Now a pentagram shined on his pupils in red. “This is also a clue…”
With all these clues in his hands, he should be able to figure something out even if he had to do it in another country. Actually, maybe he had to be somewhere else to figure it out. How many years had he spent in Roland unsuccessfully researching his eyes? Was there really anything else to learn here?
Another country might have a lot more information. For example…
“…Gastark.” Ryner grimaced. “Gastark, huh?”
He had nothing but bad things to say about Gastark. They killed Lafra and Pueka. They hated all Cursed Eye bearers, including Ryner. Even if he managed to get some information there, wouldn’t they just kill him the second they got the chance?”
Ryner scowled. “Ugh, they’re no good… but they knew about the Solver of All Formulas thing, didn’t they? Maybe I don’t have a choice…”
Once again, he had tons of things he had to do. And he could still do them.
Ryner smiled, then rubbed his fingers along his neck. His perfectly unwounded neck. “That damned Sion… I’m gonna make you regret not killing me.”
He touched the prison bars softly, then gripped them and tried to warp them. They didn’t budge. But he already knew that. This wasn’t just any old jail - it was a prison for only the most heinous of criminals. War criminals, mass murderers, and other vicious prisoners were the only prisoners here, since they needed a special level of containment. The walls and ceiling of each cell were covered with antimagic, so it was pretty much impossible to successfully cast spells inside.
Even if the bars were weak against the laws of nature, the staff were perfectly trained on how to deal with obsticals the prisoners might try to throw at them, so there wasn’t a lot Ryner could do from the inside.
“…Heeey, Unkie Jailer? Are you heeeree?” Ryner called. There was a jailer he’d gotten pretty close to the last time he was in prison. He didn’t know if that jailer still worked here or not, but if he did, he wouldn’t guard Ryner all that seriously, so he’d be able to try to escape…
“Shut up, prisoner! Be quiet!”
“…Huh. Wonder if Unkie Jailer quit…”
That made things a little more difficult, didn’t it?
Ryner would have to do something like convince the new jailer to come close, then grab him by the collar and tell him to open his cell if he valued his life. Oh, but there were tons of guards outside, too. What a pain.
He tried to run through it in his mind, but…
“…Uwah, being here really makes me want to nap for forever.”
Ryner couldn’t help but sigh. The truth was that before his motivation was born into this world, he was actively opposed to becoming motivated. Actually, wasn’t it pretty fucked up that society forced him to get motivated like this?
Ryner internally complained for a while, then sighed a second time, deeper than the first. Then took a deep breath to sigh deeper again. Then he raised his head.
“…But it’s all for nothing if I don’t do the things I need to do one by one,” Ryner said to himself. “Guess I better try.” He pressed his face to the bars. “Ah, augh, my stomach! It hurts so bad! Someone help meeee!!”
“Shut the fuck up!” The jailer said. He wasn’t far, but Ryner couldn’t see him from his cell.
“No, really, I’m serious! My stomach really, really hurts! Get a doctor!”
“Liar! I know your kind’s tricks!”
“No, this is, y’know! I caught the disease! The epidemic one!”
“You’ll get over it.”
“Seriously, it’s so bad. This is the one that spreads in the air after four hours without medical treatment, you know!”
“Huh? Ah, uh, d, don’t be stupid.”
“It’s literally that infection! And my four hours are almost up…”
“…Whaaat?”
“Hurry! Hurry up and get a doctor! It’s not for me! It’s so that you don’t get infected too!”
“Uuh… This has to be a lie.”
“It’s not! I’m serious!”
“…Tch. N-nothin’ I can do about it, then. Wait here.”
Dumbass, Ryner mouthed.
With that, his first obstacle would be cleared. The doctor would come close, and Ryner would grab him by the neck and threaten to kill him…
“Gyaaaaaagh!”
A scream rang out from the halls. It was the guard who was supposed to be getting him a doctor. “Hm? What happened?” Ryner said and brought his face to the bars again. But he couldn’t see anything. “Hey, Unkie Jailer?”
No answer.
“Hey, what’s up?” Ryner asked. “Did something—”
Ryner’s voice was interrupted by a sound like an explosion.
“Wh-who are yooouuaaagyyaaaaaaaaahh!!”
“Huh? What’s going on?” Ryner asked again.
This time, the sound was metalic. But it was still followed by a scream, closer than the last one. It was in the neighboring cell. “Gyaaaaahhh!!”
“…It sounds like something terrible’s happe—”
Ryner was interrupted by the sound of something banging agaisnt the right side of his cell. It was made of stone. No spell should be able to get through it due to the antimagic circles. But there was a loud noise like something slashing through it despite their odds.
“Huh?”
Another slash and the right side of his cell’s wall was blown into the left side. The sound of them clanking together was horrendous.
“……”
Honestly, there was only one person who could’ve done that. So Ryner wasn’t surprised when he peered through the hole and saw her. She had long blonde hair and clear blue eyes, and an eerily beautiful face.
“…Hey, Ferris, thanks for savi—”
Ferris moved faster than the eye could see. Ryner couldn’t dodge her fist. It slammed right into his cheek.
“Gyaaaaaaaaaaahhh!” Ryner yelled. It was pretty much the same sound the other guys had made. He was flung up against the bars of his cells, then crumpled to the floor. “Augh… umm… why?”
“‘Why’ is my line!” Ferris said, a serious expression on her face.
“Huh?”
“What on earth are you doing here!?”
“Umm… well, exactly what it looks like I’m doing. Being a prisoner.”
“Why didn’t you consult me before selfishly going to jail!?”
“I mean, call it selfish all you want, but…”
Ryner’s words trailed off. Because a tear fell from Ferris’ eyes.
“Huh?” Ryner said dumbly. This was his first time seeing her cry, after all. She was always so expressionless. It didn’t make sense for her to cry.
“I… I’ve been looking everywhere for you! Sion said that you were dead… Sion smiled and said that he killed you… but I didn’t believe him, so I’ve been looking everywhere for you!” Ferris yelled and raised her sword.
“Ah, um, hold up, don’t hit me!” Ryner said, flustered, and stood back up.
Ferris lowered her sword… and embraced him.
“Whoa.” Another dumb response.
She shivered against his chest. “I thought you were dead… I truly thought that you were dead…”
She was really shivering. She looked so small. Unsure of what to do, Ryner’s hands waved around in the air for a moment. But he eventually settled them on her - he lay one on her head gently, and one on her back. He could feel her shivering. “Well… I’m in the wrong here. Sorry. Being alone’s no fun, is it?”
“……”
She just shivered. To think that she was capable of shivering like this.
“Did you… did you see Sion?” Ryner asked.
Ferris nodded.
“What’d he say?”
“…He’s, he’s lost it… He said that he killed you, and smiled, and looked like he wanted to cry, and laughed… He’s gone mad.”
“……”
“…I said that he must be lying, that he couldn’t kill you… but he just laughed and laughed.”
“……”
“He said it was none of my business… And he said to not come back to the castle again…”
“……”
“To top it all off, he’s made preparations to invade Imperial Nelpha despite our alliance. It’ll be a massacre. He’ll kill his enemies, the people, the woman, the children. Everyone.”
“……”
“People here in Roland are full of enthusiasm for their hero king. They say that their hero king has the right to conquer. They say that the whole world should be Roland’s… They’ll kill everything, everything that gets in their way…”
“……”
“It’s mad… Everyone’s gone mad. Sion, everyone… everyone in this country is mad.”
“……”
“But… but you weren’t there. You’re never there when things are bad…”
Ryner moved his hand across her head, as if petting her head might somehow help soothe her. “It’s okay, Ferris. I’m not dead yet.”
She still shivered. “But, but Sion—”
“It’s okay… That’ll turn out okay, too,” Ryner said and ran his hand across her head too. But he was staring at something else - a stain in the corner of the cell’s white walls. It was a dark, nasty stain. His gaze bordered on a glare.
His mind was moving so fast that it hurt.
Things he’d seen before now. Things he hadn’t seen until now. Sion’s face. Ferris’ face. Everyone had smiled. But that time was over now.
What should he do? What should he do from now on?
There were things he had to do, needed to do, must do. Little things and big things both.
The invasion of Nelpha. The massacre of Nelphans.
“……”
So that was it, huh, Sion?
So what should Ryner do? What should he do to stop Sion?
On one corner, they had the king of Roland, the largest country in the Southern Continent. On the other corner was some low-life insect in prison.
What should a low-life like him do to stop Sion?
“…Hey. Ryner.”
“It’s alright,” Ryner said. “You don’t have to worry about anything anymore.” He pet her head gently once more.
Yeah. She didn’t have to worry. It was fine.
Ryner wasn’t going to run away anymore. He was going to do it.
If a world where no one cried was impossible.
If a world where no one was hurt was impossible.
If it was all truly just a pipe dream.
Then he’d do it.
He’d stop Sion. He’d save Sion.
He at least had the power to do that much.
“…I’m leaving the country, Ferris.”
Ferris looked up at him. “You’re leaving?”
Ryner nodded and pulled away. “I’m going to save Sion. Come with me.”
“M-mm. But Sion is truly—”
“I’ll save him,” Ryner repeated. “So don’t cry. You don’t have to worry.”
“I-I’m not crying.”
“Ahahah.”
“B-bastard.”
“Huh? No, um… listen, it’s not like that, I wasn’t trying to make fun of you… hey, put that sword down!” Ryner yelled, then sighed.
His head was racing again. There were so many things he had to do. If Sion was somewhere far away, then he only had to give chase. But what did he need to do for that goal? What did he have to do for it to work?
“……”
Ryner’s eyes narrowed as he glared at the stain on the wall.
If he had to go far away to reach him… he’d take baby steps. If a low-life little insect couldn’t save Sion, then he’d become a real person. If a plain ol’ person wasn’t enough, he’d become a king.
And if Sion said that he couldn’t bear all of the weight on his shoulders… then Ryner would say the same thing Sion said to him. He’d recite their promise.
‘Come with me.’
Ryner wasn’t going to give up on Sion. They’d promised. He’d raise Sion out of the darkness, no matter how deep it ran.
“So I,” Ryner whispered. But even if it was quiet, maybe it could reach somewhere far. “So I’m going to move forward too, Sion.”
---
That was the beginning of the legend of the southern hero king, the northern heroic king, and now the third and final king.
