Book 9 Chapter 3

Episode 202

In the green city, <Karsiko>, there was no place to quietly converse with Baekchang Palace Serwebon.

This was likely because the mayor and his aides had been apprehended by the Special Affairs Division, and the movement of merchants, citizens, and tourists throughout the city was also restricted.

Thus, guided by Kora, they headed to an island. To the very center of Linkland's main island, where Link was originally interred.

"Just go straight this way."

"Thank you."

"Thank you for what? You don't need to say such things to us. Don't even bother."

It was a valley lush with chestnut trees, filled with a sweet and bitter aroma.

Numerous wildflowers bloomed on the graves where footprints had ceased due to the Slayers' control.

Standing before the cemetery, filled with colorful lights, I think I smiled faintly.

"Hello, Link."

"Link, Link, Link, Link, Link, Link."

The location of the grave was indeed easy to find, as a 3-meter-tall megalithic statue modeled after Link had been erected there.

"It's been 300 years. With Pipi, it's been about 200 years, hasn't it?"

"Yes, yes, yes."

Pipi vigorously flapped her bandaged wings, expressing her joy at seeing Link with her entire body.

Serwebon also emitted mournful light multiple times, just like the moment I reunited with him after 300 years.

Just then, as the wind swept through the valley, sunlight danced across Link's face, which was covered in moss and vines.

"Abba, it's a stone person! It's so big, it's amazing."

"Aki, that's not a stone person, it's a statue."

"Clever, clever, clever."

"Arung."

Watching Aki jump up onto Link's shoulder, a smile involuntarily spread across my face.

"It's dangerous, come down."

I thought, "So this is what it must have felt like when others saw me riding on Link's shoulders." A little kid on a giant's neck.

"Aki, great landing!"

"Aruu!"

The Golden Dragon, fidgeting on the shoulder, cheered, seemingly thinking Aki's landing was cool. And then Aki shrugged contentedly, didn't he?

'Is Aki happy to have a younger sibling too?'

But I'm not happy about it at all.

Then, from somewhere, I felt a presence as if someone was laughing…

My eyes, after checking that direction, widened briefly, then a tired smile appeared on my face.

Because Kiess was sitting on the grave, leaning against Baekchang Palace.

Pipi might have seen the same illusion as me, but she landed on Baekchang Palace with her still-unhealed wings and wiggled her rear.

"Long time no see, long time no see, long time no see."

As if responding to Pipi's greeting, Baekchang Palace emitted large, clear waves.

With the World Tree's breath, the chestnut leaves rustled crisply. As the leaves swayed, light shimmered on Kiess's face and Baekchang Palace.

It was around that time that vines and tendrils sprouted from Baekchang Palace's bowstring. They intertwined in the air, beginning to form letters.

"Is this the letter you left for me?"

Kiess, as if in answer, smiled faintly with his wrinkled lips.

I couldn't tell if it was an illusion created by the longing in my heart, or Kiess's residual thoughts materialized by Baekchang Palace's life force.

I had no intention of using Bell Sidias to confirm it.

Because simply thinking that I was with Kiess at this midday fountain, where the scent of fruit danced on the sea breeze, was enough to make me happy.

I want to savor the scent of this memory.

"Can I read it?"

What answer could Kiess, who couldn't speak originally, give, but I asked him out of politeness, and Kiess lightly nodded his head.

"Link, do you want to read it together?"

Whether Baekchang Palace had imbued life into the statue, or if it was merely an illusion… Link stood to Kiess's right.

Haha, I laughed clearly.

Both of them were not their former selves but looked quite aged. Their hair was streaked with white, and their faces were full of fine wrinkles.

Thinking that this was the depth of time that separated me and those two, I had to feel a poignant sadness for a moment.

After exchanging light smiles with the two, I looked at the words formed by Baekchang Palace.

I read the feelings left by a friend, left behind in an era 300 years ago.

* * *

"Imperial Archer, have you never resented this world?"

Whenever I received such questions, I would evade the answer with a smile.

But to you alone, to you who taught me how to write, I want to tell the truth.

The era I was born into was a time when the abyss stirred, and cracks began to appear in the dragons' rule, causing many people's minds and bodies to become worn out.

- Kiess, my son.

My mother, a hunter's wife, died of a plague when Kiess was three years old.

And when I turned eleven, I couldn't endure my drunken father's violence and ran away from home.

I was defending a friend who took care of me during my vagrant days on the streets with a lie, and my tongue was pulled out in court. My friend was hanged on the gallows.

She was the twenty-one-year-old woman I loved for the first time.

[I came to believe that only power could be trusted.]

I thought that being subjected to my father's violence and failing to save my friend were simply due to a lack of power.

Therefore, I dedicated myself to archery, the only legacy I inherited from my father.

I roamed all corners of the country, shooting arrows in search of something strong.

Except for eating and sleeping, I only shot arrows.

After about 10 years, the world was calling me the Continent's Best Archer. The emperor of that era summoned me and bestowed upon me the status of Imperial Archer.

"How strange, how can you drink so much and still shoot an arrow so well?"

The order was wrong.

Without alcohol, without intoxication erasing the painful past, I couldn't draw the bowstring accurately and focus.

My mother who died in my childhood.

My feared father.

The death of my friend who looked straight into my eyes at the end, shouting for help.

Once even my craving for power was achieved, everything became so terrifyingly hollow.

Since I always lived immersed in alcohol, the emperor must have considered me a nuisance, so he had me participate as the Empire's representative in the last hero's party.

'It turned out well, actually. I don't want to live anymore anyway. It's the perfect place to die.'

And there, I met you.

Though you were a genius mage, you were too young and your personality had many rough edges, so I thought, 'Which school pushed such a troublesome person into a death trap?'

I felt strange.

At first, I watched you closely, thinking you might be similar to me, but I soon realized that wasn't the case.

- Kiess, come here. I'll teach you letters.

- Kiess, this is Turayna. My disciple? What are you talking about, she's just a burden.

- Kiess, teach me how to cook too.

You were simply pure to the point of being unstained. You were just not honest in matters between people.

You pretended to be gruff, yet smiled more brightly than anyone else, and pretended to be uninterested in others, yet were more meticulous than anyone else.

And deep within your heart, you had 'salt' that could change your surroundings with your own scent.

At first, you were a prim little child, but after 5 years, you had become an adult, inheriting the light of Lista and Fride.

- Me, I want to have a child someday.

Whenever I saw you like that, an old voice would resurface in my mind.

- A child just like the two of us.

The words my friend, who died on the gallows, said to me with a shy smile, were like fleeting soap bubbles.

- I'll teach that child many things. So they won't be tainted by this era.

And at some point, I realized.

The world is like you.

It could be stained black, or it could be stained golden. If only it could be guided and taught correctly.

'If so, isn't there still hope in this world?'

I'm just an eccentric who could only live immersed in alcohol, a fool who, after coming to my senses, realized I had become the very image of my father.

If only I could save you, who overcame all the pain of your childhood, and send you to the future.

If only I could help you become an adult.

I had a thought that someday, the world might take on the form that my childhood self and my friend had wished for.

- Definitely win…

But in the moment of desperate crisis, it was you who sent us to the future.

You must have been in pain, tormented by the poison engulfing your entire body, and distressed by the fear that everything you had achieved would be cut short in your youth.

At the end, you looked at us and smiled. You wore a smile like a blooming flower in spring.

- Because I will return…

What made you so happy?

Aren't we, isn't the world, resentful? The world that made you die in your youth…

Before that question could be finished, you disappeared somewhere into the boundless expanse of time.

Returning to the Empire, I recalled the meaning of the smile you wore on that last day.

It was about a month after returning to the Empire that I emerged from the disbelief and shock of everything.

You were absent from the future you had created.

The moment I realized that, I cried silently for a week, day and night.

On that day, when I had no more tears left to shed, I made a vow to myself. I vowed to the self who had originally only awaited death, submerged in alcohol.

That I would move forward into the future.

And so, on the day you return, I will surely push your back so that you can move forward into the future.

[Behold, after my death, I shall bequeath Baekchang Palace to the most outstanding among my kin and disciples. The successor shall also pass down the bow to future generations according to the same standards as me.]

When I left my will using the letters Lin taught me, I added one condition.

The successor of Serwebon must, without fail, endlessly strive for self-improvement for Lin, who will someday return.

And on the day Lin returns, that power must be used for Lin.

[However, anyone whose heart is even slightly twisted, no matter how skilled they may be, will not receive Serwebon's choice.]

What I raised in the future you created was not disciples. What I gave birth to was not my kin.

They were those who would carry on my will.

I am old and sick, and can no longer follow your journey through life.

Still, if Serwebon, who knows my will, and someone who inherited my will, could extend a hand to you in my stead when you need help.

I thought that would surely be a beautiful thing.

[Lin, where are you now?]

I will consider these letters you taught me to be you, and thus conclude this letter.

Even now, the memory of the twilight flower garden we saw together, you and I, remains perfectly vivid even on this final day.

Countless memories have eroded as I grew old. Now, I can no longer recall the faces of my mother, father, or friend.

[Has my heart reached you?]

I wonder if this last message I write will reach you, who sacrificed your life for us in your youth.

I bore descendants, raised disciples, and passed on everything I had, but did my heart also get conveyed?

But it's truly strange.

Doesn't it seem like the Osarius School, which grew from your deceased nourishment, shines more brilliantly than my own archery school, which I, alive, watered and nurtured?

No, this statement is somewhat different.

Your final smile became the nourishment for my entire life, allowing me to nurture my archery school.

Link, perhaps like me, also said he would pass his armaments down to his descendants.

Fride pondered that method and reportedly completed a certain ritual just before Link's death, so if the gods permit, I will surely be able to meet Link as well.

It would be presumptuous to convey Link's heart in my own words, but I believe he surely held the same feelings as me.

I will stop rambling about my insignificant life and wish to convey my true feelings.

In the future you sent me to, simply recalling your smile allowed me to abstain from drinking alcohol.

I just wanted to convey this last message.

* * *

Baekchang Palace sprouted new shoots into the air, and the continuous flow of letters it had formed in that shape ceased.

Rain silently stared at it for a long time, then finally bit his lip and began to cry.

Quietly, for a long time.

Shhhwaaah, the sea breeze, pleasantly rustling the leaves, caressed his cheek. Sunlight stroked his head.

Amidst that harmony of nature, a wondrous sight briefly flashed across the eyes of the Golden Dragon, which was clinging and squirming on Aki's head.

[Kiess and Link.]

Was it merely a hallucination seen by the young dragon, or a momentary miracle brought about by the young man's fervent wish?

[Caressing Lin's and Pipi's heads respectively, and exchanging smiles.]

The truth of it cannot be known, but perhaps, no, surely, the young man and the beast felt the same warmth.