WeTried Translations
Translator: Botanica
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ Academy’s Pure Love Dark Knight
Chapter 51
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Episode 51. A Black Heart for a Knight.
“Stop. Boy, you have too many distracting thoughts.”
Seeing me sweating profusely and struggling to pull the sword, the Heavenly Demon spoke with a look of pity. What on earth is this? How can I move this….
“Come here. Boy.”
“Understood, Heavenly Demon.”
Following her advice, I stopped what I was doing. I walked towards where she was gesturing. The rustling sound of stepping on grass echoed through the forest.
“..Sit here.”
I sat on the grass and assumed a meditative posture. I closed my eyes and relaxed my body. I regulated my breathing. My hurried heart was calming down.
“Boy, why did you pick up a sword?”
“..I wanted to make unhappy people happy.”
I had crossed the line between life and death many times, and even when it was painful and difficult, I gritted my teeth and endured it. But why is she suddenly asking this?
“Indeed, the reason a swordsman wields a sword is important. Really? Is that truly so?”
“Yes, I needed nothing else but that.”
I said calmly. I know nothing beyond our Saintess’s happiness. I need to return to the Academy as soon as possible and proceed with the Grand Route.
“For someone like that, you are quite greedy. Boy.”
“..What do you mean?”
“Be a little more honest. Didn't you want something else?”
Though my eyes were closed and I couldn't see her expression, her questioning tone reached my ears. It was as if she wanted me to think of more reasons.
‘Something else I wanted.’
I bit my lower lip slightly. I made Kainel and Ariel escape, healed Mardol… saved Nex and Chartiness…
What's the problem? I just met the conditions to pursue the Saintess's route.
“...”
“Did you truly need ‘nothing else but that’?”
Ah, that didn't seem right. I hadn't considered the Crown Prince route from the beginning. Actions I wouldn't have taken if I had purely and genuinely wished for her happiness alone.
If the Saintess joins a harem and doesn't die, isn't that enough? Strictly speaking, it was a foolish greed.
“..I think I like that person quite a lot.”
What I had just seen at the end of my life's panorama was not a recollection of my unhappy life, but her lovely moments. I answered that way, strongly imprinted in my memory.
“Then, didn't you ultimately wield the sword for love? Is there truly a need to run away, attaching reasons or excuses?”
“..Is there not? I lack the qualifications.”
My severe burn scars made me a target of scorn. If I were to get closer to her like this, the Saintess would be reviled. Even facing her while wearing a helmet has its limits.
“..Your solitary thoughts are excessive. Boy.”
“It's my life experience. For that person to suffer because of me…”
The protagonist of this work is Lupus Gransia. Ultimately, her ending up with him must be influenced by the developers, so the Nameless Saintess will surely be happy.
“Khahaha! Boy. That story. If Dennis were to hear it, he would be quite angry.”
“Professor Dennis..?”
Startled, I looked in the direction of the sound. Was he that kind of character? I had never even imagined Dennis getting angry at a player.
“Yes, Dennis.. that man was unique. He was the one who told me that love needs no qualifications.”
And so, while I meditated, the Heavenly Demon told me a short old tale. A tale of spring, which I had thought would never come again.
***
The pinnacle of water magic. Dennis, one of the Ten Greats.
You might have wondered why Dennis isn't referred to as a ‘Mage’ in the game.
The reason he's called the Cursed Dragon and ‘Human Male’.
Ariel is also called The Mage of Flames.
Why is it only the protagonist of <Knight Heart> who isn't like this?
This is because his original profession is different.
His true profession is ‘Hunter Dennis’.
An ordinary human male summoned as a Hero in Seoul, where gates opened and an apocalypse occurred. The setting is that he's from Korea, a world different from mine.
With his F-rank Hunter title forgotten, the man with impressive blue hair and eyes came to this world and traversed battlefields, becoming friends with the Heavenly Demon.
His ability was, in fact, ‘being good at magic’. However, in his original world, which lacked mana, this ability would never have bloomed.
“..Ha, truly a multicolored crew. A wolf-eared lumberjack, a dwarf, a demon…. What’s this now? A three-legged crow? Even bringing child soldiers, are you truly insane?”
“She's the Phoenix of House Aureus. This is why commoners…”
“Nothing exists above this one. This one would never be bound by rank. Blondie.”
At first, the Heavenly Demon felt dumbfounded seeing the people gathered to oppose The Heroic Cult.
“Shadow Slash? What good is any of that? The pinnacle of martial arts is not such a thing.”
“Uhahaha!! That’s quite a joke! You’re just a lizard, not even a dragon!”
“A Western swordsman, you say. Shall we try a bout?”
Because compared to the Demon King they faced, they were far too lacking, so the gods had requested help from other worlds, just like her. They were laughable individuals.
“Stop it, everyone. If this continues, only the Demon Kings will be pleased.”
“Huh, child soldier. Are you interfering?”
“I just became an adult yesterday. I’m 20 years old.”
However, whenever Baek-Mokryeon had various disputes with the Ten Greats, he apparently acted as a mediator and stopped the fights.
The youngest-looking man commanded the atmosphere.
“..If you can't beat someone so young, then just be quiet.”
“This one merely went easy.”
In reality, she could always defeat Dennis if she fully exerted herself, but she always let him win out of pity for him being summoned as a Hero at such a young age.
“..Baek-Mokryeon! It’s dangerous!”
“To be worried about by someone younger than me.”
“What would you have done without me? Here, this is a protective spell.”
drawing a circle on her palm with his finger to help prevent the Heavenly Demon from getting hurt, or,
“Indeed, the child soldier is naive. Do not believe the opponent's lies.”
“...”
As the Heavenly Demon repeatedly saved him. They stood back to back and crossed the line between life and death. It was truly an ill-fitting combination, the intersection of wuxia and modern times.
“Child soldier, why aren’t you afraid of this one?”
“People nowadays aren't afraid of things like that. Things like a Heavenly Demon.”
“To tease this one, you have quite some nerve.”
Baek-Mokryeon apparently didn't dislike their gradually closing distance. The days when she, born a Heavenly Demon, only received fear and awe from people, were already long past.
“...”
“You didn't kill him. Child soldier.”
“He said he wanted to go home. The Demon King I killed…”
Dennis cherished life in every aspect and was most shaken when confronting The Heroic Cult. Baek-Mokryeon, having lived as a Heavenly Demon, was relatively more accustomed to such things than Dennis.
“If that were truly the case, he wouldn't say he wants to go home while killing people. Just ignore the crazy words of such a lunatic.”
“Actually, it's hard. What if this never ends….”
Thinking, ‘So there are humans who express sympathy to those who tried to kill them,’ she gradually changed.
“You didn't kill anyone today? You just broke the Holy Sword..?”
“Hmm? The difference in power was too big, so I didn’t think it was necessary.”
“Thank you, Heavenly Demon.”
“Khahaha! How amusing. That's not how you do it.”
“..The book said to do it this way?”
Seeing the blue-haired boy, who seemed to have seen something somewhere, greet her with clasped fists, she reportedly let out a wry laugh.
“My water magic is cool. It'll be helpful since it's summer.”
“..Looking at it this way, magic isn't bad. Child soldier.”
“I think so too, Heavenly Demon.”
In the end, Dennis was the one who wasn't afraid of the Heavenly Demon and treated her most comfortably. They shared coolness in summer and warmth in winter.
“Dragon tail, this moves separately, huh?”
“..Isn't it grotesque?”
“It's cute, like a puppy. What's wrong with that?”
And each time, he would tell her some incomprehensible story about dragons being cold-blooded animals.
Friendship turned into love,
They went from comrades to lovers.
The human male who loved the Cursed Dragon.
Because she, the Heavenly Demon, narrated it that way, he wasn't listed in the story as a water mage.
At a point when few Demon Kings of The Heroic Cult remained. The conversation she had with him before fighting the Head reportedly went like this. Just before she was struck by the power of Erasure of knowledge.
“When spring comes, magnolias always become shabby. Dennis.”
“..Why are you saying that suddenly? Mokryeon.”
A war that had already been ongoing for several years. The Heroic Cult's side also summoned other Demon Kings, turning the situation into a chaotic battle, and she too gradually lost hope.
“I just think it's time to lay everything down. Like the magnolia in my name.”
(TL Note: Baek-Mokryeon, her name refers to White Magnolia.)
She sighed, reflecting on her life. She had too much blood on her hands. The days she became a Heavenly Demon because she hated a world where kings abandoned their people and poverty killed them.
“For this one, this world was nothing but a fleeting spring dream (一場春夢). Ultimately, this too will soon end.”
(TL Note: 一場春夢, “a spring dream,” a Chinese idiom meaning something fleeting or illusory, like a beautiful dream that quickly fades.)
“..I don't think so, Mokryeon.”
It was fortunate that she met Dennis after being summoned as a Hero. However, casualties had already appeared among the Ten Greats. The First Saintess and the dwarf had died, and she felt that she too didn't know when she would meet the same fate.
“Why? Dennis. Why do you think that?”
“Because I like magnolia flowers. They're white and pretty, aren't they? Most people think of cherry blossoms when spring comes, but for me that changed thanks to you, Heavenly Demon.”
Then Dennis rearranged her disheveled hair ornament. A gentle curve appeared on the lips of the boy with blue hair and eyes.
“..Is that true? Dennis.”
“Yes, truly, Your Highness!”
He playfully mentioned it with a boyish laugh. It was the first time Baek-Mokryeon had heard such a thing. In Murim, people feared her just by hearing her name, and
“Since I'm here, this world won't be like a dream. This world.”
“That can't be…”
“Aw, but it's your one and only lover talking, so please listen.”
Normally, just seeing a magnolia tree planted in the marketplace would make people tremble in fear, so they had long since removed them all or deemed them taboo.
“..I don't deserve your love, Dennis.”
“Love needs no qualifications, Heavenly Demon. Whether it's shabby or whatever, if I like it, that's enough.”
And so, the Cursed Dragon, who felt like spring would never come,
“If we catch Head Ache, you'll really marry me?”
“..I promise.”
“Thank you. I guess I'll have to fight properly now.”
fell in love with an ordinary human male. A common and clichéd story.
But with the Demon King’s power of Erasure of knowledge, the precious memories that the woman before him held so dear,
were forgotten by the world, even by Dennis himself, excluding her.
***
“So, Dennis once said this to me. Khahaha!”
“..I knew it, but hearing it like this feels new.”
That was the reason the Heavenly Demon trusted me. As far as she knew, no one should be aware of her past as Dennis's lover.
“...”
In the end, I was similar. I arbitrarily thought I wasn't qualified to get close to her. Inside my helmet, my lips pulled into a horizontal line.
‘Ultimately, I love the Saintess, so I don’t want to give her to anyone else, right?’
I had wanted something else. It seemed I even disliked the idea of her meeting another good person and dating. The thought of her dating the Crown Prince made me uncomfortable.
“So, do you understand now? Boy?”
“..To some extent.”
I opened my eyes and stood up. My footsteps towards the sword felt a little lighter. Once again, I gripped the hilt and took a stance to pull it.
So, love doesn't need qualifications after all. I had been pushing myself with negative, solitary worries.
Indeed, our Saintess is absolutely not the kind of person to dislike me because of my burn scars.
“In this one's opinion, boy, your greed is excessive.”
“..Understood. So this is what you meant by being more honest.”
It had been contradictory from the start. I wanted her more than anyone.
I cleanly admitted it.
It was an emotion I had run from and avoided. I had been pushing away love. I thought I should discard my old, dusty affection for her, but I couldn't.
‘Truly pathetic. Lee Suhyun.’
I wanted to meet the Saintess. To see her actually laugh, joke, and her lovely side. I wanted to tell her, however uncool it sounded, that I had lived because of her.
“..I am a pathetic human, Heavenly Demon.”
“Khahaha! But it is a purer affection than anyone else’s. Who else, not even one of the Ten Greats, would stake their life against a Demon King and think of overcoming them?”
Baek-Mokryeon nodded with her hands behind her back. It meant she would no longer help. I put strength into my arm to pull out the sword.
‘If this is the case, I can’t give our Saintess to the Crown Prince either.’
I gritted my teeth. In this world, with just the mindset of loving the Saintess, I wouldn't lose to anyone. Who cares about the protagonist?
From the start, Lupus, you did nothing for our Saintess, did you?
“...”
I, on the other hand, tried to protect her for 15 years and even risked my life to defeat Magic Hat. This is a clear victory by decision.
“I like the Saintess.”
Uttering the words I had only repeated internally, I reflected on myself. For now, I'll try to express my affection as much as possible, and it won't be too late to leave it to her choice.
“..To the extent that I don't want anyone to take her from me.”
Then, a strange phenomenon occurred.
“You succeeded. Boy.”
Shring. A sound rang out, and the sword, which had been stuck in the ground and unmoving, was pulled out.
“If you love, it’s normal not to want to lose them to another. You foolish boy. You just want to monopolize them. That is a natural desire.”
“Why.. did this work?”
“Because your will, boy, has overcome this one’s will.”
Looking at me like that, the Heavenly Demon smiled with a 'do you understand now?' expression. Her sharp dragon teeth reflected the light.
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