Reformation of the Deadbeat Noble - Chapter 193

WeTried Translations

Translator: Coughing Baby

Editor: Coughing Baby

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

◈ Reformation of the Deadbeat Noble

Chapter 193

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Confronting the Past (2)

Thud.

Thud thud.

The rising dust bled into the darkness. Through that veiled haze, unpleasant fragments kept falling, one after another.

Demon flesh. Vile remains that could send a person into panic just by touching them.

Fortunately, no one had been directly exposed. No one had been caught in the aftershock either.

Part of that was thanks to Lulu, transformed and standing guard over the expedition like an iron wall. But mostly, it was because every ounce of destructive force had been concentrated entirely on the Jester Demon.

A miracle born from Ignet Crescentia's astonishing swordsmanship and three years' worth of Anya's saved-up Sorcery.

'It leaves you speechless.'

Sevion Brooks and Perry Martinez arrived at the same thought.

In under five minutes, they'd witnessed far too much.

A young man who'd outshone even people like themselves, acknowledged strongmen across the continent. A demon that had taken repeated blows from his golden Aura Sword and stayed standing anyway.

It was beyond anything they could have imagined. A different tier of strength entirely from an ordinary demonoid.

And then, a swordswoman had appeared and shattered that terrifying demon with a single strike.

Ignet Crescentia. Commander of the Holy Kingdom's Black Knight Order.

'Not even thirty yet...'

'And she wields swordsmanship with that kind of power!'

Sevion Brooks let out a breath and closed his eyes.

The scene replayed vividly in his mind. But even having watched it with his own eyes, he couldn't parse Ignet's swordsmanship.

Not just parse it, he couldn't even grasp a fragment of it. Everyone here probably felt the same sense of inadequacy.

No. Not everyone.

Airen Farreira.

His golden aura still hadn't faded, and his eyes kept tracking Ignet Crescentia's blade.

'Incredible.'

A demon, and not just any demon, a great demon. The Jester Demon had appeared even earlier than the Dragon King, the very symbol of demonkind, and it was terrifyingly powerful.

But even with that monster right in front of him, Airen found himself turning away.

He couldn't help but look at Ignet's sword, Ignet's body, Ignet's aura.

Just as dozens, hundreds of muscles worked together for a human body to move.

The crimson orb that the continent's greatest genius had produced was also the result of countless aura processes working in concert.

No, it was more than that.

Even with his Eyes That See Aura, Airen couldn't fully grasp it right away. The process behind that miracle was too complex, too intricate.

And more than that.

'I don't think what I'm seeing is the whole picture.'

Airen closed his eyes and replayed Ignet's blade in his mind.

Not just recalling it, but stretching the moment out, slowing it down, going over it again and again.

Even so, parts of it refused to come through. Not understanding, but observation itself failed him.

Was this a level he wasn't allowed to reach yet?

Or was it something else entirely, some power fused with more than just aura, like the Five Elements Divine Technique?

Having thought this far, Airen opened his eyes.

His gaze, burning with intense longing, fixed on Ignet.

"How did you reach the demon before anyone else?"

"..."

"Answer. Not me, not any member of the Black Knight Order, not the priests, none of us reached the source of that evil that fast."

Ignet's color wasn't good as she spoke. She'd scraped her strength down to the bottom.

Even with talent granted by heaven itself, facing a demon left no room to hold anything back.

She should have been resting right now.

But she couldn't.

Because of the one standing in front of her.

A monster who'd transformed almost beyond recognition in a mere year and a half, growth that defied explanation. Standing before him, Ignet felt something beyond mere exhilaration, a genuine excitement she hadn't felt in a very long time.

'Strange.'

She wasn't talking about the strength of his swordsmanship.

That brat's growth was staggering enough to surprise even her, but that alone couldn't have shaken her composure.

However fast Airen moved, he was still only chasing the path she'd already walked.

If that were all, she could simply move faster and stay ahead.

So then, this itch she felt every time she looked at him.

This strange atmosphere clinging to him, constantly pulling her gaze back, what was it trying to tell her?

'...This matters.'

Maybe as much as subduing a demon that hadn't appeared in a hundred and fifty years.

Perhaps that was why.

Ignet's tone had been sharper than usual, more urgent.

It had been the same back at the banquet hall. She hadn't meant to, but the mood had come out like an interrogation.

Knowing that, she still pressed Airen with an even keener edge.

"..."

Airen calmly gathered his thoughts.

Unlike Ignet, he had some vague grasp of what was happening.

Just as he'd felt something from her, she must have felt something from him too.

A gut feeling, more convincing than any pile of evidence, told him so.

The problem was, he couldn't answer Ignet's question in a few short words.

'Where do I even start?'

Should he begin with the man in the dream?

With the Jester Demon tangled up in his past life?

Would that even be enough? Was there more he needed to explain?

Actually, shouldn't he deal with the demonic aura still saturating the dungeon first?

He and Ignet and the other strong ones could handle it, but Calven's coughing knight commander and the injured over there...

"..."

His train of thought hadn't even finished when Airen's head turned.

A moment later, Ignet's gaze followed, and behind her came Illia, Lulu, Anya, Georgu, Sevion, and Perry.

It wasn't over.

The blood pooled on the ground gathered itself back together.

The puddle took shape, slowly forming into a human figure, into the shape of the clown, and in the blink of an eye it stood whole once more.

No, one thing had changed from before.

The cracked clown mask had fallen away, exposing half its face to the open air.

"Ngh. Ah, uh."

"Aaah, aaaaah."

"Uh, g? Guh..."

"Everyone, look away!"

Ignet shouted, and Lulu unleashed her Sorcery again to block the demonic aura. It wasn't enough.

A stench of rot poured out from the demon's exposed face.

In its eyes swirled a hatred and fury darker than anything found even in the deepest abyss.

It raised an arm.

Seeing the broken half-mask clutched in its hand, Airen and Ignet shot forward instantly. But they couldn't reach it in time.

Crack.

The mask shattered, and darkness fell.

A darkness far denser than anything they'd faced when they first entered the dungeon.

Within it.

"..."

Airen felt something inside himself slip away.

* * *

"..."

Nothing but darkness.

Eyes open or closed made no difference.

Darkness pressed in through my ears, my nose, not just my eyes. My stomach turned.

Only after a fair stretch of time since waking did I gather my wits enough to understand what was happening.

"I remember now. I was chasing him."

That's right.

I'd come this far to destroy the Jester Demon.

Not for rage or hatred, but for hope and happiness.

Not for the fingers pointed at me, but with the wildflowers a girl had handed me held close to my chest, I'd followed him this far.

"No servant of his can stop me."

I said it out loud again, on purpose.

Speaking the thought aloud made my resolve feel more solid.

Confidence rising in me, I raised my old iron sword. And I walked.

The darkness still muddled my senses, but somewhere in my chest, I could feel the strength to overcome it.

I would no longer be wounded by the hatred pouring down on me.

I would no longer grieve over painful betrayals.

That's not to say it didn't sting. I'd simply come to understand something more important than that.

What I had to protect.

What I had to shield.

As long as those things existed, I would never break, never stop, and I would chase you forever.

"Forever."

* * *

'Good. Wander around all you like.'

Watching the man, the Jester Demon grinned.

For nearly a thousand years, it had thought about this. How to defeat the man.

How to protect itself from that dreadful silver-grey blade.

Fortunately, it had found a way.

Weaken the man's sword.

Which meant, weaken the man's heart.

That was the only path to victory.

'Blame and hatred, mockery and deceit, none of it works.'

Most people could be broken like marionettes with just one of those.

But that man couldn't. No matter how much suffering, no matter how unjust the circumstances, he never gave up his training.

And in the end, he always found the demon and brought his sword down.

Feeling the old wound from that blade ache, the clown chuckled and muttered.

"Just show him nothing at all."

Yes. That was the only answer.

Erase the flower he'd been given from the world.

Erase the girl who'd awakened his heart from the world too.

The mother who'd stopped that girl, as well.

The village he'd lived in, the territory he'd served.

Even the knights and villagers who'd pointed fingers at him.

Show him a world hollow and empty, with absolutely nothing left worth protecting.

That alone could break the man's iron will.

"It's fine. This is really fine. Mm, really, truly fine."

Despite the pain wracking its whole body, the Jester Demon put on an air of ease.

Battered by those reckless brats, its condition was a mess, but that was fine.

This barrier had cost half its mask to create. Unlike before, when it had let its guard down, there was almost no chance the man would find it now.

Good, good. Very good.

Humming cheerfully, the demon peered back into the man's wandering.

Still holding firm, unyielding as steel.

But nothing lasts forever. Even the finest blade rusts eventually, given enough hollow years.

The demon sang a tune of its own composition, bobbing its head along.

What made it stop keeping rhythm wasn't the man thrashing through the darkness in every direction.

Crackle, crackle...

"..."

It told itself it had imagined it.

Of course it had.

How could that green brat, nothing more than a vessel that had merely carried the man, ever be expected to break through its barrier and reach this place? How could that possibly happen?

That assumption turned out to be its fatal mistake.

He wasn't merely a vessel.

Not merely a puppet either.

There had been a time when that was true, sure, but through no small amount of experience and struggle, he had come to hold his own will.

He had set his own sword upright.

He hadn't managed it entirely on his own, but did that really matter?

Standing on your own two feet didn't require standing alone.

"Guh..."

The clown's expression twisted horribly.

Unlike before, there was no mask left to hide it. And of course, nothing left to block the light now burning through the darkness.

Soon, another man stood fully revealed.

Airen Farreira spoke.

"Karen Winker."

He wasn't addressing the demon.

Where Airen's gaze had landed, the man from his dreams now stood.

Wandering through a barren, empty world with nothing in it, and suddenly a brilliant light burst forth, it would have been stranger if he hadn't come.

He asked.

"How do you know my name?"

"I just knew, looking at you."

"An odd young man."

"Is that a compliment?"

"It is."

"Thank you."

Airen bowed his head.

The man thought for a moment, then asked another question.

"You seem to know a lot, so let me ask one more thing. For a long time, a very long time, I've wandered this world, and I've seen nothing. Not the village I lived in, not the castles or cities I passed through, and not... my own territory, Gasco, where I was born and raised."

"..."

"Can you explain what happened here?"

Airen closed his eyes for a moment.

He never once thought the demon might attack.

That thing couldn't move now. The man's will hadn't broken yet.

Cowardly and cunning as it was, it would never act from a position of disadvantage.

That let him choose his words with an easy mind, and he looked at the man with clear eyes and answered.

"Your territory no longer exists. It vanished centuries ago. Your family, your people, your descendants... none of them remain, most likely, not anymore."

"..."

"But there are still people worth protecting."

Fwaaaash!

Airen Farreira opened his heart.

Everything he'd seen, heard, and felt until now poured into the man in an instant.

In that single moment, the man from his past life fully understood what his present-day self was trying to say.

"I see. So I died."

"..."

"But that's fine. Someone who shares my will, and such a fine young man at that."

"..."

"I'd like to rest a little now. I'll leave the rest to you."

Those were the man's final words.