WeTried Translations

Translator: Coughing Baby

Editor: Coughing Baby

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◈ Reincarnation of the Sword Demon

Chapter 43

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Sword Church

They had come as two, but returned as three.

Just as Kyle ordered, Aslan couldn’t even wash, let alone trim his hair and beard, and he didn’t even get to change clothes. Dressed in rags, he sat hunched and restless in the Warp Gate VIP room of the Kingdom of Valian.

'Twelve years... twelve years?'

Of course, Aslan had never meant to stay in Closed-Door Training for that long. The insight that made him decide on Closed-Door Training had felt almost within reach, and he thought that if he shut himself away and focused only on the sword, he would grasp it quickly.

But twelve years had passed. Every time he thought of that endless stretch of time, a sigh rose from deep in his chest.

That insight stayed close enough to chase, but never close enough to catch. If it had felt truly far away, he would have stopped Closed-Door Training midway and stepped outside at least once to clear his head. But that damned insight stayed just out of reach until the very end.

As he fixated on it, he eventually lost all sense of time, as if that part of him had broken. At some point, his body stopped caring about food and drink too, and Aslan sank completely into his own world.

All excuses. Swallowing another sigh, Aslan glanced at Kyle, seated across from him.

'My... and Arian’s... son...'

Crimson hair and golden eyes were the mark of Alastor pure-bloods, but compared to Julius beside him, his son’s colors looked brighter and softer.

Rose-petal red hair and golden eyes, just like Arian. Not only that, the boy’s face resembled hers in many ways too.

'His jawline looks like mine... and his sword talent too...'

No, that wasn’t right. Aslan recalled the vicious killing intent he had seen earlier, along with mana control and swordsmanship so precise they were hard to believe. Aslan had always been confident in his own talent with the sword, but his son’s talent far surpassed his.

'Is it Alastor blood...?'

He only stole glances. Aslan couldn’t bring himself to move closer to Kyle. The pressure from Julius, sitting beside him with his arms folded, was one thing, but Aslan himself knew shame.

He hadn’t been there at his son’s birth. He hadn’t watched him grow this much. His son had been born with that kind of talent, and he hadn’t taught him the sword... and in the end, he had even made his son come find his father first. Every one of those things weighed heavily on Aslan’s shoulders.

“Was your hair always that color, Father?”

Kyle spoke to Aslan, who had lowered his head and sunk into self-loathing.

“H-huh?”
“Your hair. It’s gone white like an old man’s.”

Kyle hated watching Aslan clamp his mouth shut, hunch his shoulders, and fidget. Yes, being gone for twelve years was Aslan’s fault. But however it happened, they had met now, and time was still moving.

If all that time in the past had been wasted, then the time ahead had to be spent richly. Self-loathing was for when you were alone. When you were with people, you did your best for your son.

“M-my hair was brown originally. It faded like this during Closed-Door Training...”
“Was Closed-Door Training fun?”
“Th-that...”
“Be honest. Really honest. Don’t say things you don’t mean just because you feel guilty toward me or Mom.”

Kyle snorted and folded his arms.

“You went into Closed-Door Training for the sword. For twelve years. If you got results good enough to satisfy you in that long time, I can understand. Mom probably can too.”
“...”
“But even if I understand, I can’t forgive you. If you want forgiveness, treat Mom and me well from now on.”
“Heh.”

Julius let out a low chuckle at his grandson’s clear-eyed words, while Aslan’s pupils trembled. His son’s words struck the heart of a guilty father. Tears began to gather in his shaking eyes.

“Don’t cry.”

Kyle’s voice turned cold.

“What did you do right to cry? If you really want to cry, show those tears in front of Mom, not me. I only met you for the first time today, but Mom has known you from the start.”
“Hk...”
“Honestly, I’d rather you not cry in front of Mom either. If you cry, it feels like we have to forgive you. Even if we don’t want to.”
“Hngh...”
“I think saying you’re sorry while crying is damn cowardly. Cry after you’ve been forgiven. Got it?”

At his son’s chilly voice, Aslan desperately held back his tears. As a guilty father and husband, he had no rebuttal to those words, and even if he did, he had no right to make it.

When word came that the Warp Gate was ready, the three of them left the VIP room. Just like a few hours earlier, the corridor to the gate was lined with Valian’s prince and high nobles, fidgeting like puppies that needed to poop.

“U-um, Duke Alastor.”

The prince approached with a pale face.

“Actually... just now, a guest came asking to meet Duke Julius...”
“I know.”

Julius answered bluntly and walked past the prince. A guest? Kyle tilted his head. Beside him, Aslan let out a low gasp.

“No way...”

Aslan muttered as if something had clicked for him, but Julius kept walking. Kyle didn’t bother asking who this “guest” was. A few steps into the corridor,

he felt a cheerful yet ferocious presence ahead. Kyle looked like a child who had spotted a new toy and craned his neck to the side, because Julius blocked his view.

At the last door leading to the gate, a man stood waiting, wearing blade-sharp silver pauldrons and a pitch-black cloak. He was smiling brightly, but his narrow, sharp eyes made even that smile look suspicious and unpleasant.

“It’s been a while, Julius-nim.”

When they had crossed about half the corridor, the man greeted them in a lively voice.

“It’s been a while, Aslan hyung-nim. Wow, two men this hard to see outside, and I get to see both of you on the same day, in the same place. I must be lucky.”
“Still no manners,” Julius said coldly.
“Has the Sword Church Master still failed to teach you how to sheathe a sword?”
“Ha ha ha! I’m not a child. Of course I know how to sheathe one. I just don’t want to.”

A blue gleam flashed between the man’s thin eyes. He was openly showing blade intent, but Julius only rebuked him and did not draw his own sword.

“What brings you here?”
“Curiosity. You stayed inside the Sword Tower for thirteen years without stepping out, so why did Julius-nim come outside... Ah, now I know why. Not very interesting, honestly. I never thought someone like you would come in person to drag your son-in-law out of Closed-Door Training.”

The blue gaze shifted to Aslan.

“I’m late in saying congratulations, Aslan hyung-nim. You achieved Sword Attainment after that long Closed-Door Training? Our Master will be very pleased with your achievement.”
“Evan.”

Aslan frowned, clearly uncomfortable.

“It’s been thirteen years since I cut ties with the Sword Church, and you still call me brother?”
“They say distance makes hearts drift, but we’re both still holding swords, aren’t we? Aslan hyung-nim, as long as you’re a swordsman, apostasy is impossible.”

The man, Evan, shrugged with a grin.

“To be frank, the Sword Church isn’t asking anything from you. So just stay our brother and let’s keep things friendly.”

“Is the Sword Church Master doing well?” Julius asked with a snort.

“Master is doing very well, as always. Master sometimes speaks about Julius-nim and Aslan hyung-nim. Since her race is what it is, her sense of time is different from us humans, so her stories can get confusing. She talks about meeting Julius-nim as if it happened only days ago.”
“To an elf, fourteen years might feel like days.”

Julius muttered and strode toward Evan. With every step Julius took, Evan’s smile wavered a little more. Kyle did not follow. He just watched Julius slowly close the distance.

Julius wasn’t simply walking. Right then, Julius and Evan were trading invisible swords. The ferocious blade intent pouring out of Evan was being cut apart by Julius as the gap kept shrinking. When fewer than ten steps remained between them, Evan staggered with a groan.

“To our Master... fourteen years may feel short. But not to humans. Julius-nim, your sword has risen even higher.”
“If you truly want to see what my sword is like, stop these childish games and come to Gladiheim.”

Julius reached out and lightly patted Evan’s shoulder. Evan dropped to one knee and coughed up blood.

“Did you come out of pure curiosity?”
“Ha ha...”

Sweating cold, Evan looked up at Julius.

“You left Gladiheim only half a day ago. You know this too, Julius-nim. Our Master is not the diligent type who would grasp the situation, hatch a scheme, and dispatch me in just half a day.”
“That’s true.”
“Thank you for understanding. I came... purely out of my own curiosity. How far Aslan hyung-nim has gone in Sword Attainment. And... how large a vessel Alastor’s youngest grandson has, that boy everyone talks about but no one has really seen.”

Evan’s gaze turned to Kyle. The force that had been completely crushed by Julius narrowed into a single sharp line and shot toward Kyle.

Kyle did not shrink back. He did not step away. He also did not stride forward. He simply stood still and received Evan’s sharpness.

“Oh...”

Evan’s eyes widened, though they were already so narrow and sharp that he did not look very different.

“Young master, would you like to join the Sword Church?”

He started preaching out of nowhere. Kyle looked at Evan in silence, then asked,

“What rank are you in strength within the Sword Church?”
“Ha ha, that’s as interesting a question as your vessel. I am the youngest of the Sword Church’s seven apostles.”
“So including the Master, that makes you eighth?”
“For now, yes.”
“Hmm.”

Kyle thought for a brief moment. From what he had just seen, Evan’s level did not feel very different from Aslan’s. If someone that strong ranked eighth in the Sword Church, then it was a fairly interesting religion.

“What are the Sword Church’s doctrines?”
“Pursue the Sword, Love the Sword, Be Mad for the Sword.”
“You can do all that without joining the Sword Church.”

At that grin-filled answer, Evan blinked several times. In the silence between them, Julius burst out laughing and opened the door.

“Give my regards to your Master.”

Julius passed through the door, and Kyle followed. Aslan, who had been standing there blankly, hurried past Evan too.

...

The door closed. Left alone in the corridor, Evan staggered to his feet and looked back at the shut door.

Of course Julius Alastor, Thunder Emperor and one of the Ten Peaks, was strong. Of course Aslan Antares, who had spent twelve years in Closed-Door Training and reached Sword Attainment, had risen to a higher realm than before.

But Alastor’s youngest pure-blood grandson having a vessel that large, maybe that too was natural, yet it was far outside anything he could reasonably accept.

“The child of a monster is naturally a monster... but for a young monster, those fangs are too sharp.”

The testing blade intent he had sent was cut far too easily. It didn’t just get cut, it turned around and aimed for his own neck.

Evan gave a hollow laugh and shook his head.

“Father used to belong to the Sword Church?”
“Only briefly, when I was younger.”

Inside the room where the magic circle was activating, Aslan answered with an awkward expression.

“After graduating from military academy and wandering the world, someone from the Sword Church approached me. They said if I joined, I could learn sword techniques I didn’t know... so I joined.”
“What did you do after joining?”
“I learned the sword. That’s all I did. That’s the kind of religion the Sword Church is.”
“So... they don’t do bad things?”
“They don’t. The Sword Church is just a place where people who like swords gather.”
“Not all of them are like that.”

Julius said flatly.

“The Sword Church Master does not govern the church personally. She does not have that temperament. But the apostles under her all have different dispositions. That is why the Sword Church is an annoying, troublesome organization.”
“I-I only learned the sword in the Sword Church. I didn’t do anything else.”

Aslan sounded like he was making excuses, and Julius gave him a cold look.

“I know that. If you had done dirty work in the Sword Church, you would not have married my daughter, and you would never have been allowed to stay in Gladiheim.”
“...”
“Every problem in the Sword Church comes from the fact that its Master is an elf. Elves think only about what interests them, and what does not interest them, they do not think about at all. No matter what tricks their underlings pull, they do not care, and they do not scold them, because they have no interest.”
“That... is true.”

With a bitter smile, Aslan nodded.

“Even if rebellion broke out within the Sword Church, Master would not care until a blade came close to her personally.”
“Is that all? Even when some crazed, foul-tempered sword bastards in the Sword Church do dogshit things, Master does not rebuke them.”

Elves were a race entirely different from humans. In some ways, they were even farther from humans than the Demon Tribe was, especially in temperament.

The Demon Tribe was naturally similar to humans. Emotional and greedy. Elves were different. Dull to emotion, and not greedy.

That was because elves lived far too long. People often said elves lived a thousand years. Whether that number was exactly true or not, one thing was certain: that race lived for an absurdly long time.

To survive that long without going mad or numb, each elf held onto one personal interest.

'Fate.'

In Kyle’s previous life, the elf Raikal had taken in called that interest “fate.” Once an elf set that fate, they devoted their entire life to it. Put another way, they cared nothing for anything unrelated to their own fate.

'Helenas.'

Kyle thought of the elf now called the Sword Church Master. The impertinent little brat he had gone out of his way to rescue from a slave market, who had not shed a single tear of gratitude.

And yet she had trailed after him, begging him to teach her the sword. Then when he actually tried, she had almost no talent for the blade at all.

'If you’ve made the sword your fate and lived this long, then one day I should go see your sword.'

Sword Demon was the one who taught that elf child, who had never held a sword in her life, even how to grip one. Kyle sank for a moment into memories from five hundred years ago.

Warp Gate activation finished.

In front of the Warp Gate in Vigrid, north of the Empire, Lennon and the Sky Carriage were waiting.

“It’s been a while, Aslan-nim.”

After a brief exchange of greetings, the three boarded the Sky Carriage.

Kyle’s short outing was over, and they were heading home.

The Sky Carriage landed in the Sword Garden in front of the Sword Tower. Before getting off, Kyle looked out the window.

All their relatives were outside in the Sword Garden, and Arian was naturally among them. Kyle held his breath and checked her face.

“Mm...”

It looked like word of what happened during the half-day trip had already reached them. Arian stood at the very front with folded arms, and her expression was the fiercest Kyle had seen in his life.

“Mom is really angry.”
“You suggested this, so you finish it,” Julius said with a mischievous expression.

“Father should finish this, not me.”

Kyle set his own line just as firmly and looked at Aslan.

“What are you doing, Father? Get down there right now, kneel in front of Mom, and beg forgiveness.”
“Mm...!”

Aslan’s face stiffened as he opened the carriage door. He started to get down, then hesitated and looked back at Kyle.

“Y-you...?”
“I’ll get off when Mom cools down a little.”

Kyle answered without changing his expression.

No matter what he felt inside, for a twelve-year-old boy, his mother’s anger was scarier than a blade at his throat.

“A-all right.”

Aslan was the same. He was a great swordsman, but also a guilty husband. And if you weighed fault, Aslan’s was one hundred and Arian’s was zero.

Pouring cold sweat, Aslan got off the carriage.

Boom!

The instant he stepped down, a heavy gust blasted Aslan away.

“How dare you crawl back in here!”

At that thunderous shout from outside, Kyle sucked in a breath without meaning to and hunched his shoulders.

The End
(c) Mokma#14qpa

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