WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

Chapter 16: Finding Hope

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Just as I thought, I still don’t understand.

Rimon knew.

The shadows, including the one-eyed old woman attached to Kang Jeong-su, were avatars of the constellations.

They were no more than faint afterimages of starlight, incredibly weak compared to the constellations themselves.

Even if he cut them down, the damage to the constellations would be no more serious than losing a fingernail or a finger.

The feel of his sword had been far too light compared to before his regression, when the constellations had screamed.

What Rimon did not understand was something else entirely.

It was the blatant mockery and killing intent in the constellations’ eyes.

Did these things become hostile because Jeong-su and the others tried to kill me...?

It was not strange.

According to the common sense of this era, constellations were beings that granted blessings to players.

If so, it was only natural for them to oppose Rimon when the players contracted to them opposed him.

But was that really all there was to it?

Many owners adored their pets, but few would get angry, rejoice, and fight in their pets’ place.

Would constellations, beings said to transcend humanity, really waste such emotions on mere contractors?

And hundreds of them at that?

Rimon could not believe it.

Which was why another suspicion came to him.

...Or perhaps the constellations wanted to kill me and were using the others to do it.

It was a baseless delusion.

Anyone who heard it would call it crazy nonsense.

In fact, while killing the two hundred or so players, he had deliberately cut down the constellations first several times. Nothing had changed.

Even so, Rimon could not shake his unease.

The snake that had mocked Yoo Na-gyeong’s death.

The players who had charged at him as if possessed until they died, except for the two Grand Dukes who had fled belatedly.

They left an unresolved doubt in his heart.

What if that suspicion was true?

Perhaps he simply had not seen it before.

When he had fallen into that trap in his previous life, had the constellations been laughing at him then as well?

And perhaps this trap itself...

Still, it doesn’t matter.

For a moment, Rimon quietly looked down at Yoo Na-gyeong’s face.

Amid the terrible field of corpses, she was almost the only one wearing a peaceful expression.

He took off his coat and covered her body with it, then shook his head slightly.

Nothing will change either way.

Whether it had been their own will.

Or whether they had simply been used.

The country had decided it no longer needed Rimon. It had helped Kang Jeong-su betray him and driven Yoo Na-gyeong to her death.

And the constellations had lent those people their power.

Those facts would not change.

“Well then, I suppose it’s time to clean things up.”

Once praised as a hero.

Then discarded by his country when the times changed.

Now burdened with the stigma of a traitor.

The last Swordmaster of humanity, who now had nothing left to bind him, wore a grim smile.

The world would soon learn.

That he had stepped down from the position of the absolute not because he lacked strength, but because he had yielded to the flow of the times.

He had only refrained because there was no need.

And if there was a need, what he could do.

What kind of being he could become.

The first to learn that truth would be the one who had moved Kang Jeong-su and freed Rimon.

Rustle.

At that moment, a softly glowing orb rose above the coat he had placed over Yoo Na-gyeong.

It was the orb of light that the snake had pulled from her at the moment of her death, which Rimon had taken back and put inside her again.

The moment it shone brightly, something strange happened.

The shadows melting away nearby.

Nearly two hundred fragments of starlight began to seep into the orb.

The more remnants it absorbed, the clearer its faint glow became. The orb gradually thinned out and took the shape of a feather.

Once all the starlight had seeped into it.

Once its transformation was complete.

The object, now a white feather like an angel’s wing, soared to the edge of the night sky. Then it burst like a firework, left behind a brilliant light, and vanished.

Rimon stared blankly at the utterly unexpected sight for a while before letting out a dry laugh.

“That brat. Making a scene right to the very end.”

Rimon did not know what the orb of light was.

Why it had become a white feather.

Or what had just happened.

He was a Swordmaster, not a sorcerer or mage.

Still, he could vaguely sense it.

Just like the eyes that allowed him to see constellations, that feather was something he had gained before his regression by cutting down constellations and absorbing their fragments.

And the power the constellation had said it would give Rimon back then was probably...

“...I should hurry up and do what needs to be done.”

For a moment, he looked down at Yoo Na-gyeong beneath his coat.

Then Rimon lightly shook his head, cast off his concerns, turned around, and left.

* * *

“Sniff, sob.”

If Sia were being honest, Hanbit Orphanage was not an especially impressive place.

The facilities were old, and support or donations rarely came in.

Still, it was not a bad place.

The director was an old spinster, a penny-pincher, and a nag, but she never picked on the children for no reason. She always made sure they had food to eat and clothes to wear.

Besides, a famous guild had started sponsoring them a few years ago. More and more gifts had come in, and things had gradually improved.

They got a washing machine, making laundry easier.

They received pretty clothes that were not secondhand.

There were more side dishes at meals.

They had plenty of school supplies.

Such things might have been ordinary or expected for someone else.

But for Sia, who had lived in the poor conditions of Hanbit Orphanage since she was a baby, even those small changes were an incomparable happiness.

Yet what Sia loved most was not the gifts themselves, but the older sister who gave them.

“Shh, don’t cry.”

Sia admired that older sister.

Not simply because she was the most successful person to come from Hanbit Orphanage.

She came to volunteer every weekend.

At Christmas, she would appear by teleporting in while dressed as Santa, scatter gifts everywhere, and get scolded by the director.

She would confidently declare that she would make a luxurious meal, burn all the rice, then buy heaps of hamburgers.

No matter how busy she was, she always brought a cake for the children’s birthdays and threw them a party.

Just being with her made everyone happy. To Sia, she shone too brightly.

That was why Sia had decided she would become a PAB agent when she grew up.

She would become someone who shone just like that older sister.

“But, Sis, the director... The director...”

“The director will be fine.”

“Really...?”

“Yes, really. So hold on just a little longer.”

That was why the children clung to Sia while sobbing.

There were older children at the orphanage, but Sia was the only one who could still smile kindly in this situation.

“Lie.”

But the children did not know.

The only one smiling, Sia, had the dullest eyes of them all.

“The director is already dead.”

Sia knew.

After the bad adults had come to Hanbit Orphanage, the strict director had resisted until the very end to protect them and had been murdered.

The other adults who had tried to run or hide were already dead as well.

Only the children were still alive.

“We’ll end up like that too.”

When the bad adults murdered the director and kidnapped only the children, Sia had still had hope.

They had not killed them.

That meant they had a reason to keep them alive.

She did not know why, but she thought it would be fine as long as they remained alive.

She believed that older sister, a PAB agent, would somehow save them.

Without knowing how futile that belief was.

“...Na-gyeong is dead too.”

Perhaps because they intended to dispose of the children anyway, the bad adults had talked freely without trying to hide anything.

That was how Sia learned everything.

They were hostages.

Bait meant to move Yoo Na-gyeong.

And the woman who had tried to save them had died after doing as the bad adults told her.

That was when Sia gave up hope.

Wearing only a hollow smile, as though her shell alone remained, Sia asked herself.

“Why did this happen to us?”

What had they done wrong?

Why did good people like the director and Na-gyeong have to die because of bad adults?

She asked, thought, asked, thought, asked, and thought.

Then Sia realized.

“...Ah, right.”

“There was no need for a reason.”

Of course. The world had always been like this.

Did parents need a reason to abandon their children?

Did children need a reason to lose their parents?

Was it because of sins from a previous life?

Was it simply fate?

None of those were reasons.

Sia had seen and experienced countless children abandoned simply because they had been born, and children who lost their parents simply because they were unlucky.

She knew it well.

There was not always a cause.

The belief that the world was rational was an illusion. Reality was irrational and unfair for no reason.

That was why the world was cruel.

She had only forgotten that because of Na-gyeong.

Remembering that truth anew, Sia waited for the death that would soon come with dull, lifeless eyes.

Thud!

The building suddenly shook.

“H-How did you get here?!”

“How the hell do you think, you bastard? You plastered Na-gyeong with a listening device and a tracking device, then thought no one could trace you back?”

“That’s impossible! That product can’t be traced back!”

“The only impossible thing is you being named Impossible, asshole.”

“Arrgh!”

After the disbelieving cries and ruthless curses came a series of screams.

“Eek!”

“Waaah!”

The children heard the sounds outside, clung to Sia, and burst into tears.

Sia, who had remained still until then, opened her eyes the moment the tightly shut iron door opened.

Bang!

“Ha, these rat-ball bastards. This isn’t even a dungeon, yet they stuffed this sewer with every kind of crap.”

With just one kick, the person responsible smashed the iron door like a cardboard box and strode inside.

The children let out piercing cries at the sight of the white-haired man. His scarred eyes and blood-covered body made him look even more frightening than the bad adults.

They shouted that they were doomed, that the bad adults had sold them to this terrifying man.

But he paid them no attention.

As if he were used to that sort of reaction, he merely surveyed the children calmly.

“Let’s see. All twenty-three are here, so it doesn’t look like any of you are dead. Is anyone injured... Hm?”

The man counted them like a human trafficker inspecting merchandise, then wore an odd expression.

He strode over to Sia, who alone was sitting quietly among the panicking children, and looked deeply into her eyes.

“Why does a little kid like you have eyes like rotten pollock?”

“...Is that not allowed?”

“I came all this way to save you, and seeing eyes like those makes me feel lousy.”

“You came to save us?”

“Yeah.”

Those were words that should have made her happy.

But Sia did not smile at all.

She merely looked at the man with dull eyes like a corpse and asked quietly,

“Why?”

Why had he come to save them when they did not even know each other?

She was not questioning him.

She was not curious.

She certainly was not grateful.

She simply found it strange.

The man did not find Sia strange, however.

He simply gave her the reason.

“Because that was Na-gyeong’s final request.”

“Na-gyeong’s...?”

At that moment, Sia’s eyes trembled slightly.

But it lasted only an instant.

Like a pebble thrown into a swamp, making the surface ripple for a moment before settling again, her eyes quickly lost their light and became dull once more.

The man did not seem disappointed.

Instead, he placed his bloodied hand on Sia’s head.

“Yes. So don’t give up anymore.”

The girl had despaired, then despaired again.

To keep herself from despairing anymore, she had given up on everything.

Rimon stroked the child’s head and continued quietly,

“As long as you’re with me, no one will be able to harm any of you.”

* * *

“They can’t harm them, my ass.”

Perhaps because the tension had finally faded.

Or because they had not eaten a decent meal.

The children wolfed down their food, huddled together, and immediately fell into a deep sleep.

Watching them, Rimon let out a deep sigh.

Of course, he had meant those words completely.

Whether it was government bastards who did not even know how to do their jobs.

Or some monarch bastard who did not know his place.

No matter what tricks anyone tried, Rimon was confident he could protect these children.

The problem was that protecting them was all he could do.

“Talking big for a guy who has to rummage through corpses because he can’t afford to feed children.”

Had they already seized his account?

Rimon clicked his tongue as he remembered the card that had made the ATM screen turn red the moment he used it.

His account had already been nearly empty after repeated pay cuts, but he could not help feeling regretful now that even that little money was gone.

He did not even have enough money to buy boxed meals for the children, so he had needed to use the kidnappers’ drop items, their wallets.

“I need to find somewhere for the kids to sleep...”

Thinking about lodging made the situation even more bleak.

For the moment, they were staying at a nearby guesthouse, but they could not remain there forever.

Hanbit Orphanage?

That place was already on television.

The news was calling it a horrific incident. By tomorrow, murder and human trafficking would surely be added to Rimon’s own charges.

His home was naturally out of the question.

Branded a traitor as he was, he had nowhere to impose on.

Nor could he leave the children at a police station.

The bastards who had used them as hostages once had no reason not to use them again.

“Not that I ever intended to do something so irresponsible.”

Whether for Yoo Na-gyeong’s sake.

Or for the girl with dead eyes.

Rimon had intended from the start to take responsibility for these children.

The problem was that the situation was more troublesome than he had expected.

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