WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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◈ SSS-Class Revival Hunter ◈

Chapter 236: King of Death (3) (Revised)

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4.

The next moment.

"Hehehe."

Silvia laughed eerily.

The sparkling purity of a girl coexisted seamlessly with the moisture in her laugh, blending perfectly.

"As soon as I discovered this fact, I was shocked and hid the note. The terrifying truth that I and Lady Silver Lily had been entwined by the same destiny since birth, maybe even before. I concealed that revealing note tightly."

As if she didn't want anyone to discover it.

"Of course, right? It's a very seductive secret. While the other ladies in the social club were giggling, sharing secrets like [this is what I heard from a friend] or [oh, I eavesdropped this from my parents] just to spice up our tea time... This [Secret Note] was completely different. Yes, it had to be!"

There were still many young ladies in the Silver Bells club.

How to take this secret note without them noticing, and how to present this astonishing and mysterious coincidence to Lady Silver Lily. Young Silvia was extremely nervous.

"I was different from the other members of Silver Bells. Yes, very different. Even when those girls were utterly charmed by how beautiful Lady Silver Lily was that day, or who she danced with first... I was secretly searching for some mystical connection between Lady Silver Lily and myself. Horoscopes, fortunes, birthstones... But now they're all useless. Our names. Our names prove the inseparable bond between Lady Silver Lily and me!"

"......."

A spirited performance unfolded in the old courtyard.

The sunset slowly passed behind the mountain peak like an old person exhausted by a long walk. After making its circuit that day, the sun already seemed to have grown old.

As the aged sunset spread across the sky, the performance of a maid on the ground, no matter how fervently she voiced, only echoed as a faded sound of the past.

"Things like imperial laws don't matter. Ethics? Morality? They can shove it. I was certain. Lady Silver Lily just didn't know it yet, but if I managed to present her with this secret note, leaping over the strawberry vines in the courtyard, passing through the maze-like yard, and finally reaching the hall where Lady Silver Lily was dancing with the gentlemen… Climbing up to the hall, waiting among the fools hoping to hold hands with Lady Silver Lily until their line dwindled."

I easily imagined the scene.

"Finally, I would reveal this secret I discovered to her."

At that time, Silvia, or Goldencup, must have been disheveled.

After running frantically from the inner garden to the hall, she could not have looked remotely like an elegant noblewoman. Even when people discreetly tried to send her away, she must have shaken them off, insisting, ‘There is something I absolutely must show Lady Silver Lily!’

And then.

"My turn finally came."

The two faced each other.

One, a flower of the social world destined to be the Crown Prince's consort.

The other, a girl trembling with admiration for the flower.

-What's going on?

-I, I, I am the daughter of the Evanair Baron family. May glory be upon the Moon of Ivansia!

-I see. Why did you ask to see me, young Lady Evanair?

Lady Silver Lily was exhausted.

She had been trapped in social obligations since dawn. Her mother had long disappeared. It was the Lady herself who had to play the hostess role in the Ivansia Ducal family.

Therefore, she not only planned, designed, managed, and supervised every ball but also, as the flower of the social world honored by the Emperor, had to extend her hand to the influential heirs who requested a dance.

While dancing in the hall, she had to carefully avoid stepping on her partner's feet and simultaneously keep track of whether the ball was going well, if there were any issues with the orchestra's song selection, and if enough food and drinks were being served to the guests.

In short, Raviel Ivansia, despite her young age, was already handling one of the empire's pillars, quite skillfully.

Spies spread around the ball by the Duke family reported rumors and secrets from the venue to the young mistress. It was also Lady Silver Lily's job to classify and interpret this information.

Thus, Raviel Ivansia lived in the [Empire]. The empire was her world.

"Trembling with nerves, I held out my hand to Lady Silver Lily!"

On the other hand.

Here stood a baron's young daughter who did not yet know what the empire was, or even need to know. She had just discovered a glittering treasure called coincidence.

The secret note was crumpled tightly, hidden from others, looking tattered. She was embarrassed to present such a crumpled piece of trash to Lady Silver Lily's delicate palm.

-But she'll understand!

Young Silvia might have believed so.

-Because it's truly amazing! She'll want to be friends!

And then.

"Lady Silver Lily unfolded the secret note and looked at it for a while. Now that I think about it, she might have imagined it as [a secret directive sent by a spy from an enemy nation]. But since it made no sense, Lady Silver Lily turned to me expressionlessly."

-What is this?

"At that moment, I locked eyes with Lady Silver Lily for the first time. Do you understand? For the first time! Well, her expression was a bit expressionless and cold, but I was sure her icy demeanor would melt away once she heard my explanation. I calmed my thumping heart and explained."

-This, this is my name…

-Your name?

-Yes! My name is Silvia Evanair, and, um, your name, Lady Raviel Ivansia... If we break down both names and arrange them... they, they're the same.

-.......

-The coincidence is amazing, isn’t it? Such an incredible... coincidence...

"As I spoke more and more, the atmosphere felt wrong, like this wasn't it. I awkwardly smiled and looked up at her."

-.......

"Ah."

Silvia Evanair, dressed as a maid, sighed.

"That look made me realize it. Well, it wasn't even disappointment... and it wasn't simply boredom. As Lady Silver Lily's red eyes looked down on me, I felt every part of me turn cold during those two seconds."

A sensation of her existence being sliced away, starting from her fingertips.

"To her, I was just trash."

Lady Silver Lily said nothing to the young lady.

Without insult or scorn, without a farewell, she simply turned her back and left for the ball.

After she left, a crumpled note lay abandoned in the place she vacated.

"......."

Silvia Evanair smiled.

"Such things often happen in childhood, right? Yes."

She bent down and grabbed the broom again.

And started to sweep away the letters she had written in the courtyard.

"I never really had any greed. My peers were all excited about how handsome the Crown Prince was, but I never had any interest in love or marriage. Then I accidentally saw Lady Silver Lily, who was just, too beautiful."

Swoosh.

The consonants and vowels on the ground were swept away into the dust.

"I just wanted to be a bit closer to her."

"But, to dare insult someone like that?"

Silvia raised her head.

A smile utterly unlike the one that had rested on her lips moments before blossomed across her face. A poisonous flower. Giving off a fierce reek of venom, Silvia smiled in full bloom.

"Is the empire so important to you? Is sorting and classifying information that sacred? Organizing the family affairs, comforting the people, being engaged to the Crown Prince, are those so, so important that compared to them, I'm nothing?"

That was.

"I'll prove it to you."

A curse.

"That Crown Prince you hold in such high regard. I'll charm him. It was easy."

"A pretty face with sweet whispers, delicate gestures, and he fell for it. Those spies from your family? I asked the Crown Prince to use the imperial knights to kill some. His love for his mistress was so deep... I was moved!"

Lady Goldencup smiled sweetly.

"You despised me every time I did such things, didn't you, Moon of Ivansia? Called me [a lowly creature who never thought of the future of the empire]. Yes, that's right. I never thought about the empire. But I was curious. How such a lowly creature."

Swoosh.

The letters on the ground were completely erased.

Planting the broom against the ground, the maid Silvia bowed politely.

"Could ruin that obnoxiously smug face of yours."

"You serve the empire, don't you? You care for its people. You are faithful to the imperial family and love your own house. I simply wondered whether, after I smashed the empire, plunged its people into misery, tore the imperial family apart, and cast your house into the abyss, you would still love the empire and your family..."

Or,

"Would you hate me to the point of madness."

"That's what I was curious about."

Silvia smiled lightly.

"Waiting for the day when your hatred for me would become far more potent and deeper than your love for the empire and family. It's a pity. Some frail-looking farmhand came in and ruined everything."

Silvia glanced at me.

Beneath her smiling eyes, her pupils shimmered with resentment.

"......."

Raviel remained silent.

The events Silvia just spoke of happened in her first life.

Raviel neither remembered nor could possibly remember them. The wisest woman in the world, my wife, rested her chin on one hand and thought deeply.

"I know."

That's why I answered on her behalf.

"What do you know?"

"I know how you must have felt, how much pain you were in."

Silvia paused.

Resentment that had been pooled in her eyes spilled over towards me.

"How dare…"

Goldencup said.

"How dare you say that."

Goldencup grasped her sleeve. The crumpled sleeve created ripple-like wrinkles across her dress.

She exclaimed passionately.

"How would you know? Do you know my pain? My suffering? How much it hurt that day, how much agony I felt, the pain of being ignored by someone I looked up to! How would you, what do you know to spout such nonsense,"

"I do know."

I repeated.

"I really do."

I did not ask whether she had squandered her entire life on a futile revenge over such a trivial thing.

I didn't say it was a mere trifle to plunge your world into disaster.

Being ignored.

Being treated as if you don't exist.

Not being treated as a person is a poison strong enough to kill someone more than 4000 times.

"...."

Goldencup clenched her teeth.

Her teeth ground together in her closed mouth.

Then she opened her lips again.

"Why do you interfere then?"

"Your butler."

Silence lingered.

"I don't know much about your butler. Your butler may have loved you in secret, perhaps even my wife. But one thing is certain: the life you spent sharpening a blade for revenge could never have been happy."

"......."

"The butler wished for someone to help all of you. Hamusutra seized upon that wish, and I was merely sent out as Hamusutra's agent. In the end, you are the one who brought about the situation we have now."

"Why is that my own doing?"

"You didn't make the butler happy."

"......."

"You had someone who cared for and loved you, but you ignored him. You were just obsessed with your own revenge. At least you should have been happy yourself, but even that didn't happen."

As a result.

"The butler truly became a person who did not exist."

I said.

"If Raviel was a bastard to you, you were just as much of a bastard to the butler who was helping you the closest."

"......Ah."

Silvia Evanair dropped her head.

"What is this... a story about the butler."

Amidst the silence, her words trickled out.

"Bringing up that guy... it's cowardly..."

Silence settled again.

The sunset beyond the western mountain had faded into darkness. Streetlamps buzzed to life in the alley, but in this poor neighborhood even the lamps were miserly with their reach. Jaa Soo-Jeong's old Korean house, beyond the orange streetlight's grasp, remained dark.

"I'm sorry."

It was Raviel's voice.

"I was sorry, Silvia Evanair."

"And I'm sorry."

Slowly, Silvia lifted her head. In the dark night, people were merely silhouettes, shadows merging together. A shadowy voice flowed from the shadowy body.

"What are you talking about...?"

"Even if it wasn't in my memory, if the same thing had happened, it would have played out the same way. I would have ignored you. I wouldn't even have remembered you. Because, at that time, the only things that mattered to me were the well-being of the empire and the glory of the family."

"......."

"I'm sorry. I was a person who didn't yet understand pain."

Raviel stood up.

As she rose, the ancient floorboards of the deck creaked.

Like a broken cassette tape turning.

"You took away my promised future. You stole the position of Crown Princess, monopolized the Crown Prince's heart. Moon of Ivansia. Flower of the social world. The future leader of the empire. All those promises were broken because of you."

"So what about it…?"

"Because of you, my heart bled for the first time."

Thud.

Raviel walked towards Silvia.

"It hurt. It hurt so badly that I had to look into a mirror and drive a blade into my own heart. Only then did I understand how many people I myself had wounded."

"And then, I met my love."

Raviel turned to look at me.

Even in the dark veil, I clearly recognized the warmth of her breath, the rhythm of her breathing, the fragrance in her eyes. She didn't speak. Silently, she commanded me to come closer.

I approached her.

"My love was also wounded. A returner. The endless wounds of life repeated. Never did I expect to find someone to share such a burden."

"I am grateful for the curse of eternal repetition."

Indeed.

"Because of it, I could meet Gong-Ja."

I too am grateful for my returning life.

I became grateful.

"Although it was very painful."

As the master said, those days were painfully painful.

"If it weren't for that pain, I would never have recognized my lovely kindred spirit."

It allowed me to fall for Raviel at first sight.

"I learned that the sole reason I was wounded was so that I might meet someone bleeding as I did. Gong-Ja, I knew it when I saw you. Silvia, it was because of you that I came to understand it."

"I thank you, Silvia Evanair."

Slowly.

Raviel knelt on the dust-covered ground, bowing her head to her maid.

"Thank you."

Ah, of course.

Of course, Raviel is... my lover.

The emotions she holds for Silvia must be as intense as the feelings I have for Yoo Soo-Ha. She must want to retaliate, to take revenge. Yet, despite all, Raviel kneeled to Silvia.

Because the present moment with me is overwhelmingly happy.

Thankful for everything in the past that led to this moment.

"......Eugh."

Silvia clenched her teeth.

"Damn it... Damn! That's why. That's why I hate you people. Why do you get to be happy? Keep being miserable! Keep hurting! Keep crying pathetically, lamenting your misfortune! Yeah, damn it! Be miserable!"

That's why, Silvia said. That's why.

"That makes me... seem like a fool for being swayed by emotions, wasting my life...!"

Silvia covered her face with her hands.

"It's not true. It's not. My pain is deeper, more special, incomprehensible to anyone, unforgivable, and so, so..."

Her voice dwindled and died like a faucet after the water had been cut off.

Silence flowed.

After enough silence, when Silvia stifled her breath, trembling, Raviel slowly stood up.

"Right."

She returned to her chair and sat down.

Resting her elbows on the table, she propped her beautiful chin on her folded hands.

"Let's start thinking about how to deal with this now."

She spoke.

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