WeTried Translations
Translator/Editor: nemui
Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried
◈ The Forgotten Curse Knight ◈
Vol. 4 Ch. 8: The Promise of Welcome Home / Big Sis's Circumstances
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After discussing it, Theo and the others decided to split into two groups.
Theo, Carla, Beryl, and Hulk would head to Timbergum Minor Palace.
Gertrude and Rosé would collect the remains of Termea A and temporarily return to Cinder House. While they were at it, if they found Hugo, whom they had left behind, they would pick him up.
Rosé looked dissatisfied, as though she had not rampaged enough yet. But sending someone as powerful and destructive as Rosé to the minor palace was far too risky.
So Hulk and Beryl worked together to persuade Rosé to return to Cinder House.
(Rosé, will she be all right...?)
Knowing Rosé, who clung to the hallucinations caused by mental contamination, she might turn to alcohol once she returned.
Still, Theo felt it would be wrong for someone who did not know her circumstances to give her advice that bordered on a lecture.
Rosé clung to the battle axe she had swung around so easily until moments ago, hanging her head in dejection.
“Um, Rosé!”
When Theo called out to her, Rosé sluggishly raised her face.
Her eyes, which had gleamed fiercely during battle, were now dull and clouded.
Theo did not think his encouragement would reach her heart when he did not even know what had happened.
Even so, to keep Rosé connected to reality, Theo gathered his courage and his words.
“I’m going to fight a Termea now, so... when I get back, I want you to say, ‘Welcome home’!”
“...?”
“So please don’t drink. Wait for me, okay?”
Rosé’s eyes widened.
Had he exasperated her? Growing embarrassed, Theo lowered his gaze, when he heard a small reply.
“...Okay.”
Theo looked at Rosé. She still wore a vacant expression, but the cloudiness in her eyes seemed to have faded a little.
“It’s a promise!”
Theo firmly made her promise, then ran over to Carla, Beryl, and Hulk, who were heading for the minor palace.
Rosé watched the four leave for the minor palace, absently turning Theo’s words over in her mind.
When I get back, I want you to say, “Welcome home”!
When I get back, will you say, “Welcome home”?
A familiar voice overlapped with the boy’s. Remembering the day they never returned, Rosé felt like she might cry.
(Charles... Charles...)
As Rosé sank into her memories, Gertrude lightly tapped her shoulder.
“Come, Rosé. We still have work to do.”
“Carry... the remains...”
There was a fair amount of Termea remains scattered across the ground.
It would be easy for Rosé, with her monstrous strength, to carry them, but with the pieces scattered so widely, it would be difficult to take them all in one trip.
As Rosé looked around for a suitable container, Gertrude shook her head.
“No. We only need to hide these remains so they are not found. We can collect them later.”
“...?”
“Before that, there is somewhere we must urgently go. Before coming here, I went to the Adcock Research Institute, did I not?”
The Adcock Research Institute, the source of this entire incident. A facility that researched Termea.
It was also a familiar place to Gertrude.
Gertrude leaned close to Rosé and spoke quietly.
“One of the institute’s staff has gone missing. This Termea escape may have been a deliberate incident.”
* * *
Theo, Hulk, and Beryl leaped across the rooftops, taking the shortest route to Timbergum Minor Palace.
Carla, the only one who could fly, had been sent ahead at top speed to meet up with the Holy Knights.
The sky over Grandrium was always covered in reddish-gray ash smoke, and the stars could not be seen clearly. Beneath the night sky, where even the moonlight looked dim, Theo ran over the rooftops and asked Beryl and Hulk, his two seniors,
“Will Carla be all right going ahead alone? In the worst case, she might have to fight a Termea by herself...”
Gray Knights were not always viewed favorably by the Holy Knights.
Some were said to treat them as expendable pawns in the fight against Termea. Carla, who bore the Curse of Immortality, might especially receive careless treatment because, “She can’t die, so what does it matter?”
As though to dispel Theo’s worries, Beryl said,
“It’s fine, it’s fine. If it’s the minor palace, the Fourth Knight Order will almost certainly be deployed. And in a situation like this, an Order Captain will show up.”
“Captain Stella Garnett,” Hulk murmured.
“Exactly,” Beryl said brightly.
“If Stella’s there, I won’t let them treat Carla as expendable. If anything, I’m more worried she’ll hate Gray Knight interference and refuse to let Carla onto the scene.”
Stella Garnett, Captain of the Fourth Knight Order. She was the chestnut-haired woman who had shown Theo and Hugo around Holy Knight Order headquarters.
According to Stella, Beryl was apparently a former Holy Knight and knew her.
“Beryl, I met Captain Stella Garnett at Holy Knight Order headquarters. She showed me around.”
“Hm. Did she say anything about me, by any chance?”
Beryl gave Theo a meaningful smile and a sidelong glance. Under the moonlight, she looked especially seductive.
Flustered, Theo answered vaguely.
“...She asked whether you were well.”
“Knowing Stella, didn’t she say something like, ‘Has she been hunting for men among the Gray Knights?’”
“U-Um... Aah!”
Theo’s eyes darted aside, and he caught his toe on the roof, nearly falling.
As Theo hurriedly regained his balance, Beryl apologized.
“Sorry, sorry. I made you say something awkward. Big Sis should reflect on her actions.”
“...I told her that you are not that kind of person, Beryl.”
Beryl looked a little surprised, then smiled with softened eyes.
“I really was like that in the old days. Big Sis used to seduce her fellow Holy Knights all the time.”
“Theo boy. Beryl used to be a Double Blessing.”
Theo could not help letting out a startled sound at Hulk’s words.
Those with two Blessings, known as Double Blessings, were rare enough that there were fewer than ten in all. She was the same as Allen and young Keith.
“Yep, just like Hulk said. I was a Double Blessing with 〈Destruction〉 and 〈Creation〉. Though my 〈Creation〉 was pretty weak.”
Beryl spoke as though it were nothing remarkable.
“People who awaken as Double Blessings apparently become more impulsive. They can’t hold themselves back in all sorts of ways. If their 〈Regeneration〉 Blessing is strong, they can suppress it somewhat, but Big Sis didn’t have 〈Regeneration〉.”
Allen was the closest example Theo knew. Allen had 〈Destruction〉 and 〈Regeneration〉 as a Double Blessing, but his 〈Regeneration〉 was not particularly strong.
And he had an appetite alarming enough to make Theo pause.
(Allen has such a huge appetite because he’s a Double Blessing...!)
Apparently, the nature of those impulses differed from person to person.
Hulk spoke sarcastically.
“Of course you wouldn’t know. The Papal See wants to treat the Blessed as pure, beautiful things. They would never announce that the stronger a person’s Blessing is, the less they can restrain their impulses.”
Theo suddenly wondered about something.
When a Blessed person like Beryl became a Mad Walker, what happened to the power of their Blessings?
“Beryl, can you still use the power of your Blessings?”
“Nope. When I became a Mad Walker, I couldn’t use them anymore. I don’t know whether they disappeared completely or whether I just can’t use them for now, though...”
The angels’ Blessings were supposed to be blessings.
Yet Beryl, running through the darkness on beastly feet, wore a bright expression.
“When I couldn’t use my Blessings anymore, the impulses just sort of faded away. I stopped getting so horny.”
Theo had thought Beryl’s lack of despair despite becoming a Mad Walker was simply because of her personality, but there seemed to be reasons for it as well.
(Maybe having a Blessing is not always happiness... Would it be impious to think something like that?)
As Theo fell into thought, Beryl, running ahead of him, turned only her head.
“That’s why I stopped hunting for men, but if Theo’s too handsome, Big Sis might fall for you.”
Beryl blew him a kiss. Mwah!
Theo missed his footing.
At this rate, he had no right to scold Five-Peeks-at-the-Holy-Maiden Allen.
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