Chapter 13 – 1. The Man Who Comes Back to Life Even After Dying (3)
Revenge is over.
Rolfe’s corpse, with his head smashed, was scattered all over the stone floor. I caught my breath as I trampled on a piece of bone that had fallen in front of my feet. Apart from the exhilaration gained from getting revenge, the sensation of committing murder was not very pleasant.
– Sergeant, hurry up and pull the trigger.
― I am still 15 years old…… !
– Therefore? Shut up and pull
Damn, bad memories came to mind. The recoil caused by intense emotion and magical overload made my insides tremble.
I climbed the stairs first, leaving behind Otto and Adele, who were looking at the dead Rolfe. Because the messed up corpse of the dwarf would be cleaned up by the bodyguards led by Heinrich. Because that’s the deal between me and Beatrix Adler.
“Eagle owl!”
On the first floor of the detached building, I looked back after coming up with the key inserted in the iron window. It was Otto at the entrance over there, a little away from the entrance. The stern and silent face was uncharacteristically full of guilt, so I could guess his penchant without paying much attention.
“I’m sorry.”
Memory overflow magic has no editing function. That is, it literally exposes all the life history of a human named Seo Jeong-woo. A mere pianist who was neither an eagle owl nor anything deceived the general of Bernhardt, a self-made war hero.
“If it hadn’t been for my tip…….”
“I thought things wouldn’t have gone this far?”
“No matter what excuses I make, I’m sorry.”
We all live in opportunities and choices. And even though I felt resentful of his choice, I didn’t think it was a betrayal.
“You were a soldier of noble character. It’s like a sincere apology even now, knowing that I’m a fake.”
It wasn’t just because of the luncheon scheduled for that day that I chose him. He was one of the people who led the disabled people who were confined to a small room to the path of revolution and self-reliance.
Yes, I believed in his character and also needed it. The reason why he connected the prince of the east, Seo Jeong-woo, with the eagle owl was because he did a great job.
“So I won’t take my respect for you if it didn’t go well.”
“Then I don’t have to renounce my trust either.”
“…… What faith are you talking about?”
“The belief that you are still qualified as an eagle owl.”
In front of me was an exit to a sunny garden. Amman is a fair retribution, but the guilt of murder was heavy and I wanted to go there as soon as possible.
Under the bright sun, I tried to arm myself with unseemly self-deception.
“From this moment on, you are a real eagle owl.”
But it didn’t. I had no choice but to stop abruptly at Otto’s words that followed.
“At least for me!”
“You’re going to keep following me even though you know it’s fake?”
“Jungwoo, I saw your memories.”
The gap between his eyes narrowed in displeasure. I did it on my own initiative, but sharing my memories with others wasn’t very fun. Even more so if what was included in it was my shame that I wanted to hide.
“Where have you seen it? I experienced it vividly.”
Otto knew this, but slowly approached me.
“The terrible atrocities that Beatrix has done, has done, and will commit!”
He closed his eyes tightly and let out a deep breath like a bull snorting. His body trembled with his clenched fists. And at the end, my chest thumps! He knocked and asked.
“Do you know why I committed myself to the revolution?”
There was no way to know. It was on the eve of the Japanese colonial uprising that I learned that the soloist of the Black Orchestra was Otto Moritz.
It was also the same when I recognized that the offer I received right away had his influence. It was only on that day when we took off our masks and faced each other that we finally got to know each other.
Moreover, even the three great eagle owls, whom I knew anonymously at the time, were still only one conductor at that time.
“Frida and I had no children.”
In this world, mixed races like Frida Moritz are infertile regardless of race.
“You know why.”
Of course, love that transcends racial barriers is created every moment. Their marriage will be a little more difficult, but it’s not impossible.
It’s just that this country, Bernhard, found it more difficult to leave behind a child of mixed blood even under such adverse conditions.
“But there have been times when precious gifts have come to us as well.”
I knew why. It was the crystallization of malice created by the Ministry of Agriculture under Beatrix’s cabinet. It was because food that had been genetically modified by magic made crossbreeding, which was already difficult, even more impossible.
“That was the early days when the Führer on the podium came to power. It was around the time the kingdom collapsed and the wolf defending it fell. It was because there were no extermination camps yet, and the distinction between the good and the inferior was shallow. Every neighborhood was overflowing with so-called nomadic tribes.”
The nomadic tribes were gypsies on Earth. On this continent to which Bernhard belonged, the race represented by the beastmen often wandered like that.
There may be a country for elves in this land, but there is no country for beastmen.
“What day was it? When Frieda said that the garage was burgled, I cautiously headed there. And there I met my father who was being chased by Beatrix’s zealots. He was a werewolf, and in his arms was his newborn child.”
Before the passage of the Republic Bernhardt’s Authorization Act, this land was a country that dreamed of the most advanced constitution and direction. There was no ghetto like now, and of course there was no discrimination against lesser races. So it must be that the werewolf Otto spoke of was very unlucky.
After all, it was because he suffered such an incident when the chaos in this country began.
“We treated him, but unfortunately he died. The will was the child’s name. Jurgen was the name given to her by her father, who cared for her child even until the moment of her death.”
“…… Jurgen.”
“Frida and I decided to raise him like a child. Actually it was for several months. Until the party members who beat Jurgen’s father come to the house.”
Otto continued, swallowing his anger as if his teeth were still shaking.
“At the time, I was not a defender of the Eastern Front. He was just a promising soldier. But those zealous party members had become Beatrix’s armed guards at some point. They mentioned my rank and threatened to take Jurgen.”
He brushed his hair
“I vehemently refused.”
It was not difficult to guess the commotion that the orc in front of him would have caused.
“Cancer, of course not. Where the hell are you going to take that kind of blood? Still, they came to my house while I was out on the front lines. He assaulted Frida when she said no and took her child in her stroller.”
“What about the child?”
“I was sent to the training center. An advanced national training center established under the mercy of Her Excellency Beatrix Adler to help awaken the difference between races and grow into a proud Bernhardt youth. To the prison with that needlessly verbose name!”
I swallowed my saliva. That was the name of an extermination camp for children. Only then did I guess the ending of the story, and I pressed my lips together. This was the reason Otto and Frida had no children.
“As you may know, the training camp was one of the later extermination camps.”
It was because I didn’t want to go through such a tragedy again.
“For the first few years, I wasn’t even allowed to see my child. As a rule, when stepchildren are separated from each other, the notion of family also fades away. So, most parents also stopped walking after a while.”
But Otto and Frieda didn’t seem to do that. Well, I didn’t think that that upright orc would give up the child he once accepted as his child so easily.
“But when the child learned to speak and knew what a family was, we, who had not stopped walking until then, were able to meet Jurgen.”
“Did they recognize you as their parents?”
“It was only one hour a week, but it was. But that made it even more brutal. We were forced to make her choice as we watched her get thinner day by day.”
“Which?”
“Whether to give up or despair.”
Otto pointed to the medals on his uniform and said.
“Among the straight-headed soldiers, no one dreams of becoming a hero.”
The Guardians of the Eastern Front were not like that from the beginning.
“But Jungwoo? I mean, the method wasn’t good enough. Because the beloved homeland is gradually going to extremes, and the exhausted people have added hatred under the agitation led by that villain.”
“Yes, I came here around that time, so I know it well.”
“On the battlefield, I have killed many enemies indeed. I had no hesitation. It was because he was able to exercise his authority with the military service he had established. Because I was able to change what used to be an hour-a-week meeting to an hour a day, and in the end, I was able to get a child who was treated as an inferior race out of the ghettos and concentration camps.”
Poor newspapers still routinely denigrate or insult his fertility. It’s because such cheap articles become money, like my situation where I go up and down on a fictional day.
Of course, he is an important member of the strict army. Unlike me, you can apply tangible and intangible pressure as much as you want. The mouths of scum can be torn open or sealed. So I’ve been wondering why it hasn’t been done until now.
“Tragedies are banal.”
I get it now.
“There is no need to talk any more. You can tell just by looking at the fact that there are no children between us now.”
He just couldn’t forget the child he had in his heart.
“Jurgen died in the end, and Frieda and I are heartbroken. In those days, we fought a lot. In the end, though, I realized that dead children don’t come back just because we blame each other.”
“It must have been painful.”
“Of course it was painful. At one time, that’s why I tried to leave this country. I thought I might find idyllic rest in a faraway country. Until the first Great Horned Owl contacted me.”
Was it Apparently, the soloist of the band was directly recruited by the Eagle Owl. After all, there is no idiot who chooses and entrusts the important task of keeping the conductors in check.
“Have you ever met him?”
“No, it was just a letter that reached me. He had very elegant handwriting and writing skills, but that was all. He just advised me to go to the address on the letter. I did, and there I met Renner, then Secretary of Defense.”
“Then I offered you the enlistment…….”
“It was Rolfe. That’s why I tipped you off.”
Otto put the words of apology into his mouth once again. He revealed in detail that the reason why he divulged the order I gave in his previous life was because he thought he wouldn’t do it as much as Renner and because of a misjudgment of justice he might have.
“I’m sorry, it’s all my fault.”
Who do you blame
“My stupidity, ignorant of their meanness, ruined the business.”
“It is difficult to fathom the malice hidden within another person.”
So would my country.
“May I ask what you plan to do next?”
“There is still Julich and his violinists left.”
“The violinists in the orchestra wouldn’t move recklessly if we could decorate Rolfe as being in custody. I know that the authorities’ supervision has become more severe, and the protests will also subside.”
But that’s a makeshift solution that won’t last long. For people like Otto and me who are in a prominent position, there are restrictions on every action. The reason I had to seduce Beatrix immediately was because I couldn’t do anything about that restriction.
“I thought I wanted to call them all at once and get rid of them.”
“All the limbs that have lost their heads can do is just rot.”
“Even so, there is no idiot to approach an amputee who doesn’t know about it yet.”
Otto asked, quietly rhyming.
“Are you not going to give up?”
It was a kind of verification process. Now that my story is over, it was a rite of passage to ask if my resolve would be as firmly adhered to as mine.
“I will not turn away.”
There are moments when you have to recall even memories you don’t want to recall. I recalled losing my family to Beatrix Adler.
The wicked woman was so terribly obsessed with me that she wanted to catch me, who had escaped, and even invaded and destroyed the country that had accepted my asylum.
“She said she killed my wife and daughter.”
Even though that country, Campania, was Bernhard’s ally!
“The fact that my family, who lived quietly in Partenope, Campania, was massacred!”
“Then…… !”
Suddenly, Otto grabbed my shoulders. While keeping my head down and controlling my emotions, I didn’t let go of it until I met her gaze and said in an extremely firm voice.
“Then, leave the army to me.”
“…… !”
“If you will put a knife into Beatrix your way, I will sharpen it mine.”
Light and shadow. Certainly, Otto and I were able to make up for each other’s shortcomings. As a de facto First Lady, I was able to dominate society according to my behavior, and as a war hero, he was able to dominate the military through political strife.
“Let’s form a great coalition that will make even the black orchestra we were a part of laugh at.”
The problem is when this link is broken. A solid alliance produces fatal results the moment it collapses. So, this is a strategy that only shines when we don’t have any doubts about each other.
“Frida could be angry.”
“It is a common misunderstanding. Knowing how to survive if you do not resist.”
“You mean no?”
“Well, it may be delayed to some extent. The owner of the slaughterhouse does not slaughter an untimely animal. But where do you see that as human life? It is outside of breeding!”
That was absolutely right. That is the life of cattle. As Beatrix did to me, it was no different from breeding.
“So, Jungwoo, leave the army to me.”
Can a union that goes beyond orchestras exist? That is something that has already gone beyond the scope of the organization. Bernhardt is another empire to stand against the evil empire. Will I be able to form such a thing?
“Just as Beatrix Adler has a confidant named Heinrich Heinrich, I will give you this Otto Moritz as a limb.”
It will be difficult.
“Yourself?”
“Honestly, no.”
“Kuh-kuh, it’s the same as me.”
So it’s also more fun.
“…… Let’s do it.”
It’s well worth the challenge.
* * *
It was after Otto left the detached building.
As I was organizing my thoughts, I faced Adele who came up late. As always, with a calm expression on her face, she came up to me and slightly bowed her head. She asked what she had been doing all this time and she said she was gone and she said goodbye.
I’m sorry for nothing.
Even if she looks calm, she is a woman who had no relationship with such a terrible life until yesterday. It might have been a mistake to show Rolfe’s execution to her, who is just living without worrying about starving.
Maybe, from the fact that I accompanied her to the theater.
“…… Miss Schneider.”
“Yes, Lord Jungwoo.”
“I’m sorry for getting you involved.”
“You don’t have to apologize. It was the result of the choices I made.”
“What do you plan to do next? It would be nice if someone as smart as you could help me, but like I said before, I won’t force it.”
“Sorry. I am still in the position that there is nothing good about disobeying His Excellency.”
I guess so too. It’s unfortunate, but I won’t criticize you for being cowardly. Right now I’m at a loss as to how to kill her.
“If it’s okay, can I just post one word?”
“Yes, whatever.”
“Don’t do it.”
“…… !”
Adele added, blinking her pretty eyes.
“It is suicidal.”
She was shaking her head resolutely. With such a clear attitude, I made it known what kind of line I was trying to cross.
“It reminds me of when I first joined the society.”
“You mean the Black Orchestra?”
“At the time, one of the conductors asked me this.”
“Which.”
“Are you not Adler’s favored person? Why stick to her and try to revolutionize her without escorting her? A nobleman known as a leader pushed me with his selfishness.”
Before the Japanese uprising, there were countless people in the orchestra who suspected me of being the President’s Frakchi. It would have been difficult not to have doubts since it was like that from the beginning. In the same context, the intention of the question was not something that could not be done even if it was mischievous.
“I answered like this.”
Adele would know because she saw my memories. What happened in Partenope, the old capital of Campania, changed my life forever. That’s why I had no intention of using it for a narrow-minded and narrow-minded critic.
“I was me from the beginning.”
Revenge is as base a feeling as the sweetness of attaining it. I won’t deny that vengeance was part of my reasons for killing that queen, but there are more primal motives than that.
“I would have stood up to Beatrix after all, had it not been for that.”
The motive is nature.
“When I was young, I fought to save a friend who had fallen out of favor with my seniors at school. Even though they were beaten in groups and had to be taken to the hospital, they did not stop. Against students older than me, I was beaten day after day, endured, and broke one by one.”
I must have never tried to convince Beatrix that it was me. I have a lot of memories of trying to encourage people to pursue an appeasement policy with all sorts of fawning.
“When I was in the military, I risked my life to save a 15-year-old child from a developing country. It was a declaration ceremony, and I personally fought against those who were threatening to shoot or kill my child with a gun pointed at my head. The bullet that grazed my head at that time still remains here as a scar.”
Even so, the wicked woman never came over.
“I killed seven people, and that was my first kill. He was also a fair retribution, but it was not welcome. After reporting to the upper level, I did not receive proper protection, but it is. If I could go back then, I would make the same choice.”
Every time, he said it was for me, and committed evil deeds without hesitation.
“Why did she join the revolution? Why did you resist her? Because that’s what I was!”
It’s not because there are other grandiose reasons. Just because I am that kind of person. If you see injustice, you can’t go beyond it. That’s why he was the one who shot and killed his comrades and endured even when he was despised. Even when he was dispatched to a distant country, he endured the humiliation alone.
And, I’ve never regretted that fact once in my life.
“You will say things that you have never summoned up the courage to, but are filled with skepticism. Idiots who don’t know how to empathize with the pain of others will say. Hypocrisy or trembling is disgusting.”
“Yes, definitely.”
“Fuck you, yes.”
Emotions run high.
“Damn it, so many people die every day for stupid reasons. But do you ignore me just because I’m not? Are you dismissing it as a story that has nothing to do with me?”
My motives are clear. And it was Beatrix herself who stimulated it. Because I repeated cruel acts so that I could not love myself. Because he brutally killed his wife and daughter who had fled together. In the end, he mercilessly executed even his comrades in the revolution who committed themselves in rebellion.
“But Jung Woo-gong, I still don’t know.”
After listening to the first speech, Adele came up to me. Even though he looked thin at first glance, he stretched out his strong hand. After rubbing my cheek, which was messed with Rolfe’s blood, with my sleeve, she stretched out her arms and hugged me.
“Despite all of that, Your Excellency is a superhuman, comparable to that ancient foreign press. As I have said again and again, disobeying His will is suicidal.”
The comforting hug was as warm as her heart.
“So please don’t.”
“Miss Schneider.”
“If you still don’t change your mind, please reconsider.”
Unfortunately, the 35-year-old pianist couldn’t stop there.
“Adele, I was always me.”
“…… Is that so.”
Before long, Adele, who had moved away from me, lightly bowed.
“I will not divulge what I have seen and heard here today.”
With those words, I passed the front door far away and left the annex building.
“I’m not afraid, but please do what you want.”
Then it quickly disappeared from my sight. That’s how I realized that there was no one. In the dark-shaded entrance, I stood idly with my heart still unresolved. I brushed my hair, feeling that I needed time to organize my thoughts.
“It is suicidal.”
If you say you are not afraid of death, you are obviously lying.
“It’s not easy to kill yourself.”
However, this is not a matter of survival.
“I don’t give up.”
It’s a matter of how to live.
“So, Beatrix.”
The game has only just begun.
