Sage 11

“Did you kill her?”

“She won’t die from this. Teriz is old now, so she’ll be sick for a while, though.”

“…….”

“Are you worried about someone who was going to sell you out?”

Protagonists in typical coming-of-age fantasy novels are good. Since they have to elicit sympathy from the reader, they are rarely evil. Even in Hollywood movies, unless there is absolutely no excuse, they don’t usually make the protagonist a really bad guy.

That’s why the ‘protagonist’ Irkus was excessively humane. Kindness is a virtue, but when there are people everywhere who are out to kill you, being kind only makes it harder to survive. He was so soft that he was pushed out of the imperial palace in a bloodless coup and ended up in the Southern Forest.

Even though it was a long time ago, the imperial palace I experienced was a harsh place to survive with a gentle heart. When I was Yekarina’s pet and when I worked as an imperial mage, it was a place full of insidious people.

You had to be careful with every word you spoke, and proper flattery and decorum were essential virtues for survival. People who were used to political balancing, divided between the emperor’s faction and the aristocratic faction, became constantly corrupt in order to grab even a fragment of power.

Considering that the lunatic blond emperor was immediately dethroned after the powerful witch Yekarina died, the imperial palace was, to put it nicely, a war zone without swords, and to put it badly, a jungle of blind beasts.

That’s probably why Yekarina’s daughters were so adamant about not becoming empress.

It’s not good for a witch to get sick from worrying about international affairs. I would also run away in terror if someone told me to become emperor. Why should I take on such a troublesome title? Absolutely not.

“You need to get rid of some of your humanity.”

At my words, Irkus frowned.

It seems that the prince I picked up has quite a high capacity for empathy. If he plans to become a great emperor in the future, it was better to have this kind of humanity.

He couldn’t be a good ruler if he tried to use people as tools like the lunatic emperor, or if he only worried about himself while being invaded like the Kaman royals. Since I had accepted him as my disciple, it would be better if he became a great ruler who would go down in history. That way, I would also gain some prestige.

“You talk like a god, not a human.”

Because I was using movement magic and holding Irkus in my arms, I couldn’t avoid the small hand reaching out to me.

Irkus had a higher body temperature than me. I don’t know if it’s because he’s young or because he’s a warm-hearted human, but when I hold his hand or hold him like this, the parts that touch feel warm.

Thanks to Irkus clinging to me, I completely missed the timing to put him down.

I signaled to Gilbert, who was listening to our conversation as if he were just an ordinary tree, to come and save me, but Gilbert just stood there, rooted to the floor of the atelier, pretending not to hear anything, even though he understood all my signals.

Ha… that really unhelpful oak tree.

Instead of putting Irkus down, I just dropped the shopping items I was holding in my hands.

Normally, the dignified prince would have jumped out of my arms because he thought he was heavy, but he was still clinging to me without moving. He even covered my eyes with his hand.

“I wish you wouldn’t do that.”

“What do you mean?”

“I wish you wouldn’t hurt others so casually like that.”

It was a cheeky request.

I reached up to remove the small hand covering my eyes. I don’t think being told not to hurt others so casually is something I should hear from a twelve-year-old.

“You don’t know the world yet.”

Even though she was struck by lightning, Teriz would inform the Robain Empire of Irkus’s whereabouts.

It’s not because Teriz Perlburn is evil. It’s because there’s a huge reward for Irkus’s whereabouts.

As Teriz said, when there is money to be made, people make cruel choices. It’s not easy to make the right choices all the time because the world is a harsh place. Killing someone to fill your own belly is the same in any world.

“It’s easier to hurt others than to get hurt myself. Most people in the world know that truth.”

“But that’s not the right thing to do.”

“As long as you’re born human, you can’t live making only the right choices. If you’re that soft, you’ll lose everything you have.”

“Everything?”

When I pulled down Irkus’s hand that was covering my eyes, his clear purple eyes immediately came into view.

They were such beautiful colors that you could be mesmerized just by looking at them. Eyes that were fundamentally different from my own black eyes, which were hard to see even when light entered them, like jewels.

“Someday, you’ll be cruel to me, too.”

“If necessary.”

“By striking me with lightning, or by not granting my request?”

“Maybe I’ll choose a much crueler way than that.”

If Irkus, contrary to my expectations, becomes emperor but cannot kill me, I will cut off my ties with him without hesitation, just as I did with Teriz.

Not because I’m disappointed in Irkus, but because I don’t want to watch in real time a human I’ve spent a considerable amount of time with grow old and die.

I’ll probably go into seclusion again until Irkus’s descendant grows up and becomes the new emperor. That’s the extent of my relationship with Irkus as I see it. A fleeting relationship, just being together because the conditions are right.

“So, get rid of some of your humanity in preparation for when I hurt you. Immortals are bound to make mortals sad.”

Of course, in my experience, the opposite was more often the case.

I forcibly pulled Irkus away from me. Irkus seemed to want to say something more to me, but I didn’t want to hear it. If I get attached and my feet get caught, I’ll just be the crazy one.

Long-lived beings were more sane when they were indifferent. Those who found meaning in fleeting moments always went crazy quickly.

Again, mental strength is a consumable. It doesn’t recover on its own like the body does when it’s injured. Even if he is the protagonist, Irkus is just a human, so if he can’t kill me, he will grow old and die before me.

“And you, don’t you dare try to teach me. Admonition is my part, not yours.”

“You only act like this at times like this…”

“I took you in to die by your hand. Don’t forget that, Irkus.”

It’s bad for my heart to be harsh to an obedient child who is good at magic.

I couldn’t gauge what kind of expression I was making right now. I wish I had a very cold face… but it’s been so long since I’ve used my facial muscles in a variety of ways that I’ve forgotten how to make such an expression.

It was really my loss to get attached to those who die early. Emotionally, I was already like a minus bank account. Over the long years, there was a whole truckload of humans I had been attached to, not just Irkus. They all died a long time ago, though.

But if I give anything more here, I’ll really be penniless. As I averted my gaze from Irkus’s face, which looked up at me with hurt eyes, I made a promise to myself several times.

I must never get attached.

Absolutely never.

* * *

The name of the lunatic blond emperor whom Yekarina loved was Darwin.

After learning the emperor’s name, I had a hard time for a while. Darwin? Is that person going to argue for the theory of evolution? Was he a biologist before he became emperor?

As a transmigrator from South Korea, it was really embarrassing that a famous person in history and a person from another world had the same name. Every time Yekarina called the emperor affectionately as Darwin, an image of an ape passed through my mind in slow motion.

At first, I couldn’t understand Yekarina’s pure love for Darwin at all.

How could I fully understand such a foolish emotion? At that point, as a slave to the South Korean entrance exam system, I had only spent my days faithfully studying, so I had never been in love, let alone had a crush on anyone other than the CSAT prep books.

Moreover, since it was a time when I thought that all human relationships, including love, were unconditionally give-and-take, Yekarina, who foolishly gave everything she had and received nothing in return, seemed foolish.

Instead of being an empress, she should have just used her magic to take that Darwin guy and lock him up in a remote place and live happily ever after.

‘That’s not what Darwin wants.’

Yekarina said that even as she was gradually losing her life force. Because Darwin wanted to be emperor, she sacrificed herself to make him emperor.

There was nothing forced between the two. There was no formal magic contract, and there was no threat to the lives of their children or loved ones. Only Yekarina’s pure love supported the relationship between the two.

‘Actually, I don’t understand Your Majesty at all. Does love put food on the table?’

‘That’s a bit unfortunate.’

‘I think I may never understand.’

‘Is that so? You’ll fall in love someday, too.’

‘Me?’

‘Yes. You don’t know it now, but someday. Humans are bound to love something in some way. As long as they’re alive, very irrationally…’

When I heard those words, the emotion I felt was fear. I didn’t want to love someone so devotedly like Yekarina. In my opinion, love was crazy.

In this hierarchical society of another world, it was the worst for me, a transmigrator, to get attached to someone.

First of all, I was a human who had lived in the 21st century, where civilization had developed quite a bit, so I couldn’t accept that slavery was still alive in this world. Most people here couldn’t understand me, and I couldn’t understand them.

I wasn’t a genius, but I was a good internal calculator who knew how to live without loss. I was also someone who knew how to take care of myself more than others.

To put it nicely, I was rational, and to put it badly, I was a selfish bastard. For me to love someone in this world of mutual misunderstanding? Just imagining it was frustrating.

So, it was better for me to bite my tongue and die if I ever loved someone like Yekarina, whom I secretly thought was foolish.

Would I ever get anything back if I gave my all? I just want to live a loosely connected life so that I’m not too lonely, but humans never knew moderation.

Because of the curse of eternal life, it was impossible to bite my tongue and die, but fortunately, in all these long years, I have never passionately loved anyone.

Yekarina’s prediction was wrong. No matter how much of a witch she was, she couldn’t prophesy. Yekarina probably didn’t know that I was a human so detached from ‘love.’