23 – 23. The Blackthorn’s Sinner (1)

“[Are you kidding me? You can’t even do this? You plan to live as a disgrace to the family?!]”

The boy’s failing was.

That he held no interest in swords.

“[Why are you so weak? Do you intend to tarnish the family name? How will you ever greet those esteemed ones with this—!]”

Also, the boy’s failing was.

His inability to find courage in the face of threat.

“[You, cooking? Praise? Have you seen such a madman! Bring me the switch, now!]”

To enjoy cooking, and wish to show it off.

This too was the boy’s failing.

“[Why was such a child… ah, a child who should have been born in some slum came from my womb—]”

The boy’s greatest failing was perhaps.

Born without a sense of his place, here in Blackthorn.

* * *

“Kuhahahahahahahahaha!”

A near-deafening maniacal laugh burst forth as Polu thrashed about like he was deranged.

The black liquid that had erupted from his body had, by now, retreated back into him through every pore.

He walked on the snow.

The Yeti beside him, also consumed by the black liquid, followed Polu.

“Sikueeum, sikueeum.”

Though he spoke with a muddled slur, as if his brain were broken, the Yeti was clearly walking with purpose towards a target.

And, soon enough.

They arrived at the frozen stream, and the scouts came into view.

“Polu…”

“It really was you.”

At Isaac and Meladic’s murmurs, Polu grinned, hooking up the corners of his mouth.

“I’ve returned, everyone.”

A figure utterly unlike the timid boy they knew.

His once fair skin was now riddled with raised bumps, and its color was darkening, turning black.

If the ‘bone’ piercing his heart hadn’t still been there, no one would have guessed he was Polu.

“I’ve come! And I’ve even subdued a Yeti! Kuahahahaha! Do you see? I’ve been helpful to you all, right? Right? Yes? Isn’t that right?”

Polu’s questions, pressed with a desperate edge, met no response from the scouting party.

They were lost in the confusion of the situation, only Isaac stepping forward, slow and deliberate.

“Polu, listen calmly.”

“Huh? Isaac? What do you know? You abandoned me! Let Silverna speak!”

Silverna approached, brow furrowed, and Polu’s mouth gaped wide. Drool hung, mimicking a demon’s maw.

“Me, abandon me? Silverna? Huh? Abandon me? It’s okay. She’s pretty. Silverna is pretty, so it’s okay. But abandon me? Was I, was I so useless? Did I do something so wrong?”

“……Polu?”

“No, no, don’t be scared. I won’t kill you. But maybe I will. I don’t really know. But Silverna is really pretty. That’s what I thought from the first moment. She’s good with spears too, so different from me, huh?”

Polu, spilling words unlike himself.

The filter, usually straining his perception and thought, was gone.

His torrent of words, driven by instinct, stilled; a spark died in Polu’s eyes as he nodded.

“I should kill you.”

*WHoooM*!

The Yeti’s fist swung, enormous. Silverna, anticipating it, leapt back in a single bound, evading the blow.

“I’ll take the Yeti! The rest of you, subdue Polu!”

The first to answer her command, ironically, was Polu.

“Subdue? SUBDUUUE?! Subdue Polu! Yes! Kill him! Kill the trash! Ash of Blackthorn! Darkest star among stars! Purge the family’s sinner!”

“W-what’s wrong with him?”

Anna’s bewildered question had Isaac biting down on his lip.

Leaving the Yeti to Silverna, they all rushed towards Polu.

Sharen Helmunt launched the first attack.

*WHOOSH*!

To end it swiftly, she charged at Polu, ‘Red Dawn’ blooming from her entire body.

*CLANG*!

“……!”

Sharen’s red eyes widened, flickering.

With a thin blade, Polu had, with unbelievable ease, blocked her strike.

He hadn’t even faltered.

As effortless as catching a snowflake that fell from the sky.

“Huh?”

Even Pollu himself was taken aback by it.

His eyes, wide and round, stared at his own sword. As he began to push Sharen away with force, his lips stretched into a long, jagged grin.

“Khee, hee hee! Hah ha ha ha ha ha! Father! Can you see this? Are you watching meee! I! I am pushing Helmunth back!”

A spear plunged into Pollu’s side as he erupted in manic laughter.

“Huh?”

It was Anna, hidden behind Helmunth’s fallen form, who had landed the blow.

But the spearhead seemed to glance off steel, and Pollu easily swatted it away with a flick of his arm.

Meladic, who had belatedly rushed to attack, his fist raised instead of his sword, also halted in his tracks.

They all realized that no attack would work against Pollu now.

“He’s suddenly turned into a monster.”

“My spear seems to be getting blocked a lot lately.”

Sharen and Anna retreated.

They formed a formation, surrounding Pollu, but he paid it no mind, lost in his elation.

“Hah ha ha ha ha! So that was it! Father! Mother! That’s why you always told me to become strong! To swing a sword! To train! Every single day!”

“……”

“Ah, really! I never really wanted to swing a sword or anything! But now I know why! Now I understand the meaning!”

Pollu’s shoulders slumped, and he dropped his head, sniffing.

“Still don’t wanna do it though.”

Observing Pollu’s jumbled emotions and state, the scout team members were also thrown into confusion.

“He’s like a madman.”

“What the hell just happened?”

Sharen and Meladic muttered in bewilderment.

Conversely, Anna found herself looking at Silverna, who was facing the Yeti.

It seemed they couldn’t handle things themselves, but…

“Silverna’s a no-go.”

Isaac, having seen her gaze, stated with a cold judgment.

“Huh?”

“The Yeti isn’t in a normal state either. It’s not as extreme as Pollu but it’s clearly under the dominion of the black liquid.”

It was obvious as the Yeti’s body was taking on a murky hue.

Especially with a strength and speed that was incomparable to before.

Originally, they should have been the ones going to Silvrena’s aid.

“Right now, with Silvrena holding off the Frost Giant, this is our greatest chance.”

If Silvrena were to fall to the Frost Giant, it would be over, just like that.

There was no way anyone here could withstand the two of them working in tandem.

“Does Isaac-nim have a plan?”

At Anna’s question, Isaac fixed his gaze back on Polu. The black liquid, as if oxidized, rippled with a dark aura like smoke around him.

To Isaac’s eyes, it looked like a bonfire, blazing brightly as kindling.

“If we draw it out, we can win. That state can’t be sustained for long.”

“……”

“But we can’t afford a drawn-out fight. Which means what we need to target is that.”

The tip of Isaac’s pulse-line pointed to the ‘bone’ embedded in Polu’s chest.

The Frost Giant’s first assault, the one that had taken Polu, the very starting point of this situation.

“We’ll use that to kill Polu.”

At those words, Meladic and Sharen looked at Isaac with shocked expressions.

It was the question of how, even now, as a former comrade, they could be forced to kill him.

“We have to kill him.”

There was no hope left for him.

Isaac knew that form.

Though he’d never seen the black liquid, in his past life, he’d seen a person change like this.

“The moment someone gets like that, they’re no longer human.”

Isaac’s voice was heavy with dread.

“If you can’t do it, I will.”

The hand that held the pulse-line showed no tremor.

Watching Isaac step forward, Anna cautiously asked.

“What is it you know? Please, tell us.”

“…Enthrallment.”

“Enthrallment?”

“It’s a ritual the Transcendents use when they turn humans into their possessions.”

It drastically boosts the body, but it inflicts a very grotesque mental distortion.

They act on nothing but instinct.

Words spill out, tumbling from his head.

He forces out his raw truth.

“I’m so sorryyy! Father! Mother! I’m sorryyy! I’m sorry for being a worm like son!”

“Those words–“

“Kuhhh… I shouldn’t have been bornnn! Me! Even with this power, someone like me who doesn’t want to swing a sword!”

Anna’s gaze, filled with dread, darts toward Polu.

“Kill meeee! A disgrace who should never have existeddd! A wretch who makes mother cry! A sinner of Blackthorn!”

Every word he pours out now, is a truth untouched by lies.

“I’m a sinner! A sinner, I say! aaack! Kuaaak! Kill meee! That way, Father won’t be disappointed anymore! That way, Mother won’t cry anymore! I, I have to atone even like this!”

The sinner of Blackthorn beats his chest, confessing his truth.

Having lived a life stained with tears and regret, it seemed he’d already forgotten even the name ‘Polu.’

Perhaps it was because of that.

“Polu! Get a grip, you fool! You can’t lose to something like that!”

Melladic, feeling something surge within, cried out in anguish.

Issac said he had to be killed. Melladic, feeling a growing urgency, was struggling to find some other way.

“Kuhk!”

The Blackthorn sinner whips his head around.

He stares at Melladic and nods, drool trickling from his mouth.

“Right, right, right.”

Then.

“I want to live.”

He immediately lunges towards Melladic, swinging his sword.