“Wow, this must be the ‘fucking’ magnificent life you spoke of. I am so moved I could cry!”
Ernolf shouted as he looked through hazy eyes at a plump caterpillar whose back had burst open.
Kazar had gone out to hunt something to eat and returned with eight thumb-sized caterpillars and a king lizard tail as thick as his forearm.
Ernolf stared disapprovingly at the caterpillars, their yellow mucus running down their uneven exteriors.
‘Scientific name: Carvilius Staminiformis. It lives near roots in damp marshlands or moss-covered high-altitude regions. A highly nutritious ingredient rich in amino acids, it has an excellent effect on boosting stamina.’
The caterpillars were not harmful to eat, but the problem was their grotesque appearance after exploding while being roasted. Looking at them made Ernolf lose his appetite entirely.
“How am I supposed to eat something like this?!”
“With the mouth you’re using to complain right now.”
Ernolf glared at Kazar with eyes full of displeasure.
“Why’re you looking at me like that? You ate these from time to time. Once you shove it into your mouth, you’ll be surprised by the familiar taste.”
“I lost my memories, and now you are just making things up.”
“Eat quietly before I force it down your throat.”
Kazar spoke as he brought the roasted lizard tail to his mouth.
When they had been mine slaves, the thin gruel distributed once a day had been just enough to cause malnutrition, so they had to catch and eat insects.
They said the tastes of childhood lasted a lifetime. Was that why? Kazar’s sense of taste was thoroughly ruined.
“Hm.”
It was true that caterpillars were highly nutritious ingredients, but this was closer to a ‘roasted corpse’ than a ‘dish.’
Ernolf casually tossed the split-open caterpillar over his shoulder.
“Did you just throw away food that I went to the trouble of catching?!”
“Food has to look like food for me to eat it.”
“If it’s cooked, it’s all food.”
“How can a civilized person say something so barbaric?!”
If it was cooked, it was all food. It was an utterly intolerable statement. Trembling, Ernolf rose to his feet.
“Where are you going?”
“To the village.”
“Why?”
“If we are to live like people, we need to eat food fit for people.”
After saying that, Ernolf spread both arms.
“……What do you expect me to do?”
Ernolf called out proudly to Kazar, who only stared blankly.
“Can you not see that I am staggering? Carry me on your sturdy body.”
“Ha, this bastard…….”
Though he did not like Ernolf’s attitude, Kazar obediently carried him. He could not deny that his brother was in no condition to walk under his own power.
“Don’t stop me this time. If anyone provokes me, I’ll kill them.”
“Tsk, tsk. That temper of yours.”
“What?”
Ernolf did not want to go to the village merely for food. By looking at the village’s architectural style and the clothes its residents wore, he could estimate the era to which the body he had possessed belonged.
“Far from turning us away, they will welcome us. Trust this body.”
Ernolf was certain that if he displayed a few simple spells in front of the village, the villagers would no longer look down on him.
“I’ll steal or take whatever we need, so wait outside.”
“Hey, I told you I’ll take care of everything. You don’t need to do anything.”
“Don’t try anything. Stay still.”
“No, did I not say I would take care of it?! Why are you not listening to me?!”
Ernolf grabbed Kazar’s ear and pulled it hard because Kazar was not listening to a word he said.
“My ear is going to come off!”
“You are an Aura user, yet you are exaggerating…….”
Kazar wanted to throw him down, but he gritted his teeth and endured it. He could not kill with his own hands the brother he had struggled to bring back to life after only three days.
“But how did you know I was an Aura user?”
The Tirad Kazar remembered had never seen an Aura user even once before he died. It was strange that he knew knowledge he could not possibly know.
It felt as though only Tirad’s shell was there, while the person inside was entirely different.
“You know when you see it. How could you not?”
“You can see something and still not know.”
“That does not apply to me. It seems you still have not properly grasped it, but I am a rather extraordinary person. People usually call someone like me a ‘genius,’ you know?”
“Ha…….”
It was absurd, but Kazar could not refute him. Tirad was a ‘Self-Awakened One’ who seemed as though he had stepped out of legend.
He knew knowledge he had never been taught and used magic he had never learned. Calling him a genius was not nearly enough.
“Anyway, if you pull my ear one more time, I’ll really throw you down.”
“If you throw me down, someone like me will die instantly. If you do not want to clear away a corpse, do not do that.”
“Are you calling that a threat?!”
“You do not intend to kill your only brother, do you?”
Kazar was someone cold and cruel, but when it came to his brother, he was astonishingly kind. Ernolf used that to his advantage.
“Do not stagger. Walk straight. My waist hurts.”
“For someone being carried, you sure talk a lot.”
“If you are going to carry me anyway, you might as well do it properly.”
“Shut up.”
Even as they bickered, the corners of Kazar’s lips kept rising.
His brother, who should have rotted away and vanished long ago, was on his back, chattering away. He could not help but smile.
Ernolf slept for a long time on Kazar’s back. When he suddenly woke and looked around, there was still not a single building in sight; only forests and fields stretched on. They seemed to have walked quite far, which was strange.
“Are we really going to the village?”
“Yeah.”
“Then why does nothing but empty wilderness keep appearing?”
“How would I know?”
Even in the era Ernolf had lived in, the countryside, unlike cities, had many desolate and underdeveloped places.
With nothing but grass and trees around them, he could not determine what era this was from the scenery alone.
“Did you perhaps take the wrong path?”
“Shh. Be quiet.”
Kazar suddenly left the path and set Ernolf down amid the bushes. As Ernolf was about to ask why, he fell silent and lowered his body.
Under the faint moonlight, a bloodied young man staggered and ran across the hills.
The young man slid down a hill, rolled noisily on the road, then hurried toward somewhere.
‘What is with that man……?’
As Ernolf moved to look more closely, Kazar firmly grabbed his arm.
Soon, the heavy sound of hooves shaking the ground rang out, and men on warhorses appeared atop the hill.
The moment Kazar saw the man at their head, his eyes flashed.
‘Shakim.’
Shakim, captain of a Cornu raiding party. He took out his bow and nocked an arrow. The white aura gathered at its tip shone like a pearl in the darkness.
Kazar saw the ring Shakim wore on his right index finger. It was an artifact that enhanced physical stamina and aura ability.
He had used that ring for some time, so even after fifty years, Kazar remembered Shakim’s name.
‘Yes, today was that day!’
Kazar’s gaze at Shakim sharpened.
When Shakim released the bowstring, the arrow infused with aura flew in a white arc.
“Ghk!”
With a sharp whistle through the air, the arrow pierced the fleeing young man’s neck.
The young man, who had been running with all his strength to survive, stiffened like a log and crumpled onto the road. At the same time, Shakim’s lips curled up.
Kazar took his eyes from Shakim and looked at the fallen young man. Over the face of the young man coughing blood as he died, Kazar saw his own face from long ago.
What had happened to him on this day fifty years ago came vividly back to him.
It had been the night of the third day after he escaped the mine, leaving his dead brother behind. Kazar had nearly died after being struck by an arrow fired by Shakim.
Shakim was the one who had fired the arrow that day, but there was someone else who had been the true culprit in driving Kazar into a deadly situation.
‘Is it God’s will that I returned to this time to take revenge on my enemies?’
He had lost his throne and power, but in exchange he had gained a chance to save his brother and kill his enemies. He did not know what god had intervened, but it was not bad compensation for losing everything.
‘Then I will not refuse.’
Kazar silently smiled as he thought of a clever way to take Shakim’s head and that of another enemy at once.
When the men who had killed the young man came down from the hill and revealed themselves, Ernolf observed them closely.
Mounted on large horses, they wore clothes made of wolf pelts and fur, along with armor reinforced with metal. Seeing the oddly shaped horn ornaments attached to their saddles, Ernolf identified them.
‘The Cornu Tribe!’
From ancient times through the early Middle Ages, the nomadic peoples of the North had constantly invaded the south. The Cornu Tribe was among the tribes that had most frequently invaded the southern continent.
‘Is it not enough that I possessed the body of a complete stranger? Have I gone back through time as well?’
Faced with evidence that was difficult to deny, Ernolf froze. He had hoped it was not true, but it seemed that he had gone back about sixteen hundred years.
Magic that transcended the limits of time and space was possible only for a god or a Transcendent, a being said to be infinitely close to a god.
‘How has something like this happened to me……?’
He could not even guess which Transcendent had done this or for what purpose.
The events were so endlessly bewildering that the harder he concentrated in search of a clue, the more distant his consciousness became.
“All right, now let us go harvest.”
Shakim spoke. The Cornu warriors trampled the young man, killed by the arrow, beneath their horses’ hooves and galloped toward the village.
“All right, now let us follow.”
Imitating Shakim’s way of speaking, Kazar rose to his feet. Just before he emerged from the bushes, Ernolf hurriedly grabbed his arm.
“What are you talking about? You are going to follow them?”
As he looked at the startled Ernolf, Kazar’s eyes curved like crescents.
‘Ah, before I go take revenge, I need to put Tiri somewhere safe.’
Accustomed to being alone, Kazar had forgotten his brother’s existence for a moment.
“They are going to raid the village. We need to go save the people.”
“You?”
Ernolf gave a short, disbelieving laugh. The one who had massacred people in the mine would never take such a risk for the villagers who had insulted him.
“Are you not planning to steal something amid the chaos?”
The captain of the Cornu Tribe seemed to be an Intermediate Aura Warrior or higher. He was not someone a newly awakened greenhorn should carelessly provoke.
“Do not get yourself killed doing something pointless. It is better to hide somewhere safe until they are gone.”
“Should I?”
Ernolf had expected Kazar to stubbornly insist on going to the village, but Kazar unexpectedly agreed without resistance. Ernolf was taken aback.
“You change your mind very easily.”
“As a matter of human decency, I thought I might go and give them a warning first, but if you are stopping me, there is no need…….”
“Yes, you have thought well.”
Kazar said he knew a safe place to hide and told Ernolf to get on his back.
Kazar had disliked carrying him, so it did not seem at all trustworthy that he was offering his back so readily. Ernolf got on his back with misgivings.