Summoning an unknown man and sharing gazes with him… If they started from the assumption that he wasn’t human, everything made a bit more sense.
Dan’s eyes turned thoughtfully.
‘Then, what race could he be?’
He showed no typical characteristics of other known races.
When he refocused his gaze to analyze him again, he found himself caught by the other’s intense green eyes. No, it actually seemed like Raven had already realized he was being watched, because as soon as Dan looked, Raven turned his head and held his gaze.
“What’s wrong?”
“……”
Dan quickly shook his head.
Both his ability and his identity were full of questions, but he didn’t seem to have bad intentions, and, being the one who needed help, Dan had no right to question him.
He tried to look away, but those strange green eyes kept trapping him.
“Ah, I see. Are these eyes bothering you?”
Raven, who had already noticed his stare, lightly rubbed the corner of his eye.
“Some people feel uncomfortable with them, they say they’re filled with spectral energy. Usually it’s the elderly or people with talent like shamans. Are you one of those?”
Spectral energy? Shamans?
His expression must have shown his confusion, because Raven immediately answered.
“These eyes are lent to me by my guardian spirit. Since I can’t see for myself…”
After all, a spirit is a soul. A dead one.
“Since I’m using the eyes of someone deceased, it’s natural that they carry spectral energy.”
…So it was a guardian spirit. Right, he remembered hearing him call it “ancestor.”
Dan followed the movement of Raven, who gently touched his eyelid, and looked ahead again.
He had borrowed a part of a dead being’s body. Calling it shamanism… he wasn’t sure if it really fit into that category.
The suspicion only grew, but since curiosity had always outweighed distrust, Dan decided to set those thoughts aside and focus on moving forward.
‘Even if I doubted, it’s not like I could do anything.’
It was important to remember — he was the one in need.
He was the one who had asked for help. He couldn’t afford to distrust someone who had accepted to help him, especially when finding another willing person would be practically impossible.
Raven was an exception. Dan wasn’t someone lucky enough to get a second exception.
If he had been lucky, he wouldn’t even be in this situation to begin with.
‘Sister…’
Hopefully he wouldn’t be too late.
The closer they got to their destination, the more useless thoughts swirled in his mind. Finally, when they spotted the place in question, Dan quickened his pace.
And thus, when they arrived…
Crack.
They saw a woman breaking the neck of a man who seemed to be one of the pursuers.
“……”
[The guardian spirit ??? lets out a sigh.]
What kind of cruel joke of fate was this.
As if time had stopped, Raven froze, staring at the woman. Then, slowly, he turned his head toward Dan. His lifeless green eyes pierced the young man, and a faint laugh escaped his lips.
…Damn it.
‘Death, you surely knew.’
That I would end up getting involved with this boy, that I would end up acting to help him.
Of all the souls you could have sent me to collect, you chose this one. Because you want me not only to lose the will to live but to long for death.
“……”
“……”
An uncomfortable and dangerous tension filled the air.
Before that simple silence could transform into an even greater discomfort, Raven smiled. His voice came out light, as if nothing had happened.
“Well, how impressive. I guess that must be your sister. Is she awakened, or a warrior?”
Dan shook his head with effort.
No, it wasn’t like that. His sister wasn’t awakened. Their father had been the only warrior in the village. He had been part of the militia. His sister had only learned some basic techniques from him…
…and their father had died protecting their village during an attack by illegal mercenaries hired by slave traders.
“Who…? Ah.”
The woman, who had thrown a fierce look upon hearing an unfamiliar voice, slightly relaxed her expression when she saw Dan next to Raven. Her body, until then tense, lost strength and collapsed, staggering.
Dan immediately ran to support her.
“──!”
“……Why…?”
The woman’s lips moved without making a sound.
She was surely asking why he had come back. It was easy to guess.
Raven had no intention of interrupting that reunion. Instead, he turned toward one of the pursuers the woman hadn’t managed to finish off.
Normally, he should have approached the woman to help her, but this time he didn’t.
There was no reason to.
She was a soul he had to collect.
This was his atonement for not being able to fulfill his promise and, at the same time, an act of contained rage.
He placed his foot on the neck of the still-living man and leaned over him. The green eyes, imbued with spectral energy, flashed coldly.
“…The only slaves officially allowed by the kingdoms are nobles from defeated nations and criminals, right?”
“Guh…”
It was a rule established by the first emperor of the Ardal Empire.
Although he himself was not a supporter of slavery, he couldn’t oppose the context of his era — an era where conquering, plundering, and subjugating were normal.
In his last stand, instead of forcing conscription on innocents, he decreed that only defeated nobles would be enslaved.
It was a warning both to enemy leaders and to his own nobles — not to speak of war lightly unless they were willing to pay the price.
Although “officially” it was like that, due to the shortage of slaves caused by the low number of criminals and nobles, an implicit broadening of that margin was tolerated.
“They implicitly allow even citizens of the defeated country. But only up to that point.”
But it was still within the range of a “defeated country.” And yet, how strange.
“Those guys don’t look like citizens of a defeated country at all. You can see it in their eyes.”
“Sa… save me…”
Maybe choked by the bloodlust, the dumb, trembling voice slipped out. Raven, applying pressure with his foot on the man’s neck, shut his annoying mouth while murmuring quietly.
“It’s not like Ardal fell while I was absent.”
Ardal was a country that had built a thousand years of history, with military strength to match.
At least, before Raven isolated himself, they had enough military power to withstand over ten years in a regular war.
Although most surviving countries were similar, which is why there was an atmosphere of not attacking each other.
So, in short, these guys…
“They have guts.”
Simply lunatics. Raven defined them simply.
It crossed his mind that it could be a ploy by other forces to tarnish the emperor’s image, but that wasn’t his concern.
“What should I do with them…”
Should he kill them immediately or track their lair and destroy it?
Tracking them wouldn’t bring him any benefit. And besides, with open wounds and bleeding, he needed to look for elven herbs… It made no sense to waste time on this scum.
‘But if I think about what I’ll have to do soon…’
His gaze briefly passed over the woman. And just then, his clothes were tugged. Looking down, he saw Dan, hugging the woman, looking up at him with a tearful face, as if begging for help.
“…Ah, right.”
With a dry voice, Raven spoke.
“It was to fulfill your request that I came.”
Perhaps it also reflected a faint resolution. A determination not to waver before the reproaches that would come? Or maybe, a way to atone for himself?
With a gaze of unknown intent, he opened his mouth.
“First─”
Crack
Stepping on the hunter’s ankle, Raven closed the distance toward the woman. The annoying trace of a hidden gaze had already disappeared, so there was nothing stopping him.
With a cold voice, he said,
“First, I should apologize for not being able to fulfill the promise.”
“…….”
Dan opened his eyes wide, as if wondering what he was talking about. Raven, avoiding his gaze, brought his hand to his neck.
The pendant vibrated slightly, as if urging him.
“…I have to kill this woman.”
“!”
“There’s no other choice.”
Who would have thought things would twist this much? She was someone who should already be dead. He knew it the moment he saw her. It wasn’t normal for her to even be able to move after snapping a hunter’s neck. She was surely squeezing out her last breath to save her brother.
‘That’s why Death sent me here.’
All lives have a set time, and usually they die before completing it due to accidents. If a soul is not collected within three days, sometimes they don’t die or even resurrect and continue living.
Hence the custom of the three-day wake.
The woman in front of him was of the type that “does not die.”
She was holding onto life purely by sheer willpower.
Raven now had to crush that will and cut it off. Placing and removing his hand over the pendant, a black current emerged and formed the most familiar weapon to him.
“…You know.”
Holding the weapon that collects souls, he approached her and stared into her eyes as he spoke softly.
“Did you know that Death has a servant who acts as its hands and feet?”
It wasn’t a question, but an explanation.
Apparently, the woman caught the meaning. Raven twisted one corner of his lips upward.
With lifeless and frozen eyes, he laughed as he said,
“People used to call me Raven, like the crow that Death uses.”
“……Ah.”
“I came to stop your time.”
…Collecting someone’s soul was mentally exhausting work. Especially if there was any relationship with that person. That was surely why Death placed this condition of immortality.
Glancing sideways at Dan, who was paralyzed with shock and betrayal, Raven maintained his nonchalant attitude as he generously added,
“Do you have anything you want to say as a last will?”
Normally, he wouldn’t even ask that, but it was his way of apologizing. After all, he had come promising help, but instead was going to kill her.
“──!”
“Stop, Dan.”
The woman, barely breathing, stopped Dan, who was about to throw himself recklessly.
With a serene voice, without a trace of resentment or anger, she spoke clearly.
“Our mother’s last will was… that I take care of my brother.”
“……”
“If you take my soul, I won’t be able to fulfill that promise.”
That’s why.
“If you’re going to take my soul… at least continue that will.”
“…I asked if you had something to say, not to ask me for favors.”
The green eyes trembled slightly.
Raven suppressed his fleeting expression and added bitterly.
“You’re still saying that even after seeing how I broke the promise in front of you?”
He had broken his promise to Dan right before her.
She wasn’t stupid; she must have noticed. Yet the woman smiled softly, as if it didn’t matter to her.
“…….”
What else could he say?
After a brief exchange of gazes, Raven silently raised his weapon. The woman, knowing that the end was near, closed her eyes. There was neither acceptance nor rejection, but her resistance was also weak.
‘At least she won’t be able to ignore my request.’
In some way, Raven would remember her.
Although she did not wish to die, she knew her hopeless state and didn’t want to cling pathetically to a useless hope.
But that was from her point of view. Dan, being the only family she had left, couldn’t accept it.
“──!”
A black crow rushed in with fierce force.