C687
Night.
When Zephyr and other Kinzelo officers left, only Hedo and Sandra remained, but now they had to become comrades instead of guests.
It was the safest way for Hedo to protect Sandra.
Hoo...
Thick smoke poured into the moonlit night sky.
Instead of the strong fragrance unique to Mila's finest pine cigarette, Hedo could only taste the bitter, acrid flavor.
Hedo's back, leaning against the balcony, resembled that of a worried father.
"Tower Guardian."
Jin called out to Hedo, leaning against his side.
Hedo remained silent for a while, continuously exhaling cigarette smoke.
Behind them, the orange lights and the hustle and bustle of people could be heard.
It was the sound of Jin and Sandra's companions chatting in the restaurant.
As Sandra usually did when visiting Tikan, she mingled naturally with all the companions except Valeria.
Hedo hadn't seen her so excited and chattering like a cheerful fool in Zipple.
"What could she be doing to be so excited...?"
Without taking his eyes off the sky, Hedo murmured to himself.
"Do you also have time to laugh and chat like that?"
"I'm not as lively as Sandra by nature. But I do enjoy spending time with friends when I have the chance."
"I see."
"Have you never seen her behave like that in Zipple?"
"Since she was young, she has never been in a good mood for more than a few hours. At least, when young master Beradin was fine, they sometimes spent time together. They would laugh and then get angry, get angry and then laugh. As you know, the lady almost always acted like a madwoman. Since she met you..."
Thinking of Sandra, who had covered the room with newspaper articles, flyers, and various items related to Jin, and laughed nonstop, Hedo felt a headache coming on.
"...she got a little better... No, I'm worried if that's the right way to put it. She was still strange. She might have become even stranger. Anyway, since she met you, there have been moments like now, where she is happy without any ups and downs."
"So joining Tikan is something better for Sandra, right?"
"If you had seen that room, those words wouldn't come out so easily."
"Room?"
"Pretend you didn't hear that."
"But, Tower Guardian, what about you?"
"What do you mean?"
"Have you ever laughed and talked like that?"
"No."
Hedo's quick response, as if there was no need to think about it, made Jin shrug.
"Can a person be like that?"
"Except for the lady, I don't experience significant emotional fluctuations in everything else. I haven't had anyone by my side except the lady, and I haven't experienced loneliness since I met her, so it's actually something natural for me."
From Hedo's transcendent power, his relatively modest reputation, his past with Cyron, his relationship with Sandra, and much more.
From the first encounter in the Sota desert with him, Jin had been curious about Hedo as a person.
Somehow, he felt that this conversation would ease that curiosity a bit.
"Now that I think about it, you're the first person to ask me about that since I met the lady."
"As we are becoming family, we should know each other's personalities to some extent."
"But I remember I haven't given you a definitive answer about becoming family yet."
The night breeze passed between the two and disappeared somewhere.
Jin pointed to the bottle and glass beside him.
"You had prepared two glasses, so I assumed you had decided. Please give me a drink."
They didn't make a toast.
The two drank five glasses without a word.
Jin waited, and Hedo reflected on the past.
When Hedo started speaking again, Jin heard a name he didn't expect.
"Do you know Vanessa Olsen, the former Black Knight?"
"I have met her."
"I was in the same class as that woman."
"The same class...?"
"I was a monster from the beginning. So, even if I breathed and lived quietly, accidents were bound to happen."
During his youth, Hedo had fought Vanessa once in the Black Sea.
Jin didn't hear the detailed story, but he realized that she and most of the former Black Knights were individuals destined for tragedy.
Jin immediately understood Hedo's words.
"I became aware of that fact when I was eight years old. It started to bother me when I saw the daily beatings from the orphanage director. Without thinking, I punched him. Bam, his wrist shattered. I was a skilled fighter, about 3 stars or so."
"Hmm."
"And then, as the director fell, by reflex, he swung his sword at me. The sword barely touched me. I didn't plan to kill him, but when I deflected the sword with my hand, it broke and rebounded, piercing his throat."
"It must have shocked you at a young age."
"I didn't think much of it."
"Because he was a despicable person?"
"In retrospect, he was that type of person, but at the time, I really didn't think anything of it. Oh, it's getting heavy. That was the extent of my thoughts. I didn't even realize that killing was bad. It continued like that for a long time."
Accident and escape.
Until he turned fourteen, Hedo's life revolved around that.
At first, he caused accidents unintentionally, and later, he dealt with annoying people without hesitation, moving from place to place.
"It's strange how those people who seemed like they would die if touched always sought a fight. Maybe it was because of my unusually robust build and inflexible attitude back then."
Jin listened to his story with great interest, taking a sip of his drink.
"If you had stopped, they would have sought you out."
"I was too busy fighting from the bottom, so I didn't have many opportunities to harm powerful figures or famous individuals. Then I was too young, so naturally, I avoided suspicion. On the contrary, there were times when I completely annihilated a few bandit groups, and they came looking for me, offering rewards."
"Did you go to them?"
"They came to me. I was planning to leave for another place because I thought it would be problematic, but somehow they found their way to the old house where I was staying. They told me to come down, but I refused, and a fight broke out."
"How old were you then?"
"Twelve or thirteen, I think. I'm not sure. The force he brought was about fifty..."
"Are you saying all of them attacked a twelve or thirteen-year-old boy?"
"Since I had a large build, I must have looked older at first glance."
"Still, they must have felt resentment. Even if it was an order, they must have hesitated to attack someone as young as you."
"What surprised me the most was that they confronted me like demons, even when the first subordinate who lunged at me had his neck twisted and died."
"It's not surprising, but it's incredibly ruthless."
"There are even more ruthless things in the world. Anyway, among them, there was one person who could be called a trained knight. Seeing my power, the subordinates of the lord trusted him and fought beside him."
The young Hedo said it was during that encounter that he felt attracted to the concept of "sword" for the first time.
"Probably, you also felt the same. The feeling of those who gathered, full of confidence that they would kill me, but seemed as insignificant as jackals... I quickly killed the lord and all his subordinates, and then it was just him and me face to face."
He was the best knight in the territory at that time, but objectively, he was at a middle level. A person close to forty years old who couldn't surpass five stars. In his eyes, the young Hedo was not a human being but a monster or demon.
"There was blood and corpses all around nearby, and I was in a state where I narrowly escaped death several times. But at that moment, it wasn't fear or terror that filled my mind; it was the desire to learn swordsmanship from him. So I asked him to teach me, and he made a very strange expression."
"It's not surprising."
"And suddenly, he prepared himself and started thinking he had to kill me right here. He said that if he didn't, the village and territory would be destroyed."
Naturally, Hedo couldn't understand his actions, but now, in his old age, he understood.
"If it were now, I would probably have spared his life, but at that time, I couldn't afford that luxury. He was stronger than me, that was the only thing that mattered."
If the knight had defeated Hedo at that time, he wouldn't be standing here.
Jin is a human being, and Hedo's face seemed bitter for some reason as he spoke.
"When I killed him, I felt guilty for the first time. Somehow, I felt that he shouldn't have died like that."
Hedo momentarily looked down at the cigarette he held in his left hand, recalling it.
Among the knight's belongings, there was a cigarette.
He didn't remember the knight's face very well.
After that, Hedo took his sword and belongings and fled to another territory.
But wherever he went, similar incidents repeated, and Hedo quickly became stronger like a madman after obtaining the sword.
While he practiced alone, recalling the movements of the knight he had killed, he began to create his own swordsmanship.
And when the pursuers started catching up with him again, Hedo realized.
He was a person who couldn't blend into ordinary society.
So he chose the Black Sea as a refuge.
"I entered the Black Sea alone when I was fifteen."
"Never thought about asking for help? Going to a knight, for instance."
"Do you think I was in a state to think rationally?"
Hedo had never received proper education, and his innate body and mind were too different from those of ordinary people.
He had never learned to solve problems through means other than violence.
If someone had taught him, he would have tried to find a knight or someone who could guide him.
But realizing it by himself, he simply wanted to go to a place where there were no people.
"They say the Black Sea is full of monsters and devoid of humans, so it seemed like the perfect place to train with my sword. And indeed, the Black Sea was the perfect refuge for me. No matter how many demons I killed, it didn't cause any problems, and every time I defeated them, I became stronger."
"So, could it be... that your reputation didn't spread because you stayed in the Black Sea all this time?"
"Just like Vanessa Olsen became a knight of Sir Cyron too soon to be known, the same applies to me. I haven't counted precisely, but... I lived in the Black Sea for over twenty years."
Jin was momentarily speechless. He wasn't one to tell lies.
A person who entered the Black Sea alone at fifteen and lived there for more than twenty years... Although it was possible, considering Hedo's harsh past...
"It was also in the Black Sea where I met your father, Sir Cyron."
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