Chapter 113 (1/2)

12 It’s not over til it’s over (11)

13 Their story: Atia nel Karuan’s story

I watched Iris and Ast battle it out

There would be no hope for success if things went on like this

Iris was at her liel

Siainst a blatantly broken weapon that inflicted pain si contact with your sould be an incredible feat in itself

If it were any other time I would have praised her even if she lost, but not this time

It’s Ast

For ten years I waited, for ten years I prepared

Yet the h all ten of those years was right in front of me

I could almost touch him if I just reached out my hand

If I just reached out… I ithin capturing distance…… but why did my hand never reach that place?

Ever since I was little, I had obtained everything I wanted

The Karuan Empire was a superpower on the continent, and even the head of that superpower, the emperor, my father, could not refuse my words

But, for the first time in my life, so

All his actions were that of a petty lowlife’s, but if I thought of the way he treated me, there was no enius

But neither was he an idiot or a simple commoner

Sometimes he looked like an idiot in the way he didn’t know obvious things, but at others he created new ed to think of

There was an old saying that the line between a genius and an idiot is a thin one, and watching Ast made me realise just what kind of person that idiom referred to

So I was happy

Because he and I could converse with each other on equal grounds, soed

He was different to those who simply bowed their heads in front of imperial title

Ast’s eyes had no traces of fear or wariness

Instead, hoould I say it Looks of exasperated apathy and ones that questioned just as I up to again were plentiful

Nor did he, like the ones who knew of my fate, look at as if I was a ave me looks that said ‘what kind of ive her any attention’

‘…All of a sudden it feels like I was treated quite h threatened to escape my lips as I recalled past ed to stop it

Ast was always like this

Unlike the others, he was close to

But the only came close, he kept some distance from me and always maintained it

A quaint distance that was neither too friendly, nor too distant

Was it because of that distance?

I had always been thinking of death, and had thought I would die alone, but when death came for me, when I heard Ast’s voice, and unlike ht

If I asked Ast to die with me, would he really die with his ht of that I immediately knew the answer

That he would never, ever do such a thing

And so I smiled faintly as I said

I’ht to ether with you, at least the path to the underworld won’t be boring

But because Ast came into my room that day, my fate was overturned

Ast took away the death that had co that all the people and resources of the empire couldn’t solve, Ast went and solved it

I was surprised at ood, I began to enjoy it

I spent the days with Ast and Reia, and that didn’t change even after the Great War began

We bullied Reia as if to outdo each other, we laughed along together at Ast’s acts of lunacy, and after we played together like that a few ti country was conquered, and so we picked out a new target and started another war

But in the ht that Ast was insane enough to oversleep in the middle of a war

When he was not discovered in his cha weird somewhere else

And when the letter that said he would be leaving the imperial court was discovered, I worried whether he had been kidnapped by an enemy nation, in a manner quite unlike inally a spy for the organisation na, I was the most furious that I had ever been in my life

That he had used er at the fact that between Howling, a parasite leeching off the empire, and

That I would lose to Howling of all things, there was no greater shaht now!”

In the an to throw a tantrum

The empire’s hidden darkness? Trash naturally accumulated itself when you cleaned it out, so we had simply left the trash that was easy to take care of

I could not stand the idea thatwas in the middle of that trash that could be dealt with at any tiht noere at war

No matter howcould happen, there was no way I would permit the creation of internal strife, and because of that, all I could do was endure and end the war as quickly as possible

And so as I teer, and drank tea hness… you really like Ast too much”

As Reia said so with a bitter s

Like? Me? Ast?

I ignored a shocked Reia as I deeply thought over it

Why was I so angry

Why did it feel so stifling just because Ast wasn’t here

Why did I so openly express my wish to see Ast

“So it is”

I, liked Ast

It took two entire days for me to come to that conclusion

And the answer I found at the end of those two days ht I would ever have the chance to love anyone, but thanks to Ast I had obtained yet another thing!

So I ceased all activity related to Ast’s search

Ast had run away in disgust when I had simply threatened towere his escape skills?

He had escaped without anyone the wiser in the middle of a warzone under maximum security

If I were to carelessly lay ive him the opportunity to escape

Therefore I had to set a perfect trap and create a situation where escape was impossible

To create that scenario, I suffered a bit to end the war

And I even lifted up my little brother so that he would becoht for succession

I created all sorts of excuses to liquidate the nobles that had ties with Howling, and I secretly had

I also recruited his disciples that he had trained at Howling, and identified each and every one of the choices and decisions he couldto be perfect, I eli

But… IAst, but the retted my choices back then

If I had taken action personally, the results could have been different

So despite the opposition of countless bureaucrats of the imperial court, I had taken action personally

I roamed many countries of the continent, sometimes I wheedled them, sometimes I threatened the through the kingdoms of other races for Ast as well, and how happy was I when I heard that he was actually in the capital!

He aiting forvariables as I could, where I could stage my plan the most effectively!

It was the ined that Ast could actually be waiting for h that’s broken now…’

How much time had passed by

Thelantern, as if all

I had previously said that looking forwards to the future wasback on the past, but only the past with Ast… no, the things that ht be better called memories returned to me often

“This time for sure”

I will capture you