Chapter 3: The Side Story
For Yupi, a young girl from a remote mountain village, that day arrived with sudden and brutal force.
“Emperor or revolution?”
“E-Emperor, Your Majesty!”
The question came from a cavalryman of the Iron Cavalry, clad in unfamiliar armor. Faced with such a question, Yupi, who knew nothing of the world’s affairs, could only choose the side that seemed higher and mightier.
“Did you say Emperor?”
“Y-Yes! We are just humble servants of His Majesty…”
That answer marked the beginning of a tragedy.
“Those who reject the revolution, kill them all.”
”…!”
“What about this girl, sir?”
“Do as you please. Just make sure to clean up afterward.”
“Understood!”
At the sinister question from one of his subordinates, the man referred to as the lieutenant turned his head indifferently. A gunshot rang out. It was the sound of Yupi’s father being torn apart as he desperately tried to protect her.
“Aaah!”
“Father!”
Screams echoed through the air. The villagers, belatedly begging for their lives, were being cut down one by one by the soldiers’ weapons.
Yupi felt tears welling up, her mind teetering on the brink of despair. As the men moved to assault her, she seized the moment to bite down hard on the fingers of the man dragging her by the hair.
With all her might, Yupi broke free and ran. She thought of the man who lived alone in the village’s secluded corner, a man the villagers feared and called a “monster.” Yet, she remembered that they owed their lives to him.
“Help me, sir!” Yupi cried out desperately as she fled. The cavalrymen quickly caught up, and it seemed impossible for a mere girl to escape their armored grasp.
“What is this commotion?”
Just as Yupi’s scream pierced the air, a man in a robe emerged from a nearby hut. Shadows clung heavily beneath his robe.
“There’s no mercy for those who can’t accept the revolution,” one of the Iron Cavalry men sneered coldly.
“Did you say revolution?” The robed man tilted his head, as if puzzled.
Bang!
A cavalryman, armed with the latest armor, extended his arm. An unknown explosive force erupted from his hand, a merciless barrage of death.
Black powder scattered, and the outcome was all too predictable.
Yupi screamed, imagining the man’s body obliterated, leaving no trace behind.
But that wasn’t the case.
“What…?”
The robed man still stood there, as if the barrage had been nothing but an illusion.
“How many empires have fallen, and how many emperors have died?” the man asked.
“Which empire is it that you seek to overthrow now?”
“What are you talking about…?”
The words were incomprehensible, like the ramblings of a madman.
“I once brought down the Third Empire. And my own empire fell as well. So, is this the fifth empire you aim to topple? Is that weapon your secret to defeating my sister, Lize, and her empire?”
“What nonsense is this…?”
How had this man withstood the revolutionary strike of the magical armor, the pinnacle of magical engineering? It was unfathomable. Surely, it was a mistake or a misfire.
“Kill the imperial dog!”
Thinking this, the cavalryman extended his arm again. The magical circuits in his armor activated, and black powder scattered once more.
Boom!
This time, it was not the robed man who exploded. It was the proud revolutionary soldier, a cavalryman, who burst apart.
“What…?”
“Our comrade has fallen!”
The cavalrymen turned their heads toward the man in unison. They couldn’t understand what had happened, but it was clear that the man had somehow tricked their comrade.
“Deploy the tactical formation of the armor!”
“Execute tactical formation!”
The lieutenant and his subordinates shouted, and the armor they wore began to writhe like a living creature, enveloping their bodies.
Clank, clank!
The armor, like a reinforced exoskeleton, covered and merged with the cavalrymen’s bodies, supplying them with power.
”…”
The robed man watched with interest, tilting his head. To him, it resembled the armored soldiers of the “old world,” perhaps fitting for the new world they claimed to revolutionize.
“Death awaits the enemies of the revolution!”
“Death to the enemies of the revolution!”
He neither knew nor cared. Their fervent cries for revolution were like a mirror reflecting past follies, binding him.
The robed man smiled bitterly, leaving the sleek, reinforced armor of the Iron Cavalry behind.
At his feet, a chilling cold spread.
The icy force, incomprehensible by the world’s logic, rose against the Iron Cavalry, clad in revolutionary armor and scattering black powder.
Crack, crack.
They could not comprehend the cold the man unleashed.
No matter how advanced their armor, they could not overcome the winter that would come at the world’s end.
The Lord of Winter was there.
Cold spread from the man’s feet, engulfing and freezing the Iron Cavalry. The flames their magical armor scattered were mere child’s play before him.
”…”
Even their revolutionary fervor was no exception before the cosmic winter the man harbored.
“What is the purpose of your revolution?”
“A-Aaaah…”
As the man spread the cold of the end, he spoke. Watching their comrades fall before the Lord of Winter, one of the cavalrymen fell to the ground in terror.
“What is so noble about your cause that it justifies such cruelty without forgiveness or understanding?”
The man asked.
His voice was neither mocking nor anything else. It was purely a question, as if he truly couldn’t understand.
“We… we are the revolutionaries resisting the Emperor’s tyranny…”
“Look around you.”
The man asked, as if puzzled.
“Do the people of this village look like the tyrant’s supporters you oppose?”
“They… they defended the Emperor and rejected the revolution!”
“Is that a crime worthy of death?”
The man tilted his head, asking again.
At that moment, the lieutenant, leading the Iron Cavalry, seized the opportunity and charged.
The swift strike of an aura master, deploying the armor of thought, was nothing short of lightning-fast.
Clang!
The sword in the lieutenant’s hand clashed with something like steel, rebounding with a sound.
Did he parry it with a sword?
Thinking this, the lieutenant looked up, only to be shocked into silence.
The man’s robe fluttered like a living creature.
The lieutenant couldn’t have known it was the “Shadow Cloak,” an artifact of darkness.
“If we assume that a foolish answer justifies the death of those here…”
The pitch-black robe fluttered like a living creature, and an indescribably cold chill spread from his feet.
“Then your decision, unable to gauge your opponent, is equally deserving of death.”
“A-Aaaah…!”
A piercing scream echoed, unlike any cry a living creature of this world could make.
It was the cry of shadow creatures lurking beneath the shadowy lake spreading from the man’s feet.
The “Shadow Lurkers” unfurled their spiny tendrils, ensnaring the Iron Cavalry.
The living shadows tore through the revolutionary armor, burrowing between flesh. Blood and entrails scattered chaotically.
“Aaah, aaaaah!”
Crunch, crunch, crunch!
Flesh, blood, and bone were torn and scattered. It was a death so horrific that those frozen by the end’s chill were fortunate by comparison.
In the blink of an eye, the dozens of Iron Cavalry were reduced to a handful. And they no longer had the will to resist.
“S-Save me, no, please spare me! I beg you!”
“Are you asking for my mercy?”
The man asked, as if puzzled.
“Where has the revolutionary cause and ruthlessness you shouted gone?”
The Lord of Cold and Shadow, Winter and Darkness, asked.
“After all the cruelty you and your people have shown me, why should I show you any mercy?”
He tilted his head slightly, as if genuinely puzzled.
It was as if they were facing an incomprehensible creature from another world, and an unfamiliar fear gripped them.
“It was a misunderstanding! A misunderstanding!”
“A misunderstanding, you say.”
The man let out a bitter laugh.
“So many things stem from the most trivial misunderstandings.”
Crack!
In an instant, pitch-black spikes shot up from the shadows. The soldiers in their iron armor had no time to respond before the spikes pierced through the gaps in their armor.
There wasn’t even time to scream. Only a hollow sound, as if their souls were being sucked away, echoed in the air.
The monster of winter and shadow turned its head.
When Yufi realized the darkness beneath the man’s robe was directed at her, her legs gave way beneath her once more.
“I, I…”
“There’s no need to be afraid.”
The man spoke, his voice now softer, more gentle than before.
“Wh-what are you…?”
Yufi stammered, fear evident in her voice. As soon as she asked, she regretted it, feeling she had crossed a line.
“I’ve had many names.”
The man replied with a wry smile.
“But now, I don’t even know what to call myself.”