Chapter 841
Episode 209: The Seventh Tomb of Temar – The Shadow of Keitam (14)
Temar glared at Murakan with eyes full of contempt.
“Me? Destroy Idal? The kingdom of Padler? You don’t seriously think I used some nonsense like that as an excuse when I killed my comrades and the knights of our house, do you?”
Murakan pulled the Barisada sword out of his own chest. Temar tried to reclaim the blade from Murakan’s grasp, but it wouldn’t budge.
“Nonsense… Yeah, I wish it were nonsense. I desperately hoped all of this was just a terrible dream.”
A black tear traced down Murakan’s cheek—a tear from a thousand years ago.
Beyond his blurred vision, Murakan wasn’t looking at Temar standing before him. He was confronting the truth behind the teenage knights he had been forced to kill himself.
Murakan had wiped out Dranax and Kamalga because they had ultimately fallen victim to Ziphl’s historical manipulation.
“Dranax, why… why are you doing this? What was the reason for slaughtering them? And I heard you even attacked allied houses like Piros, Bille, and Raigen recently, wiping them out.”
Dranax blinked, clearly confused by Murakan’s words.
“What are you talking about? When did I ever do that?”
“What…?”
Outside Dranax’s camp, the blood of the innocent they had killed flowed like a river. Murakan had seen it just minutes before and hurriedly descended to the camp.
The massacre wasn’t limited to the camp’s vicinity. Most of the villages and towns along their path had been reduced to deathly ruins. All were on Dranax’s route.
“Damn it… You don’t remember what you just did?”
“Ah, leave me alone! I’m already exhausted from fighting those Ziphl bastards, and now you come barging in spouting nonsense. What’s wrong with you? Lost your mind?”
“Please, Dranax, don’t do this. You have to pull yourself together. You were holding strong against the historical manipulation, weren’t you?”
“Historical manipulation? What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
A normal conversation was impossible.
Dranax had been completely consumed by Ziphl’s historical manipulation. He and Kamalga were committing massacres without any awareness or memory of their actions.
When they killed, Dranax and Kamal’s members became monsters. Their bodies turned violet, their features erased, and they tore people apart without feeling.
Even the children transformed into monsters. Those too young to wield swords would roam the cities as monsters when the time for slaughter came.
And when the transformation ended, they remembered nothing. Not even that ‘historical manipulation’ existed.
Rokia called this state ‘Phantomization.’
“Murakan, even the witches said there’s no way to save those who’ve become phantoms of historical manipulation. Their condition will only worsen. The killings and massacres will intensify, and if there’s no one left to kill around them, they’ll turn on each other. If that’s impossible, they’ll even self-harm…”
Rokia had already captured some of those consumed by phantomization and conducted several experiments.
“They even said they’d bring any sacrifice to the witches, but unless some unknown god we don’t know of is resurrected, there’s absolutely no way to reverse phantomization.”
“What about the others… damn it… even Temar? He’s a transcendent being. Are you saying there’s no way for him to come back?”
“Since Gaju is a Changsung, there might be variables even the witches can’t predict. But Gaju is not only phantomized but also demonized. Even if they all return to their former selves, those they killed won’t come back. You have to accept it, Murakan. We lost.”
“Shut up, Rokia.”
“Padler became a vengeful spirit after Gaju destroyed Idal. Dranax, Biolo, and Frey became phantoms of historical manipulation. Most of the remaining comrades are in danger. Where is there hope? If we want to save even a few survivors, the war has to stop.”
“Shut up!”
“Now that Gaju has become a monster, you’re the only one who can persuade the steward and the remaining comrades. Think carefully about what’s right. While you’ve been denying reality, Gaju and our comrades have continued the slaughter. They’re destroying the people we swore to protect, the land we swore to protect, with their own hands.”
Murakan refused to listen any longer.
He couldn’t. Even if Rokia hadn’t told him, Murakan knew better than anyone else.
There was no hope left.
Ten days later, Murakan sought out Dranax again. During those ten days, Dranax and Kamalga had continued staining their hands with blood that should never have been shed.
Murakan felt an unbearable guilt toward them—and toward those they had killed.
[I’m sorry, Dranax. This is all I can do…]
“Murakan, everyone suspected you were a traitor, but I believed in you. When even your brother and family said they couldn’t trust you anymore, I almost lost it and wanted to take them all down. But in the end, you stab me in the back like this.”
Murakan thought it better for Dranax to resent him as he met his end.
Better than dying haunted by the massacres he had committed unknowingly.
Above all, Murakan believed he deserved their hatred and curses. Despite his immense power, he failed to stop his comrades from becoming phantoms. Taking their lives was the only thing he could do.
[Dranax, don’t forgive me.]
“Even if I close my eyes or open them, I can’t forget the hatred in their eyes. Just like you now, they truly believed I betrayed them.”
Temar gathered his strength again, trying to reclaim the sword. The aura and spiritual energy condensed in the blade exploded several times, piercing through Murakan’s hand, but Murakan didn’t flinch.
Biolo Runkandel.
When he came seeking revenge for Dranax, Murakan was burying the dead at his hands.
Biolo showed no reaction to the countless corpses around him, acting as if they didn’t exist.
“No, you forget us. We, even in death, cannot forget you. We don’t want to be remembered by you. Even as phantoms, we will curse you again and again. The future Solderet desired will end soaked in curses and blood.”
Murakan’s spirit was breaking.
Even as Biolo poured out his bitter words, Murakan silently dug the earth to bury the bodies.
After taking Biolo’s life.
He couldn’t bring himself to bury him there. Murakan flew far away to a distant island to lay Biolo to rest. The tombs he had made for Dranax and Kamalga had already been found and destroyed by Ziphl without a trace.
Biolo’s grave soon met the same fate. Murakan no longer had the strength to protect the graves of his comrades.
Swish…!
Finally, the blade of Barisada slipped from Murakan’s grasp. Temar put distance between them and prepared his spirit sword again, while Murakan muttered to himself.
“Yeah, you’re right… What I did can’t be justified. No matter the reason, I failed to protect my comrades. I abandoned those who trusted and relied on me.”
The reason no one lived near the Murakan Mountains anymore?
Because Temar, the teenage knights, and those phantomized by historical manipulation were committing massacres.
Refugees were flooding not only around the Murakan Mountains but throughout the Hupester Alliance.
And Frey was guiding them every day. She was so busy commanding the battlefield to protect the refugees from Ziphl’s attacks that she barely slept.
At night.
The refugees who trusted and followed Frey met death at her hands, transformed into a phantom. When the phantomization wore off, Frey believed all the scattered corpses around her were victims of Murakan.
More than hatred toward Murakan like Dranax or Biolo, she was driven by a sense of duty to save as many innocent people as possible.
That’s why, whenever Murakan came looking for her, she fought and fled. To save even one more person from Murakan’s slaughter—unaware that she herself was the cause.
Murakan could have easily taken her down.
But every time, he couldn’t bring himself to chase her to the end. He couldn’t crush the desperate will in her eyes to save people. Even knowing that letting her go meant more deaths, his broken heart couldn’t find its way.
“What I’m going through… it’s all… you’re… Ziphl’s manipulation… say it… please…”
[Frey, that’s right. It’s all manipulation. I was driven mad by Ziphl’s historical manipulation, and you saved countless people from me. So now… rest.]
“If I had known, I wouldn’t have liked you… If I had known I’d come to hate you like this…”
Once more, the black smoke of Temar’s spirit sword sliced through Murakan’s hand.
A thousand years ago, Murakan no longer felt pain.
There was no longer any room left in his heart for suffering. His mind, already ravaged beyond repair, focused on a single duty.
The duty to bring peace to Temar and his comrades. The sense of mission to stop their slaughter and protect the survivors was the only thing driving Murakan forward.
It was what compelled him to fight.
“You’re the last one, Temar. I hope you’re truly the last. I’ve come looking for you more than ten times already. I believed that you—of all people—could cut through this terrible fate one more time. I’ve done all I can. But still, it’s inevitable. Today, I will kill you and end this war. We will be erased completely from history.”
Murakan shifted into his true form, spreading two pairs of wings wide. The black smoke that had been absorbed into the spirit sword swiftly vanished into the darkness of his spiritual energy.