Children of the Holy Emperor

Let’s delve into a short story from the past.

At that time, young Nate, who was heavily into gastronomic travels, had a period when he was particularly obsessed with seafood dishes. He had spent a few days lodging in a port city famous for its shrimp cuisine, and met a peculiar, dark-circle-ridden old man.

The old man introduced himself as the Guardian of Delcross, and he was at the height of his struggle, fighting against a danger that threatened the dimension he was protecting.

“Oh dear…”

Even then, the boy, who had natural spiritual eyes and a distinct divine power, could immediately tell that the old man wasn’t bluffing. Nate, hoping his sincere sympathy would be conveyed, munched on a crispy shrimp fry.

“So, help me out! Don’t just offer empty words of comfort!”

“Oh dear…”

“This damned brat! Do you think I’m doing all this just for my own good? The dimension where you live is about to be annihilated!”

The important thing was not whether annihilation was impending, but when it would happen.

“So the crisis is imminent. Within a hundred years, no, at least in a few decades, a terrible disaster will strike this world!”

From a hundred years to several decades. That was outside his scope of consideration.

Nate nodded. “I hope you continue to be healthy and keep working for the world.”

“What did you say?”

A vivid vein popped out on the old man’s forehead.

“I’ve got no one else to rely on in this continent but you. All you have to do is occasionally exercise my power when needed!”

“But your power is not something I can freely exercise whenever I want, is it?”

“I’m not expecting too much from you, a human! Just assist me, okay? Lend a hand a bit. At this rate, I might die before anything about dimensions!”

“Well, I am also planning to die within a few years…”

Cough! The old man almost spewed fire from his mouth.

However, not many years passed before the Guardian of Delcross was utterly stunned by Nate, who rushed to him with a pale and haggard face.

“Old man, when is the crisis of the world you mentioned? What should I do?”

This happened just after Melody’s impending childbirth, and upon receiving news from the Information Guild that he had become a father to three more children.

* * *

‘Is this not retribution from back then, old man?.’

Being violently shaken by a bandit, Nate sorrowfully thought this to himself.

It would have been better if he had helped the weary old man a bit earlier. If he had taken a proactive stance and supported him from the start, he wouldn’t have been aimlessly wandering around, recklessly falling in love here and there.

Then again, if that were the case, he wouldn’t have met these children. A world without the children he had already met was now an unthinkable concept for him.

“You little brat! You got some nerve, huh? Planning to keep your mouth shut till the end?”

The man shaking him by the scruff of his neck lost his temper and swung his fist. Reflexively, Nate twisted his upper body slightly, narrowly avoiding the punch, and continued with his thought process.

By the way, what on earth could that kid Kaien be thinking?

The child seemed to have been born with spiritual eyes, just like him, but he never expected him to come up with the idea of devouring souls.

Was it because of his early childhood memories of starvation? Was his personality twisted because he was abused by Jerome? Or did he suffer a severe head injury when he was young that he could no longer think normally?

When he first learned that the child was doing such a thing, he was furious to the core, but when he thought about it, wasn’t it all his fault for not finding and looking after the child in time?

“Huh? Did this brat just dodge?”

The bandit lifted his other fist, but Nate spun his body around the grabbed collar, wrapping his legs around the bandit’s neck. He didn’t have enough weight to bring the man down, but luckily the bandit lost his grip on Nate’s robe and scrambled to support himself on the ground.

During that brief moment, Nate, who had quickly rolled to his side and gotten up, tripped the other bandit still standing there in shock, and with that momentum, spun and delivered a kick to the jaw of another bandit standing nearby.

Choke! Cough! The bandits staggered, but they didn’t completely fall.

Homunculus’s body was overly light and he could not replenish his strength with aura, resulting in a disaster. It would have been better if he could wield handcuffs as before.

“That bastard? He’s not just an ordinary prisoner, he was professionally trained!”

“Let’s all rush him! Kill him!”

Aaaargh! The bandits rushed towards him one after another, but Nate was still lost in his own thoughts.

Let’s just be glad I found him now.

It was fortunate that he had a bad premonition and hurriedly came here; if he had been waiting for the guild’s investigation, he might have lost track of the child completely in the scorched village swept through by the punitive force.

For now, it seems I should find Kaien and have a little chat. I’ve already put a barrier on the child’s soul at the bottom of the cliff, so now I can locate the child anytime.

Swoosh. As the bandit’s fist swung wildly with terrifying momentum, he ducked to avoid it and simultaneously spun his leg behind, slamming the bandit’s neck onto the ground.Crack!

Seeing another man rush from behind, he swirled his body, grazing past him. Using that momentum, he spun once more and kicked the bandit’s jaw. Thump!

Spinning around was a bit tedious, but he gathered his strength and launched his attack, and this time he felt a solid hit.

He moved sluggishly towards the next guy.

“…This crazy guy!”

“How can he still move like that while stumbling so much?”

Indeed, a body without aura was in such a state that it could barely muster enough strength to land a solid hit, but fortunately, after landing a hit, the divine power recovered his body enough to land another.

In other words, Nate would not fall during the fight. It’s just that the process was extremely strenuous.

He ran towards the bandit at the entrance. Using the momentum of his run, he leapt and kicked the guy’s chin. Cough!

Unfortunately, he was a bit short on strength this time. The guy wobbled but didn’t fall, blocking the entrance while the guys behind rushed towards him.

Nate promptly jumped back and headbutted the nearest guy’s chin. If one strike doesn’t work, hit multiple times.

* * *

“I never imagined that this would happen…..”

When Kaien arrived at the empty barn, all the bandits inside were already down.

Nate had cut the ropes with the dagger used to threaten him and was considering cutting off his arm as well. He hesitated because the dagger was too short to cut off an arm without aura, and the heavy handcuffs were somewhat helpful in combat with the homunculus’s body.

The boy who was quietly observing the barn opened the door in surprise at the unexpected scene, Nate called him quietly.

“Kaien.”

The boy crumpled his face in displeasure and twisted his lips.

“What? How do you know my name? Who are you to call me?”

“…….”

“What the hell is this mess? Did you do all this?”

His black fierce eyes flickered.

“Are you really a spy from Asein?”

“We need to talk.”

“……?”

Kaien examined Nate’s face for a moment. It was hard to read any meaningful emotion from his face, which never changed. As the boy looked at Nate’s emotionless face, his own expression gradually ebbed away like a low tide.

His severely furrowed eyebrows relaxed, and his exaggeratedly curving lips straightened. He decided there was no point in consciously mimicking the faces of the bandits, and that it was unnecessary.

Soon, the two of them, looking at each other, wore similarly bland expressions on their faces, as if looking at a mirror.

Kaien glanced at the bandits sprawled inside the barn with an expressionless face. Seeing the newly stamped handcuffed guys showing no signs of regaining consciousness, he staggered inside and locked the door. Then, he slowly turned to look at Nate and asked.

“…What do you want to talk about?”

This was the first time Kaien had met someone like him who could see souls. There was some time until the punitive force arrived, and there was no need to refuse when the other party wanted to talk.

He also needed to figure out what the guy had done to him a while ago.

“Why do you eat souls? Since when have you been doing this?”

“Why do I have to tell you that?”

The boy seemed to ask out of pure curiosity, rather than in an accusatory tone.

“It depends on your answer how I should stop you.”

“Like what you did last time?”

“Just like last time.”

Upon Nate’s nod, the boy’s eyebrows furrowed this time.

That could be a problem.

“If that’s the case, then our conversation is over. If you’re intent on hindering me somehow, is there any point in talking to you?” The boy turned to leave as he spoke, but he stopped at the exit upon hearing Nate’s next words.

“Have you ever examined your own soul?”

“…?”

“Do you really not understand the impact that consuming souls has on your own soul?”

It seemed to imply that it was having a negative effect on him.

Kaien quietly inspected his own soul. It didn’t look much different from his usual physical body.

If there was a difference, it would be that the numerous souls he had gorged on for the past few days hadn’t been properly digested, and they were poking out from various parts of his body.

[You want to kill Aslan, don’t you? Why me? Huh? Why me?]

From his stomach, Conrad’s face, stained with bloody tears, popped out. He was the one Kaien killed a few days ago by the waterfall, ripping out his nails with Rodrigo.

From his back, one of Rodrigo’s legs was sticking out, and from his neck, Martha’s right arm was dangling.

And Jerome’s face, whom he had just finished consuming, was poking out from his side and howling.

[Argh! Martha, Martha, Martha!]

“Well, it’s a bit of a mess.”

This usually didn’t happen, but it seemed that consuming too many souls in a short period of time caused the previously eaten souls to also pop out.

His casual reply caused Nate’s expression to become slightly perplexed. He cocked his head and asked, “Do you not feel the pain that your soul is experiencing? The dark emotions of the souls you’ve consumed pouring into you simultaneously and unfiltered, is surely not something an ordinary human can endure…”

“My soul is in pain?”

Kaien cocked his head. It was something he didn’t understand.

Since he was an infant, he had been an emotionless human. As he grew up, he gradually realized he was a bit different from others, but the clever boy quickly began to mimic the expressions of other bandits and slowly eliminate the discomfort others felt.

It wasn’t difficult. Most of the bandits were always angry.

By frowning, screaming, and cursing, the bandits believed him to be one of them. That had been his way of life up to this point.

Maybe his soul was capable of feeling emotions like other people. After all, he could not see his own facial expression and hence had no way to confirm.

But, as long as he wasn’t suffering now, wasn’t that okay regardless of his soul’s state?

Upon Kaien’s words, Nate shook his head.

“Do you think your body will be fine while your soul is being ruined? You’ll have to deal with it one way or another eventually.”

“Um……”

That reminded him—Jerome, whose soul was torn apart, had half his body disappear in an instant.

Just until yesterday, the boy had scoffed at Jerome’s idiocy for not understanding what his soul truly wanted as he tore Jerome’s soul apart. But was he no different from that fool?

“Well, let’s put that aside for now. So, why are you trying to stop me? The guys I ate had nothing to do with you, right? If there’s a problem, it’s my problem. What does it have to do with you?”

Nate then quietly locked eyes with the boy. “It’s not that it doesn’t concern me. Your every mistake will ultimately be my responsibility, and the problems you encounter will also become mine.”

“What? Why would that be?”

The boy asked with a dumbfounded face, but upon hearing Nate’s next words, even Kaien, the notorious Kaien, was left with his mouth hanging open.

“Because I’m your father.”

Huh? What?