Black Killer Whale Baby - Chapter 229

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 229
“Really? Our mother is alive?”
“I’m telling you, she is. Why can’t you believe me? You should have seen how Father looked when he found out.”
“I did see that look.”
“When?”
“When you fell into that long sleep.”
Ouch, he struck a nerve. I furrowed my brow.
We were currently on our way back to the Main Castle.
Last night, after a lengthy conversation that stretched from afternoon into evening, Father’s demeanor was ominous beyond measure.
Not like a man who had just reunited with a wife he’d believed dead for decades.
More like a loan shark who had discovered a debtor.
“I read somewhere that the opposite of love isn’t hate, but indifference. That’s exactly what this is.”
“What nonsense are you spouting all of a sudden?”
“Such things exist, Second Brother.”
And finally, when we returned to the Main Castle.
I received quite startling news.
“A rebellion?”
During my absence with Father, a rebellion had broken out in the Main Castle.
And remarkably, the one who played the greatest role in suppressing it was.
Ocula Aquasiadel.
My grandmother.
* * *
In truth, the rebellion itself was not particularly surprising.
I had already sensed such signs and allowed it to happen several times.
‘It’s cleaner to gather them all at once rather than eliminate them one by one.’
Because Grandmother’s reign had lasted so long, there was considerable talk about her abruptly stepping down from the Matriarch position.
There were quite a few who did not properly follow Father.
Father punished them when necessary, but he allowed some to slide.
The strong supporters of Grandmother.
In other words, those who still preached the law of the jungle.
There was no point in keeping those whose way of thinking couldn’t be reformed.
Therefore, to suppress the Sharks’ final stronghold and give them an opportunity to act, I, Father, Bellus, and even Atlant absented ourselves.
I even left Agenor in charge so they wouldn’t harbor the slightest suspicion.
It must have been the perfect opportunity for them.
And it happened.
Those who started the rebellion did not act without some backing.
It seemed their plan was to seize the Main Castle first, then bring back my exiled grandmother, Ocula Aquasiadel, and restore her to the Matriarch position.
‘How pathetic.’
It was transparent.
A tyrant, once they lose their grip on tyranny even once, can never return to that position.
Even if my grandmother were to rise to the position of Matriarch through their strength, could she truly wield the power she once commanded?
‘Well, even so, if she harbored ambitions for power or thoughts of revenge, this would be the perfect opportunity.’
That’s what I had thought…
But the one who suppressed this rebellion was my grandmother.
The ringleaders of the rebellion either fell by her hand or were captured.
Those wretches didn’t die, but their limbs were far from intact.
Or so I heard upon arrival.
“To summon the remaining conspirators, surely one mouth wouldn’t be necessary, would it?”
That’s what she apparently said.
‘Well, well…’
And so when I arrived at the hall, I found myself looking upon bound, bloodied collateral branch Matriarchs of the Orca clan.
I naturally took my seat at the Matriarch’s position and looked down upon them.
Father was present as well, but he naturally stood behind me.
Whatever conversation he had with Mother—his expression suggested he wanted to dash off to the Wasteland that very moment.
If that were the case, he should have just stayed there longer.
Yet he insisted he didn’t want to, and here he was.
I’ll discuss that matter later.
I slowly turned my head.
Before the rebellion’s ringleaders, whose mouths were bound shut, knelt an elderly man on one knee in a composed manner.
Despite his age, he still boasted a massive frame.
“It’s been a while. Ocula.”
I couldn’t call a former Matriarch stripped of her position grandmother.
Wouldn’t that be far too affectionate?
“Why is someone who should be in exile here?”
Agenor, who stood beside Ocula, wore an expression as if he wanted to say something immediately.
But I shook my head toward my Third Brother.
“May I raise my head?”
“Go ahead.”
My grandmother lifted her head.
Her expression was gaunt. Yet as the saying goes, even rotten fish retains its form.
Her eyes still gleamed with intensity.
She too seemed to have noticed something.
“You’ve grown stronger.”
“Is that all you have to say?”
I let out a small laugh.
“That’s not an answer to my question.”
A former Matriarch must speak with deference to the current one.
I thought it would be difficult for her, but surprisingly, it came naturally.
Strangely, she even resembled an aged knight.
Perhaps in the distant past, she had served her own mother in this very manner.
“Why are you here? This is the second time I’m asking.”
“A secret message arrived while I was in exile.”
The story the Orca Family Matriarch told me was no different from what I had heard from Agenor long before.
While she was in exile, the rebel ringleaders had made contact with her.
She had pretended to listen to their proposal, then eliminated them all once everyone had gathered.
“Why did you refuse? It would have been a good opportunity for you.”
The Orca Main Castle was a formidable fortress.
Had she seized the castle, taken its inhabitants hostage, and held it against siege, the battle would not have been easy for us.
“You wish me to fall into the hands of those worthless wretches?”
Ocula ground her teeth in frustration.
“A setting sun must be allowed to set as a setting sun.”
The Orca Family Matriarch murmured as if speaking to herself.
“Moreover, a sun that has already set should naturally fade away. I have no intention of defying the natural order.”
Humans are truly two-faced creatures.
The survival of the fittest was itself the natural order and law of the world.
In accordance with this, she was saying she had no intention of going against the current, already old and defeated as she was.
“May I rise?”
I nodded silently as I looked down at her, and the Orca Family Matriarch stood from her seat.
“Though I left exile under the pretext of eliminating the remnants, my departure was clearly a violation, so I shall await my punishment.”
It had been about nine years since I last saw her.
“Yes. Return to your exile for now and continue to serve your sentence.”
The Orca Family Matriarch’s place of exile was set in a village where the families of those she had killed lived.
Some had learned the truth and relocated there, while others had trembled with fear upon learning of her arrival and fled.
She was performing all manner of labor in that place.
Work so lowly and sometimes so shameful that she could never have imagined it when she was the Matriarch.
“How is it? Repentance is not easy, is it?”
Even as I smiled brightly looking down at her, the Orca Family Matriarch met my gaze with an expressionless face.
Then she bowed her head slightly.
“…I believe I am receiving what I must receive, and I am aware there is more I must yet receive.”
I commanded her to return to her exile.
“You will become a far greater Matriarch than I was.”
With these words, she bowed deeply at the waist.
I spoke toward her departing figure.
“Repent until the day you die. If someone throws a stone, simply take it. If someone curses you, accept the curse.”
Those who died unjustly. Those who were sacrificed. She must live bearing the weight of all their deaths.
I know well a life worse than death.
“Endure and endure, and perhaps someday…”
I tilted my head.
“…there may come a day when I call you Grandmother?”
I received her first letter when I had fallen into a long sleep.
Of course, I opened my eyes to confirm it.
The message was brief—just a single phrase asking if I was alright—but the paper was crumpled as if written with great difficulty.
“…That is a luxury I do not deserve.”
The Orca Family Matriarch turned and left without another word.
Agenor approached me quietly later and whispered carefully.
“My goodness, Sister. I saw something I shouldn’t have. She was crying?”
“….”
“I never knew that old woman could even shed tears.”
I laughed softly.
“Perhaps tear ducts weaken with age.”
Though I, who have lived over sixty years, never experienced that myself.
I shrugged my shoulders.
* * *
A week later.
Now that everything was peaceful, I was busier than when I was crushing Sharks.
This was because I had finally held the Matriarch succession ceremony that had been postponed.
Those who needed to know already understood that I had reclaimed the Matriarch position that was originally mine.
But because certain someones insisted that appearances mattered, the ceremony was held quite grandly.
‘Ugh. My whole body aches.’
Training all day long wasn’t tiring at all, so why was standing through the entire ceremony so exhausting?
“It is because the Matriarch is intoxicated by blood.”
“…Hauser, you’re not seriously saying that.”
“Yes?”
You might be sincere, but the others listening are looking at you like you’re insane.
Today was a council meeting.
Several high officials sat in the meeting, and upon hearing Hauser’s remark, they glared at him or wore expressions of disbelief.
Father was not present at this gathering.
He had gone to find Mother the moment the succession ceremony ended.
‘Saying he “went to find” her sounds a bit odd…. “Chased after”? “Went searching for”?’
But the momentum with which he left was truly extraordinary.
Only then did I realize that Father had returned for the succession ceremony.
‘I should leave my parents’ affairs to them.’
I was about to open my mouth to begin the meeting peacefully when
a somewhat urgent knock echoed through the room.
“M-Matriarch….”
The Retainer who entered with permission extended something to me with slightly trembling hands.
“An invitation has arrived from the Imperial Palace!”

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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