Children of the Rune – Winterer - Chapter 205

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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 205.
Choose the Dawn (17)
“….”
“As I said before, if you wish to kill me, then kill me. Of course, I fear death… but I have not the slightest intention of turning away from the debt my brother left me. After that, what you do with the sword is none of my concern. However, if I can grant my brother peace without dying myself, I will never surrender this blade. I will walk my own path to its end. If your prophecy comes to pass, then until I am destroyed and sealed within this sword!”
A chilling silence fell.
Living and dying—matters that had seemed so grave before entering this cave now felt as though they had sunk into the depths of a distant sea. Yet simultaneously, even in this frigid cavern, my heart thundered against my ribs, and my cheeks burned hot with fervor.
At last, the old man opened his mouth and uttered a weighty word.
“Very well then. Become immortal.”
Boris’s eyes widened in shock.
“…What did you just say?”
“Become immortal. If you intend to fight until the very end with that sword in hand, there is only one way. I shall grant you a life of deathlessness.”
The Blacksmith Elder gazed down at Boris’s bewildered, vacant eyes, then turned and walked toward the passage from which he had emerged.
Shattered ice fragments that had neither broken apart nor melted suddenly flew into the air and adhered to the passage walls. The walls then stretched upward swiftly, forming smooth surfaces and dozens of arches.
The old man walked into that space. Only then did it become visible—the old man’s feet, molded like clay, remained fixed to the cavern floor. As he walked, they continuously merged with new ice, resembling stalactites moving through a limestone cave.
At the end of the forest of arches lay an enormous anvil gleaming with bronze.
No hammer was visible, nor was there a forge. The old man stood before the anvil, raised his clasped hands high, and offered a solemn prayer to someone—or perhaps to something.
Soon, green flames erupted from the bronze anvil….
At first they grew like vines at a hundredfold speed, tracing curved lines with claws, then suddenly leaped upward. They continued to rise, soon threatening to touch the ceiling.
Then Boris called out, following the old man.
“No, that cannot be!”
The moment Boris stepped into the passage leading to the anvil, the ice all around suddenly emitted an eerie light. My vision swam.
That was not all. As I tried to advance further, an overwhelming heat surged toward me. Boris stopped in alarm. The Anvil Chamber, which had appeared to be cold as ice, was seething with unimaginable heat.
Boris suddenly understood. This place itself was the forge. A chamber of fire made of ice.
“What cannot be?”
At the Blacksmith’s voice, I snapped back to awareness. Boris pressed down on my racing heart and spoke.
“I… I cannot become an immortal body.”
“Cannot become one?”
The green flames above the anvil ceased their movement. The old man’s facial muscles twitched. His voice reverted to the terrifying tone I had heard at the very beginning.
“Cannot? Or will not?”
“Yes, I will not.”
“You refuse eternal life, which every living being desires? You?”
Boris closed his mouth and searched for words to explain his heart. Why did I not desire it?
There was a time when I had pushed through storms and traps with only one purpose—to survive. I had paid the price in blood countless times. So why did I refuse to become immortal?
Jordans’s words from moments before came to mind. He had said his sister needed immortality. Jordans had asked me for the sword to grant it to her. And he had said the path to becoming immortal was contained within the blade.
But I had believed that to be a sealed door that would never open for me….
“I must, regrettably, demand an explanation from you. For I have never before witnessed a mortal refuse eternal life, and my pure curiosity demands an answer.”
“I….”
Then Epibiono’s voice echoed through my mind.
‘The obsession and suffering that kept me alive in this form—I can no longer remember any of it. It has been diluted, worn away, lost its color… until I wonder if what I experienced was truly my own story, or merely a tale I read in a book.’
“A life too long erases emotion. If I were to live on, stripped of the very feelings that govern me now… I could no longer call such a being myself.”
Epibiono was forgetting Princess Evgenis, who had wished to share even death with him. Then what guarantee existed that I, Boris, would not forget Isolet?
And once that happened, the memories of those painful years because of Isolet would become as hollow as a sad story read from a book.
What of Nauplion? Once the emotions of those happy times spent together faded, what remained would be nothing but a hollow name, like an epitaph on a dead man’s tomb. I did not wish to become someone who, centuries hence, would speak of him lightly as “there was such a person once.”
And if I were to forget Yefnen….
I had built my entire life upon my brother’s blood. Both happiness and misery spring from possibility. My possibility came from the life Yefnen had abandoned. If I were to forget him….
I would no longer be Boris Jineman.
“You are foolish. What the master of the Winterer needs is an unwavering heart, a heart sharper than the blade itself, yet you desire the opposite, do you not? How could you command the Winterer with a heart bound by affection, debt, and responsibility as you are now? Those very emotions you speak of will lead you into the seduction of the blade’s power, the temptation of strength itself.”
I nodded. A cool, ashen gray of winter gathered in my eyes.
“I know of one ‘human without desire.’ A thousand years ago, he found the place where he should die, yet by fate’s cruel jest, he obtained a body that would not perish. His kingdom fell, his beloved died, and all that remained were ruins, yet he lives surrounded by mad spirits alone, unable even to enjoy the simple joy of true conversation.”
Even in such dire circumstances, Epibiono had managed to retain considerable sense of self and humanity. Had I been forced to endure the same span of years, I harbored no confidence I could have done better.
“No effort can bring him to death’s side, and in the meantime, all his emotions have weathered away, leaving only sediment. Is he among the living or the dead? Affection, respect, anger—all have worn away, and he lives on with mere ‘memories’ of those old emotions. He is still among the living, but…when he loses all remaining emotion, he will become one of the dead. A body alive, yet a heart dead, a corpse. That would be no different from those puppets who gain not even a shred of emotion even after living a thousand years!”
I closed my eyes briefly, then opened them, troubled. The Anvil Chamber still glowed with green light.
“Is this what you require—a ‘human without desire’? Yes, that is so. I once met someone like that as well. You say it is very difficult for a living being to become a ‘human without desire.’ But I believe it is not difficult—it is impossible. Did you intend to make me an immortal puppet and place the blade in my hands?”
Suddenly, thunder-like laughter rang out.
“Ha ha, ha, ohhahahaha….”
The entire chamber vibrated with laughter. I heard the Blacksmith’s laughter as I gazed upon the Anvil Chamber. It was not anger or despair—it was hearty, genuine laughter.
“You never cease to astound me. They say mortals possess a wisdom unique to their mortality, and now I see the truth of it. Become a puppet? Yes, that is a puppet indeed. Long ago, I once thought that whoever could bear this blade would need to be strong yet without reason—a ‘puppet.’ But there was a problem. If such a puppet existed, it would have to be locked away in a cave prison, never to encounter any living being! Ohhaha….”
The old man walked around the anvil and entered the ice chamber where I stood. As he crossed the threshold, an additional chill seemed to permeate the space.
“Now then, wise yet foolish mortal, do you understand that what you just said is the answer not only to the Winterer but to your very life?”
“I beg your pardon?”
The Blacksmith looked down at me, blinking in confusion. Then he extended his hand of ice and gently stroked my head.
The moment his hand touched me, my hair froze, and icicle-like frost branches grew down my bangs before stopping.
“Your brother, Yefnen Jineman, asked of you only one thing: ‘survive.’ And so for four years, you lived according to your brother’s incantation without even realizing it, not by your own will. Avoiding every trial, surviving, surviving, and surviving again—is that not immortality in itself? Did you not, unknowingly, suppress and restrain your own desires as though you were already immortal, knowing full well you were not?”
I protested, unable to easily accept this.
“What desires have I suppressed?”
“Reflect upon each one. Why could you not take revenge? Was it not because of your brother’s dying words? Why could you not punish your Uncle or forgive him and cleanse your past? Why could you not hold onto the girl you love? Mortals must live their brief lives without compromise, yet you abandoned the person you love for another’s sake. You humans are beings of desire, beings of want, and thus you live for that tomorrow, however brief, in which you yet draw breath.”
I looked up at the old man’s face in surprise. Were those not the very words Nauplion, who had been Walnut Teacher at Belnoir Castle, had spoken long ago?
The old man’s face, which had seemed so fearsome when I first saw it, now bore an air of mysterious kindness. It was like the face of a grandfather offering counsel to his grandson.
“If you end by losing everything in such a manner, will you still be able to say before me that you are a ‘human of desire’? Because humans cannot lose desire, and because they do not live forever, they cannot seal their hearts shut like a fortress. Open it! Open that heart your brother closed, find your desires, and fulfill them! Unearth the longings you buried to survive!”
“….”
Something flowed down my cheeks. My throat did not tighten, my nose did not sting—only tears fell.
I had not known of the heavy burden resting upon my shoulders all this time, but the moment someone suddenly lifted it, I realized how much I had been suffering.
I had lived not knowing I carried a burden, thinking each step forward was impossibly difficult.
The weight of having to survive, the eternal life now offered to me—though they seemed different, their essence was the same, and now I could finally set it down.
Something greater than mere survival.
The voice of Nauplion, who had embraced me long ago and cried out, still rang in my ears. The tears I shed then were bitter, but now they were clear. No—this time, I thought I might even be able to smile.
As Nauplion had said, the value of life lay not in whether it was long or short. On a rainy day, as Nauplion spoke of the heroes of the Continent, he had said this:
‘If you truly believe death is the end, then destroy all the dead and live anew pursuing your own desires. Or else! Should you not live all the more fiercely, all the more fully for their sake? As long as you do not become immortal, you can only heighten the density of your own life to replace the lives the dead have lost. If that is what you wish!’
The one teacher I would have for all time…. Following Nauplion’s first counsel to me, whether my life be short or long, I need only live for ‘that tomorrow in which I yet draw breath.’
Why should I not live my brief life to the fullest, happily, fulfilling my desires—I who have even rejected immortality itself?

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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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