Children of the Rune – Winterer - Chapter 378

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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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Episode 148.
May Your Final Performance
Be Your Greatest (23)
“I thought everything was already put away.”
Joshua tilted his head curiously as he lifted the box and set it on the table. Then he murmured to himself.
“It’s light. What’s inside?”
He hadn’t opened any of the other gifts, but since only one remained, the urge to open it seized him. Just as Joshua finished untying the ribbon on the box, the door opened and Riche entered. The moment she stepped in, she let out a small sound of surprise.
“What’s wrong?”
“What is that?”
“I’m not sure. I was just about to open it.”
Riche was carrying something in her hands as well. She hesitated for a moment before approaching the table and placing the bundle she’d brought at its edge. At that moment, Joshua opened the box lid. This time, it was he who said, “Huh?”
Maximian drew closer. Looking inside, the contents were clothing—a white garment that resembled stage costume. More precisely, it was a jacket adorned with silver thread embroidery on the shoulders and chest, crafted from deep crimson silk.
Joshua’s expression turned peculiar. He removed the garment and held it up to examine it.
“Why is this here?”
“This? What kind of outfit is this?”
Maximian suddenly turned to Riche as if a thought had occurred to him.
“Did you perhaps make this?”
He asked because he knew Riche had been making Joshua’s costume by herself. Of course, Riche hadn’t presented that garment even by the first performance, so Maximian had assumed she’d abandoned the project. It was natural to suspect that Riche had brought this unfamiliar outfit when it suddenly appeared.
Yet Riche’s expression also turned strange as she approached. She took the garment from Joshua and examined it, her eyes widening. Sensing something amiss, Maximian pressed her.
“Did you make it or not?”
“I… made it.”
“Really? Then surely you…”
Riche’s words were incomplete.
“At the Mirangette Atelier.”
“What?”
Maximian watched as Riche and Joshua stared at each other intently. Joshua spoke.
“This outfit is definitely the one I wore in Act Two during the Aquarian performance. Of course you made it. But why is it here? Who brought it? It wasn’t you, was it?”
Riche gazed into Joshua’s eyes for a long moment, her expression gradually hardening until she appeared to be struggling even to breathe. Maximian urged her on.
“What’s going on? If you know something, tell us quickly. What are you thinking about?”
Riche forced her lips open with difficulty.
“That… person.”
The two boys’ movements froze instantly.
“That person?”
“I’m certain. It’s that person. Back then… this outfit. Joshua, do you remember? This outfit—it wasn’t just one. There were two.”
Maximian, unable to comprehend the situation, furrowed his brow.
“What are you talking about?”
“Costumes are made well in advance before a performance and sent to the theater. This one was no exception. But that day, during the Aquarian performance… I was simply in the costume workshop when someone came running from the theater saying this outfit had suddenly gone missing. They said I needed to make a new one quickly and offered compensation, so I made another one… and then I went to the theater to deliver it.”
Riche glanced at Maximian.
“We ran into each other at the theater entrance that day, remember? I had brought this outfit then. Otherwise, why would I have gone to the theater? So where do you think that missing outfit ended up?”
“….”
Riche examined the seams and stitching of the garment once more before speaking clearly to Joshua.
“This isn’t the costume you wore in the Aquarian performance. It may look identical to your eyes, but I made it—I know the difference. This is the original garment I created, the one that disappeared from the Theater in the beginning. I assumed a fan had stolen it. But here… it’s appeared like this.”
Maximian spoke slowly.
“That alone doesn’t prove he’s appeared here.”
Riche shook her head vigorously.
“Who else knows that Joshua here is Cardi?”
“My point is, even if he did appear, there’s no reason he’d send this costume here. We never knew who stole the garment from that Theater back then. But can we really conclude that simply because this costume appeared here, he stole it, followed us to this place, and deliberately sent the costume to the Dressing Room? Just based on that?”
“But there’s no other possibility!”
“Why not? Someone who attended today’s performance could have been an avid fan of Cardi’s, recognized Joshua the moment they saw him, and made this costume to send it. That’s possible too.”
“This is a costume I made! And you can’t create a garment in such a short time!”
“Why not? You said you made it, didn’t you?”
“Because I’m the one who originally created the garment, I still have the pattern, and since it wasn’t long ago, I remembered every detail of the fabric and stitching! Do you understand? You can’t create an identical costume just by watching an actor on stage from the audience seating!”
Joshua spoke.
“Both of you, stop.”
Both Maximian and Riche fell silent. In the quiet that followed, I could feel how intensely wound up they both were. Riche sucked her lower lip, while Maximian turned his head away, nervously tapping the edge of the table.
“Let’s calm down. We need thought more than words. Time to think.”
Maximian offered a bitter smile.
“What time do you need? The moment conditions are given, your calculations are complete. There’s no need to wait for our opinions. Tell us what you think.”
There was no sarcasm in his tone. Joshua lowered his gaze.
“Very well.”
My hand traced down the embroidery of the costume. As if choosing my words carefully, I lifted my head and looked between them alternately.
“Riche is right. It’s him. The proof is this costume. The fact that it’s here. That’s why it’s definitely him.”
My hand, which had been tracing the garment, stopped at the closure, and with one hand I pulled at a single button.
“When did he first see me? He appeared before us at Montplayne’s House, but I believe he was watching me long before that. Whoever hired him, he must have been employed in case I survived the Theater fire, so he would have known his target—me—before the fire and observed my movements. That’s also why he killed Mutia, who survived the Theater fire.”
My fingertips hesitated slightly as I pulled another button.
“I’m certain he watched my Aquarian performance.”
Riche leaned against the Dressing Table, wrapping her arms around herself as if cold. Maximian was adjusting his glasses with one hand while gripping the table edge. When those words came, both of them saw an indecipherable light flicker across Joshua’s eyes.
The light of madness.
“A single costume going missing wouldn’t cancel a performance. I can’t fully grasp his intentions in taking my costume. But just before Aquarian began, as if to mock me, he took the costume. And rather than discarding it, he kept it, and when he found me here, he didn’t appear before me immediately. Instead, he carefully folded the costume he’d kept all this time into a box and sent it to me, and furthermore…”
My hand, having undone the final button, slipped inside the costume and grasped something, then snapped it free. From the opening emerged a card in a white envelope. It had been sewn into the lining of the costume. Opening the card, I read its contents aloud for both of them to hear.
May your final performance be your greatest.
A toast to your white costume.
“Ah…”
Riche’s gaze dropped as she covered her mouth with both hands. There was a peculiar intensity in Joshua’s voice as he read the card. In that moment, as if performing the role of myself, standing upon a stage and sensing someone who didn’t exist as myself, I spoke my fate as though narrating his.
There was no signature, yet these words could have been written by no one else. Everything became clear. Before the resonance of those final words, which seemed to press down upon the room, had even faded, the sound of a fist striking the table rang out.
Crash!
As if forgetting his pain, Maximian twisted his clenched fist against the table and cried out into the void.
“Damn bastard! Who decides when my final performance is!”
Tap, roll, roll…
Riche, who had been leaning against the Dressing Table, collided with his sudden movement, and the perfume stopper fell, rolling across the floor. As the bottle tipped over, a potent musky fragrance spread in all directions, as if intent on numbing everyone’s reason.
Joshua’s eyes held an even stranger luminescence. His dark pupils shimmered with hints of blue, and at times, a crimson glow. Countless reflections danced and rippled within them, growing steadily brighter. Like a child unafraid of the campfire, drawn in as if enchanted, reaching out to grasp the flames themselves.
“There’s no reason to be angry. We’re simply doing our best. Both of us.”
“Your best? What does your best even mean in this situation? He’s trying to kill you, so what exactly is your best?”
Joshua laughed.
“That’s a problem we’ll have to solve when we meet.”
“Meet? Why would you meet him?”
“I have no choice. He’ll be coming tomorrow to watch The Wedding of Il de Morbiane.”
Both Maximian and Riche blinked in confusion.
“What… did you say?”
“You’re saying that person will actually be sitting in the audience tomorrow?”
“Look at the letter he sent.”
Joshua smiled again, and this time, a glimmer of confidence shone through.
“To know whether my final performance is truly my greatest, he has no choice but to come and see it himself. If he hadn’t intended to watch the performance, there would have been no need for such theatrics, no need to reveal himself like this. Unless he was anticipating that moment when our eyes would meet—across the audience seating and the stage.”
Maximian responded harshly.
“Why does it have to be your final performance!”
“Right… it shouldn’t be my final performance.”
From his tone, it was unclear whether he truly considered the matter important. Joshua’s voice that followed began to resonate with the acoustics of the stage itself.
“He will come tomorrow to see me. He will sit high in the audience seating before the stage where The Wedding of Il de Morbiane begins, watching me. He will definitely come. He’s toying with me. He could have remained hidden. If he hadn’t sent this gift, hadn’t revealed himself, I might never have known until the moment he appeared behind me and strangled my neck. But he didn’t do that. He has no intention of breaking my neck while lurking in darkness. By letting me know he’s watching, he wanted me to watch him in return. He wants to see me, and I want to see him, and in that mutual awareness, we both want to do what we must do.”
Children of Rune – Winterer
Author: Jeon Min-hee
Publisher: 14 Months Publishing
The copyright of this book belongs to the author and 14 Months Publishing.
To reuse all or part of the contents of this book, written consent from both parties is required.

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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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