Children of the Rune – Winterer - Chapter 535

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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 305.
Beneath the Almond Tree (48)
I glanced around, but all that remained visible were withered weeds and the Meadow stretching endlessly. Not even a rabbit hole, let alone a cave, could be seen. After a moment, Tichiel spoke.
“Perhaps they’ve cast a barrier. If so, it would be invisible to our eyes.”
“Like at your home? Then we’d need to find a Boundary Stone or something like that?”
“It depends on how it was created. Either way, without knowing the method the creator established, we cannot enter.”
The situation mirrored our entry into Juspian’s House, but this time we had no way to deduce anything. The person we sought was a complete stranger.
Everyone hesitated, glancing about nervously. The Puppet Master might be watching them from mere steps away. Growing anxious, Maximian scraped his foot against the ground and called to Cardi.
“Can’t you try speaking to him? Isn’t that possible? Either way, we need to meet him before we can persuade him or do anything else, right?”
“He knows I brought you here. That’s why he won’t speak to me.”
“Then what are we supposed to do? We can’t just keep waiting here….”
Until then silent, Boris turned to face Tichiel.
“A barrier—does that mean an Alternate Space?”
As Tichiel nodded, Boris unwrapped the cloth from the bundle he carried on his back. It was the very thing he had said he could not answer when Joshua asked about it before.
From within emerged a single sword. The cloth slid to the ground.
No one knew what Boris intended to do. Only Tichiel, upon seeing that blade, felt a surge of profound unease. Gripping the scabbard in his left hand, Boris suddenly stepped forward and drew the sword, slashing through empty air.
It was a blade of pure white, unlike anything I had ever witnessed. For a moment, it seemed as though a white afterimage stretched outward. When Boris sheathed the sword again, the three standing behind him suddenly felt an intensified chill. As Boris retrieved the fallen cloth, Tichiel cried out.
“There!”
Where moments before had stretched only the Plain, the mouth of a cave now gaped open. Looking more closely, it hovered with a faint boundary overlapping the Plain. The wind that had blown across the Plain was now being drawn into the cave. The interior was dark, but in the distance, a reddish glow flickered faintly.
Maximian spoke.
“Tichiel, do not enter. The Mage’s presence seems to alert him, and if you go in, he may grow tense and do something reckless. Wait here, and if no one emerges after time passes, go down to the Academy and seek help.”
Cardi stepped in first. Then Maximian, and finally Boris. Tichiel looked once more at Boris’s sword. It was already wrapped again in cloth, bundled tightly.
Several candles extinguished all at once.
Anistan rose abruptly and surveyed his surroundings. The sound of wind rushing through the cave was deafening. After a moment of thought, he turned toward the campfire, lit a small branch, and returned to rekindle each extinguished candle one by one.
“The weather is turning foul.”
Anistan settled back onto the ground and resumed his work. He was in the midst of drawing an intricate magical circle—several overlapping rings with incantations inscribed in every corner. A coffin lay at the center of that circle.
“Even so, I must prepare. He is coming. Though I called so often without answer, the news of your presence here has stirred his heart.”
The ‘you’ who should have heard those words lay in deep slumber within the coffin. Though Anistan had arranged it thus, he spoke as though he did not remember.
“I apologize for this cold cave. I could not prepare a warmer place for you. After so long, we meet again. And I have labored so hard for this reunion. It is nearly complete now. The time has come to show what I have done to take responsibility for that child.”
At length, Anistan rose. Upon the workbench lay a small coffin, worn and cracked beyond repair. He untied the cord wound around it several times and checked the prepared reagents. Then he reached into his chest and touched what hung about his neck. A thin iron chain wound tightly around a sharp metal fragment hung there. The chain’s surface was rough, and his skin had swollen red beneath it, yet he paid it no mind.
“Preparations are complete.”
Anistan removed his shoes. He walked into the magical circle and opened the coffin’s lid. He touched the eyelid of sleeping Joshua. At the contact of his fingertips, the lips trembled faintly.
“You are different from that child trapped within, who knows nothing and dies there. You act for yourself. There is no body more complete than you. You need only become yourself. The pain will be brief. Having experienced it once, perhaps you have grown accustomed to it.”
Anistan drew the short blade that lay beside the coffin. It was brief and simple in form, but its edge gleamed with a blue sharpness. The blade’s tip traced across Joshua’s throat. He parted the collar and located the solar plexus. Beside it, the scar from a blade that had once missed its mark remained.
“You, who know well the pain that child has endured, will gladly take his place.”
The blade rose high. In the moment his fingertips trembled, a voice rang out as though the figure within the coffin had spoken.
“He cannot become me.”
Anistan’s head snapped up. Cardi, who had walked from beyond the cave’s corner, now sat before the magical circle.
“I am only myself. He is not me.”
Anistan stared at Cardi intently. Then he attempted to force a smile.
“Welcome. But how did you get in?”
“Don’t lump me together with him anymore. I need nothing.”
As Cardi spoke, he reached for Anistan’s wrist—the one holding the short blade. Anistan wrenched his hand away.
“You don’t understand. If you stay like this, you’ll die soon. Your original body has exhausted itself.”
“Do you think I’m unaware of that?”
A bitter smile crossed Cardi’s lips.
“What happens to my body—I know it well. Yes, I’m crumbling. One day I’ll become dust. My mental fortitude weakens; I can’t even endure the whispers of the Spirits anymore, and I can’t sleep at night.”
“You’ll gain a new life. You’ll shed that crumbling body like a husk and live again—healthy, with a full lifespan ahead of you.”
“What good is that? That wouldn’t be me.”
Anistan couldn’t grasp what Cardi meant.
“Not you? You are Joshua von Arnim.”
“I am not Joshua. And I never will be!”
Fury blazed across Anistan’s face.
“They told you that? No. They’re all wrong. Don’t abandon what’s yours. I’ll reclaim it for you.”
In the next instant, before anyone could stop him, Anistan drove the short blade into Joshua’s chest.
“No!”
Maximian, who had been waiting, rushed forward. Cardi seized Anistan’s wrist. After a brief struggle, the blade clattered to the cave floor with a loud crash. Anistan staggered backward, gasping. Maximian ran to the coffin, grabbed it, and looked down. Blood was spreading—but upon closer inspection, the wound was shallow, and there was only a little blood.
Anistan stared at his own hands, trembling violently.
“Why? Why isn’t it working? Did one of you cast a spell? Who? Who interfered?”
Cardi spoke.
“The Spirits, perhaps.”
“That’s impossible. This place—the Spirits can’t enter here at all. I deliberately set up a barrier to block them. Who got in? Is the barrier broken?”
Just then Boris walked toward the coffin. Anistan glared at him, then pushed off from the wall and struggled to his feet, unsteady.
“You. It was you. You opened the barrier. I know it. What is that? No. I can’t let this fall apart.”
Maximian tried to lift Joshua from the coffin. Cardi sat before it, watching Anistan. Anistan thrust his trembling hands into his robes, fumbled at his neck, and found something. He grasped it tightly.
“Everyone out!”
What Anistan held emitted no light and radiated no special power. Yet he gripped it so fiercely that its sharp edges cut into his palm, drawing blood.
“I said get out!”
Maximian paid no heed and dragged Joshua from the coffin. Whether some sleeping draught had been used, Joshua’s eyes would not open.
“I can’t let you take him….”
Anistan stepped forward and swung his arm. The chain of the necklace in his grip snapped and flew away. Boris felt a surge of strange, overwhelming power emanate from Anistan’s bleeding hand and shouted.
“Get down!”
Part of the cave ceiling crumbled, and stone fragments and dust rained down. Though the others were startled, Anistan himself seemed shocked, staring at his own hand. Blood dripped steadily, growing heavier.
“This is fine too….”
Maximian understood something then. But it was too late. Anistan raised both hands high. Fragments of stone embedded themselves deep in his palms. Blood streamed down and pooled on the floor. His face showed no pain.
“It doesn’t matter what happens to me…. As long as you who interfere disappear….”
The moment Anistan began to gather power again, Cardi sprang up and blocked the magical circle.
“I’m the one who interfered. Will you kill me first?”
“Move….”
“Kill me first.”
Anistan tried to speak, but suddenly his entire body convulsed and words died in his throat. His form began to transform. The arm where the shard had embedded itself swelled grotesquely first. Then the corruption crept across his shoulder, spreading to his torso and head. His clothes tore to shreds. A sound emerged—neither scream nor moan—a raw, meaningless wail of anguish.
The swollen arm initially resembled muscle, but soon became a glistening mass like a serpent shedding its skin. It resembled twisted tree roots. It bore no resemblance to any human limb. His hand vanished beneath the grotesquely enlarged arm. The elbow of his other arm began to contort as well. Below it, his left hand—the only part that remained unchanged—looked like a toy grafted onto his body.
The transformation consumed even his mouth. No sound emerged anymore.
“What is that?”
Boris, the first to regain his composure, asked. Maximian struggled to hoist Joshua onto his back and shouted.
“What do you think? Run!”
The monstrous arm lashed out at Cardi. He instinctively retreated, but the invisible pressure that followed proved inescapable. Struck across his entire body, he was hurled against the cave wall.
“Cardi!”
Cardi remained conscious, but his clothes and sleeves were shredded as if by countless blades, and the skin on the inside of his left arm split open like a wound he had been hiding. Boris rushed over and pulled Cardi to his feet. Maximian hoisted Joshua firmly. They all bolted toward the entrance.
Moments later, the light behind them vanished. Both the candles and lamps extinguished. Only the sound of heavy thuds echoed through the cavern.
“Hurry!”
Boris reached the entrance first and saw Tichiel waiting. Before he could explain, she cried out.
“The Artifact of Malice caused the transformation, didn’t it?”
Upon hearing those words, Boris suddenly furrowed his brow and stopped. Maximian, who burst out behind him, saw them both and shouted.
“What are you doing? Run!”
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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