Children of the Rune – Winterer - Chapter 78

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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 78.
Island of the Survivors (20)
Their arms flinched for a moment. But only for a moment. As Oizis was dragged from his chair and sank to the floor, he shook his head vigorously while staring at me.
Even in those eyes that always seemed fearful, there was resolve. They were the eyes of someone saying: I can endure this, so do not suffer harm because of me.
“If you do not stop….”
In truth, every child in the dining hall was listening intently to that final voice. Even the adults serving food paused, wondering what was happening.
“You will all regret this bitterly.”
Did I truly know how to speak such words? I thought this as I pushed back my chair and rose to my feet.
In that moment, I became the same person I had been in the wastelands of Trabaches, in the plains of Anomarad—walking alone, pledging to myself that I would belong to no one. The only thing that had changed was my shortened hair.
The boys who had seized Oizis had experienced my strength firsthand before, so they unconsciously stopped their hands.
The other children had either witnessed or heard about what happened during the staff combat lesson days ago. About how strong the boy called the “demon from the Continent” truly was.
But Ekion was different.
“Stop with your pathetic threats! If you have the strength to stop us, show it right now. You don’t have the skill, so you’re just running your mouth, aren’t you?”
And with that, he kicked Oizis hard in the ribs. But Oizis clenched his teeth and made no sound.
It was a burden he had imposed upon himself because he could not cut off his own fingers.
The shock from the story I had told before Zero was great. I did not wish to be ashamed before such a person.
I looked directly at Ekion and lifted only the corners of my mouth in a smile. It was the first time I had sneered before others.
“Then, regret it.”
That was the moment.
“Stop it, Ekion!”
It was Hector’s voice.
Unlike the other children who had abandoned their food to watch, he sat properly at the table with a spoon in hand. Without even looking this way, he spoke again in a loud voice.
“Do not anger that one. He is not a match for you.”
It was an ambiguous statement. You would not be a match for him, or: he is not someone you should face.
The boys slowly retreated. Ekion too obeyed his Elder Brother absolutely. Though he glared fiercely, he also withdrew.
I looked down at Oizis.
“Let us go.”
As the children who had stopped eating watched, the two of us walked out. Even as we passed through the entrance, their eyes did not leave us.

“Isolet?”
Daphnen and Oizis had wandered down the hillside until they found a secluded slope, where they now sat conversing. Their topics of discussion were entirely trivial matters.
Yet despite this, both felt more at peace than they had in recent days. Neither of them broached what had happened just moments before.
Oizis was deeply moved upon learning that Daphnen was receiving lessons in sacred chanting from Isolet. When I saw his eyes widen in surprise, he looked so much like a squirrel that I couldn’t help but laugh.
“It’s remarkable. She’s the most enigmatic person on our island—I’ve never even dared speak to her. People call her the ‘Princess of the Mountain.'”
Daphnen asked with a bewildered expression.
“Why do they call her that?”
“Because Isolet’s father was the Priest of the Sword before Nauplion. Before he passed away, he told the other priests something about her. I don’t know what it was, but after that, she was allowed to attend the priests’ councils, and sometimes the monks would visit her to ask her advice on important matters.”
“The monks would?”
Isolet was only seventeen years old. What could adults possibly need to ask someone so young?
“Yes. But for the past few years, she’s withdrawn from village affairs entirely and lives alone in a house on the mountain. However, because she is beautiful and also somewhat frightening, she earned that epithet.”
So the nickname carried no mockery—only reverence. That emotion was clearly evident in Oizis’s eyes as well.
Unfortunately, Oizis knew nothing beyond that.
Why Isolet despised Nauplion, why Master Jilebo insisted that Nauplion apologize to her, and what enmity existed between Master Jilebo and Nauplion—these remained mysteries.
After pondering for a while, Oizis described Isolet as having “the feeling of a warrior mixed with a priest.” He then mentioned that some people also called someone the “Princess of the Valley,” but he wouldn’t say who, only grinned mischievously.

“So you’re learning songs from the Princess of the Mountain?”
Liriope had a habit of appearing suddenly, as if she’d been treading on my heels.
This time too, she emerged just as I descended from the mountain after parting with Oizis, and greeted me with a playful smile, her pinky finger hooked.
“Yes.”
“How wonderful! She’s truly beautiful, isn’t she? Doesn’t just looking at her make you feel enchanted? You get to see someone like that every day—how fortunate!”
Daphnen didn’t understand what Liriope was getting at and simply stared at her without responding. Liriope eventually broke into giggles.
“I’m just repeating what the village men say. I’m a woman—why would I be enchanted by another woman? Unless she were a remarkably handsome man, of course.”
As she said this, she narrowed her eyes with a smile. Her small lips curved mischievously like a naughty child’s.
“But honestly, isn’t it nice? Is Isolet kind to you? You’re not interested in her? There’s only a four-year age difference!”
Daphnen found Liriope’s imagination amusing, but he spoke quietly.
“Isolet is simply my teacher in sacred chanting. My skills are so poor that she must find it tiresome.”
“Teacher? Did she ask you to call her that?”
“No.”
“Tch.”
Liriope, who had been pouting, was about to turn away when something suddenly occurred to her, and she raised her index finger to wag it.
“She’s not the only princess! Those nicknames are given by other people, after all, so you don’t become what you want to be called just because you’re called it. Really!”
Until then, I had no idea what Liriope was trying to say and simply watched her departing figure.
I learned the truth that evening.
Waiting for Nauplion, who arrived late, I prepared soup the way I had made it during our travels in Lemme. When Daphnen recounted the day’s events, Nauplion, who had been eating his soup, suddenly burst into convulsive laughter.
“Liriope said that? With her own mouth? Puhahahaha… This is quite the incident, quite the incident indeed.”
“What does that mean? And please don’t spit out the soup—it was precious.”
“Puhaha, puhahahaha…”
After laughing for a long while, Nauplion finally ceased and, after finishing the cooled soup, revealed the truth.
“The Princess of the Valley is Liriope herself. It’s a nickname that appeared while I was away from the island. But apparently, Liriope has always found the whole ‘princess’ business irritating and would bristle whenever someone called her that. So nowadays, no one dares use that epithet around her. Yet she brought it up to you—perhaps she’s subtly showing off that her own reputation hasn’t diminished? Or perhaps she actually liked the nickname all along?”
“Then what of Isolet? Does she care for such a nickname?”
Nauplion continued mechanically spooning at the empty bowl as though soup still remained. No answer came.

Far distant from Moon Island, in the Longord Estate of Trabaches, there stood a manor reduced to ruin.
Once, when properly maintained, it had surveyed its territory with quiet dignity, if not grandeur.
Now the weathered doors hung barely upright, supported only by iron chains wound about them to seal the exit. Windows stripped of their shutters gaped ominously, sweeping in fallen leaves and dust.
The roof bore a gaping hole as though bitten by some great maw, left unrepaired. The tattered carpet of a room open to the sky lay thick with rotting leaves.
A carriage came to rest before the desolate, uninhabited manor.
It was draped in black cloth, bearing no family crest. The man who descended wore country garb, yet could not conceal the bearing of nobility—a middle-aged gentleman of evident station.
He removed his hat and gazed up at the manor, then released a hollow laugh. Someone spoke from within the carriage.
“Are you certain you require no escort, Count?”
“I’m not entering. No need for concern, Hugh.”
The Count and his secretary Hugh—none other than Count Belnoir and his retinue.
It differed greatly from his last visit to Trabaches. There was no procession of carriages, no guard knights. He wished to draw no attention.
Count Belnoir climbed the entrance steps alone with measured tread. He examined the iron chains wound tightly about the entrance, then spoke to himself.
“Certainly… someone has been here.”
The chains had oxidized in the elements, yellowed with age. Yet among them were scratch marks—unmistakable evidence that someone had recently removed and rewound them.
The Count descended the steps and circled to the rear of the manor. Its rough walls seemed ready to crumble at any moment.
He discovered wagon wheel tracks hardened into the earth. Without hesitation, he bent and examined them with his fingers. Rising, he continued his inspection.
Soon the Count stood before the western face of the manor as the sun began its descent. There, leaning against the wall in far better condition than the house itself, was a handcart.
He grasped the handcart’s handles and lowered it to the ground. Inside lay traces of moisture. A sour, musty odor emanated from it.
“Wine, perhaps.”
Six days prior, I had learned that Blado Jineman had appeared in Sabanon Village, several days’ journey from this place.
Sabanon was a place I myself had visited. Blado likely went there for the same purpose as I.
In Sabanon, I discovered the men who had imprisoned the Jineman brothers in that dilapidated warehouse. It was the fruit of inquiries among slave traders who crossed the Anomarad border. They were the sort to first cast their eyes upon the helpless.
Blado Jineman had not yet noticed my pursuit of Winterbottom Kit. Had he continued tracking Boris’s movements, he might have sensed it.
Yet he seemed to feel no need to counter me. Fortunate indeed. Thanks to this, I had easily traced his path and learned that Blado had not yet secured either of the Winterbottom Kits.
Until recently, I had suspected whether Blado might have obtained Snowguard.
But in Sabanon, Blado was making inquiries about Yefnen’s whereabouts. Needless to say, his purpose matched my own.
Blado Jineman now faced continuous pressure from Khan Elector, who had risen to supreme command of Trabaches—or Khan Commander as he was now called—to locate Winterbottom Kit.
Yet Blado, forced to compete with me, had become infatuated with his newly found daughter, and of late rarely visited Khan Commander’s castle. Only when the Commander’s impatience turned to threats did he finally stir to action.

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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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