Children of the Rune – Winterer - Chapter 87

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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 87.
Island of the Survivors (28)

Daphnen wrapped Winterer in the large cloth Morpheus had given him and left that house. He had arrived in daylight, yet returning in darkness felt strange.
The darkness suddenly frightened him—something that had never happened before.
He steadied himself and pressed forward. The moon was obscured by clouds that night. The villagers had retired early to conserve oil and candles, leaving the settlement shrouded in darkness.
Morpheus had theorized that Winterer’s transformation stemmed from a return to its essence—a desire to draw closer to you, Daphnen.
Perhaps the cumbersome scabbard and crossguard were fashioned long after the blade itself.
Those ornaments had vanished now. Even the sheath he had acquired on the Continent was gone.
How was he to wield this blade now?
A corner appeared ahead. Beyond it lay the Town Hall, and three houses east of there was the modest home he shared with Nauplion.
The thought of that dwelling filled him with dread once more. Between Nauplion and himself, there existed neither deception nor secrets. Yet today’s events—he could not speak of them to Nauplion.
This was entirely different from keeping the secret of the transparent staircase Isolet had shown him.
Or perhaps… he could tell him?
Daphnen had entered this place trusting only Nauplion. If he could not trust Nauplion now, there was no reason for him to remain here at all.
Even expulsion from The Island would be preferable to a breach of trust with Nauplion.
As this thought crystallized, Daphnen noticed something like a marker stone at the corner of the path and grew bewildered. When had such a thing appeared?
The marker was heavily worn, its inscriptions barely legible. Moreover, the characters seemed unfamiliar to him.
He lifted his gaze and spotted an Obelisk soaring to a dizzying height. It was fractured in places, particularly at its midsection, where it teetered precariously.
Wait—an Obelisk?
In all his time living on The Island, he had never once seen such a thing.
Without thinking, Daphnen approached the Obelisk. Beneath his feet, something stone-like crumbled and disintegrated.
Standing before the monument, he reached out with his left hand to touch its surface. Countless small characters were densely carved into it.
Upon closer inspection, roughly half were legible. He began reading slowly from an arbitrary spot.
Leucosia, daughter of Thareia, perished in childbirth while bearing her son Hierax. 2845, April 9th.
Melanippos, son of Idaia, was struck by falling stone during the construction of the Library and died. 2845, April 9th.
Tigris, son of Pandrossos, succumbed to illness from wounds sustained while hunting a tiger. 2845, April 9th.
Hyperenor, son of Hyperenor, lived one hundred and thirty-eight years before taking his own life, unable to endure the tedium of existence. 2845, April 10th.
Corythus, daughter of Trellos, fell from a cliff by accident while playing with friends and died. 2845, April 10th.

The Obelisk bore nothing but such inscriptions. Death after death, name after name, death, death, death.
Daphnen circled around to examine another face, uncertain why he was doing so.
An unexpected name appeared—one he recognized, which is why it caught his eye so quickly.

Ilios, son of Omorphia, slew the Golmotaph that came from another realm to protect the village and perished alongside it. 5412, July 22nd.

It was unmistakably that name. Ilios, Isolet’s father. The man who slew the monster and died alongside it.
No, that couldn’t be right!
Daphnen shook his head and looked again. The inscription remained unchanged, yet he couldn’t comprehend the situation. For one thing, the timeframe was absolutely not five thousand years. No calendar system, regardless of which nation’s reckoning, would yield such an expanse of time.
Moreover, Golmodap—a name he’d never heard nor seen in his entire life—was the monster’s true name? The creature that appeared at both Emera Lake and this very island?
Yet according to Nauplion’s account, no one knew the monster’s identity, did they not? How could anyone have known that name and carved it here?
And what did “from another realm” mean? Where exactly was this other realm?
Was it like Kriegal, who had been summoned during the conflict at Jineman Estate—a being from a world other than this one?
It was precisely when shock overwhelmed me and I rushed to read further.
A sensation like wind brushed past from beside me. I spun around abruptly. There it was—a figure crouched directly beneath where I stood, scratching something with a stylus.
“Wh-what is this!”
The moment I stumbled backward in surprise, the figure turned to look at me. I saw him too.
Was he around my age? No, he appeared younger. An innocent, endearing boy—if not for the bluish luminescence enveloping his body and the Obelisk faintly visible through his face.
In that instant, a startling realization flashed through my mind, and I spun around in panic. Only then did I realize that the village which had surrounded me until moments before—or so I had believed—had vanished entirely.
The surroundings resembled the strange hallucination I’d witnessed on my first day on the island: those ruins. Piles of shattered stone scattered about, massive columns lying toppled across the ground, and—
Dozens of ghostly children, similar to the one I’d just seen, wandered throughout the ruins.
“I… don’t…”
I shook my head frantically, retreating, when the spirit child crouched before the Obelisk suddenly sprang to his feet and glared at me.
Then, with a bewildered expression, he cried out sharply.

「What are you? Why can I see you?」

A voice that pierced through my mind like an electric shock. The moment the child shrieked, the other spirits who had been wandering aimlessly all turned their heads in unison to stare at me.
Dozens of gazes. All of them transparent, hollow eyes.
Cold sweat trickled down my face. All I possessed now was the white blade of Winterer—even the sheath had vanished.
Misty eyes bore down upon me.
The wind blew, but only my hair stirred. Above my head hung an unfamiliar moon—their queen, a cold-hearted woman who sometimes pretended not to see, exhaling white vapor as she burned. White breath escaped from my own lips as well.
Was this a sudden winter?
Had the entire world frozen, and only they awakened as it thawed?
With my left hand, I pulled back the cloth wrapping Winterer and slowly wound the grip. As the hidden blade was revealed, white energy rose along the edge before dissipating.
I grasped the grip firmly. Yet in this condition, there was no way I could wield the sword properly.
It had been over a year since I last drew Winterer. But the blade, held again after so long, felt not unfamiliar in the slightest. It fit my palm with the same perfect familiarity as a sword I’d lived and died with every day.
In fact, in this very moment, I harbored the intent to attack. For the first time since that day.
The Spirit Boy retreated slowly. His translucent form sank into the Obelisk, overlapping and disappearing.
Crackling whispers echoed from all directions, growing louder. Then, like an ebbing tide, they faded away into silence.
I gripped Winterer tightly and spoke in a low voice.
“If you are ghosts, then vanish. I have no fondness for such things.”
Whispers spread in all directions again. A shrill voice cried out from behind me.
「You have entered our world!」
As if in response, countless voices shrieked simultaneously. I covered my ears to block out the piercing sound.

「Who are you? Whose bloodline do you carry?」

「How did you get in here? How do we get you out?」

「Say something! You speak first!」
Soon Daphnen realized these spirits feared him rather than sought to harm him.
He had never deeply considered whether ghosts truly existed in this world or not. Yet he had always assumed that if they did exist, they would possess some special power distinct from the living—but was that not the case?
Daphnen spun around abruptly. Five or six spirit forms recoiled as if startled by his gaze.
The girl spirit who had cried out moments before stretched her finger outward.

「Reveal your true nature at once!」

Daphnen felt bewildered and afraid, yet more than anything, he found the situation absurd.
If this truly was the spirits’ own world as they claimed, then it was he who should be asking how he had entered it.
He had not taken a wrong path, nor had he opened any strange door. He had simply been walking between familiar houses when somehow he found himself here. Yet they insisted this was no trick of theirs?
Daphnen took a slow, deep breath and steadied his mind. If they continued to speak, there was no reason to refuse dialogue.
Without lowering his guard, he quickly surveyed them. Roughly twenty in number.
“I’m the one with questions. Who are you? Why does such a strange place exist in the middle of the village? And why…”
Only then did a realization strike him. Daphnen finished his words with a tone of suspicion.
“…are you all children?”
A series of eerie thoughts suddenly flooded his mind. Perhaps this place was a barrier that only children could enter, and once they stepped inside, they could never escape, eventually becoming spirits like these…
The spirits fell silent for a time, their translucent faces tilted in confusion.
Then, parting through their ranks, a boy spirit stepped forward. He stopped at a distance and made a pushing motion with both hands, as if warning Daphnen not to approach.

「We do not wish to fight the living. If you too wish to avoid conflict, I would ask that you lower the sword in your hand to the ground. Then we can talk.」

“…”
In appearance, he seemed to be of a similar age. Yet if he were a spirit, there was no knowing how long ago he had died.
Daphnen was suddenly struck by the golden gleam in the boy spirit’s hair. Though not immediately obvious, there was indeed color to their forms.
His cheeks were pallid, yet his eyes and nose retained their living sharpness and definition. His neck, as if veiled by moonlight, and his arms beneath short sleeves were slender as if they might drift away.
Moreover, his eyes held no malice. His expression was gentler than any child Daphnen had encountered on The Island.
Had he been a living person, Daphnen would have thought such eyes incapable of harming anyone.
Yet Daphnen pressed his lips firmly together and spoke with resolve.
“I, the living, do not trust the dead. Therefore, I will not lower my sword. If you did not drag me into this place, then show me the way out. Then we need never meet again.”
Regardless of childlike appearance, regardless of seeming benevolence, there was no one worthy of blind trust.
Despite that form, the mind within was surely not that of a child, and behind that gentle face lay deep resentment. A spirit bearing a child’s appearance meant an unnatural death at a young age.
They had never reached adulthood, had lost all the precious futures they once held dear. For such a being to harbor no resentment would be strange indeed.
Most child spirits were vengeful spirits, and he recalled tales of how they lingered in the lands of the living, unable to depart for ages.

“What a pity. You lack understanding.”

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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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