I Will Protect My Brother - Chapter 149
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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 149
Epilogue. A Suspicious Conversation
“What brings you here again?”
Dorian Raylo couldn’t hide the wariness in his eyes as he regarded the young man before him.
Why was a newlywed from two years ago standing in his office?
Why wasn’t he still traversing all of Rahnar, savoring his honeymoon? Why had he ventured all the way to Raylo in the Hailon Kingdom, so far removed from Abuye?
‘I still can’t fathom what goes on in that mind of his….’
The elderly physician’s trembling fingers adjusted the spectacles perched on the bridge of his nose.
The young man, lounging against the sofa with his legs crossed with practiced elegance, smiled faintly. A teacup dangled between his slender fingers—apparently he’d ordered tea as if he owned the place.
“Nothing particularly urgent.”
Kalian set the teacup down silently onto its saucer and folded both hands upon his lap.
“I came hoping you’d give me a medical examination, Raylo.”
Raylo’s body stiffened at the déjà vu. This dialogue felt oddly familiar.
“You want me to examine you…?”
“Yes.”
The young man spoke with unusual deference.
“You’re Rahnar’s finest physician, after all. That’s why.”
“Ah, where does it hurt?”
“It’s nothing like that. I was thinking I might undergo regular checkups once a year from now on.”
The young man employed remarkably courteous and respectful language. He didn’t seem to have arrived with twisted intentions or a desire to cause trouble.
The young man shrugged casually.
“Despite appearances, I’ve lived an extraordinarily long time. Now I’m gradually returning to a human body, so I suppose I’m at an age where periodic observation is necessary.”
“True enough. Your age this year is already nine hundred….”
One of the young man’s eyebrows arched diagonally. Raylo’s tongue reacted before his mind could catch up.
“That’s quite the compliment about looking young.”
“Thank you for that.”
The young man offered languid congratulations.
How brazen. As Raylo’s lips pursed involuntarily, the smile playing at the young man’s mouth deepened.
After a brief chuckle, he steered the conversation back on track.
“Anyway, my request is simply that you examine me, Raylo. I actually considered crossing over to Alfheim to meet that High Elf, but opening a portal would mean summoning Manyeon again, and that’s become tedious. Besides, Rosy can’t know about this.”
“Is this something that must be kept from Kirges?”
“That’s precisely why I came quietly, isn’t it?”
The young man placed his index finger to his lips and winked playfully.
“The day she finds out, I’ll erase Raylo’s castle entirely from this world. Remember that.”
“My mouth is a mouth, yet it isn’t. Merely a passage for eating and breathing.”
Raylo spoke carelessly while internally screaming.
‘Just open a portal and go to Alfheim, please!’
Go ask some other Transcendent instead—anyone but me—for secrets you can’t even tell Kirges!
The words clawed their way up his throat, but he swallowed them. The man smiling before him was essentially the master of all Transcendent Families reorganized under Wynack’s leadership.
But a medical examination, no less!
‘How ominous…!’
Wasn’t this request identical to what Rosien Kirges had asked of Railo before the Continental Conference incident?
“Railo, I was hoping you could examine me.”
“Right now…?”
“Yes, immediately. From head to toe, thoroughly!”
Recalling the catastrophe that had unfolded afterward, goosebumps erupted across my entire body.
Yet the young man, as if he understood everything, offered a benevolent smile.
“Don’t worry. I’m not scheming anything behind her back. All I want is for you to accurately assess my condition and tell me whether my request is within the realm of possibility or completely impossible.”
“That’s all?”
“Of course, if the answer comes back as possible…then you’ll need to make it possible, won’t you?”
The young man clenched his right fist and lightly tapped his left chest.
“There are three things you need to verify. First, examine how the Revival Crystal embedded here has fused with me. Second, determine when my biological functions that the Sacred Relic is restoring will fully recover. The second point is especially crucial, Railo. Rosy wants to have a child. She wants to start a family.”
“Huh? Don’t tell me you’re…defective?”
“Are you insane? I really hate that comparison.”
The young man’s pride thoroughly wounded, he glared at Railo. The elderly physician cleared his throat awkwardly.
“Well, naturally you weren’t human before this, so there’s nothing strange about it. If that’s the only reason you’re seeking an examination, it shouldn’t be difficult—I’d say by today….”
“And lastly.”
The young man cut him off coldly. Before Railo could even hear what would come next, his body stiffened.
That bastard—his eyes had shifted subtly.
The young man articulated his final request in a soft yet chilling tone.
“Figure out how the Revival Crystal can be separated from me without her knowing.”
Railo fell silent. Over the course of several brief moments, his complexion gradually drained of color until, when the impatient young man called to him again, his snow-white hair and face had become nearly indistinguishable from one another.
“The Crystal…. Surely you’re not planning to use it elsewhere? No, that absolutely cannot happen. Kirges already made me swear solemnly—once she recovers the Revival Crystal from you later, I’m to destroy it completely!”
“Get a grip. I’m not saying I’m going to tear this out and use it however I please right now.”
The young man irritably cut off Railo’s words.
“I simply want to understand how the sorcery binding me is structured. It’s my body, isn’t it? I should know how everything functions.”
“That may be true, but…!”
“When I used the Revival Crystal on Rosy, I implanted it as a replacement heart, so removing the Crystal meant instant death. But it seems different for me.”
The young man pressed his palm against his chest area.
“My heart is beating fine right here, and the Crystal is embedded just above it.”
“Perhaps it would be better to leave it untouched and simply keep it as is….”
“Of course that’s the plan. But what if something unexpected happens?”
The young man sighed openly, as if finding Railo’s inability to understand pathetic. His reproach came in a mangled mix of formal and casual speech.
“I’ll live for at least several more decades, and during that time unforeseen dangers could arise. If something happens to Rosy, shouldn’t I know how to remove this so I can restore her, or even resurrect her? That’s what I intend to do.”
“The sorcery K-Kirges bound you with is hardly a simple spell that allows you to freely attach and detach the Sacred Relic. She’s the greatest sorcerer of this age, after all.”
“Which is exactly why I came to you, Railo. The finest physician in all of Rahnar.”
The young man swept off his jacket and draped it over the sofa’s backrest. Then, without hesitation, he casually undid the buttons at his shirt collar.
“Stop wasting time and examine me. I need to know what kind of sorcery my princess has placed on me. No matter how much I press her, she absolutely refuses to answer.”
In the end, Railo had no choice but to reluctantly gather his examination tools and stand.
* * *
It took Railo a full three days to examine the young man. He spent considerable time mapping out the layered sorcery that had been meticulously overlapped atop the sorcerous array sprawled across the left side of the young man’s chest.
During that time, Kalian Wynack spent his days writing letters to his wife. The letters were long, verbose, and scattered in thought.
My dearest, are you enjoying your time at the Yeljae Family Home? I’m spending intimate moments with Dorian Railo here in Heiron.
I had a brief examination done, and it seems my sense of taste and smell should return to near normal within a few years. Whether continuous sleep will be possible remains uncertain. That’s what I desire most.
Still, it’s clear that with each passing day, I’m becoming more human again. I’m quite satisfied so far.
Writing letters like this makes it feel as though it’s been three months since we parted, when it’s only been four days. I’d appreciate it if you understood that four days without seeing Rosy feels like three months to me… (omitted…) Anyway, I love you. I miss you. Oh, how I truly miss you. I’ll come pick you up from the Yeljae Family Home myself. I miss you. Why do I never tire of wanting to see you? This is truly a mystery of the cosmos. Anyway, I miss you…
Beneath the completed letter lay dozens of pages densely covered with the words “I miss you.”
Only after he sent all those letters to Nemada, where the Yeljae Family Home was located, did the examination results come back. It was the fourth day since he had made his nest at Railo’s Residence.
“So the conclusion is that there’s no way to separate the crystal while maintaining its effects?”
Kalian’s eyes narrowed at the result falling short of his expectations. Railo, who had grown pale in just four days, nodded.
“That’s right. It’s sorcery deliberately designed by Kirges. If anyone other than her attempts to undo the spell carelessly, the crystal will explode immediately—she’s layered the sorcerous array to ensure it. It seems like she set this up in advance to prevent you from scheming anything behind the scenes.”
She had even meticulously placed a location-tracking spell. Kalian smiled with a sigh mixed in.
“My goodness, my princess is truly meticulous. She’s thought several moves ahead.”
“So don’t go scheming pointless things and get caught red-handed. It’s best you abandon such ideas quickly.”
“But since she’s decided to let me live without destroying me, she wouldn’t have excluded the possibility that I might do something like this. Right?”
He wasn’t listening. His mood was visibly becoming lighter by the moment. Kalian began muttering to himself.
“Rosy knows me so well. She’d understand that I’d never let her go. She’d know full well that I can’t be satisfied with merely living an ordinary, mediocre life.”
“You should listen to your wife’s words. You’ll be restless even in sleep…”
“If I can’t remove this, there’s only one way. I keep holding onto it.”
Rosien had said she would retrieve the crystal from him when she died. An unusual gleam flickered across Kalian’s crimson eyes.
“I must never let Rosy take it from me.”
“If you continue to hold onto it, you’ll keep being resurrected.”
“That’s exactly it, Railo. To live forever without dying.”
…
“No matter how much I think about it, I simply cannot give this up… My greed only grows. The happier I am, the more it intensifies.”
The young man’s face, as he spoke to himself, was serene like someone dreaming. He looked happy, like someone finally able to fully enjoy the life he had longed for.
“A mere human lifespan of less than a hundred years is, no matter how I think about it, far too short.”
…
“This single life is not enough…”
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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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