Not A Regressor - Chapter 287

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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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I Am Not a Regressor Chapter 287
Dog and Wolf (12)
A hundred years ago.
The Demon Race’s army invaded the Kan Kingdom.
The Demons who inherited the Heavenly Demon’s power were formidable, and the magical beast legions they commanded were so numerous they blanketed the vast plains.
When shouts and screams echoed across the once-peaceful kingdom.
Two wolves appeared.
Horus of the Black-maned Tribe.
Riak of the Silver Mane Tribe.
The two wolves united the Beast-human Tribe warriors and waged war against the Demon Race.
Thanks to the two wolves who fought the Demon Race with unparalleled valor, hope began to bloom anew in the kingdom that had been on the brink of falling.
Spirited youths, children at play, and elders who had turned their backs on the world all joined the war effort.
The spark of hope that Horus and Riak had kindled spread across the entire kingdom, burning fiercely like a wildfire.
The endless war dragged on.
The Demon Race army, confident they would crush the kingdom in a single year, failed to conquer it even after five years because of the two wolves’ exploits.
But even that had its limits.
The two wolves waged a desperate resistance against the Demons, but they could not overcome the endless stream of magical beasts and the Demons wielding the Heavenly Demon’s power.
Defeat loomed before them.
The Demons, who had suffered unexpected losses from Horus and Riak’s efforts, made a proposal to the cornered wolves.
A sweet offer: if they became their dogs, the tribes would be spared.
Riak resisted fiercely, but Horus was different.
He bowed his head beneath the Demons’ feet and declared his surrender.
And the Demons imposed one more condition upon Horus.
A cruel command: prove your loyalty by stabbing Riak in the back.
So Horus ambushed and killed Riak, his cherished comrade and closest friend.
Or so he thought.
He believed he had killed him.
“…You were alive, Riak.”
“Yes.”
Riak gave a final nod.
….
….
Horus and Riak gazed at each other with eyes filled with complex emotions.
They had been long-time friends, comrades who had fought back-to-back, brothers who had shared their souls.
A hundred years have passed.
They met again.
As dog and wolf.
“Do you…”
Horus spoke with a trembling voice.
“Do you resent me?”
“….”
Riak clenched his jaws shut, claws extending in silent fury.
A traitor who had stabbed his dearest friend in the back.
How could he not resent one who had sold out his own nation?
But beyond that.
I resented myself most of all—for doing nothing while such circumstances unfolded.
Regret consumed me endlessly.
Regret for a past where I had protected nothing.
Nothing at all.
“I should have… protected them.”
Horus’s shoulders trembled faintly.
To protect family, children, and tribe.
I had no choice but to kneel before them.
I had no choice but to become a loyal dog.
“I understand.”
“Then why—!”
Boom!
Horus stamped his feet roughly against the ground.
“Why… why didn’t you submit like I did!”
If Riak had surrendered alongside me back then.
I would never have had to stab my closest friend with my own hands.
“You already knew it was a war we couldn’t win!”
“Yes.”
“No matter how much we struggled! We couldn’t save anyone!”
“That’s true.”
“Just once! If you’d only broken that damned pride of yours just once!”
Then.
Far more of our kinsmen could have survived.
“So why… why didn’t you kneel!”
Horus glared at Riak with blazing eyes.
Before attacking him.
He had tried countless times to convince him.
That fighting like this would only lead to meaningless death.
That surrender was necessary to protect our people.
But.
Riak had not submitted.
He had not become a dog.
Even as countless kinsmen fell cold and lifeless upon the battlefield.
He had not ceased his struggle against the Demon Race.
“Why… why didn’t you become a dog… Riak.”
My pride as a wolf was trampled underfoot.
Yet because I became a dog, the Kan Kingdom survived and endured to this day.
Because I knelt and surrendered, the Beast-human Tribe lived on.
“Do you think you alone didn’t want to become a dog?”
“…Horus.”
Riak gazed at Horus with sorrowful eyes.
Horus bit his lips until blood flowed.
A hundred years.
The emotions I had suppressed in my chest through that vast expanse of time.
The words I could never bring myself to speak erupted like a volcano.
“I didn’t either!”
Thud! Thud!
I struck my chest roughly with clenched fists.
“I didn’t want to become a dog either!”
I wanted to fight to the very end.
I wanted to meet death with the pride of a warrior.
But.
But.
But.
What of my remaining kinfolk?
The children barely born into this world?
The comrades wounded too grievously to fight properly?
“Was I supposed to let them all perish while I alone remained a noble wolf?”
The emotions that had festered for a hundred years, trampled and shattered, burst forth as a wail.
“….”
Riak watched the gasping Horus with eyes sunken deep.
The cry I had repeated to myself countless times over the past hundred years.
That wail, now given voice, tore through my chest with unbearable sharpness.
“So.”
Looking at the friend who had chosen to become a dog to protect everyone.
I asked in a voice heavy with sorrow.
“Having survived like this… what remains for us?”
During the past week spent in the Kingdom.
While Kwon O-jin and his companions rummaged about gathering information.
I wandered aimlessly through the Kingdom, observing the daily lives of the Beast-human Tribe dwelling here.
The Beast-humans living with expressions gripped by fear.
In a sense, those living within the Kingdom trembled with far greater dread than even the Silver Wolf Mane Tribe hiding beyond its borders.
A life spent holding one’s breath in terror, constantly watching the ‘master’s’ gaze.
Could that.
truly be called survival?
“If you die… even that won’t remain.”
“Does living change anything?”
“….”
Horus bit his lip and shook his head.
“There’s one thing I want to ask you, Horus.”
Riak took a step closer to Horus, who hung his head.
“Why didn’t you become Khan?”
“….”
“If you truly believed the path you chose was right.”
Even while trembling with fear.
If a life of mere gratitude for simply ‘being alive’ was truly what you desired.
“Why didn’t you sit upon the throne?”
“That’s….”
Horus’s words trailed off.
A sharp sting.
Riak’s words flowed from his lips like a keen blade, piercing through his chest.
Unable to find an answer to return, he averted his gaze.
“What are you doing?! Kill them at once!”
Kalike’s sharp voice rang out.
Horus turned toward Kalike.
The mysterious human who had come with Riak seemed to be giving him considerable trouble; he was gasping for breath.
“If you don’t kill them immediately, I’ll activate the ‘collar’!”
The collar.
A sacred relic fastened around his neck to prevent Horus from betraying them.
If the collar activated, he would lose consciousness amid excruciating agony.
In the worst case, he could go into shock and die right there.
Moreover, the collar wasn’t placed only on Horus.
All of his direct Royal Guard who stood closest to him and followed him loyally wore collars as well.
“…Understood.”
Horus ground his teeth and nodded.
He shouted toward his Royal Guard, who awaited his command.
“Suppress the Silver Mane Tribe!”
“Yes!”
Following Horus’s command, his Royal Guard began to move.
Horus’s Royal Guard, assembled from the strongest warriors of various tribes—the Black-maned Tribe, the Red-maned Tribe, the Brown-haired Wolf Tribe, and others.
The Royal Guard, transformed into their half-beast forms, surrounded the Silver Mane Tribe.
“Krrgh!”
Riak rushed desperately toward Horus’s Royal Guard, but their overwhelming numbers prevented him from striking them all down at once.
“Ugh!”
“Let… let go!”
The Silver Wolf Mane Tribe, already exhausted from a fierce battle against hundreds of Black-maned Tribe warriors guarding the Royal Palace, had been helplessly captured by the Royal Guard without mounting a single proper resistance.
“You bastard!”
Only Leoru managed to strike down several Royal Guard members who rushed at him.
“Get out of the way!”
But the moment Horus joined the fray, even Leoru couldn’t hold out much longer and was seized by his hand.
“Ho, Horus… you…!”
“Be quiet.”
Smack!
Horus struck Leoru’s cheek roughly as he lunged forward with bared fangs.
Leoru collapsed to the ground and hung his head in defeat.
Horus twisted Leoru’s neck and turned his body toward Riak.
“If you move, these creatures won’t live to see another day.”
“…Horus.”
After striking down all of Horus’s Royal Guard members who rushed at him, Riak had been about to charge forward to help Leoru when he came to an abrupt halt.
Riak stared at Horus with eyes turned cold as ice, watching him hold the Silver Mane Tribe members hostage.
“I have a question for you too, Riak.”
Horus continued in a voice heavy with weight.
“You didn’t die, yet why didn’t you appear for a hundred years?”
“…That’s…”
“Where were you all this time, doing what? And now you come here and impose your standards upon us!”
For the past hundred years.
It was Horus who had protected the Kingdom that fell to the Demon Race.
“I… while you were gone…”
Horus clenched his fists until blood dripped from his palms.
The Demon Race, now masters of the Kingdom, squandered the treasury through endless indulgence and debauchery.
Countless Beast-human Tribe members starved to death, and anyone who dared defy the Demon Race’s whims was executed on the spot.
Children who once smiled brightly.
Young men brimming with pride.
Elders full of wisdom.
All became mere playthings of the Demon Race and perished.
“What do you know of my despair, forced to witness all of it! What right do you have to speak!”
Horus hung his head with a contorted expression.
“I’ll make you feel the despair I felt… the wretchedness of it all.”
His eyes burning with hatred as he glared at Riak.
Horus slowly raised the hand gripping Leoru’s neck.
“Gasp, cough! Ugh!”
Leoru thrashed about, letting out pained gasps.
“Kneel, Riak.”
Eyes blazing like flames turned toward Riak.
“If you don’t become a dog right here and now… I’ll slaughter every last one of your remaining kin before your very eyes.”
“….”
My expression hardened into stone.

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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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