The Seven-Year-Old Village Chief in Exile - Chapter 55

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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 55
Nema and I moved to a small rest pavilion outside the Training Ground.
‘She doesn’t seem to have any injuries…….’
As we walked side by side, I examined her body carefully for wounds. Fortunately, nothing serious appeared to be wrong.
‘Did she awaken as a Berserker by any chance?’
Had she lost her reason and run amok, just as Verity described?
‘If it happened because of our conversation back then…….’
Shame flooded through me, and I lowered my gaze.
‘……Wait?’
I noticed something odd.
‘Her hands are empty.’
The Training Ground was left in chaos, littered with all manner of traces.
Deep indentations as if gouged by a heavy mallet, long gashes like the claw marks of some enormous beast.
Yet Nema’s hands held nothing at all. There was no weapon lying on the ground either.
“Well, let’s talk outside for now.”
We sat down in a small pavilion set up at the rest area. The moment the sunlight was blocked out, the air became pleasant and cool.
“Can I get you something to drink?”
“That’s all right.”
“Are you hurt anywhere? Did you do that to the Training Ground?”
“……Are you frightened?”
“No.”
I shook my head.
“I’m not easily scared. I don’t really understand fear, to be honest.”
“…….”
“Really! I don’t lie about things like this. There’s nothing to gain from it!”
Only then did Nema’s expression soften noticeably.
She had asked me for counsel, yet she offered no words of her own.
I didn’t force the conversation either. There was nothing wrong with sitting together in this peaceful silence for a while.
Ppoppi and Chuchu seemed content too, sprawled out on their bellies beneath the chairs, dozing in the afternoon warmth.
“……With the Scissors. That’s what I did.”
She spoke quietly, her whole body relaxed and slack.
She opened both her palms toward me.
My eyes went wide.
Her palms were covered in blood.
And clenched in her grip was a lump of iron, rounded like a stone. The Scissors.
“Doesn’t it hurt?”
I quickly reached into my pocket and pulled out the Ointment I kept in my room drawer.
“You didn’t…….”
“The blade kept pressing into my palm as I swung them.”
“You’re not lying to me, are you?”
“I don’t lie about things like this either. The blade just kept pushing further into my palm as I swung…….”
“Next time, swing a sword or a hammer, a saw—something like that. There are plenty of weapons in the Training Ground. They’re left there for a reason. Why would you…….”
“Most people would tell me not to do such things.”
“I’m not most people.”
After applying the Ointment generously to her mangled palms, I spread my handkerchief across her thigh so she could rest her hands comfortably.
For such a small gesture, Nema thanked me.
“Ugh, it hurts me just watching you apply it…….”
“It doesn’t hurt as much as it looks.”
“My heart hurts, though. Please take better care of yourself.”
“That’s…….”
“What? What did you say?”
“Nothing.”
I quickly blew softly on her palms to ease the sting.
“You know…….”
Nema flexed her fingers slightly, as if the Ointment was stinging the wounds.
“There were signs beforehand.”
“Signs, you mean…….”
“My aptitude. This thing called Berserker…….”
“Ah…….”
I didn’t know what to say, so I kept my mouth firmly closed.
Rather than add meaningless words, I chose silence—to listen closely while Nema spoke at her own pace.
“During training, my vision began to blur more and more frequently. And each time it happened, my body would fill with strength, and I’d feel oddly refreshed…….”
“…….”
I’d suspected as much.
‘I wasn’t seeing things wrong, then.’
Now I understood why she’d looked so refreshed in the Training Ground moments ago—she’d let loose the frenzy she’d been holding back.
And the sadness I’d glimpsed in her face then must have been from being swept up by a frenzy she didn’t want.
‘Did she lose control, then?’
I swung my legs slowly, feet not quite reaching the ground.
Beneath the ache of sympathy, an unanswered question lingered.
‘But if she’d truly lost control……’
Something didn’t quite add up.
For one thing, Nema’s body was far too intact.
True, her hands bore serious wounds, but compared to the wreckage of the Training Ground, those seemed almost trivial.
What struck me most was that she had no other injuries.
The fact that she’d wielded Scissors instead of the perfectly good weapons kept in the Training Ground meant she still possessed enough reason to make such an inefficient choice.
‘…….’
Then it hit me.
‘……Why Scissors, of all things?’
Just then, Nema began to speak again.
“I was a shy child—never good with people, always kept to myself.”
Her only friend in those early years was Scissors, she said.
“The sound of cutting paper, the feeling of cleanly slicing cloth—it gave me confidence that I could do anything.”
Though her hands had become scarred because of them.
Nema’s face was radiant with happiness.
Much like how I obsess over magical girl characters.
‘Ah, so that’s why Scissors.’
To suppress the rising frenzy, she’d gripped those Scissors.
The ruins of the Training Ground were evidence of her desperate struggle to cling to reason.
“Thanks to Scissors, I learned to work with fabric, mastered the art of tailoring, and finally could connect with people. I even worked at quite a famous clothing shop.”
Even now, when she must be suffering more than anyone, Nema chose to share only the good memories.
Unaware that my chest was burning.
“Hehe, truth is, back then I…….”
But then.
Her expression grew strangely rigid.
“Auntie?”
“Hm? Oh, well…….”
“What’s wrong?”
“……Well, in any case, I’m rather a gloomy person.”
She lowered her voice as if sharing a secret.
“So when I was sent to the place of exile on false charges, I was actually a little happy.”
“Pardon?”
You too?
‘There was someone like me here all along!’
My heart began to pound.
“At first, I felt wronged. But exile turned out to be so much more…….”
“Peaceful and pleasant?”
“Exactly! I thought I could happily spend the rest of my life here.”
“Me too!”
“Really, truly?”
Nema’s face flushed with joy.
“I thought……I was the only one…….”
Her eyes reddened, and soon tears spilled down her cheeks.
“I thought I was the only one crazy enough to think such a thing, and so…….”
Since the Ointment on her hands hadn’t fully absorbed yet, I wiped her wet eyes with my sleeve instead.
With her composure slowly returning, Nema offered an awkward smile—embarrassed that she’d cried in front of a young child.
“……Hebenia.”
In that moment, I understood.
“I truly love this Village.”
Nema was finally ready to reveal what she’d really been holding in her heart.
And what she was worried about.
“The people of this Village have been the kindest and gentlest I’ve ever met. I don’t want them to hate me.”
“I feel the same way.”
“So, I…….”
“You don’t want to show them what you look like as a Berserker?”
“…….”
“Afraid they’ll point and call you strange?”
“…….”
“Has that happened to you before?”
“…….”
Silence was as good as admission.
The pleasant quiet that had lingered between us shattered in an instant, replaced by awkward air.
‘The villagers wouldn’t discriminate over something like that.’
But I couldn’t promise that on their behalf.
So.
“The truth is, I’m twenty-five, but when I opened my eyes, I was seven years old.”
I decided to prove to her, with my own body, that I was far stranger than she was.
As Village Chief, there was nothing I wouldn’t do for the people of this Village.
* * *
Hebenia’s confession was truly childish and absurd.
“I think it’s funniest when I tease Ian. Actually, I’m older than Ian, but I still call him that. If someone’s handsome, they’re basically an older brother, right?”
“He-Hebenia……?”
“And Rivi is pretty, so she’s my older sister. Really, I always wanted an older sister. Back where I came from, I only had a horrible older brother and a younger brother…….”
“…….”
“And I like power too. Every time the adults call me Village Chief and treat me with respect, it feels like I’m flying through the sky!”
Nema sat stunned, blinking slowly with her eyes wide open.
Hebenia, having talked herself out without a pause for breath, let out a light sigh. Then she asked.
“Am I strange?”
“…….”
“A twenty-five-year-old pretending to be seven. Isn’t it grotesque and disgusting?”
“……Not at all.”
The answer came late, but Nema’s blue eyes sparkled with sincerity.
Hebenia stared directly into those eyes.
“But I’ve killed guards.”
Nema, recognizing this as the story of the day we escaped the Place of Exile, shot up from her seat.
Ppoppi and Chuchu, who had been lying beneath the bench, startled and jerked upright, then growled.
“Th-that was……!”
Nema looked angry, desperate to deny it somehow.
But Hebenia pushed harder still.
“I asked a Demon to kill the guards. A seven-year-old bargained away lives for her own survival.”
“Hebenia, but you were protecting us.”
“If such a situation comes again, I’ll make the same choice without hesitation. I’ll kill without thought.”
“We wouldn’t judge you for something like——”
“I know you won’t find it strange.”
Hebenia, as though she had been waiting for this moment, smiled softly.
“So I don’t have to either.”
Left without words, Nema remained rigid for a moment, then sank weakly onto the bench.
Her expression crumpled as though she’d been struck at her core, twisting toward tears.
“I wouldn’t hate you even if you descended into Madness and raged.”
She drove the point home like a nail that could never be pulled free.
“The choice was to protect each other. What’s the difference between that and what I would do?”
* * *
As Village Chief, I was confident that I had done my best in counseling her.
‘……But was I forcing it too much?’
Nema never came to accept herself.
She brought me home and left without another word. The last I saw of her looked so serious that I couldn’t bring myself to speak.
“Am I unfit to be Village Chief?”
“Squeeak.”
“…….”
Ppoppi touched my leg with his paw as if to comfort me, while Chuchu poked a small red tongue through her fur.
I jutted out my lower lip.
“So in the end, I’m the only one who looks like a seven-year-old with mental delusions.”

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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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