The Wind Calms the Fire - Chapter 24

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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 24
“My spirit is wind. Wind is the force of harmony. That’s why I can calm your spirit when it rages, Your Highness.”
“Do all people of the Zephyros Kingdom possess Spirit Power?”
“Of course not. It’s only me.”
“How did you obtain it?”
“……I’m not entirely sure.”
Lea couldn’t explain here and now the long, complicated circumstances of how she’d awakened to Spirit Power—tangled as they were with memories of a past life.
“What I do know for certain is this: Spirit Power isn’t something you gain through effort. It’s a choice. Not anyone receives that choice. You must carry the bloodline of the Ancient Kingdom’s priesthood. The priesthood that once ruled the southern ancient kingdom flows through the current Zephyros Royal House.”
“Then the imperial family inherits the priesthood blood of two ancient kingdoms. So what am I? Water? Earth?”
“Fire.”
Lea spoke carefully.
“Because you also carry the bloodline of the Northia Royal House, Your Highness.”
His expression froze in an instant.
It was different from the cold detachment that merely concealed emotion.
It was a cutting-off of feeling before it could even take root.
Anger, she thought, would have seemed almost human by comparison.
Lea finally understood what Nella had said.
“Hatred and affection are two sides of the same coin. Between us, there’s nothing like that at all.”
She grasped it now.
The gulf between this mother and son ran far deeper than she had imagined.
‘What am I to do with these two.’
One careless word here and the already-deep chasm would widen into an unbridgeable breach.
She chose tactical retreat.
Rising quietly from her seat, she spoke.
“Let’s run a second experiment today. We’ll see if symptoms appear tonight without prevention. I’ll see you again tomorrow.”
After she descended from the carriage, Carrion stared at his own hands and clenched them into fists.
‘Is that all.’
He’d never sought affection.
All his mother left behind was this tiresome curse clinging to his body—was that truly all?
“It’s not a curse.”
Knowing its nature changed nothing.
The terrible curse had been gnawing at his body and mind for far too long.
Whether divine power or spirit—it was all nothing but a curse to Carrion.
‘Chosen by a curse, how gloriously ironic.’
He muttered with bitter mockery.
“For such a reason alone.”
That night, just before dawn, Carrion woke to a seizure wracking his body in agony.
Stage three—the highest of the three intensities he’d established.
It resembled the pain he usually endured during a fit.
But perhaps because he’d tasted the sweetness of deep sleep yesterday, today the torment was unusually excruciating.
“Hah…….”
It might have been the despair of knowing this curse flowed through his own bloodline.
There was no way out without spilling the blood that ran through his veins.
Only death would free him.
He gasped as a scorching heat consumed his throat, muttering curses.
The target of his oaths was unclear.
He cursed the world, his own blood, the curse itself, and everything else that came to mind.
But when the face of the golden-haired woman with green eyes surfaced in his thoughts, the curses ceased.
“I helped because you are Your Highness. I wanted to help because you are Your Highness.”
She would never know.
How much comfort those words had given him.
He shut his burning eyes.
He wanted to see her bright, smiling face.
* * *
The next morning, Lea didn’t see Carrion until their departure.
She asked Cedric quietly.
“He has gone up to the Dark Fortress.”
‘Ah, that’s right.’
Her role as guide had ended.
From now on, she would ride in the carriage.
“Have you seen His Majesty? This morning?”
“Yes. Do you have something to convey to him?”
Lea started to ask if he was all right, then thought better of it—no use inviting misunderstandings.
“No. Would it be all right to ride a horse this afternoon? I’m feeling cooped up in the carriage.”
“Of course. I’ll let him know.”
“Thank you.”
When they passed through the Forest Path, everyone was tense.
It was because no one trusted Lea to guide them.
The right amount of vigilance kept boredom at bay.
There was a certain pleasure in soaking in the peculiar atmosphere of the thick woods.
Now the tedious part of the journey began again.
The party did not rest until the midday break, pressing on without pause.
Once they had settled in a suitable spot and begun their rest, Lea kept stealing glances at the Dark Fortress.
By the time the break was nearly over, he still hadn’t appeared.
She hadn’t seen anyone carry a meal into the Dark Fortress either.
Lea turned to Cedric.
“Has His Majesty taken his lunch?”
“Pardon?”
She couldn’t admit she’d been watching whether he ate, so she made an excuse.
“I have something to tell him once he’s eaten.”
“He said he wasn’t hungry. I’ll inform him you’re here.”
“It’s not urgent. If His Majesty asks me to come later, I will.”
“Understood.”
Lea watched as Cedric disappeared into the Dark Fortress and then emerged.
He walked straight over to her and spoke.
“He asks that you come in.”
“All right.”
Lea climbed into the carriage as Cedric held the door open for her.
The moment she stepped inside, she saw him with one hand pressed to his forehead, his gaze fixed downward toward the table.
Still in that posture, he spoke.
“What is it?”
Lea didn’t falter, even though he hadn’t welcomed her warmly.
If he’d wanted to avoid meeting her, he could have refused through Cedric well enough.
“Did you sleep well last night?”
Carrion turned his head to look at her.
Lea found it slightly surprising.
Today there was emotion in his expression.
Not pleasant emotion. Irritation and displeasure were plastered all over his face.
It was the sort of fleeting emotional fragment a dull person would miss.
But Lea, having encountered him several times and spoken with him, could sense it.
“You didn’t sleep well. Was that thing inside you acting up?”
Carrion looked at her steadily, then let out a soft exhale.
It was neither a laugh nor a sigh of exasperation—a subtle reaction—before he straightened in his seat.
While he sat in silent thought, Lea waited.
“Let’s discuss this thing inside me a bit more.”
“Of course. I’m happy to.”
“A spirit?”
“Yes.”
“If all that was passed down from the Ancient Kingdom is accounted for, that makes four total. Fire, water, earth, wind.”
“That’s right.”
“Why fire? Why not water or earth?”
“I don’t know. But Your Majesty would know better than I why the Fire Spirit chose you.”
“I would know?”
“The moment you gained Spirit Power—I call it an Awakening—you should remember that moment. It would have been the day your symptoms first appeared.”
In the autumn of his tenth year, Carrion would never forget that day for as long as he lived.
The day his mother had abandoned the Imperial Palace and gone to the Northia Kingdom.
She had left without a single regret.
Carrion learned of his mother’s departure from a servant—no more than that.
There was no final farewell.
He did not weep. It was something he had foreseen.
To his mother, he would be nothing but a stain.
The injustice of being a creature who should never have been born gnawed at him.
Who asks to be born?
That autumn night held an unusual chill.
A servant had stacked the hearth with wood and kindled a generous fire.
The boy crouched before the flames, watching them dance, and a thought consumed him.
He wished the fire would grow and grow until it swallowed everything—himself included, this entire world.
Yet he did not strike a match.
Ten years old, suffused with rage though he was, Carrion possessed enough discernment and cold judgment to resist such a foolish act.
That night, a fever of unknown origin seized him, his throat burning with an inexplicable thirst, his body wracked with the agony of swallowing molten stone.
It was the first Seizure he would ever remember.
‘The Fire’s choosing……’
In her words, Carrion dimly recognized a truth.
That night, fire alone had reigned in his mind.
Looking back now, he saw no reason for despair when his mother departed—no need to imagine the world collapsing.
He knows now that he can live without her.
But that ten-year-old boy was immature, his capacity for emotion narrow and fragile.
Why had the Fire Spirit been drawn to a child shrieking in fear and helplessness?
Inwardly, he mocked such perverse taste.

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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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