Youngest on Top - Chapter 234

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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 234

“Sae.”

I came to my senses at Ilay’s call.

“…Anyway, there’s so much I need to figure out. What on earth is Misa thinking…? Now that I think about it, the blood seal broke far too easily.”

The blood that Misa had injected through Shuellina.
To use sacred power during the mission, Shuellina had sealed that blood.
That’s what I was referring to.

“And how this bracelet, which Misa discarded, ended up in Shuellina’s hands is also a mystery.”
“….”
“Right, what happened to this mission anyway? I’d completely forgotten about it.”

Ilay didn’t answer.
Instead, he gazed at me with a strangely composed expression.
For some reason, I found it difficult to meet that gaze and looked away.

“And, and also—.”
“Sae.”
“Hmm?”
“There’s something more important than that.”
“….”
“You should think about that first.”
“….”
“You didn’t possess someone else’s past. It’s your past. In other words.”

Ilay spoke in a clear and resolute voice.

“You found your family.”

* * *

Perardin Noishurael Duke’s residence.
In darkness where not a single ray of light entered.
Only the blazing torches illuminated the narrow space.

Beneath that torch lay a man collapsed on the ground.
His entire body was covered in burn marks that looked freshly inflicted.
The shadow standing before the man bowed toward Perardin Noishurael Duke.

“You have arrived.”
“His condition?”
“He just lost consciousness.”
“Wake him.”

The shadow immediately seized the man’s head.
And then.

“AAAAHHHHHHH!!”

The man thrashed convulsively, screaming in agony.
The veins across his body bulged grotesquely, standing rigid against his skin.

Perardin Noishurael Duke observed the scene with cold, indifferent eyes.
Only when blood and foam began trickling from the man’s mouth did the Duke give a slight nod.
The shadow released its grip from the man’s head.

“Who is your master?”
“Hgh… ugh…”

Crack!
A pristine white blade pierced through the man’s body without hesitation.

“Cough!”
“Who is your master?”
“Ugh… hgh…”

Thrust!

“Who is your master?”
“Ugh…”

The man could not provide a coherent answer.
Each time he failed, Perardin Noishurael Duke drove his blade forward without hesitation.
His body, lacerated countless times over, was now a grotesque mass of blood and gore—too horrifying to behold with open eyes.

‘That bastard….’

Admiral Ekellan regarded Perardin Noishurael Duke with complicated eyes.
It wasn’t because his subordinate was cruel.
Perardin Noishurael Duke was originally a ruthless and merciless man.
Moreover, Admiral Ekellan himself harbored the same desire to tear the man before him to shreds.
However.

‘Why do you look like you’re mutilating yourself?’

It was as if he were punishing himself.
Admiral Ekellan opened his mouth to stop him, then closed it again.
Looking at the Duke’s face, he couldn’t bring himself to speak.

That was when it happened.
The man’s body, which had barely resisted at all, began to convulse and writhe.
The man’s entire frame heaved as he vomited up bright red liquid with a wet sound.

“…!”

Admiral Ekellan rushed toward the man in shock.
What the man had vomited was not blood.
No, it was blood.
But it wasn’t only blood.

Dark crimson worms inscribed with brilliant scarlet patterns writhed and swam through the blood!

“A seal curse.”
“The mark of a slave is inscribed upon it.”

Perardin Noishurael Duke spoke with a cold expression.

“There’s no point in making him talk. There’s no use in cracking open his skull either. Everything about who he met and what he did has been cleanly erased.”
“…Who on earth.”

The fact that someone could place a seal curse of this magnitude meant the mastermind was no ordinary figure.

“In any case, this one is no longer of use.”

Perardin Noishurael Duke turned around without delay.
Admiral Ekellan followed him, moving his steps.

Crack, crack-crack-crack!
In that moment, a chilling sound of bones grinding echoed through the air.
Sensing the ferocious aura emanating from behind, Admiral Ekellan sighed and looked at the Duke.

“If you suspected from the beginning, why didn’t you tell me anything?”

Perardin Noishurael Duke had been watching Shuellina all along from the start.
The man who had just died was someone he’d caught in the act.
He was the one who had made contact with Shuellina and sealed away the Demon King’s blood.

“You would have given it away immediately.”
“Me? I’m a much better actor than you.”
“I agree that you’re a con artist.”
“Hey.”
“But it’s different when it concerns that child.”

Admiral Ekellan faltered at those words.

“Even when you believed that thing was Reyarsha, you kept taking that child’s side in front of it, didn’t you?”
“That’s because it was saying completely unreasonable things. I tried to understand it as anxiety, but there are limits.”
“Right. From the beginning, you openly criticized its attitude, didn’t you? Saying it was playing the victim, that it was obvious.”
“I was so caught up in it that I kept bringing up the Protagonist at every turn. And that was even before the artifact verification.”
“What do you think would have happened if you still said there was a possibility it was fake even after the verification?”
“That would be…”
“You would have immediately ignored it and gone to ‘my Protagonist.'”
“…”

He had nothing to say.
It was far too accurate.
Admiral Ekellan, who had been accepting it, faltered.

‘…And you?’

Those words caught in his throat.
Perardin Noishurael Duke was not a patient man.

‘So he endured all of that and waited?’

Waiting patiently for the opponent to reveal a weakness before hunting was not the Perardin Noishurael Duke’s method.
Why would an overwhelmingly superior being need to exploit weaknesses?
The Perardin Noishurael Duke was a being who had no need for patience from birth.

‘That must mean he was that desperate and earnest.’

To the point of tolerating and indulging someone who dared to act as his daughter so disgustingly.
All for the sake of finding his daughter.

‘The very act of tolerating and indulging the fake to find Lesha… became a wound to Lesha herself.’

What must that desolate and tragic heart feel like?
The image of the Duke tearing himself apart like self-mutilation kept surfacing in my mind.

Admiral Ekellan clenched his fists tightly.
It was not the Duke who would regret this to the bone—it was himself.
What had he done while the Duke was going through all that?

But even comfort would become a blade that pierced his chest, he was certain.
So Admiral Ekellan changed the subject.

“But it was unexpected. You didn’t show a hint to Nana or Demian, yet you told Mikhail first?”
“….”
“I saw you two talking alone with Mikhail before the mission started at the stadium. That’s when you told him it was fake, right?”
“…Yes.”
“What were you thinking? It’s a miracle Mikhail didn’t just kill the fake right then and there.”

Given Mikhail’s nature, he could have gone and killed Shuellina without caring about the people around him.
A murder spectacle could have unfolded in the stadium packed with tens of thousands.
If that had been broadcast live across the entire continent….

It was horrifying just to imagine.
No matter who it was, even Mikhail couldn’t escape the backlash from that.

“That man has good instincts.”
“Since when? You said he acts on instinct alone without thinking, which is a headache.”
“Nana, you, and Demian think things through. Even this time, you did.”

The three of them sensed something amiss, yet they couldn’t dismiss the possibility that Shuellina might be Reyarsha.

It was unavoidable.
Decades of repeated failures.
The information and experience accumulated through them.
The frustration and disappointment encountered countless times.
And layered atop it all, guilt that swelled like a fan with each thought of their inability to find her.

All of it bound their thoughts tight, continually catching at their heels.

It was the same when Sacred Maiden Saelika first possessed the bracelet.
Admiral Ekellan worried that if he misread the situation, Saelika would be hurt.
Because of the thought—what if, perhaps—
The habit of weighing and considering every angle had taken root.

“Mikhail doesn’t have such doubts. He’s different from us.”
“….”
“And like us, he loves his sister.”
“….”
“Is there any reason not to trust the instincts of a son who possesses not a shred of reason?”

Admiral Ekellan let out a short laugh.
Perardin Noishurael Duke was a flawed man who had never properly fulfilled his role as a father.
Yet he remained a father nonetheless.

“When I told that boy Shuellina was a fake, I added this.”
“….”
“You may do as you wish.”
“…!”

Admiral Ekellan stared at Perardin Noishurael Duke in shock.
This was essentially giving Mikhail permission to kill Shuellina on the spot!

“You…!”
“I wouldn’t have let him kill her. For Mikhail’s sake. However.”

The pupils of Perardin Noishurael Duke’s eyes gleamed darkly.

“I thought it would be fine to let that bastard’s anger run its course. I even thought it would be acceptable to make that fake pay the price in the most miserable and pathetic way possible, right before everyone’s eyes.”
“….”
“But do you know what that bastard did?”

Admiral Ekellan swallowed dryly.
I already knew what Mikhail did after that.
I simply assumed it was all under the command of Perardin Noishurael Duke.

‘But that’s not all—.’

As if reading Admiral Ekellan’s thoughts, Perardin Noishurael Duke nodded.

“He ran straight to the orphanage.”
“…!”
“The orphanage sponsored by the Parmanase Temple— the orphanage where that child Saelika was.”

* * *

A few days earlier, on the day of the Grand Sacred Maiden ceremony.
Mikhail looked at Perardin Noishurael Duke, who called for him, with an annoyed expression.

“What is it? There’s no point in trying to stop me. Have you ever seen me listen to you?”
“Mikhail.”
“No matter what you say, I’m going to sit in my Protagonist’s family section. I’m not your family anyway, am I? I even removed the family name, so what’s the point.”
“That’s not it. I don’t care where you sit.”

Mikhail looked at Perardin Noishurael Duke with slightly suspicious eyes.
The Duke, who had been obsessed with his youngest for over a decade, was saying such a thing?

That was the reason.
Instead of answering ‘Fine, go on your way!’ I followed the Duke’s footsteps.
And what I heard was shocking.

“…That was fake? A fake, and yet now, like that…. Then the real Lesha is. What on earth happened to the real Lesha….”

Mikhail couldn’t continue speaking.
Perardin Noishurael Duke, who had been quietly looking down at his son, spoke.

“You may do as you wish.”
“…!”

Mikhail lifted his head blankly.

“Whatever it may be.”
“….”
“I will bear all the responsibility.”

Mikhail parted his lips several times before asking.

“As I wish?”
“Yes.”
“Anything….”
“Anything.”

Mikhail’s vacant expression hardened.
And then.

Pop!
With a ripple of mana, Mikhail vanished from sight.

.
.

Mikhail did not go to Shuellina.
Neither did he go to the collaborator being shadowed, nor to the Perpidian Temple.

He stood before a massive orphanage.
The very orphanage where Sacred Maiden Saelika had lived.

The Orphanage Director was exceedingly kind.
How many people in this world would not be kind to Prince Mikhail?

“Ah, No. 72… or rather, Sacred Maiden Saelika, I presume.”

The Director who rushed out spoke with deference.
Seeing Mikhail’s expression stiffen, he hastily corrected himself.

‘What a foolish mistake.’

I already knew that Mikhail was close to Saelika.

“Ah, well, managing so many children makes it difficult to keep track, so we simply refer to them that way. Our orphanage has always done our best for the children.”
“….”
“We, we didn’t know she would become the Sacred Maiden. She wasn’t even born during the Messis period…. If we had known, we would have treated her with far greater reverence.”
“I didn’t come here to listen to such useless excuses.”

Mikhail cut off the Orphanage Director coldly.

“When did that child arrive at the orphanage?”

The Orphanage Director was flustered but answered immediately.

“That day was long ago, but I remember it clearly. It was a night of thunder and lightning when some baby was abandoned there. If I hadn’t discovered her early, she would have died as she was. Her lips were already turning blue. I was the one who saved her. I took good care of the Sacred Maiden—.”
“When was it?”
“Ah, that was, well, sixteen years ago in autumn.”
“The records?”
“Those shouldn’t be shown carelessly to outsiders—.”
“Carelessly?”
“…but of course they must be shown! Prince Ekkelan, you’re hardly an outsider. Naturally, I should show them to you.”

The Orphanage Director quickly retrieved the documents and handed them over.
Mikhail examined the records.
The Orphanage Director’s words were true.
Saelika had been admitted to the orphanage sixteen years ago in autumn.

‘…It wasn’t Reyarsha.’

I lost Reyarsha fifteen years ago in spring.
The timeline doesn’t match with Saelika.

Only then did I realize what I had come here hoping to find.
The moment I understood, a hollow laugh escaped me.

What did it matter whether Saelika was Reyarsha or not?
Such things were of no consequence to me.
I had never cared about some lost phantom.
Whether I found her or not, what difference did it make?

“Um, Prince Ekkelan?”

The Orphanage Director called out to Mikhail cautiously.
Mikhail lifted his head with darkened eyes.

‘Ah, what should I do? My mood is terrible.’

Perhaps I should just kill them all.
The moment that thought filled my mind.

“…!”

Mikhail sensed something foreign in the air.
A thin, delicate, and peculiar sensation—so subtle that it would slip away unnoticed without heightened awareness.
Mikhail recognized what that foreign sensation was.

‘Mana…!’

A powerful spell had been placed on Saelika’s record!
And it was crafted with such precision that even Mikhail, who had reached the rank of Archmage, could barely perceive it.

Mikhail’s mana writhed like a living creature.

“Gack!”

The Orphanage Director was slammed straight into the wall.
Though nothing touched him, he gasped and clawed at his own throat as if being strangled.

“P-Prince, ugh, Your Highness…! What is this…?”
“Lying isn’t fun.”
“I, I would never—.”
“I’m asking again.”
“Ugh, p-please…!”
“When did Saelika come to this orphanage?”
“S-sixteen years ago…! It’s written there…!”

CRASH!
The wall that had been pinning the Orphanage Director crumbled completely.
The Director groaned beneath the rubble, trembling.

“There won’t be a second chance.”
“Y-Your H-Highness…!”
“Next time, you’ll end up like that.”
“P-please, spare me. I’m t-telling the truth, I swear…!”
“The truth, hm.”

Thud, thud.
Mikhail approached the Orphanage Director.
He placed his hand upon the Director’s head.

“Let me see for myself.”

A magic circle materialized as powerful mana surged into the Director’s body.

“AAAAHHHHHHH!!”

The Director screamed and thrashed, his mind torn apart by the agony.
How long did this last?

CRACK!
Something shattered, and Mikhail withdrew his hand.

“Ah… ah, ah.”

The Director drooled mindlessly, his consciousness shattered.
The light had completely left his eyes.
Mikhail spoke.

“When did Saelika arrive?”
“I don’t know.”

Mikhail furrowed his brow and asked again.

“When did Saelika arrive?”
“I don’t—AAAAHHHHH!!”

Mikhail removed his hand from the Orphanage Director’s head and asked once more.

“When did Saelika arrive?”
“I-I-I d-d-don’t kn-n-know.”

His voice came out strange, like a malfunctioning mechanism.
The magic hadn’t failed.
The Orphanage Director was telling the truth.
A thought struck Mikhail like lightning, and his face went rigid.

“…When did No. 72 arrive?”
“Fifteen years ago, spring. March 7th.”
“…What?”

Mikhail stood frozen like someone struck by a thunderbolt.

“No. 72 was admitted on Imperial Calendar Year 1112, March 7th.”

The words pierced his chest like a finishing blow.
Mikhail crumbled.

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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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