Advent of the Three Calamities

Chapter 750: Well deserved rest [1]

"It’s been a while since I last saw you two. How are you doing?"

Albeit confused, Evelyn and Kiera both entered the carriage. Because Aoife had messaged Kiera in advance, she wasn’t that surprised, as opposed to Evelyn, who looked at Aoife in shock.

"What are you standing there like that? Come in."

Evelyn only snapped out of it when she heard Keira’s words. Lifting her head and looking at the two, she bit her lower lip before entering the carriage.

Making herself comfortable, the carriage began to move.

"Are we going somewhere?"

Evelyn looked around in confusion.

She still had to meet with her father, and—

"Don’t worry. I’ll bring you back here. I just have a few things that I want to talk to the two of you about."

The smile on Aoife’s face gradually faded as she looked at the two of them. Seeing her like this, Kiera and Evelyn calmed down.

As the carriage bumped a couple of times as it moved, Aoife leaned her head against the side of the carriage while speaking, "There aren’t many people that I trust in this world. The two of you, especially. I don’t trust the two of you at all."

Kiera and Evelyn looked at Aoife weirdly. Was she here to tell them how untrustworthy they were?

Before they could even voice out their protests, Aoife continued.

"...My father and brother were both murdered."

The carriage turned deafly silent in that moment.

While everyone knew that the Emperor and the Prince had died, the cause of their death had not been explicitly stated to the public. Many made guesses, but the Royal Family never truly confirmed it.

Evelyn and Kiera were both aware.

And seeing Aoife share the news with them, the two of them kept their mouth shut as Aoife kept her head leaned against the side of the carriage.

"The craziest part of it all? It’s almost as if nobody cares that they’ve been murdered. All that my half-brothers care about is the throne, and my uncle is currently missing. Despite my best attempts to investigate the situation, I keep getting denied at every turn. It’s almost as if..."

Aoife paused, her expression turning grim as she finally turned to look at the two of them.

"...It’s almost as if the entire royal family is trying to keep their death a secret."

The carriage turned completely silent from that point.

Neither Kiera nor Evelyn said a word as the two stared at Aoife.

"There’s a high chance that someone within the royal family is involved in their death. No..."

Aoife paused yet again, her eyes narrowing.

"...It’s very likely that the entire royal family is being controlled by someone."

***

Clank—!

Pulling the carriage door open, I stretched my back.

’Honestly, Leon does have a point. This is just too uncomfortable.’

I looked back into the carriage to see Leon with his head leaning against the window, staring blankly at the world outside. His face was pale, and for a moment, it looked like the colours were leaving his body.

I thought about talking to him, but gave up and closed the door right after.

Clank!

I was honestly quite exhausted from everything.

My body still felt like shit.

’I need to take some time to properly heal myself from my injuries.’

Even though I could act and move without any problems, the injuries were still uncomfortable. I also couldn’t use my full power with my current injuries.

"Should I rest...?"

"You should."

Leon spoke, suddenly appearing next to me.

A ghost? When did he...

"You look exhausted. You should take some time to relax."

"Hmm."

Despite hearing it from Leon, I felt the concept of resting to be quite odd. When was the last time that I had properly rested? Even now, after a little bit of sleep, I planned on going back to training. Now that I had reached the seventh tier, there were quite a lot of things that I wanted to try and experiment with.

I especially wanted to see the full extent of the evolved ability that I got from Pebble’s evolution.

While I had used it for a little bit, it was still far from the full extent of it. There was so much more.

I also wanted to train my curse magic. I had been neglecting that quite a bit. There was also the weird sword style that I had managed to catch a glimpse of in my memories... Not only that, but I also wanted to get a better idea of how to fix the ring.

The rate at which my mana was being consumed was a lot more than before.

In essence...

There was a lot of stuff that I wanted to do.

’Can I even afford to rest?’

Not only that, but I also needed to take into account everything else that was weighing down on me. Delilah’s situation. The Outer Beings. Toren and the Inverted Sky. The books left behind by Noel.

I...

I really couldn’t afford to rest even if I wanted to.

"Ugh."

I ruffled my head in annoyance.

Things were really troublesome for me, weren’t they?

"Hey."

Feeling a tug at my shoulders, I turned to see Leon looking at me with a concerned look. In the end, he shook his head.

"You’re thinking too much. Get some rest now. If you don’t rest, you’ll eventually crumble. What’s the point of doing anything if your body and mind will eventually give up on you?"

"But—"

"I’ve already thought things through."

"Hm?"

Leon turned his attention towards the estate and then behind him.

"...We’re going to the city later. I’ll show you something amazing."

I blinked my eyes slowly.

However, before I even had the time to say anything, Leon directly entered the estate. In the end, the only thing I could do was trace his fading back with my eyes.

I sighed.

"Fine."

I rubbed the back of my head.

"...I’ll listen for once."

*

Entering the estate, I went to my room and fell on my bed.

I thought about getting a quick rest and relaxing my mind for a bit. In hindsight, Leon was right. I couldn’t allow all the problems to overwhelm me.

I needed to take care of my mind and body.

And so...

I decided to rest.

But—

Clank—!

Just because I wanted to rest, it didn’t mean I could rest.

"How are you still alive? Weren’t you supposed to be dead?"

I raised my head and stared at the figure standing by the door. I blinked a couple of times before nodding.

"Oh, it’s been a while."

My head dropped back onto the pillow, and I closed my eyes.

Bang—!

A loud smacking sound echoed.

He had probably smacked his hand against the door.

"Is this a joke to you?"

"....No. I’m just tired."

"Tired?"

I heard the sound of approaching steps. He was probably drawing nearer to me.

The steps eventually stopped.

He was near me.

"Tell me what’s going on."

He was practically seething.

I sighed.

"Do we have to do it now?"

"....."

I was met with silence.

Eventually, finally opening my eyes, a pair of eyes stared straight at me from above. Linus’s expression was complicated, his face looking torn between anger and something else.

Seeing his expression, I found myself unable to reject him any longer.

He reminded me too much of Noel.

"Fine."

I sat up and rubbed my face.

’Just when I thought I’d get some rest.’

Pushing my hair back, I looked back at Linus.

"What exactly do you want to know?"

"Everything."

Linus replied, his voice barely contained.

"About what happened. How are you still alive despite supposedly being dead? Where father is, and..."

Linus paused, his teeth grazing his lip as he lowered his voice to a near mumble.

"And...?"

I grew curious.

What exactly was he about to say?

In the end, despite my curiosity, Linus shook his head.

"Never mind. Just tell me exactly what happened. Was this all a stunt that you prepared with Father?"

"Hmm."

I thought for a moment, staring directly at Linus before nodding.

"Yes, you can say that."

This wasn’t a lie.

This had all technically been planned between me and Noel.

’I still feel shivers while thinking about how he’s referring to Noel as father.’

He wasn’t really ’our’ father.

"...You of all people should understand how our father operates. He’s someone who plans ten steps ahead without showing it on his face. He rarely acts, but whenever he does act, he does it with the intent of taking everything that he can. His greed..."

"It’s unquenchable."

Linus finished my words, his gaze flickering as he moved his head back and pinched the bottom of his chin.

"Looking back on everything, I can understand why Father acted as he did. We’ve gained more land than ever before, and with your recent exploits, it wouldn’t be far-fetched to place our holdings just a step below a Duchy... perhaps even two."

"...Not quite."

I couldn’t say with certainty how our standing compared to that of a Duchy at that point.

I had yet to see the full power of a Duchy. However, from what I understood, we were still not at that level yet. While we did have the territory to match a Duchy, we were still inferior when it came to infrastructure and military power.

The strongest person within our estate was most likely me.

In Duchies, they at least had more than a couple of Arch-Wizards. Aside from that, they also had a massive army comprised of extremely talented knights and mages. We would realistically get destroyed if we tried to fight them.

’Especially if I compare myself to the Rosemberg Duchy.’

Delilah and maybe Father-in-law were both enough to completely wipe us out.

"Hmm. Maybe you’re right."

Linus looked around before taking a seat. His face still contained traces of anger, and now that I looked carefully, I could see the dark circles beneath his eyes.

’He probably didn’t sleep for quite some time.’

I couldn’t blame him.

He had probably only just learned about the fact that I was still alive.

Given that he was at the Academy most of the time, and I had only shown myself once before, it wasn’t strange for him to only find out now. Especially given the chaos that I had caused at the Rite.

"What about father...? How is he—"

"I don’t know."

I answered honestly.

Noel...

I didn’t know where he was. What he was doing. How he was doing.

Despite being a god and technically immortal, I still couldn’t help but worry.

Despite everything, he was still my little brother.

"You don’t know? Then, is he..."

"Like I said, I don’t know."

"But—"

"He’s only given me instructions on what I have to do. I am carrying them right now. That’s all I’ve been doing for the past few months while you were at the Academy. In fact, I just got back from the Rite. I didn’t even have enough time to sleep before you suddenly came in here to disturb me." Before I knew it, my voice was starting to rise. This was probably my worry for Noel, and tiredness getting to me. I wanted to stop it, but I couldn’t.

It was all catching up with me at this moment.

Linus’s face changed upon hearing my words, his expression shifting between guilt, anger, and something else. However, he never had the chance to say his piece as the door suddenly burst open.

Clank!

Leon appeared behind the door.

His gray eyes scanned the room before finally locking onto Linus.

"Good timing."

He turned his attention towards me.

"...Since he’s here, you might as well join us."

"Huh? Join you?" Linus looked extremely confused. "More importantly, aren’t you a prince? What are you—"

"That’s not important."

Leon cut Linus off as he turned around.

"We’re going to the city. Today, I’ll show you both something amazing."

He left right after that, leaving me and Linus at a total loss as we looked at each other.

"Has he gone crazy?"

"...Been like that for a very long time."