“I, I…… how much.”
When all his efforts to save Cairens turned to bubbles, Abrisius couldn’t come to his senses.
It wasn’t simply for himself, but for Seianes’s future and the flow of the original story that he had risked even his life. Despite those efforts, Cairens had vanished completely before his eyes.
“What do I do……. What do I do…….”
Rather than the sadness of losing a friend, the futility of things going wrong hit him harder.
He couldn’t know what happened to Cairens, whether he was alive or dead, or even where he had gone. Though he thought there was no way Seianes would let Cairens go so futilely, if he had, his head was turning white with all kinds of thoughts about what state of mind he must have been in to commit such an act.
“…….”
Seianes quietly watched Abrisius, who was falling into confusion and unable to get his bearings.
He seemed quite shocked that the friend who had been before his eyes had disappeared.
He didn’t know what Abrisius was imagining, but beyond what he was imagining, Seianes hadn’t done anything particular to Cairens.
Cairens was his brother who would take on the most important role in the future, and since he was the child their great father watched most closely, he had merely put him away somewhere safe and far for the time being.
‘Still, how unpleasant.’
Yet despite having put away such an unpleasant existence, Seianes still felt uncomfortable.
‘Why can’t you erase thoughts of that guy even though I’m right before your eyes? Didn’t you want to see me? Were you so busy making new friends that you had no time for anything else?’
His already complicated feelings flared up even more.
Though he had so much he wanted to say, Seianes, who forcibly suppressed it, slowly descended from the air. Landing precisely where Cairens had been standing, he looked down at the devastated Abrisius and said.
“I just sent him somewhere else, so don’t worry.”
“Ah.”
Relieved by those words, Abrisius raised his head.
At the closer distance, the two stood facing each other. Seeing Seianes before his eyes, Abrisius, who finally regained a sense of reality, drew in a breath.
‘What should I say and how? No, before that, what should I talk about first?’
The gaze looking down from above was piercing.
He seemed angry, so Abrisius hesitated over what to bring up first.
“Why did you leave me?”
In the meantime, Seianes abruptly spoke first.
“Huh?”
“Baby, what did I do wrong? What on earth made you so upset? Was leaving you behind that day a big wound for you? Was not being able to go out so distressing?”
He began to pour out the things he had been curious about. Because he had so much he wanted to ask when he met Abrisius, he continued talking without order.
“Why did you leave me? No, if you left, why didn’t you come back? Why didn’t you look for me? Didn’t you want to see me?”
But what he wanted to ask most of all was why Abrisius hadn’t returned to him. No, had he even looked for him? Taking out the words he had been holding in his head one by one, Seianes revealed his complicated feelings.
Drip, drop.
Like rain, one drop, two drops of tears fell as his frozen expression began to crumble.
“Ah, uh…….”
Watching that, Abrisius couldn’t say anything. He had thought he was the only one who missed Seianes, but he never imagined that he too would want to see him this much.
He thought Seianes would only look for him briefly, that he would just be doing fine somehow.
‘He looks so worn out.’
Now that they faced each other this closely, Seianes looked so pale he seemed precarious.
What on earth had happened?
Thinking that no excuse would work now, Abrisius kept his mouth shut.
Perhaps the pent-up grievances had surged, as Seianes endlessly shed tears on the spot.
“Abrisius, please say something. You…… you…… leaving me who loves you like a child…… while making new friends, you tried to sacrifice your life while even telling lies for that child’s sake.”
He had much to say. How his eyes and appearance had changed, the strange event of transforming into a deer, how he had been doing—he had so much he wanted to ask. He should have loudly demanded why he left him and didn’t keep his promise.
He was truly angry. That without him knowing, he had changed like this, planning such big things while seeming not to care about him at all. He wanted to ask why he seemed more afraid when they reunited than when he tried to sacrifice his life.
“You…… didn’t you think even a little about me desperately searching for you? If you sacrifice yourself like that, what about me? For that child…… were you trying to leave me? Was that child more precious than my feelings of sadness at losing you?”
The longing and sorrow he had been holding poured out all at once. Forgetting even to be angry, Seianes poured out his resentment toward Abrisius, who hadn’t thought of him.
He poured it all out and cried sorrowfully. The earth that had swallowed the priests also became moist with his sadness.
“……Ah, Seianes.”
Seianes’s sadness was transmitted to Abrisius completely.
He wanted to tell him it wasn’t like that, that he made this choice not because he didn’t think of him but because he thought of him.
To that extent, he was Abrisius’s everything, and he loved him so much that nothing could replace him.
The same was true for Seianes as well.
With a seriously haggard face, Seianes, far from being angry at Abrisius who had left him, was only crying loudly as if asking him to understand his grievances.
He couldn’t even make excuses, saying this or that, facing that appearance.
“…….”
After hesitating briefly, Abrisius leaped forcefully into Seianes’s embrace.
“Wha……?”
At the weight of Abrisius suddenly leaping in, Seianes, who lost his balance, swayed.
“Abrisius!”
“I, I like…… I like Seianes!”
Just as he was about to shout in surprise, Abrisius stepped forward first.
“Not even once……. No, not for a single moment did I forget. I’m sorry for running away…… I’m sorry for leaving you. But it’s not because I dislike Seianes.”
Burrowing into Seianes’s embrace, Abrisius poured out his true feelings.
Everything was the truth without a speck of falsehood. Even if he had tried to exclude thoughts of Seianes, when he was in danger and even at the moment when Cairens might die, Seianes was inside Abrisius.
“I missed you many times too. But I deliberately pretended not to know because I thought I shouldn’t.”
“Why on earth? Why did you do that? Is that the reason you left? Why on earth, for what reason did you leave me?”
“That’s…… that’s because I…….”
At Seianes’s question, he was at a loss for words.
Would Seianes believe him if he said he saw his true identity and their fate from Amina?
The fact that he was a being of the underworld and the future to come. But Seianes didn’t know that Abrisius knew all these facts. The former, Seianes had hidden, and the latter was a future even farther than now, so Seianes didn’t know it.
Not knowing where or how to explain, Abrisius hesitated.
Whatever he said, Seianes would naturally be shocked, and explaining this story required time for Abrisius as well.
“Because I like you so much…… when I thought you would leave me…… I was scared of being abandoned, so I did that.”
In the end, instead of explaining everything, he first brought out the anxiety he had been holding.
The beginning, when he ran away in fear thinking of Seianes who would hate him someday, was vivid. The devastating heart and unsettled emotions of that time surged up in his chest again.
“So…… that’s why.”
This time, Abrisius’s expression crumpled.
As the pent-up grievances rushed in, Abrisius collapsed helplessly in Seianes’s embrace. Finally, Abrisius, whose whole body relaxed its tension, sobbed.
And he began to pour out the most frightening and anxious thoughts and feelings he had been accumulating.
“That’s why I ran away. In case you would hate me. And I thought you would be fine even if I left. Even without someone like me, you…….”
“That can’t be, Abrisius.”
“Seianes is the god of the earth and…… you have siblings too and…… I’m just a child you picked up. You wouldn’t have a hard time if one child like me disappeared. But I…… only have you. The love you gave me and your very existence are my everything. If you hate me, even that disappears. That’s why I tried to leave. I thought it was better to leave when I’m not hated yet.”
He felt he couldn’t bear it if Seianes hated him.
The first unconditional love he received.
He was afraid that love would be withdrawn and he would be turned away, so that’s why he tried to leave.
Listening silently to Abrisius’s rambling words, Seianes doubted his own ears.
‘How could he think such a thing?’
It was a great shock to Seianes, who had never even considered the assumption of disliking Abrisius.
Surprised, Seianes didn’t press Abrisius. Instead, he pulled the child in his embrace even deeper and silently patted his back. So that the child couldn’t doubt his love any further.
“Hic……sniff.”
What on earth had made Abrisius anxious? Seianes couldn’t know.
Before the child’s tears, Seianes was infinitely weak, so he felt as if the child having such thoughts was entirely his fault.
“I couldn’t trade you for anything in the world. You are my precious baby who can’t be exchanged for anything.”
Whispering in the small child’s ear, Seianes smiled gently.
