“It seems Uriel isn’t pleased to see me.”
Avelos twisted one corner of his mouth upward, apparently displeased with how Uriel couldn’t seem to form a proper word upon seeing him. And why would he be pleased? How could anyone welcome someone who harbored hatred for Uriel — the original owner of the body Yuri now inhabited?
Yuri lifted his head and looked at Avelos’s face. Even having come face to face with the Uriel he despised, his demeanor was unhurried and composed the entire time.
That composure of his looked like confidence — the kind that said he could kill him whenever he wished, in whatever way he chose — and that made it all the more terrifying. Yuri was prey that had lost the will to flee.
Yuri lowered his gaze slightly and stared at the longsword hanging at Avelos’s hip.
If the novel holds true, he’s a Sword Master. Being torn limb from limb would be agonizing, but if that blade cuts somewhere vital — the neck, the heart — death would come immediately. He hates me, so if I provoke that hatred, maybe he’ll kill me in a single blow.
Since he was going to die anyway, dying quickly at his hands seemed preferable. He recalled the scene in the original where Uriel had begged him for his life. Having the body of a mage that didn’t die easily — just how cruelly, how painfully had he died?
His heart, full of mana, was half-severed, and both his legs were cut off. Avelos had then stomped down on Uriel where he lay crumpled on the ground. Even as Uriel crawled and begged for his life, both his arms were cut off too. And still Uriel didn’t die. No — it was more accurate to say he couldn’t die. Because the mana remaining in his heart endlessly prolonged Uriel’s life.
Writhing in a pool of blood like an insect with its limbs torn off, Uriel only breathed his last when his neck was severed. Even then, as though his fury still wasn’t spent, Avelos dragged Uriel’s corpse to the imperial palace and carried out the burning. The moment that image surfaced in his mind, Yuri’s fingertips began to tremble finely.
Even if I have to die, I don’t want to die like that — in that much agony.
“There’s no reason I wouldn’t be pleased.”
Yuri slowly rose to his feet. To hide his trembling fingertips, he made a deliberate show of calm and brushed the dirt from his clothes.
He wanted Avelos to be angry at his words, so he decided to provoke him a little more. If he brought up the painful past that had made him seethe, maybe he’d kill him in one blow.
“I thought of you often too, Avelos. I regretted letting you go….”
“…Ha.”
Had Yuri’s intent landed? The smile he’d been wearing — pulling at the corners of his mouth even as the emotion filling his eyes was unmistakably rage — vanished. The violet that had blazed and flickered hotly in both eyes disappeared as well.
His long, drawn-out eyes narrowed, and after briefly running the tip of his tongue along his lower lip, he exhaled a short breath.
At that, Yuri quietly curled his fingers into a fist. He could feel Avelos’s fury plainly. The murderous intent in the eyes fixed on him had grown denser. He was without a doubt here to kill him.
Sure enough, his hand wrapped around the hilt of the sword at his hip. Please — just kill me in one blow. If he cuts my neck, I’ll die instantly.
The moment Avelos gripped the hilt, Yuri steeled every muscle in his body. He had no intention of dodging clumsily. If he did and the cut only went halfway through his neck, it would be all the more agonizing. Now all that remained was Avelos’s retribution.
“As I thought, you—”
“Aren’t you being far too relaxed in front of me, a grand mage? Hm? Looks like life hasn’t been too bad for you.”
“You’d do well to shut that mouth.”
There was something a little unfair about it, he had to admit. He wanted to say: that wasn’t my intention, and I’m not the one who wronged you. But saying that now would be utterly useless. Possession — no one would believe it no matter who he told.
All the less so when the person he was telling was someone who had come to kill him. It was obvious they’d assume he was lying just to avoid death.
“Let’s see then. Whether you have what it takes to shut my mouth, Avelos.”
Even under Avelos’s gaze, thick with killing intent, Yuri said everything he meant to say. How would Uriel have spoken in a situation like this? He thought he’d come close enough, but he couldn’t help worrying whether it might sound off to Avelos’s ears.
When Yuri finished speaking, Avelos let out a laugh with no clear meaning behind it — as though he found it absurd, or perhaps so furious the laughter came out on its own.
The sound of that laugh came from directly above Yuri’s head. He was certain he had been watching Avelos with eyes wide open, yet somehow Avelos had closed the distance without him noticing. Even with Yuri standing upright, Avelos was tall enough that he had to tilt his head up to look at him.
There had been more than enough distance and time to swing the blade, yet Avelos did not cut Yuri’s neck. Not the neck — not the arms, the legs, the heart. He didn’t touch a single one.
Why is he drawing this out? An unease Yuri couldn’t name wrapped around him. Did I get the lines a little wrong after all?
“It seems you were trying to provoke me into killing you in one blow.”
In an instant, the laughter cut off. A low, sunken voice settled down over Yuri’s shining golden hair. Avelos had read his intentions perfectly.
If this goes on as it stands, just like in the original, my heart will be cut, then both legs, then both arms, in that order — I’ll bleed out every drop in my body and die in agony, just like Uriel in the original.
Right. I’ve always been someone with rotten luck, after all. Avelos suffered under Uriel for eight years. Hoping to escape the original’s fate just because I treated him decently for a month or two before sending him back — that was greedy of me.
“That makes no—”
“I’ve known for some time that you can no longer use magic.”
“You’ve known…?”
Avelos spoke in a low, rumbling growl. The voice that seeped through his teeth sounded as though he were barely holding back a fury boiling up from somewhere deep inside.
Looking at Avelos like that, Yuri felt puzzled. Why is he bothering with this meaningless exchange? He hates Uriel this much, so why won’t he just kill me right away?
As Avelos failed to kill him outright, the shameless desire to live began to creep slowly forward. Over the past ten years, Yuri had already come to know the joy of living without pain in a healthy body.
And so perhaps, before that desire for life surfaced and he clung to him in an ugly, desperate way — he had tried to provoke him so he could die before even having the chance to show that lingering attachment to life.
Please. If you’re going to kill me, don’t torture me with hope like this — just kill me now. If any more time passes, I might end up begging you to spare me.
Yuri bit down hard on his lower lip.
Avelos’s gaze dropped to Yuri’s lips, drained of color where his white teeth pressed into them. Yuri himself didn’t seem to notice, but Avelos’s eyes would not leave them.
“It seems you… want me to kill you in one blow.”
“……”
“That’s not something I can do. What would I do with this rage of mine then? Once you’re dead, what would I do with the hatred inside me that has nowhere left to go? Uriel.”
Yuri hung his head and closed his eyes. Within Avelos’s fury, he felt a deep, deep sorrow. Enough to make him feel sorry — even though none of it had been his doing.
Because he had seen the space he had lived in. Because he had seen with his own eyes just how fragile and wounded his childhood had been.
“……”
“Don’t show me that expression either. Be the way you were before. Until I’ve returned everything to you.”
Only then could he understand. The reason Avelos had come looking for Uriel — and the reason he had drawn this out, speaking to him instead of killing him in an instant.
He had come back to return everything that had been done to him in childhood. Kidnapping, imprisonment, abuse, and the slave brand — he intended to give it all back.
That must also be why, even now with strength that surpassed Uriel’s, he wore the face of someone wounded.
Yes. Perhaps I had known as well, somewhere deep down. From the moment I realized I had possessed this novel — that a moment like this might come someday. The peace and happiness of all those years in between may have been the price given to me in place of Uriel — so that I could atone to him.
“My Uriel, whom I despise.”
“……”
“Now it’s your turn.”
2.
“What are you thinking about?”
Yuri startled at the sudden sound of Avelos’s voice and spun around. When he turned, Avelos had entered the parlor — a room that had been completely empty just a moment ago.
Avelos glanced briefly at Yuri, whose eyes had gone wide with shock at the sight of him, then strode toward him with long, purposeful steps.
Avelos stood a full head taller than Yuri, with a breadth and build that was nearly twice his size. The emperor’s parlor was far more spacious than any noble family’s, yet the moment Avelos stepped inside, the room felt as though it had shrunk — filled to capacity by his presence alone.
“Were you thinking about me, by any chance?”
