The Brothers’ Misunderstanding (2) – Proof of Worth
When Ruman stepped outside, Temarr was striding toward him with bold, unreserved steps—his face as expressionless as usual, but his eyes somehow looking menacing.
Befitting a Hero who fought with his own body, he had a good physique and muscles, so watching him approach like that made even Ruman’s legs feel weak.
“Is he dead?”
So it was only natural that if Temarr grabbed someone by the throat in that instant, they’d die. Ruman asked indifferently and picked up the sack that had been left on the ground.
It was because Ren had just come to mind.
Seeing that it had been abandoned during the headbutt, it was probably a gift or something for Temarr. Something about a one-year anniversary? Come to think of it, he seemed to have said he had something to give.
“He’s alive.”
It was a voice mixed with a sigh.
Thud!
When Ruman threw the sack, Temarr caught it lightly.
“?”
“You should ask what it is.”
“What is it.”
“Open it.”
“Later.”
Temarr frowned and set the sack down.
“Where’s Ren?”
Through the loosened opening of the sack, new leather shoes poked their nose out slightly.
How ridiculous. Ruman wanted to click his tongue.
‘This is why things go wrong. Ren, be grateful. If it weren’t for me, you definitely wouldn’t have been able to give your gift.’
“That’s a gift Ren gave you.”
“What are you talking about.”
“I said Ren gave it.”
“To you?”
“To YOU!!”
“You?”
“Don’t you know yourself?”
“……”
“I never knew you were someone this impossible to communicate with. And on top of that, to be so oblivious—poor Ren.”
“Why Ren. Where’s Ren? Is he sleeping?”
“……”
Ruman, whose mouth had fallen open, steadied himself and pushed Temarr’s shoulder as he tried to enter the cabin. In an instant, Temarr’s eyes gleamed menacingly.
“Ruman.”
“In the sack you threw on the ground, there’s a gift your younger brother Ren prepared. If you wear those and go, wouldn’t Ren’s hurt feelings be soothed? (Though I don’t know why I’m explaining this….) Go open it. Don’t just stare blankly at me. (How can a person be this dense?)”
Muttering to himself, Ruman gave Temarr a tongue-lashing.
When he pushed Temarr’s shoulder hard as he tried to ignore him and go inside, only then did Temarr reluctantly turn his steps and pick up the sack he had set down.
The leather shoes that had been hanging at the opening fell to the ground.
Temarr’s hand slowly picked up the shoes.
“……”
Temarr lost his words and fingered the shoes.
They were leather shoes that would be hard to obtain in this small village. There was even Temarr’s initial engraved on the inside.
“Better than I thought.”
Ruman admired them genuinely.
He found them well in this backwater!
If Ruman, who had a good eye, said so, they were at least not something obtained in this village.
“Aren’t you going to wear them?”
However, contrary to Ruman’s expectations, Temarr put the shoes back in the sack and began tying it up.
“What are you doing?”
Now Ruman’s voice held a faint anger that even he didn’t notice, subtly permeating it.
Temarr stared at the sack for a while, then turned his body toward the storage shed.
“Temarr. What are you doing, I asked.”
“To Ren, I’m just a Hero.”
Absurd at his words, Ruman stood with his mouth open until Temarr came back after putting the sack Ren had prepared deep inside the storage shed.
***
‘Hyung!’
Ren was a bright and lovely child.
Though their parents weren’t around, he was spirited, and a good child who listened well to his older brother. Temarr wanted to do his best to raise his younger brother. In place of their absent parents, that is. To do that, he needed money.
There were extremely few jobs a minor’s body could do, and it was even more difficult to receive proper wages. Even the hard bread that could barely last a day or two, Ren could only swallow after soaking it in water. Even then, he often threw it up, so Temarr always lived in anxiety. That terrifying anxiety that Ren might die at any moment.
Then one day, an opportunity came to him.
It must surely have been an opportunity given by heaven.
<Child Soldier Conscription Order>
A child soldier recruitment to fill the headcount, to save face while covering one’s eyes.
Temarr told Ren a lie for the first time.
‘Hyung was chosen as a Hero.’
‘Hero?’
Ren, who didn’t know much about Heroes, blinked his bright, twinkling eyes. Still not fully awake, he rubbed his eyes with his underdeveloped hands—a sight that was pitifully adorable.
‘Yeah. A Hero. You know, the fairy tale book the old man gave you, Ren. A Hero who defeats dragons and saves princesses, that kind of Hero.’
When Temarr explained gently, Ren finally seemed to understand and opened his mouth blankly.
‘I know! Ren knows about Heroes too!! The old man gave me a fairy tale book! That’s right! Hyung, you’re a Hero?! You save princesses and defeat dragons?!’
Thoroughly excited, Ren chattered away while flailing his arms.
‘Wooooow!’
His eyes, sparkling as if stars had been embedded in them, were filled with admiration.
Temarr, who had lied, felt his chest ache as if being stabbed. He hadn’t known Ren would be this happy. But he couldn’t take back the lie. And it was a necessary lie. Rather than saying he was volunteering as a child soldier for money, saying he was chosen as an amazing Hero and would come back would be less sad.
‘Amazing! Hyung, you’re so so cool! My hyung is a Hero!! A Hero!’
‘…Yeah. Ren, so hyung has to leave home.’
‘Leave home? Th-then I’ll be alone?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Uuugh….’
At the words that he’d have to be alone, Ren’s eyes filled with tears. However, young Ren maturely wiped away his tears roughly with his hands. When my hyung is going to become an amazing Hero! Stopping him would make me a bad little brother! Hyung is a Hero! Then I’ll become the dignified younger brother of a Hero too!! Ren vowed this to himself and deliberately nodded his head vigorously, again and again! As if thinking that hyung leaving home was nothing at all.
To not cry. To keep his word of praising his hyung. But Temarr misunderstood Ren’s infinite positivity.
‘Ren. Are you that happy that hyung is a Hero?’
‘Yeah!! Sooo happy! Super duper happy! This much! Thiiiiis muuuuch!!’
Ren flailed his whole body and spread both arms wide, then fell backward. Startled, Temarr caught Ren’s falling body. Ren looked at Temarr with a bright smile.
‘Okay. If Ren’s happy, then I’m happy too.’
Thinking that Ren really liked that he was a Hero.
This was the first time he’d received such an enthusiastic reaction.
Eyes that sparkled more than when listening to any fairy tale. Ren’s clear and pure eyes, reminiscent of a summer forest—those two eyes permeated Temarr’s heart as if digging into it.
That was Temarr’s most vivid first memory.
A smile like spring flowers blooming on Ren’s face, which had awkwardly hidden his expression that seemed somehow uncomfortable and scrunched up. Temarr thought he wanted to protect that smile. To do that, he truly had to become a Hero.
Hero hyung. Now Temarr had to protect that. Though he’d forgotten over time what he had to protect it for, he never forgot his vow to protect the ‘Hero hyung’ that Ren wished for.
Child soldier Temarr approached the battlefield with a determination different from others. When other child soldiers who came just to fill the numbers ran away and hid behind adults, he ran stepping on torn corpses and tried to kill even one more. To prove his worth and become a true Hero.
The first year he miraculously survived without dying.
What Temarr first witnessed upon returning was the sight of Ren boasting about him.
It was unmistakably Ren with his puffed-up back of the head and cheeks. He quietly approached from behind to surprise him, when in front of him stood boys with crumpled faces and clenched fists. Ren’s words to the boys pierced him like a dagger somehow.
‘My hyung is a Hero!! Who are you to, you idiot! I’m a Hero’s little brother! He-ro!! You idiots don’t even know what a Hero is?! Someone amazing and incredibly cool, and on a completely different level from your parents—that’s a Hero―!! Someone who catches fire-breathing dragons, saves princesses, and earns lots of money, that’s a Hero!’
He was happy yet bitter.
He had to prove his worth even on the battlefield.
He had to prove his worth as a Hero even to his younger brother.
Because Ren was the younger brother of a Hero. Because he wanted to be the younger brother of a Hero. Because that could be Ren’s only source of pride without parents.
Temarr vowed he would gladly do so. He would gladly become Ren’s source of pride. In place of their parents, he would gladly protect his younger brother’s self-esteem.
To do that, he had to earn a lot of money too.
Just being a soldier wouldn’t do. He had to command the battlefield.
Temarr absolutely had to become a ‘Hero.’
He couldn’t bring himself to acknowledge Ren. Though his heart had become as hard as steel with determination, he felt like he’d lost something. The hometown he returned to after wandering the battlefield for a year, returning to his younger brother’s side… seemed filled with pressure. But Temarr had neither the confidence to explain it nor the confidence to unravel it with his thoughts. For that, Ren was too young and Temarr was also—just a boy.
A boy. Just a boy.
Because he was young and immature, Temarr didn’t know either.
That Ren also had to prove his worth in this small village.
That to protect himself from his peers, he had to exaggerate and inflate everything.
That the only thing Ren could extend like a thorn to protect himself from the children who pointed fingers at Temarr for abandoning young Ren and running away was ‘Temarr.’
That his hearing, weakened by the screams of the battlefield, failed to catch that Ren’s voice was full of tears—perhaps that was the beginning of the brothers’ discord.
Such things repeated frequently, and when those misunderstandings became an unchangeable certainty.
After the Great Battle of Del Burk.
The second and most desperately desired opportunity in Temarr’s life arrived.
Under the oracle’s call, Temarr was designated as the Seventh Star, and with it came explosive power and a savage blue aura that seemed to reconstruct and envelop his entire body like armor, tearing even his blood vessels.
He became the Seventh Hero.
Finally, a ‘Hero’ who could stand proudly before Ren.
