I quickly removed the venom from my eyes and made the most pitiful expression in the world. Then I recalled the days when I lived as Lee Jaeyeon. It was a dark time when I had to grovel for survival to the department head even while receiving a pre-tax salary of 2 million at a shitty company, but even so, I had learned one thing. That was quick-witted cunning.
“F-Father. I’m fine. I should have bathed more diligently……”
“……Bathing?”
“Hyung-nim was simply displeased by my lowly human smell. It’s all my fault.”
The point was to awkwardly smile as if pleading ‘I’m fine, so please don’t scold hyung-nim’ while shedding tears profusely. The twins, moved by my wholehearted acting, shouted.
“Father, that bastard was rude to hyung-nim first and is now acting……!”
“Shut your mouths!”
Lucius, veins bulging on his neck, barked sharply. The twin brothers, who immediately shut their mouths, hung their heads low. Wow, look at that. What was the Ash in the original work so afraid of that he groveled to Baron? The family’s highest-ranking father was on his side to begin with. Lucius, who had been sighing, asked again.
“Baron, I ask one last time. Was it truly you who did this to Ash?”
“Yes, he was using lowly vocabulary befitting his lowly origins, so I thought education was necessary.”
Thwack!
After hearing the answer, Lucius struck Baron’s head with his cane without hesitation. He hit so hard that before long, red blood dripped down Baron’s forehead.
“What’s lowly isn’t that child but your undignified behavior. I told you to be careful with your behavior since an important guest is coming today. You couldn’t hold back and threw a tantrum?”
“……”
“What are you all doing! Hurry and support Ash and take him away!”
When Lucius shouted thunderously, maids who appeared from somewhere rushed over in a swarm and helped me up. I acted like I was staggering in pain as I stood up with the maids’ support. Toward Baron, who was glaring at me with a fierce expression, I raised my middle finger while pretending to wipe away tears. I left the scene with the last sight being Baron, whose reason was consumed by anger, almost rolling his eyes back.
‘It feels refreshing, but…… I can’t help feeling drained.’
As soon as I roughly finished treatment and returned to my room, all the strength drained from my body. Come to think of it, I think I acquired a trait as a reward earlier. I sprawled out like wilted cabbage and muttered.
“Acting wickedly is harder work than I thought.”
It was a point where Lucius felt newly impressive. How was he able to commit such original evil deeds anew in every chapter? Timid commoners like me feel this drained just from showing a bit of malice.
‘First, let me organize the original work a bit.’
After calming my pounding heart, I got up to organize the information I knew. The most powerful character in this novel was undoubtedly Kiss.
Kiss’s white tiger special ability was the power to regenerate or restore anything. It was possible for not only humans but anything with life force.
It was certainly a good ability, but this ability had one weakness. That was that this ability didn’t work on humans Kiss truly loved. In the past, when his birth mother was dying, Kiss couldn’t treat his mother due to this weakness. This memory became a strong trauma, and from some point on, Kiss developed the obsession that ‘I must not love anyone.’
‘In the original work, he also said his special ability was not a blessing but a curse.’
It was a truly bitter yet cruel ability. To be unable to treat the person you most want to treat—Kiss’s development of a cold personality was undoubtedly closely related to that ability.
‘Kiss is certainly strong, but if we’re being precise, he’s closer to a healer. He’s not the explosive attacker type.’
Ash’s illness couldn’t be cured by ordinary methods. It was an unidentified incurable disease that even skilled doctors clicked their tongues at. There was one way to cure Ash’s incurable disease. Summon the Primordial Evil and beg for life. That’s why what I needed now was someone as strong as Kiss.
To summon the Primordial Evil, the six seals possessed by the Primordial Evil’s guardians were needed. The problem was that these guardians were quite powerful beings, so it was nearly impossible for Ash, who had no special abilities or powers, to defeat them. I muttered in a gloomy voice.
“If there’s an existence as strong as Kiss in this worldview, it would be…… Deus, after all.”
Deus Zebron was the final boss-level character that Kiss attempted to subjugate over dozens of chapters in the original work. He was also an unfortunate crown prince confined to this detached palace due to severe madness that started from childhood. His black tiger special ability was powerful corrosion, contamination, and collapse. The exact opposite of Kiss’s ability to revive things, it was an attack-type ability that destroyed things.
Deus was not only as strong as Kiss, but also the crown prince with the highest succession rank in the empire currently. If I could cure Deus’s madness and make him emperor, I thought it might also become possible to prevent Kiss’s coup d’état.
For me right now, recruiting Deus as an ally wasn’t a matter of choice. I had to somehow make Deus, who was as strong as Kiss, into my ally. But there was one serious problem.
How on earth was I supposed to persuade that psychopath?
* * *
Kilius and Deus were called by the affectionate nicknames ‘Kiss’ and ‘Death’ among fans, respectively. Kiss and Death. These two, whose names stood at perfect opposing poles, were half-brothers with different mothers.
The current Elion Empire’s imperial family was occupied by the Zebron family, a white tiger family. The Zebron family had one peculiar rumor. It was a legend related to black tigers.
「The moment a black tiger is born, the Elion Empire will fall.」
Of course, it wasn’t because of that legend that Deus was confined to the detached palace. The reason Deus was confined was due to severe madness. Unlike other beastmen who usually took on human form around age four, Deus maintained the form of a black tiger until he turned five. Extreme anger, impulsive killing, lack of empathy—he was no different from a disaster possessing all the virtues a tyrant should have.
Not only did he bite servants to death, he even ate them. After several years of even the imperial family being unable to handle him anymore and giving up, Deus was ultimately confined despite being first in the succession order, due to his ominous appearance and uncorrectable violent nature. Even the empress, who desperately wanted to make her son emperor, drove the point home that ‘such a monster cannot become crown prince.’
Due to prolonged isolation, Death’s madness became even worse. As a result, Deus couldn’t even learn humanization, which all beastmen learn, and remained confined to the detached palace always in the state of a black tiger.
‘Even so, Kiss was quite jealous of Deus. He was an existence with the legitimacy Kiss didn’t have. That’s why when he staged a coup, he wanted to eliminate Deus first.’
If my memory is correct, it was probably around this time that FluffyChron started receiving criticism for its broken balance.
Readers felt doubt that the protagonist who had proven his strength throughout the work spent dozens of chapters fighting some crazy tiger who had just been locked in a detached palace the whole time. They faced controversy like ‘Wasn’t the character Deus Zebron himself too overpowered to begin with?’
The result of the flood of malicious comments was the series going on hiatus.
One thing was certain. That was that the current Death was stronger than Kiss. Being stronger than Kiss meant he could collect summoning seals more easily. And that he could meet the Primordial Evil that grants wishes more quickly. I was convinced that even if I searched the whole neighborhood for a hundred days in the current situation, no character stronger than Death would exist.
“The problem is how to make a rabid crazy tiger into an ally.”
Just as I was sighing with a devastated heart, I heard murmuring voices from outside the window. When I checked outside the window, several carriages were lined up. I recalled what Lucius had said a few hours ago.
<I told you to be careful with your behavior since an important guest is coming today. You couldn’t hold back and threw a tantrum?>
Come to think of it, he said an important guest was coming today. Although there was no way Ash, being an adopted child, would entertain a precious guest, I thought I’d at least check who it was.
‘What kind of impressive person came that there are so many escort knights?’
Warm sunlight poured down on the handsome face of the man who got off the carriage. It was a face so beautiful that even his slight frown at the beating sunlight was worthy of admiration. The man, who was being warmly received with a subtle smile, hesitated and turned his head toward me. The moment our eyes met, my heart dropped with a thud.
It was the protagonist of the original work, Kiss.
TL/N:
Keep in mind so you won’t be confused. Deus Zebron nickname is Death and Kilius Zebron nickname is Kiss they are not real brothers they are half brothers
