# Chapter 32
“Hngh!”
A small groan escaped from the man’s mouth. Hearing the sound, Ion momentarily froze.
It was a sound he’d heard somewhere before, and his mind was frantically trying to match it with the appropriate face.
In that moment of distraction, while the face still wouldn’t come to mind.
The opponent, who had no intention of staying still despite his broken wrist, seized the brief opportunity and quickly pulled his knee up to his chest. Then he kicked Ion’s chest hard.
“Ugh!”
Attacked unexpectedly, Ion stopped thinking and reached out to grab the man’s neck.
But the man’s hand moved faster than his, covering Ion’s eyes. His unusually dark right hand covered Ion’s eyes as if to shield them, and then a soft red light flowed from his palm.
However, the red light from the black palm quickly disappeared.
“…?!”
The man’s eyes widened with confusion. He was so startled that he couldn’t even remove his hand from Ion’s eyes.
Ion grabbed the man’s wrist firmly. The man, probably thinking Ion would break his wrist again, struggled desperately to pull his hand away.
But for some reason, Ion remained calm. He didn’t break another of the man’s wrists, nor did he grip tightly enough to cause pain. Unlike before, even the atmosphere had softened.
“Could it be…”
The hand covering Ion’s eyes was slowly lowered by him. Ion’s golden eyes, revealed in the moonlight, were trembling with as much confusion as the man’s.
Ion held the man’s right hand up to the moonlight.
Pitch-black skin. Sharp black nails. And a red pattern engraved on his palm.
Just from that, overwhelming emotions flooded in, making his mind hazy.
“Levi…”
The name he could never forget flowed from between Ion’s lips.
Feeling his eyes turn red with heat, Ion spoke again to the man before him.
“Levi? …Is it really you?”
The man’s pupils visibly widened. His black eyes, trembling with confusion not unlike Ion’s own, showed that he was struggling to understand the situation.
That was enough.
Ion stretched out both arms and embraced the man.
“Levi… Levi… Levi…!”
Chanting the name like a spell, Ion desperately felt the man who had completely fallen into his arms.
There was a familiar scent.
The scent he had felt when he was embraced by Levi and fell asleep in the Black Forest was now emanating from this man.
The man who was being held by Ion blinked in confusion before pushing him away forcefully. Perhaps because Ion had been so careful not to use too much strength, he was pushed back by the man’s strong force.
The man quickly got off the bed and headed for the window. He intended to open the window and jump outside. Suddenly, a hand reached out fiercely from behind and slammed the window shut. Then the other arm wrapped around his waist from behind, pulling him into an embrace.
“No. I can’t let you go.”
Ion’s low voice sounded slightly choked. He buried his face in the man’s shoulder.
“Levi… It is you, right? Isn’t it?”
Ion’s trembling voice flowed into the man’s ear. Confused by the situation, the man attacked Ion behind him with his still-functional right elbow. Having let his guard down, Ion took the hit directly to his ribs. Not missing the moment when Ion’s arms weakened, the man threw himself out the window.
“Levi!”
Ion’s bedroom was on the third floor. The man grabbed a nearby tree as he jumped out the window, then dropped from there, landing lightly. Relieved to see that the man wasn’t hurt, Ion soon jumped out the window himself.
Levi, hidden in the estate’s garden, shrank his shoulders at the voice coming from far away.
“Levi!”
He didn’t know how this person knew his name, but they were strange.
Levi looked down at his right hand. His glove that blocked his ability was off, and the pattern that could absorb “food” was intact, yet for some reason his ability wasn’t manifesting.
It was the first time his ability hadn’t worked on an assassination target, so he was thoroughly confused. He wasn’t sure if the problem was with that man or with himself.
Hidden among rose-filled flowerbeds, he heard the footsteps of several people nearby.
Security had been tightened because he had failed to silently eliminate the man he was supposed to kill.
“Levi, please!”
Moreover, that strong and nimble man was searching for him frighteningly intensely.
‘Frightened…?’
The sudden thought puzzled him.
Besides Kalvern, this was the first time he had felt fear. But even though it was the same emotion, it felt different somehow. Being still inexperienced with emotions, Levi couldn’t pinpoint the difference.
Levi curled up deeper between the flowerbeds, hugging his arms. Then he silently groaned from the pain in his left hand.
The opponent had broken his wrist so easily. Was that why he felt fear?
‘A frightening person. A dangerous person…’
Was that why Kalvern had sent him to kill the man?
“You can eat.”
Food permitted after a long time.
So he had tried to take his life with this hand and consume his vitality.
“You’re the only one I can trust and ask. So make sure to kill him and come back.”
Remembering Kalvern’s instructions, Levi raised his knees and buried his face in them.
BANG!
“Hest!”
Having chosen the fastest horse to rush to Hest’s territory, Ion grabbed his shoulders and shook him roughly without preamble.
“Levi, I saw Levi!”
“What?! Wait…! Let go and talk!”
Feeling dizzy from being shaken so much, Hest tried to remove the excited Ion, then belatedly raised his voice as well.
“You saw Levi?! No, you said you saw him?!”
Almost accidentally addressing Ion informally as he used to do, Hest hastily pulled him toward the reception room, away from the watching servants. As soon as the reception room door closed, Ion excitedly recounted the events of the previous night.
Having heard the story, Hest gave a hollow laugh and slumped onto the sofa.
“So he’s awakened…”
It had taken a full 15 years.
With the Black Forest becoming the territory of an enemy nation and troops stationed to guard it, it had been impossible to assess the situation inside. The only entrance was blocked by thorny trees, so to examine the inside, they would have had to neutralize the troops and enter.
But unauthorized entry into another country’s territory, not to mention pointing weapons at their forces, could lead to serious diplomatic issues. If the other party were a small country, they might have pushed their way through somehow, but the Black Forest had been swallowed whole by the Caron Empire, which possessed national power and military strength comparable to the Delos Empire. It couldn’t be recklessly tampered with.
Sitting across from Hest, Ion displayed both pleasant excitement and anxiety.
“As expected, he definitely seemed to have no memories.”
“That would be the case. He had no memories when he woke up after 7 years, so after 15 years, he might not even remember his name.”
“Ah…”
Ion sighed with a hint of lamentation as he ran his bare hand over his face.
“I think there was some reaction when I called his name…”
“That’s not what’s important right now.”
What could be more important than finding Levi?
Ion looked at Hest with exactly that expression. In response, Hest’s characteristic distorted expression of looking down on others emerged.
“What’s most important is that Levi came to assassinate you.”
“That’s true. I was almost assassinated by Levi.”
“Such a stupidly carefree bastard.”
Perhaps because he had been the target of numerous assassination attempts, as many as the Emperor, he didn’t seem to take it seriously at all. How could he be so sharp and quick-witted about other matters, yet so dull about this?
‘Not that I don’t understand…’
He was someone who had been filled with thoughts of Levi for 15 years.
All the brutal training to become stronger, involving himself in the fearless plan to usurp the throne to help the current Emperor, coveting a position and wealth that no one could ignore—all of it led to the answer “to protect Levi.”
Fifteen years was not a short time at all.
During that long period, he had only longed for and looked toward Levi, so it was natural for him to lose his senses when unexpectedly meeting the person himself.
Though he had grown in size, Hest, who thought Ion still had many childlike aspects, reviewed the previous day’s story once more in his mind.
Hest spoke with certainty:
“It seems Levi has a master.”
As soon as the words left his mouth, a chill came over him that made him shudder. Ion’s face, which had been bright until just now, was frighteningly cold.
“A master…you say?”
