novelraw Chapter 478: A grandfather and a grandson, and life’s greatest lesson [1]
Chapter 478: A grandfather and a grandson, and life’s greatest lesson [1]
Chapter 478 – A grandfather and a grandson, and life’s greatest lesson [1]
"You indeed got your mother’s look."
The words hit Kaden like a physical blow, his body swaying under the weight of his own weakness and everything in front of him.
His newly obtained cane failed him. He toppled, knees cracking against the wooden floor, sending a jolt of pain through his whole system.
He groaned instinctively. But his eyes didn’t leave the old man. As if in a trance. Or something far deeper than that.
"Well, my boy, are you that surprised?" The old man laughed, the sound like a flowing river. Only then did Kaden realise he had been silent the whole time, unable to say a single word.
The old man turned his head toward Historian, nodding with apparent gratitude. "Thank you for your efforts, Karim." He said. "Same to Yasmine. She must be old now, looking at your current state. Tell me, how much time has passed outside?"
"Too many, master." Historian — Karim — replied with a curt but respectful tone. He cocked his head, eyes drifting past a small pond of yellow water and a cluster of untouched wood, before settling back on the old man.
"Too much time. Or perhaps not a single second, and the state of our bodies is simply the result of the Curse of Sorrow." He smiled crookedly. "You know that, don’t you, master. You know how time works here."
"Aye." The old man breathed, eyes still fixed on the dazed Kaden. "Vainglory was serious that day." He lowered his head, looking at his wrinkled, shaking hands. "Too serious, even."
A solemn silence settled between them.
Kaden still hadn’t recovered his voice, listening to a conversation that made no sense inside his head. He was genuinely relieved when it paused, giving him a moment to try and reorganise himself.
It didn’t last. Karim spoke again, this time with a forced optimism so obvious it sounded painful.
"Yasmine is doing fine." He said, flashing his yellow teeth. "She is the Shaman now."
The old man let out a forced laugh. "I told her not to take that path. She should have found happiness with a husband and children."
"She was afraid." Karim grimaced. "Afraid of losing them to the Curse of Sorrow, like so many tribesmen before. So she chose the safest option."
"To abandon love and live in fear and solitude."
Karim shrugged. "There are worse fates." He said, glancing at Kaden on the ground and holding the look a moment longer before turning on his heel and walking back toward his house.
"The appearance," Historian’s voice drifted back as he went, "is the only thing he has in common with you, master. Perhaps a fragment of your wisdom too. But he is much more like Vainglory."
"Are you afraid, Karim?" The old man asked with a grin, rising slowly, his bones creaking and snapping like worn gears, making him wince.
"Afraid?" Karim echoed. "Yes, master. And you should be too. Cornered monsters are the worst kind. And I’ve had my fill with one already."
His footsteps faded, and then his presence dissolved completely into the darkness.
Now alone, Kaden looked at the old man standing a few paces from him, leaning on a black staff riddled with cracks that seemed to pulse faintly with crimson light.
Kaden frowned at the staff. A familiar feeling stirred within him, then slipped away as the old man spoke.
"Why are you still on the ground?" He grinned a very familiar grin. "Please don’t tell me you are as stupid as Dain. Or even as silent as Daela?" He sighed in mock pity, the look of a grandfather pained by troublesome grandchildren. "Which type are you, Kaden?"
"You... you are..." Kaden stammered, reaching for the right words. They wouldn’t come.
But the old man smiled, warmth in his face, the kind with permanence in it.
"Aye, I am." He said, stretching his hand toward Kaden. "I was not there when you were born. Nor as you grew. But I would recognise my bloodline anywhere, especially the likeness of your mother in you."
Kaden’s breath caught in his throat.
"And I have been watching you, Kaden."
"Watching... me?" Kaden echoed, reaching out and taking the old man’s hand.
He shivered instantly, barely stifling a cry of shock. His eyes went wide.
Cold. So cold it was soul-wrenching. It felt like the cold bypassed his skin entirely and gripped his soul directly, squeezing it like a fist.
A coldness Kaden would recognise anywhere. The deep, freezing coldness of death.
But more than that, it was a sensation he had felt before. In the dark alley of Waverith, where an old beggar sat surrounded by filth, cracking yellow teeth always grinning at him.
A ripple crossed Kaden’s face. His lips twisted into painful realization.
’He has been watching me... all this time?’
The old man noticed, smiled brighter, and pulled at Kaden with barely any strength — more gesture than effort — helping him rise without quite managing it himself.
"Yes." He said. "It was me. Raven Warborn. The only one."
"How?" Kaden’s voice was rough. He stood face to face with him now, seeing in the old man the ghost of a warrior, someone built like his father, once.
Now reduced to a small, wrinkled, withered thing that could barely stand without shaking. Back hunched. Shoulders twisted inward like a child hiding from something imagined under the bed.
So small. So frail. Hovering at the edge of death, if not already past it in some way.
But what struck Kaden, looking at his grandfather, was the happiness spilling out of him, threatening to drown him whole.
"Ah, how I managed, you ask?" He said, delighted. "Where do you think your father gets his Space power, hehehe?"
He giggled, then closed the distance and wrapped his right arm around Kaden’s.
"I simply created a fraction of my reflection and transferred it into another space."
"My father can’t do this."
"Your father is a useless bastard."
Kaden’s lips twitched, fighting not to shiver from the death-touch of his grandfather as the old man led him deeper into the wooden house.
After a moment of silence, he opened his mouth just as they passed through a door into a living room.
"Why are—!"
"Are you interested, Kaden?" Raven cut in, stopping on the spot and pivoting to face him. Kaden’s face went puzzled.
Raven raised five trembling, wrinkled fingers. "Forgive my bluntness. But we Warborns are not built for subtlety and poetry. And I’m afraid I don’t have the time to find a gentler way."
At that, Kaden already knew what was coming. And he was right.
"I will be direct, my boy." He smiled. "I will not live past five days."
"What—!"
"And as I said," he cut him off again, lowering his hand slightly with visible exhaustion, "I missed your birth, your childhood, and every important moment that shaped you into the man standing in front of me." He smiled sadly, coughed a few times, then pressed on. "But allow me this."
He raised the five fingers again, with obvious difficulty.
"Five days, Kaden. You and I. Alone in this house." His eyes watered. "A talk between a grandfather and his grandson. That will be our first moment together."
’And our last.’
Raven thought, but chose not to say it. There was no need. He could see from Kaden’s eyes that the young man understood perfectly.
He was crying. Looking like Raven had just extinguished the last hope left in him.
But Raven only shook his head and smiled with a life that barely existed inside him anymore.
"Our first talk will be," he said, turning slowly toward a reclined chair, "about the burden of choice. Come, my boy. Come and sit."
"I have been waiting for you. So let me know you. And let me guide you as best I can before the curse eats the last piece of my soul."
—End of Chapter 478—