novelraw Chapter 144 : Chapter 144
Chapter 144 : Chapter 144
144
The carriage was unremarkable.
No—compared to the carriages gathered nearby, it was downright modest.
A single black horse, as though shaped from darkness itself, bore the entire burden of the carriage.
In the driver’s seat, a young man lounged carelessly, leaning back at his ease.
He looked to be in his twenties, his face full of mischief. At first glance, he appeared free-spirited, but every small movement of his body was packed with intent.
‘A Runner.’
He was an Aura user I did not know.
He did not seem to be a regressor, so it was likely he had awakened Aura on his own—through my book, through the teachings of others, or by grasping a few key points for himself.
‘And a man like that is a coachman.’
He glanced at me briefly, then, as if losing interest, clasped both hands behind his head and sprawled out on the driver’s bench.
The butler moved to the side of the bench, as though his role ended here.
The butler who had guided me was also a master at roughly the level of a Sword Walker.
He appeared to be in his late twenties, similar in age to the coachman, but his eyes were sharp, and his body beneath the tailcoat was solid and well-trained.
He stepped beside the bench and nudged the lounging man with his thigh, then sat down.
His posture was ramrod straight, like a soldier’s.
‘As expected of Crownhardt.’
The Empire’s borders and front lines were effectively Crownhardt’s territory.
Those two alone exemplified the duchy’s reputation.
I opened the carriage door.
“Welcome.”
I was mistaken.
Trying to judge Crownhardt based on just two soldiers had been foolish.
Inside the carriage, the Duke of Crownhardt himself was seated.
‘Huge.’
The Duke of Crownhardt possessed a physique so massive it could fairly be called overwhelming—greater than anyone I had ever met.
Even seated, his height looked as though it might reach my own when standing.
Two meters fifty? No—closer to two eighty?
The carriage’s simplicity was not without reason.
Building a carriage sturdy enough, in one solid piece, to hold this colossal man would have required the full concentration of every craft involved.
It was more surprising that a single black horse could pull it at all.
“It has already been ten years since you said you would accept a commission. You made me wait a full decade. I am Crownhardt.”
His black hair was grown long and tied tightly behind his head, but the ends had faded to white, likely from the blood and fatigue of the front lines.
Wrinkles lined his eyes, and beneath his jaw ran a deep vertical scar where new flesh had formed.
Yet all traces of age were meaningless in the face of the violent, overwhelming power he radiated.
The hand he extended for a handshake was as large as my face.
“Pleased to meet you. I am Cassian.”
“Cassian Defnos.”
“I have abandoned the Defnos surname. I am an illegitimate child. I have no interest in devoting myself to a life that will never be acknowledged.”
“And yet you sent a résumé bearing the Defnos name to our house.”
“I thought it might pique Your Grace’s interest. A youthful indiscretion.”
“It succeeded.”
“In hindsight, I should have let it fail. I did not expect you to remember and seek me out after ten years—especially when the imperial court surely told you not to.”
I watched the Duke of Crownhardt’s expression.
From the moment we met, he had not smiled even once, staring at me intently.
It was the same look I had seen earlier at the funeral.
Greed.
The gaze of a man who had once been thwarted in his desires, and still dared to dream.
“They cannot bring our war to an end.”
“By war, do you mean the war against the external barbarians?”
“People.”
His heavy voice cut me off.
“A war against people.”
It was not something one would expect from an imperial general who prioritized invasion and conquest.
He did not view his enemies as savages, but understood them as equal actors.
And he sought to stop the fighting.
Only then did I finally understand why, ten years ago, I had been commissioned by the House of Crownhardt.
“It is a shameful past, but during my academy years, I was someone who openly criticized the Empire. I wanted to overturn that hollow, ceremonial Empire from its very foundations.”
“I saw.”
Graduates of the Imperial Royal Academy compiled the assignments they had submitted during their studies into portfolios and sent them to noble houses when seeking commissions.
In truth, those assignments were far more painfully embarrassing than even my basic swordsmanship manual.
If even one of my students were to learn about my writings, attitudes, and actions from that time…
I would rather die.
Suppressing the heat rising to my face, I extracted the common thread from those assignments.
“You wish to end the war? Even if it means overthrowing the Empire?”
“Countless people die on the front lines even now. And they do not even know why they are dying. Is that not hollow?”
“They fight to protect the Empire.”
“Do you know this? On the fiercest sections of the border, most of the soldiers are slaves.”
Because their chances of survival were low.
“Or orphans, debtors who fled, murderers, criminals rejected even by the mercenary trade.”
So that no one would mourn their deaths.
So that their lives could be spent freely in tactics and strategy, without hesitation.
“No matter how hard they fight, the land, money, slaves, and wealth gained all go to the nobles who hold the rights to territorial wars.”
The duke lifted his head.
His eyes openly mocked strategy, military doctrine, and the ideology of imperialism itself.
He did not look like a general defending the Empire’s borders.
He looked like a man intent on overthrowing the Empire.
A revolutionary.
That burning gaze asked me whether I agreed with his ideals.
And that was why I pitied him.
“Have you heard any rumors about me?”
In the near future, the Empire he loathed would lose its power.
It would remain a focal point binding all of humanity, but its form would differ from the reality the Empire so desperately desired.
And it would differ from what the Duke of Crownhardt envisioned as well.
“I hear you mastered something called Sword Aura. As it happens, we have men in our camps who have learned it. I even reviewed the manual myself. It was swordsmanship worthy of your ideals.”
From that single exchange, I understood.
This man knew nothing about regressors.
Given his personality, had he known, he would have brought it up first.
‘Perhaps this is Crownhardt’s limitation.’
A house that guarded the Empire’s borders and possessed countless warriors who reached the level of Sword Runners with only a few books.
Yet a house pushed to the front lines, deprived of proper information, and sidelined.
That was Crownhardt.
And that was why, in my youth, I had thought I could make use of them.
“Your Grace, then allow me to ask another question. Do you know anything about demons?”
And that thought had not changed even now.
***
“You are quite late.”
Abrahal was waiting for me outside.
Beside him stood Rozalin, Hati, and also the Spear God and Pan.
They all looked fully prepared to depart, just as I had instructed.
“Was it a long discussion?”
“It was about the Empire’s situation and the future of the world.”
“Then it could hardly be brief.”
Abrahal laughed as though he understood.
“Well, then. Let us leave.”
“Eh? Right now?”
“Yes. This meeting itself was part of a trap. We need to go immediately.”
“……A trap?”
At my words, the air grew taut in an instant.
That is right—a trap.
One nearly perfect, yet made hasty by an unexpected variable.
“While speaking with the Duke of Crownhardt, I realized something. This trap is aimed at you as well, Lord Abrahal.”
“At me too?”
Abrahal, who had been listening from a slight distance, raised an eyebrow.
“Yes. From this moment on, you and the Spear God should hide yourselves as quickly as possible. You need to leave the Empire. Liquidate any assets you can immediately.”
“Avril.”
Abrahal pieced together several clues and produced the answer at once.
“Yes.”
“Damn it. Thank you. Understood. I will see you soon in Akarind!”
Grinding his teeth, Abrahal departed, with the Spear God lumbering after him.
They headed toward a spot some distance from his carriage.
Given that it was Abrahal and the Spear God, I was not overly worried.
“Let us go.”
I boarded the carriage with the students, and Hati immediately set it in motion.
“Teacher. What did Avril do?”
What did he do, indeed.
I could not say exactly where Avril’s scheme had begun.
But one thing was certain.
“Professor Hollians was likely murdered.”
“Murdered? Seriously?”
“Rozalin. Do you remember when my teacher died in your previous life?”
At my question, Rozalin tilted her head with a small sound of confusion.
“I am not sure. I do not remember.”
I had expected that.
During this Academic Exchange Conference, she had never once brought up anything unusual while I met with my teacher.
‘That is the strange part.’
While discussing the future with the Duke of Crownhardt, it had struck me.
Why had Rozalin not told me something so important?
It was because she did not know.
Was it because, at the time, she had been wandering deserts and forests, indifferent to imperial affairs?
‘No. She scoured the Empire precisely because this period alone made it possible.’
She rose to the position of Grand General and knew the Empire’s secrets inside and out.
There was no way she would not know about the death of a man like Professor Hollians, one of the Empire’s foremost intellects.
‘He did not die at this time. It was not a grand death worthy of a state funeral, but an ordinary death like anyone else’s. Or perhaps he died when too many people were dying at once for it to be properly recorded.’
And yet, my teacher had died.
With a lavish state funeral, a death known across the world.
Something had changed to create this outcome.
‘Was it me?’
Had leaving something like a final testament to me robbed him of his will to live?
No—that was narcissistic nonsense.
If a life ended that easily, he would have died of heartbreak immediately after my own death.
And such an absurd death would have been remembered by Rozalin.
Then there was only one other possibility.
Someone had killed him.
“Avril would do something that insane?”
“Strictly speaking, it was not Avril himself.”
It was someone Avril had brought here.
Someone who would commit any madness for the sake of their students—
And for the sake of Akarind Academy.
“We spread Akarind Academy’s greatness far and wide through the Academic Exchange Conference. By now, Akarind Academy has likely risen to a level comparable to the Imperial Royal Academy.”
But only comparable.
If the balance were not decisively overturned, things would eventually revert.
So it needed to be cemented here.
“If you kill Professor Hollians, the core of the Imperial Royal Academy—”
“Insane……”
Rozalin and Pan stared at me as though it were impossible.
“Why? Why would he do that?”
“While you were gone, Blue Moon came to see me.”
I had thought it was a simple summons.
But what if it had been related to my teacher’s death?
“Within Goldline, there is Avril and there is Abrahal.”
Outside of Goldline, however, everyone was simply Goldline.
So if Avril had brought the chairman here and caused an incident, would the blame fall solely on him?
No—would they not hold Abrahal, the head of the guild, responsible?
“They were targeting Abrahal and my siblings.”
The moment Avril arrived in the Empire, he likely withdrew all his forces.
Perhaps even the Aura clashes within the Empire had been nothing but misdirection.
“Terrifying… but fascinating reasoning. Were you always like this, Teacher?”
Serris, who had been watching quietly, smiled brightly as she asked.
She sounded as though she found the situation amusing.
“I am merely presenting a hypothesis.”
And so—
“We will hear the answer from the people waiting outside.”
The carriage came to an abrupt halt.
When I looked out the window, a familiar face stood there.
It was Raipen, the mercenary Avril had once assigned to me for Aura training.