Chapter 261

Whoosh—

The Ice Flower Ilusion erased Forest, and now Sillad began to paint very old memories before Suho's eyes. It was a newborn baby.

[That's me.] It was Sillad in his very young age, sleeping soundly in the arms of an adult elf.

[And that's my mother.] Behind them, the towering Elvenwood was ominously wriggling its branches. Sillad gazed at the hideous monster disguised as a peaceful tree and muttered softly. Since when…?

[…Even before I was born, we elves were already being raised by the Elvenwood.]

This memory was a very painful one that Sillad still carried, even in death. Spring, summer, autumn, winter. The four seasons that the elves experienced weren't a single year. Sometimes they were short, sometimes they lasted for decades. But there was always an end. Even peace that seemed to last forever eventually met winter. One day, a blizzard raged through the barren forest where the fertile land had dried up and even the leaves had fallen,

[As always, the 'Year of Harvest' came suddenly.]

Kyaaa—!

R-run—!

[Winter is always sudden.]

The Year of Harvest. The day when Elvenwood began to harvest the elves it had raised.

[…I was still young.]

Suho, watching the illusion, saw Sillad's expression. He was facing the memories with pained eyes.

Whoosh—!

He could still see it vividly, even with his eyes closed: the blizzard, his mother desperately running across the frozen snowfield. He was just a baby, held tightly in her arms. Sillad looked at his younger self, staring blankly at his mother's urgent face from the warmth of her embrace. And…

Stab—

Ugh…!

…Even as those hideous thorny roots pierced her back, his mother's trembling hands desperately handed him over to another elf.

"You… at least you…" …Her last words as she was dragged back to Elvenwood by the Corrupted Ghosts. Her sorrowful eyes, smiling faintly as she looked at her child, who was getting further away in the arms of another elf. Still muttering towards him, her vision fading.

"Live…"

[…At least you, live.] All of that was still vivid in Sillad's memories. Even now, in this moment of eternal rest in death.

[That is the last image I have of my mother.]

Whoosh—

Time passed quickly in the illusion. Sillad. The baby who lost his parents and barely survived, entrusted to the arms of other survivors, was there. The young elf, who witnessed all that tragedy with his own eyes, settled peacefully in a new village with other adults, carrying all that despair in his memories. A new home. Within the fence of a newly sprouted Elvenwood. Sillad gradually grew into a boy. And then a young man. He made friends. Forest among them. Sillad learned spirit magic and hunting with his companions and competed with them for the position of the village guardian. 

Looking back, it was peaceful. The bright weather. The fresh scent of grass. Every second was peaceful. But even in all those moments, Sillad's friends never once saw him smile. It was as if he didn't know how to. It was only natural. His mother only told him to live, but she left without telling him how to...

[Did you know?] Sillad muttered beside Suho.

[Sometimes, a bloody battlefield is better than a miserable peace.] Sillad was staring at the illusion he created with fierce eyes.

Kraaa—!

Winter had come. Peace was over and the elves were dying once again. The survivors fled in a hurry.

"Why?!" Forest was crying out among them.

"Why must we suffer like this every time?!"

[Forest was the same as me.] He was also a survivor from the previous village, like Sillad. An elf who experienced the repeating tragedy of winter.

[We were always frustrated. Why did we elves always have to repeat this? Why couldn't we escape this vicious cycle of fate?] Sillad's eyes blazed with quiet anger as he watched Forest crying out in the blizzard.

[So I stayed.]

Sillad made a different choice. In the middle of the village where everyone was scattering and running away, In that cold and freezing blizzard, Only Sillad remained, holding his weapon.

[I was frustrated. So I made up my mind. To not repeat this anymore.] Countless thorny roots attacked Sillad, who was looking up at Elvenwood with a venomous expression.

Piercing through the icy ground.

Piercing through the blizzard.

[If my end is already decided, at least I'll choose where I die.]

Whoosh! Slash!

Corrupted Ghosts also attacked. Demons wearing the faces of those who were once family in the same village. Hungry spirits who hadn't yet found a vessel. Against all those enemies. No… against everything in the world.

[…I did not run away.]

Whoosh—!

Graaaaaaaaaaa—!

In that thick blizzard, Sillad fought and fought without rest. In the place where everyone ran away, only Sillad remained and fought alone.

[I fought day and night. I forgot hunger. The flow of time didn't matter in the blizzard. And as I fought like that…]

Suddenly

[No one attacked me anymore.]

All the enemies were gone. The cold and freezing winter. In that blizzard, only Sillad stood alone on the desolate snowfield. And Sillad couldn't help but chuckle as he belatedly discovered something. Suho, watching the illusion beside him, also saw it and opened his mouth.

'…Elvenwood froze to death.'

[Yes. Isn't it absurd?] Sillad chuckled and replied to Suho's words,

[That great Elvenwood froze to death. Much faster than me, who was just struggling to survive. Unable to withstand a mere cold. A mere cold…]

To think it was just that weak. Sillad's face was filled with a mixture of emptiness, mockery, and frustration. It also looked like he was holding back tears.

Sob…

Sillad, who barely survived, dragged his wounded body and approached the frozen Elvenwood. And he began to strike the frozen tree madly. There was no purpose. Just until his anger subsided.

Crash! Bang! Shatter—!

For days and nights. Continuously. He didn't stop until Elvenwood was shattered.

[But my anger still wouldn't subside. So I dug up the frozen ground and pulled out all the roots hidden beneath. And this time, I chewed and swallowed all of its roots.]

Munch Munch 

Munch Munch Munch Munch

Sillad's expression as he forcibly chewed and swallowed the remains of Elvenwood was already half-mad. How could he be sane? His entire body, exhausted from the long battle, was battered. The blood that came out of his wounds had frozen from the blizzard, and his skin was cracked. He looked even more miserable than the Corrupted Ghosts, and it wouldn't have been strange if he died soon. But Sillad was still alive. Even this bone-chilling cold was nothing to him anymore. Rather, he couldn't collapse; he had to live to mock Elvenwood, which couldn't even withstand this cold, to mock it for the rest of his life.

[So I decided to stay in that village. There was no reason to leave anymore.] And the thought that he would no longer have the right to mock Elvenwood if he left that land to escape the cold was also significant.

[So I just settled down. It was cold, but there were many advantages to living here.]

Advantages…? It was terribly cold. But elves were a race that adapted to their environment…

[That's how I became the first ice elf.]

The first ice elf.

The story of how Sillad, who survived the bitter cold, became the next Monarch happened a long time after that. Only after the Monarch of the elves at that time died in the war against the Rulers could Sillad finally become the next Monarch. But he was still young at that time. And… he hadn't properly taken revenge on Elvenwood. The only thing he accomplished was enduring until it froze to death. He made up his mind.

[One day, I will become the Monarch of the elves, find all the Elvenwoods, and uproot them. And I finally did it. As soon as I became the Monarch, I uprooted all the Elvenwoods I could find.]

Of course, there were elves who opposed him. But Sillad's decision, having already become the Monarch, was absolute, so all the elves gradually adapted to the land of bitter cold where Elvenwoods had disappeared and became ice elves. And the starting point was the first snowfield where Sillad survived. The first village was rebuilt on the land of bitter cold where Elvenwood died. But ironically, the elves who lost their tree were too weak. The spirits, having lost their center, no longer listened to their requests. But it didn't matter. They were no longer friends, so a hierarchy needed to be established.

– Submit to me, you lowly and cowardly spirits. – Sillad, who became the Monarch of Frost, began to hunt the spirits that scattered to avoid him after uprooting all the Elvenwoods.

[Spirits don't die. But it's enough to catch and freeze them.] Sillad poured all his resentment into a curse towards the spirits he captured one by one.

– Spirits. Freeze, be trapped in the bitter cold and suffer forever. – That curse was spirit magic containing all the resentment of Sillad, the first ice elf who survived the bitter cold.

– Just as you made my people, you too will live for eternity, neither alive nor dead. – And just as they had toyed with the corpses of dead elves turning them into Corrupted Ghosts, They too would be trapped in a frozen prison forever, becoming Sillad's slaves, neither alive nor dead.

Graaaaaaaaaaa—!

The ice giants born that way trembled before Sillad and pledged their allegiance. Their roars were the pathetic screams of the spirits trapped inside.

[Ice Golem]

Suho was looking at the name of that prison. And he remembered. A philosopher's quote he had seen somewhere.

'We are all fighting our own battles.'

When he first met the dead Sillad in this world of pure white… He recalled the illusion of the forgotten time shown to him. In that illusion, he… Was whispering in a cruel voice with a frozen blade piercing Sung Jinwoo's heart,

– Is this the end, human? Then you won't be able to see it. The moment our army arrives on this land. Then the corpses of you humans will form mountains, and your blood will form rivers. – That was the worst curse that Sillad, the King of the Snow Folk and the Monarch of Frost, could utter.

– But this land where you were born and raised will be different. I will personally freeze all the humans on this land and make them suffer eternally. – And at the same time, it was the 'real' hell that Sillad himself knew best, the hell he understood most deeply.

– They will live for eternity, neither alive nor dead.

The Corrupted Ghosts who lived for eternity, neither alive nor dead. The very lives of the elves, who had everything taken away after being raised by Elvenwood and the spirits.

– Hate me endlessly in death. – Recalling the hell they had experienced themselves, Sillad poured out the greatest curse he could muster towards the dying Shadow Monarch.

– That will also be my pleasure. – That was the only ritual that could console the smile of his mother, who died saving him, and the deaths of his fellow elves who perished unjustly by his side.

– Why?! Why must we suffer like this every time?! – The illusion had returned to the image of Forest desperately crying and running away. Sillad muttered with sad eyes as he watched that,

[Yes. I was also that frustrated. I wanted to make others experience the hell that we elves live in. That was all I could do for my friends who had already died. But now that I see it…] Sillad's eyes flashed as he saw Forest's next memory.

[…Forest, this guy seems to have found a different way.]

Sillad endured winter with his own strength. Forest, despite being a high elf, repeatedly fled from the endless winters. The fate of these two led to completely different endings. Sillad eventually became a Monarch, fought against the enemies, and died fighting on the battlefield. Even though that ending was a defeat, he was a warrior who achieved the feat of personally piercing the heart of the great Shadow Monarch with his own hands. But Forest was different…

– You creature born with a pitiful fate.

'…!'

Suddenly, someone appeared before Forest, crying out in the Ice Flower Ilusion.

'…!' Sillad and Suho's eyes flashed simultaneously.

Unknown beings with golden halos floating above their heads appeared before Forest. But unfortunately, their faces couldn't be seen clearly because of the dazzling light emitted by the aureole. This was Forest's memory. And he didn't even dare to raise his head, overwhelmed by the sacred light they emitted. But even then, he saw something.

– Shall we help you a little?

It was the cruel yet beautiful smile on their lips. And their hands, reaching out to him who was in despair. Those hands, without even waiting for an answer, mercilessly plucked out Forest's eyes.