Arc 3 - Chapter 28: Moving Forward (3/3)

He motioned to Dimen to help him to his feet and Dimen took Bart by the arms and lifted him to his feet. As the clouds disappeared in front of the sun, the sunlight that had leaked through the trees fell tragically on the old man.

"Tell me, what did you and Leoral talk about?"

Bart just smiled and refused to answer.

"That bastard Raul, is that unqualified whoreson really here?"

"Isn't it pointless trying to get words out of a dead man's mouth?"

"Hahaha... Hahahahahahaha!" He crouched down when he started laughing. His own words were being used against him. "You are a stupid person, just like other people."

Yu gritted his teeth to stop laughing and stood up, taking back the goblet Kigaro had handed him. He shook it a little and looked at the dark red wine inside, then handed it to Bart.

"Make your choice, wine or..."

His other hand went to the sword at his waist. He hoped he would drink the wine, not wanting to inflict more violence on an old man.

The old butler could not escape. In his old age there was no way he could survive the roarons. His death certain, Bart took the goblet and downed it in one go.

"What is this? It tastes disgusting..."

"My body fluid. Blended with wine and a simple poison."

Yu's answer disgusted him, but he couldn't say anything about it. His hand went to his throat as the glass fell to the floor. He was coughing.

The white of his eyes gave way to black as his pupils shrank. He spat blood as his lips parted. His blood was a burgundy color close to black. Blood of the same color flowed from his nostrils.

He fell to his knees, groaning in pain as black veins appeared near his eyes and covered his face, he brought his hands to his face and began to scratch over the veins.

It didn't take Bart long to realize that what he was doing was not scratching but tearing his face apart. He dug his fingernails into the black veins swelling on his face, bursting them, but he didn't stop. When his face was unrecognizable, he continued to scream and brought his fingers down to his neck and began to tear at the veins that had begun to grow there.

He kept vomiting blood from his mouth, but he was still not dead. When he tore the veins in his neck with his own fingernails, he fell, struggled a little, and only after drowning in his own blood did he lie dead on the ground.

"Terrible." That word was the only thing that crossed Yu's mind.

He had thought that when crows died without warning, humans would die the same way, but Bart had died so horribly that he was unrecognizable. Even Yu, who had given him the poison, had been horrified, frozen, watching him struggle.

The two roaron warriors with him were also seeing such a path of death for the first time. Their eyes were locked on the sight.

"Cut him up, cook him, then give him to the rinos. They can eat his whole body," Yu said. He still hadn't gotten over his horror, but the fear of his murder being discovered overcame him.

Rhinos were carnivores and had powerful jaws that could chew even bone. So they could eat their food with the bones and their stomachs and intestines could grind the bone. One thing Yu noticed about them was that when they ate bones, their feces came out white.

"This... This is..."

"What is this? What do you say, Dimen?"

"Cruel."

Kigaro said what Dimen couldn't. Even the roarons were horrified. The thick eyebrows above the yellow eyes of the half-lions were furrowed and their mouths, full of fangs, were open.

He had two roarons who hesitated to obey the order. Yu was in a hurry, knowing their time was limited.

"How is poison received in your people?"

"We learned from you humans that there is such a thing as poison," said Kigaro. "It is dishonorable."

He spat the word quickly, as if insulting Yu. Hurt by the harsh response, Yu sank to the ground and leaned his back against a tree.

If he seemed to regret what he had done now, he would not present a good impression to the roarons. But then again, no matter what he did from now on, he couldn't make a good impression.

He took a few deep breaths in and out, a bad smell was beginning to emanate from Bart's body. Yu thought about the people he had killed in Rolderhelm. He still felt pain over Rie's and Camaeron's deaths, but he felt nothing about the ones he had killed in İlonya.

"It wasn't Yurine who killed them, it was me. I just used Yurine to kill them. Maybe the more I kill, the less I care about them."

Although he was horrified by the way Bart died, he felt no emotion.

"We will turn back the clock, I have no doubt. If Denise can do it, so can I, but... Maybe I'm a demon, like Bart said."

He put his hand to his heart and searched for any emotion there. His love for Yurine was there, but he could not find any regret or guilt for what he had just done. 

"I can't be a demon if I still feel love."

He pulled his knees to himself and looked up at Kigaro and Dimen. They didn't have much time and they had to dispose of the body.

"We would like to judge him, but the Virgo Cathedral is small and relatively new. Trying and executing a member for treason as soon as it is founded would drive people away from the cathedral. Maybe he committed treason thinking he could not be judged and get away with it."

His words were meant to convince Kigaro and Dimen that what they were doing was right, and they were right. If they had judged and executed Bart, they would have left a negative impression in people's eyes.

It didn't matter whether they were right or not, a cathedral was being built and the first act was to execute one of its members. People certainly wouldn't like it. And they couldn't even explain it to people.

Of course, this was not the reason why Yu killed him secretly. It was only because it would not be easy to judge and execute him in the presence of Leoral.

"I did exactly the right thing. Who knows what they were planning against me? Whether I was just paranoid or not, there was no need to take risks. I have to go forward to reach my dream world."

When he saw that Kigaro and Dimen were reluctant to dismember Bart, he took off his jacket, rolled up his sleeves, took the axe from Kigaro's waist and went to work.

"If you are not going to do it, at least one of you should bring me clean clothes and water to clean myself. And one of you light the fires, I felt the cold as soon as I took off my clothes."

He might look like a monster, he didn't care. He had already gone far enough by killing him, he wasn't going to question what he was doing now. He wasn't acting just for himself, there was a woman to save and a child to make happy. Becoming a monster or a demon was an acceptable sacrifice for them.

With each blow of the axe, blood splattered from Bart's body and smeared all over Yu, but he didn't stop. He raised and lowered the axe again and again, chopping Bart's body into small pieces that the rinos could eat.

When he had completely cut it into pieces, he cooked it and gave it to the Rinos. He wondered if the rinos would be poisoned too. Even if they didn't die right away, he would put the rinos at the back of their convoy and keep them away from people in case the poison was contagious. Of course, he would also put healthy rinos with them to see if they were contagious.

If the Rinos were poisoned and died, it meant he would learn something new about the blood in his veins. And if the poison was contagious, he would have to stay away from Yurine. Even if he didn't want to, he had to stay away so as not to infect her. He hoped the Rinos would not be poisoned.

"Even if it's not contagious under normal circumstances, it could be because they ate Bart's flesh. Let's see what happens."

Bart's flesh and bones were consumed and his internal organs were successfully hidden. There was no trace of him left.

"If the roarons saw anything, I'll tell them to shut up, and then I'll get ready for Leoral. When this is over, there won't be anyone trying to separate me from Yurine."