Hero's Coffin Chapter 58

Chapter 58

#That Dawn

Harenir von Luchete always had the same dream.

It was a dream that had followed him for a very long time. He had this dream on the day he joined the Holy Knight Order, on the day he was connected to the holy sword Piarus and designated as the next Holy Knight Commander, and on the day he received God's blessing at his coming-of-age ceremony and was called the hero of the empire. Though he didn't often dream normally, whenever he did dream, he always saw 'that time'.

It had been so long that he knew it as soon as he saw the first scene. But even when he recognized it, nothing changed in the dream.

Harenir could only watch.

'Haren, don't worry. Just trust and follow your father.'

The scene of the once-green forest gradually fading to monochrome, the back of 'him' tightly grasping his hand and leading him. It was sickeningly familiar.

Harenir was the son of Holy Knight Commander Evelyn and Vice Commander Hileon.

His childhood, born in the peaceful era that followed the end of the human-demon war, was very peaceful. His mother, who had risen to Holy Knight Commander with her excellent swordsmanship and pure holy power, and his father, who had risen to Vice Commander after receiving personal guidance from the Commander despite being an ordinary knight. The child born between them boasted powerful holy power and amazing recovery ability, receiving blessings from everyone.

Until he was eight years old, the child lived only happily. He was always with his family, and showing talent in swordsmanship, he dreamed of becoming a holy knight like his parents. So when he exclaimed that he wanted to become a great commander like his mother, she jokingly said, "You'll have to study a lot from now on," and his father just smiled and patted the child's head.

It was a time of pure joy and happiness.

That's why the sudden catastrophe hit even harder.

When the Dium appeared, the whole world burned and turned to ruins. The Holy Knight Order moved busily to stop them, and the smell of blood emanating from his returning parents grew stronger and stronger.

But his mother always said everything was fine. She only told the young child not to worry, that the holy knights would get rid of all the bad monsters, so he shouldn't be afraid. When she left for battle, she would hold out her pinky finger and give strange homework.

'Today you have to play with Noi and build a house out of wood. I'll check when I get back!'

It sounded quite absurd to be told to play while the entire continent was rotting black. The child was intelligent and had noticed all the ominous developments in the war. The agitated atmosphere in the temple, the gradually sinking morale of the Holy Knight Order, and the fact that the front lines were endlessly being pushed back.

But the child smiled and linked his pinky finger with his mother's. Judging that acting innocently was for his parents' sake, he nodded with a bright face. On the other hand, he also optimistically thought that if he kept following their words well, his parents might really resolve everything one day.

That day was when the Holy Knight Order set out to eliminate the Dium.

Upon news that Dium had appeared in a village on the outskirts of the holy city, the Holy Knight Commander led her subordinates out from early morning. But the Vice Commander rested, saying he wasn't feeling well, yet now he was walking perfectly fine in front of Harenir's eyes. Gripping his small hand so tightly it almost hurt.

'Father, my hand hurts...'

'Walk straight.'

The child couldn't understand his father at all. Why they were going deeper and deeper into the Encroachment Zone, why he gripped and led him more roughly even when he said it hurt, as if worried he might run away...

And finally, in front of the Dium they encountered, why he knelt and bowed.

'I offer this child as a sacrifice. He has a lot of holy power, so you will be satisfied.'

[Oh, truly a powerful soul.]

'Yes. So please happily eat this child, and accept me as a citizen of the new world.'

Harenir couldn't understand anything.

Was it because he had only seen his father's gradually darkening under-eyes as fatigue, or because he had ignored the 'new world' he sometimes muttered about? The child's mind was filled with nothing but questions, and he remained dazed even as the Dium grabbed him. The Dium was so huge that its hand could completely envelop his entire body.

Five horns. So this is Dedium, the god of those called catastrophe...

'No, Haren!'

He learned then that when you receive too great a shock, you can't take any action. So he could only watch blankly as his mother came to save him. The sight of his father pointing a sword at his mother, and finally, the scene of his mother cutting down his father.

Afterwards, Holy Knight Commander Evelyn made 'that' choice to stop Dedium from targeting the child. She decided to pour out all her holy power and even offer her soul to seal the catastrophe.

That moment was all captured in Harenir's eyes. His mother, with her blue eyes that had always shone so clearly now filled with tears, looking back at him one last time, and then facing Dedium directly, her back slowly fading away, all of it.

Even knowing it was meaningless because it was a dream, at this point Harenir always reached out his hand towards that place. He extended his hand as if wanting to be swept back to that time and grab her. He stretched out his arm desperately, but...

Inevitably, that situation unfolded.

The most terrible thing about this nightmare was that the scene repeated endlessly. Even knowing it was a dream, he couldn't escape and had to just watch that moment. With his hand ridiculously outstretched, feeling a suffocating powerlessness towards the back he could never reach in his lifetime.

The hand he extended to her in the dream started as the child's small hand and gradually changed. To a hand calloused from holding a sword, to a hand covered in wounds. Then, even though it was a dream, he unconsciously tried to make that hand look fine.

It was on 'that day' that Harenir learned there were limits to his recovery ability. Until then, he hadn't known this truth because he had never been injured that badly, but even after that day, he didn't tell anyone.

Because that way, everyone would think of his mother, not his father, when they looked at him. Wanting to leave behind only the name of the being who was noble to the end, not the terrible traitor who sided with the Dium, Harenir strove to exist as the most perfect Holy Knight Commander.

But strangely, in today's dream, his disguise kept coming undone. The Dium's curse repeatedly appeared on his hand, making him terribly anxious. The more he tried to return to a normal appearance, the more miserable he looked. His whole body even felt tightly constricted, as if grabbed by Dedium that day...

Thud, his shoulder was shaken.

"Stop..."

Harenir's eyes flew open as he grabbed the other person's hand. Someone had touched him.

It was shocking. He hadn't noticed at all that someone had entered this space, let alone approached him. This could never have happened normally.

He immediately raised his guard and glared at the other person, but then.

"Please, let's just sleep..."

Seeing Isaph standing there with an extremely tired face, he felt bewilderment beyond shock.

Only Isaph had that pitch-black hair that seemed to contain only darkness, grown long like a curtain hiding his face, and those purple eyes with an eerie energy faintly swirling in his pale face devoid of any blood color. A being with such faint vitality that one might doubt if he was alive.

But now Isaph's under-eyes were even darker than when he had last seen him, and the haggard energy was even more intense. Perhaps the reason he hadn't woken up immediately was because he was tired from the aftereffects of the curse, but Isaph, who had suddenly appeared, looked several times more fatigued than him.

Harenir looked at him quizzically... and soon succeeded in inferring a certain truth from the earlier words. As his face began to stiffen coldly, Isaph let out a deep sigh.

"When you have nightmares, it's hard for me too..."

"You can see my dreams too?"

"No, I can't see them. I just keep feeling like I'm being forcibly dragged along, hah... As if wearing a collar wasn't enough, to have to go through this too..."

Isaph grumbled irritably while touching his neck.

"Be mindful of your sleep from now on. Try not to have nightmares if possible, drink some good tea or hang something by your bedside, or hug a doll while sleeping..."

Harenir just blinked at these bewildering words that made him feel drained. He should be wary of someone visiting in the deep dawn, and even more cautious if it was 'that' Isaph... but he looked so genuinely tired that it didn't raise suspicion. Still, he lightly looked around, but there was nothing suspicious. Isaph had really just come to wake him up.

It felt unfamiliar to have someone wake him from a nightmare for the first time. Harenir looked at Isaph with dazed eyes, then realized he was still holding his hand.

A pale hand with blue veins visible, slender fingers. Though he had watched this small hand pour out ominous energy, a truly unexpected impression suddenly struck him.

"...Your hand is warm."

"Of course it is. I'm not a corpse or an evil spirit."

"I see..."

"Why do you sound so surprised? You seem not fully awake, why don't you let go of my hand now?"