Chapter 8.10

“Are you still being chased by those men?”  

In the back alley of Peterman Station, a boy sitting on a discarded wooden box let out a sigh.  

“I… Actually, I saw it yesterday. I saw you being chased by some men… Didn’t I warn you? I told you not to get involved, that they might be dangerous people.”  

When the man sitting next to him didn’t answer, the boy lowered his head.  

In the boy’s arms was the bag of bread the man had given him.  

“S-so, please stop bringing me things like this. What happened that day was my fault, and since we’re both in tough situations like this…”  “You too.”  

“Huh?”  

At the dry reply, the boy looked up at the man. The man’s gaze was fixed on the slum near the station where the boy lived.  

A street where most people wouldn’t even think of living, thanks to the train smoke and noise.  

The boy said he lived there.  

“…You don’t have to come find me every day like this. I’m actually busier than you think.”  

Rising slowly, Kaiden looked at the boy who was clutching the bread tightly.  

Thin body, dry lips, bones sticking out sharply.  

The boy’s theft that day no longer meant anything to Kaiden. He’d learned that the boy was searching for his brother who’d disappeared years ago, trying to get money for his sick sibling’s medicine.  

Suddenly, the poor people of the Bannon’s duchy he’d passed by came to mind.  

He seemed to hear the voices of those who had blocked his father’s carriage, begging for help just once.  

They must have had circumstances just like this boy.  

With a short laugh, Kaiden took out a pouch of money he had prepared and handed it to the boy.  

“This isn’t a lot, but it should be enough so you’re not lacking. From now on, don’t think of taking other people’s things—find money in a proper way. Even if that means begging.”  

“……”  

“Continuing to do something wrong even when you know it’s wrong, in the end, is something you shouldn’t do to yourself either.”  

Who was he to be giving advice to anyone? Kaiden felt a self-mocking smile spread across his lips, but just then, the boy, blinking in surprise, jumped up.  

“N-no! H-how could I take this money so shamelessly? I’m really okay…”  

“Don’t refuse. This isn’t charity—it’s fair payment for what you did to help me.”  

Kaiden stepped closer and pressed the money into the boy’s hand.  

“It’s also my last goodbye.”  

“……”  

The boy’s eyes wavered as he looked at Kaiden. After a moment of silence, the boy wiped away the tears that had welled up with the back of his hand and nodded.  

“Thank you. Really, really… thank you.”  

The boy, clutching the pouch Kaiden gave him, spoke haltingly.  

“M-my name is Hugo… If you ever need me, please come find me anytime.”  

“…Alright, Hugo.”  

Kaiden patted the boy’s shoulder a couple of times as he held back his tears, then turned away from him.  

“Well, I hope you find your brother.”

* * *

A rag hanging on a laundry line fluttered in the wind. Kicked by someone’s shoe, the rag fell onto the dirty water, turning black. Another piece of trash was born on the filthy street.  

Kaiden, who had become used to that sight over the past few weeks, turned his gaze away and kept walking.  

An old man drinking in the middle of the day, sitting on the steps in front of his house. A block away, boys laughing brightly as they kicked stones. A woman yelling while holding a broom. A man scratching his head as he pulled coins from his pocket.  

The street where the inn he stayed at was located was not much different from the slum where the boy lived. The stench was just as bad, so thick he had to hold his breath.  

Arriving at the old wooden door, Kaiden opened it, enduring the unpleasant creak, and returned to his shabby room.  

He hung the hat he had pulled down low by the door and sat on the bed, letting out a tired sigh.  

As soon as he let go of his barely-held composure, Brienne’s voice, which had been ringing in his ears day and night, echoed in his mind again.  

<Was it so wrong for me to like you?>  

The first time she had shown him resentment, her voice trembling weakly.  

Only then did he realize what it was that had always made him uncomfortable whenever he was with her.  

A false self.  

The way she tried to match even her tastes to his, saying that anything he liked, she liked too.  

He thought he knew Brienne well.  

But why?  

“……”  

Recalling Brienne’s gaze as she looked at him that day, Kaiden gave a bitter smile.  

He thought he knew her best, but maybe he didn’t know her at all.  

No one had ever truly shown their heart to each other in all that time.  

Not her, not him.  

Realizing that fact, which he didn’t want to admit, made all their time together feel like it was fading away like smoke. Even the moments they laughed and chatted together might have been nothing more than social pleasantries, and that realization stabbed at his heart.  

Maybe that’s why he was even angrier.  

What made him feel even more empty at this moment was that he couldn’t even be sure what the name of the emotion that had dominated his mind back then was.  

Anger, jealousy, disappointment.  

All those different feelings mixed together, and in that moment, Kaiden, without realizing it, let out words he had always swallowed.  

<At least I knew how you felt. You didn’t know anything…>  

‘Didn’t you just like the way I looked on the outside? You only liked the shell that was Kaiden Bannon.’  

‘You didn’t know what I was really thinking, what I went through every day. You knew nothing about the real me.’  

He never actually said those words out loud, but the stupid mistake he made eventually led to Brienne’s question.  

<……Tell me honestly, Kaiden. What have you been hiding from me all this time?>

When Brienne looked at him with confused eyes—  

He almost told her the truth. He wanted to tell her. He didn’t want to hide it anymore.  

No, maybe he had been hoping she would notice.  

But how could he say it now? The only solution he knew was to bury it, to cover it up, just as he always had.  

Suppressing his rising emotions, Kaiden stood and approached the window. His chest felt so tight it seemed he might forget how to breathe.  

……He truly regretted it.  

Kaiden could no longer pretend to be indifferent as he accepted that fact. There was nothing left to deny. He could not ignore that he no longer existed in Brienne’s eyes.  

To be honest—  

Yes, it would be a lie to say he had no hope left at all.  

On the surface, he wished for Brienne’s happiness, but deep down, he hoped Brienne’s feelings for Herace would fade. That was how desperate he was.  

He wanted to drag her down into the mud with him.  

If she were with him, he could find happiness even in the mud.  

He shamelessly wanted to say such a terrible thing.  

‘……If I ever get another chance.’  

If Brienne would look at him and smile gently like before.  

He would go back to those days and return her feelings. He would confess that she was the reason he could endure his hardest times and would never make the same choice again.  

But now, it was truly all over.  

Having come this far, he knew he could not turn back her heart or time itself.  

The fact that he was only now looking back on the feelings Brienne had wanted for so long was proof that he was completely wrong from the start.  

Would he ever be able to ask for forgiveness?  

As that hopeless question came to mind, he felt suffocated again. Kaiden gripped the window sill tightly, unable to lift his head for a while.  

Knock, knock-knock. At that moment, when Kaiden’s gaze was on ‘The Myth of Roeta’ on the nightstand, he heard a knock at the door.  

“……”  

Slowly, focus returned to Kaiden’s eyes. He deliberately checked below the window, pressed his hat down, and quietly opened the door. One hand hid a dagger behind his back.  

“Ah, you were in the room?”  

Through the narrow gap, the innkeeper’s face appeared. Confirming that no one else was behind him, Kaiden put away the dagger and opened the door wider.  

“……What brings you here?”  

“I came to deliver a letter that arrived for you. Here.”  

The innkeeper looked around the room behind the open door and handed over an envelope.  

“If I’d known you were in, I would’ve brought up your meal. I was worried since you hadn’t eaten for days, and it didn’t look like you ate in your room either.”  

“……”  

“Are you eating outside? You look even thinner than when you first arrived.”  

Avoiding the innkeeper’s worried gaze, Kaiden pressed his hat down further.  

The elderly innkeeper, pleased to have a rare long-term guest, tried to talk to Kaiden every day. ‘Did you eat? Did you sleep well?’ Even asked his name.  

But Kaiden was uncomfortable with such inexplicable kindness. Unfamiliar attention was always burdensome. Having to hold a knife and be wary even in front of someone being kind to him made him feel disgusted with himself.  

“……Thank you for delivering this.”  

Kaiden took the letter from the innkeeper’s hand and quickly cut off any further conversation, closing the door.  

Leaning against the closed door, Kaiden’s gaze fell to the envelope.  

[Seints Barony]  

It was a reply from the family that had been looking for a tutor.