Sorry 29

Chapter 29

    ***

    Euris stared at her husband, who couldn't speak.

    Under her gaze, Chaint bit his lip several times. He looked like he was about to speak, but couldn't, and hung his head.

    "...... I'll see what I can do, there must be a way."

    He muttered, "There has to be," one more time, and refilled his glass. A clear, flat cup held an oak-colored liquid. She took the glass from him.

    "Stop drinking, you're very drunk."

    "Oh...... I'm sorry."

    Chaint meekly gave her the cup, and he stared at his empty hand as it slipped away. He closed his eyes, feeling empty as his hands.

    It was a question he'd been pondering for days, no, months, since he'd returned to the past.

    'The war....... If only I could prevent that event that shattered our lives from happening again.'

    He opened his eyes again and stared at the woman in front of him. The woman he loved. The woman he never, ever wanted to be separated from again.

    But the last thing she wanted was to run away. Because Euris truly wanted to stop the war.

    And she knew she was doing the right thing.

    "We should just...... Go to bed for the night, and we'll talk again tomorrow."

    With those words, Chaint rose from his seat, only to lose his footing and nearly fall.

    He muttered under his breath and staggered out of the office. Leaving behind Euris, who watched him anxiously from her seat.

    He felt like he shouldn't be looking at her right now. He didn't want her to see him in this disheveled state, with this poor judgment, with the woman he loved so much.

    'We'll talk about it tomorrow morning. Tomorrow, I'll apologize for being like this. Not now, not.............'

     Chaint staggered through the dark hallway to his bedroom, and instead of lying down on the bed, he plopped down on the couch, the dark leather hugging his body. As he relaxed into its comfort, his eyes closed.

    "Ha......."

    He exhaled, his breath tinged with alcohol, and suddenly remembered the past.

    In his last life, he'd met Kylan only once, and he'd never forgotten their conversation.

     "Are you, uh, Euris's husband?"

    The lonely-looking man waited for him at the outpost in a third country. His every move exuded loneliness.

    He was covered in scars where you couldn't see them, rough marks on the nape of his neck and the backs of his hands where his clothes didn't cover them.

    It was a brief truce. Chaint should have been a commander, given his background in imperial affairs, but he was merely a courtesy to the Alton Empire, which was in desperate need of troops.

    A welcome offer was made to negotiate in Lepallon, and a position was created in the third country. The man, also known as the Lion of Lepallon, was of great stature and build, and his silhouette was eerily familiar.

    Chaint was on high alert when he heard his wife's name come out of the enemy's mouth. He remained alert until the man turned around. Finally, the man turned to face him.

    His face was barely visible, obscured by his long black hair, which had grown to cover his eyes, but Chaint could tell that this was Kylan Hebron.

    An old childhood friend of Euris's, the eldest son of the Count of Hebron, who had broken her heart and then disappeared one day. He had seen him a few times when they were young at various gatherings and exchanged a few words.

    Seeing him here stunned him to the point of fainting.

    ‘Why are you here?’

    The commander of an enemy nation, the leader of the Lepallon army that had marched in and crushed Alton. Someone to be appeased and persuaded to stop the war. It was Kylan Hebron, a lifelong subject of Alton. Looking at the man's grief-stricken face, Chaint understood why this man had called him to this meeting.

    "How is Euris?"

    The cracked voice asked wistfully, this man still hadn't gotten over the woman of his youth, and he didn't need to ask. He'd come this far for that one greeting.

    Chaint nodded silently. The man's eyes met his, and a faint smile seemed to form on his face.

    "It's because of me."

    The man muttered afterward. Chaint stared at him, wondering what he was talking about.

    "I'm the one who started this whole tragedy. Those despicable imperial bastards in Lepallon used my bloodline to get what they wanted."

    This was the seat of negotiations between the Alton and Lepallon Empire. It was not the time for unnecessary talk, but he spoke anyway.

    "My mother was a spy for Lepallon, the last of the Imperial bloodline. The reason they kept me alive instead of killing me is because of my lineage. There are things in Lepallon that only traditional imperial blood can do."

    Chaint listened, not sure what the hell this man was talking about.

    "But I realized too late that I made the wrong choice. This tragic, brutal war happened because of me. If I could go back in time, I would never go to the Lepallon Empire."

    "...."

    "Alton is my home, and if I had known the beautiful country would be ruined like this, I would have preferred death, but now I can't stop it anymore."

    His voice was truly shaking. He looked like a man in the throes of great anger, or a wolf out in the cold.

    "I came out here with hope."

    "..."

    "But there is no hope, Alton will be reduced to ashes."

    "Then why is this negotiation seat......."

    "This negotiating position is fake."

    Kylan lowered his voice to a whisper. He began to grope in the closet where he stood, his hand pressing steadily in a narrow range, and with a certain amount of pressure, the boundaries shifted and a small door appeared. Chaint stared at the whole thing, dumbfounded.

    "When you're done talking to me, go out this door and run, and don't look back. They'll probably try to trick you into coming with them, and then they'll lock you up or kill you, and then they'll say it was an accident, because they're crazy enough to do anything to win."

    "..."

    Chaint swallowed dryly as he listened.

    "I'm sorry, I have a job to do, I've gone too far, I need you to find Euris...... Take care of her, and the reason I'm telling you all this...... is because of her."

    With those words, Kylan held out his hand. It looked like he wanted to shake hands.

    "A handshake?”

    It felt strange to be asked for a handshake out of the blue, but he took the man's hand with sad eyes. He could feel the rough surface of the hand, with calluses all over it. Kylan squeezed it for a moment and didn't move.

    When the conversation was over, Chaint walked, dazedly, to the door of the closet he had spoken of. There was no reason to listen to the enemy commander, but he was sure. That Kylan genuinely wanted to save him.

    The cramped passageway led to the open air. As soon as he smelled the fresh air, he ran and ran and ran. He didn't stop, even when his breath caught in his throat and his clothes snagged on sharp bushes.

    "What did I just hear?”

    His mind raced with questions.

    And he couldn't deny that the tide had already turned in favor of defeat.

    "Honey?"

    Euris called as she entered the room. Chaint opened his eyes, which had been closed as he leaned back against the couch.

    He scratched his head, feeling both asleep and not. After blinking a couple times, the blurry image of the woman became clear.

    "Honey."

    Chaint held her hand as if it were precious. Euris plopped down next to him on the couch, their hands still clasped. Her lovely face frowned at the smell of alcohol.

    The memory made Chaint uneasy. If Kylan went to the Lepallon Empire...... war would inevitably break out, a myriad of uneasiness weighed on him with each passing day.

    It had been like that ever since he'd returned to the past, and it was what terrified Chaint the most. Hopeful that there was another way, he'd searched high and low for a way to stop the war, but he was coming to the conclusion that there wasn't.

    There was no denying that this was a crucial crossroads, that the point of all keys was at this moment, as he was about to leave. Kylan had to be stopped from going to Lepallon.

    ****

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