Ch#219
* * *
"And so, we flew back to Talochioum...!"
Agavert base, first floor.
Tie panted heavily after finishing his lengthy speech before the five men.
Alexander, who had been watching, finally couldn't hold back and wiped the tears from his eyes.
"Huh? Uncle Alexander is crying!"
Tie scampered over and climbed onto Alexander's lap.
"Uncle Alexander, was Tie's Jongno-gu story that sad?"
"Yeah, it's so touching that tears are coming out. And you're so admirable too."
He gently caressed the child's cheek.
"Still, it must have been nice for you, Tie. Getting to see the people you missed."
"Yeah!"
Tie looked around at the other family members seated nearby.
"I got to say goodbye to Aunt and Grandma, so that was good. Goodbyes are sad, but a little less so if you can actually say them."
Listening to the child, Edmund quietly gazed at Tie.
Tie chattered on to Alexander about what had happened in Jongno-gu.
'It was hard to believe at first.'
Aleric and Libia, was it.
The stories from Tese tan's subordinates, who had returned from the Clock Tower Mission, were all utterly absurd.
'It's true! The leader is really the vice leader's daughter! I saw it with my own two eyes!'
Astie being Tese tan's biological child.
That meant Tese tan had gotten someone pregnant at least fifteen years old, at the earliest.
However.
'There were no women around the youngest until he left the mansion.'
The brothers who had lived sword-to-sword in one mansion couldn't be ignorant of each other's routines.
The Tese tan back then had been as consistent as Leonardo, as methodical as Alexander, and as efficiency-focused as Edmund.
In other words.
'It means he rarely ever left the mansion.'
Whenever Tese tan went out, it was straight to the training grounds.
There were no instances of mingling words or exchanging glances with women.
In fact, among their taciturn brothers, there had even been talk about Tese tan's tastes.
'Brothers. Why doesn't Theseus dance?'
'Probably doesn't like it.'
'But he just turned down Lady Bedelrain.'
'Really?'
'Yeah. Look, now he's rejecting Lady Roana.'
'...Maybe women aren't his type?'
Of course, what Tese tan did after leaving the family was beyond Edmund's knowledge.
'Still.'
The Tese tan he knew wouldn't have opened his heart to anyone easily for several years after leaving home.
Back then, Tese tan had seemed to carry immense guilt over his mother.
However, the longer the conversations with the Agavert members went on, the more suspicious points piled up.
'See! They look alike! I didn't notice at first, but look closely!'
Especially when Libia brought out a portrait of young Eleonora from somewhere and placed it before them.
'Eyes! Nose! Mouth! Even the chin is the same!'
'Libia, this is a bit...'
'Just look! I'm telling you, it's true!'
Valentis and the three young lords were all left speechless.
They didn't know where it came from, but the young Eleonora in the portrait astonishingly resembled Astie.
'Where on earth did you get this...'
'Who in the Empire doesn't know Eleonora Richard? The woman who wielded the strongest Holy Power in history.'
'...'
'The portrait came from Lady Selina, the leader's closest friend. Her mother is the head of the Bellora Merchant Group.'
The young lords couldn't tear their eyes from the portrait for a long while.
Valentis remained silent as well.
At that moment, the boy said to be Astie's summon entered through the door.
'Hey, monster Kkamangi! Tell them quickly. What you and the leader did in that Jongno-gu place! How the vice leader and leader lived there!'
Lucarion's story contained all the information Edmund needed.
The tale of Astie and Tese tan.
And all the evidence supporting that they were family.
And two days later.
Tese tan and Astie safely returned to Talochioum.
And at this moment, Valentis and the young lords were witnessing it with their own eyes.
"Daddyyy!"
"Daughter."
As Tese tan, who had gone toward the dining hall, returned, Tie jumped to his feet.
The child toddled over and threw himself into Tese tan's arms.
Tese tan smiled and rubbed his nose against Tie's.
Then he brought over the folding wooden chair he had been carrying and placed it before Valentis.
"Please sit here."
Valentis paused and lifted his gaze.
The other brothers wore equally baffled expressions.
And understandably so, as Valentis was already seated on a plush sofa.
Yet he was suddenly being asked to move to a wooden chair.
Edmund's brow furrowed.
'I thought he had improved.'
It seemed his old habit of cold-shouldering his father due to self-defensive tendencies lingered.
But just as Edmund was about to speak.
"...Thank you."
Valentis rose from his seat and readily moved to the wooden chair Tese tan had brought.
He even had a faint smile on his lips.
Soon, Tese tan sat beside him with Tie.
"Belset poison can last up to ten years in some cases."
The three young lords' expressions grew even more perplexed.
In the meantime, Valentis, who had been stiff, finally spoke.
"...I didn't expect you to remember that."
Tese tan's gaze turned to his father, who had one hand on his left knee.
"How could I forget? That day, you slew dozens of Belsets all by yourself."
Valentis's pupils quivered faintly.
The day Eleonora was lost.
In the chaotic wasteland melee, it wasn't just Tese tan who struggled with rampage.
While Tese tan rampaged, and Eleonora desperately tried to save him.
Valentis had also been fighting to protect his wife and child.
"I learned it while living as a mercenary. The blue venom spewing from Belset fangs..."
"...?"
"...invades human joints and damages the nerves."
That day.
Valentis's protective gear around his left leg had broken at the start of battle.
That was the culprit.
The moment Valentis moved to cover Tese tan and Eleonora, a Belset he hadn't seen bit into his knee.
The monster's fangs pierced straight through the unprotected skin.
The pain in his left knee had begun that day.
"...I never told anyone."
As Valentis let out a hollow laugh, Edmund rose from his seat.
"Father. Is that true?"
He alternated stares between Valentis and his knee with a mix of shock and worry.
"Why haven't you said anything about something so serious all this time...!"
"It's something that can't be resolved anyway."
Belsets were curse-type monsters.
There was no antidote for their poison, and attempting to purify it with Holy Power caused intense pain in the body.
In the end, it meant Valentis had to carry this pain until the day he died.
"It's fine. This much is nothing."
Responding, Valentis looked at Tese tan with an odd gaze.
Something hot welled up in his chest.
'You've changed, Tese tan.'
The youngest son who had silently left the mansion after Eleonora's death.
The Tese tan who had bared his fangs at family and refused any conversation.
'If even you have changed...'
"Grandpa, does your knee hurt?"
Tie, who had approached, leaned his face against Valentis's knee with drooping brows.
The conversation with Tese tan on the way here flashed in his mind.
'Astie has manifested both Holy Power and mana. The Church will surely target the child.'
"Tie can make Grandpa a special hard chair at the base!"
'...I'm prepared to fight if necessary.'
Valentis's pupils darkened.
There was nothing a parent wouldn't do for their child.
As proof, Tese tan's eyes as he said it resembled Eleonora's exactly.
His wife's eyes, looking back at him in her final moment as she rushed to the rampaging Tese tan.
"My chair is fine, child."
As he replied, Tie's eyes widened round.
Valentis stroked Tie's head with a serene face.
"I'll make you a chair."
"Huh?"
"In a place no worldly wind or blade tip can reach."
"...?"
"I will definitely make your chair."