169 - The Evil Husband (15th Anniversary Edition) Chapter 169
169
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However, there was no way to take action. He was simply breaking down, over and over. Cesare watched his own collapse as if he were someone else.
On the day he crossed the line, Cesare ordered Lord Elrod to be brought to him. Lord Elrod was dragged before Cesare in less than a day.
Cesare stared at the wizened man before him. Lord Elrod was already pale with fear.
"Y-Your Grace, Grand Duke..."
Without a word to the trembling man begging for mercy, Cesare scrutinized the Baron's face.
The Baron was the first to flee as soon as the child was in danger of execution. Far from trying to save Aileen, he sought his own survival faster than anyone else.
He was also the one who had the Brick house ransacked. With Aileen's death, her inheritance passed to Lord Elrod, and creditors swarmed in, tearing away everything of value.
Of course, before the creditors arrived, the Baron had secretly returned to the Brick house and taken the valuable items first. It was Lord Elrod who sold Aileen's platinum Pocket watch at a pawnshop.
After Aileen's execution, Lord Elrod was stripped of his noble title, but he managed to save his life by fleeing quickly. He wandered around the Empire, living on alcohol and gambling.
He was the one who should have paid the price for the child's death, but the only reason Lord Elrod had been left alone until now was because:
He was also a trace of the child.
Cesare thought he wouldn't be able to kill him if he saw his face. But that wasn't really the case. It was difficult to recall any trace of Aileen from the Baron's face, which had been ruined by alcohol and drugs. Cesare could kill Lord Elrod without any emotion.
Still...
If he looked at him for a very long time, the child's features seemed to be faintly present. Cesare stared at the Baron for a long time before asking.
"Where is Aileen?"
Lord Elrod looked blank for a moment at Cesare's question. He blinked stupidly, then subtly shifted his gaze to the knight behind Cesare.
Diego, who was standing expressionlessly, flickered his eyes faintly. Lord Elrod stammered.
"T-That child... is dead, isn't she..."
It wasn't the answer he wanted to hear. Cesare leaned back in his chair and languidly ordered.
"Cut him. Leave the face."
Diego quietly stepped forward. Lord Elrod began to scream when he saw the shelf with the sharp knives and hacksaws. Diego first gagged the Baron.
Lord Elrod's body was gradually cut away. The amputation started from the extremities. Every time a finger or toe was cut off, Cesare asked the same question. Where is Aileen?
Lord Elrod gave the same answer. That child is dead. But when both hands and feet were all bluntly cut off, he couldn't say that he was dead. He begged for his life, saying he was wrong.
Later, he answered that she was alive, but that wasn't what he wanted to hear either, so Cesare didn't withdraw his order.
Diego was the most capable in this kind of work. He skillfully cut the body while taking measures to prevent Lord Elrod from dying from excessive bleeding. It was when his arms and legs were only left above the elbows and knees. Lord Elrod said something new.
"Keuh, heuk, I, I'll bring her, heuek, I will..."
Cesare twisted his lips as if he had heard a very funny joke.
"How are you going to bring back the dead?"
"By, by any means..."
Lord Elrod twitched his shortened limbs and drooled. His face, wet with sweat and tears, babbled madly.
"Heuek, Sorcery, or something... To, to revive the dead... I'll bring her..."
Cesare narrowed his eyes. Lord Elrod clung to him, flustered by the first reaction he had shown.
"Definitely! Definitely... I'll bring her for sure..."
Cesare stared silently at the Baron, who was desperately begging for forgiveness, then got up from his chair. Hope flickered in Lord Elrod's eyes.
Cesare gestured lightly to Diego. Diego bowed and picked up a large knife. Lord Elrod, who thought he was finally free, widened his eyes at the blade coming towards him.
"O-Oh, Your Grace..."
That was the end. Then, thud, the sound of his head rolling off. Blood spurted and splashed everywhere, but Diego indifferently wiped his face with the back of his hand.
After dealing with Lord Elrod, Cesare had a new purpose. Cesare also knew well the Sorcery to revive the dead that the Baron had mentioned. It was what Mother used to do.
Cesare's biological Mother wanted to revive her dead lover. Cesare thought he was just a piece of trash, but when her lover died, Mother mourned as if her destined love had ended and committed all sorts of bizarre acts.
Of course, Mother didn't get any results. She just struggled alone for meaningless acts, and eventually despaired and ended her life by suicide.
What was he thinking when he saw Mother's body hanging from the noose? He probably mocked and despised her foolishness.
Seriously believing in unrealistic things and trying to perform Sorcery for just one man, clinging to a hope that could never be realized, and choosing death as the final refuge.
All of them were actions that Cesare could not understand and did not want to understand.
But ridiculously, now it felt like something worth doing. It might be the impulse caused by the Mother's blood flowing in his body, but for now, it was.
Because that's all he could do.
He wanted to try, even if it was in vain. He knew it would never happen, but he couldn't control it.
Cesare began to follow in the same footsteps as Mother. He followed the traces she left behind and gathered information about Sorcery to revive the dead.
Not long after he began to delve into Sorcery, Leone came to visit. Leone, who had precariously guarded the throne while being ridiculed as a mere Emperor in name, had changed a lot from before.
The brothers who used to laugh and talk together were nowhere to be found now. Leone always looked at Cesare with a stern face. He said with eyes full of sadness and fear.
"Cesare... Sorcery, really..."
As brothers who had suffered together from Mother, he pleaded with Cesare as if he wanted to stop him from doing that at least.
But Cesare was just puzzled. He tilted his head and replied to Leone, who was crying about what would happen if he met the same end as Mother.
"Then you should have protected her, brother."
Leone couldn't say anything.
After that day, people of low status came and went in the Erzeht Grand Duke Residence, and the stench of blood from sacrificing animals vibrated every day.
Cesare tried several methods. Buying trash for a thousand gold was commonplace. He even gave up the precious blood of the imperial family as they wanted, and sometimes he did things that were so dangerous that the knights tried to stop him.
But everything was useless. Time passed without any results. Time passed to the point where he had tried virtually all existing Sorcery.
Cesare began to kill one by one those who had wagged their tongues and taken only the wealth while making him do futile things. Those who had lived in luxury under the protection of the Grand Duke Erzeht under the pretext of Sorcery lost their lives like the beasts they had sacrificed.
It was then, when the stench of human blood was added to the Erzeht Grand Duke Residence, that an old Sorcerer mentioned a new path to Cesare.
"Make a deal with the gods."
Like the Burnt offering that the founding Emperor had performed to revive the dead Empress, he was told to summon the gods by sacrificing the lives of many. It was a ritual, not Sorcery. But it was a method that no one in the temple, or rather, no one in the Empire, would mention.
Because those to be sacrificed had to be citizens of the Traon Empire.
But Cesare built an altar for the Burnt offering without hesitation. The Traon Empire was no longer something to be protected for him.
And on the first day for the Burnt offering. Leone committed suicide.
