Chapter 224
Deep darkness is a Harbinger of the Coming Dawn (4)
Lionel Leonberger had a lengthy dream. Rather, it was more like one of reminiscing, or a lifelong reflection, than a dream. He relived his days of shame when the lords of the kingdom had groaned under the Empire. It was a life that he had endured with all his heart, but which eventually did not unfold as intended.
These were memories of failure and humiliation that he did not want to recall.
Still, when he awoke from his dream, the first thing he felt was a feeling of extreme loss.
Lionel looked at the empty space beside him on his bed with gloomy eyes, stroking his hand over it, and only longing was added to the cold texture of the linen fabric. But Lionel soon struggled to take control of his mind. Long dreams filled with regrets came to those nearing the end of their lives, and when Lionel remembered that the day would soon come when he would meet her again, he felt better.
His day had started in a bad, somber mood, but apart from that, his mind was weirdly clear.
The medicine prescribed by the wizard had been quite effective in relieving the pain from his wound, though not completely. In addition, it also had the side effect of making his mind unclear, as if transporting him into a waking dream.
And even before that, Lionel’s mind had not felt ordered. But this morning, the headaches and worries which had always plagued him since ascending to the throne had disappeared as if they had been illusions. Lionel’s whole body was full of vitality. It felt as if he was completely reborn.
He thought it was maybe the last sparking of a sputtering candle that people always talked about – until he saw the white skin exposed under his messy clothes.
“Ah…”
Lionel stiffened, then looked at his jacket. He didn’t see anything. Even when he changed clothes three times a day, they still became filthy. Now, there were no dirty bandages that swiftly started getting damp as pus oozed through them; there was no rotten flesh, not even any scars.
He was healed of a wound that both Dotrin’s warlocks and the court wizard had given up treatment of. It was a miracle. Lionel quickly knew who was responsible for this miracle.
“That kid… it was really what he said it was.”
His son wasn’t lying when he said there was an elixir that could save even those who had reached the threshold of death, with only a single breath left to them. It seemed that Ian had come to his room. Lionel frowned. It was hard for him to tell where the hell his dreams ended and whether this was reality. He wracked his mind to get a grip on events.
‘It’ll be over soon! Please be patient!’
The moment Lionel recalled the powerful voice he had heard in the midst of his beastly howls, when he had been in terrible pain, more memories that had slumbered in the depth of his mind started rising to the surface. There had been a terrible sense of loss and pain he had felt the moment something had broken in his body. Then there had come that unfamiliar energy which had filled the emptied spot, and all without Lionel getting a proper sense of it. He had felt a feeling of weakness and of fullness. There had been a feeling that his mind was severed from his other senses.
Lionel’s consciousness suddenly reached the boundary between dreams and reality.
‘After your Majesty wakes up, you may be angry with me, asking why I waste such a precious medicine. Maybe… you would rather thank me, being the monarch you are at present and not how you had been in the past.’
His son’s voice, which he had heard after the pain had subsided, now became a clear reality to Lionel.
‘But gratitude will not have any worth.’
The familiar yet somehow unfamiliar voice was vague.
‘As an oath to the Leonberger royal family, I did what I had to do. So, your Majesty must keep your own royal oath in your heart and live for it for the rest of your life.’
And what Lionel had heard just before he had lost consciousness certainly seemed surreal.
“The royal oath…”
In his confusion, he recalled his son’s voice in his dreams mentioning a promise to the Leonberger royal family. This land was a kingdom built by those who fled from imperial exploitation and tyranny. The first monarch suffered from fierce monsters and severe cold but was triumphant in the end. And the words of the oath made by the founder of the Leonberger royal family floated in Lionel’s mind.
“I will live as the king of the weak.”
As soon as Lionel whispered this, his heart started pounding and jumping. One instant later, the rhythm of his heart rose even more, and heat flushed over his face. It felt as if there was a fire in the middle of his breast. Lionel felt a sense of uplifted spirit, and he did not know why he felt this strange sensation. Facing emotions that he was feeling for the first time in his life, the king could only breathe wildly.
The heat did not easily subside in his body, and he wondered if his flesh would always burn like this. The flames faded as abruptly as they had risen, however. When Lionel woke up again, only a slight heat remained, wandering across his flesh. At one point, the heart that stirred across his body gathered in a single place.
It was somewhere near his heart, where the sudden fever had first arisen. The gathered heat suddenly disappeared, as if it had never existed from the beginning. What remained in its place was a heavy mass, beating like a heart.
“Mana?”
It was indeed mana, and in a completely different form from that Lionel had previously had within him.
It was heart mana. As Lionel realized the nature of the heavy mass of mana that had just now settled in his body, his face took on a foolish cast. He had not been talented, but in his life, he had managed to weave two mana rings, at least becoming a knight with a definite chain.
But now, after he had woken up, his intact rings had disappeared, and a new mana heart had settled in their place. If it weren’t embarrassing, that would have been strange.
However, what was really embarrassing was not the altered nature of his mana. No…
Lionel began to call a maid to come and change his sweat-soaked jacket but then stiffened all of a sudden. In a spot not far from his bed stood a mirror that Margarita had used during her life, and a man with an unfamiliar yet strangely familiar face was staring from it.
The only differences between Lionel and the man were their hair colors and age. If Lionel had to pick out the key difference, it was the fact that the man in the mirror had a slightly softer look. Lionel raised his hand and touched his face. The silver-haired man in the mirror touched his face the same way.
Lionel gasped in surprise, and the mirror-man also became stupefied. Only then did Lionel realize it: It was his own reflection.
He couldn’t figure out why his white-bleached hair had become a mystical silver and where all the wrinkles that had filled his face had gone.
‘Duk! Duk! Duk!’
While Lionel was looking in the mirror blankly, someone knocked on the door.
“Come in,” Lionel said quietly after hesitating for a moment.
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The door soon opened, and the heads of the kingdom appeared led by the commander of the palace knights. They were all visibly startled, stretching their eyes wide as they took in the king’s altered appearance.
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Lionel frowned with embarrassment, not knowing how he could explain the situation.
However, it was an unnecessary worry.
Count Stuttgart, Marshal Bielefeld, Prime Minister Kirgayen; not one asked him about the change.
“We are overjoyed at your Majesty’s recovery!”
They simply congratulated him with thrilled faces, as if they knew everything.
Now, the situation was rather that Lionel had to ask them what the circumstances were.
“How the hell did this happen? I know that kid healed me, but I can’t figure out what this big mass of mana is next to my heart and how my appearance has become that of a stranger.”
The commander of the palace knights stepped forward and answered his question.
“His Highness said that he judged that your Majesty’s two rings would disturb the healing energy, trapping it in their chain. To make the energy completely yours, he broke the rings and formed a new mana heart.”
Lionel could scarcely believe it.
Breaking rings is what he’s seen knights do to their enemies, and he’s never heard it to be possible to create mana heart in the body of another person.
But even if he couldn’t believe it, the heavy lump he felt in his chest was proof enough.
“I am glad that you have become more powerful, sire,” old Bielefeld suddenly stammered out a congratulation out of the blue. When Lionel asked why he said this, the old marshal answered him with a smile.
“Your Majesty has absorbed the same amount of mana as a Master. It will be very useless right now, but it is a strength that your Majesty will always have and can develop with constant effort.”
Lionel could not help but be surprised all over again. Although he had thought the lump in his chest was heavy, he hadn’t realized just how much mana it contained. But his surprise soon turned into a frown.
“You talk as if I am a champion.”
“If your Majesty achieves great success in gaining enlightenment appropriate to your spirit, to become a champion is not impossible.”
“With my qualities, I don’t think that it’ll be easy to not only battle with but also harden this heart.”
Lionel knew that even if he possessed the same amount of mana as a Master, he couldn’t break down the wall because of his poor qualities.
“Where is my son? Where is the prince?”
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“His Highness the Crown Prince is in the process of replenishing his energy.”
Lionel now blamed himself even more. His son had performed a transfusion to change the nature of the mana held by another. How much effort had been spent to achieve this?
He wasn’t sure, but he knew that his body must’ve been hungry, and his son, the future of the kingdom, had surely expended a great amount of energy.
Lionel still considered his eldest son to be far too foolish. On the other hand, the fact that his son had used the elixir on his father, a substance considered to be a heavenly treasure, felt good to the king.
His judgment was so confused and conflicted that he couldn’t easily speak. He only smiled, but the Marquis of Bielefeld then smiled gently. He said only half of the elixir was used for treatment and that the Crown Prince had kept the other half.
Those words comforted Lionel quite a bit.
“I have to go to my son.”
When Lionel started to move, intent on going to the Palace of the First Prince, Marshal Bielefeld stepped up and held him back.
“For the time being, the Crown Prince has to be disciplined to recover his energy, so he asked that your Majesty not visit him before he can come out on his own. He told me to ask your Majesty to finish the rest of the work.”
“The child struggled so much to heal my body that he injured himself,” Lionel said and turned to Siorin Kirgayen. “Prepare yourself to report everything that happened while I was away.”
“Your Majesty has just recovered from your injury. I don’t think it would be right for me to act so formally.”
Hearing the words of the Prime Minister, King Lionel just laughed.
“I’ve never been more energetic and clear-headed in my lifetime than I am now. No, Prime Minister, you should not be worried about me. You should be bringing in the representative of Teuton.”
These weren’t just words; Lionel was really full of vitality. His anxiety, always feeling like he was being chased by something, was no more. And after his worries had disappeared, a lot has changed.
Lionel’s narrow vision broadened, and his narrow thoughts expanded. It felt like he could do a lot of things that he couldn’t do before. Countless things to be done right now came to his mind, and the king did not delay.
His emotions were different from the anxious impatience that had ruled his life as an incompetent monarch. Now, he was filled with motivation and passion. Lionel also had the same sense of purpose of his youth that he had lost after numerous frustrations and failures.
“Prime Minister, you should not delay for the sake of courtesy.”
Lionel’s voice was more energetic than ever before, and his eyes were glowing with a sparkling fervor that could almost be heard sizzling in the silence.
Seeing this, the Prime Minister and Great Marshal could not resist and accepted his order. And so, they left the king’s bedside.
And at that time, Prince Adrian Leonberger, who had complicated the king’s judgment, was locked up in his palace. His state was completely different than he had made the king and others people believe it to be. He was not resting to regain his depleted energy.
“No way… My true body had rejected me because of my oath to the royal family!”
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In his hand, he held a shining royal sword.