Conquest Complete, So Why Is the Affection Dropping? - Chapter 59
Seeing this unfamiliar message for the first time, I’m anxious because the D-day is just one day away. Could Cedric be planning something again? When I looked up at him with clenched fists, Cedric blinked his blue eyes.
“I suppose there’s no choice.”
Looking at his jewel-like eyes reminded me of the numerous blue jewels embedded in that massive pillar.
Those jewels were all blue, just like Cedric’s eyes.
“Since my lady fears me so much…”
Is he going to send me back?
Is this that cliché of ‘letting go because you love them’?
Indeed, clichés always prevail!
Cedric smiled somewhat sadly and pointed to a room across the way.
“Kill me, and take a new Cedric as your companion.”
“Are you insane?”
Black! This guy’s heart is pitch black!
How can someone who looks like a winter fairy made of sugar sculpture say such things!
“S-stop saying such frightening things, Cedric. My heart isn’t that strong.”
My mental state is already on the verge of collapse from all the chaos I’ve been through. One more big shock and I might snap completely and pass on to the next world. I don’t want to live with one foot in the coffin even in a game.
“My goal is just to get home safely. I don’t intend to harm you, so please stop scaring me too.”
“I never intended to frighten you, my lady.”
Yet you’re being terrifying as naturally as breathing. This is scarier than any horror story. This guy has no self-awareness and doesn’t know when to stop.
“But my lady, this tower is located above the sky. How do you plan to return to the ground?”
Beyond the window, there’s nothing but sky and clouds; looking down, no land is visible. I’m not sure if we’re just at such an immense height, or if magic is concealing the ground from view.
“Well, if I jump, I’ll fall to the ground.”
“Wouldn’t it be better to value your life more? Those who care about you would be sad.”
“…”
Of course, I wasn’t really planning to jump. Leaping from here without a parachute would be suicide.
Even as a player, if you try something completely unreasonable, the system either prevents you from taking that action or ends with a bad ending showing a lazy message like [You have died].
I don’t want to get a bad ending after coming this far, so I was just saying it.
“I don’t think we’re completely out of options.”
“Is that so?”
“Did you come looking for me because you’re worried I might find a way?”
I decided to test him.
Though it was speculation, it wasn’t entirely baseless.
‘After all, Cedric attacked the people at the harbor on the day of my wedding with Kaint.’
It couldn’t have been a coincidence. The colorful paper flowers falling from the sky were proof of that.
That day, Cedric already knew about my dawn wedding with Kaint. That’s why he could disguise the bombs as celebratory paper flowers to avoid suspicion.
“A man I met before told me something. That you can’t escape the eyes of the dawn sky above water.”
The reason why the dark city Niflheim existed underwater rather than by the water – to escape the eyes of the ‘dawn sky,’ he said.
At the time, I thought Marvis’s words were just abstract statements explaining the world’s lore, but looking at Cedric’s status window now, I understand.
The master of the dawn sky who leads the world to destruction.
Marvis built an underground city for the demon race to avoid Cedric’s attacks.
‘Which means he can observe the ground from here normally.’
When I looked up at him, Cedric appeared startled, closing his mouth and darting his eyes around.
He tilted his head from side to side as if calculating something, then broke into a smile.
“As expected, I can’t win against you, my lady.”
“…”
I took a shot, and it hit?
Though there was evidence, Shin Joo-ah’s guessing skills aren’t dead yet!
While biting the inside of my mouth and tensing my eyes to hide my inner surprise, Cedric smiled gently. The backlight behind his smile grew brighter, and once again came the sound of turning pages.
[Cedric]’s Current Affection: 119
Until next bomb: D-1
I thought the sound effects when affection increases were different for each character route, but for Cedric, it seems to be the sound of turning pages.
While I was focused on the concerning bomb counter below, Cedric extended his hand toward me.
“Let me guide you. Shall we go together?”
“W-where are you taking me?”
“To the safest place where we can watch the world’s destruction.”
Sounds like he wants to take me right into the middle of a bloody battlefield?
***
Cedric led me downstairs. After descending the spiral staircase that wound along the tower’s walls for quite some time, we came upon a rather peculiar space.
“…Mirrors?”
The square room’s walls were entirely covered in luminous mirrors. However, they might not have been real mirrors, as they weren’t reflecting our images.
“This is the Temple, isn’t it?”
Though it was eerily empty, it was undoubtedly the Temple where I had been staying. The priests were having what appeared to be a serious discussion, while the Holy Knights were sighing as they gazed at the sky with devastated expressions.
And Hexion was watching it all from afar.
‘So he ended up returning to the Temple after all…’
Though he still looked haggard, he didn’t seem to be in pain, probably thanks to having his wounds treated.
I had worried about whether he could return to the Temple while being falsely accused, but perhaps due to the gravity of the Temple’s situation, there didn’t seem to be any hostility toward him.
Cedric, who had been observing the destroyed Temple scene, let out a regretful sigh.
“What a shame. If that man had been there, I would have turned him into mere chunks of meat.”
“Stop saying such horrible things. Unless you want me to treat you as less than meat.”
What’s with saying such brutal things while wearing a face like he’s making a shy confession?
It’s impossible for me, living in a constitutional state, to understand Cedric’s mindset as he carries out massacres. For now, I decided to just feel relieved that Hexion hadn’t been caught up in the incident.
As I shifted my gaze to the right, my brief sense of relief quickly turned to guilt.
‘Because I came here, Kaint is struggling all alone.’
For better or worse, the mirror showed Kaint’s somewhat chaotic castle rather than the harbor that would likely reek of blood just from looking at it.
Kaint was trying to manage the situation while comforting his younger siblings, who were hiccupping with pale faces from shock.
‘His subordinates seem badly injured too, I wonder if they’ll be alright.’
Kaint’s complexion looked even worse than Hexion’s. It’s understandable, considering his bride was kidnapped by a magician who descended from the sky on their wedding day.
I’m not sure whether to feel relieved or sad that he’s barely holding it together while taking care of his hurt siblings and injured subordinates.
“A victory filled with nothing but wounds.”
“What did you say?”
“Even with the blessing of victory, victory doesn’t always bring joy.”
I got goosebumps at his words, fitting for a mass murderer. When I tried to quickly distance myself from him, Cedric gently grabbed my chin and turned my head.
“L-let go!”
“You should look at the remaining one too.”
“What remaining… oh.”
Where Cedric’s hand turned my head, there was an exotic scene I had seen before.
Yellow and orange lights floating in darkness. People hurriedly climb up and down underground stairs intertwined with long pipes.
The scenery of Niflheim, the City of Darkness.
“I thought you could only see above water…”
“Ah, that was true originally. But thanks to the elevator starting to work, the route was connected.”
Elevator? That ancient relic I fixed?
So because it connected the cities above and below water, Cedric became able to spy on the underground dark city too?
“Just how much and where are you trying to spy on? Are you some kind of voyeur?”
“That’s a misunderstanding, my lady. Things simply become visible. That ancient relic originally belonged to Valhalla, after all.”
Are you saying the elevator from the tower in the sky fell and got stuck underground? From this height, it should have shattered to pieces, so it’s amazing that it only ended up malfunctioning rather than being completely destroyed.
‘Surely the dark city wasn’t created because that enormous structure fell and was carved out of the ground?’
Come to think of it, when they restored the ancient Warp Gate at the Temple, a hole appeared in the sky too. They said there were incidents of attacks on the Holy City from the sky long ago.
Could it be that those weren’t attacks from the demon race, but rather…
‘Was it this guy attacking with magic from the sky?’
If that’s the case, then instead of restoring defunct ancient relics to enrich people’s lives, I had actually opened the curtains to war.
