The West Wind's Destination - Chapter 75
Again, she returned.
Bea Westwind had lived her early years against the sandstorms of the desert.
Born on arid land, she grew up against the wind mixed with sand grains. In a region where it was hard to find nutritious organic matter, a useless child was easily discarded.
Wait here.
Those words meant the same thing as ‘we’re not coming back’.
To the abandoned child, those whispered words meant this: ‘Quietly await death’. To be swept away by an approaching sandstorm eventually, to be fed to the crows that scavenged the barren sands.
Thus, becoming a slave was, for Bea, a form of salvation.
She thought it was okay just to have that. A place to lay her body, something rough to cover herself with, and even if it was just hard bread, something to eat.
Meeting her master by happenstance and becoming an alchemist was an experience that vastly expanded her narrow world.
From living day to day merely surviving, doing menial tasks as told in a beggarly life, to having a purpose, achieving it, and receiving somewhat better treatment.
Therefore, Bea, who had once lost everything again, thought there was only one way to bring back such a life to herself.
Until then, she didn’t know what this emotion was. She only knew that she desperately wanted to reclaim something.
Yes. Just as Aseph Vilkanos had said.
―You gave me a new life.
―It’s a miracle for me. You wouldn’t understand how much it means to me. Bea, you have lit up my dark path.
―I love you.
Aseph Vilkanos defined it.
For Bea, her master was such a person.
Since being left alone on the sands long ago, Bea had been a lost person.
Wandering the desert without a settlement, like a sandstorm. A dry wind that no one welcomes to stay.
When by the side of a master who saw use in such a thing, Bea thought she had finally found a reason to live. She was a component solely for the purpose of her master, thinking of everything efficiently. Beyond that, she was a perfect tool, incapable of thinking of anything else.
But since meeting Aseph, her inherent functions began to deteriorate. From always viewing the world and thinking of its principles, Bea started to indulge in unnecessary sentimentality following him.
Even as the homunculus was breaking down, nearing complete operational failure, Bea struggled to find a way to fix it. Her weakened body wouldn’t obey her, and her mind was increasingly filled with distracting thoughts.
Thus, she reached for the hearing aid.
The magical device made by her master.
A body that had not functioned properly from the beginning was okay as long as she wore it. To repair the faltering homunculus, Bea thought she needed to correct her disordered body.
Up until then, she had only thought about repairing the homunculus, completely forgetting about her master.
But as soon as she put it on, commands her master always issued filled her mind.
―Protect me from all threats.
And after that, she couldn’t remember well.
No, her mind remembered.
She just couldn’t understand what she had been thinking when she acted.
Just the last unfulfilled command of her master, to protect him from death, she had acted.
The magical stone prepared to repair Homun wasn’t used for its intended purpose.
Essentially, she had returned everything to how it had been planned long ago.
Yet, she still didn’t understand. She was confused.
Bea had never doubted her actions. After leaving the desert, she never looked back at her past. No, she didn’t even think she should.
She had lived always doing as her master commanded. It was the only way Bea could survive.
But that excessively blind thinking suddenly shattered.
What cleared in her mind were the sights of a bleeding Aseph Vilkanos and the unconscious Homun. The smell of blood mixed with the wind.
On the battlefield, under her master’s command, she had killed countless people. She had been covered in blood and received innumerable resentful glares.
Regardless of how this situation arose, Aseph’s expected reaction was almost a given.
But contrary to what Bea had braced for, a tender voice came from him.
―Are you okay? Are you hurt?
Her heart seemed to drop at those words. That must have been the first sensation she truly felt upon regaining consciousness. Her hands trembled, unable to properly hold her weapon.
Fear.
A fear like that of humans facing the unknown.
There was no one who would say such words after being wounded by her.
No, how could such a thing exist in the world?
Retreating in sheer terror, she was caught by him once more.
―I love you, don’t go.
―You’ve touched my heart, haven’t you?
Such things.
She didn’t know such things.
Thus, she ran away.
