At The End Of The Hidden Greenery - Chapter 60
Chapter 60
“…That could be intentionally blocked?”
Whenever an Akarna touched a person, their wounds would slowly be healed.
When blood was fed or applied to others, wounds healed more quickly and the severed body was regenerated.
An Akarna was not affected by the miasma, and the miasma was automatically purified whenever she’d go to the land where the miasma resided. As if that energy was avoiding the Akarna.
It was because the power of purification resided in an Akarna, and it spread around an Akarna’s body.
However, originally, an Akarna’s power was the expression of will. It was absurd that the power awakened from a strong will did not move according to the will of the owner of the power.
“Yes…”
The High Priest looked at the Crown Prince and sighed as if he had given up.
“Because it’s your strength in the first place.”
“The reason I can’t do that is because you broke me.”
“No, Akarna.”
How much did the temple and the empire conceal and monopolize this information? How many benefits have they enjoyed using it? As the Empire grew stronger, the situation of the outer wall with other countries without an Akarna became more miserable.
“Explain further.”
“…Yes.”
As the Crown Prince spoke gloomily, the High Priest raised both hands in surrender.
“I knew you were from another dimension, another world. We summoned you to be that way… But we didn’t break you. It’s just… Huu.”
The high priest chose his words over and over again, showing that he really didn’t want to talk about this.
Then, when the Crown Prince placed his hand on his waist to draw his sword again, the High Priest said urgently.
“It is a natural phenomenon for dimensions to collide with one another. Originally, when a living being gets stuck in a huge gap between dimensions, it is normal to be torn to pieces. Since you were artificially created, you don’t realize your power. You have to overcome that place alone to become a complete Akarna.”
Up to that point, Jiwoo had also heard from the alchemist.
“And if they’re not human, they’re a monster.”
“…I beg your pardon?”
Not only Jiwoo, but also the Crown Prince who was listening from the side were surprised.
If a human endures its enormous power, it becomes an Akarna, and if it is not a human, it becomes a beast.
“In the simplest terms, an Akarna is a being who removes any phenomena they deem to be a threat. Injury, disease, aging… There are many, many examples.”
“…Then the beast? What about the beast? The beast is not the same, right?”
“That’s because humans are a threat to the beasts. Akarna… thinks we’re on their side because we’re human. Because we’re human, we can inherit that privilege.”
On her side? Are they on her side? The Temple and the Empire, all that trash is on her side? Biting her lip, she barely spoke.
“I don’t think I want to spare people like you.”
“Ah… that’s why we’re educating them from the beginning. Assigning roles in the temple, duty for the world, step by step…”
“You guys even took advantage of the Akarna’s escape, didn’t you?”
“There’s a way to do that as well. For example, since they’ve done their part, we’ll say that they’ve returned to the original world, and then close their eyes. If you kill someone without them knowing they’re dying, the power won’t completely be extinguished.”
Akarnas who were executed in that way by the temple would have smiled until the moment they died, expecting to return to their hometowns.
Jiwoo turned pale with disgust, feeling utterly devastated. Her hands trembled.
The High Priest, who was speaking calmly in front of her, bit his finger with his mouth. When he ripped it open with his teeth, there was a small cut on his finger.
The high priest forcibly grabbed Jiwoo’s trembling hand and put it on his wound. A wound as small as this one could have been healed with the mere touch of Akarna’s hand.
As evidence of that, the wound was slowly healing.
That person is a human, too.
“Now, I am the high priest who tricks and kills Akarnas like you in that way. I am a threat to you. Do you want to heal me?”
“No.”
She didn’t want to. It was disgusting.
The wound, which was gradually healing, stopped and began to open again. The high priest said right away.
“You’re doing well.”
The Crown Prince who was silent next to her asked.
“…If the beast and Akarna are not fundamentally different, why are only the beasts increasing?”
“Haa… Your Highness. That is not my purpose for today.”
“Tell me properly.”
The High Priest, who had been relaxed while dealing with Jiwoo, gulped.
“That really wasn’t our intention. The ruined sanctuary is behaving strangely…”
The sanctuary was originally a place where Akarna appeared.
A trace left on the ground as the phenomenon occurs more often, created as dimensions collide with each other. It was said that there were more such places on the outer wall, but the empire and the temple destroyed them all to monopolize the Akarna.
“Are beasts appearing in the sanctuary you destroyed?”
“…Yes”
It was originally a place where natural phenomena occurred. Even if people broke it, the flow of nature that originally occurred there could not have been reversed.
However, the ruined sanctuary had become a suitable place for creatures that live only to survive, rather than creatures with intelligence and sensitivity like humans.
In the first place, humans were not allowed to manipulate the law of nature.
So Caranazion lost their Akarna and became a world infested with beasts. There were too many that the temple had destroyed themselves to turn back now.
“Did you do that knowing how far the impact would go?”
“We don’t know. In the first place, it was the Imperial Family’s request. No one cared about it other than the Empire. Whether it was another country or the outer wall.”
Or any other continent.
They didn’t know, but Jiwoo seemed to know.
The influence of the damaged sanctuary in Caranazion extended to other continents. Because of the ever-growing number of beasts, even Elandos of El Ragneil became ill.
Regardless of the uncomfortable silence in the room, the High Priest, who had finished his job, got up.
“Then, Akarna, you just have to remember what you felt about me today. If they find out that you have the Akarna’s power in the future, I can’t guarantee how the temple will act.”
“You’ve used me just like that, and now you’re going to treat me like a monster?”
The High Priest did not answer. Does he even need to answer? The temple was already treating the Akarna as a beast.
“Scumbags.”
Jiwoo teared up.
“I want you all to perish. I just want you all to die.”
The High Priest didn’t say anything. He received a lot of curses like that as a High Priest, and he didn’t live a peaceful life enough to be hurt by those things.
However, he only conveyed one fact to Akarna.
“Yes. We’re scum, but there are more good people out there. You’re not going to become a real beast, are you?”
Now, the only sanctuary left on this land was the temple. She couldn’t kill everyone in this land because of her hatred for the Temple and the Empire.
Among them, there were those like the alchemist of the outer wall who tried to save Akarnas like Jiwoo. Ordinary people who are neither imperial citizens nor temple believers.
“Then rest, Akarna.”
A saintess. If not that, a witch.
Never once had she been treated like a normal human being.
Jiwoo buried her face in her lap and cried, not noticing that the High Priest already left.
Only the Crown Prince, who had been watching Jiwoo cry silently, watched upon her back.
The Crown Prince could not hastily comfort Jiwoo, who was crying in dismay. As he was a descendant of the imperial lineage, the culprit behind all of this, was he really qualified to do so?
After quietly closing the bedroom door, the Crown Prince listened to someone’s presence in the shadows.
“Your Highness, are you finished?”
“…Yes.”
“Shall I take care of it?”
The Crown Prince thought for a moment, then he said quietly.
“…Add one thing. Make him think he has returned safely to the temple, then torture him to death.”
The assassin disappeared without a trace.
On that day, the temple lost one of its two high priests.
Time went by fast. Tevon hadn’t shown his face for even once since that day. He told her that their situation was not good, but she had no idea where or how they were living.
Jiwoo knew that they would come to pick her up quickly.
Helkainis was said to be a great wizard who could travel great distances. She knew that he could protect the others well, survive the threats of the empire and the temple, and come to her rescue before the unstoppable wedding.
But there was no news
Jiwoo longed for it terribly, but time didn’t stop. The wedding ceremony that the Crown Prince hastily prepared was right around the corner.
At first, Jiwoo also radiated unrelenting hatred toward the Crown Prince and the temple. However, as time passed, only the children of Elandos who abandoned her here filled her mind.
‘Did you abandon me? That couldn’t be true.’
Jiwoo had no desire for anything.
Even when people changed her clothes, put on makeup, and hung all sorts of jewelry on her body, she felt nothing.
Even though they spoke kindly to the Akarna, she gave no answer, so they talked among themselves.
How could the Crown Princess be like this.
Someone had to die for a new Akarna to be summoned. Jiwoo would have to overlook that new Akarna’s suffering. Would she have to live like this in a continent that is slowly self-destructing?
…The outer wall is so terrible, is it okay?
That’s why Akarna’s wedding is being rushed right now. Because God has to find a new body.
The outer wall.
Jiwoo, who had been absent-mindedly, raised her head. Nothing else but that word reached her ears.
While helping with the wedding ceremony to be held this afternoon, the people who were attending on Akarna spoke of the outer wall.
Instead of the imperial language, they spoke in a foreign tongue, not knowing that the Akarna could understand any language here. Even the imperial language that Jiwoo said in the first place was ignored because it was short.
“…What are you talking about?”
“…W-What?”
One of the people who was speaking didn’t know how to react, and quickly hid something behind.
“What is that? Give that to me!”
“Ah, that… Akarna!”
Jiwoo forcibly took the newspaper they were reading and read it. Her both hands that were holding the newspaper tightly trembled.
“The outer wall. Destroyed…?”
She read the text in a daze, but she couldn’t see what it meant.
“The forest was all burned by fire, and caused an epidemic of unknown origin… All the inhabitants of the outer wall were destroyed…”
[ …Even if they were unbelievers and blasphemers, there are many opinions that this is an excessive treatment by God.
But it can also be a hopeful thing. These disasters are similar to the phenomenon when God seeks a new Akarna, and will soon replace the Akarna that is not fulfilling its current duties… ]
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