“Ah, father!”
"Aaaargh!"
Ryan looked down indifferently at his father's pained face.
And he thrust the knife deeper.
"Whoa, heh..."
"Even in the midst of this, you're thinking of catching me."
Blue veins clearly bulged on Edgar's forehead as he gritted his teeth and endured it.
"Next up is the neck."
Ryan said as he drew his sword.
"If you want to die peacefully, turn it off."
"...Kill me."
Ryan's eyes narrowed.
Edgar muttered detachedly with a pale face.
"Just... Kill me first."
"..."
"I'm going to die one way or another, so do you think I... would sell my children just to live one more second...?"
"..."
Ryan's expression crumpled up.
Edgar knows exactly what Ryan wants right now.
If he disabled the incapacitation while knowing about the instant kill technique, it is no different from a father killing his own child with his own hands.
The final moments of the father that his children will remember as they die will also be such a heartless image.
Ryan wanted to inflict such a tragedy, and Edgar had no intention of doing as he wished.
“Ugh...!!”
Ryan thrust the knife again. This time, between the neck and shoulder, in a slightly more fatal spot.
"You could die here if you're not careful."
Ryan turned around with the knife still thrust in, bringing Elliott into his sight.
More strength in his hands.
<Instant death>
More, more.
<Instant death>
Even though it's being given...
<Instant death>
The neutralization was not lifted.
"Kill me, kill me... No, never mind. Torture me to your heart's content, then send me away..."
"..."
"Then, won't it be resolved just as you wish... And as for the rest, let them rest in peace..."
"..."
Tears welled up in his wide-open eyes as he endured the pain. Edgar was also in charge of the fact that he would die if he was stabbed just a little more.
Still, he endures.
...Why?
Sshhh.
Ryan drew his sword.
And then, step by step, he slowly stepped back.
"Father!"
“Ahh, Father!”
As Ryan distanced himself, Elliott and Diana ran toward the collapsing Edgar.
“Brigitte!”
"Sister! Here you go!"
At Diana's call, Brigitte took a vial of medicine from somewhere and handed it to her.
"Drink! Drink, Father!"
Diana sobbingly thrust a vial of medicine at Edgar.
Why is it again, older sister?
Diana is trying to save her father, even though she knows that letting him die will lift the incapacitation.
Did you know you would die instantly if released?
However, if she knew that, she would also know that she was going to die one way or another. She would have also decided that it was better to die peacefully than to be beaten to death miserably.
Therefore, Diana's actions are purely intended to save her father.
"It's done... Use it when you need it..."
Edgar gave up the life-saving medicine even for a fatal wound.
Ryan stared blankly at the sight of them hugging each other.
This can't be happening.
Not a single person acted as Ryan had expected.
Elliott, Edgar, and Diana, too.
The moment Ryan saw with his own eyes that the bond between them, which he had thought was merely shallow affection, was more solid than he had imagined, he was seized by unbearable rage.
A heartless father who abandoned his child for being incompetent, and brothers who coldly severed ties with their younger sibling and cast them outside the fence, claiming it was their father's will.
Ryan was able to endure it because he knew such a past. He wasn't envious. Because even though they called themselves family, he thought their relationship was fragile and could crack or break at any moment.
Someone who can be discarded if they are useless, and who can be discarded again and again... that kind of...
So, on this final day, he wanted to show it. Their bond, which would one day be torn like a sheet of paper in the face of the desperate struggle for survival.
Brothers who will desperately trample over each other to survive, a father for whom their own lives are more important than their children, and affection devoid of any sincerity
However, what has made them so hardened now?
How many years together?
What memories will they have with each other?
It is impossible to know. However, one fact was certain. Even among those who were like pests deserving of dying and disappearing, bonds and love clearly existed.
"Ha-hahaha..."
Ryan laughed hollowly.
It didn't feel satisfying at all. Because the ending he had imagined thousands of times wasn't like this.
"..."
As Ryan stepped back blankly, David's hair suddenly touched his hand.
Enraged, Ryan grabbed his brother's head and roughly.
Bang!
Bang!
He lifted and slammed it down as if to smash the back of the head. Thick blood flowed onto the table.
"Aaaargh!"
Then Elliott rushed forward. He was crying. He swung his fist at Ryan. The body, flailing comically without even making contact, slumped to his knees.
"Me. Hit me. Me..."
"..."
It's really funny.
Why did Elliott, such a consistent older brother, act so heartlessly toward his youngest sibling after being kicked out at the age of twelve?
"Ryan...'
From a distance, Edgar weakly opened his mouth and called out to Ryan.
With a face as pale as a child, he barely managed to move his lips and mumble.
"Come here, I will die for you..."
Ryan snorted.
He knows why his father is trying to stall for time. He must be waiting for Christa. To make an attempt, even if it is a meaningless struggle.
And those detached eyes are speaking. That he will offer himself as a sacrifice for the waiting, in place of his son.
Ryan found Edgar's gaze utterly repulsive.
Father. My heartless father.
Even if his love for his child began out of necessity and utility...
In the end, eventually, it seems that sincerity was bound to form somewhere deep within his heart
Since he is also human.
"...My Lord."
Max called out in a worried voice as he watched Ryan trembling with rage.
"Drag them out and kill them where they can't be seen."
Ryan gestured toward the kneeling Elliott with his chin and quietly gave an order.
Consideration?
No.
It was for Ryan himself.
Watching them genuinely grieve and suffer while watching Elliott's death, the love for the family...
He didn't want to check.
"I feel like shit."
A terrible sense of emptiness tightened its grip around his neck.
He came here as a punisher for the sake of a great cause, but that fact did not sink in.
He felt like a murderer who had simply herded a family into a cage like beasts and horribly trampled upon them.
"You ruined my whole life... f***."
To think they were just playing their disgusting family games.
At this very moment, he had returned as a twelve-year-old boy, Ryan Wassenberg.
As that boy who was abandoned by everyone and left alone in the world.
Nothing has changed, neither then nor now.
The primal affection and bond he had always longed for, which he lost so quickly that he instinctively had no choice but to crave.
It still existed for them, but it did not exist for the one who was banished.
Just me.
Alone.
Poor twelve-year-old Ryan Wassenberg, stripped of everything and cast all alone into the world...
“Lion!!!”
Stop.
Ryan's eyes widened.
Yes, I looked back.
Vania.
"You, you... what?!"
In that instant, Ryan was shocked the moment he saw the owner of the voice he had thought was a hallucination.
“I’m here!”
"Hey! Are you crazy?! Why are you..."
He quickly checked on her safety first. She was safe among the soldiers. Kali and Vhrista were also by her side.
Kali gestured to Christa with her chin, signaling that there was no need to worry.
Before Ryan could even breathe a sigh of relief after confirming.
“My daughter!”
His ears went numb at the sudden remark.
"Hey, you knew I had an instant kill ability, so what were you thinking coming here so fearlessly at first?"
"It was scary! It was scary... but I had abandoned my family back then and been left all alone in the world. That was even scarier."
"..."
"Dad did the same thing."
“Brother!”
"So, as I went to meet him, I prayed. "Please, let my brother be a good person."
"Hehe. Is it scary to be alone?"
"Yes, it's sad and lonely. So, by meeting my older brother, I can rely on you, and you can rely on me, so that we can each rely on one another."
“Your family!”
"Please let us become a family. That's what I prayed for."
Ryan smiled faintly.
"Dad and I became family by 'choosing' each other, right? So we have a much more amazing and wonderful relationship."
Right?
That's right.
“Vania has arrived!”
You came looking for me, and I held your hand.
From then on we...
"For the rest of our lives, we will love and cherish each other. Even if we fight, we will make up quickly, and no matter what we change into, I will never abandon you. Be that kind of person to me, and I will be that kind of person to you too."
Yeah, that's it...
“Because that’s family.”
Ryan laughed along as he watched Vania giggle.
Ah.
What on earth was it that made me feel so wronged and so empty?
Brothers, family, love. Fence.
I got something like that again, too.
"I'm, I, I'm a total novice, but~!"
“Fuha!”
Vania had entered shouting confidently, but her legs were trembling like a rabbit about to be eaten by a lion.
Yeah, look at that.
I'm here too.
Even though she's terrified, she doesn't hesitate to come into this mud to rescue me...
I have a really cool ally.
"Are you a stupid bunny?!"
Ryan chuckled.
"I, the strongest person in the world, am your family, so what are you afraid of!"
Saying playfully, he spread his arms wide toward Vania.
"Come into my arms!"
"...? You want me to go in there right now?!"
"Ah. Hurry!"
"I, I must be crazy~!"
Despite her disgust, Vania ran toward him without hesitation, tapping her toes as if wading through a minefield.
Snap. Ryan, who had snatched her by the shoulders, turned around.
Everyone was looking at him in astonishment.
The beings who were his father, his brothers, and now did nothing to him.
One by one, with shocked expressions at Vania's appearance.
"Ahahahaha!"
Only then, after a long time, finally.
[Ryan Wassenberg] died.
Abandoned, lonely, and alone.
Like an indelible scar, engraved deep in my heart and breathing for a lifetime...
That dreadful twelve-year-old boy, Ryan Wassenberg.
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