ATTNH - Chapter 25

- Episode 25

The one who governed the mountain was the Dragon of Time, and Adelheid received that blessing.

The entire mountain was within her years.

He cannot fully understand her heart, trapped by the passage of time.

Dominic thought of Adelheid, who was trapped.

Asking about the slaying of the dragon, smiling with eyes crinkled, a coquettish voice, swaying steps, slender hands turning pages, flower stems snapping between fingers, a bored face, sobs flowing from the study, a thunderous scream, a bloodless, pale day, a body trembling uncontrollably. And the end of this life.

Why do I think about all of this?

I don't know. I don't know.

'Where did you learn to snap the stems off like that?'

I can't tell...

The summit of the mountain shook as if there had been an earthquake.

Calecresaol's heart pounded as if it were about to burst.

The dragons were returning to the moment they met their deaths a thousand years ago. At the center of the top, time mixes haphazardly. And finally, something was born.

In the very beginning, when even the records are unclear, the highest human of a certain kingdom stood before a dragon and shouted.

'O Master of the Mountains! In our Henburg, there are no dragons, nor any blessings. Only Henburg is like this! Have you forgotten the myth of our nation, which was founded together at the very beginning?'

'I have nothing to give you.'

'You are the greatest dragon. You do not die even if you die, and in all these worlds, you are the Dragon who governs the moon. How can you say that you have nothing to give?'

As Dominic looked at the story of ancient times, he wondered. A dragon that cannot die. Then what is this dragon corpse frozen in the moment of death?

'Do you think it is right for a dragon to intervene in the human world? You will receive blessings, but you will surely lose your world. Go back.'

Calecresaol coldly kicked him out.

The dragons loved humans. The absolute beings living a life close to eternity loved those lives, so weak, living only a fleeting moment compared to eternity, and sometimes illogical and contradictory. Perhaps it was closer to longing.

Dragons could not fully understand humans. They constantly desired. They hoped not to lose. They wished not to die. They grieved over defeat and despaired over death. Craving to obtain some absolute power, they each came before the guardian dragon of their respective countries and prayed.

The dragons who loved such humans bestowed blessings.

Only Calecresaol thought it was wrong.

However, humans came to the Mountain of Time demanding blessings, and came again and again, and finally set the mountain on fire. Black ash from the burned forest flew toward Dominic, who stood in a single layer of glass. The Dragon of Time was not enraged. It merely spoke silently in a sorrowful voice.

'Why do you not realize that you are destroying your own world with your own hands? The world will wage war with blessings, win with blessings, and be defeated with blessings.'

Those words became a mace and struck Dominic down.

Calecresaol was right. Because of the blessing, human effort was sometimes meaningless; because of the blessing, human life was sometimes objective; because of the blessing, sometimes trampled, sometimes won, sometimes lost, and eventually, some people's world was destroyed.

However, humans continued to shout.

'It is not so. Even if it were, it does not matter. O Dragon, grant us the blessing of the ages. I wish for this mountain to rule over us! I pray for my country to be eternal! May my name be eternal, and may my descendants be eternal. I hope!'

The moment subjectivity begins, the human world will no longer be a world solely for humans. For that is what absoluteness is.

A crack appeared in the ground where Dominic was standing. He hurriedly stepped back, but the entire area was already collapsing.

He staggered violently and looked at the dragon with a confused gaze.

Recresaol's vertically slit red eyes held Dominic in their gaze.

'...I shall bestow blessings upon you.’ 

It crumbled as if consumed by fire.

Dominic fell endlessly downward. However, it was not fast, nor was it scary. His fingertips scattered like dust in the air.

The burnt ashes that had followed in drifted around. The distant place was slowly brightening.

He saw the Age of Dragons that is said to have existed a thousand years ago.

It was an era when the Dragon Slayer was greater than the King.

Brave men set out to defeat the enemy's dragon.

One by one, dragons were slain, and accordingly, nations were established and fell. The dragon was the nation, and the dragon was the world.

After a long era of turmoil passed, one day the dragons secluded themselves in the Mountain of Time.

The world said that the dragons had hidden away out of fear of death. Those who entered the mountain to kill the dragons never returned. However, the dragons' blessings remained, and the world lived upholding those blessings.

The sacrifice that comes with absolute power was 'unavoidable'.

Because it is absolute.

Five dragons are sleeping on the mountaintop.

Dominic Legenon tore out the heart of the nine-heaven dragon Callesius and proved it to the world.

I am the beneficiary of the blessing, and I entered the Mountain of Time and emerged alive. Behold. Your blessing is gone. Genomes triumph.

And at the summit, Calecresaol opened his closed eyes.

Dominic gripped the dragon's still-beating heart tightly. Even though it had already scattered and vanished down to his forearm, he still had the sensation of gripping the heart, and it was still being held.

The speed of the fall into the dizzying abyss grew faster and faster. He shouted desperately.

"O Dragon! Please withdraw your blessing!"

- ...

"Because of that blessing, many were unfortunate, sacrificed, and had their lives ruined. And the last one to receive the blessing of time carries an unending life! How can this be called a blessing?" 

- ...

“You are right. Our world is no longer our own. It is not right for humans to be absolute. O Dragon, you are correct!”

- ...

"Please withdraw your blessing, my..." 

-...

"...No one knows the full extent of her world. She always lives with memories that never happened. She alone possesses memories that no one else in the world has. Having barely managed to come to know even a small part of it, I will forget it as I always have, and then she will be left alone again. I cannot bear that."

- ...

"She is... just a person. She was someone who possesses memories of a long time. The one with the right to reclaim her life...!"

-  We have fallen into eternal sleep, so why do you think blessings exist?

“...What do you mean?”

- We know that you have lost your world because of us. Therefore, we have fallen into eternal sleep, and the Dragon's Blessing ran its course a thousand years ago.

"But it still exists. She, too, continues, just like that..."

- Humans have had the dragon and its blessing since the beginning of time. They have believed in our existence. It was the same for the thousand years following our disappearance. How foolish they are! The reason that blessing continues is neither the power nor the will of the dragons.

"..." 

- It is because you have believed for a long time.

"..." 

- The mountain of time feeds on time. Every story contained within time is your story and the source of enduring blessings.

"..." 

- O man acclaimed by the world, if you deny the blessing, if you do not believe in it, the power of the blessing will not reach you alone. But at the same time, you will lose your blessing as a hero. You will no longer be able to enter the Mountain of Time.

“It doesn’t matter.”

At the falling answer, Calecresaol's pupils narrowed.

A brief silence followed, and before he knew it, the halo of light had risen to his chest.

Dominic squeezed his eyes shut and then opened them.

"It doesn't matter. I have to go. I must return to her without forgetting anything."

The moment he put the period at the end, the heartbeat in his hand stopped abruptly.

- ...We did not hide out of fear of death. On the contrary, we have longed for death for a long time. However, if the death we have so earnestly desired is to be used by the human world, what could be sadder than that?

“What must I... do?”

- Tell those who will receive my blessing to cut off the ceaseless years.

"However, she met her death." 

- To one who has repeated the years countless times, the mountain of time is like poison; what more could I ask of a woman? Moreover, how could we, who are neither dead nor alive, take away the blessing? Therefore, promise me. That whenever it may be, you will stop the hearts of all our dragons.

Just as he was about to ask what to do, Calecresaol added.

- I also promise. Her descendants will be able to kill us.

Amidst the vast, empty surroundings, Dominic barely managed to nod. He nodded several times. The next moment, the surroundings were turned upside down. Calecresaol's voice faded away intermittently.

- What you have seen and heard here... must be kept silent. Not to anyone. For this alone is the only thing remaining in the world... absolute.

The body, already almost gone, plummets into the distance.

The heart he had been clutching was nowhere to be found. Beyond the vast field of vision, in a very distant place, he could see that place.

It was an illusion existing beneath the memory. In front of the gate of Mont Palace. The place where Dominic had stood.

The place where Adelheid used to sit, read a book, and speak. A broken flower stem lay on the floor.

His heart feels as if it is shimmering in water.

He once had a different thought in the same place.

She is an unpleasant, vulgar, and dishonorable woman, unworthy of being loved.

However, the fickleness of a young man in love was worse than that of a beast, and those thoughts had become worse than a broken flower stem.

She was a woman to whom even giving every precious thing in the world would not be enough.

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