Chapter 27

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Translated by Sylph

Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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“Commander, I am sorry. I promised…… haah. I promised I would protect the young lady with my life.”

“You foolish bastard! What on earth were you thinking!”

“Is Al…… eric dead?”

Daddy couldn’t answer.

She only held Tie tightly and looked down at the red-haired woman.

The woman laughed hollowly and said,

“It’s, alright. Just don’t mind us and escape. The commander has the young lady too……”

“I’ll take care of it, so stop talking. Keep your mouth shut and breathe slowly.”

Daddy bent one knee.

As her view lowered, the red-haired woman’s face became clear.

The blue veins standing out on the woman’s neck were pulsing frighteningly.

“Haha, honestly, I think it’s amazing I even got this far. A thing that used to do nothing but slit pigs’ throats in the back alleys ran around the battlefield together with the little commander, so that’s glory enough.”

The arm Daddy was using to hold Tie trembled slightly.

“It’s not just me, huff. They were all like that. Basto too…… Aleric too, Victor too, everyone……”

For an instant, the woman’s gaze landed on Tie.

“Because the pretty young lady was born…… and after killing nothing but dark monsters every day, when we’d look at that cute, pretty face of yours, young lady……”

Tie forgot even to babble and only looked at the woman.

She couldn’t take her eyes away from the woman’s eyes, overflowing with affection.

“I wanted to see the young lady walk. I thought maybe someday the young lady would call my name too…… huff.”

The woman, gasping for breath, smiled faintly at Tie.

“Young lady. Please always stay healthy. And laugh a lot with the little commander.”

“……”

“Always, always, be happy without a single gap……”

But at some point, Livia’s slowing voice faded away.

Tie stared rigidly into Livia’s eyes.

The light in her pupils had gone out completely.

“Oooo! Oooooh-!”

When Tie thrashed, Daddy held her even tighter.

Daddy bent down and removed the mercenary registration tag hanging around Livia’s neck.

Then slowly, then more and more quickly, he began walking in the opposite direction.

“It’s okay, Tie. It’s okay.”

Daddy was muttering as if he were under some spell.

It sounded less as though she were speaking to Tie, and more as though she were chanting to herself.

“We can get out. We can get out of here, out of here……”

But before long even Daddy’s muttering voice stopped.

With a growing unease, Tie looked at the place Daddy’s gaze had fixed on blankly.

“Krureuk-”

With a short, bizarre sound, things began to reveal themselves from every direction.

Gigantic, hideous monsters that Tie had never seen before in her life surrounded the two of them.

* * *

“Gasp!”

Tie woke up drenched in sweat.

It was dark all around, and the lights from the square were shining beyond the curtains, so it seemed to be evening.

“A s-strange dream……”

Tie clenched her fists and forced back the tears that felt ready to come out.

Then she rubbed away the sweat gathered on her forehead with the back of her hand.

‘Young lady. Please always stay healthy. And laugh a lot with the commander.’

The image of the red-haired woman was still vivid before her eyes.

It was the first time she’d had such a vivid dream since the time she had that tyrannosaurus nightmare.

As Tie breathed deeply to calm her pounding heart, she suddenly stopped.

‘Th-they were all like that. Basto too…… Aleric too, Victor too, everyone……’

Because she had suddenly remembered other words the red-haired woman had said.

‘He said Basto.’

The woman had definitely said the name Basto.

Goosebumps prickled down Tie’s back.

‘Maybe it wasn’t just a dream?’

No matter how much she thought about it, there had been too many strange parts in that dream.

The way everyone called Daddy commander, the way Mister Basto’s name came up, and the monsters.

‘And the fact that Tie was a baby.’

Blinking blankly, Tie murmured,

“……Maybe it was something from long ago.”

Because at last she realized what the dream she had just had might have been.

“Maybe it was something that happened before Tie and Daddy went to the Republic of Korea……!”

Tie hurriedly got to her feet.

Then she began turning in circles around the room.

‘Now, Quail Class friends~ today, just like yesterday, we’re going to learn how dreams are made. What did teacher say yesterday? Our Yewon raised her hand? Let’s have her tell the friends, shall we?’

‘Dreams happen while the memories inside a child’s head get organiized!’

‘That’s right~ Our brain inside our head creates dreams while organizing memories from one day ago or even earlier.’

‘Teacher! Junsu said he dreamed about when he was inside his mommy’s tummy!’

‘Ah! I did noooot!’

‘Now, now! Quiet~’

On the day they had that lesson, Tie had raised her hand and given a presentation too.

What Tie talked about had to do with the “unconscious.”

The teacher had praised her and asked how she’d learned such a difficult word, and that still felt vivid now.

‘Ahem, ahem! The unconthious means all the stuff that’s packed inside your head even when you don’t know it yourself. They say sometimes you can dream things from the unconthious!’

‘Wow! Our Tie learned a difficult word? That’s amazing!’

‘Yeees! In Tie’s head, there is choco in the unconthious. So I dream about choco every day! But what if I put candy in there too? Then can I dream both candy and chocolate? Both?’

The teacher hadn’t answered Tie’s question.

But one thing was certain: Tie had learned something that day.

“You can even dream about things that happened a long time ago!”

Like just now.

But it was strange.

“Why was everybody calling Daddy little commander……?”

Grandpa Nordix had told her that the leader of the order of holy knights was usually called commander, not commander.

‘Come to think of it, Mister Basto is strange too.’

According to what Daddy had said, Mister Basto definitely should have been a holy knight too.

Because Daddy had said he had been his subordinate.

But Mister Basto looked like he hated holy knights intensely, far from being one.

And now she was even working as a mercenary together with Tie.

“Come to think of it, before too……”

The Daddy she had missed at the dock had been wearing an ash-colored robe.

Normally holy knights wore silver armor with fancy decorations over it.

So Daddy’s outfit had looked more like…… than a holy knight……

“No, no. It could’ve been undercover duty.”

Tie thought of the policeman who used to sometimes be on undercover duty in the alleyways of the shantytown.

That policeman was the only one who had overlooked the fact that Tie was an illegal resident.

Knowing that Tie lived in unit 106 of Gold Villa, she used to occasionally patrol the area around it.

Because if he walked around in police clothes, it made people uncomfortable, so he deliberately wore only shabby T-shirts.

‘Daddy might’ve been like that too……’

But no matter how much she tried to force the pieces together, she only got more confused.

‘It was an accident.’

Could that accident Daddy had spoken of long ago have been the terrible scene she’d seen in the dream?

That situation where all Daddy’s companions died, and Daddy alone had to face countless monsters while carrying Tie?

‘Then…… did Daddy kill all those monsters?’

That’s how he survived and escaped to the Republic of Korea, right?

But you couldn’t declare that everything in the dream had really happened, could you?

“Eheuu, I don’t know what is whaaat……!!”

She was smacking her forehead and furrowing her brow when.

“Tie!”

The door flew open and someone rushed inside.

It was Basto, wearing a worried expression.

“Mistterrr.”

“Are you alright? Your body? Hungry? Veil went to get food.”

The moment he came in, Basto sat Tie on the bed and turned her this way and that, checking her complexion.

Nordix, who had been standing one step behind, also approached Tie.

Then, in a serious voice, he opened his mouth.

“Tie, there is something we would like to ask you.”

When Tie nodded, the grandfather continued.

“Do you know that we are looking for your daddy?”

“Yes. I know you’re helping Tie.”

“But if we are to find your daddy, it seems there are first a few things we must ask.”

“What things……?”

“Can you tell us what your daddy’s name is? And where the two of you lived in the past as well?”