I Became the Tyrant of a Defense Game [EN]: Chapter 539

Zenith was dragged back to the Misty Kingdom.

Kneeling in the plaza, Zenith was beaten by the king’s soldiers all night long.

But no matter how much he was beaten and whipped, he didn’t let go of the child in his arms. He knew that the moment he did, the child would die.

“You, you vile bastard……”

“He won’t give up the child. What should we do?”

“Lock him in the dungeon for now. The King will interrogate him personally tomorrow.”

So, Zenith was locked in a solitary cell.

It was a solitary cell, but he wasn’t alone. The child was still in his arms.

“……”

Zenith looked down at the child with hollow eyes. The young child was breathing weakly, gasping for air.

Since birth, he hadn’t had a drop of milk, not even a sip of water. The child’s breathing was faint, as if it would go out at any moment.

“……”

If only this child would die here.

Then he could leave the Misty Kingdom without any trouble, and there might not be any major discord between the Empire and the Misty Kingdom.

After all, he had only helped with the princess’s delivery.

Even if this child survived, who would love him?

Another unfortunate life, abandoned by irresponsible parents, would only be added to the world.

As the breaths from the tiny child’s nose grew fainter, Zenith unknowingly felt a sense of relief.

Yes, it’s better if you leave now.

Before you taste the pain that fills the world, before you realize what suffering is, peacefully…….

“……?”

It was then.

Something blurry flashed through the bars. Zenith looked up at the window above him, puzzled.

It was a dark night, and there wasn’t a single lamp around, so where was the light coming from?

“……Ah.”

There—moonlight.

The sky of this terrible country, always covered in dark clouds, was slightly parted, and a ray of moonlight was streaming down through the gap.

The light touched the child’s face, revealing his innocent, unknowing features.

It was a fleeting moment. But it was enough time for Zenith to imprint the child’s image on his retina.

“……Ugh.”

Zenith didn’t know.

Why his eyes suddenly felt hot.

“Ugh……”

Why his heart ached at the sight of a child, who had nothing to do with him, dying.

Zenith didn’t know. He couldn’t understand. But he found himself whispering.

“Don’t die.”

Hugging the child, Zenith repeated more desperately than all the prayers he had made in his life.

“Don’t die……”

Fortunately, it began to drizzle.

Zenith gathered the rainwater that had fallen through the bars in his hands, warmed it, and poured it into the child’s mouth.

The child sucked on Zenith’s finger as if it were his mother’s breast.

“That’s right. Good, good…… Please, hold on……”

In the narrow solitary cell, shielding the child from the rain with his back, trying to keep his body warm.

“Let’s live.”

Zenith whispered desperately.

“Let’s live together……”

***

The long night passed.

The child was still alive, and Zenith was taken out of the solitary cell and dragged to the audience chamber.

“Priest Zenith!”

There was the King of the Misty Kingdom, who had not met Zenith once in the past three years.

The King, with a twitch of his mustache, greeted Zenith with open arms.

“It seems my subordinates have committed a great discourtesy to the diplomat of the Everblack Empire. I apologize on their behalf.”

“……”

“Now that there should only be good things between our two countries, my youngest daughter has done something foolish and caused trouble for Priest Zenith.”

The King gestured to Zenith, who remained silent.

“Come now, let’s not make an easy path difficult. Priest Zenith.”

“……”

“Give me that little one. Since it’s my daughter’s child, shouldn’t the ownership be mine?”

Zenith, who had been standing with a cold, Inquisitor-like expression, slowly lowered his head to look at the child in his arms.

It was his last chance.

To live the same life as before.

“……This child is indeed Princess Cloudy’s child.”

And,

Zenith decided to give up that path.

“At the same time, he is also my child.”

“……What?”

Zenith declared to the King, who was frowning.

“This child is the result of a relationship between Princess Cloudy and me.”

“……”

“For the past three years, we have been together, and our feelings grew, and this child was born as a result. This child is my son.”

The King scoffed, as if it were absurd.

“Why are you doing this, Priest Zenith? Do you think I’m a fool?”

“……”

“That child is the cursed result of my foolish youngest daughter and a furry slave rolling around. Just because I’m playing king in this backwater, doesn’t mean my eyesight is so bad that I can’t recognize a mixed-race child.”

On the child’s body, wrapped in Zenith’s blood-stained shirt, there was fur unique to the beast-kin.

The King pointed at the child and shouted.

“A common orphan, born from foolish parents who gave in to their lust and died! That’s all he is!”

“……”

“Are you going to take the blame yourself to save such an orphan? As a priest, are you going to say that you committed such an inappropriate act of having a relationship with a princess in the city where you came to preach?”

“Yes, I am.”

Zenith nodded. The King’s mouth opened slightly.

“This child is not only a child of the Misty Kingdom, but also the son of an Everblack diplomat and a priest of the Goddess Church.”

“……”

“This child has the right to be a citizen of the Empire. If Your Majesty tries to kill this child, it means the Misty Kingdom is trying to kill a citizen of the Empire, and this will cause a serious diplomatic dispute.”

The King, who had been observing Zenith with his mouth open, as if he were examining a strange animal, asked slowly.

“Did my daughter do you a great favor?”

“No.”

“Or did you owe a debt to that furry slave that my daughter was always with?”

“I have never even had a proper conversation with him.”

“Then why are you trying so hard to protect that child?”

Zenith slowly lowered his head and looked at the child in his arms. And he answered slowly.

“……You wouldn’t understand even if I told you.”

The King waved his hand as if he was fed up.

“Do as you please. Take that bastard child you picked up from my daughter’s corpse and get out of here to your homeland. I’ll let you go quietly.”

“……”

The King pointed at Zenith and spat out fiercely.

“If that child is the result of a relationship between you and my daughter, as you said, then the ‘diplomatic dispute’ is caused by you and the Everblack Empire!”

***

Several months later.

Everblack Empire. The Imperial Capital.

The Central Temple of the Goddess Church. The Tribunal of Punishment.

“You’ve gone completely mad, Priest Zenith.”

Zenith, who was arrested as soon as he returned to the Imperial Capital, was taken to the Central Temple.

In the Tribunal of Punishment of the Central Temple, not only the high-ranking members of the Church but also those in key positions in the Imperial Foreign Ministry stood with grim faces.

“You have not only given up your own life but also all the prospective believers of the Misty Kingdom.”

“……”

“You were blinded by your own personal feelings and ruined a greater cause! As a priest who upholds the will of the Goddess, as the shadow of the Goddess! You have done the one thing you should never have done.”

Zenith answered calmly.

“I have only practiced the doctrine of not ignoring the voices that ask for help right in front of me.”

“Your position was not to judge that on your own!”

The bishop, who had been scolding Zenith, shook his head.

“……Why are you trying to spend the rest of your life in pain for a crime you didn’t commit?”

Zenith was unwavering.

“Because I believe that the one I believe in would have acted the same way as I did in the same situation.”

“That is truly arrogant.”

The priests surrounding Zenith clicked their tongues and sighed in unison.

“You will realize that what you are doing is nothing more than self-satisfaction.”

“Perhaps.”

Zenith shrugged.

“But even if it is self-satisfaction, saving that young life… it seems more valuable than my entire life of just breaking things as I was told.”

Bang!

The bishop slammed his fist on the table and shouted.

“I’ll ask you one last time, Zenith! Where did you hide the child?”

“How many times do I have to say it? He died of a fever shortly after we left the Misty Kingdom. I buried the body in the mountains.”

“Zenith, to the very end……!”

“Just punish me.”

Zenith calmly spread his arms.

“Please punish this unfortunate lamb.”

His fellow Holy Knights closed their eyes tightly.

Rosetta was absent, unfortunately. Zenith glanced at his sister’s empty seat with regret and said.

“Give me the appropriate punishment for disgracing the honor of my comrades.”

***

Before standing in the Tribunal of Punishment.

Before entering the Imperial Capital, Zenith snuck into an orphanage on the outskirts of the city under the cover of night.

It was the place run by the former commander of the Holy Knights, the same orphanage where Rosetta and Zenith had grown up in their childhood.

“I will be hunted for the rest of my life.”

Zenith handed over the child in his arms, and the old man silently took the child.

The commander, who had taken in Rosetta and Zenith in that sandy wasteland when they were young, was now the director of the orphanage.

The director glared at Zenith with a dissatisfied expression. Zenith continued slowly.

“The assassins of the Misty Kingdom, and my former Holy Knight brothers, will all try to kill me. This child will be targeted as well.”

“……So?”

“I want to leave this child here.”

The director let out a hollow laugh.

“You want to leave this child, who everyone in the Church, especially the Holy Knights you were a part of, are looking for with their eyes wide open, in an orphanage run by me, who is also from the Holy Knights?”

“It’s always darkest under the lamp.”

“You daringly crazy bastard……”

The director, who had heard everything, kept shaking his head.

“It’s absurd, you idiot. No, it’s my fault for raising you wrong…… Sigh.”

Even in the face of the director’s curses, Zenith was smiling.

It was because he finally felt a little relieved after entrusting the child to the safest place he knew, to the most trustworthy person.

The director frowned.

“Why do you have such a relieved look on your face? Do you think you’ve become some kind of saint? You’re just a fool who can’t take care of himself and fell on his own.”

“I know.”

“If you know, then get out of here! Before the child remembers your face.”

Even while listening to the director’s scolding, Zenith looked at the child’s face one last time.

“You have to grow up well, Hannibal.”

As if he was comfortable in the director’s arms, Hannibal, who had always been fussy in Zenith’s arms, was now fast asleep.

To the child he had protected, fed, washed, and put to sleep as if he were truly a father, even though it had only been a few months. Zenith whispered.

“Let’s meet again someday.”

…….

And 14 years passed.

***

“……The end?”

After Zenith stopped talking and a moment passed.

When I asked carefully, Zenith nodded.

“Yes, well…… the rest is pretty much as you know. Thanks to the internal political strife in the Church, I managed to survive, and I was sent to remote areas as a common soldier……”

“……”

“I kept sending my salary, laundered here and there, to that orphanage. Well, that’s how I lived.”

The surrounding men all grabbed their heads.

“Wait a minute, why is the story so frustrating like a sweet potato? Isn’t there anything more? Is that really the end?”

“What about the King? The Church leaders? Didn’t they receive any kind of divine punishment?”

“Give me some cider, Lucas! Hurry……!”

“……What is cider, my lord?”

I, who was choking and patting Lucas’s shoulder, suddenly realized and shouted at Zenith.

“Wait a minute, then Hannibal isn’t your son!”

Zenith answered awkwardly.

“……But he is also my son.”

“You crazy, damn magnanimous person, there’s a limit!”

I pointed at Zenith and shouted.

“You’re just a pushover!”

Then Zenith smiled softly.

“I know.”