A Depressed Kendo Player Possesses a Reckless Aristocrat

A Kind Person

“I’m sorry.”

Maharet, finally bursting into tears she had been holding back, staggered.

For a moment I reached out to catch her,

But then, hesitant, I couldn’t help but freeze.

Do I even have the right?

The right to offer kindness to a girl swaying on the edge.

The fleeting question soon becomes a cold interrogation, grabbing at my own sleeve.

‘I clearly said I love and hate you…’

It wouldn’t be different for Maharet either.

Just as I resent you.

You must hate me the same.

Perhaps it was only natural.

After all, I was the one who started this whole mess of ill-fated ties.

“…Are you alright?”

All I can do is stand there, dumbly letting a stupid question slip out.

Maharet faintly sobbed, avoiding my gaze.

I just kept watching the precarious figure of the girl.

“Hic, uhh…”

Maharet raised her arm as if to hide her tears, but it was a futile resistance.

A downpour wasn’t the kind of emotion you could simply cover with a leaf.

It was a sorrow that was utterly desolate.

Faced with the song of pain confessed by her wretched appearance, I was powerless.

How could I even offer an excuse?

Because the world had given me pain, I had wielded my own wounds against another.

Such foolishness birthed yet another wound.

I had become a painter who drew countless scars.

And out of them all, Maharet was the canvas onto which I had splashed the most diverse paints.

‘Because of me…’

How much torment must have filled your blank spaces?

How many dawns must you have spent, consumed by love and hate for me?

The slowly staining self-reproach made me bite down hard on my lip.

I ruined you.

I severed your ties with the lady-in-waiting, your most cherished friend.

I deceived you with a pre-planned performance.

I made you hate me, then even aimed the arrows of resentment.

“Ugh, I’m sorry… It’s, because, of…me… *hic*”

I made you cry again.

What am I if not a sinner?

Just as you feel guilt for my misfortune, it was right that I bore a corresponding guilt.

“If, I, hadn’t, left, you… If I had, understood, your, pain…”

I wasn’t even allowed a single excuse.

Because it was none other than me who plunged our future into the mire.

It was all because of me.

Self-blame, self-blame, self-blame, and self-blame.

That repeating internal monologue grew into sharp thorns, digging into my lungs.

“Sorry, Ryden… *Ugh, hic*, I, you…”

I was someone who should never comfort you.

I didn’t have the right.

It was a fact I knew clearly, but my feet were already moving towards you.

“Princess.”

Was it, disgustingly, regret?

I was reaching out towards the light of the past I dared not touch.

The fingertips meet your coldly cooled cheek.

And a lukewarm wetness.

The girl’s tears were like a sip of a star, so hot they felt as if they would burn my fingers away completely.

A fierce burning pain found me, but I didn’t take my hand away.

Not yet, because you hadn’t stopped crying.

I waited for the winter wind filled with longing to calm, swallowing down the aching emotions.

“How can you say such a thing.”

“Ry, den…”

“……Rather, it is I who should be apologizing to you.”

The confession was endlessly self-deprecating.

“It was me, and no one else, who wrote this wretched play.”

“But, I already know… I saw everything. The sadness you harbored, the anguish you embraced all alone…”

Maybe what Maharet saw, was that moment when we were mentally linked, through Avey’s ‘Soul Link’.

A season reflecting in those transparent red eyes.

It was an endless winter.

“When you were pushing me away… the grief you felt, it was so, so vivid and painful…”

Her legs must have given way, because the girl ended up collapsing.

“If I, had known… if I hadn’t, left you… you wouldn’t, have been, so broken, like this…”

Maharet was full of regret.

She was blaming herself, saying I was this broken because she didn’t understand my pain.

……Well.

Would it have been any different if it were you?

There were so many people by my side: Rachel, Ariel, Father, even Gilbert…

There were candles that steadfastly filled their place, even with my brutish behavior.

And yet, I broke.

Pushing away the warmth they offered, I forced my feet toward destruction.

Perhaps it was a fate decided from the start.

So, there was no reason to feel guilty.

Even if you had stayed by my side till the end, my end would still have been sorrow.

It was no one’s fault.

I was darkness.

And you were candles.

Only, my shadow was just too dark to be illuminated by your slender light.

I understood now.

Perpetrator, victim.

Such superficial labels couldn’t define our relationship.

We were simply wearing veils of ignorance over our eyes, randomly aiming arrows of resentment.

I was done with it.

It was time to release the tension on my fingers.

When the taught bowstring loosened, I believed we could find each other again, the parts we’d been missing.

No, I wanted to believe that.

‘I’m tired of resenting anyone now…’

To be hated by someone.

To hate someone else.

In the end, it’s just a blade, gnawing away at the heart.

And a heart so worn will erode its warmth.

Losing love, forgetting tenderness, living life forsaking all comfort.

‘How can I waste this chance…this life like that?’

Isn’t life too short, that even speaking of affection feels insufficient?

I’ve despaired enough.

Today was a day to sing of hope.

Just like the people who welcomed me back, as if it were natural.

This time, it was my turn.

-Good morning, young master.

-Oppa!! You’re awake?

-How are you today, Raiden? You didn’t have another nightmare or anything, did you…?

-You’re awake, son.

-Heh heh… breakfast is ready, so let’s head to the dining hall, little master.

If I’ve been forgiven by someone, and yet cannot forgive another.

That is surely deceit.

I’ve never been kind, not at all.

But the rays of light that make up my world are so kind, how can I not be touched by kindness?

“Raiden… I, I…”

Maharet was still coughing out tears.

Her legs had given out; the girl was slumped on the floor.

I extended a hand toward her.

“It’s cold. Please, get up.”

“……This, it can’t be. You should, you should hate me more.”

“Please, refrain from such harsh words.”

“But…!”

“Princess.”

I cut off her retort decisively.

And then, with a voice that didn’t hold even a trace of tremor, I declared my intent calmly.

“I no longer resent you.”

“……Lies, you’re lying.”

“You don’t have to believe me. I intend to stay by your side until you do.”

It might be a little reckless, but there were words I needed to get out.

“I’m sorry. For the long time I’ve tormented you, I want to apologize for the lump of pain left in your heart.”

“……”

“I regret all the words and actions that have hurt you.”

In the winter wind filled with sorrow, I asked softly.

“Please, will you take my hand?”

“Ugh, ughh…”

“Is it… is it alright if I dare to ask for your forgiveness?”

“Please, stop… Don’t look at me, don’t look at me with such, such kind eyes…”

“I won’t move from this spot until you take my hand.”

“Hic… Ugh…”

Of course, I know.

That even if you take my hand, our relationship can’t return to the beginning.

To wish for the days when everything was perfect, that was greed.

Because we already had too many flaws.

Maybe we could no longer love each other.

In the ratio of love and hate, maybe hate occupied a larger place than love.

“This time, I will never give up on you.”

But even so.

Even so, if you responded to the hand I had extended.

If by patching and mending the tattered pieces, you could at least stitch together the severed yesterday.

I would be immeasurably happy.

“……What are you, really?”

Maharet stared blankly up at me.

The girl, who had been frozen for a moment, soon burst into tears again and sobbed.

“Raiden…”

The girl reached out a hand, on the verge of collapse.

As if I’d been waiting, I caught her pitiful body.

The girl sobbed, her voice breaking.

Her wet cries echoed again and again, muffled against my chest.

I silently patted her shoulder.

It was a scene that mirrored a past, now faded, all too well.

“Ah, a-augh, aaa…!”

“It’s alright, my lady… it’s alright…”

A fleeting, almost nostalgic scent.

I forcefully ignored the way my eyes were warming, and focused on comforting the girl.

It was a stretch of pure grief.

*

After a good while, the girl stopped crying.

Her frail body was utterly still.

She’d cried herself to exhaustion and simply fallen asleep.

The boy, carrying the unconscious Maharet, was walking through the mansion’s hallway.

Step… step…

His footsteps on the floor carried a cautious stillness.

It was a considerate gentleness, laced with worry that the girl might wake up.

“My lady…?!”

“Shhh… she’s fallen asleep, so don’t make a fuss.”

A passing maid noticed them and looked startled.

But Lyden effortlessly silenced the noise.

Soon, the boy reached Maharet’s bedroom.

“Young master, please allow us to take her.”

“I’ll lay her down myself.”

Dismissing the servants, Lyden entered the room.

He carefully laid the girl onto the bed.

The boy stood there quietly, listening to her faint, shallow breaths.

“……”

Their hands still held each other.

The boy lowered his head.

Then, with care, he smoothed down the disarray of her silver hair.

The hair, fragrant with the deep scent of roses, was surely the one he remembered from childhood.

Ryden quietly closed his eyes.

And prayed.

That, at least for the dawns he stayed by her side…

“…that you wouldn’t suffer from nightmares.”

And so, the boy remained there until morning came.

*

Meanwhile.

The girl was drifting in the depths of her unconscious.

She was dreaming.

A dream of the desire she had long held, though she had been denying it.

-I no longer resent you.

-Is it alright… if I dare ask for your forgiveness?

-This time, I will never abandon you.

It was a sweet illusion.

A whisper she couldn’t possibly resist.

Knowing she was shameless, the girl took the hand that was offered to her.

It was the moment the nightmares that had filled the previous night shattered.

‘How can you be so… kind?’

The girl trembled with a terrible feeling.

It felt as if she were taking advantage of the boy’s kindness.

She felt like she couldn’t bear such a vile version of herself.

The girl knew her place.

The boy might have offered his hand, but she was someone who didn’t deserve to lean on that warmth.

She had already hurt him once with her filthy resentment.

The girl was someone who had to live forever with a heart of penance.

‘Forever… only for you…’

Of course, it wasn’t a normal line of thinking.

But the girl’s mental state was stained with guilt, far from sound, practically broken already.

‘I’ll live for you… and I’ll die for you…’

Perhaps that was the last use I could offer to you.

The girl wandered in her sleep,

repeating such vows over and over.