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Chapter 165: Abandoned Mine
“Meat? I was rather fond of meat myself.”
Isaac was even taking his dinner inside the abandoned mine. Watching the party unpack their lunch boxes, the giant added casually:
“I used to eat whole cows and pigs at a time.”
“Lohengrin can eat that much too!”
Sharen, sitting beside Isaac and sharing a lunch box, suddenly blurted it out—a peculiar spark of competitiveness flashing in her eyes.
Lohengrin may eat plenty, but…
No matter how voracious he was, polishing off an entire cow or pig alone had to be impossible. Sharen likely didn’t grasp how much meat that really meant; in a small village, butchering even one animal could set off a festival.
Finding Sharen’s answer cute, the giant chuckled and tossed in an unnecessary condition.
“I eat them while they’re still alive.”
“Tsk, if Lohengrin tries hard enough, he could manage that too. I’ll make him do it later.”
“...”
Just what is Lohengrin to her, anyway?
Whatever the case, he’s nowhere near human.
“Did you eat cows and pigs much the same as we do?”
The giant’s gentle smile deepened.
“Oh, certainly. Back then, if you stretched out a hand to the world, some beast would fall into your grasp; if you scooped water from the sea, half of it was fish. Truly, it was an age of abundance.”
As if the memory still shimmered before his eyes, a heavy nostalgia colored the giant’s voice.
An age of abundance.
A description utterly at odds with the Abyss Realm Isaac had seen.
From time to time, the giant spoke of the Abyss Realm of ages past. Perhaps, after spending eons alone, he was simply glad for a conversation partner.
Whenever that happened, Isaac felt a yawning sense of dissonance—and the urge to puzzle out exactly what the Silver Clock had ruined.
“Come to think of it… How do you eat now?”
Isaac suddenly wondered aloud. If the giant had once lived on flesh, wouldn’t hunger still plague him?
“I’ve become a body that no longer needs to eat.”
The giant answered with a rueful note.
“...”
“It was the price for offering myself as the guardian who would preserve the rituals. That, too, is ritual. I am alive, yet not alive.”
“...”
“I can feel nothing. I cannot sleep. That is what I’ve become—no more than a great stone idol whose only purpose is to protect.”
Even though he added that this had been his own choice and Isaac need not waste pity on him, the bitterness lingered.
Meal finished, Isaac gripped his swords again. The saber he usually favored hung at his waist; in his hands were two hefty, single-handed blades. Once, simply lifting them had been a chore. Now he swung them with ease, proof of how far he’d grown.
“Starting again?” the giant asked.
“Yes,” Isaac replied.
“Do you think merely flailing your blades about like that will suffice?”
Sharen nodded in agreement; to her, Isaac did seem to be swinging aimlessly. But he smiled thinly.
“Everything needs preparation, does it not? I must be prepared to contain the power I’ll unleash.”
At that, the giant’s eyes widened. He smacked his lips a few times, then said no more.
“I was about to offer advice—but you already know,” he remarked, closing his mouth with a satisfied curve of his lips. Since Isaac had found the answer on his own, any further words might only hinder him.
Clang! Clang! Clang!
Isaac’s training resumed once more.
From behind, Sharen—who had been staring holes into his back—brushed off her skirt, popped to her feet, and announced:
“I’m going to bed, Isaac.”
“You’ve been turning in pretty early lately.”
In the past, she always schemed for ways to stay up late.
“They say you grow taller if you sleep early.”
Rising onto her tiptoes, Sharen stretched theatrically as though her height were already shooting up. Isaac chuckled at the sight and nodded for her to hurry along.
“C’mon, Unnie—let’s go.”
Rihanna had been silent the whole time, yet she was right there beside them. Still, she refused to move, her gaze fixed unblinking on Isaac as if determined to stay.
“Unnie.”
Tap.
Sharen poked her, but Rihanna deliberately kept her eyes on Isaac, not even glancing at her sister.
Tap.
“Unnie, get up.”
Bam.
Bam.
Bam. Bam.
Bam. Bam. Bam.
“Get up, Unnie. I need to grow—even if you never did.”
At last, Rihanna’s eyes swung back to Sharen. She began saying something—fortunately, thanks to a Silence spell, Sharen heard none of it.
“Ah, come on, Unnie—le-e-et’s go!”
“……”
In the end, Rihanna let herself be hauled away by Sharen’s whining. Whatever she was muttering to Isaac as she left, it mostly amounted to how much she liked him.
“...”
The night grew quiet. Within the abandoned mine, only Isaac and the giant remained.
Amid the ringing of steel, the giant asked, sounding idly curious:
“What are the birds like here?”
“Birds?”
“Yes. I once adored them. They fluttered about and would naturally build nests upon my shoulders.”
“Ha—being that large does make such things possible.”
“It pleased me, being able to serve as their roost. It brought me joy when a creature found peace upon me.”
The giant’s gentle nature was far from what Isaac had first imagined. He loved peace, sought coexistence, and wished for no struggle.
The thought of such a being sacrificing his whole body to guard a ritual felt all the more tragic.
Just then, footsteps echoed down the tunnel. Turning his head, Isaac saw Marlin Leivice, her outline faintly tinted even in the darkness, walking toward them.
“It’s my turn to bring the midnight snack tonight.”
“Ah.”
Several companions had been helping with Isaac’s relentless practice, even taking shifts to bring late-night meals. He never refused; if he was barely sleeping and swinging swords all night, he at least needed proper food.
“I’ll eat it in a bit—thanks.”
Clang! Clang! Clang!
He’d finished dinner only a short while ago, so the snack could wait.
“Just like you said, big brother.”
The spot where Rihanna had been sitting a moment ago was now occupied by Marlin Leivice, kneeling politely on both knees.
Isaac almost told her she could leave now that she’d delivered the late-night meal—but she simply stayed there, quiet and composed.
“I’ve seen you a few times, young miss, yet I don’t know your name. What is it?”
“I’m Marlin Leivice.”
Since she was now keeping the Giant company, Isaac chose not to dismiss her.
“A lovely name. And that hair that flows like a river—truly pleasant to behold.”
“Thank you.”
“A sun-touched waterway… even that is growing hazy in my memories now.”
One of the things the Giant longed for most was sunlight.
Isaac could sympathize; during his time in the Abyss Realm with only a single star hanging in the void, he’d learned firsthand how precious the sun was.
‘Because light… that we cannot bring.’
Water, fire, food—those he could provide.
But sunlight was impossible. A magically conjured glow would still be just that: magic. What the Giant wanted was living, life-giving sunlight.
“It’s just that the light—” Marlin began, but her words broke off.
The abandoned mine flared bright.
More precisely, the space where the Giant’s face protruded lit up—dazzling silver radiance poured out of the crack.
“Kkeuaaaaaaah!”
The Giant’s roar thundered through the mine. As his screams erupted, the tunnel shook; stalactites and dust rained down.
Thud! Thuuud! Thud!
It no longer seemed impossible that his voice alone could bring the mine crashing down.
“W-what is happening?!”
“……!”
Isaac and Marlin shouted for the Giant, but he had no breath to answer.
“Kkeuaaaah! Kkeuuuuuugh!”
Something was clearly unfolding in that other dimension, and the blinding silver light was inflicting untold agony on him.
Quaddudduk!
The hole where the Giant kept his face suddenly widened. With both hands, he tore it open, showing just how much strength he’d been holding back all this time.
Then—
Clang! Clang!
Both arms burst through the gap.
This was no attack, no betrayal.
“Kkeuaaaaaaa!”
It was a flight.
The Giant was trying to escape whatever tortured him.
Clang! Clang!
The shaft trembled harder. His enormous torso began forcing its way out, battering the surroundings; the mine started collapsing at frightening speed.
Everything happened too fast.
Isaac tried to drag Marlin to safety, but the entrance was the first section to cave in.
“Kkeuaaaak!”
“Please—calm down! Calm down!”
“Kkeuaaaaaaa!”
Their desperate cries were swallowed by his howls. The instant his massive form wriggled free up to the waist—
Quaddudduk!
—as though no more would be tolerated, the hole snapped shut with a splintering crack.
“Kkeuaaaaaaaa!”
The sound belonged to the Giant. Amid the collapsing mine, his upper body—severed from the rest—wailed in torment, tears streaming down.
****
The swirling dust finally settled; the roaring chaos faded.
Through the choking haze, a blue glow blossomed—Marlin’s aura, a candle in the dark.
“A-are you… all right?”
Isaac nodded slowly at her question.
“How about you?”
“I-I’m okay too.”
Somehow, both had escaped serious harm. Before they could even puzzle out how that was possible with the shaft completely destroyed, the answer revealed itself.
In the sapphire light of Marlin’s aura loomed a colossal shape:
The Giant, reduced to an upper torso, had wrapped his body around them, shielding them from the collapse.
“I’m… sorry…”
His apology, voiced in a fading whisper, sounded as if it might extinguish at any moment—pitiful and fragile even in that immense frame.
---The End Of The Chapter---
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