The Melancholy of the Demon Army Officer
Translator: Tsukii
Editor: Shizukuku
Read at Watashi wa Sugoi Desu!
Chapter 075 – The Meaning of Life [A]
Ssulal immediately questioned the meaning behind Leonhart’s words.
“The dragon is seeking death…?”
What does that mean? A voice sounded before Ssulal could continue asking that.
It was Raizen’s voice.
He exhaled lightly through his mouth, and spoke with a resigned voice.
“…Do you know?”
He spoke to Leonhart, but the question wasn’t directed at him alone.
It seemed as though Raizen was questioning Ssulal as well. When she looked at the dragon, he shifted his gaze up to the night sky.
“Once upon a time, countless dragons flew in these skies…It was really lively. One could hear many rumors on this mountain, be it an actual fight between two dragons, or just a quarrel. There were about as many dragons back then as there are humans today.”
“—”
Ssulal’s breath was taken away by those words. The others were also wide eyed when they heard this.
They understood what the dragon was trying to say.
The dragon spouted those words up into the air with a nostalgic look on his face. However, his expression quickly turned into melancholic one,
“…However, that number has greatly decreased. There aren’t many of us left, and the few that remain have all closed their hearts… and turned feral. Nowadays, they are treated no differently than demons.”
“Can you believe that?” There was one person who was willing to answer his half-laughing remark. It was Pale.
She spoke with a confused expression.
“Eh, did all dragons have such wisdom? And it’s not that you are a special one…”
“…That’s right. All of my compatriots here eventually went crazy. But the dragons in this mountain used to talk a lot, you know? Many of them were more intelligent than I am too.”
The dragon who answered her no longer exuded an overwhelming presence, the way he did before. The one standing in front of them now was nothing but a dragon who was tired of living.
“…According to legend, there were Four Great Saint Dragons and Eight Great Spirit Dragons. There was also a Dragon King…”
The one who inquired about this was Kesselring.
However, the dragon casually answered,
“…I know that the Four Great Saint Dragons, other than me, are all dead, but I have no idea about the survival of the Eight Great Spirit Dragons… Well, even if they survived, they’ve likely gone feral by now.”
“…Then, what about the Dragon King?”
Ssulal continued to ask. This was something important to her, so she had to question him.
However, the dragon laughed at her question,
“As for him… he has already abandoned this world.”
The answer he gave her was rather ambiguous.
“What does that—”
“I don’t think he will show himself in this world anymore.” 1
The follow up answer was also hard to understand.
But the dragon said, “Let’s leave that aside,” and stopped that line of questioning,
“The important thing is I am the only dragon left that remains as a normal dragon in this world.”
As the dragon told them this, his tone was filled with sadness,
“…Back to the first question. I certainly seek death. — I am tired of living.”
“—”
Hunty, who stood beside Ssulal, shook at those words. However the dragon didn’t notice her and continued to talk.
“For all my life, I have fought battle after battle — and I have lived for nearly 2000 years. I spent the majority of those years with my comrades. There was a lot of pain along the way, but the reason I could endure it — it was because of the bond I had with them.”
“I have hurt many others to protect my comrades,” said the dragon. His words certainly held the weight of his nearly 2000 years of life,
“It’s been about 400 years since my compatriots left this world. Compared to the amount of years I have lived, it’s really not so long… But, even if I’ve lived for 2000 years… spending all these years alone— 400 years is way too long to be by myself.”
“It pains my heart and makes me want to scream,” said the dragon.
“So at least,” he continued,
“I wish for an end to this. However, this body prevents me from commiting suicide. This flesh of mine that failed to protect my comrades… it still persists in protecting my own life.”
Then the dragon looked to Leonhart once again.
He made his request to the majin while ridiculing himself. And his request was,
“That’s why, I ask this of you. Fight me to the death — and kill me.”
And, in a single breath,
“—I don’t want to live all alone anymore.”
“—”
The words he said caused a heavy silence to fall.
This was the emotional expression of a dragon who had lived for 2000 years.
…Leonhart.
Ssulal fixed her gaze on Leonhart’s back as the dragon said this.
She was waiting to see what kind of answer Leonhart would give.
However, Leonhart stood in place, not making any movement.
Ssulal thought, About this dragon — I can’t understand his feelings at all.
She couldn’t understand how it felt to wish for death, and she didn’t even want to understand. For her, death was the greatest hell.
And to be in a state where he thought death wasn’t the greatest hell — that was another kind of hell too.
However, Raizen was likely in such a state right now.
Therefore, he chose death — and he thought that his salvation would come with it.
However, despite knowing that, Ssulal still thought,
That is way too sad.
The appearance of the dragon who sought his own death was very painful to witness, to the point that it became unbearable for Ssulal.
She would never wish for such an end.
This was what Ssulal thought. And this was why she looked to Leonhart to hear his answer.
It wasn’t like they were the ones at fault in this. It was the world that forced them into such a state.
As a person who lived in the age of humanity, and as a person who found such an opinion unpleasant, it was a sorrowful thing to think and speak about.
Perhaps Hunty would give the dragon his answer.
But that didn’t end up being the case, as Leonhart in front of them moved to speak.
He looked up at Raizen’s face above him and replied in a clear tone.
What he said was,
“—Screw you.”
It was a clear refusal.
“—Why?!”
Raizen shouted loudly.
Thinking of the despair that still awaited him in the future, his anger boiled within him.
He opened his normally closed mouth and roared.
“You promised me earlier! You said that you would defeat me! Are you saying that was nothing but a lie?!”
It was absolutely unforgivable. Nay, he would never forgive this.
He couldn’t tolerate seeing the worthy end, the one he had come so close to finally having, be taken away from him.
“I have already decided that this place will be my place of death! In this place, which was once the center of our world!! This is the place we once lived!!”
Raizen remembered.
That the Rising Dragon Mountain was the center of Tron, the unified nation of the continent that the dragons built.
“Behold!” roared Raizen, as he hit the outer wall of the mountain with his tail.
“—?!”
Along with the vibrations, a large cave that had previously been covered with rocks appeared.
As the others marveled at the sight,
“The caves that were hollowed out from these mountains are the places where my compatriots once lived and hid!”
The dragons that had lived with nature also built their nests in nature, in locations like mountain caves and forests.
And the place Raizen had just shown them was one of the largest of such places. Many of his compatriots once lived there and, after the catastrophe, it became a place to hide and struggle for survival.
He and his compatriots had witnessed hell, a hell that those who lived in this era had no idea about, and they had been forced to flee.
This place was important to Raizen. The reason was,
“We all promised! To protect our comrades! To protect each other and reunite in this place!”
That day, it was also a night like this one.
But his comrades had entrusted the future to Raizen and died ahead of him.
“Yet here I am and, despite being entrusted to protect everyone by my compatriots, I was unable to protect anyone and lost everything…!!”
Everyone who had placed their trust in Raizen had failed to get what they deserved, resulting in them losing their lives and hearts.
…I couldn’t get rid of the darkness that plagued my fellow dragons…!
He could do nothing but watch as his compatriots lost their minds, one after another.
“And such, it is a mistake for me to continue to live on without them…!”
Indeed. They were the ones who should have survived. He ought to have used his life and protected them with his death.
Be it during the battle against Kkluf Kkluf, during the Last War, or during the catastrophe.
Be it a dragon of the same species, his subordinates, or his other compatriots. Be it one of the Eight Great Spirit Dragons, one of the other Four Great Saint Dragons, Magiihoa, or even that Avel, Raizen failed to protect anyone.
And for Raizen, who lived on top of their corpses,
“For me to be alive like this…It is nothing but living in shame—”
“—Oi.”
“—”
A loud voice was heard.
It wasn’t that he spoke in a particularly loud voice. His voice wasn’t as loud as Raizen’s voice had been earlier, and it was certainly of normal volume by comparison.
However, that voice was filled with a tone that didn’t allow for any compromise.
And that voice,
“—What did you say just now?”
Was filled with indignation.
Leonhart silently listened to Raizen’s story.
Raizen wished to die. Leonhart could understand his reasoning.
Basically — Raizen’s comrades were no more. He hated being condemned to this solitude. There was no worth for him in continuing to live.
Therefore, he wished to fight to the death, so please kill him. Well, that was basically it.
He could understand all that. He could even sympathize with his circumstances. If Raizen wished to die in combat, it could happen as the result of their battle.
However, Raizen’s last words were unacceptable to Leonhart.
It was unacceptable entirely because he had listened to Raizen’s story, and there was something Leonhart had come to understand.
And that was,
“Living in shame, you say…?”
This dragon had said that it was a mistake for him to keep on living.
He said he was merely living in shame.
“You are…”
This dragon was,
“The fact that you managed to survive when your compatriots didn’t — that was a mistake, are you seriously saying that…?!”
“—”
Raizen opened his eyes wide.
Leonhart didn’t particularly like preaching to others. Consulting about life experience was also something he wasn’t all that good at. In the first place, the dragon in front of him had lived for far longer than Leonhart.
Even so, he had to say it.
Because if he didn’t, Raizen’s so-called compatriots — they would be denied what they had done.
Leonhart wove his words to explain to Raizen.
“Although it’s not like I was there to see all the things that happened to you dragons in the past—”
Leonhart then said it. That was,
“But is it really your fault that your compatriots died? Didn’t they die while fighting against the enemy? Or are you saying… you didn’t try your best back then?”
“……That’s not it!! You’re wrong, but—”
Raizen stopped his words there. Then, after a while, he squeezed out a response,
“It is still a fact that I manage to survive instead of my compatriots…!”
“…”
Leonhart felt like he could see Raizen’s inner thoughts. What Leonhart understood from those thoughts was,
…So he has always regretted it… the fact that he failed to protect them, huh…
Leonhart didn’t know the details of what happened to Raizen. Therefore, Raizen’s claim that it was his fault that other dragons died could quite possibly be true, at least to some extent.
Even so, there were still things Leonhart wanted to say, despite knowing that.
It was because of something Raizen had said earlier. Leonhart searched for the right words to convey his thoughts to Raizen.
“…You may be right. It’s not like I was there to see how it happened, after all.”
“! In that case…!”
“But you see — there’s one thing that I can for sure say you are wrong about.”
“W-what do you say…!”
Raizen’s eyes burned with anger.
But Leonhart spoke his words as if to pour cold water on Raizen.
“…The fact you managed to survive, it isn’t a mistake at all.”
“—!”
Raizen’s eyes wavered.
Then Leonhart continued to explain what he meant by that.
It was regarding the former compatriots that Raizen mentioned in his story.
“Didn’t your comrades entrust the future to you? Doesn’t that mean— your comrades wished for you to live on?”
“! That’s…”
It made one think.
If a person like Raizen was present on the tough battlefield then,
“It was because they trusted that you could take care of things after their deaths… I am sure of it.”
“…They did?”
“Yes,” Leonhart nodded.
If what Leonhart was saying was true,
“In that case, the fact you have survived until now means that you have managed to give them what they wished for. —If you insist on calling it living in shame, then that’s no different from insulting your former compatriots.”
“—! I-I—”
Raizen trembled. Those last words seemed to have had an effect on him.
Then, with a quivering voice,
“So I… have disgraced my compatriots… You’re saying I’ve been degrading their value…! The value of the proud dragon species…?!”
“That’s right… After all, looking at how you’ve been behaving, I can’t see you as a proud dragon. You’re just a senile old man. —Even if there are other dragons that haven’t gone feral, I guess they’re probably as miserable as you are?”
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