༺ I Don’t Need a Guillotine for My Revolution ༻
Written by – 카르카손
Translated by – Mara Sov
༺ Revolutionary Period – Black Rose (2) ༻
Because of Valliant’s words, I decided to return to Lumiere earlier than planned. But what I found wasn’t the bustling Capital of the Republic, but a chaotic city drowned with gunshots and screams.
So, I rushed towards the epicenter of it all……
Only to find Christine collapsed on the ground, bleeding heavily.
After that, everything became a blur.
I slowly dragged my hand down my face.
No matter what, the thick stench of blood just wouldn’t go away.
I was simply sitting here, helplessly looking down at Christine who rested in a bed.
Her midnight dress was drenched in blood, there were bandages everywhere, and her skin was pale – a sickening deathly shade of white.
But the worst of it was already over.
She wasn’t dead, thank God, but she was still unconscious due to her severe injuries.
However, even If I knew all of this, I just couldn’t take my eyes off her face.
I didn’t get her involved with this mess to see her like this.
I trusted her skills, never once considering the possibility that some harm would befall her.
No, I simply didn’t wish to believe she could be in danger.
A murky unpleasant feeling kept creeping around my chest, my breath erratic.
“……Marquis. I finished healing the Baron.”
Eris’s voice came from behind me.
“Alright.”
A moment of silence passed, and then Eris spoke again.
“…Marquis, at least change out of your blood-soaked clothes. Staying like this changes nothing.”
I turned to lash out at Eris, but I closed my mouth.
Eris looked at me; her complexion was pale and she looked like she would collapse at any moment now.
No, she didn’t deserve this. After all, she used all of her strength to save Christine and Baron Charon.
And here I was, ready to lash out at her……
As I brushed my face with my hand again, Eris looked away and spoke.
“I’ll go rest first.”
“…I’m sorry. And thank you.”
“It’s my duty.”
With a bitter smile, Eris turned back and left the room with a slight limp.
The reason for her exhaustion were the cursed bullets from the Abyss Corporation.
I don’t know how they worked, but I could see that the wounds inflicted by them wouldn’t stop bleeding, and they even interfered with the healing miracles of Divine Power. I doubted an ordinary priest could heal such cursed wounds.
Had Eris not been with us, both Christine and Baron Charon would have surely died.
The thought makes my blood run cold.
Did they want her dead that badly?
They sought aid from the demons – the public enemies of the Republic – and even executed their plan regardless of whether the citizens of Lumiere would get caught in the crossfire.
What Christine had done to merit such a relentless response?
“Marquis Lafayette.”
Turning towards the door, I saw Baron Charon standing there.
Christine’s most loyal subordinate, who nearly died protecting her.
“……From what I heard, Baron, you were also struck by those bullets. You should be resting.”
“Nonsense. I am a Knight. A Knight who failed to protect my Lady the Countess, so how could I ashame myself even further by resting? Forgive me, Marquis, but I must at least complete my duty. Here, take this.”
Baron Charon proceeded to hand me some documents.
As I began to read them, the Baron spoke up.
“As per the Countess’s orders, these documents are to be given solely to you, Marquis, should an emergency occur.”
Those words stabbed my frail heart.
In the possibility that she wouldn’t be able to hand me these documents herself, she had instructed Baron Charon to do so.
Perhaps it was merely an action derived due to her thorough behavior.
But to me, it was as if Christine had finished her work and handed it to me, already counting herself as a lost cause.
It made me realize how all of this was my fault for putting her in such a position.
Now, my broken heart was consumed by wrath.
–
Before my regression, my entire life had been a series of failures.
From an early age, my future as a promising knight was shattered when I lost to Sir Gaston in the knight tournament.
My fiance, Christine, whom I had a good impression of, from our few meetings, was assassinated without my knowledge.
With nowhere and no one to turn, I was branded as a complete failure by my father, the ‘Blue Knight’. So as a noble, I had no honor to speak of.
Because of this, I turned my gaze toward the common folk. They didn’t seem to care that I, a noble, had been defeated by a commoner.
Just because I was generous towards them, they praised me.
So, I tried to do more for them. In every battle fought, I tried to conserve my troops.
But despite those efforts, those who had followed me, my soldiers, were completely crushed by the revolutionaries.
And in my trial, I realized that all I had done, that I had become, or what I thought I was, was simply a delusion on my part. I realized that in the end, I was no different from the other corrupt nobles.
I was left with nothing in my life.
–
The sunset cast a bloody hue over the streets of Lumiere.
After a mad ride, I arrived in front of a building as I dismounted my horse.
In the documents prepared by Christine and handed to me by Baron Charon, there was a location of a building drawn on the map of the Capital.
The location of a secret meeting place for the Radicals,
The secret meeting place of the radical faction, the so-called Saint Just’s club.
“……Secure the perimeter. Let no one in or out.”
“As you command, Marquis.”
I drew my sword and knocked on the door.
“Who goes there? Huh?! Marquis Lafay—”
The door opened, and an annoyed man came out, his eyes widened as he looked at me.
But before he could shout, I clamped my hand over his mouth, shoved him back, and slid my blade across his throat.
“Kkreurgh……”
The man choked on his own blood before collapsing.
Even after killing this man, my wrath continued to surge unrestrained.
As I gave myself up to this feeling, I tossed the corpse aside and kicked the door open, storming the building.
Bang—!
The sound of the door being kicked open echoed loudly, and as heads turned in my direction, I quickly dispatched them all.
“Ahh, haa…”
I lodged a dagger into the forehead of someone desperately reaching for a pistol, and he fell over like a puppet with severed strings.
These men wouldn’t move ever again.
After heading deeper into the club, I struck a bronze statue with my sword, creating a loud noise, and drawing another poor fella out.
He met his end as well.
After doing this a few more times, the club was completely silent.
Because of this, I could clearly hear some voices coming from a room at the end of the corridor. As I approached it, the door opened.
“Hey, you there. What’s with all this noise—”
Ah, I finally met a familiar face.
One of the radicals listed in Christine’s documents.
The fat pig paled as he slammed the door shut.
I’m sure the room was quickly engulfed in chaos.
I waited a few seconds, and as the commotion turned into confusion, I kicked the door with all my might.
“Ahhh!”
The entire door flew off like a piece of bark while those within the room screamed.
One, two, three, four, five, six…ten.
All the names from Christine’s list, the members of Saint Just’s club were here.
Heh-.
This would save me some trouble.
“Would you look at this? All these fine gentlemen clustering like rats in a trap.”
No one said anything.
Realizing their gazes were fixed on my bloodstained attire, my smile widened.
“Ha, hahaha. Whatever you’re thinking you’re mistaken, this blood isn’t from the people inside this club.
You see, this? This is the Countess’s blood.”
Upon the mention of the Countess of Aquitaine, all the members of the assembly shuddered.
I can still feel her cold, blood-drenched body laying limp in my hands…….
Just remembering this made my mood worse than it already was.
Looking in the eyes of every single man present here, I said.
“Why are you all silent?”
Aren’t you the ones who keep yelling the same things over and over?
The cause of the revolution, the justice of the Republic.
The ones who yell the valours of the Republic, who claim to adhere to them fully, were the first to rationalize every single demented act, simply because something displeased them, using the excuse of purging the corruption of the old regime. Hypocrites every single one of them.
As I slowly moved toward the center of the room, they retreated to the corners as if to avoid me.
Finally, the leader among them, Senator Saint Just, was the first to speak.
“Ma, Marquis Lafayette! What in the world are you doing? This is preposterous……”
“What is so preposterous?”
“T-This blood! What have you done to the people outside?!”
“Ah? Oh I see, you mean your subordinates, well, they are all dead, so there’s no need to worry about them anymore.”
Even while I maintained an easy-going tone, I could feel my insides twisting.
There are countless things I want to hurl at them.
But I know that it’s all meaningless.
“This is madness. We shall denounce the Marquis’s violent act in the Assembly-”
Saint Just words were cut off as I aimed the sword in my hand at him.
“……Weird. I believed that a dead man tells no tales.”
“Hu, hugh!”
“Eeeek!”
A coward who was near the door made a run for it, while I simply threw a dagger, hitting his leg.
“Agh, my leg, my leeeeg! Aaaaah!”
Walking towards him, I stomped over the dagger’s handle still lodged in his leg.
A terrible scream filled the room.
Heh-. Isn’t he screaming just like a pig?
Ah, I see how it is! There’s no use in trying to reason with animals, is there?
While all the councilors were trembling, pale as a ghost, one of them drew a handgun and fired.
That futile resistance was deflected by my mana.
“Ah, aah….”
Despair settled upon everyone, and one of the delegates came forward and knelt before me.
“Ma-Marquis! Save me! Senator Saint Just is the main instigator of it all! I was just dragged here, knowing nothing!”
“Councilor Behrnach! What are you saying!”
“He’s trying to save his own skin! Marquis Lafayette, Behrnach was the one who planned it all! I had no idea these vile heathens had planned such terrible things!”
“Ha….”
Only a hollow snort escaped me.
These are the same people who condemned me.
“Where is the Liberty?”
The same people who pleaded for my execution, saying I plundered the lands of the citizens of Francia, these same men are now branding entire regions as traitors, seeking innocent blood, just because of difference in opinion.
“The Equality?”
These men, who are now dressed in the finest clothes, gathered in a mansion seized from the nobility as they discussed their next target.
How could those who commit terrorist acts in the heart of the Republic, claiming several innocent lives, dare to say they strive for the people’s Equality?
“Fraternity?”
Why would those who preached unity and democracy try to kill Christine?
Just because she had won the people’s hearts by improving their lives? Just because the Assembly lost their claws over the people’s opinion?
Since they couldn’t win this battle through their ‘oh-so-loved democracy’ they sold their souls to borrow the power of the same demons they once condemned.
-They don’t understand your motives, Marquis. Your loyalty and dedication are too valuable to be offered to those who are blinded by their own ideology and are deluded from reality
I was already aware of this.
And, maybe….If I was on my own, I wouldn’t have cared.
But I was responsible for those under me as well.
I was the one who demanded their sacrifices to appease the Republic.
No matter how resolved I was, the seed sown by Valliant took root in my shattered heart.
Maybe I couldn’t claim to have known the path toward the optimal outcome, but I strived for a better future nonetheless.
That’s how I convinced myself.
But the Revolutionaries won. And I lost.
Everything I stood for was deemed meaningless, they sentenced me to the……Guillotine, in the name of their Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity!
That’s why, when I had received a second chance, I sided with them, to guarantee my own survival and the survival of those who believed in me.
However, I was keenly aware that they weren’t truly just. And deep down I knew they weren’t worth my Loyalty.
Even then, my loyalty was towards this Nation, my pledge to the people who lived here. I would protect them.
Better deluding myself this way than facing another end as a treacherous wretch.
But for what end? I still couldn’t fathom the value they saw in this twisted democracy they continued to sing praises of!
In the end, I convinced myself of this nationalist behavior, to engrave my duty to protect the people.
That’s the least I could do.
Unlike my father, who built his honor on the sacrifices of others, I convinced myself I fought to save many!
So what is the result?
Did I and those who followed me receive treatment befitting our sacrifices?
My retainers, who, even in tears, believed in me and gave up their titles, their lands, their privileges……
Count Lionel – the man who couldn’t forsake the history of his noble blood until the very end.
Christine…My dear Christine…..Limp like a corpse…So much blood flowing out of her….I wouldn’t be able to forget this sight even if I tried.
“Ah, Marquis, please. I didn’t know it would come to this. Spare me!”
A beast so vile I couldn’t even bring myself to utter its name stood in front of me.
“You want me to spare you? You’ll regret this wish very soon.”
For the first time in my life, I was surprised to find myself able to laugh in this situation.
“You’ll end up begging to be killed instead.”
