The Path of Ruin-Chapter 117: Unbelievable Knowledge

The first book Kael read was exactly the kind he was looking for. It was simple, the sort that didn’t expect readers to know everything already.

The first mind-boggling fact he learned was the existence of things called seas and oceans.

He struggled to imagine these massive bodies of water stretching for thousands of kilometers, like pieces of land, with depths that could surpass the height of mountains. As someone who had seen only a few rivers and small ponds in his entire life, his imagination was insufficient. Even the illustrations provided as examples in the book didn’t seem convincing. 𝒻𝑟ℯℯ𝑤𝑒𝑏𝑛𝘰𝓋𝑒𝓁.𝒸𝑜𝘮

Moreover, this body of water was salty!

Why?

No one had a damn real clue!

That’s why they called it the work of the gods.

The world was truly full of strange things.

Setting the seas aside, while reading about landmasses, Kael finally understood what a "continent" meant.

In the past, whenever he heard others mention the word, he’d assumed it was something like the name of the world—but... he’d been wrong.

Continents were the names given to the massive landmasses in the middle of the oceans. There was talk of three main continents. The names of the two similar-sized continents were Venis and Dacthyr.

The continent where the Empire had conquered nearly the entire territory was Venis.

There was also the Platen Continent, which was relatively farther away from these two and smaller in size, but the book contained little information about that one.

Although it caused a bit of disappointment, Kael continued to absorb the information without dwelling on it too much afterward.

After the structure of the world was explained, it was time to move on to the topic mentioned in the book’s title.

According to the book, humanity was currently in its fourth age.

Another shocking piece of information Kael learned thanks to that was that, before reaching their current state, humans were no different from animals!

They had lived in caves, not in the buildings they had constructed themselves. They didn’t have a proper spoken language, and their communication was limited. On top of that, they didn’t even wear clothes!

Just imagining it was like a nightmare.

As Kael gave thanks for being born in the current age, he moved past the era he’d learned was called the Age of Beginnings and looked into information about the second one.

This era was called the Age of Development. It was the era when humans began making tools and laying the foundations of the first language. They were gradually giving up cave life and transitioning to a settled lifestyle.

The Age of Development spanned a very long period. So long, in fact, that Kael couldn’t understand why those who defined these ages hadn’t divided them into several parts. However, he wasn’t an expert, so he didn’t dwell on it too much.

Following the second age came the Age of Kingdoms, which was the period when the first nobles and kingdoms emerged. It wasn’t as long as the Age of Development; it spanned only fifteen centuries. As humanity continued to develop and socialize, this era came to be known as the golden age of humanity.

Finally, the name of the fourth age they were currently living in was...

The Age of War.

This was the era when kingdoms began waging war against one another rather than living together in peace. It had been ongoing for the past seven hundred years. It was a period during which dozens, perhaps even hundreds, of different kingdoms rose and fell. So many wars had been fought that the continent had been divided into countless kingdoms of varying sizes during this time. It was nearly impossible to tell which land belonged to whom.

However, this age was expected to come to an end soon.

Because the Empire had conquered nearly the entire continent...

Although the wars had taken on their most destructive forms in the past few years, no one expected an exceptionally large-scale war to break out anytime soon.

The Venis Continent was in a more... peaceful state, unlike the general trend of the Age of War.

After gaining a general understanding, Kael began reading about the finer details of the eras. He started learning about the kingdoms whose names everyone knew, one of which was the Kingdom of Flencar, where Hakon was an illegitimate prince.

He learned about the emergence of an institution called the church and the existence of religions.

He gathered information about significant figures, both living and dead.

He absorbed a wealth of knowledge about the continent’s explored and unexplored regions.

He read about legendary creatures and how they had indirectly shaped humanity.

And so, the hours began to pass one after another. Hours during which he did nothing but read the books in his hands.

At first, he struggled because he wasn’t used to reading for such long stretches, and he was quite slow. But as time went on, he adapted quickly, finding himself immersed in the pages without taking a break.

He was so focused that the thought of needing to sleep never even crossed his mind.

He had to finish the book to snap out of it. Only when he realized there were no more pages left to turn was he able to stop, look around, and see that night had fallen.

"Haaahh..."

He stretched as his eyes began to close. He leaned back and raised his hands to stretch.

"Yaaawn..."

He wiped the eye crust from his eyes with his fingers. Then he checked the clock and saw that there were only two hours left until sunrise.

"..."

He looked at the books in front of him, then back at the clock. Then he did the same thing again...

In the end, all he could do was sigh.

He stood up. He put the books he was holding back on the shelves where he’d taken them from, then left the library and slowly walked to his room.

He’d rather not look like a total wreck from lack of sleep while Hakon was showing him around the Shadow Recon Division... at least three or four hours of sleep would have been enough.

So, as soon as he lay down in bed, it didn’t take long for everything to be swallowed by darkness.

...

*******

Kael wasn’t usually someone who had many dreams.

He’d always wake up from his sleep as if he’d fallen asleep just seconds ago and suddenly woken up. As if nothing had happened in between.

But this wasn’t always the case. Rarely, sometimes... he could dream.

And that’s exactly what was happening right now.

He was dreaming.

How did he know he was dreaming, though...?

Because...

"Kael, come on! Eat your food!"

"..."

"Hurry! Don’t keep me waiting!"

"..."

He was happy.

He had a life where he was happy.

A life where he didn’t have to worry about anything, where he could live his childhood like a normal child.

A life where neither his mother nor he was a slave, where they lived like normal people in a small town such as Greenveil.

A life where his mother wasn’t dead—no, hadn’t been killed.

"I’m coming."

He slowly walked toward the source of the voice.

They lived in a small house with only two rooms besides the small hallway and the bathroom. On the two-person wooden table in one of those rooms... were plates with steam rising from them.

Of course, there was a figure with her back turned to him, standing between him and the table.

It was his mother’s figure.

When Kael entered, she had stopped setting the table and then slowly turned toward him.

"You took too long! Sit down before your food gets cold!"

"..."

But Kael couldn’t say a word as he looked at his mother’s face turned toward him.

Without moving a muscle, without doing anything, he just stared.

After all, his mother’s face...

Wasn’t there.

Or rather, it was blurry.

It had been like that for a long time.

He had forgotten his mother’s face. So much time had passed that he couldn’t remember it.

Even her voice sounded strange; it wasn’t exactly clear.

Like... artificial.

Kael sat down at the table before his mother said anything else. He looked at the plates steaming with food, but... the plates were empty. There wasn’t a single fork or spoon in sight, either.

"..."

What did he expect from a dream, anyway?

He turned his gaze from the table to his mother, who was sitting directly across from him.

He stared at her for a moment, forcing himself to try to remember her face. But he couldn’t.

Eventually, he gave up.

As his lips parted, a gentle voice came from his mouth.

"Mom."

His mother paused suddenly, even though she suddenly had one of the spoons that he couldn’t see on the table in her hand. She didn’t say anything, but she just stared at him as if waiting for him to continue whatever he was going to say.

At least that’s what Kael thought; after all, there was nothing on the face of the figure in front of him.

"Do you think I... messed up?"

She wasn’t his real mother.

He was just having a dream.

His mother aside, nothing here was real.

It was all just an illusion created by his mind.

But... he didn’t care.

"By accepting the King’s offer, by killing those merchants in Greenveil, by accepting the General’s offer, by getting my hands this dirty..."

He had decided to live. No matter what, he had decided to fulfill his purpose in life. Musthar V. Arcanoa would die one way or another. He would make sure it happened.

He couldn’t say he regretted the decisions he’d made throughout his life, even though he knew he’d done wrong things.

But now... even though she was fake, he wasn’t sure while standing before his mother.

"You always told me to be a good person. You said that if I were a good person, even if bad things happened to me, at least I wouldn’t regret it. But I... I wasn’t a good person. I did bad things. I killed people who had no reason to die, all for my own gain."

He narrowed his eyes. Without pausing, he continued.

"Even when I was a slave, I stood in the way of so many people just to get into the palace botany. I caused them to be poisoned. I caused the execution of those who had done nothing wrong. It was all to get to where I am now. It was all because I didn’t want to disappear as the only thing you left behind in this world—I, at the very least, wanted to take your revenge."

He couldn’t stop the corners of his lips from curving upward slightly.

"I finally reached a point where even my Path revealed itself as Ruin. Ironic, but fitting. I became the exact opposite of what you always advised me to be—in every sense."

He focused on his mother’s blurred face without even blinking.

"With all the things I’ve done, would you say I messed up? Or... would you approve...? What do you think?"

"Kael..."

When his mother’s distorted voice echoed through the room, Kael felt his breath catch for a moment. His eyes widened. Time seemed to stand still.

He could have sworn.

He might not have been able to make out her face, but...

She was smiling.

He was certain.

But, then...

"What are you talking about?"

As if everything had become a jumbled mess, those words echoed inside him. The world trembled as if an earthquake were striking, yet he simply... froze solid.

"..."

As silence took hold of his entire being, his expression didn’t change one iota. But, in the end... he couldn’t stop a small smirk from breaking through after a short while.

"Hah... hahah..."

He looked away from his mother. He placed his fingers between himself and his mother’s blurry figure, as if he didn’t want to see her, but he also wrinkled his forehead so it wouldn’t look strange.

"Of course..."

What had he expected?

This... was a dream.

It was just a trick his mind was playing on him.

"Wake up, Kael."

He paused.

As he withdrew the fingers wrinkling his forehead, his eyes refocused on his mother.

Then... the world shook even more violently.

Before he could make sense of what was happening, everything was plunged into darkness for a brief moment.

Then... his closed eyes slowly opened.

Where his mother’s figure had stood just moments ago, he now saw someone else...

Right in front of him, inside his own room...

"...?"

It was Hakon.

"Ah..."

He had woken up...