Sedina parted her lips.
Her heart was so tangled that it was difficult to decide what to say.
She was moved by the sight of Walter offering a sincere apology, but she also resented him for saying such things only now.
She felt unexpected gratitude for the fact that Walter had invested so much for her sake, but at the same time she felt bitter that even though he had loved her mother, he had still abandoned her.
Emotions were truly complicated and contradictory.
It wasn’t something as simple and one-dimensional as joy or sorrow.
She was joyful yet sad.
Grateful yet angry.
“......Let’s go.”
Sedina pulled Ludger along, walking past Walter.
In the end, what Sedina chose was not to tie off the knot right away, but to postpone it.
Walter did not lift the head he had bowed until Sedina had passed him by.
Perhaps, deep down, he had already accepted that this was how things would turn out.
Hans and Alex kept their mouths tightly shut as they quietly followed behind Ludger, not daring to interfere in the suffocating air between father and daughter.
They had realized very clearly that trying to meddle here would only cause themselves harm.
“Uh, is it okay to just leave it like that?”
Only Bellaruna, who had no sense of tact whatsoever, let such words slip out.
“Shh. Keep quiet.”
“Wh-why?”
“I said be quiet!”
Hans hushed Bellaruna harshly, dragging her away.
The one who tried to comfort the abandoned Walter was Robert, the captain of the airship.
“Chairman. Please be strong. It’s difficult for everything to be resolved with a single apology.”
“......That’s true. Perhaps I should just be thankful that she didn’t shout at me instead.”
“Mm. That might be so. But don’t worry. Things will work out.”
Robert forced a smile as he consoled Walter.
After all, he was the only one here who could sympathize with Walter as a father, so he felt he should at least offer some comfort.
Of course, it wouldn’t be entirely wrong to say he also wished to stay in the good graces of his employer.
* * *
Sedina’s mood was far from good.
To put it bluntly, she was annoyed.
The reason was obvious.
It was because of her father Walter Roschen’s attitude.
Even as she walked down the corridors of the Roschen mansion, her feelings did not ease.
She did not say a word until she finally returned to her room.
‘Why am I even here?’
The one dragged along naturally into the depths of the mansion, Ludger, didn’t understand why he was there either.
Hans, Alex, and Bellaruna were gone.
The three of them had hurriedly fled midway, knowing this matter had nothing to do with them.
What advice could they possibly give regarding the long-festering emotions between a father and daughter?
Fighting the elven nobles again would have been far easier on the heart.
Still, because Sedina was their junior in Owens, each of them had left Ludger with a parting word:
—Boss. Stay strong. She’s still the youngest, so you need to look after her.
—Leader. You know you’ve got to do well, right? A girl’s heart is like glass, really easy to wound.
—H-hehe. If things work out later, could you maybe ask if we can go back to the World Tree and log in again?
“......”
Honestly, they were utterly useless at moments like this.
Ludger gave a small sigh and quietly studied Sedina.
Sitting on the sofa, she looked deeply conflicted.
Her face shifted from anger, to softening, to irritation again, to faint understanding of Walter’s actions.
Her emotions flickered across her expression so constantly that Ludger began to worry if she might actually be suffering from manic depression.
‘Guess I have no choice.’
The reason Sedina had dragged him here must have been because, at this moment, he was the only one she felt she could rely on.
At times like this, he figured he should give some advice—as her teacher, and as a senior in life.
“How do you feel?”
Though the words came out clumsily, Sedina answered immediately, as if she had been waiting for such a question.
“Complicated. At first I thought I could just talk it through. But when I actually faced him, I felt angry and bitter, and I didn’t even want to open my mouth.”
Ludger nodded as though he understood.
“Of course. Reality is always different from how you imagine it beforehand.”
“That’s part of it, but it’s not just blind anger either. I also feel grateful, and in my head I can accept his actions. But... my heart just can’t.”
A wounded heart—
No matter how much it is coaxed, it cannot easily be soothed.
Ludger considered it.
Perhaps this was the moment to share advice drawn from his own experience.
“Still, it’s not that you hate him to death, is it?”
“......There was a time I did, but now it’s calmed a lot.”
“Then there’s still room. Unlike in my case.”
“Ah.”
Sedina’s mouth fell open as she belatedly realized Ludger’s position.
Come to think of it, wasn’t Ludger someone whose own family had tried to kill him, forcing him to flee?
‘Wait. Did I pick the wrong person to seek comfort from?’
If you compared misfortune, Ludger’s situation overwhelmingly outweighed hers.
She hadn’t realized it because Ludger always acted so calm.
He was the one who should be comforted, not her.
“Ah, um, I... I don’t even know what to say to you...”
Sedina flustered as she realized her mistake.
Her own situation was just about being angry. Ludger’s family had genuinely been full of people who wanted him dead.
“Don’t worry about it. What matters right now is your own issue.”
‘How can I not worry...’
Sedina groaned inwardly.
Because the atmosphere had turned awkward, she felt like she was sitting on a bed of thorns.
Then—someone knocked softly on the door.
Just as Sedina wondered who it could be, Ludger let a faint smile touch his lips.
“You can’t resist, can you.”
“Huh? What do you mean...”
Just as Sedina started to catch on and opened her mouth—Walter stepped inside.
She hadn’t expected Walter to follow her, and Sedina’s lips trembled.
“Sedina. I have something to say.”
Sedina turned her head sharply, avoiding his eyes.
It was a wordless refusal, saying she didn’t even want to face him, but Walter didn’t back down.
He felt instinctively that if not now, there would never be another chance.
That the opportunity to mend their twisted relationship existed only in this very moment.
Of course, he could not deny that this too was selfish of him.
He had chosen to sever things himself, and now he barged in demanding reconciliation?
It was shameless beyond belief.
Even so.
Walter chose to be shameless.
From the day he failed in his role as a father, he had already become an irredeemable man.
Adding a little more shamelessness now would not change the fact that he was a wretched human being.
First he would talk.
What Sedina did with him afterward didn’t matter.
Sensing his desperate resolve, Sedina shrank further into herself.
Like a hedgehog bristling its spines, she tried to forcibly tear Walter out of her awareness.
One side knocked endlessly.
The other side kept the door bolted shut.
It looked as though the standoff might never end, so Ludger finally decided to intervene.
‘I don’t really like this.’
Meddling in another family’s affairs wasn’t to his taste.
But treating Sedina as just “someone else” and doing nothing but watch from the sidelines was ridiculous.
“It seems your daughter still doesn’t want to talk.”
When Ludger spoke, Walter’s gaze turned to him.
“Wouldn’t it be better to just do as usual—cut off your interest and step back?”
The look Ludger gave Walter as he said it asked, plain as day, “That’s what you always did, wasn’t it?”
A direct jab at his past failures.
Walter’s expression did not flicker as he replied,
“I cannot.”
“Oh my. I suppose my words must have sounded like a convenient suggestion. Then let me say it again. Step back. And never appear before Sedina again.”
Sedina’s eyes went wide in shock, her round pupils filling with Ludger’s figure. She had not expected him to go so far.
“I cannot.”
“Or, perhaps I can count this as the payment for my commission. That you leave here and never approach her again.”
“......You could demand the entire company and I would hand it over, but not this.”
“Because of the guilt that came too late?”
Ludger fixed Walter with a cynical smile.
“You said you’d give me anything. If that’s the case, can you give your life here and now?”
As Ludger said it, he stirred his mana.
Dense, spreading mana constricted Walter’s body.
Lacking resistance to such # Nоvеlight # things, Walter let out a low groan.
If Ludger wished, he could wring Walter to death on the spot.
Judging by Ludger’s grim aura, he looked filled with the intent to kill Walter at any moment.
“S-stop!”
The one who stopped him was Sedina.
Even she didn’t seem to know why she had stepped forward.
But there was one thing she knew for certain.
She had to stop Ludger from harming Walter.
“Sedina. It may be that ending it here like this is the proper way.”
“N-no. No matter what, this is...”
“Then what will you do?”
Pressed by Ludger’s blunt question, Sedina hesitated to answer.
Knowing he shouldn’t leave any room, Ludger left none.
“If you hesitate like that, I’ll take care of it myself.”
“No.”
In the end, Sedina had no choice but to decide.
“I’ll—I’ll do it.”
Ludger looked at Sedina in silence, then released the mana binding Walter’s body.
Having regained freedom of movement, Walter didn’t even have time to feel relief at being spared.
Sedina, who had avoided his gaze until now, was looking straight at him.
The moment of resolve had come.
Sedina thought the same.
She could not keep running forever.
So it would be better to end everything here.
“Sedina. I...”
“Don’t speak—listen.”
In a cold voice, Sedina cut off Walter’s words.
It was so merciless that even Sedina herself was surprised at her own tone.
Surprise aside, her lips moved without stumbling, pouring out the thoughts in her heart.
“I hate you, Father. No—‘hate’ isn’t enough. I loathe you. I even wished the entire Roschen family, including you, would just collapse. Honestly, even calling you ‘Father’ like this—I think that’s the very least courtesy I can show.”
Walter accepted those words quietly.
It was the voice that had pooled in the wounded heart of the daughter he had hurt for years.
Listening to it in silence was the original sin he alone had to repay.
“I thought about it over and over. Why did I have to go through this. I lost my mother and fell into grief—so why was I treated as a discarded child by the family on top of that. It felt like the whole world was betraying me. No one loved me, and the loss that the only person who had loved me left my side—it loomed so large.”
“......”
“You probably already know, but I even joined a secret society on purpose to ruin the family. Because, for me, there was no path left but that. Maybe I was also trying to find someone there who could at least empathize with my situation.”
But even in the Black Dawn Society, Sedina was out of place.
The name “Roschen” that she so despised became an obstacle even there.
It got in the way of everything, that Roschen tag clinging to her without end.
And around the time she was growing exhausted with life, she met him.
John Doe.
No—Ludger Cherish.
“Teacher, you are a greater person than Father. Even when you’ve gone through things far harsher than he has, you don’t act selfishly. You always live giving your utmost. Watching you, I realized so much.”
At those words, Ludger scratched his cheek.
Her sudden praise was unexpected, but Sedina’s voice remained earnest throughout.
“Just as I was meeting new people and trying to get a little better, it all blew up. I was dragged to the elven kingdom and went through so much. And I learned a truth I had never known. That Father acted that way because he was worried about me.”
“That is...”
“Even so, I was angry. Because you worried. Because you loved me. But does that mean you can behave however you please? Is it okay to hurt someone so easily under the pretext of doing it for their sake?”
Even with a hundred mouths, Walter had no words.
She was right.
No matter how much he regretted it inwardly, in the end he was the one who pushed that method through to the end.
“But when I think back, I’m not upright enough to scold someone else like this either.”
Sedina let her shoulders sag and smiled in self-mockery.
“Because I did the same thing to a dear friend of mine that you did to me.”
Sedina had kept Julia at a distance out of what she felt for her.
But Julia did not give up and kept trying to approach Sedina.
Sedina, too, was secretly thinking of reconciling with her old friend, but the guilt kept her from speaking.
“In the end, blood can’t be fooled, can it.”
Ironically.
The moment she recognized that, Sedina found herself understanding Walter’s position.
“If I don’t accept your apology here and spend my whole life as a stranger to you... then I’ll end up becoming the same kind of person you are.”
Sedina clenched her fist.
All these words were said to Walter and, at the same time—
They were a reproach to herself.
“I don’t want to become that.”
At last, having steeled herself, Sedina stared straight into Walter’s eyes.
Walter unconsciously drew a breath at the sight.
In Sedina’s upright gaze, he saw the face of his late wife—whom he could no longer see.
Walter felt something rise up from within.
Emotion.
The emotion he had suppressed, packed away, and hidden all this time surged like a storm.
I couldn’t do anything.
I couldn’t do anything as a father.
And yet your child has grown this strong.
—She is your child too, isn’t she?
He heard her voice—a voice that could no longer be heard.
At the same time, memories from the past flashed before his eyes.
The time he first met Ella Plante and fell for her at a glance.
How, after endless courtship, he finally received her consent to marry.
He had been happy.
Behind the impassive face he tried so hard not to let show, he always held joy.
He could never forget that happiness.
The time he held the child born of that love—the baby—in his trembling arms.
The feel of that baby’s tiny hand as it reached out and touched his cheek.
Drip.
A tear slid down Walter’s cheek.
“I’m... sorry.”
The iron-blooded businessman, said to have never shed even a drop of blood or a single tear in his life—
Dropped to his knees and wept.
“I’m truly... sorry.”