I Captured the Enemy Who Tried to Kill Me - Chapter 38
Kaisis opened his eyes amidst a headache that felt like his skull would split.
‘What happened?’
His last memory was, yes, the Imperial Palace garden.
His knights screaming, and the guides collapsing.
‘Was I sucked into a Gate?’
Suppressing the sharp pain in his temples, he got up.
He didn’t know why a Gate rampage identical to the one six years ago had occurred in the Imperial Palace, but he needed to assess his current situation of being alone inside a Gate.
‘This is the worst-case scenario, no matter how I look at it.’
His body, deprived of a guide’s touch, was like a bomb about to explode.
Since he had pushed all the knights away at the end, he would be the only one caught in the Gate.
“Damn it.”
Even for the highest-ranked Awakened One, breaking through a Gate alone was no easy task.
Especially when unable to properly use one’s power.
“This is the worst. But… where is this place?”
He couldn’t hide his bewilderment as he scanned his surroundings.
The landscapes inside the Gates were mostly sights unseen in this world.
Desolate, strange terrains with tall buildings, dry and harsh air, and undergoing desertification.
Or vast lands with excessively lush, pristine natural scenery.
There were also areas with volcanoes about to erupt, or places covered in filth, spreading a terrible stench.
But this place was unmistakably…
‘…the Imperial Palace?’
Kaisis’s eyes wavered momentarily in confusion.
Never once had a Gate’s landscape reflected their world.
So how was this possible?
That wasn’t the only strange thing.
“My voice.”
At first, he didn’t notice due to confusion, but his own voice sounded strange.
While hurriedly moving, he realized that the heights of everything in his vision were also strange.
“As if I’ve become shorter.”
When he exited the long palace corridor and reached the angel fountain in the green garden, he was speechless.
‘That fountain.’
It was the one that had been completely shattered without a trace during the terrible tragedy six years ago.
The memory of his mother decorating the fountain with an angel statue resembling Luias to commemorate his birth was still vivid.
But why was it here?
A chilling sensation crept up from beneath his feet.
Kaisis then realized that he wasn’t feeling the power surge and terrible pain he should feel as an Awakened One.
His current state reminded him of his body from the time when he was too young to enter battle.
‘Could this place be…’
His face wrinkled intensely.
Gates come in various forms.
The type where you must kill endless monsters until a core appears.
The type where an exit appears only after finally killing one powerful monster hidden in the terrain.
The type where those who enter the Gate must use their wisdom to solve something symbolic or question-like to reach an exit.
But by far the worst was…
‘A mental Gate?’
The type of Gate that swallows those who enter, implants illusions close to reality, and puts Awakened Ones into an endless sleep—attacking their minds.
It also had the fewest survivors.
‘Have I really fallen into such a Gate?’
The best method was to wake the sleeping body from outside.
Usually, guides didn’t fall easily into these mental attacks.
Even if they did, they woke faster than Awakened Ones, so typically accompanying Indojas would wake the Awakened Ones.
But guides had no combat ability, so they rarely accompanied others into Gates.
For this reason, when encountering mental attack Gates, Awakened Ones often died without being able to properly use their abilities.
“I never thought I’d end up like this.”
His heart beat anxiously.
No one would know.
The strong Emperor of the Empire, the highest-ranked Awakened One.
Yet apart from that powerful strength, he himself felt his mind was unstable.
He had been gritting his teeth, imagining what scene would unfold before him if he fell into a mental attack Gate that touched one’s most painful sensations.
‘The scene that will unfold before me is surely from that time.’
He stared at his white, clean palm.
‘Yes. Just like… my hands from six years ago.’
When he was 17 years old.
When he was still called the Prince.
When he looked like a young boy whose bones hadn’t properly grown despite being a high-ranking Awakened One because he couldn’t properly unleash his power.
‘Is my mind already becoming dizzy?’
This was what made the mental attack Gates frightening.
They blur one’s sense of who they originally were, where they came from, and what they were doing.
Thus mixing with the illusion and confusing what is real and what is fake.
His tender fingernails dug into his palm.
The stinging pain felt so real.
‘I must remember. I am the Emperor of the Empire, responsible for everything. I must escape this place…’
But the nightmare he dreaded became reality before his eyes.
“How is it?”
A cold voice of a woman filled with contempt.
“That this monster is outside?”
A voice filled with such terrible hatred that one could hardly believe it was addressing her own son.
“Speak, Prince.”
As he slowly raised his head, someone who once felt like a massive mountain stood before him.
“This monster.”
Those blue eyes, so similar to his own, glared at him.
The living nightmare from six years ago.
The object of both his love and hatred.
The person who had instilled in him a deep-seated anger and disgust toward magicians.
His root.
“I said speak!”
The one who gave birth to him, his mother.
‘This is just fake.’
His mind rapidly became disordered.
‘This is fake…’
Just like the delicate young prince whose heart would crumble at a single word from his mother.
‘Ha.’
Everything before his eyes quickly collapsed.
***
Please don’t, Mother.
Don’t hit my brother.
Luias opened his eyes wide.
Only then did he realize he had dreamed of past events.
The small, thin prince who was also a mute magician boy rubbed his face with a gloomy expression.
He missed his mother. But also didn’t miss her.
His mother, a magician, and his father, an Awakened One, were subjects of a political marriage hoping to improve relations between the two groups, but the result wasn’t good.
His father deeply loved his brother, His Majesty the Awakened One, while his mother kept Luias, a magician like herself, close to her heart.
So back then, it was difficult for Luias to easily approach his brother and smile brightly.
Occasionally, when Luias would cling to his beloved brother and smile, his mother would always…
“Meow.”
His thought was abruptly cut off. Luias was startled and crawled across the bed to touch something at his headboard.
The boy who couldn’t speak urgently tapped the round, curled-up creature gently.
The creature opened its eyes—it was the plump cat Lucy, his master’s cat.
Why was it here?
Why did it seem to be in pain?
Should he take it to his master right away?
“I’m okay, meow.”
Then, the cat spoke.
As if to calm him, it gently wrapped its thick tail around his wrist and then released it.
But Luias could tell the cat was faintly trembling all over.
He silently asked.
Are you in pain?
“I’m really fine, meow. I can’t faint, meow. Those terrible things, I must stay conscious, otherwise that child might not be able to get out, meow…”
He didn’t understand what it meant.
“Meow.”
The cat’s head dropped.
‘Lucy!’
Luias’s face crumpled.
He didn’t understand. The important thing was that he shouldn’t just stay here with a cat in such pain.
‘I’ll take you.’
Luias carefully took the rather heavy cat into his arms.
Being careful not to drop it, he began running out the door.
Haa, haa. His shallow breaths escaped.
‘If it’s my master!’
Believing that his master, who always calmly resolved everything, would heal Lucy.
