Love Letter From The Future-Chapter 368: Bread and Dagger (66)

Flaming arrows, fireballs and daggers flew, piercing the hearts and heads of his comrades. Screams erupted without fail each time and lives were extinguished one by one.

“Aaaargh!”

“Guh!”

Hans couldn’t gather his thoughts.

All that filled his mind was the single thought: I must survive.

He crawled on all fours, cautiously glancing in the direction the flaming arrows had come from.

From there, figures approached with leisurely gait.

They had tall frames, pointed ears and slender limbs—

They were elves.

Could it be the elves who left earlier had returned?

But the elves Hans faced before were never this strong. Had their forces been this powerful from the start, Hans and his group would have avoided confronting them altogether.

Amid his trembling gaze, one particularly out-of-place silhouette caught his eye.

Among the tall elves stood a short, stocky middle aged man.

His face, horribly disfigured by burns, was hideous. And there was no hair to conceal his grotesque appearance, as if even that had been scorched away .

Yet, his eyes.

Those blue irises were sunk to a chilling depth.

For a moment, Hans was struck with confusion.

But he didn’t have much time to dwell on it.

Crawling desperately, he threw himself into the charred remains of a hut. Then, he shut his eyes, feigned death and waited while silently praying those monsters would hurry past him.

The residual heat from the ashes stung his skin. To make matters worse, he eventually realized an oblivious crow moving around near him.

Hans felt a groan involuntarily rising, but he held it in with all his might.

A nightmare that haunted him all his life was replaying before his eyes.

The day his village was burned.

Even back then, he barely survived by hiding among the ashes of a burnt barn.

From his obscured view, he could hear the elves talking.

At first, their voices were heavy with sorrow.

“This can’t be… We’re already too late. We came to help because we received the intel that there was a human encampment nearby, but…”

“Still, I’m thankful we were at least able to avenge them.”

A voice, likely that of a middle-aged man, was met with a languid response.

Sweat began to bead on Hans’s forehead. Not being able to grasp the situation only made him more uneasy.

In the end, Hans couldn’t resist his anxiety and cracked his eyes open.

And then, he saw it.

A middle-aged man with a hideous visage, accompanied by a tall elf who stood at his side like an attendant.

The elf’s eyes were covered by a strip of crimson cloth. He appeared blind, yet his movements were unnervingly natural.

As though he had another pair of eyes hidden somewhere else.

The middle-aged man let out a lament.

“Revenge, oh… revenge! Is there any fate more tragic than this? Still, if it is the will of God, it is our duty as servants to comply… Though I must admit, I find it troubling that I don’t see the corpses of our brothers and sisters here. Could you please use the ‘Blessing’ to check for me?”

“Of course, Lord Leoric.”

The tall elf complied without hesitation with the command of the man called ‘Leoric.’

He opened his mouth wide and stuck out his tongue. Something began to churn up his throat.

It didn’t take long for a grotesque eyeball to emerge.

The eyeball rolled along his tongue, blinking as it scanned the surroundings. Then, when the middle-aged man placed a hand on the elf’s shoulder, the lump of living flesh began to flicker with a blue light.

Leoric soon let out an exclamation.

“Ian Percus? Hahaha! To think he’s been hiding in an elf village… and even drew his sword to save our brothers and sisters.”

Slurp. The tall elf finally withdrew his tongue.

Naturally, the grotesque eyeball slid back down his throat as well. The tall elf turned to Leoric and asked,

“What should we do about him?”

“He is a remarkable figure. He saved the lives of our brothers and sisters. However…”

The middle-aged man heaved a deep sigh, his face contorting with anguish.

The way he covered his face with both hands seemed like he was trying to make a show of how distressed he was.

“He knows too much. Like that human brother over there pretending to be dead while eavesdropping on us.”

For a moment, Hans felt his breath seize in pure terror.

Summoning superhuman self-control, he forced himself to remain completely still, desperately hoping that it was all just a misunderstanding.

But Leoric had no intention of allowing Hans even that brief moment of false peace.

“Enough of the pointless act, brother. Surely you’ve lived long enough, haven’t you? All while spilling the blood of our elven brothers and sisters…”

“You were the ones who started it.”

Grinding his teeth audibly, he spat out those words.

Hans’s eyes snapped wide open. Perhaps it was the desperate resolve of someone who had already given up.

His mind had long been tangled in fear beyond reason and yet, at the same time, there was also a surge of defiance welling up within him.

This had been the nightmare that haunted him all his life.

And was he supposed to retreat again now, only to regret it later?

He didn’t want that. If the result wouldn’t change anyway, then he wanted to resist to the very end.

After all, wasn’t this a chance someone had given him?

Recalling the face of the young knight wielding a hatchet, Hans staggered to his feet.

“You were the ones who burned down our village first! I still remember—those flaming arrows… It was you who attacked us!”

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“We had no choice.”

Leoric let out a faint sigh and took a step forward.

The elves accompanying him gasped and tried to stop him, but his resolve was firm.

When Leoric raised his hand to signal them to stop, the elves became eerily calm almost instantly, as if by magic.

It was a terrifying display of control.

Hans couldn’t stop the cold sweat running down his back.

“There was a time when I dreamed of a world where humans and elves could coexist. A chance encounter with an elven girl while I was aimlessly wandering as a defeated soldier gave me hope for that possibility. She gave me bread, you see.”

As he spoke, Leoric wiped a tear from the corner of his eye.

His hand fumbled inside his coat, and soon he pulled out a loaf of bread.

Then, as though it were the most natural thing in the world, Leoric held it out.

“Would you like some?”

“Shut up.”

‘Hmm,’ Leoric muttered, as if disappointed.

His hand slipped back into his coat, yet he continued advancing, taking one deliberate step at a time.

“I, too, have grievances. After all, haven’t humans taken everything from the elves? Their homeland, their food, even their very lives…?”

“You elves are just the same!”

“Yes, indeed! And that is precisely the point!”

Leoric clapped his hands together and exclaimed those words. To an onlooker, he might have seemed like he was merely fooling around.

“I—I came to a realization… on the day I watched an elven village burn at the hands of humans, and the day that elf girl who saved me starved to death.”

The middle-aged man stopped in his tracks abruptly.

He quietly drew the sign of the cross with his hands and then clasped them together. It was a gesture often used by followers of the Church of the Heavenly God.

“Immanuel, praise be to the Lord! How arrogant this wretched servant has been!”

At his fervent sermon, the elves following him immediately dropped to their knees.

They also drew the sign of the cross and then clasped their hands in prayer.

Having never seen anything like this in his life, Hans was at a complete loss for words.

“Live together in harmony, they say?! That vile presumption that co-existence is our best path forward! That worthless pile of beliefs has deceived us all! Look at this burning village!”

Leoric’s voice, now heated, carried a faint hint of madness.

His blue eyes burned with fierce intensity.

“Elves, humans—both are exactly the same! This world, where we wound and rob one another, desperately struggle not to avoid getting eliminated… how can this possibly be a realm cared for by our Lord? This is Hell! We’ve been trapped in Hell all along!”

“S-So that’s why you attacked our village?!”

“Yes, exactly! For it is the will of the Lord!”

Step, step.

With his face brimming with conviction, Leoric began walking again. Unnerved by an inexplicable chill, Hans took a hesitant step back.

That’s when his foot caught on something.

It was a half-burnt wooden stake—long and whittled to a sharp tip at the end.

Perfect.

Hans suppressed the surge of elation rising within him.

Then, just as Leoric drew within arm’s reach…

Hans seized the stake and thrust it forward with all his might.

At that range, there was no avoiding it. Clad in nothing but a shabby cleric’s robe, there was no doubt the stake would pierce Leoric’s chest.

Right, that’s what should have happened.

But when Hans felt that dull impact reverberate up his arm—

He lifted his gaze toward Leoric in blank astonishment. Leoric hadn’t moved an inch in defense—he just stood there, wearing a forlorn smile.

Then, with a crushing force, Leoric’s hand slammed down onto his shoulder.

Hans thought he heard a sickening crack.

It all happened in an instant. Before he knew it, his arm had been ripped clean off at the shoulder, blood gushing violently from the exposed stump.

That was no human strength.

Hans let out a bloodcurdling scream of pain.

“GUH, GAAAAARGH!”

“Immanuel, praise be to the Lord! My human brother, you are on the brink of salvation now….”

Then wham—Leoric’s kick slammed into his abdomen.

Feeling his insides churning, he rolled across the ground, coughing up a mouthful of blood. After just two hits in, his vision was already starting to blur.

He was on the brink of death.

Worse yet, Leoric was clearly holding back. If he’d wanted Hans dead, it would’ve happened long ago.

Even so, Leoric did not finish him off.

Just to kill him slowly.

Hans felt a boiling rage mixed with paralyzing fear.

His hair stood on end.

This man—he is insane.

And he truly believed he was doing this for Hans’s own good.

As he spoke again, Leoric’s voice quivered with emotion.

“Loathe me, curse me… I will bear that sin. If someone must go to Hell, then let it be me! So, brother, complete your atonement and swiftly ascend to Heaven!”

Leoric’s hand, which had been fumbling inside his coat, emerged once more.

This time, it wasn’t a loaf of bread he held.

It was a dagger—a weapon unmistakably meant to take a life.

Hans felt his eyelids grow heavier and heavier.

There was no hope. He couldn’t possibly win.

Yet he still wanted to strike back once. Summoning every ounce of strength left in his ruined lungs, Hans let out a laugh.

“Hah… hahahaha… L-Leoric, was it?”

Leoric’s hand, which was wielding the dagger, paused abruptly.

His gaze grew grave, as though willing to hear the man’s final words.

Hans didn’t let that opportunity slip by.

“Y-You’ll fail… There’s someone far more fitting to be a savior than you…”

A man who might have turned his back on humanity, yet still raised his sword for the elves.

A knight who even spared the lives of those who sought to kill him.

Hans had hated him so much once—but now, he couldn’t imagine anyone more reliable.

Hans’s eyes turned bloodshot as he wailed

“I-Ian… Heh, Sir Ian will bring you down. Just wait and see how terrifying the blade forged by humanity truly is…”

“…I’ll keep that in mind.”

That was the final exchange between them.

Thunk—blood spurted from the dagger embedded in Hans’s nape. He let out a final, choking gasp before his body seized and went still.

He was dead.

Leoric, all too accustomed to such outcomes, let out a weary sigh and turned away.

“I appreciate your advice, brother. Ian Percus, I see… so, he’s involved.”

Leooric muttered to himself, his gaze falling to the half-built snow mount constructed nearby.

A greatsword stood upright atop it. It seemed someone had been constructing a grave.

A faint curve appeared at the corner of Leooric’s lips.

“If he is truly such a great hero, then he must overcome trials befitting his greatness…”

Around the middle aged man’s hand, soft white light shimmered.

It soon began to envelop Hans’s severed arm. Not only that, it also began healing the gaping wound on the nape of his neck.

The regenerative power was almost grotesque in its potency.

Such regenerative power could not be granted even by the renowned Saintess herself. And yet, neither Leoric nor the elves around him seemed moved by the spectacle.

Leoric simply leaned in closer to the now-lifeless soldier and whispered into his ear.

“You will be the hero who exposes Ian Percus’s betrayal… This setup should work perfectly. You were believed to be dead and buried in a grave, yet, clinging to the faintest shred of consciousness, you used the last of your strength to write this with your blood.”

The elves began gathering the soldiers’ bodies.

All to carry out Leoric’s plan.

“…‘Ian Percus has betrayed humanity.’ How does that sound?”

Afterward, several more mounds appeared in the elf village.

Later, a group dispatched from Yurdina Castle arrived, eventually followed by a brown-haired woman in a maid’s uniform.

She quietly surveyed the area before reaching into the collapsed rubble.

A lone crow swooped down onto her outstretched hand.

Caw—the crow cried, and as it did, a blue current of mana began coursing up the woman’s arm.

Moments later, the woman let out a meaningful sigh.

“…I’ll have to report this to Sir Ian.”

The next day, Ian stood before the elves and said,

“I must visit this so-called ‘Headquarters.’”

It was a bombshell declaration.

***

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