A Survival Guide for a Counselor in the Apocalypse Chapter 84

Chapter 84

 

Time continued to pass. Leon Wolf could neither persuade her nor kill her. They simply came to understand each other a little more.

The reason she became the last person was very simple. Because she was strong. She said she had refused a “title” until the very end. In the meantime, someone else had received a “title,” and that person had also died of the plague.

Helin lived in a place untouched by anything. People, trying to escape the plague, gathered at the cabin one by one. But the plague spared only Helin and killed everyone else.

And so, a dead world remained with only Helin alive. No, rather, a world completed by Helin, having taken in thousands of lives.

Perhaps it was the cruelest form of preservation.

“This is how you make a contract. You directly ask the spirit, and if they agree, the contract is formed.”

“Isn’t it hard?”

“I don’t know.”

Helin was a strong person. Leon knew that. That was why, whenever he had the chance, he apologized for his past rude remarks. He simply continued doing so as he came to understand her more.

There were no more sharp words. No more desire to be rude. He wanted to respect her… her life, the choices she had made.

Little by little, like clothes getting soaked in a drizzle, a 22-year-old man who had never even experienced love began to give a part of his heart.

The sensation of offering his heart to someone he was supposed to persuade or kill, and instead understanding her, was incredibly strange. Very strange. But Leon knew all of this had been inevitable.

Perhaps from the very first moment he saw her, from the nights when emotions he didn’t want to admit surged up uncontrollably.

In the end, Leon loved Helin. Not her appearance, but her strong inner self. He loved her boundless compassion and the heart that did not break or fade.

Leon had been taught to admire the strong. To not oppose them, but to learn from them. He knew this creed deeply. So it was inevitable… to love someone strong.

 

***

 

Time passed. He didn’t know whether it had been months, days, or years. He simply lived while carrying an immense night and a silent world.

Little by little, his attachment to Hermadion faded away. Because he was too happy. Talking with Helin’s spirits, learning unfamiliar martial arts from them, and learning various knowledge from them.

A place where he could strip away the titles of noble or knight and exist purely as Leon. Only then did he realize the crown of thorns on his head had always been painful.

He didn’t want to lose this warmth. He liked the warmth that came from her small frame. He liked how her smile seemed to shatter sunlight. Even if the sky collapsed, that smile felt like it would remain.

He liked that.

 

***

“Helin!”

When he decided to build a family with her, Leon thought that perhaps it wouldn’t be so bad to live under her, devoted to her.

When her small body slowly grew round and she gave birth to a child who resembled both of them, Leon decided to make this world his own.

He chose not to return.

He chose to dream of living with Helin.

If anyone broke this peace, he would cut them down himself.

 

***

 

Then one day, when their small child had been weaned, Leon realized something.

At some point, Helin had stopped smiling.

A spirit once told him that women, after giving birth, could become depressed or unsettled due to many changes.

So Leon tried to make her smile. He did ridiculous things he’d never done before, begged, and fed her good food.

But Helin only spent more time staring out the window without responding.

He grew anxious. It felt like he had already lost something. Like that, warmth was slipping away from him.

Holding their babbling child, now familiar in the role of a father, Leon looked at Helin.

And she spoke.

“Broken’s Oath.”

Her skill. Why mention that now?

A terrible premonition struck him.

Something was going wrong.

“When a stones drops, Broken’s Oath will be among them. I have many skills, so to obtain Broken’s Oath, you have to understand death. You have to have lost something most precious and have a desperate desire to bring it back. You need to understand that to find it. It’s a kind of trick. After absorbing many stones, I figured it out.”

“…What are you talking about?”

“You said it yourself at the beginning. That our worlds must not merge. I agree. I still don’t know what caused this plague or how to resolve it.”

Even after all that research.

Leon simply stood there, holding the child, listening to the flood of words.

It was violence.

And then Helin acted.

“Helin!!”

What should he call it?

Even decades later, Leon could not find the answer.

Helin turned her back on him and threw herself onto a sword that Leon had created with magic.

Because it was Leon’s magic, the sword became Leon’s attack.

Though she had jumped into it herself, it was ultimately Leon who killed her.

Leon stood there, holding her crystal, as the world collapsed around him.

Holding their child.

He ran to her too late.

When he stepped into the pool of blood and held her carefully, she had already begun to crumble.

“The stone… absorb it…”

He had to obtain Broken’s Oath.

Then… maybe, just maybe… he could bring Helin back.

The world collapsed.

Years, months, days… all vanished as if they had never existed.

Like a mirage.

Gone.

“Helin… Helin…”

Only then did he realize, like a flash of lightning, why she hadn’t merely kept memories… but had resurrected everyone to remain with her.

If evidence disappears, the past disappears with it.

Without proof, even recorded history becomes nothing.

Now, all evidence was disappearing.

 

***

 

Decades later, Leon would reflect on this and think:

Why weren’t her last words “I love you”?

He would suffer alone for decades anyway.

She could have said it just once.

Still a cruel woman.

Leon came to his senses when the child in his arms cried.

Yes… there was one piece of proof Helin had left behind.

Anton, his son.

And Broken’s Oath.

“If I carve you into my body, you will be remembered forever.”

To remember you, I must obtain it.

This foolish, stubborn…

Helin.

 

***

 

The stone. All of Helin’s life.

Leon remembered all of it painfully.

The last memory… just before that terrible moment… was of Helin writing a letter.

 

—

[At some point, your world became just as important to me as mine.]

—

 

A letter written with absolute certainty that Leon would one day see all of this.

 

—

[I do not regret loving you… it was the most foolish thing I’ve ever done.]

—

 

Leon obtained Broken’s Oath.

It was Helin engraved into him.

Something that must never be taken, that must be protected until the very end.

Even after losing Helin, Leon Wolf remained Leon Wolf.

He had to move forward.

He had to lead.

 

“Uncle!”

 

“Father!”

 

“Master!”

 

To protect the small, foolish things he cherished, he picked up his sword.

The crude soup he learned from Helin became his staple.

Whenever he complained, Helin would have thrown a knife and cursed at him.

So Leon never stopped complaining.

If he called their child pitiful, Helin would have told him to shut up.

If he cursed at the dazzling light, saying it would blind him, she would have called him a joyless bastard.

So Leon did exactly that.

The world continued to take everything from him.

What had gone wrong?

Because the child was too lovable.

Because he resembled Helin so much that Leon kept him close.

Because of his playful nature, like Helin’s, he always felt fragile.

So he protected him too much.

 

So…

 

So…

 

“…Anton.”

 

This kind of joke isn’t funny…

 

Not even worth cursing at…

 

“Anton, respond… Get up. Anton!”

 

He called him again and again with Broken’s Oath.

 

But it was too late.

 

Only after the soul had completely dissipated did he find him.

 

Ah.

 

Perhaps he should have raised you like a Wolf.

 

Then maybe this…

 

Ah.

 

The world is too much to bear.