“Since this is the case, the Rardin family will no longer interfere with the matters of the Siris family. Bertran, you have served me well these years, but I believe it is time you retire. In thanks for your decades of service, please feel free to contact me directly if there is anything you need at all, I wish your family peace and prosperity into the future.”
Healer Averit gracefully left his final words, leaving with his head held high and a slight nod of etiquette toward Leonidas. However, all Leonidas could think was…
‘What a sly fox.’
Leonidas’ goals had instantly become almost impossible.
He wanted the relationship between the Rardins and the Siris to be as strained as possible, but with things like this, Bertran would never have a reason to talk.
As things stood now, the Rardins were unaware that Leonidas was targeting them for the sake of his mother. There were plenty of other reasons for Leonidas to be hostile.
However, even if they were unaware, in the case that Bertran was privy to information that Leonidas would very much want to know, the Rardins would know to appease Bertran so that the latter would never have a reason to betray them.
So long as Bertran felt that he could benefit from both sides, there would never be a need to betray either one.
In addition to this, Leonidas didn’t believe that his War Cry interrogation methods would work against Bertran.
For one, the latter was a veteran of battle, his mental fortitude was far beyond Beccerth’s.
Secondly, if he was smart enough to play both sides, he was also smart enough to know that Leonidas couldn’t afford to be openly hostile with the Rardins just yet without putting his own life in the line of fire.
It wasn’t a coincidence that Averit had been caught by Leonidas visiting the Siris family just a day after he managed to save Anabel from their clutches, especially after neglecting and ignoring them to the point they had to sacrifice Anabel to Leonidas in the first place!
As Averit’s steps faded away, Leonidas felt that his lead toward finding out the connection between the Rardins and his mother was fading as well.
His finger tapped again, the wood nearly splintering to the point the entire table would collapse into two.
Anabel’s gaze flickered with worry. She had been with Leonidas for a long time, but she had never seen him react like this to anything.
To someone else, it might look as though his expression was still unmoved, but Anabel could feel a swirling imbalance around him that was a far cry from his usual dull and calm appearance.
Her hand subconsciously reached forward, touching his wrist before he could tap the table again.
If his finger really landed once more, the table would most definitely crack. At that point, it wouldn’t be a mystery to anyone how he was feeling.
Leonidas’ hand paused, his gaze shifting to Anabel’s small hand.
Her fingers could barely wrap around the meat of his thumb, but her touch felt warm, bringing him a novel sort of feeling.
How long had it been since someone tried to comfort him?
Leonidas closed his eyes, his rumbling heart ringing in his eardrums.
Maybe things had been too smooth-sailing for him since he met the spirit. Not everything could endlessly rise, there would inevitably be some bumps in the road.
His mother’s corpse had vanished, he had lost maybe his greatest trump card in the tome, and now, his best lead to finding out even a modicum of his mother’s struggles was right in front of him, but he couldn’t even use it.
Leonidas rose his free hand to his chest, feeling for his mother’s letter.
It had been broken and bruised, especially after Lady Eve had tossed it and considering what he had been through. But, it was still there.
Even without bringing it out he could practically see it before his eyes.
Rarely will goodbyes be as you planned them. Soon, any day now, I can feel that my time with you will come to an end. You’ll feel rage, sadness, your heart might be broken. However, you must dare to live on. You must, MUST, dare to survive. Often times, choosing life is the hardest decision you can make. But, it is right then… no, now, that you must choose the road less followed.
Times will be difficult. Your rage will consume you. Should you accept such hardship? Should you weather it all? My son, you must not let such thoughts consume you. Believe in yourself, your talent can accomplish much more than you believe. You are not a cripple, outsiders and their words are filled with ignorance and a facade of superiority. They do not know of the remarkable strength of your heart, of your mind, of your soul.
Allow yourself to dream, to open yourself up to hope, to experience what kindness the world might have to offer, what love. Organize your aspirations. Choose goals that will fuel your future endeavors. Demand a radiant path for yourself. Seize the day, erase your doubts. Allow mom to look down upon you with a smiling gaze filled with pride.
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Live on, my son
Love, mom
Leonidas felt the toughness of the letter, reading it in his mind again and again.
Eventually, he calmed down enough to cast Scholar’s Mind, allowing the last of his impulsive feeling to vanish with the wind.
But, that was when he suddenly sat up as straight as a javelin.
Why hadn’t he thought of this before?
‘Mother’s final letter, could there be a message left within?’
When Leonidas thought about it, his brows furrowed. The words spoken were a bit different from what Leonidas was used to from his mother, but not to the point it felt like a completely different person.
While Yvette never spoke these words so forcefully, her actions often pushed Leonidas in this direction.
But, when Leonidas really focused on the words, his mother’s mention of his talent and the ignorance of others was especially jarring. Did she know something he didn’t?
His mother never spoke ill of others, even when they had clearly done her wrong. Something like calling others ignorant wasn’t in the realm of possibilities for her, that was definitely more of something Leonidas would do since he wasn’t very good at controlling his temper.
‘Wait!’
Leonidas’ eyes glowed. One of the first books he learned how to read was about a crime fighter and detective. It was very possible that this book had given Leonidas much of the impetus he needed to form his current relationship with books and knowledge.
Within that book, there were several scenes related to coded messages and words.
Leonidas had only had three of four books back then. After all, books were expensive.
He would read them again and again, and there was no way his mother wouldn’t be familiar with such a small selection. And, clearly by her letter, she could both read and write.
‘Which one… Which one…’
Leonidas no longer had access to these books, but he had read them enough to have practically every word memorized.
‘For this letter to flow so smoothly, it’s very likely that mother used an Initialism Cipher.’
An Initialism Cipher was a coded message that made use of the first letter of every word.
Leonidas immediately put this into action, but he was just as quickly stumped.
Just the first line, “Times will be difficult”, made no sense. What was “Twbd” supposed to mean?
‘No, the book went further than that. In fact, the main twist in the book was that what was thought to be a normal Initialism Cipher actually turned out to be a variation where only some letters mattered and others could be ignored based on a set of hidden keywords the main character had to find…’
Leonidas went through the words again, but he couldn’t find any ‘hidden keywords’, nor could he find a pattern. He even went as far as to only use the first letter of every sentence, but that failed as well.
Realizing that he had probably overthought things, Leonidas settled back down, taking a deep breath. He had allowed his emotions to get the best of him again.
Sometimes, he wished he could be as calm and level-headed as his mother. He didn’t know how she had been so strong for so long.
‘No… it doesn’t make sense… Mother wrote a letter that emphasized my need to live on so many times, but she didn’t warn me about my greatest enemy? That makes no sense… Unless?’
Leonidas’ gaze glowed again.
‘Maybe it’s a stepwise Initialism Cypher. Rather than a repeat pattern, it’s an evolving one.’
Leonidas’ gaze snapped closed, his heart shuttering when he found a pattern that finally seemed to work.
‘R… a… r… d…’
Rarely will goodbyes be as you planned them. Soon, any day now, I can feel that my time with you will come to an end. You’ll feel rage, sadness, your heart might be broken. However, you must dare to live on. You must, MUST, dare to survive…..
‘… t?’
Leonidas’ brows furrowed, hard.
Had he just found a pattern where he wanted to find one? He had read a psychological textbook about that in the past. People tended to do that a lot, especially when they didn’t want to believe the alternative.
‘Rard… That almost spells out Rardin… Is it really just a coincidence? Am I an idiot?’
Leonidas had taken the first letter of the first word of the first sentence, then took the first letter of the second word of the second sentence, continuing on to pull out these words.
‘… There has to be something I’m missing, something…’
Leonidas’ heart skipped a beat.
If this method of decoding was correct, there were two lines that would never fit no matter what he did.
Live on, my son
Love, mom
Leonidas immediately sprang into action. He ignored every sentence with ‘live on’, ‘my son’, ‘love’, and ‘mom’.
The keywords he had been looking for all this time were right in front of his face!
Rarely will goodbyes be as you planned them. Soon, any day now, I can feel that my time with you will come to an end. You’ll feel rage, sadness, your heart might be broken. However, you must dare to live on. You must, MUST, dare to survive. Often times, choosing life is the hardest decision you can make. But, it is right then… no, now, that you must choose the road less followed.
Times will be difficult. Your rage will consume you. Should you accept such hardship? Should you weather it all? My son, you must not let such thoughts consume you. Believe in yourself, your talent can accomplish much more than you believe. You are not a cripple, outsiders and their words are filled with ignorance and a facade of superiority. They do not know of the remarkable strength of your heart, of your mind, of your soul.
Allow yourself to dream, to open yourself up to hope, to experience what kindness the world might have to offer, what love. Organize your aspirations. Choose goals that will fuel your future endeavors. Demand a radiant path for yourself. Seize the day, erase your doubts. Allow mom to look down upon you with a smiling gaze filled with pride.
Leonidas opened his eyes, the sharpness within them causing Bertran who stood across from him several meters away to almost completely stop breathing.
Rardin. Traitor. Ogre.
Leonidas stood from his seat, his calmness having returned.
“Anabel, let’s go.”
He turned and walked away, leaving without speaking a single word to the retired Paladin. A man who wanted to sit on the fence and look for benefits from two sides was worthless to him.