Life didn't get easier, even in another world

259 Who?

“You...”

Kairen muttered. The man’s eyebrows twitched upon hearing Kairen.

“You are him?”

A smile formed on the man’s face.

“So you finally decided to drop the act-”

“The head of the religion?”

The man’s words were interrupted by Kairen.

“The holy sain?”

“...”

.....

As soon as those words left Kairen’s mouth, the man’s expression turned weird. He froze for a moment, opened and closed his mouth several times, and blinked his eyes like an idiot.

“Huh?”

And in the end, that was the only thing he managed to say. Kairen however, didn’t seem to have noticed the change in the man nor had heard the man’s confused voice as he himself was not in the best state of mind at the moment.

“The holy saint! The head of the religion??? You?? You are him? The temples are yours? White hair? The man?”

Kairen’s voice raised a little bit without him noticing it himself as he kept babbling whatever came to his mind. He was too busy holding the last thread of his sanity from leaving his side to notice his loud voice or the man’s face.

Blink blink

The man blinked several times, tilted his head, frowned, and then blinked again. These actions were accompanied by the opening and closing of his mouth, which made him look like a confused fish.

“Why are you... Calling me like that?”

He finally managed to ask a question, his voice low and confused.

“Why? Are you not him? The holy saint! The head of the religion!!! The one who killed a dragon!!! That... That man who made the temples! That temple there, this temple here, the temples everywhere! The seven! The heptagon! You are not him?”

Kairen started to name the man’s nicknames and all of the things he had done one by one while raising his voice and also hands little by little. If one looked at him from afar and heard his words, they would think that he was a cultist or some such.

“Huh?”

The man was still looking at him with that strange face.

“Are you NOT him?”

“....”

“ArE yOu NoT HiM?”

“...”

Kairen’s voice was getting more and more coarse the more he repeated that question. His face was hidden under the mask of his uniform, but he was sure he looked like a crazed monkey at the moment.

“Ah? I am him... But... Why are calling me with those names?”

“YOU ARE HIM!!!”

Kairen took several steps back as he gasped. The man thought he was overreacting, but he didn’t say anything.

“How??? You are still alive? After so many years?? And you look young what the hell! Why are you even here? No, wait! I should ask you about the temples!! Holy shit what the hell!?!?!?!?? Where did you come from? Where were you until now? What the hell is going on?”

Kairen’s mind was a chaotic mess. He didn’t even notice that he was saying those words out loud.

“Why are you after me? Do you know me? Nah! How would you know me? Wait, is it true that you are from another world? They said you came from somewhere else! How? How can someone travel through worlds? Wait, do you know anything about how I can undo the curse of the artifacts?”

The man that was silently listening to Kairen finally opened his mouth.

“Did you finally lose it?”

The man had a blank face.

“Did all those years of traveling through worlds finally drive you crazy?”

He asked in a way that was hard to say if he was asking a real question or just mocking Kairen.

“What?”

The man ignored Kairen’s question and started to mumble to himself instead.

“No. That can’t be... He wouldn’t lose his mind in the first place and... My prince wasn’t someone who would act like this even if he had lost his mind and gone crazy...”

As he said that, his handsome face contorted to an ununderstandable expression.

“Who are you?”

This time, it was the man who asked that. Unlike Kairen, who asked that question out of pure curiosity, this man didn’t seem to actually question Kairen’s identity. It was clear by his tone and face that he was threatening Kairen, that if he didn’t explain himself, he wouldn’t hesitate to kill him on the spot.

“I-”

Kairen opened his mouth to answer but was forced to close it without being able to utter any words. It was because of the man’s pressure. It was huge before, but it suddenly increased so much that it was now unbearable.

“Gasp!”

Gasping, Kairen stumbled in his place.

‘Damn! You are the one who suddenly jumped at me, now you are asking who I am?’

Kairen closed his eyes and tried to take deep breaths as he held himself standing by leaning on the wall.

‘I also said before that you’ve mistaken me with someone else! It was you who didn’t believe me!’

Drip drip

Sweet was dropping down to the ground from his forehead.

“...Ren.”

Kairen uttered some words with much difficulty.

“Kairen.”

He couldn’t even raise his head to see the face of the man. He just talked out his name as he was asked to.

“It’s Kairen.”

The face of the man, which Kairen was unable to see, contorted into a stiff expression.

“Kairen?”

He raised one eyebrow.

“I don’t know anyone with such a stupid name.”

He said it with a tone that made Kairen wonder if he had to apologize to this man for his parents’ weird naming skills.

“....”

He decided to just shut his face. Not that he could say anything even if he wanted to.

“You are not him?”

“I- Uh...”

Kairen curled up even more and clenched his chest. As if just noticing that the pressure he was emanating was making the boy unable to talk, the man suddenly chuckled.

“I’m getting more and more sure that you are not him. He wouldn’t falter with such small pressure.”

As he said in a mocking tone, he retreated his pressure a little bit.

“Huff... Huff...”

Finally able to breathe again, Kairen took in as much air as he could as fast as possible.

‘Damn bastard! Alright, I’m not the one you were looking for, I’m way too weak and stupid to be that... Your prince dude! Now go! Leave already!’

Why was it Kairen’s problem to know how strong the person this man was looking for was?

“So tell me.”

But it seemed the man was not done talking even after knowing that he has mistaken Kairen for someone else.

“Where did you get this power from?”

‘So it was about this?’

Kairen finally raised his head and looked up at the man. What should he say? Not that he knew the answer to this question. Should he say that he was born with it or make up some kind of bullshit? But he felt that this man would catch on to his lies if he did. Then, Kairen would be definitely killed.

“I’d be glad to know that as well.”

He answered honestly.

.....

“So you don’t know?”

“I don’t.”

“Hmm...”

The man seemed to contemplate something. He didn’t say anything for a few moments and lowered his head, massaging his chin. He looked to be deep in thought.

“Doesn’t matter really.”

He opened his mouth after a few minutes, only to say that short sentence. Kairen, who had distanced himself from the man several meters while he was thinking and was about to cast a shield, though he knew it was useless, flinched as soon as he heard the man talk.

“I’ll find it out later somehow.”

The man said, lips raising to a smirk. He was smiling, but his eyes looked anything but happy. The man’s eyes were now void of anything. There wasn’t even light in his white pupils. The blank and empty eyes turned towards Kairen.

“Whether he created you, or someone else managed to get their hands on that power... Things will get clear soon.”

The man raised his hand to the air.

“Huh-”

Kairen didn’t have time to wonder what the hell did this man mean. It was because he saw the man’s raised hand lower towards the ground.

ZZZZZ

And he saw it at that moment, something flashing around the man’s hand.

“Ah?”

But the time he found out what was happening, it was too late.

ZAAAAAAAAPPPPP

A huge red electric current shot to the ground from the sky, maybe not the sky but somewhere else, but Kairen honestly didn’t have the leisure to find out the source of the light.

CRACK

CRACKLE

As the red lightning moved towards the ground, more specifically, everywhere started to crack up. The air, the space itself, started to crack. It wasn’t Kairen’s doing. The red cracks that appeared everywhere inside the doom created under the man’s barriers weren’t created by Kairen.

“Wha-”

The only thing that Kairen knew was that something red flashed before his eyes before everything flipped upside down.

B-BOOOOOOOOMMMMM