The Terminally-Ill Lord Desires Hospice Care

“Who did that?”
Her question was as hot as it was cold.
The heat likely stemmed from the blazing fury towards those who caused the bleeding of my lips.
The coldness was likely from the monstrous cruelty she would show them.
It was simply hot and cold.

“Ah ha.”
Seeing Nil, the one who had struck me, and the soldiers behind him, she seemed to understand and smiled.
“It was you people.”
“L-Lady Camilla…!”
“You know me?”
“I-I am Nil Fehen. The Army Minister’s nephew…! The Army Minister highly regards me, which is why he sent me as the commander of this fort…!”
“Oh is that so? But sadly, your daddy cares not for the likes of you. You only rose through the ranks because those trying to stay in his good graces passed gas.”

Indeed, that may have been how it happened.
She had deduced a clear answer I had never considered.
With that niggling question in the back of my mind resolved, it felt as if a weight had been lifted.
Though it had only been a trivial question, akin to pondering which would win between a bear and a lion.

“And who you are is not important. What matters is what you did.”
“Lady Camilla…I, that madman dared try to commit violence against me, so…!”
“No, what happened to you is not important either. Even if your arms and legs were severed and your eyes gouged out.”

Camilla began slowly approaching him, grasping a lance imbued with azure currents.
“As I said, what matters is…”
As Camilla twirled her lance, the azure currents scattered like blind arrows of lightning.
They grazed the earth, shattered the fort’s walls, and set ablaze the proudly fluttering imperial banners.
“What you did to whom. That is all.”
“Just who is that man for…”
“Someone you cannot even imagine. If you knew who that fool was, you would soil yourself.”

Soon, Camilla was within striking distance of Nil, the atmosphere making it seem she could impale him at any moment.
As it had been quite a while since I had seen her this enraged, I had to dissuade her – even if it meant incurring her wrath.

“Let it be for now.”
“Are you trying to stop me from doing what I intend?”
“You intend to kill that man, and likely his subordinates too, do you not?”
“You know me well. Then stay out of this.”

As she raised her lance, it emitted an even brighter azure radiance.
“You likely cannot understand the current situation at all. So just die. You were never able to comprehend death in the first place.”

Just before she could swing that lance, I roughly severed my chains, then immediately deflected the trajectory of her lance.
The azure lightning erupted from the deflected lance, reducing a section of the fort’s walls to powder – only scorched earth remaining as proof something had existed there, its identity now indiscernible.

Seeing that blackened scorch mark, Nil and his soldiers fainted from sheer shock.

“Stay out of this. This is about me.”
“Did you not consider how contradictory that sounds?”
“You always choose the wrong answer when it comes to yourself. That is the real contradiction.”
“For those bearing contradictions to debate would only result in talking past each other. So I shall be blunt.”

That they would die was lamentable, but only that much.
That lament would not follow me to bed, nor impact my life in any way.
But there was another reason I had stopped her.

“This goes too far.”
“Too far? This is about me, and about you too. They harmed my friend. Got anything else to say?”
“Even so, it goes too far.”
“Are you seriously taking the side of that trash in front of me?”
“I am not taking their side, I am looking out for you, Camilla.”

That they would die was lamentable, but only that much.
“I do not wish for you to bear the stigma of killing soldiers over a personal matter.”
“I couldn’t care less? I don’t want the bastards who dared lay hands on you to keep breathing either.”
“It seems we are engaged in a debate stemming not from selfishness, but altruism. Parallel lines destined to collide.”
“You think you can take me without your cane?”

I could deflect her thrown lance with my hand blades.
Amused, she twirled her lance as I blocked her attacks with my resonating hands, counterattacking whenever an opening appeared.
Thus our battle continued, attacking and being attacked, the reason for starting it becoming irrelevant.
Hoping her anger would be swept away by the life-threatening flow of our clashing.

After quite a sweaty bout, she too seemed refreshed as she sheathed her lance with a satisfied expression.
“…Enough. Fighting you any longer would only strain my arms.”
“It is my arms that are numb.”
“I swore to kill the bastards who dared harm my friend.”
“If that is the case.”
If harming her friend was a crime deserving death.
“Then you should kill me first.”
“You’re still hung up on that…”
“Camilla. Just as crime and attempted crime differ, there is a distinction between one with such intent and one without. So leave them be.”
“Alright, alright. You just don’t want your childish games stained with blood.”

Childish games…that may be quite an apt description.
Like how children playing house imitate being parents, I too had been acting out the false identity of Raul Musca.
Yes, this may be my final childish game of make-believe.
Just as such games end when it is time to return home, this game too would end when I received heaven’s summons.

“But just letting it go still irritates me somehow.”
“They will have to renovate this fort, so that should be sufficient punishment, should it not?”
“Ho…That does sound entertaining. Of course, the fool who kicked you will be made to work too.”
“To be made to work, you say…?”
“To keep me company in your childish game for the time being by staying here.”

Upon hearing she would be staying, Nil and his soldiers paled, but Camilla was not one to care about such things.
For she was the type to show not a shred of interest in anything that did not pique her curiosity.

“…But do not torment them too much.”
“You still don’t know me. I may directly kill, but I do not torment in underhanded ways.”
“It would have been perfect if not even the former.”
“If I were that perfect, it would be troubling. Overly virtuous people die young, you know.”
“…I am not virtuous.”
“No, I mean overly virtuous in terms of perception and social graces. Yes, you are excessively so.”

As she brushed the dust off my clothes, she let out a soft laugh.
More than any spectacle, I favored such smiles from my friends.
For amidst the battlefields where blood and viscera bloomed like flora, those were the only beauties.

“Hahaha, well, since we’ve reunited after so long, why don’t we go have a drink? It’s been nearly half a year, after all.”
“If my memory serves, it has not even been a fortnight since we parted.”
“I’m talking about perceived time. Like how a second can feel like an hour when you surface for air after being submerged. That’s what you are to me.”
“I cannot comprehend that, I’m afraid.”
“…Honestly, you’re so oblivious. Anyways, hurry and lead me to a tavern. I’m parched to the point of death.”

Then, addressing Nil and his subordinate soldiers, she issued a chilling warning:
“Prepare a place for me to stay while this fool and I go drinking. If I sense even the slightest bit of filth or anything amiss…the ‘attempted’ things from before will no longer be attempts. Understood?”
“Y-Yes! We’ll prepare it!”
“Good. Then let’s go.”
“It is quite a distance from here.”
As it would take about two and a half hours on foot, I felt I should give her a heads up.
“Which way?”

I pointed in the direction of the village, and she nodded in understanding before stretching her arms.
“At such a close distance, it’s actually harder to control my strength. More often than not, I end up flying much farther.”
“I have no intention of participating in your outlandish manner of flight.”
“And I did not ask for your consent.”

Those who heard the words ‘fly’ and ‘flight’ tilted their heads, unsure of what she meant.
While I had no intention of joining her insane act, Camilla’s left hand soon grabbed my collar.

“…You are increasingly resembling our teacher.”
“Is it not natural for a daughter to take after her parent?”

Facing the village’s direction, she hurled her luminous azure lance, then leapt up and safely landed atop the lance shaft as it flew.

“Let me reiterate, Camilla. I cannot comprehend this outlandish flight of yours.”
“I know. Feeling dizzy and nauseous? I sometimes feel similar when conversing with you.”

After about 6 or 7 minutes of flight, just as something threatened to come up from my stomach, the lance fell like a thunderbolt into the forest near the village.
Naturally, the surrounding vegetation was reduced to ash, but she showed no concern for this destruction of nature.

“By the way, this really is the backwoods of the backwoods. I wonder if there’s even a tavern.”
“There is an old tavern, though the atmosphere makes me think they would simply dilute cheap distilled liquor with water instead of serving wine.”
“More important than the drink itself is who you share it with. Drinking wine with superficial fools only made it reek.”
“I did not know you disliked wine.”
“Haah…Your obliviousness is incurable.”

As we entered the village entrance together, the villagers who saw me began clamoring.
Some cheered as if not expecting me to return alive, others asked my secret to survival, while some expressed concern over whether any accidents had occurred.
It was an excessive reception for me, but it seemed natural to them.

“Quite noisy for a rural village.”
And the presence of Camilla, whom I had brought, seemed to become the new catalyst for rumors about me.
The one who drove that wedge deeper was none other than Camilla herself.
The trigger was when Cecilia, hearing of my return, came rushing over from afar and, still breathless, approached me to speak:

“Haah…haah…My lord, are you unharmed…?! That deviant did not do anything untoward to you, did he? If so, I shall go and disfigure that bastard’s face…”
“It would be meaningless for you to go. He is not someone you could contend with in the first place.”
“Even so…!”

But upon seeing Camilla’s face, even Cecilia seemed startled and flinched slightly.
“This person is…”

Camilla observed Cecilia, then tilted her head and asked:
“Ah, is this the woman you mentioned?”
“Indeed. Is there an issue?”
“Well, I was a bit surprised from just hearing about her…Hmm…”

Then Camilla lightly laughed and said:
“Stories will be stories, it seems. I nearly got unnecessarily excited over a matter not worth worrying about being exaggerated.”

Of course, Cecilia, who had weathered the passing storm, did not seem in the most pleasant mood either.