NABC Chapter 10 Right and Wrong
Chapter 10 Right and Wrong
"Mr. Clemens, I know you'll scold me for asking this, but I still don't understand."
Esther leaned close to Edmund's ear and whispered.
"Why did you choose me? I'm just a poor wretch living on the streets, how could I possibly become... become a true nobleman like you?"
"Estelle, how many stupid questions have you asked today?" Edmund leaned back in the padded carriage seat, too lazy to even open his eyes.
"I just have a few questions," Esther said, her head bowed and her hands clasped in front of her stomach. "Why did you choose me? If you want to be a true nobleman, wouldn't it be better to have a wealthy young lady by your side?"
Upon hearing this, Edmund snorted and rolled down the closed car window.
Hearing the commotion behind him, the coachman spoke respectfully through the curtain.
"Sir, if you wish to open the window, please open it only slightly. It's cold now, and if you get sick from the cold, even if I were to break my old bones, I wouldn't be able to apologize to you."
Edmund nodded and pointed out the window, gesturing for Esther to look.
This was the first time Esther had ever sat in a carriage and looked at this familiar yet unfamiliar city.
The dawn light had already risen, but the thin mist that permeated the morning air, carrying with it ice and snow dust blown by the gale, acted like a heavy curtain blocking the spotlight that was called the rising sun.
A thick white fog and the smoke rising from the chimneys enveloped the entire street and square. Even the towering and sacred Karenbel Monastery appeared as a shadowy figure in the fog, like an ogre from an adventure legend. Its spires, piercing the sky, seemed to tear at the gray sky like claws, as if trying to grasp the round, rough glass bead in the sky that emitted a faint light.
The narrow streets were crowded with carriages, and the drivers waved their long whips, shouting and cursing in their hoarse voices to drive away pedestrians or anything else blocking their way, as if this would make the streets, which were as congested as a constipated intestine, pass smoothly.
In the center of the square, the statue of the Holy Light Goddess bowed her head. A beggar, dressed in rags or simply draped in a few pieces of cloth, prostrated himself on the snow under Her pitying gaze, holding a broken piece of pottery that could hardly be called a bowl, and mumbled auspicious words with his almost frozen lips.
Not far away, missionaries were carrying small bags and scattering grains that only birds could eat towards the flock of pigeons in the square.
Suddenly, the flock of pigeons took flight in a flurry. On the third step of the monastery, two fully armed paladins viciously threw a vagrant-looking man high off the steps, watching him roll like a broken ball until his head was bleeding profusely.
"Get out! Get out! This is not a place you can defile!"
"You damn bug, how dare you hide in the temple? Is that a place for a bastard like you who can't even afford indulgences?!" Their voices drifted over, only to be quickly drowned out by the organ music coming from the monastery.
Less than a step away from the carriage, the adventurers who hadn't been taken by the cold night slowly made their way forward, draped in blankets that had been with them for who knows how many years, to begin a new day. Those who could no longer get up were poked with long sticks by the corpse collectors or military police, and once they were sure there was no sound, they were thrown onto a dilapidated cart dripping with snow water and taken away.
As if noticing that the crowded throng was about to collide with Edmund's carriage, a uniformed gendarme approached the carriage. He stood between the crowd and the carriage, his right hand resting on the walking stick hanging from his waist. He looked up with a fawning smile, his gaze briefly sweeping over Esther before settling on Edmund's face, which was as cold as the wind and snow outside the carriage.
"Sir, this road is always so congested, but don't worry, we'll clear the road soon and it won't delay your and your esteemed lady's journey."
Before he could finish speaking, a woman with a woman was pushed by the crowd to Edmund's side. The disheveled middle-aged woman looked up and saw Edmund and the gendarmes in front of the carriage. Her cloudy eyes were filled with fear. But when she saw that the woman sitting next to Edmund was Esther, who was wearing a brown robe and whose temperament was not as noble and elegant as Edmund's, she seemed to remember something and desperately moved forward.
"Please, please... merciful sir." She was clinging tightly to a girl who looked about fifteen or sixteen years old. "Take her away, take my daughter away. She's a very obedient and good girl. She'll do whatever you ask of her."
Edmund glanced at Esther beside him.
Esther bit her lip, her blue eyes flashing with a feeling of pity.
Noticing that Edmund was looking at her, she pursed her lips and tugged at Edmund's sleeve, hoping that Edmund would take in the poor girl next to the woman.
Edmund said nothing, gave the gendarme a look, and then looked away.
The military police swung their walking sticks in a wide arc.
"You lowly commoner, how dare you ram the carriage of a nobleman! Get out of my way! Get out of my way!"
"Ah...!" A piercing scream of pain, accompanied by the whooshing sound of a walking stick being swung, rang out in the cold, misty morning, only to be quickly drowned out by the booming sound of the monastery organ once again.
"My daughter is better than you in every way! You pretentious bastard, why, why, ptooey, I don't need your sympathy, you son of a bitch..." The middle-aged woman stared intently at Esther until she was forcibly dragged away by two other military police who had arrived. The carriage gradually escaped the congestion and began to move. Esther's mind was still filled with that gaze full of jealousy and resentment.
"It seems she doesn't appreciate your sympathy." Edmund glanced sideways at Esther.
Estée kept her head down.
"In your eyes, all I need to do is nod, and that child can sit in a carriage like you, living in a warm house. A simple promise is all it takes to save her and her mother from hell. But I am like an executioner on the guillotine, personally directing the executioner to bring down the guillotine, just watching helplessly, even giving the military police ample time to demonstrate his obedience to and execution of my will."
"You want to know why I took you in, let you experience happiness that wasn't meant for you, and now I'm making you witness the pain you once went through, right?"
"But have you ever considered that she was pushed and shoved by the crowd from the other end of the road to get here, through so many carriages filled with countless dignitaries far more glamorous than myself, yet why would she choose to beg in front of my carriage?" Edmund leaned down slightly, turning his head to try and see the expression on Esther's face. "Because she saw you in the carriage. You look a lot like her daughter. She knows that if I agree, it means I favor her daughter more than you. And soon, this girl, who is smarter than you and knows how to flatter and fawn, will replace you, and then let her mother ride in the same carriage."
"And you, Esther, you will only be chased or killed by the cat that comes later, like a mouse. Worse still, you will fall into the hands of the gendarmes and slave traders that you would rather die than touch, or you will slumber in the soil of a small garden."
"And the people around me will know that I'm a guy with a fetish for 'rescuing' girls in distress. Maybe one day in the future, they'll beg me for help. At that time, do you think they'll try to please me? Deliberately create 'girls in distress' and make them appear before me as pathetic servants or even playthings?"
"At that time, what do you think that girl, now in a position of power, will do to these victims? Hmm?"
"If one day in the future my enemies discover my weakness, will they be like maggots that finally find a warrior's festering wound, tearing at me bit by bit until I am killed? And all of this, perhaps, is simply because of an ordinary act of pity?"
Esther bit her lip, her eyes filled with struggle and hesitation.
"Even if none of what I just said happens, well, Esther, perhaps I could save one, two, ten, or even a hundred, just like I do with you. But I am not an elf. I do not have a long lifespan that lasts forever. When I am gone one day, who will save them? Are they supposed to pray to the so-called holy light, praying that heaven will grant them another kind and merciful man?"
Edmund looked out the window.
"Winter will never end, as long as the snow and cold continue."
"Sir..." Esther lowered her head, her fingertips tightly clutching the strands of hair that fell over her shoulder. "I'm sorry, I was wrong."
"Right and wrong are childish terms."
He ruffled Esther's hair. The moment his palm touched Esther, the girl trembled. This was the first time she had been touched by a man. But then she shifted her body and leaned against Edmund, motionless, as if she were cold.
"I don't know how someone as naive as you has managed to survive this long in a city filled with sin, chaos, and shamelessness."
"But you must remember, no one here deserves your childlike pity and kindness," Edmund said, looking at Esther. "This is the first lesson I'm teaching you."
"Does 'anyone' include you, sir?"
"That includes me."