Chapter 74

As soon as he entered, the interior brought him back to his own timeline and finally remembered that this used to be the dungeon where the colonists imprisoned lawbreakers.

When such realization had struck, his mind immediately thought of his brother.

Toren knew that there might be a little chance that his brother would still be stuck in there, but he still tried to push his luck. And as if by fortunate answer, when he arrived at Coen's prison cell, there was a soldier who peacefully got him out.

Coen had grown a stubble and a miserably wrinkled skin on his feet. He was much older and more mature, it seemed.

He looked different, but Toren could definitely still recognize him.

Estimating the age, Toren thought that his brother must be around middle-aged, so he calculated the time he leapt through. It was more or less a decade.

As Coen plodded through the narrow aisles of the dungeon, Toren's head was suddenly filled in with the gaps. The moments in between the time leap were paraded across his brain quickly.

He clutched his head because of the unbearable pain gushing along with the memories.

He saw how much pain Coen received during his imprisonment inside.

The war went on even after Muren's death and Coen was subjected to torture and discrimination until he spilled out everything. He suffered famishment, thirst, and tremendous mental damage which seated deep inside him then.

His loyalty, in his realization, did not matter much in the end.

People would not listen.

They would all pretend to be blind.

And they were all pieces of craps, he thought. The bitter mindset lingered across his mind, transferred inside Toren's, and almost blinded him with pain.

When things felt a bit better, Toren felt suffocated inside, carrying the burdening memories of his brother's ordeal.

He ran out, following the sunlight, and tried searching for Coen again.

The colonizers, it seemed, was weakened along with the great war's progression. After running around as if he was chasing for time itself, he could not find a single trace of Coen. He decided to map out in his head the location towards the En household and clutched onto the remaining abstract tracker in his brain.

When he arrived there, he saw Coen and observed him for a while – which turned into days and weeks.

Throughout the silent spectating, Toren clearly saw the slow progression of Coen succumbing into loneliness.

Despite their bad impression left to each other by the last time they have met, Toren felt sympathetic that he wanted to appear before his brother with all his flesh and blood intact and lock him in an embrace.

He imagined their reconciliation, their teary reunion, and the lifestyle that they could have gotten if not for the war.

A month had passed and Coen decided to work at a carpentry firm.

He dedicated and busied himself with the furnishings and designs of government or residential establishments.

He worked on their architectures and even ended up working to build a castle for the royalties and other officials.

Coen diligently dealt with people, built high-end castles, and solidified the economy.

Toren would notice that every time his brother encountered a design or branding that was extracted from his paintings and artworks, Coen would immediately respond with spite.

He would turn it down, downright reject it, and erase it aggressively as if its existence is an utter irritation to him.

It seemed like in this timeline, Toren was only reminded of the bittersweet imaginations he could only have.

Once, he would think of him and Coen spending time happily with each other and the next minute, he would be reminded about Coen's hatred against him.

Soon, the idea of revenge seemed to surge naturally inside Coen's system and it drove him harder over the edge.