The Undead Captain Takes No Living - Chapter 10

Chapter 10

Auguste didn’t look like a villain.

It sounded stupid to say.

But he truly didn’t.

His robes were clean, his temples faintly gray, and his expression was calm. He looked like one of those elders in the Royal Capital who would step aside to let children pass.

He even said to Victor, “Ah-Du, you’ve lost weight.”

Victor gripped his bow.

“Were the things in the counting room real?”

Auguste glanced at him.

“You’ve already seen them.”

“I want to hear you say it.”

Auguste sighed.

“They were real.”

Victor’s fingers went white.

I looked at him, and suddenly felt awful.

Suspecting your father was one thing.

Hearing your father admit it with your own ears was another.

Auguste turned to me.

“Three years ago, Ghost Port split open, and the kingdom needed someone who could seal the harbor. House Melowen guarded the Soul-Crossing Salt for a hundred years. Your father refused to hand it over, so I had no choice but to take it myself.”

I tightened my grip on my knife.

“You killed my dad?”

“He was old.”

Auguste’s voice was perfectly flat.

“He wouldn’t have lived many more years anyway.”

Leon lunged forward.

Cedric stopped him.

Leon’s eyes were red.

“I’ll kill you.”

Auguste looked at him.

“You can’t kill me. You tried three years ago.”

Leon’s chest heaved violently.

It was the first time I’d ever seen him like this.

Leon had loved to laugh since we were children. Loved to joke. Even when he broke his leg, he could lie in bed and tell me, good thing it was his leg, because if I’d run off to cause trouble, no one would be there to chase me down.

He rarely showed hatred.

Now that hatred seemed to be seeping out from the cracks in his bones.

Auguste said, “Leon, you should be thanking me.”

“If I hadn’t sent you aboard the Ghost Ship, Ghost Port would have found your sister long ago.”

Leon gritted his teeth.

“Shut up.”

Auguste looked at me.

“You didn’t know, did you? You aren’t an ordinary daughter of House Melowen.”

“House Melowen produces only one Soul-Crosser in each generation.”

“A Soul-Crosser can seal the harbor, but can also open it. Your father wanted to raise you as an ordinary girl, but Ghost Port had already caught your scent.”

I remembered how Dad never let me go near the sea when I was little.

Other families’ children ran around the docks, while I could only squat in the shop peeling garlic.

I’d always thought Dad was timid.

Only now did I understand. He had been pinning me down in the world of the living.

Auguste continued, “Three years ago, I originally intended to use Leon to seal the harbor. Unfortunately, he was only half Melowen. His blood wasn’t enough.”

My face changed.

“Half?”

Leon closed his eyes.

He wouldn’t look at me.

I stared at him.

“What does that mean?”

Auguste smiled.

“Your brother didn’t tell you? Your father picked him up by the sea.”

My mind went blank.

Leon finally spoke.

“Lia.”

His voice was hoarse.

I said, “Don’t call me that.”

The moment the words left my mouth, I was the first one they hurt.

Leon froze too.

I regretted it almost immediately.

But Auguste didn’t give us time to talk.

He lifted the lamp.

Blue fire illuminated the door on the lighthouse.

“I waited three years for you. Not to listen to you reminisce.”

Victor stepped in front of me.

“Father, this ends here.”

Auguste looked at his own son.

“You’re going to stop me?”

“Yes.”

“For a few dead people, a traitor, and a girl you’ve known less than a day?”

Victor’s lips moved slightly.

He didn’t look back.

“For the oath I swore when I put on this uniform.”

Auguste’s eyes finally turned cold.

“Then you can stay here with them.”

He smashed the lamp against the ground.

Blue fire exploded outward.

All the wooden planks in the Harbor Heart flipped up, revealing dense layers of white bones beneath.

Those bones wore the old armor of the Sea Patrol Navy.

Victor’s face went deathly pale.

These were the Sea Patrol Navy soldiers who had died three years ago.

It wasn’t that Auguste had failed to save them.

He had buried them beneath Ghost Port, using them as firewood to feed the gate.

The skeletons crawled to their feet.

They had no eyes, yet all of them turned toward me.

Cedric drew his blade.

“Go.”

I didn’t move.

Because behind the Lighthouse Gate, I saw the figures of the people at South Seven Pier growing clearer and clearer.

The fish-selling auntie, the old coroner from the little coffin shop, and many other people I knew.

They had no idea a ghost gate had already opened behind them.

As long as Auguste pushed me into the lighthouse, Ghost Port would fall into the human world.

I asked, “How do we close the gate?”

No one spoke.

I looked at Leon.

He avoided my eyes.

I looked at Cedric again.

He was silent.

I understood.

“With me.”

Cedric immediately said, “No.”

“Then with what?”

He couldn’t answer.

Auguste smiled.

“As expected of a daughter of House Melowen.”

“Clever.”

Leon shouted at me, “I won’t allow it!”

I shouted right back, “You shut up!”

My shout stunned him.

Tears fell from my eyes, but I didn’t wipe them away.

“You’ve been making decisions for me for three years. Now it’s my turn to make one for myself.”

Leon’s face was as white as paper.

“Lia.”

“You’re not my real brother, so you don’t get to control me.”

The instant I said it, I knew how badly it would hurt him.

The light in Leon’s eyes dimmed.

Cedric frowned.

Even Victor glanced at me.

I clenched my fists.

“But you raised me, protected me, and stood in front of me for three years. Leon, if you dare die for me again, I will never forgive you for the rest of my life.”

Leon froze.

I looked at him.

“I don’t want anyone else choosing my way to live.”

“I’ll choose it myself.”

The skeletons had already charged right up to us.

Cedric split the foremost Navy skeleton apart with one stroke.

Victor’s arrow pierced through the blue fire.

Gloria dragged Leon backward.

Gripping the Salt Crystal and the Soul-Crossing Blade, I ran toward the lighthouse.

Auguste was waiting for me.

He smiled gently.

“Come.”

“Be a good child.”

I lifted my head.

“Did you misunderstand something?”

He paused.

I shoved the Salt Crystal into the groove in the hilt.

The Soul-Crossing Blade let out a clear, ringing cry.

“I said I’d choose for myself.”

“I never said I’d choose death.”