Arthur Pan.

He was the spiritual pillar of the Rose Party. You could even say he was the founder of the Rose Party.

Arthur, who studied abroad and personally experienced and embraced the changes of the world, returned to the kingdom and shared what he had seen and felt with the people. The Rose Party was born in that process.

He was such an excellent person that it was not enough to describe him as a good person.

Arthur loved not only humans but also plants and animals. Even the soil, water, and wind were objects of his affection.

That’s why he wanted to change both the commoners who hated the nobility and the nobility who oppressed the commoners.

He also believed that if they understood each other, the deeply rooted corruption and the unilateral exploitation by the nobility and royal family would disappear from the kingdom.

As the Rose Party, which started with people who liked him, grew, more people began to demand action from Arthur.

Arthur opposed it, but the revolutionary army was finally organized 7 years ago, and local battles broke out.

He watched his friends being trampled and falling by soldiers, and eventually took up a gun.

The fight between a formally trained army and a ragtag revolutionary army was predetermined from the start to end in the defeat of one side.

So Arthur, who had learned tactics through his studies, had no choice but to participate in the battle.

Although the revolution failed and they became fugitives, the battle continued.

With the dogs of the royal family chasing them.

One of them was Cain.

Cain wiped out the Rose Party members at a terrifying speed.

But at only twenty-three years old, he was too young to face the experienced Arthur.

In the end, Cain fell into a trap set by the Rose Party and fell off a cliff while trying to escape.

When he opened his eyes…

“I had more than a dozen guns pointed at my head.”

Jane gripped the hem of her dress tightly.

“Weren’t you scared?”

“I was scared.”

Cain spoke as if it was nothing, but Jane’s hands trembled just from imagining it.

“I thought I was going to die.”

But Cain did not die.

〈You’re still young, right? Hey, young man. Are you conscious?〉

Arthur saved him. Lightly ignoring Cain’s plea to kill him right away, he put Cain in his tent.

And he treated Cain himself.

〈That bastard killed so many of our comrades! You’re going to let him live? Captain! That son of a bitch is the queen’s dog. We have to kill him!〉

〈What’s the use of repaying death with death? Let’s treat him first and hear his story. We can always kill him later.〉

At a glance, it sounded like a cruel thing to say, but Arthur’s words were a smokescreen to calm the anger of the Rose Party members.

Cain, who was seriously injured anyway, was in no shape to escape. Even if they cleared the way for him.

Cain didn’t want help from the people who had overthrown the country, but he compromised with reality.

“As soon as my injuries healed, I was going to return right away and bring the army to wipe them out.”

“But then?”

Jane became more and more curious about his past.

“But… there was an unexpected variable.”

“What variable?”

Cain’s eyes grew distant.

Cain’s daily routine became simple while he was injured.

When Arthur brought him something to eat, he ate, when he felt sleepy, he slept, and he spent most of his waking hours observing the faint light coming through the cracks of the tent.

Then suddenly, he felt that everything was futile. Both the path he had walked and the path he would walk in the future.

〈Have I gone insane?〉

His condition was not good.

〈No. You’ve lost your way.〉

Arthur responded to Cain’s monologue, which was their first conversation.

It was a little over a month since Cain had been staying at the Rose Party’s camp.

By then, Cain had realized by watching the Rose Party from the side that they were similar to himself.

It was a time when his proposition that ‘everyone is bad’ was changing to ‘some of the Rose Party members might be good people’.

〈Why don’t you kill me? I killed many of your comrades. Don’t you hate me?〉

〈I hate you. But I pity you.〉

Arthur grabbed Cain’s shoulder, spun his body around, and grinned.

〈Your injury is healing fast. It’s good to be young.〉

〈You still haven’t answered my question. Why don’t you kill me?〉

Arthur’s eyes widened.

〈Do you want to die?〉

Cain was at a loss for words.

Do I want to die?

For the first time, Cain seriously contemplated death. There was only one conclusion.

〈I want to live.〉

〈Then you should live.〉

Arthur gave a simple answer to everything.

From that day on, Cain and Arthur began to have many conversations.

The two had a lot in common. They liked the same scholars, and their favorite music and memorized poetry were the same.

But there was a clear difference.

〈The Rose Party is dangerous. Disband and surrender to His Majesty.〉

〈They are ordinary people. And they are not wrong. If this is a war, it is His Majesty who should declare surrender.〉

Sometimes they argued, blushing. But even on those days, Cain’s tent was quiet. No one tried to kill him, and no one mixed stones in his food.

To the Rose Party, Cain was an enemy who had killed their comrades. Yet they treated Cain as a human being.

Cain, who knew how the queen’s army had treated the captured Rose Party members, hung his head low.

“How did they treat them?”

Jane asked.

Cain couldn’t easily answer. They starved them, tortured them, and then either killed them or left them to die.

He did not participate in that process, but he knew. He knew the plight of those who were treated worse than beasts.

Cain quickly brought up his past story again.

〈At this rate, everyone will die. His Majesty will not give up.〉

When it was almost two months since Cain had been staying at the Rose Party camp, he acknowledged that there were some respectable ideas among the Rose Party’s ideologies.

Above all, he grew fond of Arthur. He was deeply impressed by the way he treated the Rose Party members.

Taking the lead in difficult tasks, taking responsibility for others’ mistakes and cleaning up, and showing a kind smile to everyone.

As his impression of the Rose Party slowly changed, he naturally became curious about the reason they were fighting with their lives on the line.

〈I don’t want to fight. I want peace. That’s why it’s necessary. Equality and freedom.〉

The setting sun was shining on him as he laughed out loud, saying it was funny that he was living a life of struggle for a life without struggle.

At that moment, Cain saw a huge mountain in the man.

He shone even when standing alone. It was fully understandable why people flocked to his side.

〈I don’t like the Rose Party. And I have to chase them. That’s my job.〉

〈I know, keep going.〉

Cain had to return to his original position. He had things to do and people to save.

“People to save?”

It’s you.

Back then, he believed that he had to faithfully play the role of the queen’s dog in order to save Jane.

He thought it was the queen’s consideration that Jane, despite being the family of a traitor, was not killed but exiled.

Looking back now, it doesn’t seem so.

Cain gave a different answer instead of the truth.

“Yes, someone like that.”

Jane’s eyes sharpened, but Cain spared an explanation about that person.

The expression was so solemn that Jane gave up prying. Instead, she asked something else.

“After you fully recovered, did you go back?”

“I went back. That’s why I’m here.”

Cain returned to where he was supposed to be.

People thought Cain had survived alone from the valley.

Cain didn’t bother explaining either. He lived, dismissing his encounter with Arthur as a dream.

But he could not actively capture the Rose Party as before.

When he caught the Rose Party members, he would release some of them after persuasion, and if that didn’t work, he put them in the security forces.

Torture was also prohibited for those he caught.

〈You were told to kill them all.〉

One day, the queen’s dog who noticed Cain’s change said. Cain ignored his words.

Then an incident occurred.

Some of the Rose Party members who had been locked up in the security forces were killed by security personnel while attempting to escape.

〈These damn bastards!〉

The queen’s army, empathizing with the dead security personnel, became enraged, and an order was issued to annihilate the Rose Party. Along with it was an arrest warrant for Arthur.

The bounty on Arthur’s head was a whopping 50,000 marks.

It was an amount that could turn a poor commoner’s life around in one shot.

The army scattered wanted posters in the areas where the Rose Party appeared. The streets were practically wallpapered with posters.

Cain knew Arthur would not be caught. Because he was a genius at hiding. If he made up his mind to hide, it was absolutely impossible to find him unless someone betrayed him.

Could there be someone who would betray him?

He was a person respected even by his enemies. The Rose Party was an organization that started from Arthur.

But the world always flows in unexpected directions.

〈Area B38, pigeon flew.〉

Intelligence came in. The pigeon was Arthur, someone had ratted him out.

Cain rushed to where Arthur was, but it was too late.

More than a dozen guns were pointed at a small brick house. Arthur was alone inside.

〈I’ll go in.〉

〈The order from His Majesty is to bring him in, not kill him.〉

The aide reported to Cain.

〈Understood.〉

Cain raised both hands beside his chest and entered the mansion.

Arthur was calmly drinking alcohol with a gun placed on the table.

As soon as Cain entered the mansion, he drew the curtains so that the inside could not be seen from the outside.

〈What are you doing now? You should be finding a way to escape!〉

Arthur burst out laughing.

〈You can’t say that to a wanted man.〉

〈Arthur!〉

〈Shh, Cain. This is it. If I die here, the Rose Party will… stop fighting.〉

Arthur said all this arduous battle was entirely his fault. Because he had a futile dream, because he gave people useless hope.

He looked very tired and hurt.

〈Who is it? Who betrayed Arthur?〉

〈The person I love.〉

Cain’s eyes trembled finely. Cain felt a deep sense of kinship with Arthur.

He, betrayed by Jane, and Arthur, betrayed by the woman he loved, were in the same situation.

〈Cain, I have a favor to ask. It’s shameless, but will you listen?〉

So he thoughtlessly answered that he would.

〈Please kill me.〉

Cain’s heart sank.