the streets, whispers spread from one house to another.
"Look, it's the murderer boy, Ikiro Sanim."
"What are you doing here?"
"I'm just here to visit my home again," Ikiro replied calmly.
A man stepped forward.
"A home is only a home when you have a family, and you lost yours because of yourself."
Ikiro's expression did not change.
"I didn't do it. I did not kill my parents… but sometimes I wish I had. Killing them would have given me more peace than this town ever did."
"You said those same words during the trial and still lost."
"I escaped. They didn't."
"Murderer! Someone kill this boy!"
No one moved.
"I wouldn't even try to touch him," another villager muttered.
"You've become arrogant because of the power you have now."
Ikiro smiled faintly.
"I was always like this. You people just never noticed."
Behind the crowd, an eight-year-old boy listened carefully. He stepped forward nervously.
"What did you actually do back then?"
The villagers shouted at him to stay quiet, but Ikiro raised his hand.
"No. Let him ask."
He looked at the child.
"You deserve the truth. Sit down, kid, and I'll tell you what happened twelve years ago."
12 YEARS AGO
"My parents hated me because I wasn't their real son. I was adopted. They found me in a river, and they named me Ikiro. Every adopted child in our district receives the surname Sanim. Many people hide that fact. I never did."
The boy listened silently.
"They treated me differently from my siblings because I was adopted."
"Then why did they adopt you if they hated you?"
Ikiro laughed bitterly.
"They adopted me to win the town's sympathy. They wanted votes in the election for the head of Ureland. A poor orphan made them look kind."
"And it worked?"
"Yes. They won because of me. After that they couldn't throw me away, so they kept me."
He looked toward the sea.
"I was punished constantly. Beaten. Insulted. But I never told anyone because they were still my parents."
His voice became colder.
"One night a massive sea storm struck Ureland. Houses were being swallowed by the waves. I ran to the shore and saw my father using Sea Magic to strengthen the storm."
The boy's eyes widened.
"He wanted the town destroyed?"
"Yes. An organization called Organization X had promised him money if the town was wiped out."
"What did you do?"
"I confronted him. We fought. He was stronger than me, but during the struggle I pushed him. He fell against a rock, and his skull was crushed. He died instantly."
The crowd around them became silent.
"My mother had already been killed by him before I arrived, but the villagers saw me standing beside his body. They believed I murdered both of them."
"And the trial?"
"They put me on trial, but no one in Ureland was strong enough to execute me. After that I left the town and created my own crew. I never returned."
The child looked at him carefully.
"So everyone hates you because they loved your parents?"
"Yes," Ikiro answered quietly. "Hatred is easier than truth."
The boy nodded slowly.
"Then I know the truth now."
Ikiro smiled for the first time.
"That's enough for today."
"But what happened to the storm?"
Ikiro's eyes drifted toward the ocean.
"That is a story for another time."
For a brief moment he remembered the waves, the lightning, and the night he fought the storm itself, awakening the power of the Blue Emperor and saving the very town that later called him a murderer.
No one there knew that part of the story.
Ikiro turned away from the crowd and began walking back toward Ashfang Alley, where the rest of the Devil Horns would soon return.
As the sea wind blew through Ureland, one truth remained hidden beneath years of fear.
THE TRUE HERO OF URELAND
IKIRO SANIM