Became a Strategist with a 100 Intelligence and 100\% Accuracy-Chapter 295: The Responsibility That Comes with Choice

“What... did you just say?”

Carlints stared wide-eyed at Lyn, his pupils shrinking as if trying to process the meaning of the sword she had thrown him.

Did he hear her right?

She just asked him to... kill himself?

“L-Lyn! Come on now, this isn’t the time for some twisted joke between siblings—”

“It’s not a joke.”

“...!!”

“Right here. End your own life. If you do that, I’ll make sure your honor is preserved. That, I will protect.”

Carlints looked disbelieving for a moment—then quickly began calculating.

What the hell is going on?

If it were anyone else, he might have panicked. But this was Lyn. His sister. And if there was anyone capable of making such a demand without flinching, it was her.

Granted, she often said things like that in jest—or half-jest, at least.

House Brans had always been proud. Pride was practically in their blood—call it pride, call it arrogance, it was one and the same. Carlints liked to think he was the least arrogant of the siblings, but to an outsider, he was just as full of himself as the rest.

That’s why this demand—telling him to take his own life—might just be part of a power play. Punishment for his betrayal. A show of dominance.

If it was just that—then she didn’t really expect him to do it.

If that’s all this is...

Then he knew exactly how to respond.

Carlints didn’t hesitate. He dropped to his knees, slamming his forehead to the floor.

Thud!

“My lady! I, Carlints, deeply repent for the foolish thoughts that led me to raise a sword against you! Please, have mercy upon me—your blood kin! I swear, with body and soul, I will redeem myself with results worthy of your trust!”

Thud! Thud!

He struck his forehead so hard that blood began to trickle from the skin.

His vision spun a little—but compared to losing his life, this was nothing.

“Please spare me! I want to live! I want to see the banner of House Brans fly over this continent again!”

“...”

What would she say?

Was she looking at him with disgust?

Would she laugh in his face?

Maybe she’d walk over and stomp on his head for good measure.

It didn’t matter.

Carlints told himself he could endure anything—crawl through filth if he had to. As long as he lived.

He glanced up carefully, gauging her expression.

...!

But the face that came into view— was nothing like what he expected.

No scorn. No anger. No laughter.

Her brows were slightly furrowed. Her eyes looked like they might fall apart at any moment.

If anything, her expression was... pity.

And then—

“L-Lady...?”

Thump.

Lyn knelt down in front of him. Just like him, she sank to her knees on the opposite side.

“Carlints... We never had that many fond memories together. I know that. So I understand why you’d assume I brought you here to humiliate you...”

“W-What do you mean...”

“I didn’t say it to humiliate you. This wasn’t about crushing your pride. That’s not what this is.”

And then—

Tears began to fall from Lyn’s eyes.

“This... This is the path I believe will protect the Brans Army.”

“The... Brans Army...?”

This translation is the intellectual property of Novelight.

Carlints dropped the formal speech without realizing it. He couldn’t help it. Because the Lyn in front of him... didn’t look down on him.

She didn’t act like a general, or a sovereign. She was just... Lyn.

“This is about the fate of our house,” she continued. “You know what happens to traitors. No one ❀ Nоvеlігht ❀ (Don’t copy, read here) in history has ever forgiven one. You knew that too, didn’t you?”

“T-That’s...! I just...! I heard you were making poor decisions, and everyone around me kept urging action... I had no choice—!”

“That’s exactly the problem, Carlints.”

Lyn wiped away her tears with her sleeve, then locked eyes with him.

Fierce, determined eyes—the eyes of someone who had already made her choice.

“The fact that you committed treason just because people urged you to—that’s the problem. Chel wouldn’t have done that. I never got the chance to ask him what he was thinking... but I know he wouldn’t have crumbled that easily.”

“You carry the same blood I do. That blood—it demands moments like this. It gives you all the justification, all the reason in the world, to rise up when you shouldn’t. And someone like you... someone indecisive, easily swayed—if another opportunity presents itself, I know you’ll raise your hand against me again.”

“No—no, I won’t! Lyn, please! Believe me! I’ll never rebel again—!”

“No, Carlints. That’s not the only reason.”

Her voice sharpened, and a heavy silence followed.

“No sovereign who spares a traitor—even their own kin—can earn the people’s trust. This war has taken many lives. If I let the man responsible for those deaths go unpunished... just because he’s my brother... What do you think the soldiers who fought for me would feel?”

“Th-That’s...”

Carlints’s mind went blank. He couldn’t say a word.

Or rather... was the woman before him really Lyn—the Lyn Brans he’d known all his life?

The person in front of him felt like someone entirely different from the Lyn who had lived in his head.

And before he could even think of how to respond or reason it through, his real feelings slipped out.

“But... I—I can still be of use. You must be struggling in many ways after so many capable officers joined Chel’s side... Even if I’m not as good as him, I can still—”

“I told you, brother. You’ve already become a threat to the army’s morale just by existing. And—”

—“Once a choice is made...”

Lyn bit her lip the moment those words left her mouth.

“Once a choice is made... the consequences it brings, no one else can take responsibility for. Only the one who made the choice can bear that burden, brother.”

“Lyn...”

That wasn’t just a message to Carlints—it was something she was telling herself.

Once a decision is made, it cannot be undone.

It was she who had unfairly shunned and pushed away Airen—someone who had devoted herself completely—over nothing but pride and suspicion.

And she had paid dearly for it. She lost Swen. And with him, perhaps the most loyal retainer she’d ever have.

The territory had fractured. Chel, the strongest swordsman of Brans, was now dead.

The cruelty of those “consequences” gnawed at her day by day, thorns that bled her every time she remembered.

She had sworn—again and again—that she would never make another wrong decision.

And so—

She couldn’t afford to make the wrong choice here.

“I’ll say it one more time. ...Take responsibility, brother. End your life by your own hand. If you do, I’ll stake my own life to protect your honor—just like I said. I’ll carry the burden of your betrayal, and of the consequences it brought.”

“......”

“As I said, if you refuse, we’ll continue the war. Eventually you’ll be captured. And if you run... the name you were once so proud of—Brans—will become a ghost that haunts you forever. You’ll live in fear, always looking over your shoulder, never knowing when we’ll come for you. Even if you go to another lord, how many would accept a known traitor?”

“...You won’t be able to return to your old life. And when it ends, it’ll be without honor.”

Carlints looked up at Lyn once more.

Her eyes were clear and steady—serious in a way he’d never seen before.

There was no contempt, no mockery, no hate.

“...Honor...”

“You know, brother... I don’t think you came to surrender just because you wanted to save your own life. If that’s all you wanted, you would’ve run by now. Hiding might’ve been miserable, but it would’ve been easier. You came here... because there’s something you want to protect. Isn’t that right?”

“!!!”

Yes.

That was it.

The only thing he had ever leaned on, the one thing that had always let him walk with his head held high... Was the fact that he was born into House Brans.

He may not have had the strength of his brother or the brilliance of his sister, but he was still a son of that noble house. It was what had always given him purpose.

And he didn’t want to become the man who handed that name to Serpina through incompetence.

“If there’s something you want to protect—then I promise I’ll protect it. I give you my word. Please, believe in me, Carlints.”

He lowered his head, silent.

But something changed.

Looking at Lyn—this Lyn—he thought maybe... maybe House Brans wouldn’t have to end like this.

And for the first time in a long time... a strange, quiet sense of peace washed over him.

Maybe... I didn’t just want to live for the sake of living.

He’d spent his life as a petty, indecisive man. But now, at the end, that truth didn’t feel like despair.

It felt like... release.

The silence stretched.

Everyone present understood—this was truly the final moment.

After a long time—

It was the man who had to take responsibility who broke the silence.

“...Leave me, Lyn.”

“...Alright. I understand.”

She rose slowly.

“Goodbye, brother.”

Leaving only those parting words, she stepped outside with the guards at her side.

As soon as she exited the room, one of the officers approached her with concern.

“Shall we keep watch? If he tries to flee, or attack—”

“No. He won’t. I trust my brother, Carlints.”

“If you say so, my lady, then I have no objections... but...”

Still uneasy, the officer kept glancing back at the door.

A few tens of minutes passed.

Then a soldier quietly opened the door to the room.

And—

***

A few days later.

The merger between Carlints’s forces and the Brans Army was completed.

Though technically a surrender, it was formally treated as a unification—and progressed swiftly, without opposition.

It was, after all, a reunification of a once-whole nation. Little reason for unrest.

With this, the Brans Army recovered a significant portion of its former strength.

Though the territory once held by Chel was lost, the reabsorption of Carlints’s lands meant the house had avoided total collapse.

The peace treaty with Serpina held, and with the southern continent in chaos, the Brans Army now had the breathing room to rebuild internally.

The story publicly told of Carlints Brans, the rebel—

Was that on the day of the surrender, he died heroically by taking a sword meant for Lyn, in an assassination attempt by one of his own guards.

In honor of that tale, Lyn held a grand state funeral for him in the central square of Arnel Castle—more magnificent than any the city had seen before.

Just as she had promised—she preserved his honor.

The promise between the blue-eyed siblings. The ideals once protected by a red-haired knight. The beliefs once championed by a green-eyed, virtuous sovereign.

All those wills, in their many forms—

Were now gathering behind Lyn Brans.