Chapter 823
Chapter 823
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Translator: Ebonarch
Chapter: 823
Chapter Title: Chapter 823 - #172_보라색 장미(3)
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Translator: Ebonarch
Chapter: 823
Chapter Title: Purple Rose (3)
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1.
A chill ran down his spine.
The sleet blanketing the lavender fields.
Every time the purple waves rippled in the wind, it felt like rough breathing battering his ears.
The red lotus placed demurely on the shelf offered two clues to grasping this world's lore.
One, Rafi had died once.
Two, Rafi had been resurrected as a red lotus.
Combining that with the surrounding scenery and Eloa's behavior today allowed for additional hypotheses.
One, Eloa Tiferet had offered a sacrifice to resurrect Rafi.
Two, she had thereby earned merit and turned her back on Gehenna.
Siu had likely followed such an Eloa in fleeing Gehenna.
It was entirely plausible.
Master had severed with her own hands the chance to save Rafi.
If time could be rewound to that moment, even the most upright woman might have made this choice once in tens of thousands of tries.
This world-building rested on solid plausibility, not some far-fetched delusion.
"...Why on earth?"
That was precisely why it made no sense.
According to Gretel, the dream conjured by Happy Pig was a utopia.
A space perfect in its very existence, ideal and impossible in reality.
Humans dream of perfect fulfillment.
All the more because it defies reality.
Rafi never died.
Eloa never needed to use the red lotus.
Siu, Eloa, and Rafi lived happily ever after. That alone would be ideal enough.
Just like how Malika—who died handing over her stigma—was recast in Amelia's dream as having departed on a distant journey from which she could never return.
Better to abandon plausibility altogether than introduce such a twisted distortion.
The cause was unknown, but the conclusion was simple.
This was no utopia.
At least not for Siu, Linne, or Amelia.
-Whirrr!
Suddenly, the red lotus trembled violently.
As if declaring itself the core of this distortion.
The lotus, clad in vivid crimson, was both bewitching and enigmatic.
"Siu."
He must have been too lost in thought.
He hadn't even noticed the voice right behind him.
"Master."
There stood Eloa in her white pajamas.
Somehow, his chest grew cold.
Her gaze shifted between Siu's face and the red lotus, complex beyond comprehension.
Sunk in deep worry, or lost in uncontrollable turmoil.
Yet resolute determination and resignation lingered beneath.
"Will it fall?"
"Ah, yes."
He stepped back from the red lotus first.
Outside the window, the wind and rain intensified.
The glass panes rattled as the lavender fields' breathing grew louder.
"......"
Eloa fell silent, then approached Siu and hooked her arm through his.
Her fingertips clutched his forearm tightly, seeking something to cling to.
"I feel nothing but regret toward you."
"No."
"I know. You're a gentle soul. You might forgive me, but you can't forgive my choice."
"......"
If this were reality, how would Siu have acted?
Just as Eloa said.
He couldn't condone her actions.
But hating Master would be even harder.
Even trying to right the wrong path, he'd hesitate every time he saw Eloa looking so blissfully happy.
Cover the sin, bury the past, smother the regrets.
Avert eyes from unwelcome truths, focus solely on the peace at hand.
Thus, a flimsy peace, gilded in falsehood, takes shape.
All three would share that sentiment.
"Let's go."
"Understood."
Siu and Eloa left the workshop without exchanging proper words.
"......"
Siu's role was to awaken Eloa's overly immersed, fused dream into a lucid one.
He'd hesitated to reveal the truth, unwilling to brutally shatter her wish.
But if it harbored such darkness.
If it wasn't a happy fairy tale but a nightmare masquerading as paradise.
Then conveying the truth was the right course.
"Master, I have something to tell you."
"What is it?"
He swallowed hard and spoke.
"It'll sound strange, I know. But this is a dream. Not reality."
"...What do you mean?"
Eloa's expression showed utter surprise.
As expected, even their daytime encounter today hadn't sparked any awareness in her.
Likely due to excessive immersion.
"We were searching for the Soul Witch. When we entered the larch grove in the national park, we met a homunculus called Happy Pig. It grants happy dreams."
Was this the weight a doctor felt breaking the truth to a terminal patient?
No.
This was far heavier.
For Siu had to deliver tragedy directly to the Eloa he loved.
"......"
"Didn't you sense it too, Master? Something off?"
Those trapped in a dream struggle to detect dissonance.
Discontinuous events and contradictory causality feel natural.
Siu aimed to gently highlight the inconsistencies.
To spare Eloa shock, he'd take it slow, comfort her, then reveal the truth.
"For instance..."
"Siu."
It felt like a sharp blade prodding his heart.
So resolute, unblockable, laced with sharp authority.
"Shut your mouth."
"Master..."
"Even you can't make me stomach such drivel. So, what are you getting at?"
The atmosphere shifted abruptly.
Just like when she found the brooch.
Not calm reasoning, but paranoid rejection.
Not mere displeasure at his words, but primal fear of hearing them.
Like a wounded beast baring fangs at an outstretched hand.
"Siu, curse me instead. I'll kneel and beg your forgiveness a thousand times."
"......"
"Just stay by my side... Do anything to me. I'll accept any demand. I'm in earnest."
Where had those fiercely blazing eyes gone?
Eloa huddled, sobbing softly.
For a Master who couldn't forgive herself, this world was happiness's fragile boundary.
Siu fell silent before her desperate grasp on the warped paradise.
2.
Eloa returned to her chambers, eyes rimmed red.
Not the bed she shared with Siu, but Rafi's room.
Rafi lay curled up, snoring in colorful bursts, lost in slumber deep enough to go unnoticed if carried away.
An apprentice witch's bedtime, after all.
"......"
Eloa sat by her head and stroked Rafi's hair.
So soundly asleep.
A wistful smile tugged at Eloa's lips.
She recalled the moments right after wresting the lotus from the Coward Witch to revive Rafi.
Learning the resurrection's truth, Rafi raged: Do you know what you've done? Why bring me back?
She wept, thrashed, struck, screamed—resenting Eloa.
Only natural.
Rafi wouldn't want her beloved Master stained by sin for her sake.
Yet Rafi forgave Eloa.
Hugged her, kissed her cheek.
Understood that even born of Eloa's hubris and selfishness, its root was love.
Siu had too.
At least until today.
Eloa slipped out quietly, deep in thought.
Why had Siu suddenly entered the research annex he never approached?
What thoughts drew him to stand blankly before the red lotus?
Why spout such absurd nonsense that everything was a dream?
If this hard-won peace—gained by turning from all else—was mere ephemeral illusion, what of reality?
A gut-freezing chill gripped Eloa.
Her subconscious screamed.
Don't grow aware.
Don't peer into the truth.
It would shatter Eloa Tiferet.
"Even I'm wavering..."
Eloa halted her thoughts.
Soon, she forgot even entertaining them.
Only a stabbing migraine pierced her temple.
Eloa suddenly recalled.
The black brooch Siu wore today.
The item that stirred her primal crisis sense wasn't mere jewelry, but an artifact.
And not originally Siu's.
His sudden shift in behavior coincided suspiciously with the brooch's appearance.
"Could it be..."
Eloa swallowed a groan.
One name flashed through her mind: the Witch of Whispers.
Black幕 sowing chaos, the antithesis of Keter's order in witch society.
Eloa had pursued her for years but never faced her directly.
Lilith, veiled in mystery, whispered vile temptations to the wavering.
Clouded judgment, eroded by desire, led to ruin.
The Soul Witch was an epithet she'd never heard.
Lilith could warp perceptions at will, shapeshift into any witch.
What if she'd approached a tormented Siu?
What if that brooch was Lilith's venomous fang?
Utterly plausible.
Siu had claimed understanding, forgiveness.
Would overlook the blood-soaked purple peace she'd barely safeguarded.
That it was a dream, not real, something amiss.
He wouldn't say such things out of nowhere.
In the vast mansion.
Eloa's steps quickened, instinctively sensing Siu's location.
Ascending the spiral stairs to the spire, she halted abruptly.
Siu stared at her in surprise.
His feet and motions had been climbing toward the red lotus.
As expected.
"Siu, hand over that brooch."
The current Siu wasn't himself.
Bewitched by whispers, no doubt.
Eloa was certain.
Her two disciples bore no fault.
The sole sinner here was Eloa Tiferet.
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