Beletria Lien Archesium (End)
Beletria Lien Archesium (End)
Even though three of their fingers had been rawly severed, the prisoner only let out a short groan.
It was an attitude as if this level of pain was familiar to them.
Beletria, who had been watching that sight for a moment, wiped the blood off her dagger with a clean cloth placed nearby, and immediately raised blue-colored magic from her palm.
That magic took on the form of a sphere above her snow-white palm for a moment,
and soon left her palm to wrap around the man's severed fingers.
Soon, with a bone-chilling sound, new bones sprouted on the severed fingers, and flesh and skin regenerated.
I just stared blankly at the whole scene.
"......."
"The reason I showed you this out of the blue is simple."
Beletria, who had also been staring blankly at the man for a while, finally opened her mouth.
"Since I lost my mother, and since I saw the Emperor who went mad after losing his beloved wife, I became unable to trust people."
Her voice was trembling very slightly, more than usual.
So slightly that one wouldn't notice unless they focused all their attention.
"Although 13 long years have passed, I still come here sometimes to carry out meaningless revenge, to nurture my hatred, and to solidify my goal of keeping everything under my feet so that such a thing never happens again."
"I... see."
A single word I barely managed to spit out.
At first, I couldn't understand, but now I do.
That woman is asking me.
Forget about your 8-year unrequited love; no matter how hard you try, I will never be able to trust you to the end.
I am a woman who is more cruel than anyone else and prepared to do anything for my goal.
She is asking if I can still love her despite that.
'... What should I do.'
It goes without saying, but leaving here under the guise of an opportunity or telling the whole truth isn't even an option.
The current Beletria is in a more unstable state than usual.
There was almost no outward agitation, but my intuition was warning me.
That if I uttered even one wrong word here, my neck would be sliced off as easily as that prisoner's fingers.
'Haa....'
My mouth was completely dry.
Whispering unconditional love and promising to make her trust me for the rest of her life,
those cliché and sweet words are ideas only a third-rate stage actor would come up with.
There was no way sugar-coated comfort would work on a monster who had stood at the pinnacle of the Empire while chewing and swallowing hellish suspicion and hatred for 13 years.
Use your head.
To avoid the worst outcome, I must be prepared to derive at least the second-worst outcome.
If I can't prove it with this shallow tongue, all that remains is blatant and shocking action disguised as sincerity.
"Hoo...."
I took a deep breath and put strength into my stiff legs.
Before my reason could belatedly come to its senses and put the brakes on my actions, my body lunged forward first.
I strode over and snatched the hilt of the silver dagger that was held in Beletria's hand.
"...!"
Whether she had intentionally loosened her grip or was momentarily off guard, I took the dagger too easily.
And before Beletria could come to her senses, I kept the momentum going and, without a moment's hesitation, moved right up to the man bound in the air.
Puk!
I shoved the dagger straight into the prisoner's gaunt neck, right into the carotid artery.
"Keuk... keuheok."
A metallic sound like a beast's cry burst out as a dying gasp.
Dark red blood sprayed out like a fountain, running down his neck where the skin was sparse and dried up, soaking the man's body and my shoes.
He flailed a few times as if convulsing, then went limp and met his death.
It happened in an instant.
I felt like retching at the hot, sticky sensation flowing over my hands, but I bit my lip hard and held it in.
"... What, what is this."
A voice so low it gave me goosebumps came from behind me.
Following that, a thick and heavy killing intent, enough to freeze the entire air of the dungeon, engulfed my whole body.
My heart felt like it was going to pop out, and the hairs on my body stood on end from the terror, but
since everything would be over if I panicked here, I cleared my throat and pretended to be as calm as possible.
"Why have you given your attention to such a trivial man for as long as 13 years?"
"... What?"
"I understand Your Majesty's intention well."
As if a man blinded by jealousy was spewing out suppressed anger.
I threw my life completely on the line, starting my concept acting of an 8-year unrequited love.
"I dare to guess. You have also become a little interested in me, and before we begin our relationship in earnest, didn't you want to check the bottom of my heart in such a cruel way?"
I slowly pulled out the blood-stained dagger and turned around.
In contrast to the killing intent pouring towards me, Beletria's expression and red eyes were chillingly calm.
There was no sign of the anger that looked like it would cut my throat at any moment.
Having caught a glimpse of a ray of hope in that calmness, I spurred on the rest of my acting.
"How could the emotion of love be the same for both sides from the beginning? One person gets soaked in it first, and slowly harmonizing with each other's lives—that would be true love."
I picked up the white cloth placed nearby and carefully wiped the bloodstains off the dagger's blade.
"I know well enough that the emotion I offer was a one-sided unrequited love, and that it is highly likely to remain a one-sided love for a while to come. At least until I pry open that tightly closed heart of Yours."
"......."
Beletria, who was still just watching without a word.
I placed the cleaned silver dagger on my palm, approached her, and carefully handed it to her.
"However. Even if it is a prisoner, I would like you to not do things like this in the future... pouring personal time and emotions into another man for 13 years and provoking my jealousy."
To drive the wedge in, I met her red eyes one last time with a gaze full of resentment and affection.
And without waiting for her answer after she received the dagger,
I turned my body and started walking toward the exit of the prison first.
A stylish performance and a clean exit until the very end.
'Damn it, did I survive? Surely she won't just cut me in half for being presumptuous, right?'
Every gaze piercing my back felt like a well-sharpened blade.
Amidst the pressure that made my heart feel like it was falling to my toes with every step I took,
I desperately started climbing the underground stairs, pretending not to be shaken.
And until Idelon Halden Rehentra's presence completely disappeared, while blankly holding the dagger he had handed her.
Beletria, who had been watching his back, soon slowly turned her gaze to look at her only enemy who had become a cold corpse.
"Do not... provoke jealousy...."
It was truly an absurd choice of words.
Showing her shame and pain, which were filled with deep meaning.
To transform it into a prank that ordinary lovers might do, called provoking jealousy.
However, because of that, it could be said to be even more like Idelon, if one were to say it was like Idelon.
"From our first meeting, he sent a marriage proposal full of cringey words instead of a surrender document right away... He really doesn't let me get bored for even a day."
The reason she had confessed all the truth to a man she had only met for three days, of all days today, was simple.
Today was the day Miresia Lien Arkesium, her mother, met her death at the hands of that man.
It was the moment she had almost been murdered for the first and last time.
That was why, unlike usual, it was a day when emotions took precedence over reason,
and that was why she had unknowingly let Prince Idelon into the space that was like her reverse scale.
And she was just about to vomit out, even if just a little, the anger that had been rotting away for 13 years, just like usual.
A terrible bottom that she would never show to others usually.
But Idelon, who had witnessed that terrible shame, instead of stepping back,
rather snatched the dagger from her hand and put a period to the remnants of the past himself.
'The boldness of stabbing the dagger in at once was quite worth seeing.'
Beletria fiddled with the dagger resting on her hand a few times.
That short moment when he cut off the prisoner's life without hesitation, without blinking an eye.
His hand gripping the hilt of the dagger had turned deathly pale, and she saw the muscles of his entire body trembling like an aspen tree.
The instinctive repulsion emitted by someone not accustomed to slaughter.
The recklessness of trying to prove his blind affection for her by willingly covering himself in blood, even while struggling to swallow the nausea rising up.
As the back view of him turning around shamelessly, saying he would cover himself in filth so she shouldn't give her attention to another man, came to mind.
A silly, empty laugh leaked out between Beletria's red lips.
"One person gets soaked in it first, and slowly harmonizing with each other's lives—that is true love...."
She rolled the sentence Idelon had left behind on the tip of her tongue once more.
To dare to try and teach the principles of love to herself, who would become the master of the Empire and the monarch of the continent.
It was an arrogant remark that, if it were the usual her, she would have snorted at and immediately cut off his head for being disrespectful.
But not today.
In her gray world, which had always been filled only with wariness and death, the existence of that stranger who popped out suddenly without weighing the pros and cons was certainly an interesting variable.
"Well, it wouldn't be bad."
With a low mutter, Beletria lightly flicked her finger toward the air.
Ttak.
At the same time, the candles on the ceiling all turned into flames emitting a strange blue light and began to burn.
The magic flames soon transferred to the man's corpse hanging on the chains in an instant.
A quiet finish where even the sound of burning was barely audible.
The blue flames left not a single trace of flesh, bone, or the bloodstains that had been pooled on the floor,
and turned the 13-year-long terrible nightmare into white ash in an instant, scattering it into the air.
Only the empty chains fell to the floor with a thud, making a metallic sound.
She no longer gave her gaze to the ashes scattered on the floor.
Beletria, who lightly brushed off the hem of her uniform, slowly turned her body.
Over her pale face, instead of the deep shadow that had been bound by the ghosts of the past.
A slightly relieved smile, as if a long-standing indigestion had cleared, bloomed faintly.
The Empress of the Empire, whose footsteps had become much lighter, left the dungeon, which was being dyed in pitch black again as the candles went out, without lingering attachment.