Cattle Registration (2): Reality
Yuriathenes knelt on the floor of the iron cage, breathing in ragged gasps.
The collar and shackles continued to emit faint warning tones.
Her platinum hair was soaked with sweat and clung heavily to her face.
Her pale skin was flushed red in countless places from the electric shocks.
Yet her crimson eyes remained cold and razor-sharp.
“……I am cattle?
What a pathetic joke.”
She muttered under her breath.
Her voice held not a single tremor.
Karsen seized her chin in a brutal grip and forced it upward.
“Last chance. If you don’t start repeating ‘I am cattle’ right now, I will keep the electric torture running for twenty-four hours straight.”
Yuriathenes stared straight into his eyes.
“How laughable……
We are the Iron-Blooded Empress of Elysium. We have not the slightest intention of submitting to filth like you.”
Karsen let out a quiet sigh.
At a flick of his finger, the collar and shackles unleashed a ferocious wave of electricity at the same time.
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzt——!!!
“Aaaaaaaaagh——!!”
Yuriathenes’s body arched like a bow.
Excruciating pain lanced up her spine and pierced straight into her brain.
She clenched her teeth and endured.
Blood welled from between her lips, but she refused to utter a single word.
“This…… is an illusion spell cast on me during the coronation.
Someone…… either the remnants of my brothers or a betrayal by the Magic Minister……
Otherwise something this absurd could never……”
She convinced herself with those thoughts.
She fought desperately to believe none of this was real, that it was merely a hallucination.
That belief was her only anchor.
Zzzzzzzzzzt——!! Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzt——!!!
The electric shocks continued without pause.
Yet in one corner of her mind, a dark whisper had already begun to surface: What if this isn’t an illusion after all……
Ten minutes. Thirty minutes. One hour……
As time passed, the intensity grew steadily stronger.
Her body was already drenched in sweat.
Her muscles convulsed and twitched beyond her control.
“……Kh……! Haa……!!”
Even so, the words “I am cattle” never once left her lips.
Instead she bit down even harder.
“As if We…… would ever yield…… to a mere illusion……!”
Karsen and the female trainer watched her with expressionless faces.
They were veteran slave trainers who had broken countless heads of cattle.
Yet this was the first time they had encountered one who resisted this fiercely for so long.
“Two hours now.
Still keeping her mouth shut,” the female trainer muttered as she recorded the data.
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzt——!!!
“Aaaaaagh——!!”
Yuriathenes collapsed to the floor once more.
She raked her nails across the iron bars, refusing to yield.
Blood seeped from her fingertips, yet she never gave up.
Three hours.
Four hours.
Five hours……
The electric torture had already surpassed ten hours.
Her vision was beginning to blur.
As time dragged on, her consciousness grew fainter and her body slowly slipped beyond her control.
But her spirit alone endured to the end as the Iron-Blooded Empress.
This…… is an illusion.
It is not reality.
I…… was still seated on the imperial throne.
All of this…… is magic……
Her awareness gradually faded.
The last thing she heard was Karsen’s voice drifting in from far away.
“Twelve hours.
This should be…… about her limit.”
Yuriathenes could no longer speak.
Her crimson eyes slowly closed.
And then——
The world twisted once more.
Yuriathenes’s eyes snapped open.
She was still seated on the throne in the Hall of Eternity.
The crimson mantle rested on her shoulders and the ruby crown remained atop her head.
The audience chamber was as orderly as it had been moments ago, and hundreds of vassals still knelt, gazing up at her.
“……?”
She flinched violently.
Her entire body was drenched in sweat, her muscles still convulsing.
She immediately raised a hand to her chest.
Her nerves were hypersensitive, as though the electric current still lingered.
The area beneath her left collarbone burned especially fiercely.
She lifted her hand at once.
“Imperial Guard!”
Her voice rang through the great hall like a thunderclap.
It was the cold, sharp voice befitting the Iron-Blooded Empress.
“Search the entire imperial palace at once!
Find every trace of residual magic, spatial distortion, and illusion spells!
Allow not a single gap!”
Imperial Guard Commander Teos looked up in astonishment.
“Y-Your Majesty?
What is the matter?
The coronation ceremony has not yet concluded……”
“Silence!
Move at once!”
Yuriathenes rose from the throne and shouted.
“The coronation is temporarily suspended. Imperial Guard Commander, Magic Minister, and High Priest of the Sun Temple!
Come to the side chamber immediately!”
Soon afterward, Imperial Guard Commander Teos, Magic Minister Elion, and High Priest Seres of the Sun Temple hurried in.
The three knelt at once inside the chamber.
Yuriathenes spoke in an icy voice.
“Everything We are about to tell you is a secret of iron and blood.
The three of you will swear Mana’s Oath.
You will never speak of anything you hear in this place to anyone until the day you die.”
The three were momentarily shaken, but after meeting the Empress’s gaze they bowed their heads at once.
Imperial Guard Commander Teos drew his sword, pressed it to his chest, and swore.
“By the name of mana and on my life, I shall protect Your Majesty’s secret.”
Magic Minister Elion placed a hand over his heart first and spoke.
“I swear upon the name of mana. Everything Your Majesty has spoken shall remain secret until the day I die.”
High Priest Seres also radiated sacred light as she swore.
“In the name of the Sun God, I offer this holy oath.”
Yuriathenes gave a satisfied nod.
“Good. Now listen.”
She spoke calmly yet with steel in her tone.
“During the coronation, I was struck by someone’s illusion spell.
We were unmistakably dragged into another space.
There, We endured more than twelve hours of torture.
This is clear treason.
Find the culprit.”
She did not mention the slave market, the iron cage, or the degrading treatment of electric torture.
She also omitted the branding, the humiliation, and the shameful label of “cattle.”
The three of them grew steadily paler.
Imperial Guard Commander Teos clenched his fists tightly.
“Your Majesty…… you remained seated on the throne throughout the entire coronation.
You never left your seat for even a moment.”
Yuriathenes’s face hardened instantly.
“……What did you say?”
She was speechless for a moment.
Magic Minister Elion continued in a trembling voice.
“Your Majesty…… such a phenomenon has never been recorded once in the entire history of the empire.
Consciousness transfer, time suspension, a curse that affects only the physical body……
This is no ordinary illusion spell.
This is…… an entirely new kind of curse.”
High Priest Seres shook her head as well.
“Even with holy magic we could detect no anomaly whatsoever.
There were no traces of illusion energy or spatial distortion…… none at all.”
Imperial Guard Commander Teos tightened his fists again.
“Your Majesty, if a traitor exists I will find and execute them immediately.
However…… as you have said, there were no traces of magic anywhere in the imperial palace.”
Yuriathenes ground her teeth.
She dismissed the three and remained alone in the side chamber.
“An unprecedented, abnormal phenomenon with no historical precedent……”
She muttered quietly.
Once her vassals had withdrawn, only she remained in the chamber.
Yuriathenes slowly summoned the status window.
Erosion Rate: 5.2%
Real-World Time: Resumed
Partial Experience Reflection: Complete
Her eyes widened violently.
“……Five percent?”
That number proved everything she had just experienced was no mere illusion.
She slowly lifted the hem of her upper garment.
Pulling aside the crimson imperial robe revealed her white skin.
And there——
Beneath her left collarbone,
a shallow wound that looked like crude graffiti.
Yet she could read the letters clearly.
【Iron Blood】
Her hand began to tremble.
“……This……”
She traced the wound with her fingers.
The burning pain was still there.
This was no illusion.
This was reality.
Yuriathenes slowly sank to the floor.
“The cattle dimension……
The experiences there…… are affecting my real physical body.
Time stopped, the empire suffered no damage, yet……
only my body…… bears the exact marks of what happened there……
So the erosion rate measures how much it influences reality……”
She clenched her teeth.
“In that case……
this is no simple illusion.
This is…… a curse meant to turn me into cattle forever.”
In her crimson eyes,
for the first time,
genuine terror and fierce rage bloomed together.
The Iron-Blooded Empress had just realized that if she did not choose,
her own body would gradually be reduced to cattle.
