Echoes of a Ruined Past
Lisianthus had always possessed a knack for winning people over whenever he set his mind to it—even if that person happened to be an outcast princess he had despised with every fiber of his being until recently.
"Did you see how reckless she was, swinging that sword around last time? Someone has to go with her. It has to be me. I already asked Father."
Even if it had merely been for treatment, Raymon had witnessed it with his own eyes: the tender way Lisianthus and Titania had held each other's hands.
When had they grown so close?
He had not dared to ask. The thought alone scraped against his heart like rusted iron nails. I'll protect her. I'll go with her and keep her safe... Lisianthus's declaration lingered stubbornly in his ears, refusing to fade.
Raymon knew he was far stronger.
His ability to handle sudden crises far exceeded his brother's. Above all, he was her fiancé.
Yet the one permitted to accompany her, the one standing by her side to protect her, was Lisianthus.
"Still, given the current circumstances, it may be for the best that Master Lisianthus is there," Cassian remarked. "Between whatever nonsense the Southern Temple is plotting and the troublemakers stirring up chaos... we cannot be certain of anything. Having someone of Master Lisianthus's caliber present offers at least some peace of mind, no matter what happens."
"……."
"And Lady Bibi sending all those communication orbs was truly a stroke of genius, wasn't it...? Young Duke?"
A sudden tightness seized Raymon's throat.
Darkness bled across his vision. A blinding headache struck him, as though burrowing insects had been shoved deep into his ears. Scritch, scritch, scritch. It felt as if someone were carving away his memories—or perhaps, unearthing them.
It was as if black ink had once been poured over layers of painted emotions to force him to forget, only to now be washed clean again.
What is this?
What am I seeing?
His heart hammered violently against his ribs.
This was a memory the man named Raymon should never have possessed.
"I'm sorry."
Someone was begging. Tears spilled endlessly from green eyes that resembled swamp moss submerged beneath a mountain stream. Once those eyes caught someone's gaze, they refused to let go—clinging damp and murky like a marsh dragging at one's ankles, impossible to escape no matter how hard one struggled.
"You... you want to k-kill me, don't you? Yes, I kn-know. But please... please spare my life. There is... something I m-must do. If I can just do that, just that one thing..."
Parched, blood-crusted lips twisted into a lopsided smile.
She tried to smile, but in the end, the corners of her mouth only crumpled in agony. Hair that had once gleamed like spun silk spilled across the floor like dry straw.
"You can c-cut off my arms, or chop off my legs... You can do whatever you like to me. In Bibi's stead, I will—"
In her stead?
Instead of what?
"Bibi will be all right."
The woman looked like a mangy, beaten dog.
A hound battered by everyone until it shrank into itself, constantly watching for the next blow. Yet her gaze burned with raw desperation, and she strained her gaunt arms to cling to him. Her fingertips trembled violently, anticipating rejection. Even so, she had no choice. Even if struck, even if pushed away, there was something she could never surrender.
"I know... you cannot believe me... You must think my words make n-no sense at all... B-but you love Bibi, don't you...?"
From the man's throat rose a voice like simmering lava—a heat so searing that even he could not contain it.
"Why should I believe a word you say?"
"……."
Her emaciated frame flinched.
"You claimed you loved me, yet you poisoned my sister. And when everything fell to ruin, you vanished, only to return now and utter such nonsense? You claim to know how to save my sister, so I should let you live?"
"……."
"...Liar."
His stomach churned with nausea. Seeing those trembling, skeletal limbs drove him near madness.
Where was this fury coming from? He wanted to seize her by the throat and demand the truth. Yet he feared that the moment his hands touched that fragile neck, what little breath remained in her would be snuffed out forever.
If she died, that would truly be the end.
Whatever the truth was, it would die with her.
"I suppose your claim that you loved me was a lie as well?"
Cracks fractured the woman's emerald eyes, like porcelain shattering under pressure. Something within them that had once held light drifted away, fading slowly into nothingness.
Like warmth departing a lifeless body.
Like a hope that had never existed in the first place.
The woman released her desperate grip on his clothes, letting go of the hem she had clutched like a lifeline.
It was a movement so faint it barely made a sound. Yet the man suddenly realized he had sucked in a sharp, startled breath.
He realized, too, that within the knot of tangled emotions he had thought to be pure rage, hatred was not the only thing burning.
"...Yes."
Her voice was strangely clear.
"It wasn't love."
She spoke like a shade severing pieces of its own soul to cast into the river of the underworld, like a ghost casting aside past, present, and future in a single breath.
Strangely, that pleased him even less.
Every time he heard that voice, it felt as though someone were hurling stones against the quiet, fragile remnants of his sanity.
Until nothing remained in the end but shards.
"So... you truly can believe what I am telling you... Because I have nothing left to lose. Not even love."
It was bewildering.
Her expression was serene.
If anything, she seemed to wear the faintest ghost of a smile.
Yet in that final moment, the voice he heard sounded unmistakably like a sob—so agonizing that it choked the breath right out of his chest.
"Young Duke?"
"……."
Raymon loosened his clenched fist, realizing only then that his fingernails had dug into his palm deep enough to draw blood. Cassian was watching him with open concern.
"It's nothing..."
Yet it could not possibly be nothing.
Raymon was no fool.
The more he pieced the puzzle together, the more wretched he felt. He could not comprehend it. It was enough to make him feel as though he were losing his mind.
One day, Titania had suddenly changed, and Bibi had become a new member of the ducal family. Titania no longer obsessed over Raymon...
All of it had begun after that day she nearly died.
Titania often joked with a light laugh that her former self had died and a new one had been born, but there was no way she said that because it meant nothing.
There was something else—something he did not know. He had no solid proof, only his instincts guiding his deductions.
The woman in that vision was not a stranger. She was Titania. And the man facing her was almost certainly himself.
The scene had been far from normal by any standard.
Titania was imperial royalty. For her to beg Raymon for her life in such a wretched state, and for Bibi's safety to be in grave jeopardy, made no sense at all. None of it aligned with reality.
Was it merely a dream? A hallucination?
Could a mere illusion truly tear at his heart like this, as if retracing a reality that had already transpired?
Could a daydream suffocate him without him even understanding why?
Raymon was certain of one thing.
Whatever he had just witnessed, it was no simple figment of his imagination.
Around the same hour, deep within a spacious chamber on the outskirts of the Southern Temple.
Though every door and window remained firmly shut, dozens of candles burned throughout the room, illuminating it as bright as day. A strict order had been issued forbidding anyone from approaching the vicinity, leaving the surrounding corridor utterly deserted.
"Her Imperial Majesty is furious."
Sir Gregory wore an expression of severe irritation.
When a knight of such imposing stature scowled so openly, a fainthearted person would have wilted on the spot.
Yet the man seated before him did not bat an eye. If anything, he clicked his tongue as if to ask why that was supposed to be his problem.
"And what, pray tell, would you have me do about that?"
Cronen tossed a pinch of incense into the burner sitting before him.
A faint ember flared, catching the aromatic powder. Savoring the drifting scent, Cronen leaned back until he was practically reclining in his chair.
In stark contrast to the modest, genial persona he displayed before the public, his posture reeked of indolence and insufferable arrogance.
Gregory clamped his mouth shut, feeling insulted by Cronen's blatant insolence.
When Prince Brian had visited previously, this very man had groveled until his forehead practically touched the floor.
To think he would put on such an insolent display now!
No matter how much authority Cronen wielded here, he had no business treating Gregory so lightly—not when Gregory acted on the Empress's direct secret orders. Suppressing his rising temper, Gregory pressed on.
"Her Majesty ordered that we use this opportunity to teach her an unmistakable lesson. She insists that sword cannot possibly be a holy relic. Suspecting they may be using magic in collusion with House Castrein, she promised an enormous sum of gold if we uncover the secret and thoroughly humiliate her..."
"Did she not already make excessive demands during the last Offering Festival?"
Cronen's expression soured completely. Knowing part of the reason behind his grievance, Gregory felt his own patience wearing thin.