The White Flame of Wrath
The strange unease and vigilance Raymon had felt when Titania smiled and proposed a deal upon meeting her betrothed had long since vanished. Or rather, thinking back, he had been plagued by an utterly bizarre sensation even then.
Titania, who had always trailed behind him with desperate eyes, like a lost child clinging to her only guidepost, had suddenly looked upon him with a gaze composed and serene. It was unnervingly foreign.
He had known Imperial Consort Cleo forced that strange blade upon her. When it came to unusual weapons, the intelligence network of the Castrein Duchy stood far above anything Cleo possessed.
Whatever the weapon was—a Berris-Facio or something of the sort—it was undoubtedly rare, yet it bore no signs of being blessed with divine power. He did know, however, that it chose its master.
Before that blade found its way into the Imperial Palace, or more precisely, into the hands of Imperial Consort Cleo, the Castrein family had identified its previous wielder as a mercenary. Refusing allegiance to any lord, the man accepted exorbitant sums to undertake any contract, butchering demonic beasts and men alike without distinction.
The Castrein family had always been eager to scout capable talent, yet they never once extended an offer to him. The man’s nature was far too vile. He had once brutally slaughtered and mocked a young child simply for attempting to pick his pocket.
A coarse disposition was hardly unusual among those who drifted through back alleys, but the mercenary treated his own companions and the young errand boys under his wing with the same casual brutality. It reached the point where one began to wonder if he was devolving into a mindless butcher.
In the end, he met a gruesome death. At that very time, Imperial Consort Cleo was distributing gold through the underworld to purchase information and hire mercenaries, desperate to provide practical protection for her precious son. The masterless sword found its way smoothly to the imperial consort, and she paid the courier handsomely.
Any ordinary person would hesitate before thrusting a blade tainted with its former wielder’s gore into the hands of their own child. Yet Cleo gave no thought to how easily the sword’s previous masters had perished. In her eyes, mercenaries and knights were bloodthirsty lowlifes who died stupidly because of their own vulgarity, whereas her precious son, surrounded by an elite escort, would never meet such a fate.
It was not an entirely baseless assumption. There was little reason for Brian, the Emperor’s eldest son, to personally wander a battlefield like some wretched sellsword. Even when hunting a rabbit or a deer, beaters and retainers swarmed beside him to ensure his safety.
If anything, the consort seemed to have envisioned fabricating a grand narrative: The sword that wandered without a master has at last found its true sovereign in Brian, awakening its radiant glory. That fantasy, however, shattered the moment the weapon met Titania.
Titania had changed.
Even she did not deny it.
From possessing intimate knowledge of Gloriana's Insignia to taking up a sword and driving back a demonic beast, every single detail was riddled with suspicion. Risking her life to shield Bibi, whom she had barely ever spoken with, was no different.
This transformed Titania was the first to propose breaking their engagement. She was an imperial princess raised from birth solely to become the bride of House Castrein; the consequences awaiting her after a dissolved betrothal could never be kind.
Her demand to sever the ties had truly been for the sake of the Castrein family. It had been for Raymon. It had all been... for him.
“…Titania.”
Raymon’s trembling fingertips hovered near the tip of her nose. When he felt no distinct breath, he froze entirely. Titania was drenched in blood. A crimson torrent seeped endlessly from where the demonic beast had impaled her abdomen. The scene mirrored the past with horrifying precision.
He had witnessed countless soldiers draw their dying breaths. There had been many moments where he had been forced to sever their necks with his own hands. Had he not been trained never to falter in such moments, to maintain cold rationality above all else?
The next master of the illustrious Castrein Duchy, the commander destined to shoulder the northern defense and drive back the darkness—was that not what he was supposed to be? Had he not been forged to be that very creature?
“Ti…”
A broken syllable caught in his throat. Titania’s shoulder went utterly slack in his embrace. Her head tilted back, lifeless, like a corpse whose final spark of vitality had guttered out.
In that instant, his heart constricted violently. Cold terror seized him, blinding his senses so completely that he could not even properly assess her wounds despite the raging urgency.
What if she is truly dead?
What if I lose her like this?
“Damn it, Brother!”
The raw shout snapped Raymon back to his senses. Lisianthus was barely warding off a frosty blue spearhead that had thrust toward Raymon, parrying it with Flamberge's Rage amidst a violent spray of embers.
The flames whipping through the air burned with a sharp, brilliant white. Lisianthus had always grumbled about how difficult it was to manifest a White Flame at will, yet in this dire extremity, his power had surged into full bloom. There was no time to celebrate such a breakthrough.
“Take Titania and run!” Lisianthus roared at the top of his lungs.
A shrill screech pierced the air as a demonic beast lunged at Lisianthus and was incinerated to ash. Phlux and Debbie, having barely gathered their wits, rallied to Lisianthus’s flanks.
Phlux swung his rapier with clumsy desperation, barely better than having no weapon at all, but the sight of the three standing in unison made the pale girl scowl in irritation. Raymon ground his teeth.
Though he had pursued Titania upon learning she was heading this way, he had brought far too few men—only his adjutant, Cassian. And after witnessing the dire scene, he had already dispatched Cassian to summon the reserve unit stationed near the villa.
Rationally, Raymon should have held the line while Lisianthus, Debbie, and Phlux escaped with Titania.
Yet Titania’s condition was critically fragile, and the clearing crawled with demonic beasts. If a beast snapped at her ankles to halt her flight, they might lose her forever. The only one capable of carrying Titania to safety with absolute speed and protection was Raymon himself.
His mind cut through the hesitation in an instant.
“…Hold out, Lisianthus. Just a little longer.”
“Hah! Hold out? I’m going to wipe the floor with these bastards, so just get moving!”
Lisianthus shouted with fiery bravado, unleashing another fierce spray of sparks. Across from him, the girl with the icy countenance watched with detached, unnerving eyes.
“Cannot… let go. Master’s… orders…”
“Yeah, well, I don’t give a damn what kind of mongrel your ‘Master’ is! You bastards underestimated me!” Lisianthus snarled like an enraged hound. The smell of singed fabric rose from the edges of his scorched sleeves.
Normally, the power Lisianthus wielded caused no harm to his own body; otherwise, every burst of flame would leave him charred by his own hands. But perhaps because the blade was called Flamberge's Rage, the fire resonated fiercely with his anger, drawing out its true destructive essence.
When his passions ran wild, he could summon flames vastly exceeding what he could normally control.
Yet immense power always demanded an equally steep price. If Lisianthus unleashed an inferno that surpassed his ability to govern...
The flames roared, blazing violently.
Lisianthus clamped his jaw tight against the searing sensation crawling up his flesh, as though his hands were roasting in an oven. His skin felt blistered and raw.
The backlash was burning him as well. Even so, Lisianthus forced a brazen sneer onto his face, posturing with reckless confidence. He had already resolved to burn his bridges and fight to the bitter end.
“Ha! To hell with rumors, I don't give a damn anymore! Now that Titania’s out of harm's way, this miserable building and every little garbage beast here... I’m going to burn the whole lot to ash—!”
“Young Master!”
Debbie shrieked, seizing Lisianthus by the waist and yanking him backward with all her might.
A deafening shriek tore through the wind.
“Whoa!”
Lisianthus tumbled backward, landing hard on his tailbone with a yelp.
A demonic beast that had lunged straight for his throat snapped its beak in vicious disappointment, then fluttered up to settle upon the pale girl’s shoulder. It resembled a crow, possessing eyes like wet rubies and a beak that gleamed like tempered steel.
It muttered something into the girl’s ear with a sound like grinding rust. The girl, who had looked ready to skewer Lisianthus, Debbie, and Phlux where they stood, drew back her spear a fraction of an inch.
“You’re lucky,” she whispered.
“…What?”
Those pale, mineral-like violet eyes gazed down at them without a trace of warmth.
“Unless that man from before is here… you cannot defeat me.”
“Who the hell do you think you’re looking down on—!”
“Control yourself, Young Master!”
“Damn it, listen to her! Hey, just hold on for one second!”
Debbie and Phlux grabbed hold of Lisianthus’s arms from either side, throwing their full weight into dragging him back before his fury could get them all killed.