Grant me Your Grace Chapter 70

Hissin’s escape from the underground prison was nothing short of a miracle—so much so that it seemed as though someone had deliberately helped him.

 

That day, after being tortured nearly to death, his body, now lighter than a sack of barley, was thrown back into the cell. 

 

Unable to even swallow the blood boiling in his mouth, Hissin shakily forced himself up.

 

Then, as the boy groped blindly in the dark, his hand caught hold of a rattling iron bar. It was one of the bars right next to the locked door.

 

The strange vibration under his palm made Hissin tighten his grip. And then—the iron bar, which should have been firmly embedded in the ground, wobbled with an ominous creak.

 

Blood rushed back into his freezing body. 

 

Before his mind could even process it, his body moved first, shaking the bar. After twisting it a few times, a small gap appeared. The boy’s lips parted slightly.

 

After desperately shaking the bar, he finally managed to pull it free. 

 

Whether it was a mistake by the prison’s builders or simply corrosion from age, he didn’t know—but one thing was certain, the gap was now wide enough for a grown man to slip through.

 

Hissin quickly squeezed out of the cell. 

 

Even in his dazed state, he shoved the bar back into place before breaking into a frantic run.

 

To the him, darkness was no obstacle. The boy darted through the caves as if it were broad daylight, searching for a way out.

 

When he finally reached the prison’s entrance, the voices of guards echoed from beyond the door. Hissin turned back, this time choosing paths where no ropes or markers guided the way.

 

The underground caverns, shaped by nature over centuries, had dozens of passages beyond those used as prison cells.

 

And then, at last—

 

“Haa…”

 

The secret entrance where the wind passed through led the boy back outside. 

 

After digging through the soft earth for a while with a piece of stone he had found somewhere, young Hissin let out a low, beast-like cry. He gazed at the countless stars densely scattered beyond the wooden planks that had blocked the sky.

 

But there was no time to hesitate. He had to escape this hellish land as quickly as possible.

 

Clutching the sharp stone to his chest, Hissin desperately ran. 

 

Though his vision blurred from blood loss and his tortured legs refused to move as he wished, he still ran for his life.

 

He had hoped to reach Mohron—the kingdom rumored to have been founded by relatives who had left the fallen Janna long ago.

 

But had the miracle ended with his escape from prison?

 

“That damn brat! How did he get out?!”

 

With vicious curses, the guards came rushing. Hissin tried to flee in panic, but a severely injured child could never outrun grown guards.

 

“Gah!”

 

In the end, Hissin collapsed under the guards’ merciless beating. 

 

The last descendant of Janna, said to possess mysterious powers—realizing their mistake too late, the guards saw his ragged breaths, shallow enough to stop at any moment.

 

“Tsk, this one’s done for.”

 

“What do we do? Say he died during torture and dump him in the Bial River?”

 

“How are we supposed to get there in the middle of the night? Just toss him somewhere in the desert.”

 

“And if we get caught?”

 

“Look at the wind. A sandstorm’s coming soon.”

 

The guards exchanged meaningful glances as they eyed the sky. The wind, growing fiercer by the moment, was anything but ordinary.

 

“Hurry up. If we’re found out, we’re the ones who’ll pay.”

 

Grabbing Hissin’s arms and legs like a piece of luggage, the guards lifted him. 

 

Dangling limply, Hissin hadn’t even the strength to close his eyes, staring blankly into the void.

 

Far away, someone stood by the window of a solitary palace, watching.

 

“…”

 

It was that girl. 

 

The innocent-looking princess who had tripped and fallen in front of me on my first day in the Kingdom of Baran, seemingly unaware of the cruel and vile ways of the world.

Even from this distance, our eyes met—or so I felt—as the girl gasped beyond the window, covering her mouth with her hand.

 

Was she simply startled by the sight of a horrifying criminal? Or was she shocked to witness the brutal reality of her own kingdom? 

 

Before I could guess her thoughts, the guards dragged me away, and the girl vanished into the darkness.

 

Thud—

 

Hissin’s body tumbled onto the endless expanse of the desert. 

 

The guards carelessly kicked sand over the boy’s frame before turning back toward the city walls.

 

Death crept closer with each passing second, its presence palpable. 

 

The fierce wind, like a jailer, showered his body with coarse sand, and the grains invading his nose and mouth slowly choked the life out of him.

 

So this is how it ends. 

 

In the end, the beautiful and peaceful breath of Janna would scatter under Baran’s merciless slaughter.

Young Hissin closed his eyes and quietly waited for death to claim him.

 

“Hey, if you can hear my voice, answer me! Hey!”

 

Was this what death sounded like—so frail and delicate? 

 

Stirred by the faint voice, Hissin struggled to lift his eyelids. Beyond the half-buried sand grave, a figure emerged through the raging wind.

 

It was the girl.

 

“Hey? Please, answer me!”

 

At that moment, life overcame death as breath surged back into Hissin’s lungs.

 

“Cough, cough…!”

 

Hissin convulsed, coughing violently as an abrupt, sharp sensation clawed at his chest. 

 

Startled by the sound, the girl rushed toward him.

 

The girl groaned as she laid Hissin down, but soon let out a sharp gasp. It must have been the first time she was facing the horrific carnage her father had committed.

 

“Hey… get up. Hey.”

 

She could feel the girl shaking her body, voice trembling. Though the words in her ears were clearly filled with pity, to Hissin—who had lost his country and family to the Baran Kingdom—even that was nothing but a curse.

 

Enraged, Hissin gritted his teeth and shoved the girl down.

 

“Don’t touch me! Or I’ll kill you before I die.”

 

He pressed a rock, one that had been torn from the cave’s ceiling, against her throat. The girl’s delicate skin split, and crimson blood quickly seeped out.

 

“Did you come to capture me? To drag me back to that hell?”

 

Terrified, the girl shook her head frantically.

 

“I… I didn’t come to capture you. I came to help.”

 

“Lies!”

 

Hissin tightened his grip on the rock and glared at the Daemon headpiece the girl wore.

 

“You’re one of the royals too!”

 

The filthy scum of the Baran Kingdom—the ones who beheaded his father, slaughtered countless siblings and relatives, and even threw his mother’s corpse into the river, never to be found! 

 

A den of deceivers who hid their corruption behind the shield of divine will!

 

How dare such a nation call itself the ruler of the Misilan continent? It was utterly despicable.

 

“It’s true. I really came to help you.”

 

Hissin let out a sharp, mocking laugh as he watched the girl, oblivious to the enmity between them, recklessly offering kindness. 

 

To him, even her ignorance was a sin.

 

“Because of you… because of you, our Janna…!”

 

If he couldn’t kill the Emperor, he’d at least take his precious child with him to the afterlife. Hissin raised the arm holding the rock high.

 

“Ugh…”

 

But his body, already pushed to its limit, collapsed back onto the desert before he could take the girl’s life. 

 

The last shred of consciousness he had been clinging to was now gone.

 

May my last remaining life leave a curse upon those filthy royals.

 

As Hissin exhaled his final breath filled with resentment and rage, something warm flowed into his mouth.

 

At first, it was just a drop or two, but soon enough, it filled his mouth enough to soak his tongue.

 

Instinctively, he grabbed onto something and swallowed. Though it was thick and metallic, it felt as desperate as an oasis found after a long thirst.

 

When he had swallowed every last drop without wasting a single one—

 

“Thank goodness…”

 

Before Hissin, who had just opened his eyes, stood a girl covered in red spots, smiling.

 

The girl had transformed grotesquely, as if cursed. The red spots spreading from head to toe looked like a horrifying skin disease, and her bloodshot eyes spilled tears of rising terror.

“Ah… Aagh!”

 

The girl trembled violently before collapsing. 

 

Startled by the sudden situation, Hissin jolted up and ran away from her. But when he noticed his own body, now clean without a single wound, he couldn’t help but turn back to the girl dying in the desert in his place.

Ignoring the voice in his head screaming at him to leave, to escape this land and head to Mohron, Hissin approached the girl. 

 

Over her collapsed figure, he saw a vision of himself—trapped and tortured in an underground prison.

 

Hissin slowly crouched down to examine the girl closely. Half-open in her palm was a patch of sand embedded deep into her skin.

Surely, she must have sliced her own hand to feed me her blood.

 

Hissin brushed his fingertips over the sand stuck in the girl’s palm. 

 

Beneath the grains, her thin skin was smooth, without a single trace of a cut.

 

At that moment, something astonishing happened. The red patches on her skin began to fade under Hissin’s touch. 

 

Startled, he reached out once more, gently brushing the girl’s flushed skin. 

 

As if to confirm it wasn’t an illusion, her skin turned pale again under his fingers. 

 

Hissin studied the girl with trembling eyes. Upon closer look, the areas where the red marks had been darkest were precisely where he had suffered the most severe wounds.

 

He knew instinctively—this girl had taken his pain away.

 

With small hands, he pulled her into an embrace. Just moments ago, he had resolved to kill this princess to exact revenge on the Baran Kingdom. 

 

But now, faced with this fragile girl who had borne his suffering in his place, an indescribable emotion swelled within him. 

 

It was too complex, too overwhelming for the young boy to put into words, so instead of examining his feelings, he simply held her tight—this girl who was so much younger and weaker than himself.

 

Even the raging sandstorm could not engulf them.

 

Under the boy’s touch, the girl’s red patches faded, and before long, the dawn erased the darkness of the night that had passed.

 

Hissin carried the girl in his arms and carefully placed her near the castle walls. Hiding not far away, he watched as soldiers soon discovered her.

 

“Your Highness! Princess Dahlia, Your Highness!”

 

Dahlia. The girl’s name etched itself into Hissin’s heart. He watched as Dahlia disappeared beyond the castle walls, then turned away.

 

In that moment, two conflicting emotions took root in the boy’s heart—ones he could neither swallow nor ignore.

 

A bitter thirst for vengeance.

 

And a tender, yet hateful longing for one girl.