“Don’t try to die so easily like that.”

 

“Ah…!”

 

Hovan lifted Dahlia’s body with one arm. Her body was dragged along by his grip, a strength she had never experienced before.

 

Hovan forcibly pried open her clenched hand and made her hold the spoon again, even though it was already lukewarm.

 

“Let go of me. Just leave me alone…!”

 

“Find some way to eat and survive! Don’t you dare think about irresponsibly leaving like this!”

 

In the end, because of the two people’s struggle, the soup bowl tipped over, and the floor became dirty once again.

 

Looking at the messed-up floor, Dahlia bit her lip miserably.

 

Toward her, Hovan spoke in a low, suppressed voice.

 

“You asked if it was laughable—how I deceived Your Highness for over ten years.”

 

The always calm voice of Hovan was, for the first time, swept away by emotion and turned rough.

 

“Yes, it was laughable. Every time I saw Your Highness, the princess who followed me foolishly and chattered away without knowing anything, I trembled with rage at that ignorance and sneered inwardly. My parents and siblings were torn limb from limb and killed by the Emperor of Baran, yet you—completely unaware—your purity was utterly, horrifyingly detestable to me!”

 

Murky hatred pooled in his amber eyes.

 

“So I thought—someday, when the Baran Kingdom falls, you too would receive a punishment befitting your crimes, and suffer horribly…!”

 

The hatred that had weathered and been worn down over long years had, ironically, become softer and more fragile than mud, covering his eyes.

 

“But… didn’t Your Highness also have everything taken by Baran?”

 

Your life, your freedom, your will, your laughter, even your fate.

 

“You, who lost everything no differently from us.”

 

And yet you always greeted me with that clear smile… how could I possibly—

 

“By what right do I dare to punish you?”

 

Hovan clenched his jaw tightly. 

 

The bulging jaw muscles were completely out of place on his otherwise elegantly flowing, refined face. 

 

The reddened rims of his eyes as well.

 

It was the first time Hovan had shown tears or let his emotions burst out in front of her. Seeing the shattered remnants of that hatred, Dahlia too shed silent tears.

 

“You called yourself a prisoner, but please remember this one thing.”

 

Hovan closed his eyes for a moment before opening them again, delivering the truth in a voice flat and without inflection.

 

“Levitzenna… Hissin, he endured the past twelve years for Your Highness’s sake.”

 

“…”

 

“To return to that horrific land, just to bring you back.”

 

Hovan swallowed his silence as if suppressing it, then quickly cleaned up the soiled floor. He was about to leave as he was, but he stopped in front of the door and deliberately told Dahlia one more truth that didn’t need to be shared.

 

“My mission was to protect Your Highness.”

 

Dahlia’s trembling eyes turned toward Hovan. But his broad back was turned to her, so she couldn’t see what expression he was making.

 

“I tried my utmost to prevent you from getting too close to Levitzenna, in case it would disrupt the plan.”

 

Only the trembling in his voice, the hesitant trailing off of his words—

 

“Perhaps… I was also worried that Your Highness might get hurt.”

 

It merely allowed her to gauge a little more of the sincerity he hadn’t managed to hide. 

 

A heart so complex it couldn’t be defined by any single thing.

 

Thud, clank—

 

The door closed and the lock engaged with a sound. Hovan’s footsteps quickly faded away. The surroundings fell silent once more.

 

Left alone in the room, Dahlia stared blankly at the door Hovan had exited through. The words he left behind lingered in her ears like a ringing echo.

 

To bring me back, Hissin returned to Baran. 

 

For me—the daughter of the one who destroyed their country and massacred the people’s entire family. For me—who, in Baran’s name, dared to recklessly prolong your breath.

 

Even sending Hovan to protect me along the way.

 

“Why…”

 

How did you end up becoming so deeply entangled with me like this?

 

What should I do with someone like this?

 

What kind of ending will we ultimately face?

 

“Why…”

 

Dahlia clung to the unanswered question and sank endlessly into the dragging flow of time.

 

That day, for the first time, she realized that tears without sobbing are even hotter.

 

💫

 

“Aaaaaaaaah!”

 

A scream that seemed to tear apart rang through the torture chamber. 

 

Khankundra, who had fallen face-down onto the iron plate heated red-hot under the sun, rolled around frantically before hurriedly scrambling up and running to the corner. 

 

But the edges lined with sharp thorns only shredded his already blistered and peeled soles even more.

 

“Save me… please, please get me out. It’s too hot…!”

 

Khankundra desperately clung to the iron bars, enduring the scorching ground with just the tips of his toes. 

 

The way he frantically hung on looked no different from a monkey caught as prey.

 

Hissin watched him with an expressionless face before giving a slight nod. 

 

At that, one of the soldiers walked over and placed a large slab of ice into the iron cage where Khankundra was trapped.

 

Sssssss— 

 

An enormous amount of steam rose from the thick ice.

 

“Ice, ice!!”

 

Khankundra hurriedly climbed onto the ice slab. 

 

Though it was only large enough for him to barely stand on with both feet, he wore an ecstatic expression as if it were paradise itself.

 

Unaware that his feet were freezing to the ice and that the skin would eventually peel off completely.

 

Seeing Khankundra—so utterly wretched and pitiful that it was hard to believe he had once been a warmonger who rampaged across the entire continent—Hissin let out a hollow laugh without realizing it.

 

To think he had sharpened his blade for over ten years just to capture a pathetic thing like him. 

 

It was enough to make him feel a fresh wave of emptiness.

 

Hissin rose from his chair and approached Khankundra. He, who had been shivering helplessly from the bone-piercing cold, timidly lifted his head at the appearance of the massive shadow.

 

Hissin slowly crouched down, bringing himself to eye level with the skeletal remains of Khankundra.

 

“Quite a sight you are, Khankundra.”

 

“You bastard…! Do you really think our great empire of Baran will fall into your hands just because of this?!”

 

“Why is it that every single one of you keeps searching for a country that no longer exists?”

 

Hissin let out a short scoff, twitching one eyebrow as she rubbed her forehead.

 

“You and that woman—neither of you can still let go of hope, can you?”

 

At those words, Khankundra stepped down from the ice without even realizing his skin was peeling off. 

 

He charged across the heated iron plate, eyes rolled back in fury, and violently shook the iron bars.

 

“Do you have Dahlia with you? Where is that child right now? Where is my daughter?!”

 

“Why. Now that she’s your last remaining child, are you suddenly feeling affectionate?”

 

Hissin stared straight into his clouded, dull pupils—ruined from long-term addiction to blue lotus—and spoke coldly.

 

“Or is it because you need that blood?”

 

The moment the sacred blood was mentioned, Khankundra grew even more agitated. In an instant, he thrust out his arm and grabbed Hissin by the collar.

 

“If you dare lay a hand on that blood, I’ll tear your limbs apart!! That belongs to me! It is the power the Goddess permitted only to me!!”

 

Hissin looked down at his tightly stretched collar and let out a soft snort. The laughter gradually deepened until it spread throughout the entire torture chamber. 

 

To anyone who didn’t know better, it would have sounded like laughter bursting out at a banquet hall rather than a torture chamber.

 

After savoring the lingering echoes with low chuckles, Hissin lifted his still-amused eyes to look at Khankundra.

 

“What a shame. That daughter you cherished and guarded so fiercely has shed her own blood to save me—again and again.”

 

“You—!”

 

“Foolish emperor.”

 

Hissin grasped the wrist of Khankundra, who still held him by the collar. His arm was pitifully thin—nothing but bone and skin, devoid of flesh or muscle.

 

“Aaah…!”

 

Even though he hadn’t gripped it that hard. Khankundra screamed as if his bones had been shattered, trembling violently with his curled hand.

 

“Did you truly believe you could deny the choice of the goddess you so revere and still escape that sin until the very end?”

 

“Nonsense!”

 

Even so, did some remnant of the spirit that once dominated the continent still linger?

 

Khankundra bared his teeth like a beast and snarled.

 

“‘That’ has been a blessing the goddess permitted to us long ago. It is something granted solely to our Baran—after serving the imperial palace for so long and bestowing the astonishing grace of the goddess upon it!”

 

Hissin slowly raised an eyebrow. 

 

Several parts of Khankundra’s words grated on his ears.

 

The way he said “that,” the way he spoke of “serving the imperial palace.” It sounded less like an ability passed down through generations of the royal family and more like something referring to slaves exploited in unseen places.

 

Hissin tightened his grip on Khankundra’s wrist even more and asked coldly,

 

“Is holy power manifesting outside of the royal family as well?”

 

Khankundra, who had looked ready to ram the iron bars at any moment, flinched and stiffened at those words.