“The moment I regained my memories, I wanted to go back. To you.”
However, Roxanne had knights following him.
A place where the abandoned gathered.
If he turned his army around, Roxanne would be punished, but all of his subordinates would be sentenced to death.
However, he could not choose to defect alone.
That would mean sending the knights who had protected each other through life and death to the brink of death and running away alone.
After that, Roxanne successfully returned three years after regaining his memories.
Roxanne had not been able to return for ten long years, and his lover must have been waiting for him all along.
‘That was me.’
Roxanne’s past was ultimately Sepia.
“I wanted to tell you. But I couldn’t. I couldn’t reveal anything about the past or the Empress Dowager, either in writing or speaking.”
It was the last taboo the Empress Dowager had imposed.
However, there was one thing the Empress Dowager didn’t know.
“...What is the name, Roxanne?”
“It’s a blessing given by the priest. It’s a name that protects the subject.”
The more others call him by his blessing, the more powerful the blessing becomes.
The blessing protected Roxanne and helped him regain his memories on the last day of the Empress’s life.
A crack appeared in the gold that seemed unbreakable.
The only one who remembered him.
The only one who could break the gold was his only lover.
His eyes turned red enough to hurt. Roxanne wiped his eyes.
The tears were out of control.
It was as if he was trying to pour out both his pain and his joy.
“You told me you went to meet your lover.”
“It wasn’t a lie. I went to get you back.”
Roxanne closed his eyes tightly and opened them, enduring the pain.
The pain of that day.
That suffering was transmitted to Sepia.
The pain they carry eventually reaches each other and allows them to regain everything.
Now, the last question remained.
While Roxanne was in Huron, Demios, in his guise, remained in the Beastkin Empire.
“Then the story about you killing beasts...”
“When I was in the Huron Empire, Demios was in Leopold. In my guise.”
Ten days had passed since the deposed Empress was confined to the Ghost Palace.
Only the maids showed their faces to receive food, and the deposed Empress did not show her face.
She did not make any requests.
The Ghost Palace was tightly guarded.
No one could approach or leave.
Demios had confined his former wife in a completely separate space.
Evening in the Imperial Palace.
Demios poured himself a glass of wine and looked out the window.
From his palace, he could see the edge of the Ghost Palace.
The lights had just come on, and the maids were drawing the curtains, and the sound had disappeared.
‘It would be better if you surrendered quickly.’
Even if she kept her mouth shut for now, long-term isolation drives any living thing mad.
The higher the intelligence of the target, the more so.
The Empress's throne was empty.
In a month. The coronation ceremony for Titie would be held.
The imperial palace was noisy with preparations for it, but Demios didn't care much.
To Demios, the position of Empress was more like a reward given to someone.
For five years, Sepia had not shown gratitude for the position.
It was the same as not paying the price for the position.
So taking everything away from her was a just punishment.
'I don't intend to let her go, though.'
Demios wanted her as she was, not Sepia the Empress.
A strand of hair, her blue eyes, her voice.
The thoughts in her head. And even her heart.
As Demios looked at the ghost palace, he heard the voice of a servant.
"Your Majesty, I am ready."
"...Let's go now."
Demios put down his glass and turned around. There was a hobby room in the imperial palace.
It had been used since he was young, and the door that had not been opened since he became Emperor was recently being used again.
The hobby room was full of living animals.
Demios caught a bird and snapped its neck in one go to survive.
The scream of the last words that rang in his eardrums thrilled his spirits.
He had suffered from madness since his days as Crown Prince.
The thrill of stabbing and killing a living thing. How sweet that joy was.
The servants who served the Crown Prince disappeared one by one.
Empress Yerdial discovered Demios's condition too late and fell into a panic.
At first, she denied reality and beat the young Crown Prince.
Brainwashing him that it was not his doing.
However, she could not suppress the murderous desire that was inherent in his nature by urging him.
Yerdial changed the Crown Prince's prey from beasts to animals.
The Empress always said this when she saw the Crown Prince killing an animal.
'The Crown Prince did not do it.'
Demios blindly followed her words.
However, he knew.
That day, it was he who killed the servant and the animal for fun.
However, there was a limit to the Empress's ability to stop the rumors from spreading.
One day.
Yerdial stood in front of Demios with a black book.
Holding the book that was barely half full, Yerdial said this.
'My crown prince. Trust only this mother.'
Then, strange language flowed out of the Empress's mouth.
And black power.
Demios still remembered that time clearly.
From that day on, Demios's desire to kill disappeared.
He later learned that what the Empress had done that day was black magic and that she had obtained the book through the Emperor of the Huron Empire.
As the rumors about Demios decreased, Yerdial's body began to rot.
It was a side effect of black magic.
However, Demios felt no pity or guilt when looking at the Empress. The only thing that had decreased was the desire to kill because he had been deformed since birth.
Yerdial's black magic made the caster sick.
However, the price for the book was to be paid later.
The Emperor of the Huron Empire wanted to send the Crown Prince of the Beastkin Empire to study abroad as he had promised.
However, the Empress chose a different path.
She puts a curse on the land of the Red King's family and intimidates them.
Seeing the Red Queen getting sick, the Red King finally brought their successor.
The golden-eyed divine beast.
Claude Leopold.
The Empress used magic to change the appearances of Demios and Claude and rotted both legs.
When Yerdiel's face distorted in pain, Demios felt a full sense of elation.
That sweetness was not only felt in the Empress's screams.
More precisely, it was the joy he felt towards Claude, who would take his unfortunate five years in his stead.
Demios's hatred was all directed towards the successor of the Red King.
A perfect-born divine beast, not even a Crown Prince.
Demios laughed heartily at Roxanne, who was going to his death in his place.
'Make sure you die there.'
His red eyes filled with malice, and he smirked at the divine beast.
With that last goodbye, Demios, in the form of Claude, headed toward Leopold.
Only the Red King and his wife knew that he was not the real Roxanne.
Everyone there called Claude Roxanne.
The Red King's successor was a son respected by everyone and a beloved divine beast.
He had never received such warm gazes and respect.
This was enough to twist Demios's insides.
'Please, be unhappy.'
His murderous desire was suppressed, but it was impossible to get rid of his malice.
Demios killed beasts in the form of Roxanne and filled the bedroom with the strange magic circle he had seen from the Empress.
How delighted Roxanne's nanny must have felt when she saw him killing beasts.
The terrified nanny went straight to the territory and spread the rumor.
This gave rise to the stigma that the Red King's successor had summoned the devil to bring about an epidemic.
On the day he heard the rumor, Demios could not sleep because of the thrilling joy.
Five years later, in the winter.
The King Queen died just as Roxanne was returning.
Demios headed to the palace again.
Roxanne returned from Huron without dying. What a pity.
Demios went to see Yerdial.
'Please banish the Red King's successor to the dead.'
This time, Yerdial accepted the Crown Prince's request.
The Empress, who had summoned Roxanne, brainwashed him and ordered him to subdue the barbarians.
Even if he regained his memories, she had placed a spell on him so that he would not be able to tell anyone.
She used black magic to rot her left arm.
Demios returned to the form of a Crown Prince.
However, unlike Leopold’s life, his days in the palace were too boring.
In this place where many eyes were watching, even a small beast could not be killed freely.
The biggest problem was the Emperor.
His biological father doubted Demios's qualifications.
Instead of suppressing his desires, Demios came up with another method.
If he knew the cause, he could just eliminate the target.
He went to Yerdial again and said,
'I want to become Emperor as soon as possible.'
Demios's ascension to the throne was the Empress's long-held dream.
The Empress used her remaining arm to curse the Emperor.
It was the day of the tea time between the Emperor and the Crown Prince.
'Your cruelty is strange. It makes me question whether it is okay for you to become Emperor.'
The moment Emperor Gilutiae made a remark doubting Demios's temperament, he vomited blood and died.
A small amount of poison was added to the tea prepared in advance.
However, there is almost no lethal poison that can be used against a divine beast. The Emperor was the only one who collapsed that day.
The first to witness it was Demios's attendant.
The attendant was accused of murdering the imperial family and was sentenced to death.
Demios stayed in the Crown Prince's Palace for a month, pretending to have collapsed after drinking the same poison as the Emperor. He then pretended to have lost his memories of Huron.
No one suspected Demios.
Even after he ascended to the throne.
However, even after becoming Emperor, there was less he could do as he pleased than expected.
At least he had to look close to normal so that no troublesome things would happen.
Was it the effect of the magic that suppressed madness?
He had nightmares every day.
Whether he killed something or not.
Those boring days with nightmares continued.
Until a letter arrived from Huron.
However, Roxanne had knights following him.
A place where the abandoned gathered.
If he turned his army around, Roxanne would be punished, but all of his subordinates would be sentenced to death.
However, he could not choose to defect alone.
That would mean sending the knights who had protected each other through life and death to the brink of death and running away alone.
After that, Roxanne successfully returned three years after regaining his memories.
Roxanne had not been able to return for ten long years, and his lover must have been waiting for him all along.
‘That was me.’
Roxanne’s past was ultimately Sepia.
“I wanted to tell you. But I couldn’t. I couldn’t reveal anything about the past or the Empress Dowager, either in writing or speaking.”
It was the last taboo the Empress Dowager had imposed.
However, there was one thing the Empress Dowager didn’t know.
“...What is the name, Roxanne?”
“It’s a blessing given by the priest. It’s a name that protects the subject.”
The more others call him by his blessing, the more powerful the blessing becomes.
The blessing protected Roxanne and helped him regain his memories on the last day of the Empress’s life.
A crack appeared in the gold that seemed unbreakable.
The only one who remembered him.
The only one who could break the gold was his only lover.
His eyes turned red enough to hurt. Roxanne wiped his eyes.
The tears were out of control.
It was as if he was trying to pour out both his pain and his joy.
“You told me you went to meet your lover.”
“It wasn’t a lie. I went to get you back.”
Roxanne closed his eyes tightly and opened them, enduring the pain.
The pain of that day.
That suffering was transmitted to Sepia.
The pain they carry eventually reaches each other and allows them to regain everything.
Now, the last question remained.
While Roxanne was in Huron, Demios, in his guise, remained in the Beastkin Empire.
“Then the story about you killing beasts...”
“When I was in the Huron Empire, Demios was in Leopold. In my guise.”
***
Ten days had passed since the deposed Empress was confined to the Ghost Palace.
Only the maids showed their faces to receive food, and the deposed Empress did not show her face.
She did not make any requests.
The Ghost Palace was tightly guarded.
No one could approach or leave.
Demios had confined his former wife in a completely separate space.
Evening in the Imperial Palace.
Demios poured himself a glass of wine and looked out the window.
From his palace, he could see the edge of the Ghost Palace.
The lights had just come on, and the maids were drawing the curtains, and the sound had disappeared.
‘It would be better if you surrendered quickly.’
Even if she kept her mouth shut for now, long-term isolation drives any living thing mad.
The higher the intelligence of the target, the more so.
The Empress's throne was empty.
In a month. The coronation ceremony for Titie would be held.
The imperial palace was noisy with preparations for it, but Demios didn't care much.
To Demios, the position of Empress was more like a reward given to someone.
For five years, Sepia had not shown gratitude for the position.
It was the same as not paying the price for the position.
So taking everything away from her was a just punishment.
'I don't intend to let her go, though.'
Demios wanted her as she was, not Sepia the Empress.
A strand of hair, her blue eyes, her voice.
The thoughts in her head. And even her heart.
As Demios looked at the ghost palace, he heard the voice of a servant.
"Your Majesty, I am ready."
"...Let's go now."
Demios put down his glass and turned around. There was a hobby room in the imperial palace.
It had been used since he was young, and the door that had not been opened since he became Emperor was recently being used again.
The hobby room was full of living animals.
Demios caught a bird and snapped its neck in one go to survive.
The scream of the last words that rang in his eardrums thrilled his spirits.
He had suffered from madness since his days as Crown Prince.
The thrill of stabbing and killing a living thing. How sweet that joy was.
The servants who served the Crown Prince disappeared one by one.
Empress Yerdial discovered Demios's condition too late and fell into a panic.
At first, she denied reality and beat the young Crown Prince.
Brainwashing him that it was not his doing.
However, she could not suppress the murderous desire that was inherent in his nature by urging him.
Yerdial changed the Crown Prince's prey from beasts to animals.
The Empress always said this when she saw the Crown Prince killing an animal.
'The Crown Prince did not do it.'
Demios blindly followed her words.
However, he knew.
That day, it was he who killed the servant and the animal for fun.
However, there was a limit to the Empress's ability to stop the rumors from spreading.
One day.
Yerdial stood in front of Demios with a black book.
Holding the book that was barely half full, Yerdial said this.
'My crown prince. Trust only this mother.'
Then, strange language flowed out of the Empress's mouth.
And black power.
Demios still remembered that time clearly.
From that day on, Demios's desire to kill disappeared.
He later learned that what the Empress had done that day was black magic and that she had obtained the book through the Emperor of the Huron Empire.
As the rumors about Demios decreased, Yerdial's body began to rot.
It was a side effect of black magic.
However, Demios felt no pity or guilt when looking at the Empress. The only thing that had decreased was the desire to kill because he had been deformed since birth.
Yerdial's black magic made the caster sick.
However, the price for the book was to be paid later.
The Emperor of the Huron Empire wanted to send the Crown Prince of the Beastkin Empire to study abroad as he had promised.
However, the Empress chose a different path.
She puts a curse on the land of the Red King's family and intimidates them.
Seeing the Red Queen getting sick, the Red King finally brought their successor.
The golden-eyed divine beast.
Claude Leopold.
The Empress used magic to change the appearances of Demios and Claude and rotted both legs.
When Yerdiel's face distorted in pain, Demios felt a full sense of elation.
That sweetness was not only felt in the Empress's screams.
More precisely, it was the joy he felt towards Claude, who would take his unfortunate five years in his stead.
Demios's hatred was all directed towards the successor of the Red King.
A perfect-born divine beast, not even a Crown Prince.
Demios laughed heartily at Roxanne, who was going to his death in his place.
'Make sure you die there.'
His red eyes filled with malice, and he smirked at the divine beast.
With that last goodbye, Demios, in the form of Claude, headed toward Leopold.
Only the Red King and his wife knew that he was not the real Roxanne.
Everyone there called Claude Roxanne.
The Red King's successor was a son respected by everyone and a beloved divine beast.
He had never received such warm gazes and respect.
This was enough to twist Demios's insides.
'Please, be unhappy.'
His murderous desire was suppressed, but it was impossible to get rid of his malice.
Demios killed beasts in the form of Roxanne and filled the bedroom with the strange magic circle he had seen from the Empress.
How delighted Roxanne's nanny must have felt when she saw him killing beasts.
The terrified nanny went straight to the territory and spread the rumor.
This gave rise to the stigma that the Red King's successor had summoned the devil to bring about an epidemic.
On the day he heard the rumor, Demios could not sleep because of the thrilling joy.
Five years later, in the winter.
The King Queen died just as Roxanne was returning.
Demios headed to the palace again.
Roxanne returned from Huron without dying. What a pity.
Demios went to see Yerdial.
'Please banish the Red King's successor to the dead.'
This time, Yerdial accepted the Crown Prince's request.
The Empress, who had summoned Roxanne, brainwashed him and ordered him to subdue the barbarians.
Even if he regained his memories, she had placed a spell on him so that he would not be able to tell anyone.
She used black magic to rot her left arm.
Demios returned to the form of a Crown Prince.
However, unlike Leopold’s life, his days in the palace were too boring.
In this place where many eyes were watching, even a small beast could not be killed freely.
The biggest problem was the Emperor.
His biological father doubted Demios's qualifications.
Instead of suppressing his desires, Demios came up with another method.
If he knew the cause, he could just eliminate the target.
He went to Yerdial again and said,
'I want to become Emperor as soon as possible.'
Demios's ascension to the throne was the Empress's long-held dream.
The Empress used her remaining arm to curse the Emperor.
It was the day of the tea time between the Emperor and the Crown Prince.
'Your cruelty is strange. It makes me question whether it is okay for you to become Emperor.'
The moment Emperor Gilutiae made a remark doubting Demios's temperament, he vomited blood and died.
A small amount of poison was added to the tea prepared in advance.
However, there is almost no lethal poison that can be used against a divine beast. The Emperor was the only one who collapsed that day.
The first to witness it was Demios's attendant.
The attendant was accused of murdering the imperial family and was sentenced to death.
Demios stayed in the Crown Prince's Palace for a month, pretending to have collapsed after drinking the same poison as the Emperor. He then pretended to have lost his memories of Huron.
No one suspected Demios.
Even after he ascended to the throne.
However, even after becoming Emperor, there was less he could do as he pleased than expected.
At least he had to look close to normal so that no troublesome things would happen.
Was it the effect of the magic that suppressed madness?
He had nightmares every day.
Whether he killed something or not.
Those boring days with nightmares continued.
Until a letter arrived from Huron.
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