The moment Sion stepped onto the ground, the surroundings instantly turned into a desert landscape.
Into the endlessly vast and infinitely barren Ervin Desert.
"Odette!"
Sion ran after Odette through the desert. The sun was blazing behind him, and sandstorms filled his lungs with every breath he took. The dry breath made his throat itch.
Odette, whose head-aching stench and the endlessly alluring scent of peach blossoms had disappeared.
It was the moment when Sion barely managed to catch up with her and grabbed her arm.
"...!"
The world before his eyes dispersed like a mirage, and when he opened his eyes, what he saw was once again the vast ocean.
Meursault's sea, where the water rises to his waist and creates foam.
"Your Excellency... Please..."
The butler looked at Sion with a breathless expression. The emotion on Alfredo's face was no longer worry but despair.
'He didn't even sleep this time.'
The old butler seemed to have noticed that Sion was now floating in his dreams without falling asleep.
This time, Sion had no time left to pretend or bluff.
Sion opened his hand that had been holding Odette's arm. A butterfly with a wounded wing was fluttering its wings in his hand.
Sion released the butterfly with complicated eyes.
"Go back. I think I was hallucinating for a moment."
The next morning, Alfredo left the household. Sion did not stop him.
That is why no one noticed that Sion was falling.
He still joked arrogantly at meetings with the Pope, persuaded the Emperor in private conversations, and grilled the Council of Aristocrats.
He gave impressive speeches to the Commonwealth, extracted information from people through torture, and ran an intelligence agency.
An object of fear and a subject of dominance.
That's why no one noticed that the seemingly perfect Margrave Kleist was now experiencing hallucinations of Odette wherever he went.
Sometimes she wears a fancy dress, sometimes she has short hair and is skinny, and sometimes she wears a simple chemise and pajamas.
Sometimes sitting next to the Pope, sometimes standing behind the throne, and sometimes in one of the noble councils.
"Answer me, Sion. Can't I run away now?"
The fact that she is speaking to Sion.
And wherever that place was destroyed, Sion always followed the vision.
Now there wasn't a single day that heppp didn't get wet in the sea. Every time he opened his eyes, the water level was rising.
The water level had risen to her waist, to his chest, and now to his neck.
Sion knew better than anyone that he was going crazy, but he did not rest.
All he could do was rest, and he would end up regretting it anyway. Sion had to keep working, if only to stop thinking about wanting to die.
***
Side story 3. Karl's position
Bring it back. Bring it back. Please, bring it back.
Karl continued to pour out his supernatural powers like a madman.
The carriage, running through the wind and rain, stopped in front of the Meursault Cathedral.
It was then that Karl's hand, which had been endlessly turning back the corpse's time as the carriage ran, suddenly stopped like a marionette with its strings cut.
The moment he arrived at the embassy, something struck his mind strongly.
'This corpse is not my master.'
It was like a sudden realization, a revelation, or a sense of déjà vu. It was as if God himself had called him.
At that moment, Karl's vision cleared. The things before his eyes became amazingly clear.
The corpse still looked exactly like Odette, but Karl could see that it was 'created'. A perfectly crafted replica.
"I need to check the villa."
At that realization, words flowed out of Karl's mouth as if he were possessed. As if a revelation from God was leaking out.
Karl did not hesitate. He willingly left the fake Odette in the carriage and rushed to Albrecht's Meursault villa.
"Please, Master. Please..."
All along the run, Karl pleaded. He could call it the first prayer of his life.
If that isn't Odette's corpse, then maybe Odette is still alive.
As his hopes rose, his heart began to tighten painfully. Desperation made his legs buckle several times.
Arriving at the Count's residence, he hurriedly ran up to the second floor, pushing open the door as if he was going to break it down.
The place he arrived at was the room from which Odette had jumped. Standing there blankly in the middle of it, he was momentarily overcome by a feeling of dizziness.
'Why did I... run here?'
He came running, filled with those words, telling him to check out the villa that he had blurted out as if he was possessed.
There was still nothing Karl could do.
Thud, thud.
The only sound that filled the room was the sound of waves crashing against the cliff and breaking into foam.
The sound of rain hitting the balcony window was loud.
Karl was paralyzed with helplessness.
'What on earth can I see her...'
He felt like his ankles were tied up, just like when Odette said her final goodbyes.
That was the moment.
"Check the balcony."
Again, something like a revelation dug into his mind.
His footsteps seemed to be led to the balcony by someone. Then, his sight reached the railing soaked in rain.
Odette's blood, which had once soaked the railing, was now gone without a trace.
Karl's red eyes, which were sweeping the railing with his fingertips, slowly began to light up as if he had realized something.
"Return the time on the railing...to the moment the master died to the moment I awakened."
A crimson ring protruded from Karl's body and wrapped around the railing. The ring, which had been slowly tilting clockwise with time, quickly began to tilt in the opposite direction.
The numbers indicating the time, written in ancient language engraved on the ring also decreased rapidly.
In an instant, the railing became filled with blood again, just as it had been at the moment when Odette died.
Even though it was a spectacle created by his own power, Karl instinctively hesitated.
This strong scent of blood was his master's. At that fact, Karl felt his heart sink once again.
Taang.
The moment the gun pierced the master's head seemed to be replayed before his eyes. A pain surged through his chest as if his heart was being torn apart.
Even as he sweated profusely, KarI never took his eyes off the railing. He simply gave orders to the rings on his body, panting with pain.
"Make time... flow again. Faster than the original flow of time."
Following his command, the ring quickly tilted clockwise again. Time on the railing also passed quickly.
Then, at some point, the excited blood magically disappeared in an instant.
"...!"
Strangely unnatural.
Karl checked the time on the ring. About three hours after Odette died, the blood suddenly disappeared.
Isn't something like this only possible when supernatural powers intervene? Like magic tools, for example.
It was only then that Karl realized that Odette had used a magic tool to fake her own death. The fall off the cliff was also part of the fake.
There were still questions about what exactly she had done and whether she had planned this situation from the moment she got her hands on the magical tool.
Anyway.
'The master is alive...'
As Karl realized that fact, the color began to return to his face.
"Haa..."
Karl sat down on the balcony, his legs giving out and leaning against the railing. It was a swamp of emotions he had never experienced before in his life. It still lingered, and he could not find strength in his entire body.
A sense of relief gradually came over him as he emerged from the terrible despair.
"Haha... Master."
The hollow laughter was drowned out by the loud sound of the rain. He had been so tense for so long that his limbs were starting to go numb.
Now, he has awakened as a transcendent being, but it is so ugly.
"Master, really, really..."
Odette's last greeting, so sorrowful, was a lie.
Once he realized that he had been used in Odette's plan, other facts began to look objective.
For example, the fact that Odette stopped by the bank and withdrew all her money before arriving at the villa, or that Odette was the only one who could move freely while the Transcendents were bound by strange powers.
Karl's sight brought his own ankle into view.
'What on earth was the force that held the Transcendents' ankles in check?'
He is sure that what was holding his ankle was not a magical tool. It had too much of a sacred quality to be called magic. It was a power that was extremely similar to the power of a god. It was similar to the power of a transcendent being given to him this time.
'If I have to compare, it's most similar to the divine power felt from the master's locket necklace.'
Karl thought of Odette's silver locket necklace. Now that he thought about it, he seemed to have seen it in his earliest memories.
At the moment when his eyes met Odette's blue-green eyes in Fenrir's castle.
'Perhaps that necklace has some interesting power?'
Odette seems to have used it to ward off the Transcendent One.
"You got hit hard. You were completely hit."
Karl burst out laughing and grabbed the lower part of the railing.
Unable to withstand the force, the railing bent like a piece of paper.
"But isn't this a bad habit?"
The corners of Karl's mouth twisted upward.
"You should have taken me with you, Master. How could you possibly think of abandoning me?"
It doesn't matter if you ignore other transcendent beings. But aren't you under her purview?
Her faithful slave, Karl, followed Odette's orders no matter what Victor said because her orders took precedence over all else.
"I was so kind, but this is the price I have to pay."
The laughter disappeared from Karl's voice.
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