Chapter 84

Episode 84: Be It Happiness Or Hell

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Melpomene sent someone to dump Eris Miserian after hearing the news that the marquis exchanged a promissory note for gold. When she told the maid to ban it, she didn’t know whether it would be effective. That was because the child, who had always sent it to the tower, came back and whispered a word to use ‘that’.

“Vicious……”

Helena was dead. To be exact, she was barely breathing, but she was unconscious the whole time. Even though she didn’t have a place to put her heart in the imperial palace, she loved the child, it was heartbreaking to see her lying down. She must have become more affectionate than she thought.

However, Melpomene knew better than anyone else how useless personal affection was. Melpomene stood at the cusp of life and counted them one by one.

Many days were a tragedy, and the joy of a moment was only a device to make sadness more dramatic.

There were so many regrets in her life that she would never regret from now on.

“Go and tell His Majesty… I want to see him, so come here.”

The maid disappeared, and Melpomene got up and took out the teacup herself from the cupboard. After raising the cup and looking at the moon pattern on the bottom of the teacup for a long time, she soon placed a teacup with four petals in front of her.

Choosing the tea leaves took longer than that. That was because it had been quite a long time since she chose the tea leaves herself.

What she chose after much consideration was the tea with a strong scent and taste. Even if the taste changed due to the poison, she won’t notice it. It was a tea that she won’t drink until the end anyway, but the reason she was struggling was because she thought this was really the last time.

She suspected whether it was really poisonous, so she secretly scratched the inside of the teacup and fed it to a mouse, and the effect was clear. Even from a slight scratch, the mouse turned its belly upside down and died.

Sitting still on the sofa waiting for Kratos, Melpomene suddenly realised that, between the two of them, the one waiting was always Kratos.

Kratos did not eat food or sleep until Melpomene came. While waiting for her, what was Kratos thinking about? She had never asked before.

So Melpomene finally tried to ask what he had in mind when Kratos arrived.

However, when she saw Kratos’ face, she wondered what was the use. They had already come to an irreversible place. Even if she knew the reason, she didn’t have the confidence to understand or forgive.

“I can’t believe you asked me to drink tea first.…. Tomorrow, I’ll have to check if heaven and earth have changed.”

“You’re talking nonsense.”

Melpomene poured tea into Kratos’ cup without saying a word, and then into her cup.

However, even though Melpomene poured the tea, Kratos did not touch the cup and looked at Melpomene endlessly. Like a person who was anxious that he would forget if he didn’t capture it in his eyes for a moment.

“The tea is getting cold.”

“I prefer cold tea.”

“Lies.”

Melpomene took a sip of the tea from her cup and stood up. Then she approached Kratos and kissed him. Neither of the two closed their eyes. For that reason, Melpomene was convinced that Kratos had noticed. She said quietly after they finished kissing.

“Do you want to hear a lie?”

“……I wanted to kiss you for the last time.”

Melpomene lost her words because of his words and looked down at Kratos. She was suddenly angry at the man in front of her who ruined everything.

They could have been happy. Rather than this ending, they could have had a boring but warm future. Melpomene grinded her teeth.

“I’m going to fall into hell.”

“I’ll go with you.”

“No, don’t come and be born again.”

Blood tears were deeply ingrained in every word. Kratos looked up at Melpomene and wiped the blood flowing around her mouth silently. He looked like the boy who held her when she was young.

“Until the soul wears out, I am born and die as a life that is not as good as a stone on the side of the road, let alone a dog or pig.”

“If you reborn and die a thousand or ten thousand times like that, will you make me your husband again during that time?”

At that, Melpomene vomited blood and laughed. She seemed to have shed tears.

“Nonsense.”

Melpomene collapsed first. Kratos finally gave up holding her in his arms and laid her on the floor as she was.

* * *

In a fading memory, the two were running together on a snowy field.

Running away.

In the brilliant white night that would never melt down again, the boy and the girl lost each other forever.

I woke up vaguely at the distant sound of the bell. As if I hadn’t slept very long, it was dawn when the day was dim.

Even though spring was almost here, dawn was still cold, so I was crouching down. The bell didn’t stop.

Wait. How many times did the bell ring? I kicked out of bed and walked towards the sound of the bell and focused my ears on it. It was more than ten times, at least ten times. There are only two cases in which bells are rung more than ten times in the empire.

First, when war broke out. Second, when the imperial family, if those whose rank was in the top three, died. There was no way that the crown prince, the male protagonist of the novel, or the grand duke, who was playing and eating in the outskirts, died suddenly, so there was only one answer.

The emperor and empress died.

I thought I wanted it to be as fast as possible, but I didn’t know they would die so suddenly.

It had not been more than a day since I spoke through the attendant.

Still, I thought she would hesitate a little more because she had lived for a long time. The empress must have hated the emperor more than I thought.

I expected the crown prince to visit me soon. Sure enough, the crown prince came to me with a more emaciated face than ever before.

Perhaps because he lost so much at once, his hair was white like his father’s in a day. What was unfortunate was that even white hair looked good on him. He sat on the bed, looked at me and said,

“The marquis is the culprit.”

“You already know why I came. Are you an accomplice?”

“Am I?”

The tea cups bought by the marquis did not have their own feet, so there was no way to enter the Empress’ Palace unless it was through me. Originally, I tried to say no because I had no motivation and had an alibi, but I was worried about changing his mind.

It was enough if the marquis ordered it.

I killed Helena anyway, so it was not a big deal to add another crime.

I was just going to confess that I gave it to the empress, but my mouth was shut up by the person who suddenly came in. He was a close aide to the crown prince.

“Please forgive me, Your Highness, no, Your Majesty, for coming without courtesy. However, I couldn’t help it because the issue was urgent.”

“……What’s going on?”

“The man who was bribed by the Marquis and brought a teacup to the Empress’s Palace was caught. But that’s…”

The aide closed his eyes and said.

“It is Lady Justia, the nanny of Letatio. Many people have witnessed her coming and going to the marquis several times.”

What? I couldn’t hide my surprise and took a breath. I didn’t know she’d come out here.

As in the case of the Magic Gate, I only assumed that the Empress would at best bribe her maid to confess, but she used her nanny who taught her.

“I can’t believe it. She was my mother’s teacher. Even after being kicked out of the palace, the two did not stop contacting each other.”

“That… It seems that she lived quite poorly in a back alley. She has only one nephew in her family, but she didn’t have the money for her niece’s wedding, so she got money from the marquis to commit the crime…”

Perhaps the nanny and empress were closer than I thought. Not only was she more reliable than others, but considering the rest of the life of the nanny, it may have been judged that it was better than sacrificing a young life.

The empress would have told the nanny about the plan and asked for some work. Because the two hated the marquis. She would not have wanted to leave any room for the marquis to escape.

“This is not the time for this. We must hold the coronation ceremony as soon as possible, even if it is only now.”

The close aide said that and looked around for a while, but he soon said without hiding his contempt for me, as if he thought it was not worth paying attention.

“Your Highness has not responded, but at this rate, the snake-like Marquis of Misérian and the aristocracy may try to usurp the throne with the Grand Duke at the forefront.”

No matter how resentful and upset the marquis was for being betrayed by the emperor, he could not commit such an emotional rebellion without going crazy.

In order to make the marquis believe that he was not framed, but that he really committed rebellion, it was necessary to have something that the marquis believed in.

Ironically, in order to devise a life for himself, the marquis met with people here and there, which ended in a situation where his title was cut short.

To be honest, I never thought to link the marquis to rebellion because I thought it was only in vain.

When I was wasting my time running away, the empress was firmly fixing the noose for her purpose.

I got embarrassed again. When I was lost in thought for a moment, the aide whispered something in the crown prince’s ear.

He used great effort to keep me from hearing it, but it was obvious that Lady Misérian could not be saved anyway. The crown prince’s shaking eyes looking at me were saying that.

Even though he knew he couldn’t save me, he kept hesitating. Because there were only a few people left around him now.

“Helena…”

Finally, the crown prince spoke with a distorted face as if in pain and a voice that was completely restless.

“I’ll spare your life if you find a way to save her.”

This was what it meant to choose to talk while suffering so much and agonizing. I didn’t expect to find a way to really save myself.

I didn’t know what the crown prince was thinking, but I wasn’t actually curious. So I smiled and drew the knife.

“Just kill me, Your Highness. Please kill me.”

If you suffered like that, you would die.