Niel watched her busy movements from a distance, standing with his arms crossed in the cold air.

Even in his childhood, Niel had always been like this.

He always followed her without realizing it, and like this, he would secretly watch her from places where she couldn’t see him.

Even though he had claimed the title of her fiancé.

“Ahaha, Yuphe! What are you saying?”

“What? Beatrice had a baby?”

“Send my regards to His Holiness Johannes too! Tell him I miss him a lot!”

It was a bad habit that had started from that young age, when he was eleven and she was nine.

Because she never smiled brightly like that when she was by his side.

In the bleak imperial palace of Shunaibel, she always wore a cold ice mask when dealing with people.

There was no exception even for the young duke of Alpenhayer, her fiancé.

She would occasionally melt her sharp attitude only in front of her childhood acquaintances from the Grand Temple, smiling as radiantly as warm spring sunshine.

But these were very fleeting moments, and that’s why her smile was so precious.

So precious and rare that it was sweet like secretly hidden candy.

But it was a sweetness not permitted to him, a beautiful yet cruel illusion that would shatter the moment he approached.

That heartless cruelty cut his heart to pieces, but still, how many times had he swallowed his misery just to steal glimpses of that bright and lovely smiling face?

So now, having become numb and desensitized, her coldness could no longer leave any scratches on him.

“…”

Niel unconsciously clenched his fist.

Yet sometimes, he still coveted that smile.

He wished that bright smile could be his.

The pharmacy door opened with a clamorous sound, and she came outside. The burly members of the underworld organization followed behind her.

She carefully locked the pharmacy door and then moved to the tavern right next door.

Niel’s gaze followed her attentively.

The tavern she entered had large windows that made the interior clearly visible.

Niel remained standing in the same spot, quietly appreciating the sight of her smiling brightly as she raised beer glasses with the organization members.

She was smiling.

She was smiling brightly.

Suddenly, Niel’s Adam’s apple moved slightly.

When she was Emperor, had she ever smiled like that?

Just a few hours ago, he had been sitting at his desk in his office, working tirelessly day and night for this empire that he would return to her.

‘…Come to think of it, I never told Father why I decided to become Emperor.’

Niel recalled the day he had seized the throne with his own hands.

That day, when everyone had blessed him.

As always, with a gentle smile on his face, he had ascended her vacant throne after her death.

Suppressing the urge to destroy and ruin this land that had driven her to death, he had chosen the throne for himself, for the sake of her who would surely return.

But now he wondered.

Jella. Would you truly appreciate this empire that I’ve polished and maintained to return to you?

…Perhaps you are happier with your current life.

As he was immersed in these melancholic thoughts,

She rose from her seat, raised her beer glass high, and narrowed her eyes playfully.

It was such a clear and bright smile that it seemed as if her crisp, cheerful laughter would burst in his ears at any moment.

Staring at her blankly, Niel unconsciously let out a groan.

“Ah…”

“Ah…”

But suddenly, an unwelcome voice overlapped with his.

Whip!

Niel turned his head.

There, a short distance away, was Cail Aleret, also hiding and watching her.

He too seemed to have noticed Niel’s presence and turned to look with cold eyes.

The cool light green eyes and the blue eyes carrying the chill of the north wind met in midair.

Both men’s expressions hardened simultaneously.

Niel was the first to speak.

As if his expression had never hardened, with a faint smile once again on his lips, Niel spoke in a gentle voice.

“Cail Aleret, it seems you haven’t received any further permission from her. How futile your hovering around her has been.”

Despite the polite speech that flowed out like a long-ingrained habit, the gaze with which he looked at the other was arrogant, as if looking down at the most worthless thing in the world.

However, Cail, as he had always done, retorted with that challenging look that Niel hated.

“You, too, were creepily spying on her. The noble Duke of Alpenhayer, her fiancé, no, now the new Emperor of Alpenhayer. Looking no different from a pitiful slave who hasn’t received her permission.”

“…”

The smile instantly disappeared from Niel’s face.

An indescribable sense of humiliation washed over him, as if a flaw he had long wanted to hide had been exposed, and the mask covering him shattered completely.

Without hiding his hostility toward the other, Niel muttered in a chilly voice.

“After you killed her.”

Flinch.

Cail’s expression hardened at those words.

“You killed her. By stabbing her heart with that sword.”

Knowing full well that this was Cail’s sore spot, Niel continued to spew barbed words at the man who had exposed his flaw.

“Yet you have the shamelessness to hover around her.”

Niel slowly raised his shoe and stepped on a small insect crawling on the ground.

“How are you any different from this bug?”

The life smaller than a palm was crushed under his shoe without even a struggle.

Niel removed his foot with an indifferent face and looked over the man standing before him.

Five years ago, Niel had finally reached the verge of opening the dimensional gate.

Those who had slandered and hurt her had gathered in one place under the name of rebels.

Many lives were needed to cross dimensions, and Niel had no hesitation in sacrificing those who had united in their desire to kill her.

He had planned to use those who had failed to recognize her noble and sacred intentions as sacrifices to send her soul to another dimension.

The plan was perfect.

On the day of her twentieth birthday celebration.

He had prepared a trap to bring down the rebels all at once, and their lives would become a birthday gift for her, saving her from the cursed dragon and giving her a new life.

But Cail Aleret, this man, had ruined everything.

Though he knew that her death was her own intention, if it hadn’t been for this man, she wouldn’t have been able to achieve her death.

If it hadn’t been for this man, he would have taken her soul to another dimension, and she wouldn’t have had to experience death.

Yes, if only it hadn’t been for this man…

He should have removed this man from the beginning.

In fact, from the first time he saw this man, he had been overwhelmed by such an impulse.

Everyone had gossiped that this man was a knight in name only, that he was actually the Emperor’s bedroom slave.

But Niel had ignored the impulse boiling up from some deep, dark place within him, and as always, with a gentle face, he had simply ignored him.

Whether the pretty slave personally brought by Her Majesty was for warming her bed or for some other purpose.

He had tried not to care.

Because that was the proper virtue to maintain as the Emperor’s spouse.

No matter how or how much this man pleased her, he was ultimately just a tool for her pleasure.

The name that occupied her side was Niel Alpenhayer, himself.

So he thought he could be generous about a mere bedroom slave.

Just like not bothering to step on and kill every single annoying insect crawling underfoot.

Only after her death did he come to regret.

All those moments when he had suppressed his emotions due to the tiresome Alpenhayer family education he had received since birth.

If he hadn’t turned away from his emotions from the moment this man first bothered him, and had crushed and trampled him like this. If he had, she wouldn’t have died.

“I should have killed you from the beginning.”

“…”

“If it weren’t for you, she wouldn’t have died.”

“…Ha.”

With his lower lip firmly bitten and his face pale, Cail suddenly burst into cold laughter.

“Haha! Hahaha!”

“…?”

Niel frowned as he stared at Cail, who had suddenly burst into laughter.

‘Has he gone mad?’

Just as Niel was thinking this to himself about the man who couldn’t stop laughing.

“You of all people.”

Cail, who had abruptly stopped laughing, glared at Niel with fierce eyes and said.

“You betrayed her.”

“No, I…”

“Did you think she wouldn’t be hurt at all?”

“…”

Cail cut off Niel’s attempt at an excuse.

“That’s not true. You know it too.”

“…”

Cail is right. Niel knows it too.

That she, who hid herself within a thorny, hard shell, was actually a fragile person who could be hurt by even a small glance or a single word from others.

It’s just that her upright nature covered up even those wounds, so they weren’t visible on the surface.

How could he not know? He was a man who had paid more attention to her than anyone.

A twisted sneer spread across Cail’s lips as he fiercely stared at Niel’s contorting face.

“If I stabbed her heart with this holy sword, you all tore her heart with your gazes and words.”

“…”

“You too. Yupheon Arne as well. And the people of this empire too. Each one of you stabbed, tore, and mutilated her.”

“…”

“And now, seeing you all sending love to her, it’s disgusting. It’s so disgusting that…”

I want to kill you all, always. Cail muttered in a sharp, low voice.

After a brief silence, Niel parted his lips with a sinister smile on his pale face.

“…So.”

Glance. His gaze moved to Cail’s chest. The dragon Helasio, who had tormented her all her life, was parasitizing right beneath that chest.

“So you made a contract with the dragon she tried to eliminate with her everything, making her death meaningless?”

“I…!”

“Pretending to be an obedient dog that only follows her words in front of her. When in fact, you betrayed her intentions more than anyone.”

“…”

This time, Cail’s mouth closed.

Ironically, the two men who harbored deep inferiority complexes toward each other exchanged fierce gazes as if they were about to kill each other.

“I disliked you from the moment I first saw you.”

“…We think alike.”

Click.

Shing.

The two men simultaneously reached for their sword hilts, and then, without anyone taking the lead, they drew their swords and rushed at each other.