Chapter 27 – Even If You Confess the Truth

“I don’t know. Whether they wanted you, or my father chose you. Anyway, I’ll apologize on his behalf.”  

“That really happened…”  

“Adults are like that, but so am I.”  

Lyle’s voice trembled.  

Ethea was puzzled. Adults—plural? Did someone else, besides the former Emperor, agree to send her as a bride?  

“You see… I couldn’t send you there. So I made the Homunclepet. That’s how Gin was created.”  

Over a long time, Lyle confessed calmly.  

He hadn’t intended to create a child from the start. In that ritual combining magic and alchemy, he’d hoped for a stone or small animal—at most, a cat. He wanted to make a vessel for a soul to block her marriage. But the result turned out as it did.  

After hearing everything, Ethea’s mind was pitch black.  

Marriage, alchemy that creates life, vessels for souls… It was too much to take in all at once.  

“I wanted to protect you.”  

“Protect what?”  

“Your peaceful days. Those ordinary days when you smiled with me, and your own self that made them possible. Quietly, secretly, I wanted to protect you. I believed you’d be happy that way.”  

If you were dragged to Garental, all of that would end.  

He added, powerless.  

Ethea slowly shook her head.  

This wasn’t right. She understood his feelings well. She never doubted his heart, which always thought of her. But frustratingly, why did he decide everything alone?  

Ethea clenched her fists. Her broken heart now felt crushed by a heavy stone.  

“Why didn’t you tell me?”  

Even as she asked, Ethea knew it was a silly question.  

Even if Lyle told her the truth, she wouldn’t have had good options. At best, she’d have begged her father—who wasn’t really her father—to protect her.  

But now, thinking back, that man wouldn’t have bothered to protect a fake daughter. He’d have acted only for his own benefit.  

Still, if Lyle had told her beforehand, she could have at least run away.  

Suddenly, Lyle’s words from six years ago flashed in Ethea’s mind. Under the crabapple tree on the windy hill, he’d said,  

‘I want to go far away. If I could, I’d go very far away.’  

Ethea was confused. Was the former Emperor already planning to send her to the King of Garental then? Or did it happen after that?  

No, the timing didn’t matter. What mattered was that all this happened without her knowing.  

She resented Lyle.  

“But you could have told me. At least said something. Just experimenting with life through alchemy is a death sentence, but you didn’t just experiment—you actually created life. Didn’t you think you might get caught? You did something so dangerous because of me, because of me…”  

Was Ethea really worth that much to Lyle? She was a friend he liked, but was she really that special?  

Everything he did, everything he felt for her, was overwhelming for Ethea.  

Before she knew it, Lyle slowly approached her. He took the broad, soft cloak from his shoulders and wrapped it around her like a blanket.  

The lavender scent was so strong—just a fragrance, but it felt gentle.  

Even in the darkness, she felt him looking at her. She sensed his gaze. His golden eyes seemed to flicker softly.  

“Ethea.”  

“You did all this alone…”  

“It’s because I was arrogant.”  

“Lyle.”  

“I was careless, hasty, reckless. I made things so hard and painful for you. And I felt I couldn’t afford to be weak, so I wore the Crown of Orodium. I had no choice.”  

So he killed nineteen siblings and became Emperor for that reason?  

It had always seemed strange. From the start, Lyle never seemed interested in power. Far from it, he was a lazy prince who didn’t even do what was required and just wandered around for fun. That such a person killed his siblings and ascended the throne—it was odd.  

To think it was all because of Ethea. Ethea felt afraid of Lyle.  

“After putting on that crown, the real problem began. It was a constant time of having to prove myself. I had to endlessly show others I deserved to be Emperor. Maybe that’s why they say the Crown of Orodium is the heaviest in the world.”  

“Lyle…”  

“I was late coming to you, too. Wearing this crown means having more enemies. I was afraid someone might do something bad to you, so I just watched over you cautiously. I’m sorry. I apologize. I won’t do that anymore, now that I’ve finally found you, even if it’s late. I won’t confuse you again.”  

Something sparkled on his cheek. It was, surprisingly, tears. Ethea reached out and touched his cheek without thinking. Hot tears were soaking his eyes.  

“Forgive me.”  

He grasped her hand tightly against his cheek.  

“If you forgive me, I want to be with you. Everything I couldn’t do for you and Gin—I want to do it all. I’m confident.”  

“Hah, haha…”  

Ethea laughed hollowly.  

She could see that Lyle was stronger than before. But he was still reckless.  

“There’s nothing to forgive. It’s gone now. It’s over.”  

“What?”  

“All I have left is Gin. For better or worse, now it’s only Gin.”  

So you can’t enter my and Gin’s peaceful life. Because you…  

As Ethea was about to say that, he was already pulling her into his arms. She felt like she couldn’t breathe. The gentle-scented cloak and his embrace were so heavy she could barely catch her breath.  

Maybe her sigh sounded like relief, because Lyle said,  

“I won’t leave now that I’ve found you, even if it’s late. I want to be by your side, always. Forever.”  

There was a desperate tenderness in his words. They could have sounded sweet, but it wasn’t easy to take them that way.  

“Will you allow it?”  

Ethea pushed him away. She had to.  

“No, Lyle. Sorry. I can’t allow it.”  

“Why…”  

“We can’t live like we did when we were sixteen.”  

“Of course not, but I can do better now…”  

“I’ll let you see Gin. Let’s say he’s just a child from a poor family sponsored by the Emperor. That should be enough. Like you said, you have many enemies.”

“You don’t have to worry about that anymore.”  

“No, I do worry. And there are others watching. Oh, you don’t need to pay so much child support. I only said that out of anger. Just enough for Gin to go to school comfortably, that’s all I ask.”  

“Etty…”  

“I think I’ve said everything I needed to. Please go now.”

It was then that the lighting magic was cast again. Ethea reflexively lowered her gaze. She didn’t have the courage to look at his face, surely wet with tears.

She took off the cloak and handed it to him.  

“Take it.”  

He didn’t try to take the cloak, so Ethea grabbed his hand and forced it into his grasp.  

“Goodbye.”  

Then she went into her bedroom. She took off her shoes and lay on the bed, thunder rumbling loudly.  

Rumble, crash.  

It shook the whole house, but sounded faint.  

She wished the thunder would keep going. She wished the sky would cry more. She burrowed under the blanket, saying she should sleep, but couldn’t fall asleep.  

She wasn’t sure, but it seemed the lighting magic wasn’t disappearing. It felt like he hadn’t left.  

“Idiot, wanting to stay by my side when you even have a fiancée. What nonsense.”  

Her pillow soaked quickly with tears.  

***

Inside the Imperial City, it was deathly quiet and peaceful. But those serving the Emperor up close were busier than ever. Not just today, but always lately.  

“Mage Commander Lint, here are the coordinates. Please prepare ten Dimension Gate scrolls for each coordinate.”

Seisil shook his head as if disgusted, seeing the Emperor’s aides come every morning to request teleportation scrolls.  

“Mage Commander, why am I always called that? Please, let’s not use such cringe-worthy titles. If I’m a mage, just call me a mage, or if I’m the top manager of the Mage Tower, call me the Tower Master, but Mage Commander?”

Of course, Seisil knew his father, the previous Mage Tower Master, was also called Mage Commander. The Mage Tower, strictly speaking, wasn’t an independent institution but part of the Emperor’s guard, that is, the military, so its top administrator was called a Commander. Still, Seisil felt the title ‘Mage Commander’ was like wearing ill-fitting clothes.  

The Emperor’s aides laughed as if teasing him.  

“That’s the official title. If you didn’t want to be called that, you shouldn’t have become Mage Tower Master. Anyway, please hand over the scrolls.”  

“D*mn, I didn’t become Mage Tower Master just to hand out carriage tickets.”  

“It’s not carriage tickets, it’s Dimension Gate scrolls.”  

“Same difference, you’re moving people somewhere. But why are there so many coordinates? After roaming around all morning, are you going out again?”  

The coordinates handed over were all places where the Emperor’s rival factions were hiding.  

The forces of the nineteen siblings Lyle killed were scattered throughout the Empire, and their numbers were countless.  

With so many, their personalities varied. Some wanted to live quietly forever and paid no attention to the Imperial City, while others questioned the legitimacy of the crown and secretly moved to shake the Empire from the ground up and seize the Crown of Orodium.  

But the latter group wasn’t very strong. To plot a rebellion, you need money, organization, and everything else. But they lacked the most essential power—magic. As long as Lyle led nearly all the Empire’s magicians, their schemes were ultimately useless.  

Lyle had always pretended not to notice his enemies. More precisely, he planted spies, built up weaknesses, and when they surfaced, struck those weaknesses so they could never rise again.  

Some might call Lyle a cunning tyrant. But Seisil knew the truth. Lyle didn’t attack enemies to eliminate them, but to feed Sadea. So whenever the Emperor’s enemies died off regularly, Seisil would just think ‘Sadea’s feeding again’ and move on.  

But today, Lyle seemed to be acting on his own, not because of Sadea—almost as if he couldn’t endure unless he did something.  

From dawn to afternoon, Lyle traveled all over the Empire, personally wiping out enemies like taking out trash. It sounded easy, but it was physically exhausting and used up many magic scrolls.  

So Seisil was busy making and sending scrolls with Dimension Gate effects. To make scrolls that weren’t harmful to the body even after repeated use and allowed fast travel, and to keep the Emperor’s secret actions from leaking, Seisil’s team was needed. The Emperor’s sudden purge made not only the guards but Seisil suffer.