Elisa’s memories ended there. From that point on, it was entirely Luke Velius’s memories alone.

After the wedding ceremony, Luke didn’t even spend his wedding night and headed straight to Callista. However, what awaited him wasn’t Elisa, but news of her death.

It had been only about two weeks. Excluding the round trip, he had literally just held the wedding ceremony and rushed over immediately.

Yet she had passed away in that brief time? The funeral had already ended, and all that waited for him was her small grave.

He couldn’t find Elisa anywhere. In front of Elisa’s grave, Luke Velius collapsed in devastation.

For three days straight, day and night, he wailed for her alone at that spot. Elisa’s household members came running and tried to bring him inside, but Luke paid no heed and kept vigil beside Elisa’s grave.

But when it became a week, then nearly a month, Harn finally came rushing over. Having already heard news of Callista’s lord’s death, Harn had expected Luke to be broken, but seeing Luke’s condition directly was even more serious.

“Luke.”

At the voice filled with pity and a hint of anger, Luke shifted his unfocused gaze.

“How long are you going to be like this…”

“Your Majesty…”

His roughened voice scraped his throat as it emerged.

“Your Majesty, Elisa…”

“I know. Her death is truly, deeply regrettable to me as well. But Luke.”

“…”

“You can’t stay like this forever. While you’re doing this, the people of Velius territory are living in abandoned fear. What about the wife who was abandoned by her husband right after marriage? What about those who are constantly eyeing Velius lands?”

“…”

“Most importantly, if Elisa saw you like this… How would she feel?”

“Ha…”

He knew his words were right in his head. But…

“Alright.”

Eventually, Luke left her gravesite after nearly a month. Though moving was uncomfortable for him, Luke tried to leave Callista immediately without rest, like he was punishing himself.

Since he was the one who said he needed to return to Velius immediately, Harn couldn’t stop him and could only sigh deeply. Just as Luke was about to mount his horse and leave.

“Wait a moment!”

Someone burst out and blocked his horse’s path. Luke’s desolate gaze turned forward.

She came around to the side of the horse and looked up at Luke. Elisa’s household member – her younger sister.

In front of her, Luke felt endlessly guilty and couldn’t even look at her. Seemingly indifferent, she held something out toward him.

“Take this.”

His lifeless red eyes touched upon it. At that moment, Luke’s eyes shook.

“That’s…”

“Sister squeezed out her remaining strength for you.”

The dagger Elisa had always carried. Her keepsake that she had prepared as his wedding gift.

“I can’t take…”

“Take it!”

“…”

When Luke tried to avoid the dagger, she shouted and thr*st it toward him. Luke’s expression became strange as he received the dagger unexpectedly.

Elisa had squeezed out her last energy and breathed it into this dagger. And under the pretext of a wedding gift, no less.

If he had any shame, he couldn’t take her keepsake with him. This keepsake should belong to her family, the Reilat clan…

“Sister never resented you, not even once.”

“…”

“The curse too – she said that curse on purpose because she was worried you’d be too sad after she died.”

“…”

He knew. Elisa was that kind of woman.

Yet what drove him mad was the self-loathing of having neglected her and let her die alone.

“That sword contains all of sister’s heart and soul for you. Sister wanted that sword to go to you. If you truly loved sister, please fulfill her last request.”

“…”

Luke still felt he had no right to possess her keepsake. But in one corner of his heart, selfishness stirred, wanting to keep some trace of her by his side somehow.

“Alright.”

In the end, he bowed his head to that selfishness. Carefully storing the dagger deep in his chest, Luke left Callista.

From then on, it was the ordinary life of Grand Duke Velius. As the princess had said, right after the marriage, assassins frequently attacked her, but they all met death at Luke’s hands.

Rather, his methods were so cruel that assassins came to fear him. After this repeated for several years, even the western empire gave up on assassinating the princess.

With only the alliance remaining, the Aker Empire flourished smoothly, and Velius territory also developed brilliantly. He cared for Callista along with Velius, and had an heir with the princess.

Everything went smoothly, but he thought of Elisa every night, retraced her memories one by one each day, and desperately clung to her fading memories as time passed. He walked daily through white flower gardens that resembled her, and slept in the greenhouse she had loved.

Even twenty years after she disappeared, his life was filled only with her. However, a life that has lost its master is bound to become sick, and before he could pass his 47th winter, he finally sensed that death had come to visit him.

No one sensed his approaching death. His wife, the princess, didn’t love him, and his son always resented and turned away from a father who spent his whole life longing only for a former lover he had sent away.

His only close friend Harn was busy caring for the empire, and aside from him, he had no real friends. Yet being alone before death wasn’t lonely or desolate.

Rather, he was genuinely happy that he could finally meet the same death as her. Before dying, he took out the dagger that was her keepsake.

Shing.

Even the silver, pale, and pure blade suited her perfectly.

“Eli… sa…”

Luke endlessly called that name that had now become awkward.

‘Elisa, Elisa, Elisa. Elisa, I truly…’

“Miss you so much.”

‘If I hadn’t been Grand Duke Velius, would our fates have changed then? How resentful I am.’

‘Everything that grew by sacrificing her – I hate it all, everything. The affection he had felt toward the empire and Velius had somehow transformed into hatred.’

More precisely, he hated everything that was subordinate to him. Nothing he loved remained.

Therefore, even until the moment of death, he endlessly burned with longing for Elisa and hatred toward himself. Not knowing that Elisa’s power dwelling in the dagger was responding to his fervent hatred.

Before that night could even pass, he finally fell into a sleep from which he would never wake. He thought that was the end.

However, after his death, the Velius curse began. The world began to know it as a curse cast by a divine incarnation he had abandoned, who hated him.

* * *

That was it. The memories of the two people dwelling in the Reilat… no, Elisa’s power ended with Luke’s curse.

After seeing all the memories, Lesia found it difficult to recover from the shock.

‘The Velius curse… began with the first Grand Duke Velius.’

In a way, he had been quite cowardly. In the end, he had shifted all his responsibility to Velius and hated it.

How many people had lost their lives and suffered from loss because of his petty revenge? If not for the curse, Grandma Lulu, the people of Flora Village, and Mother too!

‘And Cesar.’

When her thoughts reached Cesar, Lesia’s head snapped up. Now wasn’t the time to resent Luke Velius.

‘So how can I save Cesar?’

She had discovered the truth of the Velius curse, but that wasn’t a way to save Cesar.

‘I definitely asked to meet Cesar again…’

That’s when it happened.

“Hello.”

Someone spoke to her. Who could be speaking in this void space where only fragments of memory remained?

Startled, Lesia turned around and froze in place.

“Are you… Elisa?”

Snow-white hair and blue eyes with a playful glint. She was unmistakably Elisa Reilat.

How was she here? As Lesia looked with shaking eyes, Elisa smiled briefly.

“I’m precisely speaking, a fragment of soul I left behind.”

“A soul fragment?”

“Yes. Originally, I left it thinking I’d meet him if Luke committed s*icide with that sword or something.”

“…”

When Lesia couldn’t bring herself to answer, Elisa laughed briefly like it was a joke. Such a bright and lively woman.

Since the early part of the memories, she had always been gloomy and sickly, so this appearance seemed rather unfamiliar.

“This is troublesome. I can’t say to you what I was going to say to Luke.”

Worried she might leave, Lesia spoke urgently.

“Pl-please help me.”

“Hmm?”

“Can’t the power of the Reilat bring dead people back to life?”

“What?”

Haha.

She laughed briefly. Then immediately hardened her expression and answered in a cold tone.

“Impossible.”

“But…”

Lesia despaired. She couldn’t bring dead people back to life.

Then what about Cesar? Should she give up like this?

‘No.’

She absolutely couldn’t give up. She had something she absolutely, definitely needed to say to Cesar.

Noticing that Lesia’s gaze remained unwavering, Elisa’s expression shifted to one of intrigue as she murmured, “Hmm.” 

Shortly after, she stepped closer and began to speak.

“But changing the past is possible.”