Episode 29
Helen, quite flustered, turned around, the hem of her skirt fluttering. She saw Lucas, his eyes red from tears, reading the situation.
“Your Majesty!”
“You call me Your Majesty until the very end.”
She could have called him brother, just once, like she used to, but Helen did not. Perhaps to clearly sever the relationship between them, she addressed him as Your Majesty until the very end.
“I expected that you would choose not to stay by my side.”
Lucas rose, brushing off his seat. Then he passed by the chair Helen had sat in and approached her, who stood with her back to the entrance.
“If you ask me why I did it despite knowing, I suppose I wanted to cling to even a thread of hope that you would not choose this.”
I should have done this from the start. I should have abandoned such futile hope and locked you away so you could never leave again.
A bitter smile hung on Lucas’s lips as he continued walking. But the shuffling footsteps soon stopped.
Suddenly, a massive light erupted in the greenhouse garden, and a man entirely white appeared, blocking Helen’s path.
“…….!”
Hair as white as snow piled deep in midwinter and his pupils seized Lucas’s gaze. Moreover, the entirely white man wore an annoyed expression. It was Liandor.
After confirming Helen’s safety, Liandor looked at the Imperial Knights and mages blocking the entrance to the greenhouse garden. Displeased with the current situation, Liandor pursed his lips.
“I wondered who had invaded Hexilov, but it turns out to be His Majesty the great Emperor.”
At the seemingly mocking words, Lucas tilted his head. The entirely white man who had appeared after conjuring light was definitely a mage. Furthermore, he was a mage of considerable skill, having appeared inside the Imperial Palace that Imperial mages were defending, and moreover, inside the greenhouse garden where the Emperor was.
But he was a mage of a caliber Lucas had never seen or heard of in his life. He looked Helen over.
Lucas asked Helen, who stood beside the mage.
“Violet, do you know him?”
Before Lucas’s words had even finished, Liandor hid Helen behind him again. Soon after, a clamorous sound of blades falling to the ground filled the greenhouse garden.
They were the swords of the Imperial Knights. The knights who had lost their weapons could neither pick up the fallen swords nor flee, as if their entire bodies were frozen. The two mages in dark robes with star patterns were the same.
Helen knew that Liandor was the one who had caused the clamor. She guessed that the reason he had returned less than a week after leaving for Hexilov was related to Lucas, but now was not the time to dig into it.
“It seems you’re in an unfavorable situation. How about it, shall I flip everything over?”
“Liandor….”
“Just say the word. I’ll erase the Imperial Palace from the map.”
Helen believed that those playful words were Liandor’s true feelings. He was someone who would have no trouble burning down the Imperial Palace. If she said just one word, it would be realized at once.
As if it would stop at the Imperial Palace. He was someone who would turn the entire empire into a sea of fire if Helen wished it. All those who had loved Violet, and all those whom she had loved.
Should she? Should she start from the beginning in a world where everything had disappeared? In a place filled with things that neither loved her nor were loved by her, should she build up from small things again?
At the completely useless thought, Helen let out a scoff. She didn’t want to take innocent lives.
They were memories that would be forgotten anyway. If Liandor had succeeded in brewing the magic potion to erase memories, all memories would soon be erased.
Helen shook her head.
“You came to take me. Let’s go quickly.”
“Are you really just going?”
“We really are just going.”
At that, Liandor made a rather disappointed expression.
“It’s been a while since I’ve been to the Imperial Palace, and to think I have to just leave….”
“A while…?”
Helen realized from Liandor’s words that he had been to the Imperial Palace before. But as far as she knew, he had never set foot in the Imperial Palace. Of course, that period was quite limited, beginning from when Helen was Violet.
She grew curious about what status Liandor had come to the Imperial Palace with, but her curiosity had to be set aside here.
Lucas, his hands clasped behind his back, took a step forward and spoke.
“For someone who knows this place is the Imperial Palace to set foot here without permission.”
“That’s not something to say to someone who doesn’t know who I am.”
“Just who the hell are you!”
“Well. I don’t think you’d know even if I told you.”
As Liandor sneered, his white hair floated upward in the greenhouse garden where not a single breath of wind entered. At the same time, the knights and mages blocking the entrance vanished without a trace. The weapons they had inadvertently dropped on the ground also disappeared.
It was magic that seemed to proclaim that he was a great mage.
“Do you understand a little now?”
At the stranger’s provocation, Lucas’s mood grew sharp.
The entirely white man who blocked the Emperor’s path without knowing his place was no ordinary mage. The Imperial Palace’s elite knights and Imperial mages renowned on the continent had been defeated without even lifting a finger.
If he was someone possessing not only a peculiar appearance but also truly astonishing magical power, there was no way he wouldn’t be known.
Lucas couldn’t face the unknown mage who was extremely grating and insolent. Unlike a mage whose entire body was a weapon, he himself didn’t even have a sword at the moment.
Lucas smacked his lips in bitterness.
In the meantime, Liandor prepared the magic to escape the Imperial Palace with Helen. A small, bright light flickered at his fingertips. With his other arm, he wrapped around Helen’s waist as if to bind her.
It was when the two had finally finished preparing enough mana to move outside the Imperial Palace. Before lightly snapping his thumb and index finger, Liandor locked eyes with Lucas’s blue pupils.
“My Helen saved you and your worthless things.”
A massive burst of light, like the one that had erupted when Liandor stormed into the greenhouse garden, engulfed the two.
At the blindingly intense light, Lucas inevitably covered his eyes with his palm. Soon, as the massive light gradually faded over a few seconds and completely disappeared, he lowered the palm that had blocked his sight.
The only person remaining in Violet’s greenhouse garden was him alone.
* Sibel
“Huu!”
Helen exhaled a rough breath. She hadn’t eaten anything, so her stomach was empty, yet she felt like she had to retch.
On the other hand, Liandor, who had escaped the Imperial Palace with her, was completely fine. He even laughed as he watched Helen pound her chest with a small fist.
Helen placed her hand on the outer wall of some unknown building and tilted her head to glare at Liandor.
“You can laugh when someone is in pain?”
“It’s a slight side effect. You didn’t eat anything at the Imperial Palace, did you?”
“I didn’t not eat, I couldn’t eat…!”
Due to her churning stomach, Helen soon crouched down.
There was a time she had hated Liandor for not using magic to travel from Hexilov to the capital. Only now did she realize that had been his consideration, but regretting it now changed nothing.
Liandor knelt beside Helen, who was curled up and groaning. Then he carefully rubbed her back.
It wasn’t truly pain, but a side effect common to those experiencing spatial movement for the first time, so rubbing her back wouldn’t cure it. The reason he continued despite knowing that was because his heart, not his head, moved him to do so.
“How is it? A little better?”
“I think so, but I also don’t think so. Don’t you have any medicine to take at times like this?”
I’m really dying here.
Helen looked at him with puppy-like eyes waiting for their master’s decision, but Liandor only shook his head.
Helen felt that he was lying, but she had no choice but to place her hand on the outer wall and stand up. Even if her stomach was queasy, staying here wouldn’t change her condition.
The moment she thought she should go to the mansion first, Count Platini and Rosy suddenly came to mind. Those two wouldn’t know that Helen had escaped the Imperial Palace by magic.
“Liandor, what about Father and Rosy? They should still be at the Imperial Palace….”
“They’ll figure it out. Those two aren’t the type to go back to the mansion just because you’re not there.”
“I suppose…. They’re both adults, so they’ll take care of themselves.”
Helen felt a slight pang of disappointment at the part where he said ‘those two aren’t the type to go back to the mansion just because you’re not there,’ but it wasn’t enough to make her heart ache. After all, it was Helen herself who had left those two behind.
As if by habit, she dusted off the dirt on the hem of her dress with both hands and smoothed out the wrinkles as well.
She had seen it when he appeared in the greenhouse garden earlier, but when Liandor had left for Hexilov, his hair had been black. Perhaps because of that, Helen found the hair as white as snow piled in midwinter awkward.
“Your hair is….”
Helen stared at the white hair, unable to continue, and Liandor stroked his hair as if he found it awkward too.
“It’s white, isn’t it? I wanted to keep it black, but while brewing the potion for you, it turned white before I knew it. Shall I make it black again?”
“It’s fine. Since Lucas… no, since the Emperor has already seen it, I don’t think you need to hide it.”
Helen, who had mentioned Lucas in the moment, corrected herself with a greatly surprised face, but it was after the words had already entered Liandor’s ears.
Watching Helen run her slender fingers over her lips after saying ‘Lucas,’ Liandor thought to himself. He should have overturned the Imperial Palace regardless of Helen’s will, after all.
He then thought that it wouldn’t be too late to turn the Imperial Palace into a sea of fire after taking Helen back to the mansion.