Roadell was a beautiful town.
At its heart, a grand fountain murmured in the central square, its water catching the afternoon light in ribbons of silver. Around it rose rows of red brick buildings, their facades warm and sun-baked, their awnings casting stripes of shade across the cobblestones.
The square hummed with life — parents chasing after small children, elderly couples resting on iron benches, and white doves fluttering down to peck at crumbs scattered by passing strangers. The air smelled of bread and stone dust, sweet and faintly golden.
Juliet drifted through the shopping district, her pace unhurried, until she stopped abruptly in front of one of the stalls.
"Welcome! What would you like to see?" the shopkeeper asked, her voice flat with boredom. She didn't even glance up, already waving a lazy hand toward her wares.
Juliet didn't answer. Her eyes roamed the counters instead, drinking in the vivid display of fruit — pyramids of color she had no names for, strange shapes with skins like velvet and rinds like polished stone. The warm eastern climate must have coaxed things from the soil that the North had never dreamed of.
But the prices. *Not cheap at all.*
She picked up two fat, red apples, their skin tight and gleaming, and reached for the oranges — then her hand froze midway.
"What on earth is *this*?"
Nestled beside the oranges sat a much smaller fruit, round and bright, its skin dimpled like a miniature sun.
"And why is the price *double* if it's half the size?"
She stood there, biting the inside of her cheek, caught between curiosity and frugality. Then silver coins shifted and clinked inside her small purse, and the sound decided it for her.
"I'll take this as well."
The shopkeeper's face transformed instantly — boredom peeling away like old paint, replaced by a wide, eager grin. The fruit Juliet had pointed to was expensive and rarely purchased.
"Oh, of course! Let me wrap those up for you!"
---
A short while later, Juliet settled into a chair at an outdoor café table near the edge of the shopping district. She set her bag in her lap and pulled out the small orange fruit first.
*Mandarin.* That was what the locals called it.
She peeled back the skin, and a fine mist of citrus oil burst into the air. The scent struck her like a memory — sharp, sweet, and achingly familiar. She placed a segment on her tongue.
*The same.* It tasted exactly the same as when she'd tried one in the North.
She ate slowly, savoring each piece, letting the tartness dissolve on her tongue. When the last segment was gone, she wiped her fingers on a cloth napkin and stood to leave.
That was when she noticed the newspaper stand.
She hesitated. She *knew* she shouldn't be following the news. Tracking headlines was a thread that could be pulled — by her or by someone looking for her.
But curiosity gnawed at her like a dull tooth.
She bought one.
Juliet took a steadying breath before unfolding the paper, then skimmed through the columns with practiced speed.
"…Nothing."
*No. That can't be right.*
She went through it again, slower this time, dragging her gaze across every headline, every minor article crammed into the margins. There was no mention of what she was looking for. She closed the paper and set it down.
It was a strange feeling — searching for bad news and being unsettled by its absence.
*Perhaps she hasn't appeared yet.*
Juliet had been dreading this moment for a long time.
Even without confirmation in print, she was almost certain that **Dahlia** had already arrived. In Juliet's first life, Dahlia had appeared on the first day of the new year. The location and circumstances of her emergence had been so dramatic, so perfectly staged, that the entire continent had erupted with talk of it.
She remembered it clearly — *too* clearly.
*"Have you heard about this, Your Grace? They say the Child of Prophecy has appeared!"*
It had been Juliet herself who brought the news to Lennox, her voice light and teasing, her smile carefully mysterious. She no longer remembered what he had answered. Probably something indifferent. Probably nothing at all. It never mattered to him.
In her past life, Juliet had always searched for excuses like that — any reason, however flimsy, to see him. To linger near him a little longer. She had always done that.
Simply because she wanted to be near him.
*Enough.*
She pushed the memory aside and spread her map across the café table.
---
Unlike other regions of the empire, the eastern provinces were not dominated by noble houses. The aristocracy's grip here was weaker, diffused by geography and faith. At the center of the East stretched a vast forest, home to dozens of creature species and dense enough to swallow armies whole. And beyond that forest —
*There it is.*
Juliet's finger landed on a point on the map, and a quiet smile crossed her face.
**The Holy City-State of Lucerne.**
Lucerne was unique — a place where the rule of law and religion took precedence over the authority of the emperor or any noble lineage. Though small in territory, its influence stretched across the entire continent.
*Except, perhaps, the North.*
The poisonous relationship between the Duke of Carlisle and the Temple was no secret. Their mutual contempt was practically a matter of public record.
That was precisely why Juliet had chosen the East. Here, most people worshipped the goddess. Here, the Temple's word carried more weight than any duke's decree. She had reasoned that Lennox — who despised the Temple with every fiber of his being — would have neither the interest nor the inclination to chase her into territory so thoroughly saturated with holy authority.
Even if he wanted to, which she had strongly doubted at the time.
*But he…*
Her expression darkened, her lips pressing into a thin, troubled line.
She'd had no idea that Lennox would **mobilize his forces** and storm the Temple to seize the sacred relic of the Great War. That he would break through consecrated walls as if they were made of paper.
And then — *then* — he'd accused her of trying to run away with his child.
*You must have been furious to go that far.*
A small sigh escaped her.
She didn't regret running. But the way things had unraveled left a dull ache she couldn't quite name.
All she had wanted was to say goodbye with a sweet smile and leave quietly — a clean, painless departure. He had always been indifferent to her, indifferent to *everything* around him. He had always parted with his lovers calmly, without fuss or feeling. So why had he been so angry this time?
"Well… what's done is done," she murmured to no one, and turned her gaze back to the map.
As long as Lennox possessed the sacred artifact, it was only a matter of time before he discovered she was here in Roadell. He already knew she had been heading east — he'd watched her board the train with his own eyes.
That was why she had changed her plan midway and disembarked here, well before her intended stop. If she traveled directly to her true destination, he would know not only *where* she was going but *why*. And that was unacceptable for someone who had resolved to sever every tie.
To truly disappear, she would need to neutralize the **Eye of Argos**.
If the Eye had been a magical tool, the task would have been straightforward enough. But it was an artifact charged with **divine power**. Mana and holy power were opposing forces — like oil and flame — and neutralizing a relic required an even greater concentration of divine energy.
Most people would have stopped right there, defeated by the impossibility of it.
But Juliet wasn't most people. She already had a very good idea of how to do it.
Her finger traced a route across the map, stopped, and tapped twice.
*Found it.*
She smiled — wide and certain — and folded the map.
---
## — The Road to Lobell —
From Roadell Station, Juliet's next destination was the town of Lobell. The journey required a stagecoach, so she made her way to the departure point at the edge of the district.
"How far are you planning to go, miss?"
The staging area was swarming with teenagers — quick-footed, loud, and relentless. They descended on every new arrival like a flock of starlings, hawking everything from tickets to lodging with breathless enthusiasm.
"Don't you need a place to stay?"
"You can sleep at *our* hotel — best rates in Roadell!"
Juliet pressed her bag closer to her side and said nothing, suspecting that if this went on much longer, she'd reach the stagecoach with considerably fewer belongings than she'd started with.
Just then, a tall young man cut through the crowd directly ahead of her.
"Out of the way."
His voice carried a sharp edge of irritation. He towered over the teenagers, and he moved through them without ceremony — one broad palm pushing a head aside here, a shoulder there, clearing his path like a man wading through tall grass.
The teenagers protested loudly, hurling insults at his retreating back, but he ignored them entirely and kept walking.
Thanks to the corridor he carved, Juliet was able to follow in his wake, stepping easily through the gap to the next waiting stagecoach.
And there she saw him again.
She looked up — and stared.
*What stunning red hair.*
It was the first thing anyone would notice. His hair fell in thick, untamed waves the color of dark garnets — not the brownish-auburn that magical dye usually produced, but a deep, vivid crimson that bordered on the color of blood. Even in the dull light beneath the staging awning, it caught the eye like a struck match.
People around them had stopped to stare. He seemed entirely indifferent to their attention.
*A traveler, perhaps?*
Juliet studied him with quiet curiosity before a voice pulled her back.
"How far are you planning to go, miss?"
"Ah — I'd like to go to Lobell."
The coachman nodded and quoted her a fare. Juliet paid and climbed aboard.
Then a rather awkward situation presented itself.
The red-haired man was sitting directly across from her.
The stagecoach rattled and groaned beneath them. Beyond the wooden walls, the noise of the town filtered in — shouts, hooves, the distant clang of a blacksmith — but inside, only silence. Thick, conspicuous silence.
*I should have taken another coach.*
She'd deliberately waited, assuming more passengers would fill the seats before departure. But as the coachman cheerfully informed her, Lobell was a small town. Only one or two passengers traveled there on any given day.
So it was just the two of them.
The stagecoach itself bore no resemblance to the carriages Juliet had known in her former life. The seats were little more than two long planks of wood, set vertically on either side of the cabin, wide enough to accommodate several people sitting shoulder to shoulder. Backrests were, of course, out of the question. Every bump in the road jolted through her spine.
Mercifully, before the carriage even lurched into motion, the man crossed his arms over his chest and closed his eyes, his chin dipping toward his collar as if he intended to sleep through the entire journey.
This gave Juliet the freedom to observe him without pretense.
His hair truly was remarkable. Even the best magical items for changing one's hair color typically produced a muted reddish tone — a rust or a faded copper. But this man's color was saturated, almost impossibly vivid. Like wine held up to firelight.
*Perhaps they use different magical objects here in the East? Something that deepens the color instead of merely shifting it?*
*Maybe I should dye mine, too.*
"Hey, miss — what brings you to Lobell?"
The coachman's voice broke through her thoughts. Apparently, the silence had been bothering him as well.
"I have to meet someone," Juliet answered, keeping her tone deliberately vague.
The coachman, undeterred — or perhaps simply bored — launched into an unsolicited account of Lobell, filling the cabin with his gravelly voice as the stagecoach swayed and clattered along the road.
"In fact, there's no safer place in the East than Lobell. Do you know why? Because it's the king's hometown."
"The king?"
Juliet, who had been listening with only half an ear, straightened in her seat. This was something she hadn't heard before.
"You don't know him?" The coachman glanced back over his shoulder, eyebrows raised. "***Lionel Lebatan***. The Red King."