“My apologies, but I'm coming.”
The door, which had been left open, opened slowly without any resistance.
“……”
Fenric entered the dark room, his calm gaze falling on Prisippi.
Thanks to the tea given to her to help her relax, she was asleep in bed, her face showing signs of exhaustion.
Fenric quietly pulled a small chair from near the table and placed it next to the bed, sat down and looked at her.
Her pale, glowing skin glowed faintly under the moonlight. Her eyes were closed, her long eyelashes casting thin shadows. Her silver hair was draped over the bed like a shining veil. Her small, fragile hands were clasped peacefully.
Preseppe must have been deeply affected by Ivan's visit.
Believing she had escaped, only to feel the overwhelming fear that the nightmare might repeat.
“Don't worry,” Fenric's low voice broke the heavy silence in the room.
“I will handle everything.”
His large, rough hand gently touched her round, white forehead.
Even his fingertips trembled due to the unfamiliar softness and warmth, causing a slight tremor.
“I promise you will never face a situation like this again.”
This promise was the only thing that had pushed him this far.
Fenric murmured softly, his thoughts returning to the day they had first met—when Prisippi had given him a jeweled sword and said:
“If I sell this, it will only be money. But if I fight with it instead... a lot will change.”
And it was.
After that day, the skinny boy who had been begging for crumbs began wandering the battlefields, carrying a sword as long as his arm.
Constantly, aimlessly.
He did not remember much of the landscape he had seen in those years, and only small fragments remained of it.
Like the day he killed someone for the first time. The expression on the enemy soldier's face when Fenric swung his sword.
The older man, who was probably about the age of Fenric's father, was looking at him with stunned eyes, ready to strike back and counterattack. But Fenric struck first, without hesitation.
As the man collapsed, his chest pierced and coughing up blood, Fenric realized:
“From this moment on, absolutely nothing will be undone.”
As he walked around the battlefields, his body became taller and stronger. The number of people he killed increased, and no matter how many times he bathed, the smell of blood seeped deep into his skin.
“Why do I fight?”
“What am I trying to become?”
“What am I trying to change?”
He escaped a life of daily beatings and begging but could not find a reason to live.
The more he felt lost and unstable, and the more he was teetering on the brink of collapse...
Fenric remembered her.
That noble girl.
“If you can endure and do a good job, maybe I can do a good job too.”
The face that looked so sad for her age became clearer in his mind.
Even though all he knew about her was her name, Fenric couldn't understand why she remained in his thoughts.
It sounds silly, but it's inevitable.
Like a duck that leaves a mark on the first thing it sees, it was Presibe who shattered Fenric's world that day.
“I was curious.”
'How are you?'
Are you managing your affairs as you told me?
“So… I looked for you.”
For years, Fenric has roamed battlefields. By the time he became a young man, he had achieved many accomplishments and gained fame.
No one could look down on him anymore.
After the wars were over, Fenric returned to the capital, and the first thing he did was search for Prisippi.
It wasn't hard to figure out what happened to her.
By the time he returned to Ateloya, Prispe had already been expelled, disgraced by her mother's betrayal.
Only then did he realize that she had always been beyond his reach.
The rumors painted a bleak picture.
Why did the emperor execute the concubine but spare her daughter?
“Maybe he would kill her later, pretending to spare her out of mercy, only to brutally slaughter her in secret.”
The stories were many, but the result was always the same:
“She's completely gone.”
Presibe disappeared as if she had never existed.
Fenrick's only clue was Dietrich, so he searched for him, spilling more blood to secure his throne.
But as soon as Dietrich became emperor, he confined Presipe in a tower, isolating her from everyone.
Then Fenric began to realize:
“Something is not right.”
“You said you'd come too.”
When he saw Presibe again, it wasn't long after that.
“To this miserable celebration.”
Celebrating Dietrich's rise was one of the most important moments that Precipe always returned to in the game's tournaments.
“So, I waited for you endlessly, in front of the banquet hall.”
From afar, Fenric watched Presibe approaching step by step.
It was Presibe who saw her after a long time...
She looked thinner and sadder.
“I'll wait until you come to pay me back.”
The smile that was on her face at that time was no longer visible at all. It seemed like it was about to crumble into nothingness, like a dry autumn leaf at the slightest touch.
However, as if she was being chased by something, Precipe, who was lost in her thoughts, suddenly changed direction.
Instinctively, Fenric followed her, all the way to the deep lake near the banquet hall of the Imperial Palace.
And then, Presibe…
"She jumped. Yes, right in front of me."
She threw herself into the lake.
It was a deep lake, famous for claiming lives every year.
Fenric couldn't think of anything. Without even taking off his clothes, he jumped after her to save her.
But his efforts were in vain. Presibe had already sunk to the bottom of the lake, her head was hitting a large rock, and blood was bleeding endlessly from her wound.
“I just wanted to greet you.”
There was so much he wanted to say.
"Are you okay? How are you? Do you remember me? I remembered you all this time."
But the precipice in his arms did not open her eyes.
Her shallow breaths became fainter, and her already pale skin turned an unnatural blue color.
I said that if you endured well, maybe you would be able to do it too.
“You said you didn't know what would happen, but you would try to hold on anyway.”
Fenric couldn't say a single word of what he had prepared as he stared expressionlessly at Presibe, who was now lifeless in his arms.
And at that moment it happened.
A strange light began to see out of Prisippi's cold, flabby body.
The dazzling, incomprehensible light made Fenric reflexively close his eyes.
When he opened them again, he was back on the battlefield.
Specifically, the battlefield where Dietrich fought to regain the throne.
“At first, I thought it was a dream.”
“Something like this couldn't be possible.”
But everything happened exactly as Fenric remembered it. Dietrich became emperor, Preseppe was again imprisoned, and the celebration was held at the time, date, and place appointed for it.
At the second celebration, Presibe did not leave, but rather came to the ceremony hall wearing the same clothes she had worn before, and sat quietly with her face devoid of any emotion.
Fenric wanted to get closer to her.
So, when Precipe quietly rose from her seat and left the hall unnoticed, he followed her again, just as he had done when she threw herself into the lake.
“This time, I thought I would finally talk to you.”
But…
“I couldn't even get close.”
It wasn't just a metaphor.
Physically, Fenric was unable to move, nor did he take a single step.
He could only watch as Prisibe stood far away from him, greeted by Atari Hanan. He could only watch as she met Noah Duverne, and as the original events unfolded, Dietrich rushed out to find her, captured her, and ordered Siegfried to take her back to the tower.
Fenric was unable to do anything. nothing.
Only after Siegfried disappeared with Presibe did his frozen body finally move.
“I was confused.”
What is happening? What is this?
Days passed, and Fenric remained confined to his residence, suffering from confusion.
Then came the news.
“When I heard that you were going to be executed, I felt very sad.”
Dietrich decided to hang Preseppe in the public square, for everyone to see.
“I watched you die.”
Fenric could only watch as her limb body writhe in pain, hanging in the air.
He couldn't stop it.
His body wouldn't move, like before.
When her body finally became limp, Fenric watched her with his bloodshot eyes.
He saw Dietrich staring at her lifeless body in disgust, as if it were nothing more than dirt.
But that moment did not last long.
When Fenric opened his eyes again, he was returning to the battlefield.
“Then I understood,” Fenric said in a brightening voice.
“You are trapped, repeating the same cycle endlessly.”