*"Why did I run away... How could I not?"*
The words of a woman who considered herself nothing more than a useless commodity.
Yet the true reason for her flight had been her desperate desire to save her younger sister. She had been prepared to die—*willing* to die—so that he would never discover where the girl had gone. So that he could never find her.
*That pain again...*
Calix frowned, feeling something sharp twist deep in his chest. Ever since he had dragged his wife back into the castle, that same strange sensation surfaced whenever he thought of her.
It was... peculiar.
He had spent years in brutal battles. He had suffered his share of wounds—ripped arrowheads from his own flesh, stitched gashes that exposed living muscle, healed sword cuts without the luxury of proper magical remedies. Physical pain had long ago become something he could dismiss with contempt. Among his men, the ability to laugh at one's own agony—no matter how excruciating—was considered the mark of true strength.
But this pain was different.
It arose somewhere in his heart, in a place he couldn't locate or understand. It was so mild it seemed almost laughable to call it pain at all. And yet, at the same time, it was so *intense* that he found it impossible to focus on anything else.
"Dinner with me won't give her pleasure."
Raizen offered no response. And truthfully, Calix didn't need one. He remained lost in his own dark thoughts, circling endlessly around the same impossible questions.
He had been living exactly the life he wanted for years now. He could do whatever he pleased. He possessed everything a man could desire: power, wealth, experience, ability. He knew how to manipulate people to suit his purposes—it was effortless for the leader of Karma. Was there a single person in the Empire who didn't have invisible strings tied to their fingertips? Becoming insensitive to the pain and needs of others had been a natural evolution. Nothing particularly impressed him anymore. He considered no one in his life *special*.
*"Have you decided to toy with me before killing me?"*
*Why?* Why were her words lodged so firmly in his mind?
They swirled and tangled through his thoughts, never ceasing for a single moment. And her face—that tear-streaked face as she poured out everything that had festered in her wounded soul—remained burned into his memory. Along with the image of her plunging a jagged shard of glass toward her own throat.
Even when Calix closed his eyes to sleep, the vision refused to fade. It seemed seared into the very retinas of his blood-red pupils.
*Why?*
He couldn't understand it at all.
But what he understood even *less*—
*"Let me go! Just let me go..."*
The mere thought that she might truly leave. That she might vanish and never return.
His heart felt as though it were falling into an endless abyss.
"Raizen."
"Yes, Your Highness."
But Calix didn't speak. He wandered somewhere distant, lost in the labyrinth of his own tangled thoughts.
*When did I first feel this?*
Probably then. At that moment. When she tried to throw herself from the window.
What had happened could not be undone. Even a man as powerful as Archduke Calix Benvito could not turn back time.
But at the very least...
He tore his gaze from the window and looked directly at Raizen.
"Tell me everything about Margot Roman."
---
## — The Imperial Palace —
Fernando's face glowed with undisguised curiosity.
"So, the Archduke *personally* rushed to that provincial town for his runaway wife?"
"Yes, Your Majesty. The Archduke went so far as to blockade all roads leading out of the principality."
"And how far did she manage to flee?"
"According to reports, a fine carriage pulled by four strong horses can travel from the town where they were found to Benvito Fortress in just half a day. Provided one knows the shortcuts."
"That," Fernando declared, clapping his hands together, "is the most *amusing* story I've heard in quite some time."
He burst into genuine laughter—a rare sound that echoed through the chamber.
He hadn't been in such excellent spirits for months.
The Grand Duchess had fled the castle completely alone, without escort, and had even managed to bring her younger sister along. The Archduke had rushed headlong in pursuit. Meanwhile, a veritable quarantine had been imposed throughout the entire Principality of Benvito.
Fernando's imagination ran wild with delight.
Fragments of an exquisite vaudeville kept flashing before his eyes—a comedy of errors with the Grand Duke and his beloved wife as the hapless protagonists. It didn't require genius to surmise that Calix Benvito's family life was proving rather... *eventful*. Rumors were already circulating among the nobility that the prince and his wife were constantly at odds, barely exchanging civil words.
If the Grand Duchess had fled merely one month after the wedding, then everything was proceeding *exactly* as planned.
*The spell is working perfectly.*
Fernando pressed his lips together in satisfaction.
The effects would only intensify with time. The woman would be increasingly tormented by endless nightmares—visions that would grow darker and more consuming with each passing night. This would continue until the thin ribbon woven into his web turned completely black.
The fact that her husband had destroyed her family likely added considerable fuel to the fire. Upon learning that the Charts bloodline had been erased from existence, the woman had apparently decided to flee from such a vile monster.
"Ha! What a clever fellow I am, to have patronized that idiot Philippe for so long." Fernando's eyes glittered with self-congratulation. "Thanks to my instincts, I was positioned to witness something *this* entertaining. Isn't that right, Duncan?"
Duncan bowed his head in silence. He wasn't foolish enough to confirm or deny his master's musings. Only through such careful neutrality had he managed to survive this long—even when he occasionally made serious mistakes.
"She's more desperate than I expected, this little creature. I assumed all she could do was tremble quietly, locked away in her room."
"..."
"Benvito must be in complete shock."
Fernando harbored no doubts about the Grand Duke's motivations.
It was obvious *why* Calix Benvito had personally rushed headlong to capture his escaped wife. Of course, it was only because she had brought Mariel along. The younger girl clearly possessed supernatural abilities—unlike her useless elder sister. Naturally, the Archduke had no choice but to immediately reclaim the child. After all, he had already expended considerable effort to obtain her.
*I can imagine how furious he must have been when that worthless creature caused such a spectacular scene.*
Fernando's lips curled into a mocking smile as he pictured Calix forced to deal with such tiresome complications.
But there was one detail that struck him as exceedingly strange: the events at the hotel where they had been staying.
According to the innkeeper—whom his dogs had already interrogated most thoroughly—the woman had rented a room with a young girl. But she had departed alone. And when his agents searched the premises, the child was nowhere to be found.
*Perhaps the owner simply failed to notice the girl leaving.* Dozens of guests passed through taverns every day. It was difficult to track them all.
However, Fernando soon dismissed this assumption. Calix Benvito was *not* that careless. The prince could not possibly have allowed this child to slip through his fingers.
Come to think of it, Calix had been among the first to volunteer for the destruction of the Charts family—and had personally executed Philippe. Having thus eliminated a perpetual nuisance, he had nevertheless secured a new title for Mariel. But he had done so *in advance*, as if certain that Fernando would eventually dispose of Philippe and, subsequently, the entire Charts bloodline. Once and for all.
Thanks to this foresight, Mariel had not been affected by the repression that befell her family—the charges of treason against the imperial throne.
"So he only managed to capture the elder one," Fernando continued musing aloud. "But either way, it's merely a temporary inconvenience."
*What if this presents an opportunity?* Duncan thought, watching the Emperor lick his lips with carnivorous anticipation. *We should dispatch as many dogs as possible to the Principality of Benvito.*
Of course, he voiced none of this.
"Her tenth birthday approaches very soon. We'll discover whether her power has awakened. Sooner or later, we *will* know."
Fernando's grey eyes flashed with cold fury.
"Duncan. If this child possesses magical abilities, we must eliminate her by *any* means necessary. No matter the cost."
*Was there truly any reason to keep Adele Charts' daughters alive?* He rubbed his eyebrow with one finger, irritation flickering across his features.
"But if she displays no abilities... leave them alone."
In truth, Fernando would have been delighted to dispose of both unfortunate girls. But—
*Damn that oracle,* he muttered internally.
At first, he had dismissed it entirely. After all, a good thousand years had passed since the prophecy was spoken. Why should he heed ancient nonsense and dusty relics? It was merely an old legend. Nothing more.
And yet...
*Should I truly ignore it?*
Lines from that ancient prophecy played over and over in his mind, haunting him, filling him with doubt and gnawing anxiety.
*What if it actually comes to pass?*
So he had hesitated before giving the order. And in the end, he had never quite brought himself to completely exterminate the Charts bloodline.
If Adele's second daughter did not awaken, there was no need to kill a useless child who posed no danger.
The *problem* was that once the Charts daughters fully awakened, it was practically impossible to stop them.
Even now, Fernando had no way to get close to Mariel Loctrin. He had been dispatching dogs for the past month to infiltrate the Archduke's territory. Half of them had been discovered before even reaching the principality's borders. Those who managed to cross had simply... *vanished*. No news. No word. Nothing.
"The last group of dogs departed for the principality's territory ten days ago?"
"Yes, Your Majesty. They disappeared three days ago. There has been no communication since."
"Is it truly that difficult? That *none* of them can survive?"
"Unfortunately, this appears to be the case."
"You're doing a poor job," Fernando remarked—though the reprimand was brief, almost perfunctory.
He himself knew that breaching Benvito Fortress was practically impossible. Even if one managed to penetrate the fortress walls, surviving within was another matter entirely. Scattered throughout the castle were magical stones that activated powerful deterrent spells the moment an intruder set foot inside.
Fernando leaned back in his chair, thoughtfully stroking his chin. It was an old habit—one that surfaced whenever he was wrestling with a problem.
"Even if she awakens, it need not be the end."
Little was known about how Charts abilities manifested, yet Fernando possessed certain fragments of information.
At the very beginning of awakening, the power was unstable. It required time for the energy to stabilize and become fully subservient to its wielder. To eliminate the threat, the problem needed to be resolved *quickly*—before the transformation was complete. Once Mariel Loctrin fully awakened, she would be extraordinarily difficult to touch, even without the Archduke's protection.
"Do you remember, Duncan? How *difficult* it was to dispose of Adele?"
"..."
"But Philippe proved most helpful in the end. He played his part to perfection. That idiot was remarkably useful when the time came."
Duncan said nothing. To an outside observer, it might have appeared he was simply agreeing with his Emperor in respectful silence.
But that was not the case.
Behind his back, his fist clenched so tightly his knuckles went white. No matter his complicated feelings toward Philippe, the Emperor's casual treatment of his dogs—the way he spoke of them as tools to be used and discarded—pushed Duncan to the very edge. But all he could do was grind his teeth in helpless silence.
"Do you understand me? We must eliminate her the moment she begins to awaken. Otherwise, it will be too late. She will become untouchable."
"I understand, Your Majesty."
Duncan had spent so many years at this man's side that he had long ago learned to bury his true feelings beneath layers of stone. And Fernando had never cared what his dog Duncan actually felt. So the Emperor continued, oblivious:
"I sent the Archduke an invitation to attend a celebration in the capital—to commemorate the conferment of Mariel Loctrin's title." He waved a dismissive hand. "It didn't work."
---