episode_0077

She can be seen through the bright red blood.

“Alina..?”

The person in front of me was definitely Alina.

As I stared blankly, she avoided my gaze and walked towards Bordin.

“Alina..! What the hell are you doing?”

“…Master.”

While Alina was looking at Bordin for a while, she was agitated.

Bordin grabbed the dagger with his remaining arm and swung it at Alina.

But Alina seemed to have expected it.

I reacted immediately, dodged, and quickly grabbed his remaining arm and twisted it.

“Ugh!”

“Didn’t the Master himself teach you to never let your guard down?”

Finally, when Bordin let go of the dagger in pain, Alina kicked the sword away from him as it fell to the ground.

“Kuhehehe…yeah…I thought it was kind of weird.”

Bordin, who had lost both arms and even had his weapon taken away, let out a small laugh that was out of place in the situation.

“You can’t survive this long after eating basilisk venom. What have you done? ”

As he spoke, glancing at me, Alina stepped between me and Bordin, blocking his view from my view.

“The symptoms are the same, but the poison has been changed to one that does not harm the body.”

“Great…”

He closed his eyes for a moment, smiling hollowly.

“Why did you betray me!!”

When Bordin opened his eyes again, the smile on his face had disappeared, and he shouted at Alina with a face distorted with anger and murderous intent.

“I raised you in a cold and dark poetry room with all my heart and soul to become a proper assassin. Is this how you repay that favor?!”

Alina’s eyes began to tremble violently at his shouting. But she closed her eyes tightly once and calmed her wavering heart again.

“I’ve always thought of Master as a father.”

“But why!!”

“….Young lady, aren’t you innocent?”

“….what?”

“We have already committed an unforgivable sin against the young lady. We will not allow her to be hurt any longer.”

Bordin, who had been looking at Alina with a vain expression, soon burst into loud laughter.

“How ridiculous!! You betrayed me with that kind of sympathy! What do you think that would change?”

“I just don’t want to go down the wrong path anymore.”

Bordin sighed deeply as he saw the stubborn determination in Alina’s eyes.

“Yeah…so what are you going to do now? Are you going to kill me?”

“Please stop now, Master. I have absolutely no desire to kill you, Master.”

“Stop? If I stop now, do you think that monster will let me live?”

“Don’t you have the royal seal?”

“…..”

what?

It was only for a moment, but Alina’s words came to my ears clearly.

‘The royal seal?’

It was something I knew.

As it was mentioned in the original.

The Seal of the Imperial Family. A medal of great merit and privilege granted to only five people in the Empire.

A treasure created by the emperor himself and given directly to a person who has made a great contribution to the empire.

Just possessing this seal made it impossible for most nobles to treat one rudely, and would grant one all sorts of favors from the palace.

Moreover, just once, he had the privilege of being pardoned for any crime except murder of the royal family.

In the original work, it was once given to the protagonist who saved the empire from crisis.

But why does Bordin have such a treasure?

“Please give me the seal, and I will protect you and the young lady.”

“You’re talking out of your mind. Do you know anything?”

“I will confess to everything I did.”

“What?”

As Bordin looked at Alina with a dumbfounded expression, she continued speaking with a determined expression.

“I’ll adjust my words so that you can get away with it. From now on, with the Master’s ability, you’ll be able to survive.”

“Even if I survive by just one chance, you will definitely die, right?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“….”

Bordin was momentarily speechless at Alina’s serious gaze.

After looking at his face once, Alina turned her head and came towards me.

“Alina..”

“Miss.”

“What the hell are you-”

But before I could finish speaking, Alina put her finger to my lips and stopped me.

“I’m sure you have a lot of questions, Miss. But right now, there’s no time. Please listen carefully to what I have to say.”

“…..”

There were so many things I wanted to ask her.

But first, I nodded to listen to her story.

“I will give you the royal seal. Take it to the palace and I will personally protect you there.”

“….what?”

“Don’t worry. Even Athena can never defeat the Empire alone.”

“What is that…”

“If it is a slave mark, the Great Sage in the palace will be able to remove it without any problems.”

“Al..Alina.”

“If you go to the palace, it will be much-”

“Alina. Wait.”

Only when I held out my hand to tell her to stop did Alina stop talking.

It was confusing.

I have no idea what she’s talking about.

Why should I go to the palace?

“Miss. Time is-”

“Alina. I don’t understand. Why do I have to go to the palace?”

Alina answered my question right away.

“…Don’t you want to be free?”

Her answer made my mind go blank for a moment.

Because the word freedom was so unfamiliar.

“Freedom..?”

“I’m talking about a free life where you live according to your own will, not a life trapped here.”

“……”

“Meet new people and do everything you want to do, miss.”

When I looked at Alina’s face looking at me with a warm smile, I could tell that her words were not a joke.

‘A free life…?’

It was such a sudden story.

I thought about it for a moment.

Somewhere other than this suffocating mansion. Doing what I want to do.

Alina talks about a free life without being bound by anyone.

But ironically.

I didn’t think I would be happy at all in that life.

“…I hate it.”

“Huh?”

Alina looked at me with wide eyes, seemingly bewildered.

My body was moving properly, as if it had been freed from the paralysis of the poison to some extent. I took a step back from Alina and looked at her.

“I hate it. Life without Athena.”

“….”

“You said it. People like me are useless.”

“Miss.. That..That’s..”

At my words, Alina’s eyes began to shake violently.

I can’t forget. The indelible scars I received from so many people.

The most decisive moment of all was when even Alina turned her back on me so miserably.

As close as I was to her. As much as I trusted her. The knife she swung at me was sharper than anything else.

“Thanks for helping..but I’m staying here.”

“…..”

Honestly, I don’t even know why she’s helping me like this now.

Was it sympathy towards me?

Or maybe he reached out because he felt sorry for me.

Maybe it helps with the guilt.

Nothing was of any comfort whatsoever.

Because I’ve already been sick of the looks of pity directed at me.

“It’s okay now, Alina. You don’t have to do anything for me anymore.”

“Miss..”

When Alina looked at me with sad eyes, tears almost welled up in my eyes without me knowing it.

Thank you. And I’m sorry, Alina.

“Kuhehehe…”

While Alina and I looked at each other with emotional eyes.

From behind, Bordin could be heard laughing faintly.

When I turned my head, I saw that he was seriously injured, but he was trying to suppress his laughter by lowering his head as if he found something so funny.

“…Why are you laughing?”

I don’t know why, but his laughter annoyed me.

When I got up and looked at him with my body completely back to normal, he was smiling at me with a smile that was almost mocking.

“I’m sorry, Miss. I couldn’t help but laugh. By the way, you seem to trust Athena quite a bit. ”

Despite Bordin’s laughter, I looked at him and spoke confidently.

“Because I love you.”

“Keuk..! Love..love..”

My face wrinkled at the sight of him smiling over and over again.

Why on earth are you smiling like that?

“How pathetic.. You didn’t even know you were playing into that monster’s hands. You really fell in love with her.”

“….What are you talking about.”

“Kuh… Are you curious?”

As Bordin struggled to get up, Alina held out her blade to him and warned him.

“Master, please stay still.”

“Alina. I’m just trying to tell you the truth. Don’t you know? How stupid you look right now.”

“…..”

“If you really care about the lady, shouldn’t you tell her the truth?”

Alina’s body trembled once at Bordin’s words.

“…..It’s still early.”

“Rather, if you want to take the young lady to the palace as you planned, it would be much faster to tell her the truth than to try to persuade her without any meaning.”

“…..”

Alina looked at me cautiously.

The expression on her face as she looked at me seemed to convey a variety of emotions, including worry, sadness, and guilt.

….Why are you looking at me like that?

He avoided her burdensome gaze and spoke to Bordin.

“..What on earth are you trying to say?”

I asked him for an answer, and he readily gave it to me.

“Listen carefully, young lady.”

As he stretched his broken arm forward, a strange sound of bones cracking began to resonate throughout the room.

“The humiliation, shame, self-loathing, helplessness, and guilt you’ve felt since coming to this mansion.”

He looked at me with a big smile on his face and said,

“Would you believe that all of that was Athena’s doing?”

“…..What did you say?”

One side of my face was grimacing. Bordin looked at me like that, laughed loudly, and then spoke again.

“That’s exactly what it says. Everything that happened here.”

“It was Athena’s plan that she desperately wanted you to be ruined.”