Chapter 101

Keirhan’s protection was the only thing that made Edelis more than just an ordinary noblewoman.

“If I can just kill Edelis, that thorn in my side of an empress!”

She planned to kill Edelis first and then overwrite Keirhan’s memory with the false belief that he was the one who killed her. Next would be Berman Pasis. Since she didn’t know what he might say if left alone, it was safer to erase his memory as well. She wished she could manipulate the memories of everyone present, but she couldn’t manipulate the memories of people who didn’t appear in the book. Having finalized her plan, the Saintess lunged toward Edelis.

“Die, die!”

The Saintess swung her knife with eyes that couldn’t be described as normal. Pushed back by an assassin and with her life in danger, Edelis had no way to defend herself. Just then, Sir Ferrin appeared to help her, attacking the assassin and allowing Edelis to escape the immediate danger. But the Saintess, still swinging her knife, was right in front of her. Edelis blocked the attacks several times, but the knife, imbued with some kind of divine power, was unbelievably heavy and fast, coming from a Saintess who was not trained in combat.

“This is all because of you. If it wasn’t for you!”

“No, this is all because of you. I was trying to live, but you were trying to kill me!”

“You were destined to die!”

“No! There is no such thing as a fixed destiny.”

At first, Edelis also believed her destiny was set in stone. So she thought she should just graciously step aside. She was glad to see Lehan, but a greater fear held her back, and she couldn’t take his every kind action at face value. She suspected he had ulterior motives, worried about the day he might change, and tried to ignore his affection to avoid being killed by him. But Lehan’s affection for her was always unwavering, making her worries seem pointless.

“You just want to believe in a destiny like that.”

“Th-this…!”

The Saintess, full of rage, swung her knife. It was a good thing Edelis had learned swordsmanship, because the Saintess’s knife, imbued with divine power, was formidable. However, Edelis had been trained in swordsmanship by her father since she was a child, and after a previous attack near the slums, she had also received personal training from Lehan. While she might not be able to block a sudden attack from the trusted Frache, she wasn’t so weak as to be defeated by a Saintess who had never even held a sword, even with divine power behind her.

“Who said I was destined to die?”

“You must have seen the book, too, right? That you die by the Emperor’s sword!”

“I’ll return those words to you!”

Edelis knocked the Saintess’s knife away, creating a gap between them. Both of them were breathing heavily, glaring at each other with their swords pointed. The Saintess glanced at the floor and grabbed a knight’s longsword that was lying there. She wanted to increase her attack range.

“You took the book, so you must have seen it. Reality is already different from the book!”

“How foolish!”

The Saintess leaped forward and swung the sword quickly. She swung it in a wide arc from above, but Edelis found it much easier to block than when the Saintess used a dagger. The longer, heavier sword made her movements slower.

“I have history with the Emperor, didn’t you know? If I use divine power, I can change things back to the way they were.”

“So you stole the divine power from the Pope and the other priests?”

“Stole?”

The Saintess held back her words because of the priests watching her from the surroundings. The priests were using their divine power to heal and help the fallen Holy Knights stand up, and she knew she would get into trouble if she said anything unnecessary. Of course, the current situation was not in the Saintess’s favor, but it was okay because Lorenz had explained everything to the priests before they came here. She had received a divine oracle to kill the Empress because the Empress was going against the will of God. Since it was the God they believed in so much, they would surely obey her command, not hers. But divine power was different. If they lost their divine power, they would be cast out of the temple, and they would no longer listen to the Saintess.

“Stop saying useless things and just die, will you?”

“Would you die if you were me?”

“That’s a shame.”

Although she answered confidently, Edelis’s breathing was getting more and more ragged. Fighting the Saintess with all her attention was rapidly draining her stamina. She was using every last bit of her strength to fight the Saintess, thinking this was truly the end, but she was slowly reaching her limit. Meanwhile, the Saintess’s body kept shining, as if she was using divine power even while fighting. She had to fight against someone who would not get tired.

“Do you really think you can be happy with Lehan as in the book if you kill me?”

“Why wouldn’t I?”

Although it would require a lot of divine power, it wasn’t entirely impossible. The biggest concern was what to do with the memories of the many witnesses. But the first thing she had to do was kill Edelis, before manipulating their memories. She believed that if she made it look like Lehan killed Edelis, just as in the book, then Lehan would cover for her. The divine power she had received from the priests was running out, so she had to win quickly.

‘…No. That’s not it. I don’t need to do that, do I?’

A brilliant idea popped into the Saintess’s head. The anxiety on her face from the dwindling divine power vanished, replaced by a grotesque smile once again.

“You don’t have to worry about what happens after you die!”

The Saintess backed away from Edelis and gathered all the divine power she had. She had been holding back some divine power before, which was why the fight had been long and her divine power had been drained.

‘First I should have killed Edelis, then stolen the priests’ divine power.’

The Saintess laughed at the irony that the one who had given her the solution was none other than Edelis, who was fighting for her life. After a short but intense preparation, the Saintess wrapped her entire body and the dagger she held in divine power and lunged at Edelis. Even though it was all the divine power she had left, it was as much as the combined divine power of a high-ranking priest. And Edelis thought she would surely lose to the Saintess’s explosive power.

“I’ll pray to God that you go to hell.”

A sudden impact struck Edelis’s body, and she collapsed to the ground, feeling her vision go black.

***

Meanwhile, Lehan was fighting off the assassins one by one. The three assassins who were attached to him fell one after another. Lehan used all his strength to get to Edelis as quickly as possible. And the last remaining assassin lunged at him with all his might, but he was no match for Lehan. Lehan knocked the sword he was fighting against toward the Imperial Knights, and the Imperial Knights, who were also clearing out the assassins, joined Lehan. The fact that the Holy Empire had joined hands with assassins was astonishing to anyone who heard it, and the victory was already leaning toward the Imperial Knights. And just as Lehan turned to save Edelis, the sight that met his eyes was the Saintess swinging her sword at Edelis.

“Edelis!”

“Your Majesty!”

Johannes Frache, who had been fighting the Holy Knights first, thinking that surely the Saintess would not attack the Empress, shouted in shock. He believed in her until the very end, until he saw the scene of the Saintess truly swinging her sword with murderous intent at Edelis. But the answer to his belief was Edelis lying on the ground.

“N-no…”

By the time they ran to her, the floor was covered in blood, and both Edelis’s magnificent dress and the Saintess’s pure white priestess robes embroidered with gold were stained red. Both the Saintess and Edelis were lying on the ground as if to show how fierce the duel had been. Edelis was at the very bottom, unconscious, and the Saintess had fallen on top of her, her wide priestess robes covering Edelis.

“E-Edelis…?”

It couldn’t be, this blood couldn’t be Edelis’s. Lehan tried to deny the reality he saw before his eyes and ran toward her. But his legs were so weak that he could barely keep from falling over. The Imperial Knights who witnessed the scene knew how much Lehan cherished Edelis, so they couldn’t bring themselves to say anything.

“Edelis, please, say anything. Anything at all.”

Lehan pleaded with her in a voice full of tears.

“Please…”

But there was no answer from Edelis. The heavy silence she gave him felt like it was suffocating Lehan. He tried to think rationally, but all he could do was gasp for air. While he was struggling to breathe, Edelis’s and the Saintess’s clothes were getting more and more stained with blood. A scene overlapped in Lehan’s eyes. It was Edelis, holding her stabbed heart and bleeding. He shook his head repeatedly to shake off the image he couldn’t believe. And the overwhelming stress made him feel nauseous, and he bent over to retch. It was strange that he was seeing a scene he had clearly never seen before.

‘—Lehan!’

Just then, he heard Edelis’s voice calling him and quickly lifted his head to look at her. But Edelis was still unconscious. And her voice kept echoing in his ears.

‘I don’t want to be with the Emperor, I want to be with Lehan.’

It was something he had never heard before. But this voice was definitely Edelis’s. Before he could even think about what was happening, memories flooded into his mind like a tidal wave. The dark night, the golden hair fluttering in the wind. And through the gaps, her green eyes looking straight at him. And her earnest face, just as desperate as his, and the warmth of her body in his arms.

‘Even when you weren’t here, I kept thinking about whether you were doing well!’

I did too, Edelis.

‘There should only be me around you, Lehan.’

If that’s what you want, I can cast out every woman in the palace. I can stop holding balls and not invite a single woman to the banquets.

‘I love you, Lehan. I hope you only love me from now on.’

Of course I’ll only love you. I’ve never even thought about loving anyone else. Just like that, Lehan’s mind was filled with the time they had spent together, which he had forgotten. Every single memory was incredibly vivid. He couldn’t believe he had forgotten all of this. He could understand why Edelis had so desperately wanted to help him regain his memories. Their precious memories together. They were memories that would never be forgotten for a lifetime. After his memories returned, his love for Edelis grew even deeper. To an uncontrollable degree.

‘So Lehan, don’t worry too much. Because I have no intention of leaving you.’

“You said you had no intention of leaving!”

He knelt and shouted, telling her not to disappear from his side, to get up right now. No, he begged her to open her eyes, no matter when it was. He would wait, whether it was 10 years or 20 years, because he was already used to waiting.

“Edelis, please!”