CHAPTER 508: IF STORY - THE INITIAL DRAFT (16)

0% About a month since the war ended.

Sunrise Empire, A Miraculous Victory

Demon King’s Army Annihilated... The Hero of the War is None Other Than the Princess

The Missing Hero Found as a Corpse After the Final Battle...

Serena, secluded in her room, stared blankly at the newspaper before slowly shifting her gaze to the side.

- Chirrrr...

The faint chirping of insects outside her window signaled that night had fallen.

- Clatter...

As she wobbled to her feet, the empty bottles scattered across her desk rolled onto the floor.

- Step, step...

For someone who was both highly intolerant to alcohol and usually avoided drinking, this scene did not suit her.

Yet, in her current state, it seemed oddly fitting.

Her once neatly arranged hair was now a disheveled mess, her eyes had lost their light, and her expression—lifeless and hollow—sent chills down one’s spine.

- Creeeak...

In such a miserable state, Serena opened the door to her room for the first time in a week, stumbling as she walked.

“M-My Lady!?”

“Wh-where are you going in the middle of the night...!?”

The servants rushed toward her in alarm, but she simply raised her hand to silence them before stopping in place.

“...A carriage.”

“Pardon?”

“Prepare a carriage.”

Her pale, ghostly face left no room for opposition.

“...”

And so, the servants hurriedly retreated downstairs to fulfill her command.

- Flutter...!

Behind the now-alone Serena, the sound of rustling paper echoed.

- Rustle...

The diary that had been left on her desk fluttered in the breeze.

“Lady Serena, the carriage is ready.”

“...”

“...My Lady?”

Hearing those words distantly, Serena’s mind drifted back to that day.

“Frey...”

The day when Frey perished alongside the Demon King.

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“Khak...”

“Why... Why? Why did you do this?”

I couldn’t understand.

“Why the hell? For what purpose?”

That day, as I watched Frey grow cold, coughing up crimson blood, the truth finally reached me.

The man I had despised, the one I had been so desperate to kill.

The demon who had stolen the purity of the princess who was supposed to be perfect.

The cancer of the Empire.

The disgusting scoundrel.

All those labels belonged to Frey.

And yet, the conclusion was undeniable.

Frey had been the Hero all along.

“Explain...”

“Ugh...”

“Hurry and explain!!!”

My mind could grasp the answer.

The thoughts racing through my overdeveloped brain connected the dots, presenting the undeniable truth before me.

“Now!!!”

But my heart—my very instincts—recoiled in fear, refusing to accept it.

If everything I had just deduced was true.

If it meant I had crossed a river I could never return from.

Then what was I supposed to do?

“...I’m sorry, Serena.”

Lost in those thoughts, I stopped thinking altogether and simply listened to his dying words.

“No matter what I did... No matter what tricks I tried...”

The moment the words left his lips, I felt something within me snap.

“...It was impossible to deceive you until the very end.”

With that final break inside me—

“If only you weren’t so sharp... Haha.”

“...”

“Still... I’m glad.”

I stood frozen, listening to him, again and again.

“Because I tried my best... I managed to delay the moment you’d figure out the truth... Until the very last second.”

My hand, which was gripping his, started to tremble violently.

“And now, at last...”

“...”

“I’ve reached it... A happy ending where you don’t die in my place.”

Tears welled up in my eyes, breaking free from where they had been dried by exhaustion.

“You... You...”

“I was scared... Because the moment you realized the truth, you would have sacrificed yourself for me without hesitation...”

“You...”

“But you can’t do that anymore, can you...? Haha...”

At that moment, I could no longer run from the truth.

“...You planned all of this, for me... for everyone?”

“Cough, Cough...”

“You orchestrated everything?”

The tattered diary beside him slowly crumbled into dust.

The “book Frey always looked at” that her subordinates had mentioned.

It was my diary.

- Shhaa...

A diary where words appeared on pages I had never written, fading away as it lost its form.

“When... When did it start?”

“...”

“SINCE WHEN FREY!?”

Realizing what it meant, I pressed my trembling hands against his wounds and begged for answers.

“...Who knows?”

“Tell me... Please...”

“When did it start, Crybaby?”

“...!”

At his response, I shut my eyes tightly and lowered my head.

“I really don’t know...”

“Ugh...”

The nickname Crybaby—one I earned on his ninth birthday.

The night we lay on the hill near his estate, gazing at the stars.

“From that day...? From that day until now?”

If it all began that night—

Then everything I had done to him since then.

The curses I placed on him.

The poisons I forced him to drink.

The false accusations.

The assassins I sent after him.

The wounds I inflicted.

All of it...

“A... Aah...”

With a pale, horrified expression, I tore at his clothes, only to see his body discolored—blue and sickly.

Not from the wounds of the Demon King.

But from the countless curses and poisons I had inflicted on him over the years.

“I had cloaked them with illusion magic... Why is it fading...”

His weak mumbling drove a dagger into my heart.

“All this time...? You endured this... while fully conscious...?”

He had not sold his soul to the Demon King for an invincible body.

He had simply endured all of this suffering—just to keep deceiving me until the very end.

“Wa-Wait. Wait, Frey.”

My mind could no longer process it.

“I-I’ll fix this right now.”

Desperation took over as I poured every healing spell I knew into his dying body.

Restoration magic, purification spells, blood-staunching enchantments, pain-relief magic.

Everything.

“J-Just wait.”

But it was pointless.

“Wait!!! Frey!!!”

No spell I cast made any difference.

“I-I’ll bring Ferloche here... I’ll bring her right now...!”

His life force was already depleted beyond saving.

“Serena.”

I was about to dash toward my only remaining hope, the Saintess when Frey caught my hand.

“This... is the path I chose.”

With a faint smile, he slowly closed his eyes.

“This is the ending... I chose and wanted...”

“No!!! This isn’t what I wanted!!”

“This was the best outcome. You were just deceived by me...”

I clung to him desperately, pressing my hands against his face, frantically trying to lift the curses I had placed.

- Shhh...

“I didn’t know!! I didn’t know!!! I’m...!!”

But there were no curses left to remove.

“Not Crybaby... No.”

Forcing himself to stay conscious, he looked at me one last time.

“...Serena.”

Weakly, but firmly, he grasped my trembling hands.

“Take care of the Empire...”

Noticing his voice growing fainter, I hurried to cut him off.

“Wa-Wait. I still have so much to say—“

“And...”

It was already too late.

“If there is a next life... then next time, for sure...”

“Frey?”

I never got the chance to apologize.

Or even to thank him for saving everyone.

“You?”

And just like that—

He was gone.

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“Um, Lady Serena.”

“...”

“It’s time to wake up.”

Serena, drenched in cold sweat and letting out weak groans, slowly opened her eyes at the worried voice of her maid.

“We’ve arrived at our destination.”

“...I see.”

The carriage she had been riding in had already reached its destination.

“Um, excuse me, but... are you feeling any better?”

“...”

Serena, who had been preparing to step out of the carriage with an empty expression, quietly turned her head at the maid’s question.

“...Has Princess Clana still not woken up?”

“Huh? Oh, no. She’s still in a coma...”

“I see.”

That was the last bit of interest Serena had in the outside world.

- *Creak...*With a look of determination, she opened the carriage door, waving off the maid who tried to assist her and stepped outside.

“...The mansion is gone.”

“It was burned down by the enraged citizens a few days ago.”

The place she had walked past was none other than the ruins of the Starlight Mansion, now nothing but ashes.

“They got what they deserved, really.”

“...”

Frey, and the Starlight family, had gone down in history as great traitors who sided with the Demon King—just as Frey had arranged beforehand.

And with Serena’s order stripping the family of their ducal status, there was no way the people of the Empire would let the mansion remain untouched.

Of course, there was no one left from the Starlight family to stop them.

Every last one of them had already lost their lives.

— S-Serena, is it really true that my brother is dead?

“...”

The only exception was Aria, who had been studying abroad when it all happened,and had called Serena on the day the mansion burned.

— T-That can’t be right, can it? Everything was supposed to end five years from now! My brother said so!

“...”

— Serena? Why aren’t you answering...?

That day, as Serena stood in the ruins of the mansion, she discovered an impeccably forged document proving that Aria had no ties to the family’s crimes.

— P-Please... tell me it’s just a rumor... Please...

— Beep...

And yet, she had not been able to say a single word in response before ending the call.

“From here, I’ll go alone.”

“What?”

Serena recalled Aria’s voice as she stared at the burned ruins of the mansion.

“Don’t follow me.”

“L-Lady Serena...”

She left her maid behind and continued walking.

“...I’m coming now, Frey.”

Toward the hill where, ten years ago, she had shared memories with him.

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“I’m sorry... for breaking your final request.”

Pushing through the dense trees, Serena murmured softly as she ascended the hill.

“No matter how much I try to follow it, I just can’t.”

Branches and tall grass scratched at her skin, leaving wounds in their wake. Yet, Serena continued climbing without a single flinch.

“...Every time I close my eyes, I think about all the things I did to you.”

Even letting out a groan from the stinging cuts would feel like an insult to Frey.

“I’m truly sorry... really, I am...”

So, biting her lip tightly, she ignored the pain and pressed forward.

“...”

At last, she came to a halt, lifting her gaze.

“Ah...”

This was the hill where she had once walked hand-in-hand with a young Frey, sneaking up under the cover of night on his birthday.

A mystical hill where, ever since the ancient Oath a thousand years ago, moonflowers and starflowers would bloom at this very time of year.

And the same night sky they had once looked up at together stretched above her, unchanged.

“...That night, what was it you were trying to say?”

Serena took slow, deliberate steps forward, staring at the view.

“What could it have been?”

His unfinished last words lingered in her mind, circling like a haunting echo.

“No matter what I do now, I’ll never know.”

Muttering in a cold whisper, her foot reached the very edge of the cliff, teetering over the abyss below.

“...I’m sorry, Frey.”

Before her lay an endless chasm of darkness.

As her moonlit eyes reflected its depths,

“Now... it’s my turn to atone.”

She stepped forward.

“...Even someone like me—“

- *Thud...!*“Kyah!?”

Just then, the ground beneath her feet suddenly gave way, swallowing her whole along with her final scream.

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“...Hah?”

Coming to her senses in the darkness, Serena blinked blankly, scanning her surroundings.

“...I’m alive? But why?”

For some reason, she had survived.

“The... the ground is... soft.”

As she tried to make sense of her situation, she realized that something cushioning the ground had broken her fall, saving her life.

“Where... is this?”

Rising to her feet, she muttered as she examined the mysterious padding beneath her.

“...!”

And then, she saw it.

“Frey...”

Her entire body trembled as she took hesitant steps forward.

“You came back here... every year?”

As the memories began to resurface, she realized that this was their old hideout—the secret place she and Frey had claimed as their own.

Extending a shaky hand, she reached for an object resting atop a worn wooden desk.

“Every single time... without fail?”

Ten moonflowers, carefully preserved, were placed on the desk.

“You... never forgot, did you?”

Now that she looked around, the hideout was far too well-maintained for a place supposedly abandoned for ten years.

As if someone had been coming back, over and over, taking care of it.

“...”

At a loss for words, she slowly lowered herself into the chair before the desk, her mind flooding with distant echoes of the past.

“I-I don’t wanna go...”

“Why not?”

“I just... I wanna stay with you...”

A younger version of herself, pouting and clinging to Frey.

“After today... I have to take on family responsibilities... I won’t be able to play with you for a while...”

“Hmm, is that so?”

And Frey’s promise to her in response.

“Then let’s make a promise.”

“...A promise?”

Serena’s eyes widened in realization.

“Yeah, a promise so we don’t forget each other.”

Her trembling hands moved toward the desk’s drawer.

“That day... we wrote letters to each other.”

A memory long buried. No, a memory she had forced herself to forget.

“Letters to our future selves, ten years later.”

A time capsule meant to ensure that their feelings would remain unchanged after a decade.

- *Click...!*The magic seal on the drawer had been undone, just as expected.

It had been exactly ten years—ten flowers, ten years.

I’ll love you forever, Frey!

As the drawer opened, her gaze fell on a letter with a childish, overly affectionate message scrawled on it.

“...Ugh.”

Then, her eyes shifted to the letter beside it.

“Ah...”

And with that, the dam finally broke.

“Ahhh... ahhh...!!!”

Ever since Frey’s death, she had been broken—numb, lost, beyond grief.

But now, her emotions surged back, burning with unbearable sorrow.

The tears spilled freely, soaking the letter she had once written.

In our next life, I want to marry you too!

A love story between a boy and a girl.

A love that should have lasted forever.

But it had reached the saddest ending imaginable.