CHAPTER 485: NOT AS UNBEARABLE

After all, who ever truly cared why someone became evil?

People only cared about what evil had done to them, how it hurt, how it scarred. No one paused to ask what shaped the darkness that lived inside another. No one would want to put their feet into the shoes of the people who had harmed them, not unless they are truly someone with the heart made out of gold.

Yet here was Cassius, known across the kingdom for his merciless heart, pondering the reason behind cruelty. Even more, he could forgive it. He doesn’t seem to lie or pretend his righteousness, not him, someone who could easily admit what he had done without any shame.

Meaning, that this man’s heart was truly carved out of gold and that impressed her as she never had once thought of why someone had turned evil like him, or try to understand it.

Evil and kindness are always so black and white to her. She never knew that there was grey in between. That perhaps many didn’t choose to be evil, but their situation or circumstances had shaped them into one.

Though she still held the strong belief that even if someone was truly innocent for their reasoning, what they have done still needed to be taken accountability of, it was still an eye opener for her.

Perhaps by understanding why one is evil, they could prevent for more people from turning the same way as those poor people.

"Did you ever wonder," Arabella asked softly, her gaze meeting his, "if you became cruel because of how you were raised? That maybe, if things had been different, your actions might have been forgiven?"

Cassius’s lips curved into a faint smile. "Forgiveness isn’t mine to decide, is it? It belongs to the ones I’ve wronged." He paused, his voice calm but threaded with something that almost sounded like sorrow. "Still... I’ve never hurt anyone simply to destroy them. I only ever repaid what was done to me. And if that makes me evil, then so be it."

Moments like this made Arabella see his heart more clearly. The darkness that everyone feared wasn’t absolute, it was layered, complex. Beneath it lay a kind of honesty that few dared to have, few dared to face, in fact.

Cassius, who the world called heartless, was the same man who could forgive someone’s cruelty simply by understanding where it came from. He never sought forgiveness for himself; instead, he accepted whatever judgement others deemed fair, even if it meant pain equal to what he had caused.

He never asked to be pardoned, and yet she could tell: he wasn’t someone who hurt for the pleasure of it.

"How far along is the progress of your memory alteration?" Cassius asked after a quiet pause. "That sorcerer boy told me—"

"Isaac," Arabella reminded gently.

Cassius rolled his eyes at the name, his tone betraying a faint, childish jealousy that made her laugh. He seemed to have sworn in his heart to never ever remember Isaac’s name even if it was forced.

"He said he’s been studying ways to help refine the spell," Cassius continued, as if the name had left a bitter taste in his mouth. "But he never touch magic before so it was a trouble for him."

"Yes," Arabella nodded. "But do you think it would be faster if you helped? I can’t stand waiting any longer, Cassius. I need to remember."

He hesitated, a shadow of concern flickering over his face.

"My power isn’t magic," he said at last. "It looks like it, but it’s not. When I do this—" He snapped his fingers, and a flicker of blue fire bloomed at his fingertips, twisting gently into the shape of a flower. "—I don’t chant spells. I can’t. I’ve tried, but nothing ever happens."

"You mean your power isn’t compatible with witchcraft."

Cassius nodded. His kind of power was something else, untamed, inherited from no one, belonging to no coven of sorcery or chant. Perhaps it was because he wasn’t born a witch. In the old texts, only women could wield true witchcraft, only their words could shape into that miraculous power.

Even Morpheus had to rely on sigils and curses instead of magic as they are created from a different source.

That was also why he had trouble into truly erasing his memories without touching the forbidden magic.

"I have a plan," Arabella said, her voice steady, snapping Cassius’s attention back to her. His green eyes caught hers just as the once bright sky dimmed, clouds gathering above as if her very words had summoned the storm.

By the same afternoon, the entire castle had been thrown into motion. Sorcerers who had planned to spend the day buried in their scrolls or tending their families were stirred by a single rumor: that Morpheus and Arabella were to duel.

A duel. With the two strongest people in the castle!

Within the hour, every corridor burst into whispers, and no one remained indoors. They hurried toward the sparring grounds, their steps were mostly filled with excitement and eagerness, drawn by the kind of anticipation summoned from curiosity as none of them had thought the spar had spawned from hatred or anger, perhaps just to test one’s capability and for learning.

Unaware of the truth hidden of the friction between Arabella and Morpheus, the sorcerers jumped into the training ground- a field stretched wide and bare, an open expanse of the brown sand with almost nothing on it except a few straw dummies leaned crookedly in the distance, crafted for arrow practices.

"How did this even happen?" one of the younger sorcerers asked, his tone a mix of disbelief and excitement.

Isaac stood nearby, his expression taut. His brows were drawn together, his mouth a tight line. If one didn’t know better, they might have mistaken him for the one about to face Morpheus, not his mistress.

"I heard that the Lady had asked for a spar, she wanted to see whether Lord Morpheus truly could protect the Castle," someone answered.

"Doesn’t that sound like the Lady is worried of whether Lord Morpheus could truly protect the castle? As if she doesn’t trust him?"

"No, I doubt so! I heard that Lord Morpheus had asked her back whether this was for their second test."

"Second test?"

"Second test out of three tests. The Lady promised marriage to the Lord if he wins all the three tests successfully. They even took oath!"

To him, they sounded like lambs bleating behind a fence, blissfully unaware of the wolf waiting beyond. None of them truly understood what had happened that afternoon — not one had seen the exchange between Morpheus and Arabella with their own eyes.

It hadn’t begun as a test at all. Arabella’s only intention had been to measure Morpheus’s strength, to see how formidable he truly was when stripped of his throne’s power. But Morpheus, ever so cunning, refused her outright until he twisted her challenge into his own advantage.

He insisted that he would not lift a hand against her, not even daring to touch a single strand of her hair, unless it counted as the second test. A sly ploy, dressed as chivalry, to push himself closer to victory.

He wanted the two tests to be done for good so he could quickly marry her!

"That bastard!" muttered Isaac before he turned around to hear the sound of someone smacking their lips.

Of course, it was the same maid again!

Her hand was holding to a brown bag and inside that brown bag was filled with freshly baked bread that Isaac could have sworn was held by a child earlier. He didn’t want to ask whether Cassius had stolen the bag from the child but was half certain that he did as he could see the curl of his grin while the child from earlier was crying when he walked passed by her earlier.

"What?" Cassius snapped at Isaac without looking. His eyes were glued, or perhaps strewn to Arabella who had changed her dress into one that was easier for her to walk on, boots instead of her heels too. Being in such attire, she looked free. After all, she was more used to living with such attire than those gowns and constricting corset.

Even in Versailles, he had always supported her wearing such easier to move dresses than gowns which she truly appreciated.

Arabella herself found herself free from the constrict, liking her simply ivory dress with the brown skirt.

"I’m not sharing," Cassius snapped again at Isaac who was still sharing.

"I don’t want them either!" Isaac cursed his luck for being placed in one location with Cassius. Not only was this maid rude, something about her presence always made Isaac crawl. He felt unfitting for the castle. As if this maid was born with a nature that was against Sorcerers since birth.

"Do you think Lady Arabella would be alright?" Isaac then asked. He fiddled with his hand and waited for Cassius to answer. Although he dislike the maid for her rudeness, something about her was more certain than anything Isaac had ever encountered.

"Duh," Cassius sighed, biting to the next pretzel. "Why would you even doubt her? Are you by chance a supporter of Morpheus?"

"Over my dead body!"

"What a great response," Cassius smiled, almost too brightly, "I don’t actually find you quite unbearable as I used to anymore."

And for some reason Isaac had a nagging feeling that being liked by Cassius was more of a curse than good...