Chapter 2

When Callisis got to the mansion, he sat down in the office and let out a big sigh.

He felt as if he’s walking through a foggy forest, but the forest was in his heart.

Callisis was looking at the papers with blank eyes. He wrinkled his forehead and shook his head back and forth.

The scene he had seen before came back to him in vivid detail and seemed to eat away at his mind.

Long, yellow hair that was starting to turn gray, and red drops of blood all over. 

He didn’t know that the lifeless body of the woman would be stuck in his mind for this long.

Even if he tried to forget it, it was like he had a lump in his throat every time he tried.

Not just because he saw something interesting. I wouldn’t have gone there if I was so weak that I could be shocked by just that much.

Still, he thinks the reason it’s so hard to understand and frustrating is because he saw her.

He put the papers that had hit him in the face in order and shoved them into a corner of the desk with a bitter smile.

Because I knew I would no longer see her.

He looked out the window to calm his sore heart, but he knew that nothing would help.

There weren’t any clouds in the sky, so it looked like a blood-red sea. It was bright and red.

A cool breeze blew through his hair as he stared blankly at the sunset, as if he were possessed.

At first glance, it looked like winter was melting into the cold air in the wind. Still, the sky was not cloudy.

Summer passes, autumn passes. The end of the year was getting close.

This is how his time will go on and on.

Even though she had died, it was as if nothing had happened.

I thought it would be fine, and I thought it was fine.

It seems it wasn’t.

Even though he hadn’t done anything or even thought about doing anything, he felt this way about something he had only watched.

The death of that someone didn’t go away when he closed his eyes, and it kept floating over his field of vision.

As if someone kept showing the same scene on purpose.

As if she was trying to bother him.

It kept going on and on, over and over again.

It felt like a joke. Isn’t it about the death of someone who no longer matters to him?

But why does my heart hurt so much?

He tried to figure out why he felt the way he did, but he could never find a reason.

No, maybe something that was an answer was thrown out because he was left thinking it was wrong.

When he suddenly felt backlight through his closed eyelids, he slowly opened his eyes and looked at the reddish sunset.

Even though it looked like a piece of the setting sun, it was bright.

So much that it made me cry.

He looked away from the tears that were coming out against his will and kept staring at the blood-red sky.

Then, an old thought came back to him. Even on that day, the red and beautiful sun was going down.

That child was on Callisis’s eyes, and it reflected the same blood red sunset

A young face that looked at him with innocence, with cheeks that were raised and full.

As they looked at each other, a bright smile grew around their eyes.

There were times when just being together made him and her happy, even though they didn’t know why.

It was hard to remember even old memories that had lost their color. It seemed like something had hidden it.

Only one thing was clear among the scenes that looked like they were covered with sand.

The girl he liked most had red eyes that looked like a sunset.

Only her smile still had color. Everything else had lost its color.

In his, she was wearing an ugly wreath on her head and moving it around with her fingers, but  she was happy.

If he knew how messed up the wreath was, he wouldn’t even look at her as dirty, but she was smiling as if she had just gotten the most valuable jewel in the world.

That moment, my heartbeat, how I felt at that time, and her.

She was gone, and it was as clear as if it were written in stone.

He found it strange that he couldn’t see the person he remembered. He couldn’t see how happy she was.

At the same time, one question comes to mind.

‘Why did you pull away from me?’

Today, he thought of the words he always thought of.

He doesn’t know what’s going on, and he doesn’t want to.

No one knew what was in her heart until the last second before she died.

Now, there is no way to ever find out. Since dead people don’t talk.

What’s the reason?

What is it? What is the beautiful jewel I’ve lost? He continued to question.

Am I less important than that power? Is that why she left me?

I also thought it was a stupid idea for her to serve that power.

On the other hand, he wasn’t sure if he even got what she meant.

But the selfish greed that made him want her wasn’t enough to make her not understand what was going on.

He understood her, but she didn’t.

It just can’t be that strange.

Still, he wants to know if she’s being honest because she might want to explain why she left.

It was a good investment.

In Callisis’s mind, he started to remember how she had let go of his hand in order to gain great power.

One day, nothing had changed in the way they were together.

“Lia… Are you serious?”

Callisis’s voice shook, and he could hear it through his teeth.

As always, he was only looking at one person.

Callisis couldn’t believe that the girl who had always been by his side was now a woman.

He looked at her with sad eyes, but she wasn’t sad. No, she wasn’t looking at him to begin with.

She sat on the window sill and looked out the window, as if she didn’t care about anything.

She seemed to be having trouble with something. Soon, her well-kept golden hair started to move lightly in the breeze.

She slowly closed her eyes and enjoyed the wind, then slowly opened them again.

Her red eyes, which had been hidden behind her eyelids, were now very obvious. Her eyes went straight to Callisis and talked to him.

Instead of the fresh feelings of the past, he saw a different kind of bold resolve in the eyes that held him.

Just as Callisis started to feel strangely out of her league, her red lips opened.

“Yes, I already told my father that. I never thought it would happen this way.”

The cruel sentence that came out calmly made Callisis feel like he had been hit in the head.

He made a shocked face and shook his head to say ‘no’.

“But it’s not… That’s not what you told me.”

He denied.

But he knew at the same time.

She won’t lie… because she’s never the person to make up stories.

When the subject of a painful situation came up, she gave a clumsy smile.

Killianerisa, who had been looking at him, laughed out loud. Then she said something quietly,

“No… I told my father that.”

“You can’t do that! You can’t do that to me!”

‘Say no, please’. At the small sound of sincerity, Killianerisa’s face turned stern for a moment.

For a moment, she looked like she was holding something back with a tense gaze. But when Callisis’s gaze, which had been on something else for a moment, returned to her, the tense gaze was gone, as if it had been washed away.

One side of her mouth turned up at an angle as she watched him in silence. “Stop doing that to your lips. It’s over already.”

Her words to say goodbye were as cold as a knife cut, and they went right through his chest like a dagger.

He looked at her blankly with dark eyes, and then his face changed shape.

How, how could someone be so mean?

“Stop!”

Callisis couldn’t even look at her anymore because he kept making a weak sound like a moan.

If he kept looking at her, his head would hurt and he would feel like he was going to die. The final rejection was like a stigma on him, and he had lost all motivation.

“You have to quit. You already know that it’s too late to go back.”

Was there ever a time before a few days ago when those pretty lips of hers that whispered love felt so mean?

Even though harsh words were said about her that broke the hearts of everyone who heard them, he couldn’t give up on hope.

“You said you liked me.”

For a moment, the corner of her mouth, which was full of mockery, was tightly shut.

After that, there was a dull silence. Then, as if she had second thoughts, she spoke again with a firm voice.

“Yeah, I liked you, but I knew I couldn’t be happy with such childish feelings.”

“What?”

Callisis asked, sounding confused.

Killianerisa snorted at that, and she purposefully showed it to him. “You can’t do anything for me. More specifically, you can’t put me in the best position because you’re not the Emperor.”

At that moment, Callisis’s heart felt like it was being crushed by a big rock.

Callisis didn’t say anything; he just looked at Killianerisa.

I had nothing to say. She wasn’t wrong, so she had already given what she could, and, as she said, I couldn’t put her in the best position she wanted.

But, but,

She also knew the truth, right?

Callisis wanted to say that wasn’t true.

But when his lover suddenly betrayed him, Callisis was so shocked and angry that he couldn’t speak.

He was scared and mad at the same time, but he was also lonely.

‘I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you. If you were happy, I was happy, and just being by your side made me happy.

So I just wanted to make her happier all the time

I’ve already imagined thousands of things…

I can’t even think about how I would live without her.

Why do you want to leave me alone?’

Callisis clenched his fists because he didn’t know what to do with his aching heart.

At the same time, he was both angry and hurt. 

How can he say that he’s sad and wanted to yell?

Callisis put his head down.

It was hard to think about life without her.

Because she is already in Callisis’s life.

Callisis, who had been looking at the floor the whole time, turned his head to get her to look at him.

But as soon as he looked into her eyes, he felt like giving up.

How could I talk to her when she is more determined than me?

He gave a sad smile.

Yes… he can’t live without her.

But at the same time, his honesty and love for her wasn’t enough to shake her cold heart towards him.

You won’t even listen to me.

He liked how stubborn and self-centered she was like a child.

‘So, even though I’ve always hated you, why can’t I just hate you now?’

It was really sad to see. He could have said something angry or even begged for help, but he couldn’t.

No, I didn’t really want to.

He didn’t do anything because he didn’t want to make her sad by spitting out grudges, because he didn’t want his pleadings to weigh on her, and because he didn’t want to be remembered as a bad person in her mind.

Even though he was mad at her, he didn’t want to bother her.

He was very weak and afraid of her. The coward finally backed away from her slowly and didn’t say anything.

His feelings, which he couldn’t express, slowly left his trembling hands. 

The coward, who didn’t know anything, muttered,

“Yeah, just like you said. I don’t have anything to give you except my heart.”

But you wouldn’t want it. If that’s the case, I don’t have anything to give you.

Callisis began to move, but he didn’t turn his head. He was breathing slowly.

His steps were heavy, like he was carrying something heavy.

He swore not to see her again.

He felt like something was stuck in my throat, but my mind was empty, as if nothing was there.

At the same time, it felt empty, as if something had been taken away.

Just like all the different feelings in his heart that used to come out every time something happened have gone away, so has anger.

Sadness, too, and love.

Callisis saw that the front of the shoe he was wearing was worn out while he was walking.

He smiled and looked sad at the same time.

‘Why were you running so fast?’

It was nothing more than a call for them to face a harsh truth.

‘What’s the hurry?’

‘Instead, I should have asked myself if I could have kept my heart for her even for a moment longer if I had moved more slowly.’

It’s pathetic.

He laughed, but his mouth felt like he had taken a pill because it’s bitter.

His steps were hard to follow, like glue had been put on his feet.

Aside from that, it was hard for him to find his heart and mind, as if something had been pulled out of them.

He wasn’t used to being in a place that was already empty.

Callisis was scared because he didn’t know how long this feeling of emptiness would keep him up at night.

Callisis couldn’t think about anything else or even look around when he felt like that.

Because he didn’t notice,

That Killianerisa was looking at him with her eyes shaking and her hand out toward Callisis.

But that didn’t make a difference.

At the same time that she turned around, he moved and made his heart a home made of ice.

They might regret for the rest of their lives that they grew so far apart, that they didn’t try to get closer, and that they didn’t hold on to today.

But they didn’t meet until just before she died, so they don’t know what the other person thinks.

They wouldn’t ever know.

So, she died, and he never really paid attention to what she wanted to say.

Callisis slowly opened his eyes. He had been sleeping lightly for a while without realizing it.

Darkness covered the sky, which looked like someone’s eyes… or so he thought. Instead, a shy twilight moonlight crept down and landed on his face.

When the glimmer of light touched eyes that were used to darkness, it felt like the sun’s bright light.

He made a sad face, ruffled his hair, and stood up.

Silence created a calm tone that seemed to show sadness over someone’s death.

Even though he didn’t have any big changes in his life that day, his mood got worse.

‘I thought I wouldn’t be able to fall asleep tonight.’

Callisis slowly walked out of the office. It was a very dark night, and everyone was sleeping.

The only sound in the empty hallway was the quiet echo of his single steps.

‘I haven’t seen that woman in a long time.’

Knowing that this wouldn’t change anything in his life and that he’s never seen her or knows anything else about her made his heart heavy again.

It’s the same as putting something like a rock, or a lump inside.

But he broke up with his lover a long time ago.

Like always, he will be back on track tomorrow.

No one will be able to hear the clumsy feelings of childhood lovers that have died out because they never grew up.

Because no one could lift the veil that Callisis used to cover it.

He won’t tell anyone what this feeling he’s having is, and he won’t talk about it again.

It’s just because today is just another day and he’s in a slightly bad mood.

At least, that’s what it seems like to other people.

But you can’t say that I’m selfish because of this.

Because we’re no longer related. Because we’re not close enough to each other to make each other feel better.

No tears came out, but his chest hurt like it had been hit.

I think it’s clear to us that Empress K was a real villain… imo she deserved her death because not always villains need redemptions…

But oh boy, the charm of this story— I just wanna cry.