CH 200

The moment I raised my head, my world turned black. However, I could guess who it was by his voice alone. Within the spaces between his fingers, she could see people crowding around the dead body but at least the confusion was dissipating. 

“… Were you responsible?”

“That’s right. I already told you my ‘chief’ had ordered me to do something. This was it.”

That man. Without denying my accusation, Deros answered firmly. He sounded relaxed. 

“For someone who grew up as sheltered as you, it must have been a gruesome sight, right? Come with me.”

There was still commotion all around her. Ashley had no choice but to let go of the corpse’s hand as Deros continued to pull her away. The cold feeling propped against her neck felt familiar. It was a sword. Or perhaps a dagger. Deros whispered softly.

“Give it up. That man is already dead.””

At his relaxed tone, Ashley bit her lips.

“What do you gain from killing that man?”

“Well, would you like to guess?”

The man smelled horrible. HIs fragrance was intense as if he had poured an entire bottle of perfume over himself and yet it smelled familiar. 

“It was someone who jumped to be a shadow for your sake.”

Ashley had never thought she was dumb. After overcoming death on numerous occasions, the experience she accumulated and the sixth sense she honed had reached unbelievable heights. She didn’t want to believe the man that just popped into her head to be responsible. No, she shouldn’t believe it. 

“… Was Hernan behind this?”

Deros then burst into laughter.

“Puhahaha, young lady, I mean, princess. You should already know the answer, no?”

Castor had just made a bet on someone’s life. He knew that someone was going to die and he knew who that someone was. When she thought about it again, she realised that she actually did not know the man who just died. Still, Castor spoke as if Ashley knew who it was going to be. Why? 

Because the one who was meant to die was not her but someone close to her. 

A variety of emotions swirled in her heart. She had wanted to say something but her wicked thoughts and corrupted emotions twisted her tongue. No, the girl had already known. 

Deros never referred to Hernan as his ‘chief’.

As their hands slowly separated, time felt as heavy as tens and thousands of bricks. In Deros’ arms, Ashley stared straight ahead. Her hair was fluttering about because of a strong gust of wind. But even with strands of hair blocking her field of vision, she could see it clearly. Someone murmuring to the man who collapsed. 

“His heart. His heart has stopped.”

“I was surprised when our chief suddenly gathered all of us.”

“Your chief?”

It felt like a black feather was hovering above her head. The feather carried misfortune and landed on her shoulders. She held her cheek. She couldn’t breathe.

“He’s a prince here, isn’t he? I’m talking about Dane.”

She finally understood what Castor was plotting. 

“Ah. Come to think of it, I do have a cousin.”

“But we’re not particularly close.”

It was only at that moment did Ashley realise what Castor was trying to tell her. 

“You’re going to be safe. Always. Even when you find yourself in a dead end in the belly of the underworld forever… I’ll pull you out of there.”

Her heaven collapsed. 

“For you, I’ll be your never-ending night.”

“Dane…”

As if he realised that she finally understood, his gentle voice drifted into her ears. His voice was as beautiful as the man who had been her heaven. 

“Have you realised it? My name is Deros Rome Hertotes and my cousin’s is Dane Rome Hertotes. But you know him as Dane Lowell Hertotes Kaltanias, the 7th Prince and the chief of the ‘Emperor’s Shadows’.”

From afar, she could hear a shrill crash of something falling and breaking. Someone wrapped their body around hers so that all she could hear were a cacophony of different screams. 

“The Crown Prince! The Crown Prince was the one who did it!”

Someone shouted. 

“O-Only the Crown Prince is able to stop someone’s heart without touching them!”

Right when the lights powered by divinity shattered around them, someone shouted an accusation towards the Crown Prince. The cool feeling felt like it was burning her insides. Someone staggered towards the corpse. Even in this commotion, he still had a bored and languid expression on his face as he stood before the body.

It was Castor. 

“The emperor hates the Crown Prince.”

Sounding as if he was speaking from a distant place, Deros spoke. She felt out of breath, as if she was drowning. 

“The emperor had ordered his shadows to make the Crown Prince the public enemy.”

And Castor knew about it. Castor knew that he would not be able to stop that man’s death. 

“Today is only one of the many. We, the shadows, are responsible for all sorts of dirty work.”

No, even if she were to prevent it… she knew she would have to face the truth. That there was a clear gap in their positions. Just then, their gazes met. There was a glint in his radiant golden eyes. 

‘I won, didn’t I?’

Castor mouthed before smiling. 

The truth and her shattered heaven. This was what he wanted to happen. 

She tried to get her head straight even amidst her confusion and chaos. Had she been wrong about everything? At the thought that perhaps everything here was just a dream, she soon burst into laughter. Her laugh was out of resignation and anger. Maybe secrets were best left as secrets. If Dane had purposefully not said a word about it or was trying to hide it till the end, she had to hear it from Dane himself. 

“The Imperial Palace is a cold place.”

“I wish you could hurry and become an adult soon but at times I hope you can never grow up.”

An afterimage of his figure lingered in front of her. Dane? Dane, Dane! Ashley called out for him. 

“Dane, why are you always busy?”

Everything was collapsing. Her memories and the moments of time that made up her image of him. She recalled her brother who had always been smiling sadly. His smile pricked her heart like a thorn. 

“I’m sorry.”

From some point on, she found herself in Ray’s embrace who was treating her like some fragile baby chick. But she slowly left his arms. She ran after the Crown Prince who disappeared amidst the gossiping and whispering. She had even taken off her high heels so she could run bare feet but she still lost the man.

She struggled to catch her breath. 

Ashley found herself in an unfamiliar garden. She could hear grass bugs in the distance. She had no idea how to find her way back to the Central Palace. She had chased the Crown Prince without thinking so for a long time she could only wander along a path that she thought would bring her to the Central Palace.

How much time had passed? A loud chime rang in her ear. When she raised her head, she found herself standing in front of a large stele. The rest of the garden was silent. The stele standing before her looked a lot like the one she was familiar with.

The bell signalled that it was 12. Everything was progressing as it was written in the original novel. After running out like that, Castor would meet Rusbella. On the top of the tallest clock tower in the square, the two would meet. She had to see it with her own two eyes. 

‘Is this really the world inside a novel?’

Ashley squished her face together as if she was going to cry. In order to overcome the misfortune brought forth by the relentless truth and her circumstances, she had to check. Was what was written in the novel really going to happen?

“Someone tell me.”

With a grimace, a tearful scream tore through the air. 

“That I’m really not crazy!”

Had she really been born in the world of a novel? Had she really been reincarnated into a novel? If not, was she just some crazy person who thinks she was someone from a novel? Ever since she received that diary, that idea had plagued her. 

Ashley lifted her diary and flipped it open.

“I should try to do something.”

She flipped it open to any page before clenching her fist. She could feel the pulsing pain from knocking the hard cover over and over again but she continued knocking without caring about the state of her fist. She talked to the book as if it was really living. She didn’t even know why she was doing this.

“If you brought me into this mess, you should be doing something!”

Knock.

Just when she was about to knock on the diary one more time, a bright light burst from the book. Not only was the light piercing through the darkness, but her hand too was glowing in purple. The purple light wrapped itself around the girl’s arm as if comforting her before rising towards the stele. 

Boom.

Exuding majesty, the stele vibrated. 

The vibrations from the stele rippled through the ground like an earthquake. With an unreadable expression, she looked up at the sky. Under the sky packed with stars, the stele glowed more beautifully than any star. A corner of the large stele chipped off. As the falling debris hit her head, she became swallowed by the light. Within a blink of an eye, Ashley found herself standing in the middle of a street she had never seen before. 

It was the ‘square’ with the clock tower.

The girl was sitting blankly on the ground. 

She felt dizzy and there was a ringing in her ear. She felt motion sick from the sudden teleportation. After waiting for a while, she felt better.

‘Where am I?’

She quickly scanned her surroundings. She was in a dark empty alley that wasn’t lit by a single lamp. She could find a lamp but she couldn’t tell if it had been intentionally turned off or if it was just broken. Ashley could hear a faint roar from afar and she instantly realised where she was.

It was the square. 

She was in an alley not too far from the square. She spotted a familiar sign and realised that she had been to this alley before with Hernan. Her memories were slowly returning to her. With Amor’s drug and his divinity mixing strangely inside of her, the girl’s memories were getting strangely mixed up as well. She bit her lips. There was no way she could control the irritation and lament she was feeling from being unable to remember. She felt pathetic. 

‘I can’t even remember anything when all I need to do is remember!’

As she bit her lips harder, her fingers started trembling.

‘… The diary?’

The girl wasn’t the one trembling. The diary she had been holding was shaking slightly. As she slowly opened the diary, the diary that had been shaking subtly began glowing. She stared blankly at the purple beam of light that shot to the sky. Soon, she got up to her feet. It was obvious. This light was pointing her towards somewhere.

“Thank you.”

Without realising it, she muttered. As she moved her feet, numerous thoughts passed through her mind. Even in the middle of the dark and chaos, she could only think of the original novel. She thought of Castor and herself. She thought of Dane. What did Castor want? Why was Castor trying to chain her down? She didn’t stop walking.

Boom.

It was the fireworks. She could constantly hear the cheers. She knew that the festival was going on right next to the alley. There was only an alley separating commotion and silence, light and shadow. As she waded through the pitch-black darkness, she slowly moved away from the light. After walking for a long time, she stopped. 

She reached the clock tower.

The entrance felt like an opening to a beast’s den. Goosebumps swept her skin. In a blink of an eye, she raised her head. What would she see at the top? She thought she was finally facing fate. She looked away from the top of the tower that looked too distant at the moment and started walking up the numerous steps. 

As she climbed up the steps, she sifted through her thoughts. 

Would the story progress according to what was written in the original novel or would she be seeing something never written before? Or was there even an ‘original novel’ to begin with. 

She was ridden with anxiety.

The girl panted heavily. Her lack of stamina caused her to vomit on her way up the steps numerous times. Ignoring her body’s screams, she moved forward. The diary which had just been shooting a beam of light was now quiet. The more she walked, the closer she got to the rooftop. Finally, she arrived at a huge door. 

‘What am I going to see after opening this door?’

The hand grabbing the door handle was trembling. 

Creak.

A gust of wind burst through the crack in the door and blew against her. She pushed against the strong gust of wind. Finally, the door swung wide open. She couldn’t open her eyes. When she pushed back the strands of her hair flying about and raised her head, she noticed a random spot in the night sky. Fireworks were bursting into a bright bulb of light in the sky. When she slowly looked down from the sky, she spotted someone leaning precariously over the narrow railings.