Chapter 137
“Sione, please.”
Ludwig pleaded.
“Look at me. Okay?”
Turning away, Sione never gave Ludwig another glance.
Ludwig clung desperately.
He tried to get her to change her mind, but no matter how hard he tried, no matter how many pleas and appeals he made, she remained indifferent.
The endless parallels were exhausting, and Ludwig became furious.
“Your behavior doesn’t make any difference,” he said, “and I think it’s rather wise of you to try to take advantage of me, when I’d do anything for you.”
“Wise?”
“Yes, wise.”
“What would you use to change?”
“Nothing. You don’t know what I can do.”
“That’s a funny thing to say.”
From then on, Sione ignored Ludwig even more thoroughly.
Angered by her stonewalling attitude, Ludwig left her alone, but in the end, it was Ludwig who bent first.
“Tell me what I can do, Sione, tell me. Please.”
“Give me up.”
“You can’t.”
“Then there’s nothing to say.”
“Why are you so angry with me?”
Ludwig sincerely couldn’t understand Sione.
“Why are you angry?”
It was the same for Sione.
“It’s not enough that you’ve changed my life, and now you don’t even know why?”
Sione’s hatred was blue and cold.
“You want to turn our relationship around?”
Sione’s eyes were so cold that Ludwig couldn’t formulate a response.
“It’s too late.”
“…”
“If you wanted to make me love you, you should have dealt with me, not that Morden man.”
Ludwig said painfully, looking at Sione, who didn’t even call Archduke Halbern father.
“If I had traded with you, would it have changed anything?”
“At least I wouldn’t have hated you.”
But they both knew.
If they could go back to that moment again, neither would change their choices.
Ludwig could not bear to see Sione harmed in the slightest.
But Sione would never stop killing her father, even if it meant dying at his hands.
It was Sione’s desire to get rid of him in the first place.
So there was no way she could forgive and love Ludwig for joining hands with her father and foiling her plans.
“It’s not too late, use me, I’ll be used as long as you want, get revenge on Halbern as you wish, I’ll help you.”
“Help? You? With what?”
Sione sneered.
“My poor brother is already at the mercy of that man, his brain pickled by his strange education, and what can you do to help?”
Once broken, there’s no fixing it.
Just as crumpled paper leaves wrinkles when straightened, or broken glass leaves marks when glued back together, Sione could not protect Valar.
“What the hell can you do?”
Finding and rescuing her brother from the underworld, a place where the killer is unrecognizable, a place where even the most qualified would need training and courage, was impossible, even for Sione, who was unusually strong.
In the end, her father would destroy her.
His own treasure, so precious to him that he would never give it up.
All she could do was hope that his brother would make good use of the arrangement he had made for him.
If she tried to explain her despair, her anguish, her grief, the man would not understand, not even in the slightest, but Sione spoke anyway.
“I think you should realize what you’ve broken.”
Then he’d never be so presumptuous again.
“I swore I would never let my brother live like me or anyone else.”
“…”
“You ruined everything.”
Sione’s voice quivered thinly.
“I hate you.”
“…”
“And I feel sorry for you.”
Sione genuinely pitied Ludwig, who didn’t recognize the rottenness in his grip.
“Even if you die, you won’t get a piece of my heart.”
A single misstep.
A choice that led to catastrophe.
A man who wanted to turn back, and a woman who wouldn’t look back.
The ending was set in stone.
“I’ll take the shell, then.”
“Take it, if you can.”
***
It was then that Castle Locke began to be murderous.
Sione was a dead or dying, unbreakable woman, and Ludwig wanted her, even if it meant breaking her.
It didn’t matter if he was hated, he was already hated.
As long as Sione stayed by his side.
He couldn’t tell if it was him or Sione who was going crazy.
Ludwig knew he wasn’t normal, but he didn’t know what to call this terrible feeling.
Was this love?
He didn’t know, but he felt like he would die if he didn’t have Sione.
The terrible hunger showed no sign of abating. The thirst grew worse, and Ludwig became even more obsessed with Sione.
He should have known what it meant when a clever, intelligent woman decided to turn him inside out.
The harder Ludwig tried to break Sione, the harder she tried to break him.
Sometimes, completely broken, Ludwig would cling to Sione again.
“I did it because I love you.”
“Love?”
Sione scoffed without hesitation.
“That’s what you call love?”
“Sione.”
“You don’t love me.”
“…”
“You love yourself for thinking you love me.”
Sione. His Sione, the one he can never hold in his hands.
They were so focused on hurting each other that they couldn’t stop, even as the world around them fell into ruin.
Ludwig could not let go of Sione, even though his heart was breaking.
One day, as they tormented and ruined each other with their deep-seated hatred.
Suddenly, Sione disappeared.
He knew she often disappeared with the power of Halbern, but never for this long.
“The Duchess is gone. Pursue her now.”
He gave the order, but Ludwig didn’t take it seriously.
‘She’ll be back soon.’
There were only so many places Sione could go anyway. She couldn’t leave the Southern Empire without his permission.
But it didn’t take long for him to realize that this wasn’t just an outing, it was a runaway.
***
It took him a year to find Sione.
In the eastern fringes of the Southern Empire, in a rural village with no name.
Reunited with Sione against the cliffs, she was still stunningly beautiful, despite whatever she had been through.
“Let’s go back, Sione.”
Sione smiled white against the backdrop of the cliffs. It was then that Ludwig’s expression hardened.
Sione pulled the black dagger from his arms. Ludwig’s eyes narrowed at the ominous black aura.
“… What are you doing?”
“What do you think I’m doing?”
“Stop it, Sione. Now, what the hell…”
Sione smiled faintly, pointing the blade at herself.
“There won’t be anything you can take from me, because I won’t let you have even my shell.”
Ludwig’s world went black from that day forward.
What a woman she was.
She had done exactly what she said she would do.
Sione had done nothing but let herself be taken advantage of?
She did?
She’s the one who threw herself into the abyss?
Sione disappeared, leaving only the dagger behind.
Everything she had brought with her had disappeared somewhere, and only the things he had given her remained unused.
“I thought she was gone, leaving nothing in the world.”
Nothing, really.
“But she left his brother.”
To her brother, whom she loves.
And a daughter who looks just like her.
She must have been a terrible woman.
A spark flashed in his eyes, dulled by years of mud. Ludwig could not like Valar, as he had never liked her.
Not his sister, who, unlike him, was so dearly loved by Sione.
“You should be rolling in the mud too.”
Yes, this was jealousy and anger.
***
Ludwig closed his eyes for a moment, exhausted from a long night of sleeplessness and poor physical condition.
“Are you ready for this?”
“Yes. I’ve also drawn Arellin’s blood.”
A piece of the Imperial Protective Stone that would prove Ludwig’s biological daughter.
Arellin’s blood.
Ludwig was excited. If he could prove she was his daughter, he could take Arellin away from Valar once and for all.
He’s sure he did.
“It’s not responding.”
The piece that was supposed to resonate was motionless.
“Isn’t there something wrong?”
“No. If there’s even a drop of blood in it, it’s bound to respond.”
In other words.
That Arellin was not Ludwig’s child.
“Ha, Sione.”
Ludwig smirked at the unexpectedly huge back of his head.
