YED Chapter 162

It would have been an ordinary life.

Hyperion Sabrand Ferraro, the only son who inherited the hidden castle of Gusalante, would have lived with his kind and warm nature intact if only the Emperor hadn’t coveted his mother during her brief visit to her family.

Unlike his father who was bound by a promise, he could freely enter and leave the Crania Empire, so he would have traveled the whole world freely, including the vast empire.

Then, if he had seen a princess as radiant as the sun in southern Crania, he would have fallen in love just like his father and lived happily. Without any interference, without any tears, ordinarily and happily.

Having received much love, being affectionate and kind, and walking only the righteous path, the dragon would not have earned any nicknames. He wouldn’t have been recorded in human history as a dragon, but would have lived a peaceful life following his wife.

However, Hyperion Sabrand Ferraro carried madness that had never existed in dragon history and walked a path that no one had ever walked. He is the Mad Dragon. The dragon clearly judged and decided his identity.

Who created the dragon rooted in madness?

I died….Or rather, was determined to be dead.

At the northernmost point of Lusenford, I died under a shower of spears and arrows beside my imprisoned wife in an abandoned tower. Before dying, I killed Beatrice Ravalley, so I was satisfied with that.

…No, I’m not satisfied.

Is it because I’m not satisfied that I wander with the faint life remaining after death? Peon looked down at his body, where only fatigue, pain, and injuries remained.

The remnants of the heavy, but now powerless, taboo kept flowing down over his body that felt nothing. The terrible sorcery he broke just before death was so trivial that it tormented him more.

Kaela.

The place he reached after death was full of fire. It was the fire set by the Empress who somehow escaped after learning her son would die, using magic tools.

The flames devoured the fallen Empress and consumed Peon as well. At this moment, countless unknown events passed through Peon. The power dormant within the burning dragon stirred.

Kaela.

The innate power exploded inside the mad dragon. He died but did not die. The cry of his father, who had earned the stigma of being an evil dragon, spread throughout heaven and earth, shaking them.

His mother who died in the flames, his wife who died of starvation in confinement, lay there. The aura of death felt stronger around his wife. Wailing and flames and death. A cold chill, the heat from burning magic tools containing ancient power, seeped into the dead dragon.

Peon let go of all reason, common sense, and principles he had desperately maintained until now. The dragon’s nature, twisted by abuse, chose madness and took the power dwelling in the magic tools that the Crania Imperial family had collected for hundreds of years as sacrifice.

It doesn’t matter.

With reason crumbling and only instinct remaining after death, the dragon chose without hesitation. Whether this body lives or dies doesn’t matter.

He didn’t even want to live anymore. Only his innocent wife, who came knowing nothing and died caught up in a family tragedy that had nothing to do with her, had to live.

The newly awakened dragon thoroughly calculated the power he held, his limits, the established rules, and the circumstances under which his wife could live comfortably again.

The power of the magic tools his mother burned, its price, his mother’s collapse, the magic tools already burned – none of it mattered. He would go back. Go back and save her.

After finishing his calculations, the dragon reached out toward an ability that no dragon had ever dared to attempt, burning his entire body, and grasped the timeline.

A dragon is born from ashes.

****

There are various kinds of regrets. Sometimes you regret thinking “I shouldn’t have done that,” and sometimes you regret thinking “I should have done that.”

While Peon had absolutely no regrets about Beatrice Ravalley, there was just one thing he kept mulling over – the fact that he had killed her too easily.

Amidst the shower of spears and arrows, he had sworn to kill at least her and took her head with one strike. That was so regrettable. There should have been more time. He shouldn’t have killed her so easily.

After returning to the past, there was Beatrice Ravalley, living quite well without dying. She now had her wrist broken and finger bones shattered and swollen after carelessly trying to harm Kaela.

Moreover, she was bleeding profusely from being cut by a dagger. Peon watched with emotionless eyes at Beatrice, who was groaning in pain, and the fallen Crown Prince while holding his wife. One person was missing.

“Since His Majesty is looking for us, shall we go together, Your Highness.”

Need to find the missing one. The Crown Prince and Beatrice were certainly in the third room on the second floor of the Balzar Palace in the western wing of the imperial palace, when they suddenly had the terrifying experience of their surroundings changing to the Emperor’s bedroom in the Soleil Palace.

The collapse of known common sense and the violation of natural laws was nothing short of terror. The Crown Prince pushed his hips backward as he saw the Emperor sitting reclined on the bed.

“Ugh, ugh…!”

At the groan, the Emperor blinked his drowsy eyes. He hadn’t heard the door open and the servant announce visitors. Perhaps he hadn’t noticed due to feeling unwell.

Peon, who appeared suddenly, was so kind as to fully obey the orders by bringing both Kaela and that cursed patricidal Crown Prince.

“Hy-Hyperion. You came. You caught that bastard. Well done. Well done. It could only be you.”

The Emperor nodded. He didn’t even realize that everything around him had become dark and completely quiet.

In fact, he had never cared about his surroundings. Because ‘I’ was always the most important. So he started cursing at his son as soon as he saw him.

“That bastard tried to kill me! That shameless, ungrateful wretch who doesn’t even recognize his own father!”

“Yes. Indeed he did.”

Peon nodded with a smile. Huh, huh-uh, the Crown Prince trembled and tried to escape from the man approaching like a pitch-black shadow, but he couldn’t.

Finally caught by the head, the Crown Prince trembled. Peon wrapped the Crown Prince’s head with his gloved hand and pressed down. Even without looking, memories came flooding in. Obvious but enjoyable memories to watch.

“He resembles Your Majesty the most.”

He lifted the Crown Prince by his hair. The space between the Crown Prince’s legs, dragged helplessly, began to get wet.

“That thing is not my son!”

Kaela thought that statement was quite difficult to hear. The Emperor tried to shout something more, but Peon didn’t give him the chance.

“In every way, his cowardly, stupid, and vile nature proves he is indeed Your Majesty’s son.”

The Emperor froze and stopped shouting. Peon smiled as he dragged the Crown Prince to the bed. Beatrice stood like a mounted butterfly specimen, unable to do anything, and a trail of urine marked where the Crown Prince had been dragged.

The Emperor’s face, which had been spitting curses and insults, turned deathly black. They were ugly. All of this was filthy and ugly.

“Your Majesty wished for this empire to shine gloriously. Stealing a dragon’s woman to feel like a dragon yourself.”

“Heuk!”

Peon casually muttered while holding the Crown Prince’s head in front of the Emperor.

“Wanting to be called a great emperor. And your heir must perfectly match your petty heart but not dare to surpass you. You wanted so many things.”

Kaela watched as the Emperor, who had finally truly encountered fear, couldn’t say a word. Ah. She felt laughter quietly escaping.

To see such a terrified expression on the face of the one who had played with her father’s life, taken everything from her, and imprisoned and humiliated her in Lusenford. A thrilling delight secretly came over her, raising goosebumps on her arms.

Ah, she had wanted to see him like this so badly. That was it. That’s why she came all this way to witness their final struggle. Kaela only now realized this fact she hadn’t known before.

“Having done it once made it easier this time too, didn’t it? Right?”

Beatrice looked at Peon with trembling limbs. The Emperor also looked at Peon with shaking eyes.

“Isn’t that boring?”

Peon spoke without smiling. Then he shook the Crown Prince’s hair once while looking down at him.

“Kill him.”

He was telling him to kill the Emperor. He’s insane. He’s crazy. He’s completely lost it. Beatrice thought, unable even to scream. He’s completely mad.

“Kill him again.”

At the urging to do it quickly, the Crown Prince was now sobbing continuously. The Emperor was too shocked to speak.

The only one who could stop this madman was Kaela. Beatrice immediately turned her gaze to Kaela. Would this precious Grand Duchess, raised so delicately and never exposed to such horrible sights, be in the same state as them?

No, she wasn’t. Kaela, like a white porcelain doll, quite unlike herself, calmly watched her husband’s actions. She seemed quite familiar with such insane situations, not just having seen beautiful and pretty things.

“I said kill him.”

The Crown Prince reached out to the Emperor in terror but couldn’t put any strength into his hands.

To think that one who would rule Crania would be like this. Kaela couldn’t shake the thought that perhaps the empire’s destruction, which she had desperately tried to prevent, had been determined long ago.

“Can’t do it? Do I need to help with even this?”

The Crown Prince’s hands moved on their own to grab the Emperor’s neck, which was nothing but bone and skin.

“Heuuk!”

Though the Crown Prince shook his head while crying, something pressed down his hands that moved against his will. The Emperor could only stare with wide eyes, unable to move, just being victimized. Just like moments ago when the Crown Prince had pressed him down with a pillow.

“No need to think badly of this, Your Majesty. Isn’t this all what you’ve done too? You killed your brother, killed your nephew, so isn’t it natural that you experience such things yourself?”

At that moment, the Crown Prince finally let go of his fragile mind. Peon clicked his tongue and pulled up the Crown Prince’s hair as he slid down.

“In terms of mental strength, the son is weaker than the father. What to do.”

“What, kek, what are you doing…!”

Peon held the Crown Prince’s head and gently shook his brain.

With a gasp, the awakened Crown Prince reached out again and began strangling the Emperor. It was torture. Kaela turned her head to look at Beatrice who was watching the torture.

“What am I doing? Just having the most pathetic emperor ascend through patricide.”

At those words, the Crown Prince fainted again. Peon frowned and dropped his hand that had been holding the Crown Prince.

“Completely useless.”

The Crown Prince fell face-first like a puppet with cut strings. Because the Crown Prince’s second strangling attempt had been so weak, the Emperor could barely speak. No, strangely, his tongue and throat moved even though it wasn’t a situation where he should be able to speak.

“You, you think you’ll get away with this…!”

“Let me tell you what will happen from now on. Your Majesty will lie here alone and become a living corpse. But don’t worry. Your eyes and ears will remain fine. You just need to watch your son, who resembles you the most, ruin the country while lying there.”

The Emperor kept choking while trembling. Death was right before his eyes, but strangely, death wouldn’t come.

“Since all you’ll do is watch and listen while lying down, think carefully about how this happened. Who knows. Forgotten memories might surface.”

Standing like the grim reaper, Peon didn’t grant him death.

“By the time memories surface, this country will probably have fallen, but still. Ah, but don’t be afraid since Your Majesty won’t die.”

The Emperor tried to make a sound. But he couldn’t even moan, let alone curse. His powerless body crumbled.

Peon smiled as he watched his wife approach and gather the blanket. This wasn’t consideration but an insult she was bestowing.

“Live long, Your Majesty. Very, very long.”

Kaela, who had cursed rather than blessed, calmly covered the Emperor’s body with the blanket. More precisely, she covered him because she didn’t want to see the unpleasant sight.

“Just like I yearned for death, longing for death that will never come. For a very long time.”

Kaela dusted off her hands after putting down the summer blanket as if disposing of something dirty. The Emperor’s eyes were still clouded with incomprehension. Peon whispered to those eyes.

“I came like this because you sought a new dragon, Your Majesty. If you didn’t want to see a dragon descend upon Craine, you should have left the dragon’s wife alone.”

Should not have created a mad dragon.

“Mother asked me to send her regards. Mother is living very happily after meeting father again.”

The Emperor felt the chill and darkness creeping in despite it being summer daylight as he looked into the purple eyes full of mockery. This darkness was pulling at his ankles. This was hell, where he would endlessly moan but never escape.

While the Emperor finally stiffened completely, the couple turned around.

Receiving the gaze of two pairs of gleaming eyes, Beatrice wished she would faint like the Crown Prince.

****

Flowers that emitted their own light illuminated the darkness. These tiny glowing flowers decorated the bed. It wasn’t mourning, nor was it an overt bridal chamber decoration. It was just a careful expression of affection offered to a noble lady.

The person lying on the bed looked at those flowers and turned their head. Though an unbearably long time had passed, there sat a man whose appearance remained unchanged.

Glossy black hair and red eyes. Delicate features with a massive build. The man who had passed everything to his son, making it painful to look at his son.

“Gusalante.”

“…Evelyn.”

The dragon, who hadn’t dared to wake her or call her name before she called him, appeared in his human form that he showed only to her.

“I hate you.”

Why did you make such a promise, unable to do anything for such a long time. Like a fool.

When she says she hates him, he can’t even meet her gaze. She knows. This was how he was.

When she briefly saw him as she died in the flames, he had despaired and raged while giving all his power and perhaps even his madness to his son.

However, from the moment she said she hated him, long-suppressed tears mixed into her voice. It couldn’t be helped. Her longing was greater than her accumulated hatred.

“I hate you, and I missed you so much. So much I wanted to die.”

She endured without dying because of Peon. Because Gusalante was the same, he nodded.

“Me too.”

He gently took his wife’s hand, untouched by time, and carefully kissed it.

“Have you been well?”

Evelyn asked with a wet voice.

“I haven’t been well.”

The lonely evil dragon answered while embracing his wife.

“How could I be well without you?”

After a terribly painful and long time of going round and round, finally–

“I too, I too was waiting, unable to die, Evelyn. Forgive my incompetence.”

They met again.