A Shadow Cast in Paradise - Chapter 27

The hellish pain did not end, as if trapped for eternity.

One second felt as long as hundreds of years.

The mind, unable to bear the pain, repeatedly blacked out and was forcibly awakened by the agony.

It felt like the inside of her head was burning pitch black.

How much time had passed like that?

“Look. It doesn’t hurt anymore, does it?”

Her father’s voice was heard, as if awakening her from the hell she was trapped in.

Felix gazed affectionately at his daughter, sprawled like a puppet with cut strings on a pool of blood.

He quietly approached Louise, who had stopped convulsing, and caressed the soft skin beneath her torn dress.

Though soaked in blood, the wound that had pierced her heart was cleanly gone.

A bright smile spread across Felix’s lips as he confirmed this.

“Rejoice. You will live eternally, Louise.”

Louise heard her father’s voice flowing through the gaps of her faintly returning senses.

Her father’s voice was gentle and caring as always.

But it was more cruel than ever before.

Beyond her hazy vision, she could see Sched collapsed on the floor.

Louise realized as she looked at him.

Ah, nothing can be undone.

In the face of such perfect despair, even her tears had dried up and wouldn’t come anymore.

Traitor, criminal, devil, heretic…

She knew the weight of those glorious charges.

Nevertheless, the reason Louise Ideana was living shamelessly was because she couldn’t find a way to die.

Because she was a monster cursed to be unable to die, she had to live on.

“Why are you hiding that power?”

The heretic asked, looking down at Riana’s abdomen, which hadn’t fully healed yet.

Knowing she couldn’t die, she had taken the blade for Sched instead.

This meant that she was well aware of her own power.

Yet she was deliberately hiding her strength.

Setting aside the internal injuries from the holy power, she could quickly recover from such wounds, but to appear as an ordinary person, she was suppressing her regenerative abilities to prevent the wounds from healing.

Even though her body wouldn’t die anyway, it only prolonged the pain unnecessarily.

It was a foolish stubbornness.

“If I were you, I wouldn’t live so stupidly.”

The heretic criticized the foolish lady.

His eyes seemed filled with resentment and despair.

Words her father had once said flashed through her mind.

“Don’t feel upset that I used you as a subject for sorcery experiments. I only gave you power when I reached the stage of certainty.”

Felix said there were failed attempts before creating Louise.

He wasn’t such a heartless father to easily sacrifice his only daughter.

He wanted the strongest and most complete power to be held by the Ideana bloodline.

Someone bound by blood who would not betray him and would obey, elevating the Ideana name.

Therefore, before using ancient sorcery on Louise, he sacrificed many ‘offerings’.

But as far as she knew, all the ‘offerings’ had died.

And yet.

“While I, a half-finished product, have to live in pain every day, you have that power and yet you’re living like that……”

The ‘heretic’ remaining in Ideana.

He was clearly one of the many ‘offerings’ her father had created.

Probably the last experimental subject he had tested just before completing Louise.

That’s why Riana couldn’t help but feel an inevitable sense of kinship with him.

“Aren’t you afraid of that power that harms people?”

When Riana asked in a trembling voice, he burst into laughter as if it were absurd.

“Harm people?”

He shook his head.

“I’m not harming people. To harm, there needs to be malice. I’m just living. Like how people kill chickens to live.”

The sound of his teeth grinding could be heard as he muttered.

“I need sacrifices to live. Human sacrifices. Better if they’re Lupus.”

Left incomplete, he was different from Louise.

He was unstable, and if he couldn’t maintain his power, his mind and body would collapse.

Therefore, he had to constantly take lives to maintain the power of black magic.

Endlessly, like filling a bottomless vessel.

“So don’t hate me too much. Especially you, you shouldn’t.”

The heretic stared at Riana with wide eyes.

It was Ideana who made him like this, and the reason was to complete Louise Ideana.

So at least she shouldn’t call him a sinner.

She, who had obtained perfect power through numerous sacrificial trials and errors, couldn’t condemn him, a failed product.

“After making me like this and obtaining that power, and even disposing of other test subjects with your own hands.”

At the heretic’s words, Riana clutched the blanket tightly.

“S-save me!”

Riana squeezed her eyes shut, recalling her hands stained bright red.

Just then, rapid footsteps were heard from outside.

The heretic turned his head to look at the door.

“An intruder has appeared.”

At the same time, the door burst open.

“You’ve returned earlier than expected.”

The heretic stepped back as he looked at the man standing at the door.

He had collapsed part of the mansion to divert attention, but it seemed Sched had already dealt with that and returned.

Or perhaps he had come back before it was completely resolved.

The intruder’s eyes narrowed as he looked at Sched.

“Heretic…!”

Sched, upon discovering the intruder, drew his sword. Blue light spread across the blade without hesitation.

“Don’t be so harsh. I just came to talk for a moment.”

The heretic slowly backed away, waving his remaining hand.

He needed to kill, but he wasn’t a fool who would charge in without knowing the situation.

He knew well enough that he could never defeat Sched Lester in his current state with one arm imperfect.

“Let’s meet again next time.”

Dense darkness spread from the heretic’s body once more.

In an instant, he vanished like smoke.

As Sched tried to chase after him, Riana grabbed him.

“Your Excellency…!”

Sched stopped in his tracks as Riana clutched the hem of his clothes.

Sched met the green eyes looking up at him as if pleading.

As the eyes that had been closed all along looked up at him filled with fear, the blue light surrounding his sword faded.

His eyes, which had been blazing with hot excitement, instantly cooled down.

“…Wait.”

Sched uttered coldly and went out to call a doctor.

Riana shrank her aching body at his voice, more indifferent than usual.

What had happened after arriving in Paradel?

Her memory stopped after the encounter with that heretic.

She belatedly looked around at where she was.

A very familiar, nostalgic scene.

‘This is…’

Though worn and faded with time, she could immediately recognize where this was.

It was the bedroom Louise Ideana used in the old Ideana Count’s mansion in Paradel.

Although the old furniture she used to use had been broken and removed, the view of the lemon tree and stone wall outside the twisted window was just as she remembered.

Just then, the doctor Sched had called entered the room.

“You really woke up…!”

The middle-aged man’s face was filled with inexplicable deep relief.

Sched Lester followed behind him.

He said nothing, frowning.

Riana felt crushed by the deep silence.

The old Ideana mansion, Louise’s room where she always had nightmares, the heretic who had disappeared without a trace.

The headache from the fever and the pain from the wound, along with mixed guilt, swelled like an untreated wound.

Everywhere was quiet, and only the doctor silently tended to Riana’s wounds.

Meanwhile, Sched stared at Riana receiving treatment with his arms folded.

Riana fidgeted with her trembling hands as she observed Sched’s expression. His cold gaze silently staring at her piled anxiety in her heart.

He did not question what she had talked about with the heretic.

Why? Uneasiness built upon the long silence.

While the doctor treated the wound, pain pierced all her senses, but her attention was entirely focused on Sched.

If he found out that I know how to use black magic…

If he learns that it was none other than Louise Ideana who killed his brother and numerous Lupus that he so hated…

She bit her dry lips.

“Miss Riana, do you have a headache or any discomfort?”

At that moment, the doctor who had unwrapped her bandages broke the silence and asked.

Her attention, which had been focused on Sched, was finally dispersed.

“…I can bear it.”

Though it hurt as if her body was being torn apart with every breath, she could still endure it.

Fortunately, or perhaps unfortunately, she had grown accustomed to enduring pain for a long time.

To the point where screaming and struggling seemed meaningless.

So she didn’t want to be a burden by complaining about this level of pain.

It was just a bit overwhelming with old memories overlapping this familiar scenery.

Her head throbbed, her vision occasionally blurred, her chest felt tight, and she felt nauseous.

“You need to tell me your symptoms accurately.”

The doctor looked at Riana with a serious expression.

The fever that had risen on her pale face was hot enough to feel just by touching, and her eyes occasionally lost focus and became unfocused.

Blood seeped through the wound that had not yet healed.

Having not eaten or drunk properly while unconscious, she naturally had no strength in her body.

To be honest, it was surprising and even admirable that this tiny woman had not died.

It seemed that this frail body had managed to survive and save him who had nearly died by Sched Lester’s hand.

Riana nodded before the doctor who was looking at her seriously.

“…My head hurts a little and I feel weak, but that’s all.”

Riana forced a smile.