“Already twenty people have gone missing. You be careful too, Sched.”

Numerous Lupus members disappeared.

Sched pursued the trail with his longtime brother Parmen.

And at the end of Parmen’s disappearance, he witnessed the deaths of the Lupus members.

It was more like a livestock slaughterhouse than a murder scene.

Uncontrollable anger consumed him.

Sched drew his sword and rushed at the unsuspecting count.

But it ended in failure.

After being subdued by the knights, he had no memory.

When he regained consciousness, he found himself here, in the torture chamber.

An underground space he didn’t know existed in the House of Ideana.

A place filled with the stench of blood and rot.

Those trapped in iron cages were no longer called human.

They were treated as beasts or emotionless objects.

The guards relieved their stress by beating, breaking, branding, and injecting unknown drugs.

“Now that the experiments are over, is there any need to keep them alive?”

“That’s right. There’s no need to give such power to the Lupus.”

They casually conversed while poking Sched with a long skewer, as if sticking a fork into meat.

Sadism was extremely natural and routine.

Could humans degrade to this extent?

Having witnessed all kinds of death and inhumanity on the frontlines since childhood, he suddenly questioned God anew.

Facing the ugly true face of Ideana, Sched clenched his jaw, tasting blood.

He should have killed Count Felix Ideana.

He should have killed him properly.

In front of the mountain of Lupus corpses, he shouldn’t have lost his reason.

Because he moved too hastily and emotionally, he made a mistake at the most crucial moment.

He should have aimed for his neck more calmly and meticulously…

Even amidst the pain piercing his body, he chewed on his anger.

Perhaps due to the unquenched rage, his body felt hot.

Maybe it was a fever from his numerous wounds.

His limbs bound and body hanging limply, he burned uncontrollably.

And through the cracks of that anger and heat, thoughts of Louise Ideana spread.

That is, the daughter of his mortal enemy who massacred his comrades, and the girl who was his master.

‘…Louise.’

Did she know about all of this?

Did she know about the terrible massacre her father committed, this space where torture was routine?

In his hazy mind, the image of the girl smiling brightly on her sickbed flickered.

The intense fever spreading through the pain tormented him.

He hated Ideana.

But at the same time, he loved Ideana.

He resented the ‘Ideana’ attached to Louise’s name.

Why did she have to inherit Ideana blood?

If only she had been a Lupus instead…

No, he didn’t want to drag her down to this terrible position of livestock.

Then conversely, if I had been a noble like her… what would have been different?

If I had been born noble, could I have stood beside her?

Could I have been honest?

Would I have turned a blind eye to massacres like this?

In his dizzy mind, Louise’s image repeatedly came into focus and blurred.

“…Louise.”

Her name leaked out with blood from the corner of his bitter lips.

“What’s he saying? This bastard.”

“How dare this animal speak the young lady’s name?”

The guards mocked his slurred pronunciation.

“Did you think you were something just because the young lady kept you close?”

They kicked him hard as he hung like a slab of meat in a butcher shop.

Ugh, disgusting air burst from his empty stomach.

Once again, brutal violence struck him.

Then.

“Stop.”

A trembling young voice flowed into his ringing ears.

At the same time, a sweet scent out of place here filled his lungs.

Sched, hanging limply without strength, instinctively raised his head.

When he lifted his eyes, swollen almost too much to open properly, he faced that face that had been lingering in his mind.

A fantastically fair and beautiful girl stood before him.

“Ah, young lady…!”

“How did you come here…!”

The guards’ startled voices rang out.

Those who had been inflicting violence on Sched stepped back at Louise’s glance.

Clank, as his body reacted towards Louise, the chains binding him rattled with a harsh sound.

Due to his blurred vision, he couldn’t tell what expression Louise was looking at him with.

“Louise…!”

He called her name in a voice close to a metallic sound.

Louise didn’t answer and just looked at him silently.

For a moment, an even hotter heat rose in his chest.

A rough, growling breath flowed between his teeth.

“…Sched.”

When she called his name, even the anger towards Ideana seemed to fade hazily in his mind.

Sched wished her presence here was an illusion.

While wanting to see Louise, he hoped the Louise before his eyes was false.

You shouldn’t be here.

You shouldn’t know a place like this exists.

You should be… unrelated to Felix Ideana’s crimes.

But as she approached, she became undeniably clear.

All his senses reacted only to her, clearly revealing her presence.

“Did you… know about this too?”

Sched parted his blood-stained lips to ask.

He hoped Louise would deny it.

But.

“…If I didn’t know, I couldn’t have come here.”

A cruel voice echoed in his head.

At that moment, Sched felt as if his heart was boiling.

He felt suffocated, as if all the blood vessels in his body were expanding and about to burst.

The thick scent flowing from her made his head even more dizzyingly complicated.

“…Parmen… all my comrades are dead.”

Did you know about that too?

As his anger-filled hand grasped the chain, blood gushed from his wounds.

At that, Louise turned her head.

“…You’re just a slave, aren’t you?”

Louise’s voice trembled.

Even amidst the ringing in his ears that seemed to tear his eardrums, only her voice came through terribly clear.

So he knew.

Louise was lying.

Sched had watched Louise for a long time, and he knew that when she lied, she couldn’t look into his eyes.

Her faintly trembling voice held fear.

Just what are you afraid of, and why?

“Why are you lying…”

“What did you expect? A Lupus like you, did you think you were something…?”

She tried to deceive him with clumsy lies.

Her quivering voice was struggling to feign composure.

Sched couldn’t understand her.

He wanted to question her, to see her expression more clearly, but cursed phlegm mixed with blood caught in his throat and his voice wouldn’t come out properly.

He felt like he was going crazy.

He was angry at his powerless, bound situation.

“Don’t lie…!”

Clank! The chains pulled strongly again at his resisting body.

He felt uneasy, unable to understand why she was bothering with such unskilled lies.

She was putting on a show of malice as if trying to completely end things between them.

His body grew hotter and hotter, and he felt a strange lust amidst his anger and despair.

He thought he must be a madman.

He wanted to embrace her right away as she pretended with clumsy lies and ask if she didn’t love him.

He wanted to ask if that wasn’t why she kept him by her side, what those gazes she gave him back then meant.

“Take him away.”

Louise turned her back on Sched and turned around.

“Louise…!”

“Young lady, but this one is…”

“Are you saying you’ll disobey my orders?”

When the guards tried to object, Louise coldly asked them.

At that, the guards shook their heads with pale faces before the small and delicate girl.

As if their necks could fly off at Louise’s hand at any moment, they feared her.

At Louise’s gesture, the guards loosened the chains binding Sched with trembling hands.

And slowly supported him and dragged him out of the iron cage.

Sched saw Louise’s back as she walked ahead.

He had to hear it.

Just what she was thinking.

What he had meant to her.

Clank!

“Grab him!”

He shook off the guards holding him and lunged at Louise walking ahead.

Louise’s body fell into his blood-soaked arms.

Sched lost his reason at the sweet scent filling even his mind.

“Ugh!”

He instinctively bit Louise’s nape.

Even he didn’t know why he did it.

Was it an expression of resistance against Ideana?

Was it resentment for her lies?

No one knew the reason.

“That bastard!”

The guards pulled on the chains still attached to him.

Only after two guards pulled with all their might did Sched separate from Louise.

The tangy taste of Louise’s blood spread in his mouth.

“How dare this crazy bastard do that to the young lady!”

They subdued him like a wild beast, pinning him to the ground, binding him with chains, and pressing his head down with their feet.

He lay face down like a dog, breathing roughly.

Their hard boots kicked his body indiscriminately.

“Ugh!”

The wounds opened wider under the merciless kicks.

“Stop…!”

Only after Louise stopped the guards did the kicking cease.

Louise hid her nape, where blood was faintly seeping through, under her collar and turned her gaze away.

“…I’m fine, so bring him out.”

At Louise’s order, they completely bound Sched’s arms and legs with chains, cursing.

With his arms and legs restrained, he was dragged to the ground like a limp sack.

A long trail of blood remained where he had been dragged.

Leaving the underground, the bright sunlight pierced his eyes.

Sched raised his eyes, which he could barely open, to look up at Louise with the light behind her.

“Young lady… Why…”

Sched dropped Louise’s name like dripping blood amidst his high fever.

Then Louise spoke.

“I… care more about the family than slaves.”

Her words struck his chest with a thud.

Sched realized.

Ah, in the end, you’re an Ideana too.

Her beautiful platinum blonde hair, resembling Felix Ideana’s, fluttered cruelly.