Shallen dreamed every day lately.

“I must have been mad. To think I sincerely loved a woman like you and planned to make you queen.”

“From the start, my wife is on a different level of character, and she doesn’t make cheap excuses like you do.”

The harsh words he had hurled at Kasallin until now.

The chilling sensation that spread through his palm when he struck her cheek.

All those memories, like scattered drawings, jumbled chaotically and relentlessly churned in his mind.

As if screaming that someone like him didn’t deserve a moment’s peaceful sleep and should suffer every instant.

Without downing wine, he couldn’t face reality at all.

Now, he couldn’t even bear to look at Rose’s face.

He loathed his past self, who had neglected Kasallin for the reason that everything was too perfect and thus boring, and had continued inappropriate meetings with Rose.

“What did you say, Rose? That’s a lovely name.”

“I’m embarrassed, Your Highness.”

“Even though you’re sisters, you’re somehow different from Kasallin. You’re special and charming.”

Unlike the stoic Kasallin, Rose was cute and charming, and he had blabbered on about how fun it was to have her around.

Even then, unable to break his vile habits, he had often sent letters to Queen Izet of the Ram Kingdom.

Lying in bed, unaware of how time passed, recalling his sins one by one, he felt nausea rising.

“Am I even worthy of living like this?”

Perhaps it was only natural to think this way.

After days of staring at the ceiling like a corpse, Shallen rose as if he had made a decision.

Anyone watching might have thought he had finally gathered his strength and resolved to return to his duties as king.

But the place Shallen strode toward without hesitation was the window.

Pulling back the curtains and flinging open the glass, a humid west wind tickled his wine-soaked hair as it passed.

“What a splendidly clear day. Is Kasallin looking up at this sky right now?”

He silently placed one foot on the windowsill but suddenly paused.

Rose’s image—more precisely, her slightly rounded belly—finally came to mind.

“I forgot about it all this time, but what will happen to her if I’m gone?”

Rose would manage on her own. But wouldn’t the child in her womb become a pitiful soul, losing their father right after birth?

Shallen, with one foot extended out the window, gravely lowered his gaze.

After a while, the piercing screams of maids echoed from the garden below.

“Good heavens, Your Highness!”

“It’s dangerous!”

Shallen leaned out and looked down.

Among the maids stomping their feet, his mother Nivia was staring up at him, her face filled with horror.

Princess Rilen was there too.

With her characteristic look of disdain, she stood with arms crossed, as if she wouldn’t bother stopping him if he jumped.

“Why are you all just standing there? Go up and stop His Highness at once!”

“Y-Yes!”

This was no good. He had intended to throw himself into begging Kasallin for forgiveness, but even that wasn’t going as planned.

With a low sigh, Shallen lowered his foot from the windowsill.

At that moment, servants and guards, who had climbed the stairs with bated breath, rushed into the room.

Soon after, Nivia, Princess Rilen, and Aster followed them in.

“Your Highness, what were you trying to do? Did you want to see this mother faint and collapse?”

Unlike Princess Rilen, who showed no trace of agitation, Nivia repeatedly clutched her chest.

No matter how much of a wreck he’d become, it seemed a son was still a son.

Watching quietly from the side, Aster subtly curled his lips in the shadows.

“Mother, you must be shocked. Why don’t you go rest? I’ll handle things here.”

Princess Rilen gently placed a hand on Nivia’s shoulder as she spoke.

Nivia nodded slowly, agreeing, and left the room, supported by a young man who might have been a servant or a lover.

Shallen clutched his throbbing head, reeling from days of pouring wine like a shower and the effects of headache medicine.

At that, Princess Rilen clicked her tongue almost inaudibly.

“You’re truly pathetic. You’ve shaken the royal family, driven a stake through Mother’s heart, and now you’re about to give up everything?”

“That’s none of your concern, Sister.”

“If you intend to keep unsettling the people’s hearts like this, abdicate to me. Go recuperate in some quiet countryside, or better yet, go beg the Empress of the Renel Empire until your hands become your feet.”

“No. If Kasallin saw my face, she’d cry from the shock.”

“Then what do you plan to do?”

Princess Rilen bit her lip in frustration.

Shallen’s quiet gaze, which had been fixed on the floor, slowly rose to meet his sister’s face.

Looking at her familiar features and blonde hair, he felt as if he were staring into a mirror.

“There will be no abdication to you, Sister. Return to the Ram Kingdom.”

Princess Rilen and Aster both narrowed their eyes at the same time.

For a brief moment, the despair that had enveloped him seemed to peel away ever so slightly.

And in its place, a tiny spark of final hope seemed to ignite.

Fumbling to adjust his disheveled shirt collar, Shallen spoke.

“Upon careful thought, it’s not yet time. I’m sorry to Kasallin, but I have a child who will soon be born. I must pass the throne to that child. Begging Kasallin for forgiveness with my life will come after that.”

The murky air of the prison camp beneath the shaded hill clouded Katarina Rudo’s mind.

She looked down at her hands bound with coarse rope, her eyes filled with pessimism, then glanced around warily.

Red stains clung to the walls, seeping with cold dampness.

The old wooden floor creaked like a ghost’s wail with every step, sharp nails jutting out.

“To think I must endure such treatment…”

Katarina Rudo glared at her daughter sitting across from her, her eyes thick with resentment.

At the imperial trial held the day before, Isabella had confessed every detail of her mother’s crimes.

Katarina had protested, but the emperor did not accept her defense, and in the end, a guilty verdict was declared by vote.

She had never imagined that her daughter, who would have done anything for her mother, would betray her like this.

She should have sacrificed herself to protect the family’s honor.

The fact that Isabella, refusing to die alone and abandoning her filial duty, was so infuriating that Katarina could hardly bear it.

“This is because of you. Because of someone like you, even I, who did nothing wrong, ended up like this.”

“Nothing wrong, Mother?”

Isabella, so painfully thin her bones protruded, struggled to move her lips to respond.

“You truly have no conscience.”

“You started this. If you hadn’t foolishly mistaken the empress for using tricks, none of this would have happened.”

Isabella’s eyes, with veins so red they seemed blue, turned toward Katarina.

“Didn’t you tell me to do anything? To find a way, no matter what, to become empress?”

“I gave you everything. I took a beggar rotting in a monastery corner, clothed you, housed you, educated you. And yet, you couldn’t even win the emperor’s heart and ruined everything like this!”

Katarina screamed, her eyes rolling back as if she would devour her daughter.

The image of Duchess Rudo, once renowned as the epitome of grace, was no more.

Isabella, momentarily shocked by her words, shakily stood on legs that barely held strength.

“And you, who couldn’t win the previous emperor’s heart, have you lived any better?”

“What?”

“You sent improper letters to win the previous emperor’s favor, even snuck into his chambers late at night, didn’t you? When that didn’t work, you begged to at least be his mistress, didn’t you?”

“You… how do you…”

“I heard it from Marquis Clemens. You thought no one knew? They all knew and mocked you behind your back. And now you act so high and mighty—it’s truly laughable.”

“You’ll come to your senses when that mouth of yours is torn apart!”

It was then that Katarina raised her hand into the air.

Through the opening iron bars, Parnes walked in.

Katarina froze with her hand raised, then slowly stepped back, unable to hide her dismay.

“Do you know why I’ve left you alone until now?”

Parnes threw the question at Katarina, who was biting her lip and steadying her breath.

As if not expecting an answer, he continued without pause.

“Because, unlike others, you knew where the line was. At least until recently.”

The smile on Katarina’s lips faded, like a painted picture washed away by rain.

“Even when you deluded yourself into thinking you were the mistress of the imperial court and dominated high society, you never crossed into my domain, so I thought it was fine to let you live for now.”

“Your Majesty, I am your one and only aunt.”

Katarina, with veins bulging blue in her neck, began to plead.

She still didn’t grasp the gravity of the situation, clinging to the delusion that Parnes might forgive her.

“I have made many contributions to the imperial family and have acted as another mother to Your Majesty. Do you truly intend to cast me out? Does Your Majesty have no compassion or mercy?”

“None.”

In that moment, Katarina felt as if the late previous emperor, not Parnes, sat before her.

From his flawless appearance to his distinctive tone and ruthless nature, how could they be so perfectly alike?

Even his abnormal obsession with his wife. This father and son were undoubtedly both lunatics.

“Your Majesty, my only crime is failing to stop my daughter from sinning.”

Katarina staggered around the desk’s edge and knelt at Parnes’s feet.

“Please, think of the long years we’ve known each other.”

“…Vincent.”

Parnes extended a hand with a voice tinged with mild irritation.

Vincent, standing guard at the iron gate, pulled something from his waist and handed it over.

It was a sharply honed dagger.

The faces of Katarina and Isabella turned pale at the same time.